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]
|
When I was a teacher I would sometimes, not often but sometimes, convince a yob* to do some work. When this happened I would do my best to welcome him back to favour but also tried to avoid giving said yob an easier ride than those who had always been working. I felt that giving him an easier ride would send the wrong messages to both yob and good kids. Correction, stuff the “wrong messages” bit, it would be radically unfair to both yob and good kids.
If I could work this out within weeks of first facing a class, why can’t Tony Blair? I say all this to illustrate why I heartily support David Carr’s recent post “A warning to George W. Bush” while opposing, in gnomic fashion, his post a little further down where he appears to lament the partial reform of terrorists.
* Editor’s translation for our American cousins: yob = English slang for a disorderly young man
I just want to say that I am deeply annoyed by the remarks made in the letter from Peter Barker below. This man actually expects to be subsidised to enable him to buy his weapons of choice. Well, I have just one message for your, Mr.Barker: if you want a state-of-the-art fighter-bomber then you just jolly-well get a job, save up your money and buy it yourself. Sponger!!
[Editor: in the crazed Mr. Barker’s defence, he was only appealing for private sector investors, not state aid, in the matter of financing his purchase of the required armoured vehicle and (single) tactical nuclear device. Peter, my cheque is in the mail. Is this going to be a time-share kind of deal: I get the play with the nuke while you drive the tank?]
Two days ago, Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness the two leading members of Sinn Fein took up an office in the British House of Commons from where they will continue their campaign to wrest Northern Ireland from British control, over the wishes of the majority of its inhabitants. In this task they will be assisted by an annual grant of £400,000 of British taxpayers money. This is how the British government fights a war against terrorism
Sinn Fein is the quasi-marxist political wing of the Irish Republican Army, an utterly ruthless terrorist group that has conducted a murderous war against British state agents and civilians for over 30 years claiming as many victims as the WTC attacks (albeit over a longer period). The wholly understandable howls of protest from the families of some of those IRA victims (both British and Irish) have been callously ignored
This is the latest stage in what is euphamistically called the Peace Process started several years ago under the then Major government and heralded by all as the start of a new era for Northern Ireland. Little did any of us suspect that is was, in fact, the start of an abject surrender by a British establishment that had decided that fighting against terrorists was more trouble than it was worth
The British public had been spun a line but Sinn Fein were under no illusions and all the time the ‘peace’ was being ‘processed’ , the killings, bombings, intimidation and beatings when on almost without a pause. Yet, at every stage, the British government withdrew that bit further under the heat. After all, they couldn’t break their committment to the ‘process’ now, could they
It has to be said that Sinn Fein can hardly be blamed for any of this. In fact, their bloody methods aside, I can almost concede to them a certain grudging admiration for the tenacity and single-mindedness with which they have pursued their political goals. They are surely the most brazen example of a spectacularly successful insurrection movement
No, the blame must lie with the craven and self-serving British political class that will cut any deal, shake any hand, stab any back and spin any lie in order to keep itself grazing peacefully in the pastures of power; a political class that has abandoned even any pretence that it still upholds the core principle that underpins any government of any nation state – the protection and security of its citizens
One can only be grateful that the campaign against Al-Qaeda is being conducted from the Whitehouse and not Westminster for, if the latter, then apparatchicks in the Foreign Office would already be busy negotiating to give Osama Bin Laden a seat in the Cabinet while the compliant and lickspittle media would faithfully distribute and amplify any government propoganda they were fed
How can the message to the world be anything less than crystal clear? Kill Americans and you sign your own death warrant; kill Britons and you sign a book deal
It used to be said that the USA and Britain were two countries divided by a common language. Sadly, they are now divided by a great deal more than that
Crazed Samizdata reader Peter Barker has written in with a proposal that we felt needed to be shared:
I was involved in an interesting discussion with a self claimed libertarian the other day. We were doing the rounds on the usual ideas about gun control and the right to arm bears. This guy was up for the idea of unrestricted possession or firearms but was advancing the idea that a legal caliber limit (?) might be placed on personal weapons.
