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There are so many things to do these days, especially in a place like London, that often you make up your mind about what to do of an evening at the very last moment. So, maybe you have the coming Tuesday evening, tomorrow, March 17th, still free. If you do, I strongly recommend the Libertarian Alliance’s 2nd Annual Chris R. Tame Memorial Lecture, which this year will be given by Professor Kevin Dowd.
Getting on for a hundred people have already signed up to attend this event, in other words quite a few more than showed up for last year’s inaugural Chris Tame lecture given by David Myddleton. But there is room for more still. Attendance is free of charge. All the organisers ask is, if you want to be there, email them beforehand. Follow the link at the top of this for all the details of the event, and for the email to confirm attendance.
What excites me about this lecture is that Dowd is both an unswerving libertarian, and an expert on banking, on the history of banking and on the baleful effects over the decades of state monopoly fiat money and of banking regulation. This is a man who not only believes in the idea of a free market in currencies and in banking, but someone who can actually explain in detail why that would be a better arrangement than anything else now being proposed. He also has firm and positive views about what should immediately be done, right now, to alleviate the crisis. And because he is a Professor, he has some leverage for getting his ideas reported in the mainstream media.
Having been looking forward to this event for several months, I now realise that I have, infuriatingly, a teaching commitment set in concrete for that very same evening. But the good news for me, and for anyone else who won’t be able to attend the lecture in person, is that it will be videoed, and video internetted just as soon as that can be contrived. You may depend upon me to have further things to say about this potentially very important lecture just as soon as that video is available and linkable to.
Can we win the ideological war that now swirls about the current financial catastrophes? Personally I remain optimistic about this possibility, but whether we can actually win or not, we should surely try to win. And those of us who conveniently can should surely support those people, like Kevin Dowd, who are making the biggest efforts to this end. Most of Samizdata’s readers do not live in London and can’t be at this lecture in person, although lots are Londoners and could. But, Londoners or not, I very much hope that a healthy proportion of us will at least give the video our closest attention. Meanwhile, I am sure that almost all of you will join with me in wishing Professor Dowd all the best for tomorrow evening.
It’s like a parallel universe out there. Politicians, newspaper journalists and television presenters are running around like headless chickens with no clue as to how to deal with the economic crisis. But the truth is out there.
Things are quite different from the recession of the 1970’s, which coincided with my discovery of libertarianism and Austrian School economics. Back then one had to be extraordinarily lucky to come across the likes of Mises, Hayek and Rothbard. Now correct explanations of why the crisis arose are just a few clicks away.
– David Farrer
But the internet is a city and, like any great city, it has monumental libraries and theatres and museums and places in which you can learn and pick up information and there are facilities for you that are astounding – specialised museums, not just general ones.
But there are also slums and there are red light districts and there are really sleazy areas where you wouldn’t want your children wandering alone …
And I think people must understand that about the internet – it is a new city, it’s a virtual city and there will be parts of it of course that they dislike, but you don’t pull down London because it’s got a red light district.
That’s Stephen Fry talking, which I spotted here. This got posted at almost exactly the same time as the one below. Never mind. Both are worth having. And I am sure that Jon Coupal would agree that those wanting to castrate the internet make copious use of children to do it, just as others use children to boost their budgets.
“The trouble is that because schools fail to teach history, especially legal and constitutional history, the vast majority of today’s citizens have no inkling to what they owe their liberty and prosperity, namely a long and successful struggle for the rights of which the right to property is the most fundamental. They are therefore unaware what debilitating effect the restrictions on property rights wil, over the long run, have on their lives.”
– Richard Pipes, Property and Freedom, page 291.
Of course, by property, one does not just mean physical property, but also to the whole idea that individuals, not the state, own their lives.
