We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people.
Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]
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More RFID coverage in the Chicago Sun-Times:
RFID chips could make your daily life easier, but they also could let anyone with a scanning device know what kind of underwear you have on and how much money is in your wallet
But these same super-small computer chips might also, for the convenience of retailers, be tucked into every shirt you wear, every book you buy and even every dollar bill you put in your wallet – and that could inadvertently create a profound threat to your personal privacy. A clever snoop, armed with a scanner that can read the radio signals coming from the microchips, could size you up in an instant while just strolling past you on the street.
Spooky. (Actually it sounds rather fun. Sorry. Sorry.)
I’m to be on Talk Sport Radio tonight at 10.30pm, talking about ID cards, unless something bigger happens between now and then and they cancel. I’ll do my best, which probably wouldn’t be as good as some of the other luminaries here. Or here and here.
I’ll probably only be on for a minute or two, but it’s a stimulus to educate myself. I’ll try to strengthen my grip on the subject by working my way down this lot.
Patrick Crozier of Transport Blog links to this piece from last August at Tollroadnews about the EU banning one kind of road pricing technology, in order to make things easier for its own preferred sort of technology.
Here’s what the EU wants to ban:
No new DSRC systems would be permitted in Europe after 2008, and existing ones would be banned in 2012. This radical anti-DSRC move is an attempt to force adoption of what is seen as a modern technology (GPS) regardless of cost or difficulty by forcing out the existing short range wireless technologies.
And they want to replace it with their own pet satellite based system.
I always want to believe the worst of the EU, and unimpeded by any facts, I do. In this instance, I assume that the technology that the EU is engaged in banning is better from the civil liberties point of view than the technology it favours, and that this is part of why it is banning what it is banning. It doesn’t supply as much in the way of incidental snooping and central surveillance as the kit it wants to use.
Tollroadnews assert that it’s a bodge of the worst sort, because the new kit will work worse than the old kit. But if it could be made to work, would the system the EU wants be more centralised and Big Brotherish, or from this particular point of view is there no great difference? Obviously, comments welcome.
Assuming all goes as promised I am to be on the Jeremy Vine radio show at about 12.30 pm today, i.e. in about an hour and a half from now as I write this, on the subject of the latest suggestions/proposals/outrages of the Food Standards Agency.
“Doing nothing is not an option,” said Sir John Krebs, the agency’s chairman, yesterday. Childhood obesity was “a health time bomb that could explode”.
By 2010 “it could cost £3.6 billion a year and be a significant factor in the ill health of thousands of people and their families”, he said.
Well, I suppose it you are Chairman of the Food Standards Agency, then “doing nothing” is indeed not an option. I mean, imagine it:
Sir John Krebs, Chairman of the Food Standards Agency, today said that doing nothing was an option, and in his opinion the best one.
“Yes, it’s true” said Sir John, putting his feet up on his big new desk and drawing on his cigar, “that I’m paid a big fat salary, I have this handsome new architect designed award winning office and have more and more people reporting to me every day, but the conclusion we’ve all reached is that on the food front, things are, you know, really not too bad. There’s very little starvation. Some people are getting too fat, but we can rely on advertisers to tell them they’re ugly, and food faddists to write books to get them to go on diets. Plus, there’s a most welcome trend nowadays which should obviously be encouraged, of employers refusing to hire fat people because they frighten away the customers. So our recommendation is, relax everybody. There’s no need for any new laws or campaigns or anything, so far as we can see. The really fat people will die prematurely, and the rest won’t. It’s taking care of itself. Frankly, the only slimming down I’d really suggest would be of this organisation. Have a slice of cake.”
Doesn’t quite work does it?
In Zimbabwe, things are just getting worse and worse:
An estimated three million Zimbabweans are seeking sanctuary in neighbouring South Africa, while 400,000 have gone to Mozambique. Anything from 10 to 20 per cent of the Zimbabwean population have left their homes to seek job security and wages in neighbouring lands.
Trains, buses and lorries have been used by the South African authorities to deport 498,321 since the crisis began in 2000, according to official figures, although it is believed that only one in six illegal immigrants is caught.
Even desperately poor Mozambique is now attracting Zimbabweans. Thousands have streamed over the mountainous eastern border into Manica province, hoping to be paid in any currency other than the Zimbabwean dollar.
Ironically, many black Zimbabweans are leaving for Mozambique to work on farms being run by the same white farmers kicked off their land by Mr Mugabe.
Zimbabwe may hate the white farmer, but scores have been welcomed into Mozambique by the authorities keen to lure agricultural specialists, especially in the tobacco sector.
Botswana, too, has also been inundated. A rare African economic success story, it is now under threat from hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants. It is dramatic proof of the regional chaos caused by Mr Mugabe’s chaotic rule.
So is anything being done about this horror story? According to Zimbabwe “Information” Minister Jonathan Moyo, something is being done:
“Britain, America, Australia … and New Zealand are truly and seriously committed to regime change, they seek a regime change in Zimbabwe,” he said.
