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]
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I can’t remember exactly when it was, but one evening something like a fortnight ago, David Carr, Adriana (I think she was there), Perry and I were gathered at Perry’s in the small hours of a morning and we were discussing that newly erupting Transnationalism article. The various properties and qualities and signs of Tranzis and Tranzi thoughts (we were already using David’s word, I seem to recall) were itemised. I offered the thought that Tranzis probably prefer Linux to Microsoft, but was squashed by the assembled majority. Linux is libertarian and the Tranzis don’t like that do they? Course not. I said no more.
But now have a read of this article by Steve Lohr, and then tell me I was wrong. Anti-American governmentalists everywhere (especially from the Tranzi heartland: the EU) queueing up to support the Penguin and to trash the Evil Gates, whom they regard as the personification of US corporate imperialism.
I think personal computer software is a natural global monopoly, if you’ll pardon the expression. What I mean is that at any moment there is a global winner which it makes sense for nearly everybody to use – Tranzis, anti-Tranzis, Americans, anti-Americans, everybody – simply because everybody else does. And any year now, it would seem, the world may do a switch. But I confess to being biased about this, because I placed a sort of bet four years ago in a Libertarian Alliance piece about Linux!, and if Linux ever does topple Big Bill I will look very prescient.
It is possible Iraq was involved in the Oklahoma City bombing, the first World Trade Center bombing, the Anthrax attacks and 9/11 itself. Although it is not in the list of events the media hounds are baying after, I would also toss in TWA Flight 800. I simply never bought the NTSB story on that one.
I don’t like conspiracy theories. That doesn’t mean conspiracies never happen. They do – and I am beginning to think this is one of them. Unlike most of the tales of twisted logic to be found in dusty corners of net.news groups, this one doesn’t set off my bullshit detectors. It’s perfectly plausible. Motives for all parties are believable and most importantly, the total incompetence of the authorities gives it a level of believability often missing from such tall tales. Most conspiracies theories would have us believe US government agencies are capable of keeping a secret, are highly competent and in some cases capable of intentionally doing weirdly evil things. All three are contrary to the embarrassing reality. None of the agencies are outright bad guys. They are just a bunch of buffoons led by idiots. In other words: totally normal government bureaucrats.
Saddam had a motive and would not blink an eye at mass murder. He’s quite experienced at it. He’s already used poison gas in battle against Iran and there is evidence he used bios against the Kurds back in the ’80’s. Bush Sr and Bill Clinton both had reasons for avoiding the war which would have ensued if investigations had proceeded to their conclusion.
A lot of very knowledgeable and quite “serious” people are questioning the official line now, and they have good information to back them up. It’s not even a hidden trail, just a baldly denied one. I’m not going to rewrite what can be read elsewhere. First look at this article from the Opinion Journal. Investigative reporters are digging out facts and getting affidavits which put Iraq up to their necks in Oklahoma City and the first WTC bombing. If Iraq really is running a hijacker training school with an old airframe one starts wondering about 9/11 as well.
We have known from the very beginning Atta met with Iraqi undercover agents in Prague. There have also been reports that Atta and friends stayed at a Kansas motel where Iraqi’s are purported to have been before the Oklahoma City bomb.
The Wall Street Journal and various reporters are not the only ones digging into this mess. Rep. Dan Burton of Indiana has a committee looking into who worked with McVeigh.
Earlier I mentioned TWA 800. The official explanation of this disaster was a spark in a fuel tank caused an explosion. I find this very hard to buy. The aircraft in question was just off the US coast on a trans-Atlantic flight. That means it had a full fuel load. A bigger explosion you might think? Not at all. Fuel vapor can only blow if there is a critical mixture of fuel and air. With the tanks near full, there would not have been much room for said vapor. My bullshit detectors went off like an Armageddon Day air raid siren on this one.
I’m willing to listen if someone can show me the numbers that prove a full fuel tank could explode. Until then, I reject the NTSB report.
Some intelligence types believe it was a missile. In particular there was a very good article in the November issue of Air Forces Monthly by Ronald Lewis, a former USAF and Army intelligence analyst (“War in the Shadows”, p34-p38) that is quite an interesting read. He does not finger Iraq, but does make an interesting case that we have been at war for nearly 10 years and the government has been keeping the lid on it, perhaps to avoid popular pressure for taking out Saddam Hussein.
We wouldn’t want to upset the Saudi’s.
A reader has noted a 747 would not require a full fuel load for this run. I still have not seen information on whether the Wing Center Tank was partially full and thus potentially explosive or if there is no way to vent and purge empty tanks on a 747.
I passionately believe in freedom of speech and not just for my friends but also for my enemies. Not just for people who are right but also for people who are wrong and even for people who are vile and obnoxious.
