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

[W]hile SOPA/PIPA may be stalled for now, a big part of the reason is that tech companies got into the lobbying game, too…That’s right, slowly but surely, Congress is sucking the tech industry into their world, making us play by their rules. We have to pay them off, literally with cash, or we get slaughtered.

…Well, we’re now playing by big government rules. Congress can set up a fight pit with Hollywood in one corner and Silicon Valley in the other. Who cares what happens. The money will just roll right in.

This is how criminal organizations run protection rackets. Congress is doing just that, only it’s completely legal.

TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington on the spanner thrown into the works of SOPA/PIPA (for now)

How I got by without watching the State of the Union Address

“Well, I didn’t watch the State of the Union, but I did fix the dishwasher, and teach a fairly decent class on the non-delegation doctrine, and edit some page proofs of a forthcoming law review article. So it was a pretty good day.”

Glenn Reynolds

In my case, being a Londoner, yesterday, I attended an excellent Institute of Economic Affairs talk by “Bleeding Heart Libertarian”, got a plumber around to deal with a blocked pipe, picked up a suit from the cleaners, discussed a finance matter with my Dad and typed about 4,000 words at work. I did later skim a few lines from the Obama speech, though. I see he’s taking tax policy advice from Warren Buffett, whom I am increasingly bracketing alongside George Soros as prime James Bond villain material.

Another reason why (some) Americans like Dr Paul

In a good article at The Atlantic, Conor Friedersdorf (now that is a name to remember) has this zinger of a response to a recent desperate attempt by Andrew Sullivan to try and claim that Mr Obama has been pursuing a brilliant, long term strategy. He asks, how would any Obama voters feel had their man promised to do the following prior to his election:

“(1) Codify indefinite detention into law; (2) draw up a secret kill list of people, including American citizens, to assassinate without due process; (3) proceed with warrantless spying on American citizens; (4) prosecute Bush-era whistleblowers for violating state secrets; (5) reinterpret the War Powers Resolution such that entering a war of choice without a Congressional declaration is permissible; (6) enter and prosecute such a war; (7) institutionalize naked scanners and intrusive full body pat-downs in major American airports; (8) oversee a planned expansion of TSA so that its agents are already beginning to patrol American highways, train stations, and bus depots; (9) wage an undeclared drone war on numerous Muslim countries that delegates to the CIA the final call about some strikes that put civilians in jeopardy; (10) invoke the state-secrets privilege to dismiss lawsuits brought by civil-liberties organizations on dubious technicalities rather than litigating them on the merits; (11) preside over federal raids on medical marijuana dispensaries; (12) attempt to negotiate an extension of American troops in Iraq beyond 2011 (an effort that thankfully failed); (13) reauthorize the Patriot Act; (13) and select an economic team mostly made up of former and future financial executives from Wall Street firms that played major roles in the financial crisis.”

Now I don’t, as readers know, like everything about Ron Paul, who is opposed to every single thing mentioned in this paragraph. But the reason, surely, why even those who might have the odd doubt about him are giving this man respect is for the sort of facts as contained in this paragraph. It is, if you think about it for a few minutes, truly shocking, even though someone like me is not really all that easily shocked by politics and politicians any more.

And here are further signs that Sullivan’s infatuation with Mr Obama is a joke:

“Over the years, Sullivan has confronted, as few others have, American transgressions abroad, including torture, detainee abuse, and various imperial ambitions. He’s long drawn attention to civil-liberties violations at home too, as a solo blogger and as lead editor and writer of a blogazine. When I worked for Sullivan, he not only published but actively encouraged items I found that highlighted civil-liberties abuses by the Obama Administration, and since I parted ways with The Daily Dish, he and the Dish team have continued to air critiques of Obama on these questions.”

“But his Newsweek essay fits the pattern I’ve lamented of Obama apologists who tell a narrative of his administration that ignores some of these issues and minimizes the importance of others, as if they’re a relatively unimportant matter to be set aside in a sentence or three before proceeding to the more important business of whether the president is being critiqued fairly by obtuse partisans.”

