Here is a sight calculated to warm the hearts of anyone who has been bitten by the state’s fetish for surveillance.
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Some weapons are marvels of technology, such as laser guided bombs or an F-22 fighter. Other weapons however use much older technology, based on something invented by Johannes Gutenberg in 1447. Such a weapon can do more damage to the cause of puritanical Islam than a thousand well aimed bombs. June 8th, 2006 | 35 comments - (Comments are closed)
 The Daily Kos has an article about the notion of Libertarian Democrats which attempts top square the circle of favouring government regulation with that of personal liberty. Now before you all snort with derision, at least ‘kos’ attempts to essay a way to avoid the inevitable problems that result from trying to legislate everything. And that said, the article falls pretty much at the first fence.
And there you have one of the classical error of the left: the idea that corporations have great power to coerce in and of themselves. Now it is true that corporations often behave disgracefully (no one has ever accused Samizdata of being soft of corporate wickedness or being reflexively well disposed towards Big Biz) but the overwhelming way they do this is by using their vast wealth to manipulate the power of the state in their favour. When the state uses the power of eminent domain to take land from people so a wealthy corporation can profit from it, that is an example of state power. When corporations get subsidies and regulations which make it harder for new market entrants to compete with them, that is an example of state power. When corporations use laws to bust unions and restrict reasonable rights of workers to organise, that is an example of state power. Large corporations can coerce people because they can manipulate excessively mighty state power. The problem is the amount and scope of coersive power that the state has been allowed to accumulate. Make the state’s power to do things less and you make large corporations less able to coerce people as an inevitable consequence. It is just a variant of the notion that the only way to stop corruption in high places is to get rid of high places. Kos does not have to agree with that (and he surely does not) but then that is one the main notions underpinning what makes a libertarian a libertarian. And thus it shows that ‘kos’ truly does not understand what ‘libertarian’ really means and so his use of the word is simply a category error. You can coerce a society out from under tyranny (i.e. you can shoot tyrants and hang their retainers) but cannot coerce a society into liberty by just using the power of the state to impose it via state mandates (i.e. the roads and healthcare and all the rest that he advocates, showing that his notion of what ‘libertarian’ means involves large amounts of coercive taxation in no way different to what prevails right now). In short, ‘kos’ can call himself a Libertarian Democrat if he wishes. He can also call himself a horse if he wishes. However saying it does not make it so. June 7th, 2006 | 95 comments - (Comments are closed)
I am delighted that Google seems to be having second thoughts about collaborating with repression by the Chinese state. I realise that it is not easy for a company to walk away from a huge market but if Google does decide to stop aiding and abetting of a vile regime in a very direct manner, they are to be commended fo their change of heart. June 7th, 2006 | 12 comments - (Comments are closed)
The utterly flaccid David Cameron has balked at even the token gesture of pulling his ‘conservative’ party out of the Euro-integrationist EPP in the European parliament. As withdrawal from the EPP would be little more than a minor token that did nothing beyond offer the tiniest of fig leaves to the now completely naked Euro-skeptic remnants within the Tory party, is anyone under any illusions now of his inclination to ‘stand up for British interests’ in dealing with the EU? As having the Tories ditch the EPP (whose platform includes ‘ever closer union’) was one of the planks of his pitch to win the Tory Party leadership against David Davies, will conservatives who are not pure Blairite (or perhaps even Heathite) now admit they have been screwed (and not in a fun way) and finally decamp from Cameron’s appalling social democratic party? June 7th, 2006 | 14 comments - (Comments are closed)
Yet again we see on the issue of homosexuals marrying that conservatives and left-wingers are just arguing over whose prejudices the law will validate, rather than should the law validate anyone’s prejudices. Why oh why are people on both sides not calling for the obvious solution to this (non)-issue: get the state out of the marriage business. We do not require the state to sign off on most contracts between two people, so why should marriage be any different? Sure, let the courts get involved if there are disputes or malfeasance just as it does with any contract (that is what civil courts are for), but by de-politicising the whole institution and treating it as just another civil contract, the whole tedious issue goes away. If religious conservatives choose not to recognise ‘gay marriage’, well fine, that should be their prerogative. If a homosexual couple want to declare to the world they are ‘married’, well how is that the business of anyone but the people involved? June 6th, 2006 | 47 comments - (Comments are closed)
There is yet more evidence of the delusional mind set of those who say David Cameron’s utterances are just a deception to get into office so not to worry, he is really in favour of limited government and real-world economics. The truth is Cameron is New Labour through and through and those who want an unbroken series of regulatory statist policies from Blair’s government to continue should have no hesitation voting for the Tories.
