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]

Samizdata quote of the day – sage geopolitical wisdom edition

Why we can’t leave the Houthi’s to shoot at us in peace is completely beyond me.

– the indispensable Zarah Bukake MP echoing nice Mr. Corbyn.

Samizdata quote of the day – we are more screwed than even I imagined

The course began with the issue of definitions. What is Terrorism? Without anyone providing an opposing standpoint, we were taught the adage, ‘One man’s freedom fighter is another man’s terrorist.’

I posed to the room: ‘Surely we can acknowledge subjectivity while being able to come up with a collective understanding of what terrorism is?’ Some 40 civil servants looked at me blankly. No?

I wondered why we were there.

The danger of understanding terrorism with cultural relativism is that it breeds moral apathy; the kind that says ‘Who are we, mere democratic, liberal Westerners to impose our morality onto others? Who are we to say our culture is superior to others?’

These are luxury attitudes. It is easy to be sat in Kings College London and feel that all cultures are equal, when you haven’t been anally raped at a peace festival by someone shouting ‘Allahu Akbar’ and held hostage. In the introduction to the course, labeling an organisation as terrorist was described as a problem because it ‘implies a moral judgment’. Nothing was said about why a moral judgment might be appropriate.

Anna Stanley

Tories delenda est

The Tory failure is, as Helen Joyce mordantly details, spiritual too. The care of souls is what Trans extremists have squarely set themselves at, and this Tory government has, in law and administration alike, conceded to them. Penny Mordaunt, Maria Miller and Caroline Nokes head a very long list of Tory MPs who have not just done the bidding of Stonewall et al, they have cheered them on and denounced their critics.

The Critic Editorial

Samizdata quote of the day – why the Tories need to burn to ash

Almost half the Conservative Party’s backbench MPs in the British Parliament belong to a Caucus promoting extreme Net Zero ideas that is funded by a small group of green billionaire foundations. The Conservative Environment Network (CEN), which acts mostly as a lobby group, receives over 80% of its funding from the European Climate Foundation, Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisers, Oak Foundation, WWF-UK and Clean Air Fund. As regular readers will recall, these paymasters crop up regularly whenever anyone of influence, be they journalists, academics or politicians, requires help and guidance in promoting the insanity of removing hydrocarbon energy from industrial societies within less than 30 years.

[…]

It is noted by CEN that when Russia invaded Ukraine “we helped promote the narrative that reducing dependency on fossil fuels through renewable energy and insulation would help defeat Putin”. Quite how fossil fuel dependency is reduced by intermittent renewables that rely on back-up hydrocarbons is not immediately clear. It’s unlikely that Putin quaked in his boots at the thought of the widespread mobilisation of loft insulators in the U.K.

Chris Morrison

I made it clear to my very marginal Tory MP (150 vote majority last election) that her membership in CEN guarantees I will be voting Reform.

Champagne for my real friends…

…real pain for my sham friends. Bring consternation to your enemies by having a splendid and productive New Year.

Jamie wishes our readers a splendid Christmas

A glimpse into the future: you have no rights

The point here is that if one only has a right so long as it is in accordance with the public interest, then that is tantamount to saying one does not have a right at all, because it is entirely contingent on the authorities’ view of what the public interest entails. If they have a plausible-sounding reason why depriving one of one’s property is in the public interest (spoiler alert: they almost always will have such a reason), then they can do so irrespective of one’s ‘rights’, and one’s rights therefore are of no real practical or legal consequence.

This is the position we find ourselves in, then, with respect to A1P1. We have a right to property but only insofar as we can be deprived of our possessions when it is in the public interest. We do not then really have a right to property at all, at least insofar as the ECHR goes, but more a liberty to enjoy peaceful possession of our property on the sufferance of the State. We are on implied notice that as soon as it is in the public interest to deprive us of our property, the State can do so.

David McGrogan

Strongly recommend you real the whole thing.

Samizdata quote of the day – screwed and then screwed again

Make energy expensive so industry moves abroad, then tax the goods coming back in due to their carbon content.

You pay twice.

Steve Loftus, illustrating why the Tories should and will burn to ash at the next General Election.

Samizdata quote of the day – the crisis of British politics and government

We don’t face a Brexit crisis, a migration crisis, a housing crisis, an NHS crisis, a social care crisis, an energy crisis, a productivity crisis, a deficit crisis or an education crisis — there is one universal and interconnected crisis of British politics and government.

Samuel Hooper.

The article is not new but it is still interesting.

Samizdata quote of the day – pharma bombs

Now, remember. This study — and all the news reports about it — constantly reassures pharma bigwigs and depressed jab-takers that there’s no evidence of adverse effects from the random ‘nonsense proteins,’ the randomized proteins that 25% of their transfected cells are now making. Nothing to worry about!

But check out this very telling quote from one of the study authors, Anne Willis, who is a very upbeat kind of lady. She found that the problem just creates a very exciting opportunity for jab makers to fix it:

(Professor Anne Willis, Director of the MRC Toxicology Unit) adds it is very exciting that there is a way to fix the issue, which “massively de-risks this platform going forward”.

Screech! Hold on, wait just a minute! Slam on the brakes for a second. If fixing the issue “massively de-risks the (mRNA) platform” … that means … there are massive risks to be fixed. And that quote, ladies and gentlemen, gave away the entire game, right there, and showed us what the study authors are really thinking.

Jeff Childers

Samizdata quote of the day – from anti-authoritarian to bootlicker

The sad thing is that the character of the Doctor used to represent a distinctively British kind of amateur anti-authoritarianism. He took on the might of the Daleks with the equivalent of a screwdriver and a well-worn scarf. Now he surrenders to the pronoun police without so much as a quibble.

Malcolm Clark

Samizdata quote of the day – Thucydides once said…

The society that separates its scholars from its warriors will have its thinking done by cowards and its fighting by fools.

― Thucydides