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I cannot begin to tell you how frustrating it is that I cannot link directly to this article in the UK Sunday Times about the growing influence of Blogging and Bloggers.
The article is focussed on the fall on former New York Times editor, Howell Raines and unequivocally places the responsibility for his downfall on the Blogosphere:
A proliferating band of independent writers known as “bloggers” (short for web loggers) is pumping out personal takes on the news, and one of the most persistent themes of their websites has been that Howell Raines, executive editor of The New York Times, would have to resign or be sacked.
The bloggers got their man last week and have been exulting in their power. After a rollercoaster two years in the job, Raines resigned from The New York Times last Thursday along with Gerald Boyd, the managing editor.
The article goes on to specifically mention Glenn Reynolds , Andrew Sullivan and Mickey Kaus and the leading role that all played in the relentless (and thoroughly merited) hounding of Mr.Raines, emphasising that, ten years ago, he would have gotten clean away with putting idealism before the truth. Nor is this the end but merely the beginning:
Their latest target is Maureen Dowd, a star writer who jeered at Bush for claiming that Al-Qaeda was “not a problem any more” and has yet to acknowledge that she played fast and loose with his words.
The article also goes on to hint at the depth of the libertarian/conservative influence in the Blogosphere:
The attacks on The New York Times have added to the suspicion among Democrats that internet pundits are part of the “vast right-wing conspiracy” once alleged by Hillary Clinton. The right is certainly gloating over the newspaper’s discomfiture. According to Kaus, a Democrat, “the blogosphere does tend to skew to the right, though not as badly as radio”.
And a warning of things to come:
Raines’s departure is allowing bloggers to indulge in further self-congratulation. The internet’s new breed of media commentators is already savouring its potential impact on the 2004 presidential race.
Which means that traditional opinion-shapers like the UK Times are also ‘savouring’ (or, perhaps more accurately, ‘fearing’) that potential impact as well.
I must say that I have had my doubts about the capacity of the Blogosphere to impact upon the wider world but perhaps I have underestimated it. When a handful of bloggers can force the editor of a publication as august as the New York Times out of his job, you know that the game has changed. The once-untouchable are now touchable and they know it. That, of itself, is hugely significant.
I don’t believe that British or European bloggers are yet having the tangible impact on this side of the Atlantic that US bloggers are clearly starting to have on that side but, then, orthodox opinions are far more hegemonic here. Still, I do not believe that the Guardian would have been forced to issue a shame-faced apology for its woeful distortion of the Paul Wolfowitz statement even a year ago. Maybe they feel that they cannot get away with that kind of thing anymore. If so, good.
The watchers are being watched. They probably don’t like it. I expect that, in due course, they will respond by lobbying the government to bring bloggers under ‘democratic control’ which is the widely accepted procedure for laying low the competition. When that happens, we will all know that we have truly arrived.
[My thanks to my dear friend and reader Nigel Meek for alerting me to the article in the Times.]
There is a lot of remarkable news in Gabriel Syme’s posting about Sabine Herold, the young French woman who is spear-heading a brave fightback against the bolshevik hegemony that squats on her country like a poisonous toad.
That someone so young should be prepared to shoulder such a herculean (or perhaps even quixotic) task should be enough to earn her unqualified praise but what takes her stance onto a higher plane of bravery is the fact that she is prepared to do this openly. As this e-mail letter sent to Steve Den Beste reveals, France is a country where dissent against the prevailing orthodoxy is really dangerous:
As you may now, France is now undergoing a series of strikes protesting the government’s pension reform. Among the strikers, the Communist Union “Confederation Générale du Travail” is using unacceptable methods that violate the most basic human rights. Today it has vandalized and burnt the employers’ union offices in several cities. Worse, this organization has prevented, in the city where I leave, a meeting by a democratic political party and violently intervened in a demonstration by people who protested the strike, in order to make sure that demonstration would fail.
Furthermore, the government is taking no steps to maintain public order and guarantee people’s freedom of goverment and expression. The city of Toulouse was blocked during the morning of yesterday and not a single step was taken by public authorities to end this blocking. On the contrary, the police collaborated with the unions in order to make sure that people could not pass. In the demonstration I just mentioned, not a policeman was dispatched to protect us against the assaults of the communist union’s members.
