Overall it’s just that Birkenstock stamping on a human face, forever, again isn’t it?
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Just imagine the current Wuhan Coronavirus lockdown, not for a month or two, but forever, with government telling you when you can go out, when you can travel, who can work and what jobs are ‘essential’. Welcome to the NetZero future some people want for everyone. If this message lodges in enough minds, the Chinese Bat Lung pandemic might actually have a substantial upside. April 22nd, 2020 | 8 comments - (Comments are closed)
 This is too long and not right for a Samizdata Quote of the Day. I am busy today, but just have to put this up:
Arnold Kling. (Hat-tip, Tyler Cowen at his Marginal Revolution economics blog.) Margaret Thatcher once famously said (to the fury of the Left) that socialists always run out of other people’s money. Same applies to locking people down for months on end. It will end. The issue is how high the rubble is going to be. April 21st, 2020 | 35 comments - (Comments are closed)
Taiwan is not a Chinese province, you bat-eating, dog-beating, grave-robbing, ethnic cleansing, police state cockwomble of a stolen Nazi uniform. April 20th, 2020 | 53 comments - (Comments are closed)
I read (iirc in one of Viktor Suvorov’s books) that in the Ukraine of the 1930s, a peasant who was not starving and thin automatically came under suspicion of food hoarding. Whereas, in besieged WW2 Leningrad, the populace were starving, and I read somewhere that there was a sub-stratum of the population who had unusually rosy cheeks and an almost healthy glow compared to their starving fellow citizens, they were not under suspicion by the Party. These were not privileged Party members, but cannibals, who had resorted to devouring the abundant supplies of human flesh. Grim as that was, and we are nowhere near anything like that yet, I can’t help but noticing that the impact of the CCP-Covid-19-Terror is beginning to show in people. This is a country where, whilst not illegal per se, getting a haircut other than from a member of your household (and how many live alone or with those unable to help) necessarily involves leaving your home (or someone else leaving there’s) without ‘reasonable excuse’ under the (not quite limited) excuses, so if your hair is now neat and short, or dyed or coloured in your usual fashion for those so inclined, you might come under suspicion of having failed to have followed ‘social distancing rules’ or having patronised a business operating illegally. Will we see a ‘haircut hotline’ open up for us to denounce a neighbour whose thatch is well-trimmed? Will we have Ministers of the Crown denouncing professional haircutting at the daily 5pm press conference, a ‘Two Minute Hate’ against the ‘Socially Undistanced’ (or should be the ‘Unsocially distanced’)? What else might be a give-away in this new culture of conformity? Looking unconcerned as the economy collapses, or not clapping the sky when the time comes to applaud the NHS? There is more to be done. Perhaps to deter breaching of ‘social distancing’ in those elements of the populace who pay for ‘personal services’, the Queen could grant a Royal Charter to a new organisation “RASEL – The Royal Anti-Sex League“, that might give the Duke of York, who currently seems to be at a loose end, a useful role as its Patron should he seek a new role and a spot of image polishing, there’s not much use for his Airmiles at the moment, and even if there were, he might wish to avoid countries with US extradition treaties, just in case he is unjustly accused. April 20th, 2020 | 17 comments - (Comments are closed)
One trend that has been a big push in recent weeks is – for obvious reasons – homeschooling. And those who run the education system in North America (and I presume, in other places) are worried that if youngsters learn at home, they’ll be less prone to teachers’ ministrations. Kids will start to think for themselves. This must be resisted because it undermines civic spirit, apparently, according to this Harvard Review article:
Here’s another gem:
The problem with this article is that the author of the piece appears oblivious to parents’ worries about the poor quality of much public schooling in the US. There is also the default assumption that the State is entitled to impose a certain view and set of aptitudes and attitudes on children and that the burden of proof is on those who want the family, not the State, to be the primary decision-taker on education. An article in Reason magazine last year also directly challenged the idea that homeschooled kids are less likely to be well-adjusted adults. (Like with all these issues, there are clear exceptions, such as with children who are maltreated by parents, etc). I will be interested to see if any of you fine Samizdata commenters have been schooled at home for any part of your time, and what your experience has been. In times of crisis, certain viewpoints are challenged. Now is such a time. April 19th, 2020 | 60 comments - (Comments are closed)
I expect ability to procure was some way down the list of attributes they were expected to demonstrate at the interview, coming behind devotion to the cult of the NHS, commitment to diversity, and being utterly subservient to upper management and bureaucracy. – Tim Newman responding to reports of NHS procurement ineptitude. April 19th, 2020 | 6 comments - (Comments are closed)
Via Ed Driscoll of Instapundit, I found this admirably thorough story by Mollie Hemingway in The Federalist. Here, she said, are some of CNN’s reports about Christine Blasey Ford’s accusations against Brett Kavanaugh: Read the letter Christine Blasey Ford sent accusing Brett Kavanaugh of sexual misconduct, These senators could make or break Kavanaugh’s nomination, Trump calls Kavanaugh ‘an extraordinary man’, In Hemingway’s report, every one of these is a link. Click ’em and see. There were more, I just got bored of copying them. And here is all the reporting CNN had done of the very similar allegation against Joe Biden by Tara Reade until yesterday: April 18th, 2020 | 10 comments - (Comments are closed)
“China knows it is in a strategic battle with the West; it is time we realised this basic fact, too. Using their comparative advantage of getting through the virus first, Beijing is pursuing its geostrategic interests via ‘mask diplomacy’, soft power, trying to change the basic narrative by offering hard-hit countries medical supplies, both as a showy humanitarian gesture and as a sign of their system’s supposed superiority. Leaving aside that these supplies must be paid for and some are defective, the whole exercise feels like an arsonist expecting gratitude for providing their victim with a watering can.” April 17th, 2020 | 21 comments - (Comments are closed)
Governments anxious to be seen to “do something” (the curse of democratic politicians everywhere) made grand dramatic gestures – building hospitals in days that would normally have taken years. To hell with whether they were needed or not (the much bruited London Nightingale reportedly has just 19 patients) Look! We are doing stuff. Stuff you could never do yourselves!! The State and its hordes are heroes. April 16th, 2020 | 17 comments - (Comments are closed)
Samizdata no longer needs me. Soon it will no longer need you. I took the text from the sidebar:
and copied it into Talk To Transformer.
Comments are, as ever, welcome. Even from humans. April 16th, 2020 | 21 comments - (Comments are closed)
“The coronavirus outbreak gives us a neat experiment in what happens when humans suddenly dramatically reduce both production and consumption. And, to put it mildly, most of us are not enjoying it one bit. That suggests that instead of the hair shirtery favoured by the Gretas of this world, our best solution is creating the technologies that allow us to keep consuming while also keeping the planet cool with our doing so.” April 15th, 2020 | 39 comments - (Comments are closed)
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