And this:

“Beyond strenuously objecting to the focus of his piece and what it doesn’t mention, and agreeing with some of Sullivan’s points, I have important disagreements with others. “Where Bush talked tough and acted counter-productively, Obama has simply, quietly, relentlessly decimated our real enemies, while winning the broader propaganda war,” Sullivan writes. “Since he took office, al Qaeda’s popularity in the Muslim world has plummeted.” But it’s surely relevant that, according to surveys like this one from James Zogby in 2011, “After improving with the election of Barack Obama in 2008, U.S. favorable ratings across the Arab world have plummeted. In most countries they are lower than at the end of the Bush Administration, and lower than Iran’s favorable ratings (except in Saudi Arabia).” And in the areas where Obama’s drone strikes are killing innocent civilians, he is trading short-term terrorist deaths for the possibility that our policies will create more terrorists in the long run. It’s a tradeoff some people consider prudent; but that’s different from saying he is “winning the propaganda war.” In fact, the predictable effect of some of his policies is to increase hatred of the U.S.”

Meanwhile, foreign policy specialist – and Salma Hayek fan – Daniel Drezner is unimpressed.

Anti-SOPA blackout

Wikipedia will be going offline tomorrow to protest against the Stop Online Piracy Act. So will Reddit. This kind of protest could have some effect because ordinary Wikipedia users from all points in the political hyperspace will be told just what a terrible idea SOPA is, and a lot of them will get it.

CNET has a useful FAQ about SOPA.

The Fox News – Wall Street Journal debate

The best debater was, without doubt, Newt Gingrich. He would tear Barack Obama apart in a debate.

A good way of understanding just how good a debater Gingrich is may be to compare him to Ron Paul – someone whose opinions I often agree with more than I do with the opinions of Newt Gingrich.

Ron Paul was asked about a radio interview where he appeared to say that Bin Laden should not have been killed by the Navy Seals (I, and a lot of other people, predicted that he would be asked such questions by Obama if Ron Paul was the nominee).

The only way out of such a position is to apologize for one’s confused speech and say “OF COURSE BIN LADEN SHOULD HAVE BEEN SHOT”.

Instead we got a long complicated reply, comparing (at one point) Islamist terrorists in Pakistan to Chinese dissenters in the United States, and saying that the reason that people attack the United States is “because we bomb their countries all the time”.

And on and on (Taliban allies against the Soviets – the Taliban hardly existed at the time, Taliban totally different from Bin Laden’s supporters NOT TRUE THEY HAVE THE SAME THEOLOGY, and…).

Ron I agree with you that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have proved to be a mistake – and I was still almost booing at the television screen as you spoke (a lot of people actually present at the debate could not stop themselves booing you – how you spoke was just so offensive). I agree with your policies (on just about everything), but they way you express yourself…….. You do not just sound silly (and make errors of fact) you actually sound hostile to the United States and the West in general. As if you were an enemy of the West – you are not, but you sound as if you were.

And Newt Gingrich – he told a brief story about Andrew Jackson and “killing the enemies of America” and had everyone cheering him. As he did on virtually everything else…

“But he is still wrong about the issues” – no more wrong than Mitt Romney, Rick Perry (less than one percent of the vote in New Hampshire) and Rick Santorum. And he can debate vastly better than they can.

Still it is all pointless now.

Neither Rick Santorum or (even) Rick Perry will get out of the race and endorse Gingrich – which means that Mitt Romney will win on Saturday.

And that means it is over.

The candidate with the least good economic plan (although light years better than Obama) and the person who, when asked if he would support the new Obama law that allows imprisonment (without time limit) of citizens suspected of supporting enemies of the United States – said “yes” (and meant it).

People are to “trust in the good character” of the President not to “abuse this power” – well that is fine, let us see the end of what is left of the rule of law at once. As long as the President is of “good character”.

Oh well at least Goldman Sachs and J.P. Morgan Chase will be pleased.

I hear they have switched some of their support from Barack to Mitt – what a good sign of high moral character. Almost as good as being against abortion (as the most senior Elder of the Morman Church in Massachusetts), then being “pro choice” when in politics in Massachusetts, then being against abortion again (when running for the Republican nomination for President). Oh well my “do not say nasty things about Mitt” New Year’s Resolution did not last long – but he is going to be nominee after Saturday, so it is a last negative statement before I (and everyone else interested in defending the West) have to rally behind this man’s banner.