One of the many reasons for my view is that freedom of speech enables us to identify the bad guys among us. Unfettered by laws or conventions they will, in the fullness of time, display their true colours. Freedom of speech is not just desirable, it is an essential tool of survival.
I am very glad the enviro-mentalists are able to speak their minds because that enables the sane among us to learn the extent of their psychosis. Let us ponder, for a moment, on this little gem:
“Phasing out the human race will solve every problem on earth, social and environmental. — Dave Forman, Founder of Earth First!
Enviro-mentalism is not just a ‘different viewpoint’; it is a deranged, homicidal death cult and should be treated as such.
Since these people have expressed a clear (and gleeful) desire to exterminate us all, I believe it to be of the utmost importance to ensure that they never acquire the means to do so.
In the meantime, I nominate this question for debate: Is shooting an enviro-mentalist a legitimate act of self-defence?
Dr. Jan Fortune-Wood is a libertarian home educator and freelance writer who supports ‘Taking Children Seriously’. She writes in with some insightful views on the Orwellian ‘Connexions’ programme.
The nine most frightening words in the English language, Ronald Reagan is once reputed to have said, are “I’m from the government and I’m here to help.” One only has to glance at the latest brainchild of ‘joined-up government’ to know the truth of that statement. The Connexions scheme is meant to ensure that children are tracked in order to give them maximum access to the benefits everything taxation has to offer. The price tag comes in the form of an electronic card that is programmed with a complete history of the child. It is optional, no one has to join the scheme – it’s simply that learning institutions can make it a requirement for registration and it remains to be seen how many other public sector institutions will be joining in the rush for data.
This back door identity card is administered by ‘personal advisors’ (PAs) using the ‘Connexions Assessment Tool’. Based on a system used by Social Services, the tool enables PAs to assess eighteen areas of private life and ‘score’ the answers from 1 – ‘positive strengths’ to 5 – ‘critical or complex issues identified’. With just one simple tool these PAs can sum up and objectify young people under the all encompassing headings of: Life Skills
Key Skills
Basic Skills
Achievements
Participation
Substance use issues
Emotional well-being
Physical health
Income
Housing
Social & community factors
Family history & functioning
Capacity of parents/carers
Risk of offending
Relationships within family & society
Attitudes & motivation
Identity & self-image
Aspirations
When it comes to ‘exploring issues’ with the young person no category escapes scrutiny, for example ‘attitude to authority’ is ‘explored’ as a key skill for young people. As the sickening document develops, PAs are advised to look for evidence of living in a criminal environment to predict risk of offending. Blair’s advisors have not yet discovered any gifted precogniscants who can see the future and lock up offenders before they commit their crime in the manner of the recent ‘Minority Report’ Movie, but they are doing their best to decide people’s futures even without the aid of extra sensory perception.
Young people are expected to report on their parents as part of this welfare provision, telling all about the level of their parents’ aspirations for the young person, what kind of dental care they have provided and how often they are made to take a shower. Parental stability, difficulties and ‘evidence’ of substance abuse by parents, all as perceived by the young person, are all recorded.
Again and again the recurrent word is ‘appropriate’ and the document suggests that it is highly appropriate for some under trained, intrusive PA to explore a young person’s private sexual history alongside her ‘developmental progress’ and immunisation history. Moreover, this PA, fresh from her in service training course on how to be an authoritarian government lackey goes on to delve into the young person’s mental health. ‘Do you now or have you ever had suicidal thoughts?’ Does the teenager have any other juicy emotional life experiences that can be recorded for his own good? Self harm? Bereavement? Masturbation doesn’t seem to be listed, but then there is enough of that going on in this document already.
Home-educated young people are amongst the few escaping the routine invasion of this new and invidious scheme, but as they enter colleges later in their education they are being asked for details of their Connexions cards and pressurized to join the herd of electronically tagged Blairite citizen fodder. Having libertarian views would no doubt earn them a 5 score for critical and complex attitudes to authority. Living in a household where they are taken seriously as autonomous human beings able to initiate and motivate their own learning would put them well off the scale, a new class of ‘potential offenders’ in their own right. The Connexions scheme is inimical to liberty and we need to be campaigning against it vociferously before all young people are made the subjects of joined up government ‘help’.
Dr. Jan Fortune-Wood, North Wales
Well it just so happens to be Hedy Lamarr Day! I know this to be the case because Shannon Okey told me and we all know that Shannon, the veritable Lucretia Borgia of the Blogosphere, would not say such a thing if it were not so.
And just incidentally, if you are going to go and peruse the Bitter Girl site, make sure you do not miss one of the funniest blog articles in quite a while:
Tune in a decade or two from now for the year 2018 version of this post, when I take on Britney Spears’ cellulite, visible C-section scars and obvious track marks as she performs “Oops, I Did It Again!” at the MTV VMAs with Michael Jackson, who, by then, will be made entirely of plastic and have a robot monkey to guide him on and off stage.