So Cameron is now working hard to secure the public sector vote and he most surely deserves it as they need fear no loss of influence under him compared to Tony Blair. Dedicated professionals, eh? You mean the people responsible for 95% of days lost to strikes in the UK1? The almost un-sackable people who get better pensions that people who work in the productive sector? The people who for some reason seem to get ‘sick’ far more often than people in the private sector? A vote for the Tory party is a vote for Blairism, pure and simple. The Tories really really needs to be destroyed so that we can get a worthwhile opposition party. 1 = Not that I am really complaining… I would like 90% of Britain’s public sector to go on strike permanently, even if we still have to pay for them, so that people can discover that life will go on without them. June 6th, 2006 | 23 comments - (Comments are closed)
The music business has fought tooth and nail against digitalisation in general and the internet in particular and I have long suspected that regardless of how it struggles, eventually Big Music will go the way of the buggy-whip industry, with music returning to its ‘craft’ roots and simply ceasing to be a big business, at least in the way that is currently understood, the mass market eventually giving way to a mass-of-niches. I wonder if this is a sign that future has taken a step closer?
Regardless of sour grapes claims the viewing figures were inflated in this case, I wonder if the wave of the future has arrived? June 5th, 2006 | 25 comments - (Comments are closed)
In the latest police anti-terrorist ‘swoop’ in which a man was shot (though not killed this time), there now seems to be some question of whether or not initial reports of a chemical weapons ‘factory’ and ‘hazardous materials’ being found have any truth to them at all. Moreover the highly dubious sounding report yesterday indicating the man who was shot was actually shot not by police but by his own brother is being denied by the lawyers of the injured man. However at this stage all the information coming out is from the two least reliable sources imaginable, namely the lawyers for the people arrested (i.e. people who are paid to lie on behalf of their clients) and the police (i.e. an institution with a track record of lying about the facts when they shoot someone). As a result it is probably best to wait a while before drawing too many conclusions about what really happened and whether or not the guys arrested are guilty of anything more than being Muslims. Whilst I would be delighted if the anti-terrorist squad had broken up an Al-Qaeda cell in the UK, the bitter experience of the Jean de Menezes killing and subsequent criminal conspiracy to cover up the facts, not to mention the scandalous Harry Stanley killing, means that the police and entire structure within which they operate cannot be trusted to tell the truth, it is only clear physical evidence that can show us what to believe. June 4th, 2006 | 30 comments - (Comments are closed)
The alleged atrocity carried out by a fire-team of US Marines in Iraq is ghastly news and whilst I hope, like so many other allegations against Allied soldiers in the Middle East, it turns there is much less to this than meets the eye, the reports do seem to be indicating that this time there really was a monstrous massacre of innocents. However the fact this horrendous incident has not been swept under the table shows that the US military does have structures that work as intended. Whilst it is appalling such a thing could have happened, it would be even worse if it had happened and the people responsible got away with it. In that respect at least, one cannot but compare the accountability of the USMC with what happened when British police shot dead Jean Charles de Menezes, a innocent Brazilian man, and what we got was a stream of barefaced lies and complete fabrications and still no one has been brought to book (which should not just be the people responsible for the killing, but everyone involved with what has clearly been a conspiracy to pervert the course of justice). It is when things go badly wrong that you discover how decadent an institution has become. The contrast between the US military and British Police is quite revealing. May 28th, 2006 | 40 comments - (Comments are closed)
Last night Adriana showed me a very strange DVD which will probably not appeal to folks who dislike ‘art house’ movies… but if you like bizarre English phantasmagoria at its quirkiest, set in Brighton and by Neil Gaiman and Dave McKean no less, then you will probably just love Mirrormask.  Young actress Stephanie Leonidas has presence beyond her years and reminded me of the young Natalie Portman in Leon, which makes me think she may be one to watch in the future.  I particularly liked the evil sphinx-cats. It is all intensely English, in a magic mushroom induced hallucinogenic Alice in Wonderland sort of way. “We are not at home to Mister Grumpy”. May 28th, 2006 | 12 comments - (Comments are closed)
Alain Lamassoure, a prominent French (naturally) MEP is proposing the idea of a pan-European tax on e-mail and SMS text messages and is quoted as saying:
Huh? I hate to break this to Mr. Lamassoure but countries neither communicate with each other nor ‘exchange’ with each other, companies and people do. Moreover I think the ‘benefit engendered by the EU’ is highly debatable. If I am understanding this klepto correctly (and as he is both French and a politician, that may be beyond me), he thinks that without the EU, people would not be able to exchange e-mails and SMS messages? And if that is not what he means, what the hell does he mean? I do not even grasp what he is talking about, let alone understand why even more money should be appropriated from people to pay for that sublimely corrupt institution. May 26th, 2006 | 17 comments - (Comments are closed)
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