One must draw a sharp distinction between the person of the King (as a human being) and “the Crown”. In the clash against the Marxists, Mitt Romney will be “King” after Saturday (the Coronation is not till the Convention, but a King is King before his coronation) – so his personal imperfections will have to be overlooked, the oaths that I (and so many others) have taken to defend the West against the totalitarians, will bind us to him in the contest (regardless of what terrible end this riding leads to). The choice of not following the banner will still exist – but not as an honourable choice. The statement “the King will lead us to our deaths” may be true – but it is also irrelevant. After all the enemy will still be in the field, seeking to flee (on the grounds that the commander of our own army is useless) is just a “cop out”. When the banner is formally raised one follows the banner – even if it leads into a narrow valley, with the enemy in front and on both flanks. One can advice against it – one can even call the King an idiot to his face. But fleeing is not really an option – neither in honour (leaving everyone else to die), or in practicality (for the enemy will follow after they have done their business – in reality there is no real place to hide). And defeat is not predetermined – if one attacks fast enough (and fortune turns in one’s favour), one may be able to cut one’s way through, before the enemy has time to react.

To turn to lighter matters…. or, at least, the same matters expressed in a lighter tone.

Max Keiser (and the rest of the dodgy people) will be overjoyed – they are already using their “two Dollar whore” lines (and so on) against Romney. The attacks on Bain Capital may be unfair – but “loading companies with debt so that they fail after you walk away with millions” was a line used against Romney by the Wall Street Journal questioner, the left will use it also (and much more). They will love it when he is the nominee.

Which he will be.

Mr Romney’s background in creative destruction

“Certainly there is a need for free-market economics to be rescued from those who distort and discredit it, but that is the argument that must be made: that this system has delivered mass prosperity (and the self-determination that comes with it) on a scale unprecedented in human history, and that it deserves to be saved from the spoilers.”

Janet Daley, writing with justified scorn about those people who have been bashing Mitt Romney for his career in venture capital at Bain. To be honest, his background in this area is one of the few things going for him. It would be quite refreshing to have a president of the United States who can actually read a balance sheet.

For those who have not come across the “creative destruction” line before and how it applies to sometimes wrenching change in business, check out the great Joseph Schumpeter.

As a caveat, I should add that some – but no means most – private equity buyouts of firms have been made possible by cheap credit, and therefore might not have occurred in the way they did had interest rates not been how they were in the past decade or so. On a related point, here is what I wrote in defence of private equity at Samizdata several years ago. Excerpt:

“In the main, what these firms do is target cash-rich firms that are run by often lazy executives who have presided over crappy business decisions. Take the meltdown of Marconi a few years ago, one of Britain’s most famous companies. That was a listed company. The destruction of value and jobs in that company remains, in my mind, one of the most disgraceful episodes in British corporate history and who knows, it might have been saved from making big errors had a private equity fund been in charge, rather than deluded executives. Private equity firms helped stymie Deutsche Börse’s foolish bid for the London Stock Exchange 2 years ago, and have turned around businesses. They typically buy and hold a firm for 5 years or more, take a hands-on approach to running firms before spinning them off to another buyer or floating them in an IPO. So Will Hutton should spare us sentimental guff about how limited liability firms floated on the stock exchange represent the perfect model of doing business or something that Adam Smith or Voltaire would exalt. They are merely one of the many ways in which economic activity manifests itself. As interest rates rise and the economic cycle turns, some of the excesses of leveraged buyouts will fade and private equity transactions will decline.”

Why the military like Ron Paul

Some commenters on this blog got more than a little sniffy when I had a few critical things to see about Ron Paul the other day. I stand by my remarks, which actually were hardly the sort of fire-eating stuff that some people come up with, but I’ll happily repeat my respect for his genuine good points, as I see them.