Prescient.
I share Perry’s high opinion of Alice Bachini’s Libertarian Parent In The Countryside blog, provided only that she is able to keep it going, which it looks like she might.
Even if she doesn’t she’s already supplied many good blogules, of which my favourite so far is this, the best short explanation of the exact place of “spin” in British politics that I have yet come across:
… New Labour’s gift for spin was never what enamoured them to the British public, it’s more complicated than that; in fact, we just thought spin was what professional politicians did, and we wanted a not-totally-incompetent government to manage the economy for us, so we voted for the one that spun competently thinking maybe they were capable of adding up a few numbers as well. Or at least that they would actually be in their offices looking at a few numbers now and then instead of just hanging out in brothels wearing football shirts and hiding brown paper bags of money about their persons. Anyway, spin was the price for competence, we thought, which is why we’re still paying it.
The hangers out in brothels etc. are Britain’s Conservative Party, in case you live on the far side of the moon and didn’t recognise them. I’ve been saying something along these lines in conversation for years, but never got around to telling the universe.
The entire quoted paragraph above was in brackets in the original, a flying-off-at-a-tangent in a piece that was basically aimed at Tony Blair’s dress sense, body language, etc., provoked by a Telegraph photograph of the Great Leader.
There is a certain kind of right-wing pundit whose hatred for British Prime Minister Tony Blair is so great that, even when the man takes a stand worth supporting, such as Blair’s brave backing of Bush over the case for deposing Saddam, the rightwinger will always find some way of qualifying his support with a kind of low-tempo sneer. Sadly, Tory MP and Spectator magazine editor Boris Johnson just cannot quite bring himself to resist a barb or two in Tony Blair’s direction over this issue.
Of course, Johnson does have a valid point. If we are able and willing to oust Saddam who poses a threat to the West due to the alleged acquisition of weapons of mass destruction (WMDs), then why not move to oust the brutal Zimbabwe dictator, Robert Mugabe, who has unleashed violence and mayhem against holders of British passports in that afflicted country? A fair point, but Mugabe is at least not yet attempting to get WMDs, at least as far as we know.
And on another point, Johnson omits to mention that Blair’s strong support for Bush, in contrast to that of German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, is another sign that Blair is backing the Anglosphere horse rather than the Euro-federal one. And for Boris Johnson, a so-called eurosceptic, that should be cause for celebration. Or maybe Johnson is not quite such a skeptic as he makes out.
Lewinsky and Clinton have shown
What Kaczynski must surely have known –
That an intern is better
Than a bomb in a letter
When deciding how best to be blown
– Winner of a limerick contest on Long Island – the requirements were to use the two words, Lewinsky and Kaczynski (the Unabomber), in a limerick
Glenn Reynolds over on Instapundit already pointed out this post on Indepundit. It deserves to be widely read so I am reiterating it.
If anyone tells you Saddam isn’t really trying to acquire nuclear weapons and isn’t really a threat… tell them to read the above.
Jeff Jarvis is quite right, it makes no sense to turn the whole of the site of the WTC into a memorial. Croatia has not turned all of Vukovar into a memorial to what was done to the people there. Rebuild and move on. It is a sign of strength not heartlessness.
From time to time, the Lima newspapers publish stories about such and such a community’s having “invaded” properties of latifundists or miners. The informed reader knows what is happening. Disgusted with being dispossessed, lacking official justice, the Indians have decided to take through their own efforts what has always belonged to them.
– Sebastian Salazar Bondy, Whither Latin America
Several blogs have also picked up on Janet Daly’s article that Brian Micklethwait mentioned at length earlier on Samizdata.net. However the section of Daly’s piece which attracted my attention was not the section that Brian quoted:
Collectivism involves giving up your autonomy and your moral responsibility to the group. In practice, in modern political economy, that means giving them up to the state. There is nothing inherently good or ethical about this. But that is a wildly unfashionable thing to say – just like saying “No” to the euro used to be.
The way I see it, writing “there is nothing inherently good or ethical about this”, whilst most certainly true, really misses the point as it looks at the question from the wrong direction. There is something inherently bad and unethical about giving up your autonomy and your moral responsibility to the group. In fact it is completely impossible to transfer moral responsibility: that is why a soldier can be tried for any war crime that they carry out regardless of the fact they were only ‘following orders’ from their duly constituted superiors. The entire concept of ‘group morality’ is an absurdity. Individual morality is the only morality.
It does not matter what anyone else does or what ‘permissions’ you are given by family, religion or state, you are morally responsible for your actions. For it to be otherwise you must be quite literally insane.
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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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