“They are pursuing it through acts of economic sabotage and they use weapons of mass deception, (under the cover of) instruments of democracy, human rights rule of law, good governance, to sound reasonable,” Moyo said.
“They steal our foreign currency earnings, they attack even our own currency to the point of saying it’s scarce, to blame the government, to seek regime change, and they drive the parallel market,” he told top government, economic and civic officials seeking solutions to the economic malaise.
We can hope, I suppose. But you get the feeling that although lots of people know what’s going on out there, nobody important in the world has this horror story near enough to the top of their to-do list for anything to be done about it at all soon. Only when, having destroyed Zimbabwe itself, the Mugabe regime destroys itself, as it presumably will when there’s nothing else left to destroy, will this horrible chapter in human affairs draw to a close.
The final paragraph of this second story, originally from Agence France-Presse, is a classic of Gallic gallows humour:
The two day conference convened by government and business heard yesterday that Zimbabwe’s economy was being undermined by contradictory and ineffectual government policies, corruption, greed and the country’s negative image abroad.
Yes how true. Government policy isn’t being imposed nearly firmly enough. If government officials were murdering people selflessly and ungreedily, instead of how they’re doing it now, and if Zimbabwe could shed its negative image abroad, all would be well.
What would happen if the Sahara Desert went communist? – For fifty years nothing, then a shortage of sand. Remember that old joke? Well, have a read of this, from the BBC earlier in the week:
Saudi Arabia has reportedly imposed strict border checks to enforce a ban on the export of sand.
There are fears that the growing demands of the construction industry could lead to a shortage in the desert kingdom.
The Arab News newspaper reports that neighbouring Bahrain needs to import large quantities of sand for reclaiming land from the sea.
Demand is also expected to grow as the process of reconstruction in Iraq gathers pace.
Although sand remains plentiful in Saudi Arabia, construction experts say the high costs of bagging and transporting make exploiting it difficult.
Experts have told the newspaper that if a mechanism could be devised to move sand from the vast desert region known as the Empty Quarter, it could be a very profitable proposition.
As the paper points out, there is more sand in the kingdom than oil.
Cement is also in high demand, the report says, with many cement factories having to expand their production capabilities to meet domestic demand.
We speculated here that if the Americans went into Iraq they could then put pressure on Saudi Arabia. Now the American plan is revealing itself. “I know it sounds crazy, but guys, here’s the plan. We’re going to suck all the sand out of the place. We’ll have them over a barrel.”
To be more serious, I guess the thing about about sand, compared to oil, is that sand can’t, unlike oil, be controlled. Oil extraction requires expensive infrastructure manned by a highly skilled workforce. Once it’s out of the ground, it can still then be stolen and smuggled, but until then, it’s the possession of the resident power structure. But sand “extraction”? Anyone can do that.
For as long as Marxists continue to evade responsibility for the atrocities that their own atrocious opinions unleashed upon this planet during the twentieth century, then for so long will be necessary and desirable for anti-Marxists to go on attacking Marxism. For as long as it is seriously being argued that Marxism was innocent, or worse, that it should even be encouraged to rise again from its grave, then the rest of us should continue to stamp on that grave.
One of the best such stampings I’ve recently read – although it is more of an elegant and civilised application of the light roller, as if at a cricket match – is a piece by Anthony Daniels in the October 2003 edition of New Criterion, entitled History by other means.
His reflections are provoked by a trip to Cambodia, and by the uneasy feeling that all that charm and grace might merely be a mask for the horrors that erupted during the ghastly reign of Pol Pot. He reflects upon a writer called Vickery, who plays down the Marxist aspect of what happened in Cambodia, and plays up the Cambodian aspect of it all he can. → Continue reading: Nothing to do with ideology?
Sean Gabb comments on the Conservative leadership switch in his latest issue of Free Life Commentary. So far, it’s just an email and that link doesn’t now work, but it will soon.
He starts by saying nice things about Michael Howard, and notes that he said much nastier things in the past. But since Sean now really hates the government, whatever has to be, in the matter of who has to be the Leader of the Opposition, has to be. At least he’s better than Iain Duncan Smith.
But how come, he asks, the Conservatives have suddenly had this collective fit of effectiveness?
But the question remains how did they do it? For the past six years, I have watched from an advantaged view as the Parliamentary Conservative Party ran about like terrified sheep in the dark. How have they managed this coup so quickly and so well? The simplest explanation is to say that enough of them saw the possibility of losing their seats at the next election and that desperation supplied the lack of courage and imagination. I like to believe, however, in a more complex explanation. Mine is not a standard conspiracy theory, as I claim little prior evidence in it support. Instead, I reason back from perceived effects to possible causes. It may be entirely false, but it pleases me to entertain it. Here it goes.
