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.
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I’ve been watching a series on BBC-2 called “The Seven Industrial Wonders of the World”. Tonight’s episode was the story of the Hoover Dam which was built during the ‘made in Washington DC’ depression era of the 1930’s. The Beeb did a mostly bang-up job and filled in much interesting detail on the harsh and dangerous condition the workers endured.
They showed the Bosses versus the Union. The organizer and everyone with him got fired and run off the job site. Many workers had serious health disabilities caused by working in improperly ventilated tunnels with gasoline powered machinery packed to the rafters. The company claimed illnesses were pneumonia when they were plainly caused by Carbon Monoxide poisoning.
One worker sued and claimed, among other things, sexual dysfunction. The nasty old bosses set a prostitute on him… and she later testified in court that his function was quite satisfactory!
The Beeb told us the heroic Union organizer was from the IWW or International Workers of the World. The Wobblies. They left out a ‘minor’ detail: the IWW was a Communist front organization. I happened to be quite aware of who they were because I gigged in a Pittsburgh South Side Bar called “Wobbly Joe’s” for many years. To those not familiar with the Pittsburgh that once was, the South Side was Steel Worker country. [Remind me to tell you the story about the night I got my tires slashed after beating a local in an impromptu drag race in my souped up MGB]
The Wobbly’s of the 1930’s were widely known to be Communists. This is no conspiracy theory. They were Reds, pure and simple. Just try a google on the terms: “IWW Communist”.
I know how Communists operate albiet (fortuneately!) not as well as some here at Samizdata who grew up under them. If this was the source of information on the Union strife at the Hoover Dam, then the information is likely as truthful as a Pravda editorial. That the BBC neglected to inform the viewing audience of this places a very big question mark on all the rest of their historical information about the working conditions and worker mistreatment.
I do not doubt things described in the documentary could be true, but I require a more trustworthy source than 1930’s Marxist-Leninists to convince me.
Bet that title grabbed you… not! I don’t normally ponder the business section of the newspaper either, being a non-earning radical unschooling parent with barely a couple of ha’pennies to rub together for heating at this time of year. However, as one of Samizdata’s resident optimists, I couldn’t help but notice this Telegraph headline warming the cockles of my heart:
FTSE rides wave of global optimism
So what? I hear you all demand. Aren’t markets notoriously fickle? Don’t share indexes go up and down like yo-yos from one moment to the next?
Well, not exactly, no. They do react over-sensitively sometimes, including to mistaken theories and red-herrings and suchlike. But they do also tell us something about how economies are doing, in a general sense. And there are few things more important to a country’s success than its economy. And free-markets succeed where controlled markets never can, which is why Eastern Europe is still hobbling its way towards the 1980’s while in the West we enjoy Gameboy Advance, ever-improving standards of living and quite a few more Wonderbras per capita than you will still find in rural Transyllvania.
And also why looking at the economic news can actually tell us something about how free our country is. If things are booming, then of course lower taxes would help them boom even more: but something else is definitely still going right regardless (probably many things, in fact).
Freedom is about more than legislation. It’s also about how the state enforces its legislation, what methods for criticising and changing the legislation are in place (democracy being the best one anyone seems to have achieved so far, definitely more efficient for spreading ideas than fascist dictatorship), and how effective people are at doing this criticising and changing. Here on Samizdata, I’d say we’re pretty good. But it would be wrong to assume that everyone is as knowledgeable (or interested) as we are in the political process and evolutionary growth: interpreting widespread disagreement with our own ideas as hard evidence that evil Marxist brainwashing plots have tainted the Nation That Once Was Great is a big logic error (file under “conspiracy theory”).
→ Continue reading: UK Business News
What a sorry state of affairs, when we are reduced to hoping that the Queen of England, a monarch, will prove to be the bulwark of liberty against the encroaching EU superstate.
The Queen is growing more concerned about Tony Blair’s plans to sign a European constitution that she fears could undermine her role as sovereign.
The Telegraph has learnt that Buckingham Palace has asked for documents highlighting the constitutional implications of the EU’s plans to be sent to her advisers.
It is believed that the Palace’s concerns focus on whether the Queen’s supreme authority as the guardian of the British constitution, asserted through the sovereignty of Parliament, could be altered or undermined by article 10 of the draft text.
This states: “The constitution and law adopted by the union’s institutions in exercising competences conferred on it shall have primacy over the law of the member states.”
Many MPs say that this will rob the House of Commons of its ultimate authority to override decisions and laws made by the EU.
I love that “many MPs.” I mean, it isn’t like they are making their interpretation up out of thin air. Isn’t that what the damn thing says in so many words?
So, fill in this American on what, if anything, the Queen can do to toss a spanner in the works. I tend to believe that liberty is preserved when power is dispersed through competing authorities. Does the old girl still have the stuff to make a difference?
