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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Rageh Omaar, writing in the New Statesman, makes an interesting observation:
Each time I return [to Somaliland] I am struck by the increasing influence of puritanical interpretations of Islam. […] Generations of young Somali men have attended seminaries and Koranic schools, but they never used to wear turbans or red and white keffiyehs, increasingly a symbol of Sunni sectarian identity.
Somalis have been guest workers in the Gulf, especially Saudi Arabia, for decades, giving Saudi Arabia considerable economic and cultural influence over the people and institutions of the as yet unrecognised Republic of Somaliland. One influence has been the financing of schools based on the puritanical Wahhabi interpretation of Islam. Western governments seem unperturbed. They are more worried, in the case of Somalia, by the emergence of a loose alliance of home-grown Islamists who came to power because they got rid of hated warlords, than with the large sums of money being spent by Saudi institutions to spread an austere version of Islam.
It was ever thus. I know some in the commentariat will dismiss anything Omaar says because he’s an ex-BBC journalist writing in a lefty publication. But his point, supported by these facts, boils down to a simple one, with which I concur: Islamism won’t weaken in the rest of the world while it continues to be spread from Riyadh.
You would not want to start from here, but the West must find ways to stop sucking up to the Saudis and, more, to begin to counter their theological export industry. 30 years late is better than never. Killing people is beside the point. Offering cultural alternatives is not.
Nicolas Chatfort foresees the coming Holy Inquisition… albeit a rather innumerate Inquisition it must be said
The UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) issued its long awaited pronouncement last Friday in Paris and I am informed by the media that this most definitive of all documents closes the debate on anthropogenic climate change. Now is the time for action, no more discussion will be allowed. I have read the document, and most assuredly it does use uncompromising language ascribing recent global warming to human activity. The science in the document, which I am told was reviewed by 300 eminent scientists, at first sight appears to be impeccable, but I must admit that was a little perturbed to find on page 5 that 0.16 + 0.077 + 0.21 + 0.21 = 0.28 rather than 0.657. I must not fully understand that esoteric form of mathematics known as addition. This level of ignorance on my part clearly shows that I am incapable of judging the merits of the science on my own and I give thanks to the IPCC for taking this burden off my shoulders.
With the debate now settled, what are we to do with those scientific heretics (deniers is a much too mild a term for these dangerous individuals) who continue in their error and refuse to accept the teachings of the UN’s ecumenical council of scientists. David Roberts has already called for climate change heretics to be put on trial, but he goes too far as he appears to want to punish people for heretical statements they made prior to the issuance of the latest UN writ. After all, as the earlier pronouncements from the UN’s ecumenical council were not as definitive as the current one and the debate not yet closed, these unfortunate souls must be given a chance to repent from their errors before they are punished.
Following enlightened historical precedence (see Galileo), I humbly suggest that the UN create an office to be known as the Permanent Tribunal of Universal Inquiry to investigate into the views of scientists on climate change. Those who publicly repent from their errors would be given leniency, but those who maintain their heretical positions should be handed over to civil authorities for proper punishment. In times past the penalty for the crime of heresy was burning at the stake but, regretfully, this would release too many greenhouse gases, so another form of punishment must be found.
Lord Monckton should be one of the first of the heretics to be brought in front of the tribunal of inquiry. I cite his recent critique of the IPCC report only as evidence with which he condemns himself. He has had the audacity to continue to publish his heretical views even after he was duly informed that the debate was officially over. His critique of the IPCC report is comprehensive and it could cause weaker minds to question the infallibility of the IPCC.
As for other scientists whose views remain suspect, helpfully Canada’s National Post has recently provided a survey of some of the more prominent scientists who have veered from the true path in the past. These individuals are particularly dangerous as they all have reached such high levels of respectability in their professions that they will most certainly pollute the minds of the impressionable if they are allowed to continue to publish their heretical views. I will cite just a few of these scientists to show how much damage these individuals can do.