I realize that this is small stuff compared to the atrocities taking place in several countries. Nevertheless it is taking place right in the middle of Europe and it would be of great help if this state of things were publicized by your organization. I can provide you with further testimonies about the events I am referring to, if needed. We badly need the help of the international community in fighting these constant violation of human rights by the communist union.
Yes, this is happening right smack dab in the heart of ‘civilised, sophisticated, nuanced’ Europe. What a stark contrast it provides to the baseless squealing of the spoilt brats of Hollywood as they wrap themselves in cloaks of martyrdom at the first sign of a drop in CD sales. France is a country where it is not just your dissent that can get crushed; you can get crushed along with it. → Continue reading: Le coeur de l’obscurite
Sir, If Tony Blair is seeking a weapon of mass destruction he has only to read the proposed European constitution.
(From today’s UK Times letters page)
Go out and buy a gas-guzzler, right now. Drive around burning tons of petrol and enjoy yourself in the process. Better still, invest your money in smokestack industries that belch fumes into the atmosphere. Not only is there a prospect of making a healthy profit but you will also be contributing to a better world:
The world has become a greener place in the past two decades as a result of climate change, according to a major study published today.
As the climate has warmed, the Earth has become more lush and rich with vegetation, notably in the Amazon rainforests, according to a study jointly funded by the US space agency Nasa and the US Department of Energy.
In the Amazon, plant growth was limited by sun-blocking cloud cover, but the skies have become less cloudy. In India, where a billion people depend on rain, the monsoon was more dependable in the 1990s than in the 1980s.
So it appears that we are not destroying the planet after all. Nor are we ethically obliged to abandon our consumer societies or turn our backs on technology and progress.
Of course, a few of us were saying this all along but, amidst the whistling of different tunes, it is nonetheless instructive to actually observe the process of the juggernaut of received wisdom performing a 180 degree turnabout.
I predict that, within a few years, the whole notion of ‘global warming’ and its attendant primitivism will become every bit as laughable and discredited as the ‘Canals on Mars’.
I bet I know what Tony Blair dreams about at night. I’ll bet that while he is tossing, turning and crying out in his sleep, his dreams transport him to the dusty, fetid alleyways of Baghdad. There, he strides forth like a grand, confident colossus surrounded by a squadron of husky, shaven-headed Royal Marines. Gaggles of excited Iraqi children bay and yap around the fringes of this entourage, hoping that the Great White Leader From Across the Seas will stoop to confer some benediction on their tiny heads. But he cannot stop. He is too busy. He is too single-minded. He knows what he wants and he is determined to find it. All other priorities are rescinded and greeting the thronged masses of downtown Baghdad will have to wait.
Suddenly, through the whirls of settling dust, he spots it. A big warehouse miraculously untouched by Cruise missiles or JDAMs. He points. “There” he says, “that’s where they are”. Tony and his bodyguards break into a trot and then a run as they draw near to the entrance of the warehouse. One of the squaddies produces a bolt-cutter and snips off the padlock with a flourish. The great doors are swung wide open and, inside, gleaming and shimmering with pointy Ba’athist menace is a phalanx of stonking, great missiles, each one marked ‘London’, ‘Manchester’, Birmingham’, Leeds etc.
“I was right, I was right” yells Tony triumphantly. “I told them so. I told them Hussein had WMDs and they didn’t believe me. Well I’m going to make them eat their weasel-words. I’m going to shove it right up ’em and show ’em whose boss and….. → Continue reading: It’s the WMDs, stupid!
Switch on the TV, open a magazine, buy a newspaper or surf the net and it won’t be any time at all until you come across an advertisement for some diet-related product. Be it an exercise-contraption, a formula drink or a low-calorie food range, the market cup runneth over with weapons we can use to fight the Global War on Flab.
As a veteran footsoldier in this campaign (my abdomen is more ‘lunch-pack’ than ‘six-pack’) I bear many scars of battle. But I long ago realised that I can never really win this war. Though I have succeeded, with grim determination and effort, to cast off the oppressive tyranny of blobdom, my liberation has only ever been temporary. Somehow, by various means, the forces of fattiness manage to regroup and come roaring back to overwhelm me again and take me prisoner.