Doesn’t it?
Just when you thought you’d seen it all, someone opened up with a set of twin-mounted .30-caliber machine guns, or the more lethal array of quad-mounted .50-cals in a swivel turret.
Hitchhikers’ Guide to the Galaxy fans will remember the ultimate cocktail drink; the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster. Imbibing this infectious blend was like being hit in the head by a slice of lemon wrapped around a large gold brick. But does the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster remain the ultimate cocktail? I think I may have stumbled across something even stronger.
Imagine a blowtorch. A really fierce one glowing bluely in the dark. Turn it up a little, hear that roar. Stuff a small lemon into the top of an Irish whiskey flagon. Lay the flagon on its side, perhaps propped up on some old hitchhiking towels, and place the blowtorch against the flagon’s newly exposed underside. Retire to an unsafe distance. When the flagon explodes, try to catch the whiskey-flavoured lemon between your teeth. Suck it and see what you think. Because that’s what it’s like reading Hans-Hermann Hoppe’s book, Democracy: The God That Failed, first published in 2001. As the latest professor of economics at the University of Nevada, and senior fellow of the Ludwig von Mises institute, this book out-Rothbards Hoppe’s old Austrian mentor, Uncle Murray Rothbard. Did you even imagine this was possible? Check this:
The mass of people, as La Boetie and Mises recognised, always and everywhere consists of “brutes”, “dullards”, and “fools”, easily deluded and sunk into habitual submission. Thus today, inundated from early childhood with government propaganda in public schools and educational institutions by legions of publicly certified intellectuals, most people mindlessly accept and repeat nonsense such as that democracy is self-rule and government is of, by, and for the people.
Schwing, Baby. And that’s just the warm-up. Try this, if you like your lemon juice even sharper:
Hence, the decision by members of the [libertarian] elite to secede from and not cooperate with government must always include the resolve of engaging in, or contributing to, a continuous ideological struggle, for if the power of government rests on the widespread acceptance of false indeed absurd and foolish ideas, then the only genuine protection is the systematic attack of these ideas and the propagation and proliferation of true ones.
Sounds like a great idea for a web site.
And if you like it really rough, try this:
As a result of subsidizing the malingerers, the neurotics, the careless, the alcoholics, the drug addicts, the Aids-infected, and the physically and mentally challenged through insurance regulation and compulsory health insurance, there will be more illness, malingering, neuroticism, carelessness, alcoholism, drug addiction, Aids infection, and physical and mental retardation.
Crazy, dude. → Continue reading: Hans-Hermann Hoppe: Walking on the wild side
H. R. 3245, a bill to streamline the regulatory framework under which the new suborbital tourist business will operate, has been submitted to Congress by Dana Rohrabacher (R-Ca).
Dana has a somewhat libertarian background (or so I was told by a staffer of his from early days) but has become more a conservative Republican over the years. He still shares many ideals with us. He is also one of the few who actively support commercial space development. This is not to say it is opposed by many; most in Congress don’t particularly give a damn.
You can read the bill here, but this summarizes it nicely:
The Secretary of Transportation shall take appropriate efforts, including realignment of personnel and resources, to create a streamlined, cost-effective, and enabling regulatory framework for the United States commercial human spaceflight industry. The Secretary of Transportation shall clearly distinguish the Department’s regulation of air commerce from its regulation of commercial human spaceflight, and focus the Department’s regulation of commercial human spaceflight activities on protecting the safety of the general public, while allowing spaceflight participants who have been trained and meet license-specific standards to assume an informed level of risk. Not later than 6 months after the date of enactment of this Act, the Secretary of Transportation shall transmit to the Congress a report on the progress made in implementing this section.
If you are in the US, you may want to encourage your congresscritter to support it. The bill has inputs from many in the commercial space advocacy community, Among them are a number who actually run the small companies who will be most liberated by a simpler and clearer regulatory framework.
We might wish for a zero regulation policy, but that is not the world we are living in. Still, we can push legislation in the direction of clarity and minimalism.
Despite the presence of many excellent Canadians in the blogosphere (such as this splendid chap) I don’t know all that much about Canada. My first and only visit to that country was some fifteen years ago and rarely does Canada merit any coverage in the UK media.
However, from what little I have learned I get the impression that it is a country where the left-of-centre political culture is pretty much set in stone and the ruling (and misnamed) ‘Liberal Party’ is a perennial electoral shoe-in.
Could that be about to change?
The leaders of Canada’s two rival right-wing parties said on Wednesday they were very close to agreeing on a merger to form a united conservative movement to challenge the ruling Liberal Party.
Canadian Alliance leader Stephen Harper pulled out of a town hall meeting in his hometown of Calgary, Alberta, to fly back to Ottawa for talks with Peter MacKay, leader of the Progressive Conservatives.
