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Human desire is insatiable. Now, some think this is a bad thing, blaming it on greed and consumerism. But think about Mother Theresa – a saint if ever there was one. Was she greedy? Insatiable? Well, yes, she was. If she could have helped one more person, she would have. – Russ Nelson, The Angry Economist January 20th, 2008 | 24 comments - (Comments are closed)
 Whilst roaming the interweb and dozing through meetings, I have collected the Iron Laws of Human Behavior: 1. You get more of what you reward, and less of what you punish. 2. The less you know about something, the easier it looks. 3. If everything is a priority, nothing is a priority. No particular claim to originality of thought is made, but I rarely get through either a political or a business discussion without seeing one or more of them in action. I will caution the reader that noting the application of an Iron Law out loud in a business setting is not without its risks. Additional nominations and/or corollaries are hereby solicited. January 19th, 2008 | 34 comments - (Comments are closed)
At some point we Californians should ask ourselves, how we inherited a state with near perfect weather, the world’s richest agriculture, plentiful timber, minerals, and oil, two great ports at Los Angeles and Oakland, a natural tourist industry from Carmel to Yosemite, industries such as Silicon Valley, Hollywood, and aerospace—and serially managed to turn all of that into the nation’s largest penal system, periodic near bankruptcy, and sky-high taxes. – Victor Hanson Davis, as pointed out by Instapundit. This point though could be made about any community. There is no country on earth that is not voluntarily in poverty. If you choose to have an anti-wealth creating atmosphere, then you will be poor. If you choose a wealth-creating meta-context in your society, then you will have wealth. The rise of the wealthy East Asian nations, with almost none of the natural resources that bless the State of California, demonstrate that there really is no excuse. January 19th, 2008 | 11 comments - (Comments are closed)
– Paul Marks, taking no prisoners January 18th, 2008 | 18 comments - (Comments are closed)
Kill six millions Jews in Germany, your name becomes a synonym with evil. Kill between 44 and 72 million Chinese, you get a café named after you. It’s a funny old world, eh? – commenter Jill Murphy January 16th, 2008 | 91 comments - (Comments are closed)
Ron Paul is the least objectionable Republican. The second-least objectionable Republican is Fred Thompson, and if he were likely to win the nomination I might be persuaded to switch my support. All the ones who are likely to win are indistinguishable from Democrats (and some of them are Democrats on Fire for Jesus which is just all kinds of not a good idea). January 14th, 2008 | 59 comments - (Comments are closed)
The decision to go nuclear has exposed the whole environmental cause for what it is: not a well intentioned drive for clean power but a spiteful, mean-spirited drive for less power. Because less power hits richer countries and richer people the hardest. I’ve argued time and again that the old trade unionists and CND lesbians didn’t go away. They just morphed into environmentalists. The red’s become green but the goals remain the same. And there’s no better way of achieving those goals than turning the lights out and therefore winding the clock back to the Stone Age. Only when we’re all eating leaves under a hammer and sickle will they be happy. I’m serious. All the harebrained schemes for renewable energy are popular among Britain’s beardies only because they don’t work. January 13th, 2008 | 25 comments - (Comments are closed)
For, despite the warnings of the accursed health and safety apparatchiks, who enjoy nothing more than closing paths of self-discovery, the human spirit will not be tamed. That is the important lesson of Hillary’s life, a lesson that is worth passing on to children growing up in a world where everything must be measured and known. – Michael Henderson, talking about the late Sir Edmund Hillary, who died last week: January 12th, 2008 | Comments are closed
IN 2006 EMI, the world’s fourth-biggest recorded-music company, invited some teenagers into its headquarters in London to talk to its top managers about their listening habits. At the end of the session the EMI bosses thanked them for their comments and told them to help themselves to a big pile of CDs sitting on a table. But none of the teens took any of the CDs, even though they were free. “That was the moment we realised the game was completely up,” says a person who was there. – The Economist reports on the decline and fall of the music studios. January 11th, 2008 | 145 comments - (Comments are closed)
How odd it is that we in the West seem to have only two ways of thinking about politics – either supreme cynicism or supreme credulousness. – David Aranovich, who is not entirely impressed by the Barack Obama phenomenon. Count me in on that. January 8th, 2008 | 32 comments - (Comments are closed)
I’m proud to live in a culture in which I can go for a beer, shag a bird in the alley behind Spaggers’ Nite Spot, then go home and look at gay hobbit porn. These are western values. These are things our own ruling class despise. – Commenter Ian B, who has probably set a local record by having his remarks made into ‘Samizdata quote of the day’ on consecutive days. Give that man a cigar! January 7th, 2008 | 102 comments - (Comments are closed)
Imagine telling somebody twenty years ago that by 2007, it would be illegal to smoke in a pub or bus shelter or your own vehicle or that there would be £80 fines for dropping cigarette butts, or that the words “tequila slammer” would be illegal or the government would mandate what angle a drinker’s head in an advertisement may be tipped at, or that it would be illegal to criticise religions or homosexuality, or rewire your own house, or that having sex after a few drinks would be classed as rape or that the State would be confiscating children for being overweight. Imagine telling them the government would be contemplating ration cards for fuel and even foods, that every citizen would be required to carry an ID card filled with private information which could be withdrawn at the state’s whim. They’d have thought you a paranoid loon. – Samizdata commenter Ian B. We do not have to imagine these things any more, alas. The only problem with his quote is that he omitted to mention assault on jury trials, Habeas Corpus, double-jeopardy… January 6th, 2008 | 83 comments - (Comments are closed)
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