The first of these is Dr. Edward Wegman, professor at the Centre for Computational Statistics at George Mason University and chairman of the National Academy of Sciences’ Committee on Applied and Theoretical Statistics. Dr. Wegman’s crime is that he verified the McIntyre and McKitrick critique of Michael Mann’s famous “hockey stick” graph, and has also complained that climate change scientists have routinely made basic statistical errors and insists that climate scientists actually consult with professional statisticians when using statistics in their work. I do note that the IPCC, quietly and without comment, has dropped the use of Dr. Mann’s graph from its latest report. The IPCC’s current global temperature graph, which only starts in 1850, will hopefully stop all the embarrassing distractions on the Medieval Warm Period and the Little Ice Age.
Then there is Dr. Henrik Svensmark, director of the Centre for Sun-Climate Research at the Danish Space Research Institute. Dr. Svensmark presents an alternate theory on climate change that involves the sun’s magnetic field, cosmic rays and cloud formation. Dr. Svensmark has even conducted experimentation to support his theory. As the IPCC report concedes that cloud formation and feedback remains a major source of uncertainty and its discussion of the role of the sun is limited to solar irradiance, it is clear that an alternative theory that attacks the weakest parts of the IPCC dogma must be silenced.
An what are we to do about Dr. Habibullo Abdussamatov, head of the Russian Academies of Sciences’ Pulkovo Astronomical Observatory in St. Petersburg and head of the International Space Station’s Astrometry project? He comes to the puzzling conclusion that the simultaneous global warming on Mars, where there are no man-made (or martian-made) greenhouse gases, shows shows that the sun rather than man’s industrial activity, is the main cause of warming on the Earth. The very fact that the IPCC report did not address Mars warming shows how irrelevant this argument is for global warming on the Earth. Another of his heresies is that the IPCC has the cause and effect backwards, that it is the Earth’s warming that causing the release of CO2 from the world’s oceans, rather than rising CO2 causing the warming. He also points out the surface layers of the world’s oceans are actually cooling. Allowing the dissemination of such information will only cause confusion.
I will stop my indictment of prominent climate change heretics at this point, the reader can follow the link to the National Post if more information is desired. Furthermore, I do not want to leave the reader with the mis-impression that these are the only heretics within the scientific community, there are many more. Although the media is doing their best to keep these unsound views from the public, they can not do the job alone. Now that the debate is over, I urge the UN take immediate steps to set up the tribunal of inquiry so we can rest easy at night and not worry that we may have to weigh the merits of these arguments for ourselves, knowing that superior minds are taking on this awesome responsibility on our behalf.
We cannot but be astonished at the ease with which men resign themselves to ignorance about what is most important for them to know; and we may be certain that they are determined to remain invincibly ignorant if they once come to consider it as axiomatic that there are no absolute principles
– Frédéric Bastiat
If you’re unhappy and you know it, ring the cops.
If you’re unhappy and you know it, ring the cops.
If you’re unhappy and you know it, and you really want to show it…
If you’re unhappy and you know it, ring the cops.
If you’re unhappy and you know it, shout out loud.
If you’re unhappy and you know it, shout out loud.
If you’re unhappy and you know it, and you really want to show it…
If you’re unhappy and you know it, shout out loud.
If you’re unhappy and you know it, blow your horn.
If you’re unhappy and you know it, blow your horn.
If you’re unhappy and you know it, and you really want to show it…
If you’re unhappy and you know it, blow your horn.
If you’re unhappy and you know it, ring up again.
If you’re unhappy and you know it, ring up again.
If you’re unhappy and you know it, and you really want to show it…
If you’re unhappy and you know it, ring up again.
If you’re unhappy and you know it, jump up and down.
If you’re unhappy and you know it, jump up and down.
If you’re unhappy and you know it, and you really want to show it…
If you’re unhappy and you know it, jump up and down.
(The original version of this post was rather obscure, so I have expanded it. I also felt that a musical setting would render the advice of the Minister on how to assist an old woman being beaten up more memorable to citizens anxious to do the right thing in these difficult times.)
In London this morning:
A letter bomb has exploded at the London HQ of congestion charge firm Capita. A female employee at the office in Victoria Street was slightly injured – she is understood to have opened the envelope….