Still, surrender is not an option and I am always on the lookout for new ideas that may, I pray, grant me permanent victory and eternal snake-hips. Somebody recently suggested that getting one of those Jane Fonda videos might help and, prickly with expectation, I went out and bought one. Another let-down, I’m afraid. I spent the whole of last weekend watching ‘On Golden Pond’ and I didn’t shed an ounce.
Now, fortunately, I have private health insurance which means that my midriff mission-creep has few practical consequences apart from a vampiresque aversion to full-length mirrors and the occasional ‘magic flying shirt-button’. The same cannot be said for many of my fellow citizens who find themselves at the less-than-tender mercy of the state healthcare system:
Patients could have to sign up to healthier lifestyles under new plans being considered by the Labour Party.
Written contracts would ensure a certain standard of treatment in return for people following doctors’ advice and attending appointments.
Or, ‘Ve haf vays of making you slim’. Okay, in some ways I am quite pleased that this is now out in the open because it has actually been bubbling away just below the radar for a good few years now, mostly as ominous mutterings from NHS doctors that they might refuse to treat patients who smoke (despite the fact that taxes paid by smokers prop up the NHS).
Yes, carry on I say. How about a ‘no dangerous sports’ contract? A ‘stress-free career’ contract? A ‘no casual sex’ contract? A ‘no riding motorbikes’ contract? Why not? Since the NHS is clearly destined to become a lifestyle-policemen they may as well go the whole hog. And I sincerely hope they do because then our dirty, little secret will be secret no longer. The dirty, little secret (that no-one ever mentions in polite company here) is that nationalised healthcare is not free healthcare, it is rationed healthcare and this is just the latest rationing scheme.
The unpalatable truth is that this is a cost-cutting measure. Not so much doctor’s advice but bureaucratic diktat. Despite the extra squintillions of pounds that have been poured into it by the current government, the NHS still cannot meet the market demand for healthcare and so increasingly ruthless ways to cut the waiting lists are having to be formulated.
I have no doubt whatsoever that proposers of the scheme will argue they are only finding ways to improve people’s health and forcing them to lose weight and give up smoking is therefore a truly kind act of a caring government. But that is not why they’re doing this. And, while no reasonable person would argue that losing weight and quitting the weed can by anything but beneficial to health, a threat to withdraw healthcare for those who fail is nothing but a squalid act of bullying.
But, this is time for satisfaction not outrage. The great fabian promise of free healthcare for all regardless of who they are or how much they earn is finally showing up for the lie it always was. Let it grow and deepen. Perhaps, when some poor sod has been turned away from a hospital because of his ‘irresponsible’ roller-skating hobby, the British public will finally realise what Ayn Rand realised a long time ago: that the difference between a welfare state and a totalitarian state is merely a matter of time.
Those who look for symbolism as a guide to events might like to note that ‘Evian’ spelled backwards is ‘Naive’. Whilst I would never suggest that that is anything except concidental I do reckon that even a casual observer of the latest G8 conference in that Southern French town would have noticed that idealism (to the extent that it ever existed at all) has given way to thorny realpolitik.
No amount of mutual backslapping and bonhomie can disguise the fact that this latest conference was little more than a cosmetic exercise in alleged unity of purpose where none, in fact, exists. Quite aside from the fact that US-EU tensions are hardly going to be settled by a couple of days of diplomatic chinwagging in the Alps, the early exit of George Bush illustrates pretty effectively where he feels his priorities lie:
President George W Bush was not present for the summit’s final session on Tuesday, having left the previous day on the Middle Eastern leg of his foreign tour.
Nothing could illustrate more clearly that the Americans regard the Middle-East as a more pressing concern than the latest round of plaintiff appeals for ‘international somethingorother’ from the likes of Chirac and Shroeder. The former demands attention, the latter can be safely stacked in the pending tray.
But even aside from that, there are cracks which just cannot be papered over with reams of polite communiques. Even a left-of-centre and devoutly internationalist British PM is pressing for a different worldview than the one assiduously promoted from Paris. The result will be no single worldview at all.
I suspect that this G8 malarkey has had its day and not because of the travelling circus of the ‘Great Unwashed’ wreaking havoc and gutting town-centres in its wake, but rather because the reasons for its inception just no longer hold true. This annual round of global group-hugging was only important when it was felt (perhaps not unreasonably) that the interests of the world’s great industrial powers were converging. They are not converging any longer and, if anything, they are diverging. This is not so much globalisation as polarisation.
