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

Society is something emergent that occurs when people interact with each other, you cannot point at it and you cannot owe it anything. When any politician says the word ‘society’, you can be damn sure what he really means is ‘the state’.
– Perry de Havilland

“More will mean worse”

An unfunded pension is like a university education. If everyone has one, you can’t expect it to be worth anything.

Samizdata quote of the day

Mr Drucker says that modern government can do only two things well: wage war and inflate the currency. It’s the aim of my administration to prove Mr Drucker wrong.

– Richard Nixon

Samizdata quote of the day

Actually, I have had some very good experiences with extra large prawns.

– Michael Jennings

Samizdata quote of the year

“If the French social model is so great, why is the country in flames?”
– Peter Mendelson in an off the cuff remark before talks with Philippe Douste-Blazy, French foreign minister.

Samizdata quote of the day

Among a fringe community of paranoids, aluminum helmets serve as the protective measure of choice against invasive radio signals. We investigate the efficacy of three aluminum helmet designs on a sample group of four individuals. Using a $250,000 network analyser, we find that although on average all helmets attenuate invasive radio frequencies in either directions (either emanating from an outside source, or emanating from the cranium of the subject), certain frequencies are in fact greatly amplified. These amplified frequencies coincide with radio bands reserved for government use according to the Federal Communication Commission (FCC). Statistical evidence suggests the use of helmets may in fact enhance the government’s invasive abilities. We speculate that the government may in fact have started the helmet craze for this reason.

– Ali Rahimi, Ben Recht, Jason Taylor, and Noah Vawter of MIT, getting down to the really important research. I wonder what they think of lampshades? (Link from Scott Wickstein).

Samizdata quote of the day

“No man in the country is under the smallest obligation, moral or other, so to arrange his legal relations to his business or property as to enable the Inland Revenue to put the largest possible shovel in his stores. The Inland Revenue is not slow – and quite rightly – to take every advantage which is open to it under the taxing statutes for the purpose of depleting the taxpayer’s pocket. And the taxpayer is in like manner entitled to be astute to prevent, so far as he honestly can, the depletion of his means by the Inland Revenue.”

– The Lord President Clyde, 1929

Samizdata quote of the vote

“We are not living in a police state”

Tony Blair, asking MPs to support police detention without charge for up to 90 days.

Never believe anything until it has been officially denied.

Samizdata quote of the day

“So promoting wealth creation – at home and abroad – means changing the climate of opinion so that politicians and bureaucrats who argue for measures that damage business and economic competitiveness are less likely to succeed. In short, we need to campaign for capitalism. To promote profit. To fight for free trade. To remind, indeed to educate our citizens about the facts of economic life. The message is simple – you cannot win the battle against red tape unless you win the intellectual and cultural battle for open markets.”

David Cameron MP

Samizdata quote of the day

As masters of their estates, the rioters cock their legs and piss molotovs to provide the reek of burnt plastic that serves as their territorial marker.
Philip Chaston

Samizdata quote of the day

With hindsight it can be stated that the outcome of the Industrial Revolution was that human beings no longer needed to go out and grab other people’s possessions by force, but merely to settle down, work hard and exchange the considerable surplus they produced for something they wanted from the surplus someone else produced. How simple it all seems! Yet how hard to put into practice.

Findlay Dunachie (1928-2005 – his funeral is today) in The Success of the Industrial Revolution and the Failure of Political Revolutions: How Britain Got Lucky, page 6, published in 1996 by the Libertarian Alliance.

Samizdata quote of the day

“The Bush administration is the most dangerous force that has ever existed. It is more dangerous than Nazi Germany because of the range and depth of its activities and intentions worldwide.”

2005 Nobel Prize winner Harold Pinter, displaying an interesting sense of historical perspective.