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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‘Animal rights’ campaigners of the RSPCA were themselves the target of protests by rural activists who are having their entire way of life criminalised.
But the fact is, the establishment will not take any notice of well mannered protests by people from the leafy shires. Of course there is indeed an established template for a minority-within-a-minority group in the British Isles to successfully defeat a majoritarian tyranny, provided you are willing to fight your corner for many years.
Sadly that template is Sinn Fein, the ‘political wing’ of the Provisional IRA: if the deck is stacked against you, play the game by different rules, a fact that has not been lost on some of the members of the Countryside Alliance’s splinter factions… and those ‘splinters’ are rather larger than many care to admit.
Indeed the Idols I have loved so long
Have done my Credit in men’s Eyes much wrong:
Have drown’d my Honour in a shallow Cup,
And sold my Reputation for a Song
– The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, 69, First Edition
The constant expansion of the market, both in extensiveness and in intensity, was the result of an absence of a political order extending over the whole of Western Europe
– Jean Baechler, The Origins of Capitalism
Gun control? It’s the best thing you can do for crooks and gangsters. I want you to have nothing. If I’m a bad guy, I’m always gonna have a gun. Safety locks? You’ll pull the trigger with a lock on, and I’ll pull the trigger. We’ll see who wins.
– Sammy ‘The Bull’ Gravano, Mafia hit man
The supposed quietude of a good man allures the ruffian; while on the other hand, arms, like laws, discourage and keep the invader and the plunderer in awe, and preserve order in the world as well as property. The same balance would be preserved were all the world destitute of arms, for all would be alike; but since some will not, others dare not lay them aside…Horrid mischief would ensue were one half the world deprived of the use of them…
– Thomas Paine, Thoughts on Defensive War in 1775
No kingdom can be secured otherwise than by arming the people. The possession of arms is the distinction between a freeman and a slave. He, who has nothing, and who himself belongs to another, must be defended by him, whose property he is, and needs no arms. But he, who thinks he is his own master, and has what he can call his own, ought to have arms to defend himself, and what he possesses; else he lives precariously, and at discretion.
– James Burgh from Political Disquisitions: or, an Enquiry into Public
Errors, Defects, and Abuses, London, 1774-1775
At Brian Micklethwait’s monthly meeting of libertarian subversives in Victoria, American blogger-in-exile Robert Bauer, of Hokiepundit fame, attended after first getting spectacularly lost en-route.
He has wisely decided to keep quiet about certain secrets he has learned about me and as a result I see a long and healthy future for the young man.
The mind cannot foresee its own advance
– F.A. Hayek
 
No, not that Hayek… this one!
Princes and democratic majorities are drunk with power. They must reluctantly admit that they are subject to the laws of nature. But they reject the very notion of economic law.
– Ludwig von Mises, Human action: A Treatise on Economics
Political revolutions do not often accomplish anything of genuine value: their one undoubted effect is simply to throw out one gang of thieves and put in another
– H.L. Mencken
If you had bought $1000 worth of Nortel stock one year ago, it would now
be worth $49. With Enron, you would have $16.50 of the original $1,000.
With Worldcom, you would have less than $5 left. If you had bought $1,000 worth of Budweiser (the beer, not the stock) one year ago, drank all the beer, then turned in the cans for the 10 cent deposit, you would have $214. Based on the above, my current investment advice is to drink beer and recycle.
– Unknown, (via Alexander Baron)
[Editors comments: My only trouble with this advise, oh wise Illuminatus, is the choice of Budweiser. To quote ‘Spike’ from ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’: “Many American beers are under-rated… this ain’t one of them”]
You see those dictators on their pedestal, surrounded by the bayonets of their soldiers and the truncheons of their police, they are afraid of words and thoughts
– W.S. Churchill, referring to ‘book burnings’
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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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