David French, over at National Review, has an interesting item reflecting on why, of all GOP candidates, and of Obama himself, Ron Paul gets more respect in financial terms from the serving military. Here is the final paragraph:

“I know there are many other reasons why troops support Ron Paul (quite a few embrace libertarian economic principles), but this post is an attempt to explain his support within a national-security framework — how some of the most hardened warriors I know enthusiastically embrace a man whom others say is soft on national security. They don’t see him as soft. They see him as realistic. I disagree (strongly), but it’s an argument that won’t be defeated by ridicule, and it’s an argument grounded in a cultural reality that few Americans have experienced.”

Tactical wisdom from Mark Meckler

One of the more dispiriting processes I regularly notice in confrontations between Good and Evil is when Evil concedes that it has done something evil, and Good promptly turns round, in the spirit of fair play, and concedes something else evil. It’s like Good is a football team, and when it goes one-nil up, it feels that the fair thing to do is to give the other fellows a goal. To make a game of it. Or something.

So, for instance, if Evil concedes that, I don’t know, “socialism hasn’t turned out very well in practice”, Good, in a burst of bonhomie and generosity and brotherhood-of-manliness, concedes that socialism was a nice idea “in theory”.

No it wasn’t. An idea that turns out badly in practice is a bad idea. Especially if the badness was a predictable and predicted consequence of that bad idea.

Often, in circumstances like these, Evil even asks for an equalising goal.

Evil offers a pairing of ideas – good twinned with evil, like socks emerging from the laundrette – as a package: “I’ll concede that socialism has turned out badly in practice if you concede that socialism is a nice theory.”

The proper way to behave, if you are Good, and go one-nil up in an argument, is to press for a two-nil lead.

The proper response to going one-nil up in the above argument about the practice and theory of socialism is to say: “Socialism has indeed turned out badly in practice. Now, about this evil notion of yours that socialism is a nice theory. Let’s talk about that. And let’s you admit that you are wrong about that also. We told you you were wrong from the start, and we were right that you were wrong. We predicted that socialism would turn out badly in practice, on account of it being a bad theory. You pressed on. You were wrong. In theory as well as in practice.”

Like I say, press for two-nil.

So, all hail to Mark Meckler. (And further hail to Instapundit for linking to the story, today, and earlier.)

Meckler, arriving in New York and learning that he must not carry a gun, handed his gun over to the New York goons. (That much, he was willing to concede.) The goons promptly arrested him, for carrying the gun up to the point where he stopped carrying it, or something.

Faced with a determined Meckler, and a huge outcry of rage and contempt from the forces of Good, the New York goons have dropped their evil charges. One-nil to Meckler. But Meckler is now being subjected to another evil injustice. The goons still have his gun, and are refusing to return it.

Instead of thanking the goons for being so nice about not arresting him any more, Meckler now wants his gun back. Quite right. New York goons, give the man his gun back! (This is now an international campaign. I am international and I now say this.)

Saying “now give me back my gun” is not only the good thing for Good Mr Meckler to do; it is also excellent tactics. He is now one-nil up. He faces the chance to score another goal, and go two-nil up against the forces of Evil. He is now pressing to do just that.

Quite right. When you have argumentative momentum, against a team that is saying (or in this case also doing) not just one bad thing but many bad things, use it. Thereby keep it, and build it.

When the New York goons do hand back Meckler’s gun, if they ever do (and actually, even if they don’t), the proper next response, from all of us who have now rallied around Meckler, is: “Now, about all these other gun-carrying people, against whom you have not dropped the charges, and whose guns you have not returned …” Three-nil. Four-nil. Five-nil …

If the New York goons don’t hand back Meckler’s gun, perhaps because they sense that if they do, Meckler’s team will then get more momentum, then the New York goons will be digging their heels in in an argument that they will hate but which the Meckler team will relish.

Also good. Shame about the stolen gun, but also good.

Is Canada’s political class turning decisively against the AGW alarmists?

Now and again, when the subject of environmental alarmism comes up, someone – such as the likes of me – might wonder when, or whether, a mainstream, high-profile politician in an important country will get up and stick it to the Green lobby. For perhaps obvious economic reasons, given its vast natural resources, Canada seems to be the country where this is starting to seriously happen. Consider this report (Reuters):

On the eve of public hearings into a proposed oil pipeline from Alberta’s tar sands to the Pacific Coast, the Canadian government lashed out on Monday at what it said were foreign-funded radical groups opposing the project. The comments by Natural Resources Minister Joe Oliver were another sign of the pressures mounting against Enbridge Inc’s proposed C$5.5 billion ($5.4 billion) Northern Gateway pipeline. Canada’s right-leaning Conservative government, which says the pipeline would help diversify energy exports away from the United States and more towards Asia, says activists are clogging up the regulatory process.