This will likely not be the last G8 summit. There will probably be more in the future. But I suspect we have seen the last meaningful one and that the summits of tomorrow will be prove to be nothing more than an exercise in formality and politeness where the delegates exchange chit-chat whilst waiting for something bigger and more exciting to come along.
It is hot and humid Monday morning here in Britain and, right about now, millions of people are waking from their slumber to the start of another week.
Bleary-eyed and sticky with sweat, they will munch their toast, slurp their coffee, grab their keys and head out of their doors to do battle with another working day. A day, on the face of it, much like any other day.
Only it isn’t. Not quite. For today, 2nd June, is Tax Freedom Day in Britain. This is the day when we stop working for HMG and start working for ourselves. From today, we can begin supporting our families and not the state. Up until today, from January 1st, we have laboured non-stop for the benefit of the public sector; for all those legions of bureaucrats and rubber-stampers without whom life would be worth living.
There will be no celebrations though. No party hats, no holiday cheer and no group hugs. For the vast majority, the day will pass by without so much as a brief acknowledgement of the temporary release from bondage. There is something sad about a whole nation being so inured to the painful bites of the government that they do not even notice when the biting ceases.
Nearly half a year. Nearly half a life. What a waste.
No sooner has Perry reminded us that the Conservative Party are not to be trusted when it comes to liberty, than, as if right on cue, the buggers prove him right:
Patients should be issued with “entitlement cards” to stop illegal immigrants abusing the National Health Service, the Tories said yesterday.
Liam Fox, the shadow health secretary, said the cards, which would be issued to every UK citizen, would stop so-called “health tourists” being treated at the taxpayers’ expense.
Now, to be fair, the problem they are referring to is a valid one. It is an outrageous abuse of the already over-burdened British taxpayer to force them to pick up the healthcare tab for anyone anywhere in the world who happens to want it. However, the blindingly obvious way of putting a stop to this would be to deregulate health services and dismantle the Soviet-inspired monstrosity of the NHS.
But, no, the Tories would never dream of doing anything to upset the left. They would much rather that we were all issued with an electronic tattoo which is not only obnoxious and anti-British, it will also prove ineffective in solving the problem referred to. Within weeks of the introduction of any such ‘Entitlement Card’ the country (and possibly the rest of the world) will be flooded with forgeries and, even if that were not the case, neither the Human Rights regime, nor EU law will permit the NHS to discriminate against non-UK nationals. Added to that is the massive cost of administering and policing the system the burden of which will also fall on the taxpayers and probably prove more expensive than treating foreigners for their arthritis.
The Tories clearly have not thought this one through but ‘thinking’ is generally frowned upon in those circles. I expect very little from the British Conservative Party and I am rarely disappointed.
[SCENE 26. Int. LUCY’s bedroom. Night.]
Open on shot of bedroom wall opposite the bed. There is a large mirror hanging on the wall. In the mirror we can see the reflection of LUCY and JOHN making wild, passionate love in the bed. Camera turns down and pans across bedroom floor, past assorted clothes discarded hastily in the fenzy of mutual lust. LUCY’s cries of climax drown out JOHN’s heaving grunts. Camera closes in on bed as JOHN rolls over. Both are glistening with sweat and breathless.
LUCY: That… that was… fantastic!
JOHN: Yeah… great. You were great.
LUCY: Do you know what I want now?
JOHN: What?
LUCY opens the top drawer of her bedside table and produces two large carrots.
LUCY: Want one?
JOHN: Oh, you bet.
LUCY hands one carrot to JOHN who begins to munch it manfully. LUCY nibbles her carrot, savouring the little bites.
LUCY: Mmmmm… I just have to have a carrot after sex.
JOHN: Yeah. Nothing beats a post-coital munch.
LUCY: So, am I going to see you again?
JOHN: Well, now that Sheila and I have split up… I reckon so.
LUCY: Why did you two split up anyway?
JOHN stops eating his carrot and looks away, trying to hide his shame.
JOHN: She… she was a celery-freak!!!