Capita manages the London congestion charge as well as collecting revenue from TV licensing and other tasks.
More about Capita.
I have just made the mistake of reading the Sunday Telegraph. As is too often the case the only really good thing in the newspaper was Mr Booker’s half page – and it is not worth getting a whole newspaper for half a page.
Looking through the rest of the Sunday Telegraph I came upon an article by Mr David Cameron (the leader of the British ‘Conservative’ party) the main business of the article was not important. It was just another absurd claim that we can “reform” the European Union in order to make it a ‘force for good’ – an excuse for Mr Cameron had his friends to not even promise to get the United Kingdom out of ‘the Union’ which is now the source of about 75% of all new regulations.
However, it was the rewriting of history that caught my eye. Mr Cameron correctly points out that we are coming up to the 50th anniversary of what was in 1957 called the European Economic Community. But Mr Cameron also states that this time (1957) was a time when the European Economic Community (EEC, now the EU) had to deal with a Europe that had been devastated by war, that was under the threat of Soviet attack, and was on the point of economic collapse.
In reality…
War damage had (in most of Western Europe) been to a great extent repaired by 1957, partly by the efforts of Europeans and partly by American aid. The EEC was not the thing that rebuilt the towns and cities of Europe. The Soviet threat was not kept at bay by the EEC – it was kept at bay by NATO (i.e. in reality the American military) and it is NATO, not the EEC/EU, that was responsible for the peace of post war Western Europe, which may well be why so many Europeans hate the United States – people often hate those they have long depended on.
As for on the point of economic collapse. In fact in 1957 Western Europe was in the middle of great period of advance.
Here American aid was not really the driving force. What was the driving force of economic progress was deregulation and the reduction of taxation. This movement is best remembered, if it is remembered at all, by the weekend bonfire of price controls (weekend because the allied occupiers would not be in their offices to block it) and other economic regulations by Ludwig Erhard in the soon to be West Germany in 1948 (the Federal Republic coming into being in 1949).
However, there were similar movements in other Western European nations. Even Britain had its ‘Set the People Free’ and its ‘Bonfire of Controls’ under Churchill and Eden.
Also (again even in Britain) there was a policy in the 1950’s of the reduction of taxation.
Neither the deregulation or the tax reductions had anything to do with the EEC which (as Mr Cameron correctly states) was created in 1957. And I hope that no one will claim that such things as the Iron and Steel Community or ‘Euro Atom’ were behind the deregulation or the tax reductions (in various nations) either.
In short, Mr Cameron’s view of history (which might be best described as “at first there was darkness and then the European Economic Community moved in the darkness…”) has no connection to the truth.
So I am reading the declassified summary of the National Intelligence Estimate(PDF) that everybody is talking about. While there are dissenting opinions in the classified version, the 3+ pages in the declassified summary are the conclusions that every contributing intelligence source agree on. The core problem is captured in the very first bulleted point; the point that is getting quoted in the news reports.
- Nevertheless, even if violence is diminished, given the current winner-take-all attitude and sectarian animosities infecting the political scene, Iraqi leaders will be hard pressed to achieve sustained political reconciliation in the time frame of this Estimate
How can so many learned people look at this and not understand the root of the problem immediately?
Democracy is the problem. Democracy = winner-take-all. Whether on the left or the right, politicians and pundits have been unanimous in couching our presence in Iraq in terms of “bringing democracy” like we have here in the United States. How can so many people be under the mistaken notion that we are a democratic republic? We are not. We are a constitutional republic. What MacArther and his staff understood while enforcing the Potsdam Declaration (perhaps even better than the Allied leaders did) was that we, the United States, are a republic governed by a constitution with some carefully limited democratic features. With that in mind, when the process foundered for building in Japan a new government adherent to the declaration’s terms, he oversaw the construction of a constitution with strict limits on the power and reach of both the government and the majority of the population. We, the US, handed Japan a constitution on a platter.