There’s more:

“Unfortunately, there are environmental and other radical groups that would seek to block this opportunity to diversify our trade,” Oliver said in a statement. “These groups threaten to hijack our regulatory system to achieve their radical ideological agenda … They use funding from foreign special interest groups to undermine Canada’s national economic interest.” Ottawa and the oil industry are particularly interested in Northern Gateway after Washington delayed a decision on approving TransCanada Corp’s Keystone XL pipeline, which would transport oil sands crude from Alberta to Texas.

Of course, it goes without saying that the UK government is a million miles from this sort of rhetoric, with the partial exception to how ministers sometimes try to push aside environmental concerns that are raised about various transport or other projects. In these cases, though, there are legitimate private property rights issues as stake (such as the use of compulsory purchase powers to make way for something like a high-speed rail link). And as for AGW alarmism in particular, there is yet no sign of a major political figure realising how many votes might be won in confronting this.

Rick Santorum: Left-wingers are too libertarian, destroying America with their freedom

This video makes for hilarious – if frustrating – viewing. Leading Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum ludicrously posits that left-wingers in America are massive advocates for too much freedom…and cites this as a problem.

Richard Nikoley sums up the vile Santorum thusly:

[L]eave it to far-right, fundamentally religious Christians to come full circle, meeting up with commies—in true East meets West fashion—to declare that America is not really about the pursuit of happiness, and that freedom really means freedom to be responsible and subservient to the values dictated to you by on high (or Santorum, his Congregation and extended brethren).

If Santorum and his ilk keep forcing me to agree with left-wingers – in this case, that Santorum is pure evil – it is going to be a very, very long election year.

Iowa

A very interesting night, and a fairly inconclusive one unless you were in the bottom tier. There is no clear front runner in the Republican camp and one can essentially look at it as three candidates with roughly a quarter of the votes each… and all the rest divvying up the few leftover scraps in the remaining quarter. The fact that we have two top tier candidates in the race who are not that progressive guy from Massachusetts is perhaps the most important outcome of the night.

The outcome is good in another way: with any kind of luck we could end up with a libertarian sitting in the catbird seat in a brokered convention, assuming of course that he does not surprise us all and win it. I do not think many libertarians are expecting that. The concept of winning is a thing to be slowly approached and gotten used to for most of us. So I will not make any assumptions of grandeur. I will only say we have a good shot at a situation where we have a libertarian in the GOP with substantial power at the convention. He will be able to push them our way and at the same time we have an excellent candidate in the LP itself pushing them from the outside. This should have the GOP strategists wondering how to attract voters from our ranks.

The answer to that question is really simple: drop the Big Statism. Make the repeal of the entirety of Obamacare a priority; and for damn sure stop this mandate talk. If you want even a sidewise glance from us, just drop it and pretend you never even thought about it. Individual Mandate is a poison pill for the GOP and the sooner they realise it, the better off we all will be.

PS: You may have noticed that I have gone MSM journalists one better: I wrote this entire Iowa article without mentioning ANY of the candidate names. Those pikers can only manage to ignore one.

Romney throws the election

Romney may have just lost the election for the Republicans. If he is going to stand behind Individual Mandate, then why not vote for a real socialist? Why not just let someone who walks the walk drive things to their disastrous conclusion rather than allowing the left to point to a ‘conservative’ and blame the failures of socialism on him?

If it is a given that Romney will be the Republican candidate, then come next fall I will vote for Republicans in the House and Senate and Obama for President in hopes that libertarian, tea party and conservative types can dominate the Legislative Branch and fight the Executive Branch every step of the way. If Romney were in, they would have to at least give a show of support for ‘their’ President. Let us shoot for total war between the branches of government as our best option for preserving liberty.

The government which governs least is best… even if it is because they are too busy fighting amongst themselves to govern at all.