Are you optimistic about the future? Several months ago I was not, but I am now. From what I can see, governments are walking down the path of their complete moral and financial bankruptcy far more quickly than I ever imagined they would. I thought that it would take our overmighty governments several slow, demoralising decades of decline and eventual collapse to completely discredit their authority and control in the eyes of the people. However, our governments appear to be going supernova right now and I suspect they will burn themselves out over a few painful and tumultuous years – destroying a great deal of wealth in the process, no doubt. However, as worrying as that prospect is, it was always going to be that way. And in spite of that, I feel particularly upbeat about the longer term future. Those who know nothing more (and expect nothing less) than widespread government authority and control over all aspects of our lives will have their imbecile – sorry, umbilical – cords to the State cut sooner than expected, thanks to the overwhelmingly reckless (but entirely predictable) government response to the current financial crisis. I really do believe that future historians will pinpoint this crisis as marking the beginning of the end of the big-government era.
Do you agree?
One of the best journalists out there, Claudia Rosett, responds to the dimwit assertion in parts of the MSM that “We are all socialists now”. Quite. I would also be happy to see someone write denying that “we” are all Keynesians now, by the way. Who is supposed to be the “we” is never quite explained. It is just assumed by the issuers of such pronouncements that all those in positions of power and influence have signed on to a particular world view.
Rosett, as I remember, did great work in helping to expose that sink of corruption and double-dealing that was the Oil For Food Program of the United Nations, yet another reason for shutting down that organisation.
I just watched this BBC Horizon programme, about cannabis.
Many who favour the legalisation of cannabis base their case on the claim that cannabis is less harmful than is widely assumed. It is less bad than you think, they say, in fact very good. For me, the case for legalisation does not depend on any claim about riskiness or lack of it, but rather on the idea that individuals should be allowed to decide for themselves about the risks they take, and about how pleasurable the pleasures are that they take these risks to enjoy. Not myself having any plans to take cannabis, I have tended to remain rather ignorant of the details of the riskiness argument, because I just do not think that this is what matters, any more than I favour denationalised washing machine businesses (which I do), because of and following long years spent studying the internal workings of washing machines.
But being a libertarian, I inevitably come across screeds about cannabis, of which this splendid rant (linked to from here yesterday by Johnathan Pearce) is a fine example. Spurred on by this rant, I watch the BBC show. I dozzed off during some of it, but still learned quite a lot. → Continue reading: Late night thoughts about cannabis
This topic will be familiar to a few readers, as will one of its main protagonists, Patri Friedman. But via the excellent Alex Massie blog at the Spectator, is this interesting fresh take on the issue, in a Wired article about the topic of seasteading and politics.
It is easy to scoff at such things – as scoffers no doubt laugh at other attempts by people to get away from governments they dislike. But it always struck me as valuable to get the meme out there that existing national borders are not sacrosanct, and that they can and should be challenged. The earth is a big place. Why should its current divisions be regarded as sacrosanct? The way things are going, it pays to think of options, such as these guys.
I have felt for some time now that for all its many faults – and there were many – the UK’s traditional Labour movement, with its desire to see prosperity for all, was likely to be deeply at odds with the Greens. Yes, the former, with its foolish confidence in central planning, redistributive taxes and the rest, had some shockingly silly ideas, but at least it wanted people to be better off, to be materially richer, for there to be more stuff about to enjoy. Indeed, having a good time was part of the idea.
As for the Greens, or at least those taking a more ‘Deep Green’ approach in ideological terms, their agenda was and is very different. It cannot be stressed too often that parts of the Green movement are profoundly reactionary. Well, it seems that some leftist commentators have joined in the voices of environmental skepticism about things such as man-made climate change. In this case, the commentator is justifiably irritated that Greens such as George “Moonbat” Monbiot have welcomed the onset of a recession, a fact that is hardly likely to go down well with traditional Labour voters scrabbling to pay a mortgage.
I think that libertarian free marketeers such as ourselves should see this as an opportunity for a spot of intellectual, friendly outreach to the more moderate, still-post Enlightenment bits of the left. There are surely fissures to be exploited. For as Paul Marks has noted below, part of the far-left has hooked up with radical Islam much in the same way as it has hooked up with the radical Greens, and for a similar purpose: a hatred of science, rationality, individualism, progress, enjoyment of this life and Man’s ability to reshape it. Islam means submission; the Greens want Man to submit to their static view of the Earth.