This got me thinking in my radical way. When the “founding fathers” drew up the American constitution (and all its subsequent amendments) and gave American citizens the right to bear arms they did so to enable the citizens to defend themselves not only from hostile people but also (and mainly) from hostile governments (like their own…). The general idea being, I suppose, that if the “government” attempted to impose unconstitutional means upon the populace then they could resist effectively – as they did against the British.
So move this ideal forward a few centuries. Now if the government think you shouldn’t be doing something – they send round a semi-armoured swat squad, a few APCs and have a helicopter with missiles in reserve. If the neighbourhood ain’t so quiet they send in the national guard with the whole cacophony of modern warfare. Now of course if the local citizens objected to this and “tool up” to resist effectively, well, the administration will just calls them “unlawful combatants” and your civil rights are history. Remember those mad mullahs – the Branch Davidians of Waco (We Ain’t Commin’ Out) as an excellent example.
So how to square the circle? American citizens are supposed to be able to effectively defend themselves from government aggression. This can only mean one thing. The right to bear arms must translate (in new speak) into the right to own an effectively deterrent against anyone attempting to arbitrarily impose their will.
Which leads me to conclude one thing. I want a tank and a nuclear bomb [Ed: only one?]. As much as I’d like a Sukhoi 29 (or the new 31) the running costs are too high – there are some fiscal limits to my imagination. So, libertarians, who’ll support me?
Oh! that many…. Hmmmm.
Peter did not say if he takes cash, cheques, gold or credit cards for this worthy cause.
Great Moments in Capitalist History: on this day in 1964 the world’s largest cheese (34,591 lbs) was manufactured in Wisconsin
I don’t know how many Americans have been dismayed at the breast-beating of the British elite and much of the British media over the apparent (and in most cases alleged) condition of the Al-Qaeda fighters currently cooped up in Cuba.
Incantations of solicitous concern for their welfare jostle for front page space with dire warnings to the US government about the consequences of ignoring the Geneva Convention. The BBC has just stopped short of launching ‘Taliban-Aid’
It’s all a delicious irony really. Most of these Guardianistas would pay good money to be hooded, handcuffed and pushed around by big, burly men in uniform
Maybe the Americans have been disappointed by all this, maybe not. Maybe they couldn’t care less. But in the event that they have been taken aback then let them take heart from, of all places, the Richard and Judy Show
The ‘Richard and Judy Show’ is a daytime magazine programme aimed strictly at the ‘British Street’, and the female part of that street to boot. It is wall-to-wall gossip, recipes, beauty tips, agony aunts, fashion reviews and is wildly popular. Occasionally, though, the producers like to get serious and hold a phone-in poll on some hot current topic or other. Yesterday that topic was the Al-Qaeda prisoners in Cuba and was their treatment fair or unfair?
Some 5000 viewers phoned in. The result? 8% thought their treatment was unfair and a whopping 92% thought that the US was doing the right thing
Assuming that these kind of polls are an accurate reflection of grassroots opinion then clearly pro-Amercian feelings are far thicker on the ground than they are in the lofty towers of the political/media nomenklatura and yet another indication of the ever-widening gap between the people of Britain and the establishment that rules over them
Many groups on both the Left and the Right have big money behind them and manage to keep their message and spin on the television screen morning, noon and night. Thus far we Libertarians have had neither the numbers nor the wealthy backers to do more than an occasional Presidential Campaign ad. But that is about to change and I’ll let Jim Babka’s report speak for itself.
I may disagree with he and Harry Browne on some issues, but I still think they are two of the most effective outreach people we have ever had. Without further ado, here’s Jim:
We did it! Thanks to you, we reached our goal — we raised $20,898!
And this morning, I signed a check to CNN for $21,005 for three television spots which will air on Saturday, February 2, 2002.
We’ve chosen Saturday on a major national cable network, which means most of you will be able to view these ads. CNN viewers will be treated to a little lampooning of politically correct gun control advocates in our Yard Sign Ad
This is a historic ad buy, representing the first time, to my knowledge, that a libertarian commercial will be on national television without the benefit of a presidential campaign.