As said, this is not an ordinary Labour Government, but something of wonderful malevolence. It does not so much want to change the running of the country as to destroy it. There is the continued sapping of the Monarchy – the threatened removal of royal powers, and the degradation of Her Majesty from our Head of State to citizen of a United States of Europe. There is the determination to outlaw hunting and to destroy farming and to remove all the hereditary peers from the House of Lords. There is the progressive hobbling of the City financial institutions with European levels of tax and regulation. There is the use of the armed forces as American mercenaries – and without any advantage gained in return. There is the possible murder and undoubtedly the forced suicide of someone senior in the foreign policy and intelligence establishment. The remnants of the Old Order may finally have realised that there is no compromise on offer from this Government, and now may be doing something about it. The Monarchy, the landed and mercantile interests, and the security services – these are even now a formidable combination. Perhaps 1688 is finally come again. Then, an alarmed old order realised the nature of its enemy and took up the cause of an aroused but leaderless nation. Perhaps Mr Blair is to play the role of James II, and Mr Howard of Prince William.
Is there any truth in this? Or am I just an old romantic? We shall see.
Some but not much. Yes you are. And I believe we can already see. → Continue reading: Michael Howard and the Conservative opportunity
It had to happen:
Undercover Agents Talking To Each Other In ‘Under 12’ Chatroom
WASHINGTON, DC—In an effort to weed out pedophiles, two FBI agents, identified only as “Cutiepie1994” and “KoalaLover,” unknowingly communicated with one another in the under-12 chat room of TweenTalk.com for almost two hours Tuesday. “You should see me in my new bathing suit. It’s really rad,” Cutiepie wrote. “Kewl. Guess what? My parents aren’t home right now,” KoalaLover responded. Two minutes after their lengthy Internet conversation ended, KoalaLover unknowingly passed Cutiepie on the way into the bathroom.
Well, it probably will happen, assuming life imitates Onion.
White Rose is run by people in London, so they won’t be going, but maybe we have a few readers in Chicago. It’s organised by the Century Foundation, and they also publish this, which all of us can get hold of and read.
True:
In this handout picture made available Tuesday Oct. 28, 2003 by the Israel-based Cornershot Co. in Tel Aviv, Israel, a rifle is seen composed of two parts; the front, that can swivel from side to side, containing a pistol with a color camera mounted on top, and the back section which consists of the stock, trigger and a monitor. According to a report by the Israeli daily ‘Maariv’ newspaper, the pistol, produced by the Florida-based Cornershot Holdings, is being tested by the Israeli military and has already been bought by a number of special forces around the world. The unique weapon allows a soldier to remain behind cover, with only the barrel of the rifle exposed in the direction of the hostile fire. (AP Photo/HO, Cornershot)
If you’ve already seen and heard about this days ago, apologies from me and only me. If not but you’re glad to see and hear of it now, you also have Chris O’Donnell to thank.
Update from the editor: As it happens, this innovative Israeli weapon is just a more sophisticated development of an idea implemented by the Germans in World War II… a version of the MP44 with a ‘shoot-around-corners’ attachment using a mirror.
This story offers a new slant on how the USA is preparing to deal with a smallpox terrorist attack: Smallpox: A Musical:
St. Cloud, Minn. – Here’s the way doctors in St. Cloud imagine a smallpox outbreak. Panicked hospital employees scurry about in a blaze of blue scrubs. A doctor dons a biohazard suit and sprays bleach everywhere. The beleaguered workers wring their hands and then belt into song, to an oddly familiar tune.
“Smallpox, smallpox, what a challenge for our docs,” they sing to the tune of “Charleston.”
It’s a performance of Smallpox: A Musical. Covers of hit musical tunes are cleverly revised to tell the story of mucus – that nefarious transmitter of smallpox.
Suddenly, the familiar sounds of music are back.
“The halls are awash, with the sound of mucus. And everyday ills, are now shown the door. ‘Cause deep in our hearts, what has so confused us, is fevers and pustules and festering sores,” sing hospital workers to the melody of “The Sound of Music.”
The musical is the brainchild of Dr. Daniel Whitlock, vice president of medical affairs at St. Cloud Hospital. But these days, in addition to his administrative role, Whitlock is busy making casting calls. His eyes twinkle as he runs a hand through his silver hair.
“I thought you’d be a good one,” he says to a perspective recruit, “because you have stage presence. And you’re dynamic.”
The medical profession has always been a bastion of bad taste and gallows humour. It seems to be my day for confirming stereotypes.
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We are also a varied group made up of social individualists, classical liberals, whigs, libertarians, extropians, futurists, ‘Porcupines’, Karl Popper fetishists, recovering neo-conservatives, crazed Ayn Rand worshipers, over-caffeinated Virginia Postrel devotees, witty Frédéric Bastiat wannabes, cypherpunks, minarchists, kritarchists and wild-eyed anarcho-capitalists from Britain, North America, Australia and Europe.
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