“We haven’t (yet) come to an arrangement but we’ve had some very positive talks and I expect to have some more very shortly, and I am very optimistic about things developing,” Harper told reporters at Calgary airport.
“It’s not often that the political landscape is altered in a big way so quickly but I think we’re very close to doing that,” he said. The tentative name for the united party would be the Conservative Party of Canada.
Interesting as far as it goes but it does beg quite a few questions, such as:
1. Is this ‘merger’ likely to happen or is this all aimless flapping?
2. If it does succeed then is the Conservative Party of Canada going to commit to rolling back the Canadian state?
And….
Polls give the Liberals the same support as all four opposition parties combined, but also show that a single right-wing party could mount a serious challenge.
3. What are their chances of climbing that electoral mountain any time soon or at all?
Wait a minute, I thought it was George Bush who was supposed to be the new Hitler:
Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad has called on Muslims to use brains as well as brawn to fight Jews who “rule the world”.
“The Europeans killed six million Jews out of 12 million. But today the Jews rule this world by proxy… 1.3 billion Muslims cannot be defeated by a few million Jews,” he said, speaking at the opening of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference in the Malaysian administrative capital Putrajaya.
Well, at least he’s not a holocaust-denier. Anyway, he has probably been driven to desperation by the Zionist occupation of..er, Malaysia.
Some people are just so selfish. Rather than queue patiently for their state ration of bread and cabbage, they’ll conjour up all sorts of ruses to get an unfair advantage: [from the UK Times]
A GRANDMOTHER at the end of her tether after waiting seven months for an operation mixed cranberry juice with crumbled biscuits to simulate her own blood and dialled 999 for an ambulance.
After claiming to have been vomiting blood, Trizka Litton, 62, was taken to Walsgrave Hospital in Coventry. The mother of three got rid of her fake blood, which she was carrying in a plastic container, before it could be tested and underwent surgery to remedy a serious hiatus hernia.
Obviously an extreme right-winger and an enemy of the people.
“I carried a heavy burden of guilt and shame at being forced to cheat and lie,” Mrs Litton said, “but that vanished when doctors told me just how near death I had been.”
Well, in the circumstances I suppose this indiscretion can be overlooked. But anymore tricks like that and it’s re-education for her.
PRIVACY INTERNATIONAL
MEDIA RELEASE
LEGAL BLOW TO UK GOVERNMENT’S “SNOOPERS CHARTER”
Retention of phone and Internet records breaches European human rights law
15th October 2003
EMBARGOED UNTIL 11 PM, WEDNESDAY 15th OCTOBER 2003
Details of a legal Opinion announced today has dealt a blow to Home Office plans to snoop on the phone and Internet activity of the UK population.
The Opinion, which relates to an EU framework directive on the retention of communications data, has profound ramifications for ten EU states that have implemented, or are planning to implement, measures to place communications users under blanket surveillance. The UK is in the early stages of implementing such measures.
A series of regulations (Statutory Instruments) recently laid before the UK Parliament intends to create a legal basis for comprehensive surveillance of communications. The regulations will allow an extensive list of public authorities access to records of individuals’ telephone and Internet usage. This “communications data” — phone numbers and e-mail addresses contacted, web sites visited, locations of mobile phones, etc. – will be available to government without any judicial oversight. Not only does government want access to this information, but it also intends to oblige companies to keep personal data just in case it may be useful.
The twenty-page legal Opinion was commissioned by Privacy International and was provided by the international law firm Covington & Burling. It has unequivocally concluded that such plans would be unlawful.
The Opinion states: “The data retention regime envisaged by the (EU) Framework Decision, and now appearing in various forms at the Member State level, is unlawful.
“Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) guarantees every individual the right to respect for his or her private life, subject only to narrow exceptions where government action is imperative. The Framework Decision and national laws similar to it would interfere with this right, by requiring the accumulation of large amounts of information bearing on individuals’ private activities. This interference with the privacy rights of every user of European-based communications services cannot be justified under the limited exceptions envisaged by Article 8 because it is neither consistent with the rule of law nor necessary in a democratic society.
The Opinion continues: “The indiscriminate collection of traffic data offends a core principle of the rule of law: that citizens should have notice of the circumstances in which the State may conduct surveillance, so that they can regulate their behaviour to avoid unwanted intrusions. Moreover, the data retention requirement would be so extensive as to be out of all proportion to the law enforcement objectives served. Under the case law of the European Court of Human Rights, such a disproportionate interference in the private lives of individuals cannot be said to be necessary in a democratic society.”
The Opinion details a lengthy history of case law that clearly rules against the use of indiscriminate surveillance of communications.
Privacy International today warned that it intends to pursue test cases in at least two EU countries where mandatory retention has been implemented. It is currently seeking litigants from within the communications industry.