More specific details will be provided next week, along with confirmed broadcast times so that you can tune in to see your contribution dollars at work.
Thank you for your ongoing support, and please stay tuned.
Jim Babka, President
American Liberty Foundation
“21st Century Outreach for Freedom…”
I can’t wait to see the impact of this. Kick the anti-2nd Amendment crowd in the goolies while they’re down. Yeah, that’s the ticket!
Sorry but our hosting server has maxed out and thus you may (or may not) have problems seeing the pictures you have have come to see… this will be fixed by tomorrow.
A man, by some miracle of medicine, is cured of bubonic plague. Then does he forget that he came close unto death and sayeth he desireth back his beloved plague because the warmth of fever, yea the very burning of his flesh, stopped him feeling cold at night in the tents of his cyber-camp. Truly, it is hard to discern the meaning of this parable.
As has been argued on the Samizdata in previous articles, liberty is not genuinely advanced by legal maneuvers but by cultural shifts. I am all for the overturning of laws that infringe civil liberty on-line and certainly I wish well to groups like the Electronic Frontier Foundation which fights the good fight against attempts to censor the Internet and the monstrous Digital Millennium Act in the USA… but this is not an American or a British or an Australian problem. It is a global problem and the solution is a global one.
Encryption cracks, DVD decoders and all that good stuff can be made illegal in the USA but so what? If it can be found on a server in Romania or Taiwan or Indonesia, who cares what the law says in America? You want what the US called non-exportable ‘weapons grade encryption’? No problem, if you know where to look: there are several servers in Eastern Europe that offer you crypto as good as or better than what is commercially available in the USA, plus it is less likely to have a NSA or GCHQ backdoor. Much of the good stuff of that nature is written outside the USA and EU to begin with. If a server gets shut down, there will be another with the same software up and running a day or a hour later somewhere else. Peer-to-peer transfers make this an even more robust process.
Liberty is furthered by simply making unreasonable laws unworkable and this happens when enough people refuse to comply and find viable ways to circumvent them. This can take form from minor disobedience all the way up to Boston Tea Parties. Let the democratically sanctified congresses and parliaments of thieves spew out ever more regulations: if the reality is that continually evolving technical means of distributing the codes of liberty continue, then we win and they lose regardless of who wins in the courts.
Sure, they can find a few people using these unauthorized things and throw them in jail, but if a code crack for a DVD can be downloaded for free in a matter of seconds off some off-shore server and used in the privacy of your own home, the fact is 99.999% of the people who do that will go undetected regardless of the huffing and puffing of the large US media companies and the finest politicians their money can buy.
But no, do not write to Samizdata asking where to find this stuff… that is what UseNet and Search Engines are for.
Sheesh… we try to bring a little class and glamour into the blogosphere but I guess there is no keeping some people happy. Glenn on Instapundit accuses us of not showing a faithful representation of semi-recovered bloggstress Natalija Radic (scroll down six articles for the ‘offending picture’ of a suspiciously healthy looking Natalija).
There… are you happy now? This picture even shows the amazing disappearing cat “Little Monster” prior to his absconding during Natalija’s hour of need. Can we please have our journalistic credentials back now, Glenn?
There is an excellent editorial in The Telegraph called Not your business, Mr Straw which makes the points that need to be made about the Al Qaeda prisoners in Cuba
Yesterday’s Mail on Sunday [Ed: mouthpiece of the British Idiotarian right], on the basis of a few photographs, told its readers that the suspects had been “tortured”. This has sparked some predictable howls of rage from America’s traditional foes on the Left – may of whom were oddly silent when the Taliban were practising genuine torture on their own citizens.
Although the US is understandably being careful with potentially dangerous men, there is no evidence of human rights violations. These, after all, are not prisoners of war, but terrorist suspects.
The whole point is that these people are accused of either terrorism or war crimes, neither of which accord them the protections of the Geneva Convention, not that such legalisms are all that important. What is important is that they be treated in an objective, appropriate and reasonable manner according to the nature of what they are: extremely dangerous terrorists.
|
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.
|
Recent Comments