So, is it really very surprising that those parts of the Left that still cling to a tradition that goes back to the Enlightenment are getting irritated by all this? Or, to pick up on a theme occasionally mentioned by Samizdata commenter Ian B, this can be framed as a class issue: the deep Greens and their far-left/far-right friends are part of the ‘posh establishment’ that want to keep the nice views to themselves and bugger the unwashed.
In fact, if there is an upside to this period of economic turmoil, is that it might, just might do serious damage to part of the Green cause. Well, it’s Monday and one might as well kick off the week on an optimistic note.
Life is always better when I have a book on the go which I can hardly wait to get back to. The Blind Watchmaker by Richard Dawkins is not quite going to be that for me. Too complicated. Not central enough to the things I happen now to be interested in, probably because I already agree with it far too completely for it to grab me by the throat. But, I have recently been dipping into this book, having finally got hold of a cheap second-hand copy of it, and yesterday I came across an argument in it which I found familiar, but in another context.
Dawkins criticises Bishop Hugh Montefiore (on page 38 of my 1991 Penguin paperback edition) for again and again resorting to the argument that he just cannot believe that this or that complex organ or organism could possibly have evolved. → Continue reading: Arguments from incredulity
When I saw this:
California may accept military identification as proof of legal drinking age under legislation proposed after a group of Marines were denied service because they weren’t carrying other documents showing they were at least 21.
[…]
The legislation comes after a group of Camp Pendleton Marines attending a banquet in Temecula were refused service when none was able to produce any identification other than their military card.
The cards include the holder’s picture and date of birth. What the cards don’t have printed are height, weight and other physical characteristics, which are encoded in a magnetic strip for security purposes. Because that information isn’t visible, the cards are not officially recognized by the state as proof the person is old enough to purchase alcohol.
I thought
— Wow! an extension of personal liberty; pity it is only for state employees.
Then I thought
— ‘Wow’? Is that really the reaction to such a feeble easing of regulation? Surely there are plenty of better things happening all the time?
And I thought. And I thought. And I discovered I could not think of any significant withdrawals of the (western ‘liberal’ democratic) state from the personal lives of its citizens this side of the millennium. It is too depressing (and would involve half an hour of futile typing) to list the obvious encroachments — in 2009 so far.
Please prove me wrong by providing copious examples of liberty expanded.
Take a look at this, and scroll down for some of the comments. I still occasionally come across the sort of comments in the vein of “would it not be a good idea to stick all those yobs in the Army/whatever or make them do unpaid work?” etc, etc. These comments come up when there is a discussion about problems of our terrible young people. And this seems to be a viewpoint that transcends the usual left/right political divide: conservatives like the “get em sorted out” mindset while the left goes more for the “building a sense of community” approach. As usual, the notion that individuals are entitled to live their lives for their own sakes gets lost. I mean, that is just so damned selfish.
The issue is quite simple: if the problem is youngsters getting bored and into trouble, then the obvious solution is paid work, hence removing all the legal and tax barriers to said, such as minimum wage laws, restrictions on hiring teenagers, and so on. Acquiring the pride of getting a paycheque strikes me as far more useful in encouraging positive behaviours than some sort of conscription plan for young adults, as seems to be on the cards in the US.
And I’ll repeat my point that it is not enough just to speak out against plans to conscript 18 to 25-year-olds, for example. Proposals to make people attend schools (or whatever euphemistic words for such places exist) until they are 18, for example, is also wrong, and in many cases, counterproductive, particularly where non-academic youngsters disrupt the teaching of their fellows because they are bored senseless. Far better to encourage apprenticeships, with things like tax breaks, than keeping them in one damned education project after another.
If this idea of a young civilian corps in the US becomes fact, I wonder how many of all those young Obama fans will became disenchanted with him? But then I recall that Mr McCain, his vanquished opponent, was pretty keen on all this service stuff as well.
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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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