The Opinion – along with the substance of the government’s proposals – will be debated at a public meeting hosted by the London School of Economics on Wednesday October 22nd (see http://www.privacyinternational.org/conference/sfs7/ for details and registration information). The meeting will involve speakers from the Home Office, the Department of Constitutional Affairs, the Department of Works & Pensions, Local authorities and ACPO, together with industry representatives and parliamentarians.
In two parallel actions, Privacy International today lodged a complaint with the Information Commissioner alleging that the government’s regulations and voluntary code on retention breaches at least three of the core Data Protection principles enshrined in the Data Protection Act. The complaint requests the Commissioner to take urgent action to alert the appropriate Parliamentary committees, and to support a referral to the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights Committee.
The complaint argues that the blanket retention of communications data breaches the principle of proportionality, that the practice flouts the specificity principle, and that the existence of a voluntary code for communications providers takes no account of the consent principle.
Privacy International has today also lodged an Open Government request for disclosure of the government’s legal advice relating to the regulations before the Parliament.
Simon Davies, director of Privacy International, said: “This is an important legal analysis. It clearly exposes the government’s intention not only to snoop unnecessarily on innocent people, but also to force unwilling companies to be complicit in an unprecedented and disproportionate surveillance regime”.
“The government’s plans are illegal. We are calling on all communications providers to support their customers’ rights by ignoring the government’s proposals”.
_____
Simon Davies of Privacy International can be reached for comment on 07958 466 552 (from the UK) or on (+44) 7958 466 552 (from outside the UK). Email simon@privacy.org
Copies of all documents mentioned in this release can be obtained by contacting Simon Davies.
Privacy International (PI) (www.privacyinternational.org) is a human rights group formed in 1990 as a watchdog on surveillance by governments and corporations. PI is based in London, and has an office in Washington, D.C. Together with members in 40 countries, PI has conducted campaigns throughout the world on issues ranging from wiretapping and national security activities, to ID cards, video surveillance, data matching, police information systems, and medical privacy, and works with a wide range of parliamentary and inter-governmental organisations such as the European Parliament, the House of Lords and UNESCO.
When a politician backs something “in principle”, that means he doesn’t back it, right?
Let’s hope so, because the headline at the top of this BBC report is:
Blair backs ID cards ‘in principle’
Let’s hope the rule still applies.
Here’s a strange article, by the Telegraph’s education man, John Clare, in today’s Telegraph.
It starts with lots of standard issue bad political news, about cuts and the resulting educational damage. Deranged plans for improvement, smashing down all that we’ve worked for over the last twenty years, blah, blah. The headline – “‘Government incompetence’ led to schools shedding 21,000 staff” – is all about that bad news. The usual political wreckage in other words.
But this, about one of those reports that journalists so love, is the interesting bit, I think:
The report laid much of the blame for the funding “debacle” on the “patently unfair grant culture” that the Government has imposed on schools.
It led to chronic disparities in funding, much of it allocated on an ad hoc basis to poorly conceived projects. “Schools emerge as winners or losers almost in spite of themselves,” the report said. “On the basis of some decision taken in the remoteness of Whitehall, a school can suddenly find itself receiving or being deprived of an extra £100,000 or more.”
Or, as one Inner London head put it: “Pots of money suddenly appear and disappear.” This year’s winners were failing schools, specialist schools, and schools with high proportions of pupils who are entitled to free meals and achieve poor exam results.
Okay, I don’t know what’s really going on here, but here’s my guess. What we see here is government activity done by people who have been pummelled with free market ideology and have accepted that free markets, although politically impossible to actually have, are nevertheless worth learning from. So the responses of consumers are faked by issuing that deluge of directives from London that I spent about a third to a half of my education blog complaining about. These directives give you extra money if you do what London says are good “outcomes”, and less if you don’t. Like in the free market, right?
Well, not really. These directives don’t actually have even the crude rationality of the free market. They aren’t actually the same as actual consumer demands, so instead of satisfied or unsatisfied customers giving you more or less money, you just get a kind of permanent government organised lottery. This month, the winning number is: Schools who are crap but considered by London to be getting better! If that’s you, you win! But, if your school is good but not considered by London to be getting any better, you lose! Next month, it’ll be something different. Next month it’ll be: Maths! Or: Languages! Or: The Obesity Directive! Or: Social Inclusion! Or: (Socially?) Excluding bullies, in response to the government’s Bullying Directive! And through it all, win or lose, you have to fill in form after form after form, because if you don’t even do that much in response to each bullying directive, you definitely lose.
When Tony Blair uses the word “reform” in connection with education, it is this process that he is referring to, and he wants more of it, but done better.
That’s what I think may be going, but it’s only me guessing really. Anyone with any better ideas?
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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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