[END]
There are many pleasurable benefits in writing for a blog such as this, not least of is revelling in the quality of our readership. This being the case, I can think of no finer endorsement of our efforts than that we attract thinkers and writers of the calibre of Andy Duncan, a regular reader who has produced an analysis of the strategy behind the EU project that I cannot possibly leave languishing at the bottom of a heap of comments where it currently resides.
Andy’s hypothesis is so startlingly good, not just because of the thought that has gone into it but also because he admits to having once been a ‘creature of the night’. We can therefore safely assume that he knows whereof he speaks. So let him speak:
I’m unsure as to your political orientation, but if you were a follower of Karl Marx’s fallback idea of creating a social democratic Utopia, via the ballot box rather than via the bullet in the back of the neck, how would you do it? Putting my devout Marxist hat on, (and I was such an idiot, until well after my 30th year), this is how I would do it:
Marxist Hat ON
- I would base myself in my philosophical homeland of Germany and France, the roaming ground of Hegel, Marx, Napoleon, Kant, Sartre, and other assorted violent destroyers and idiots.
- I would pretend to be democratic, having seen honest revolutionaries fail in Russia and elsewhere.
- I would slowly subvert democracy, steal or distort the language of liberty to throw off my accusers and enemies, and gradually form an unspoken aristocracy of fellow travellers. What better than to call this a “liberal” elite, to really turn white into black, and make two plus two equal five? 🙂
- I would gradually raise taxes, intervene, cause capitalist failure through regulation, thereby allowing myself the excuse to interfere even further, raise even more taxes, etc, etc, until at least half of the economy was in my hands (though 40% will do nicely).
→ Continue reading: Duncan’s Laws
If there are any talented graphic designers out there perhaps they might want to grasp this opportunity to design a symbol that will, from now on, represent the ‘Country formerly known as Britain’.
The instrument of conquest, the draft EU constitution, was presented in Brussels today. For those of your with the time and fortitude all 148 pages (yes, 148!) of this document can be found here.
Fortunately, the Telegraph has an edited version which sets out the ‘money’ clauses (the ones that British federasts would rather nobody spoke about). Among these are:
Article I-2: The Union’s values
The Union is founded on the values of respect for human dignity, liberty, democracy, the rule of law and respect for human rights.
These values are common to the Member States in a society of pluralism, tolerance, justice, equality, solidarity and non-discrimination.
Meaningless, empty prattle that might have been drafted up by the editorial team of the Guardian. What ‘solidarity’? What does that mean? And ‘equality’? Does this mean Mao suits for everyone? If not, then what? And why on earth the prohibition on ‘discrimination’? Discrimination just means ‘judgement’. Are we supposed to live without it?
2 The Union shall offer its citizens an area of freedom, security and justice without internal frontiers, and a single market where competition is free and undistorted.
Which means that Anglo-Saxon common law and Habeas Corpus are out to be replaced by Napoleonic Code and Corpus Juris.
The Union shall work for a Europe of sustainable development based on balanced economic growth, with a social market economy aiming at full employment and social progress.
Semi-planned economies with rigid labour laws and an omnipresent dead-hand of state.
It shall contribute to peace, security, the sustainable development of the Earth, solidarity and mutual respect among peoples, free and fair trade, eradication of poverty and protection of human rights and in particular children’s rights, as well as to strict observance and development of international law, including respect for the principles of the United Nations Charter.
Euro-sclerosis for the whole world!!
Article I-5: Relations between the Union and the Member States
1 The Union shall respect the national identities of its Member States, inherent in their fundamental structures, political and constitutional, including for regional and local self government.
2 The Member States shall facilitate the achievement of the Union’s tasks and refrain from any measure which could jeopardise the attainment of the objectives set out in the Constitution.
The potemkin clause. This is the one the federasts will refer to in an attempt to rebut concerns over loss of sovereignty. As per usual, they will be lying. It only says that ‘national identities’ will be respected, not sovereignty which is clearly abolished by Part 2 of the clause.
Article I-6: Legal personality
The Union shall have legal personality.
So no question that this is any longer about ‘co-operation of sovereign states for mutual benefit’. The EU will exist as a formal entity separate from the national governments. → Continue reading: And this is how it ends
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Who Are We? The Samizdata people are a bunch of sinister and heavily armed globalist illuminati who seek to infect the entire world with the values of personal liberty and several property. Amongst our many crimes is a sense of humour and the intermittent use of British spelling.
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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