The only hope for peace in Iraq is to stop calling for democracy, and instead call for, or dictate, a constitution that guarantees the rights of life, liberty and property. Only if that effort fails, should we pull out and resort to preventing the development of military capabilities by intermittent military hit and withdraw interventions.
Following on from Thaddus’s recent posting about how politicians are trying to enlist children in the Green agenda, it is worthwhile pondering why environmentalism, even the more scientifically credible sort, is often depressing, puritanical and unpleasant. Let’s face it, a lot of libertarians’ hostility to Greenery is a suspicion that the Greens are “watermelons” – green on the outside, and socialists on the inside. Socialism, in as much as it has ever been a coherent political and economic point of view, has been economically if not entirely intellectually discredited. It has been a failure, with varying degrees of nastiness, ranging from the stifling if relatively benign version of Sweden through the to mass killing fields of Mao’s China and Pol Pot’s Cambodia. So if you hate capitalism and material wealth then the Green agenda comes in very handy.
There is a danger in this approach, however, and not just because ad hominem points about the motives of one’s ideological opponents often put off the uncommitted. The fact may be that the planet is genuinely getting warmer and that human activity has helped to cause that. Pollution of the air, seas and rivers is a problem for someone who is polluted. The destruction of ancient woodlands and the loss of flora and fauna is bad. So I can see why environmentalism appeals not just to anti-capitalists, but to conservatives and liberals who want to live the good life and ensure there is plenty of that good life around for future generations. There is in fact a school of environmental thought that harnesses ideas of property and markets to make its case.
Another point I’d make is this: why cannot the Greens, or at least the more sensible ones, throw off the image of po-faced puritanism that so often hangs around their pronouncements. His Supreme Blogness, Glenn Reynolds, has interesting thoughts here on how technologies like electric cars and so forth should be sold not as a sort of “hair-shirt” consumer gesture but because such technologies might be fun and interesting for people.
Fun – that is a word one does not hear much about when discussing technological fixes for our planet. Perhaps we should hear it a good deal more.
Spring onions are spring onions (or scallions). Aussies might have recently beat us at a pointless activity (it isn’t sport if you can do it in a chunky-knit tank-top) but they lag well beyond the Northern Hemisphere in the recognition of common-place veggies. And your water goes down the plug-hole the wrong way round… And that’s moral turpitude that is, not the Coriolis effect.
– Commenter Nick M
I was swapping recipe tips on a comments thread recently, and the recipe in question involved soy sauce. I am a big fan of this particular seasoning, and I launched into a lengthy discussion of it. When I had finished regurgitating, I got to thinking – hey! This is good stuff! Why am I wasting this on a comments thread? It could be a discrete blog post! So, ladies and gentlemen, without further ado I present to you Everything You Needed To Know About Soy Sauce (But Were Afraid To Ask):
There are two – and only two – important points that need to be considered if you are to get the most out of your soy sauce investment. The first is in the buying. Look at the ingredients list of the soy sauce you are interested in. It should consist of soy beans, water, wheat flour and salt. That is it. If it has some kind of hydrolyzed protein shit in it or any other weirdness, recall that that is the mark of an inferior sauce. Desist.
The second is in the storing. Soy sauce goes stale. Remember this when considering storage options. Once opened, most leave their soy sauce on the shelf at room temperature. This is not optimal. Storing it in the fridge will keep it fresher (much) longer. Unfortunately, the majority of non-Asians require a couple of years to work their way through a bottle of soy sauce. No wonder; it will start to taste pretty ordinary if opened and subjected to a few months at room temperature. When soy sauce goes stale, it tastes like salty brown water. It loses complexity. Who would want to cook with that? You will see what I mean if you compare the taste of fresh sauce to that of the stuff sitting in your cupboard for the past half-decade. Look, just keep your soy sauce in the fridge and stop quibbling. And if you have not used the bottle after – say – no more than a year, replace it.
Of course, soy sauce is not soy sauce. There are many breeds of this beast, from the light soy poured over cheong fun (the so-called Cantonese cannelloni) at a dim sum banquet, to kecap manis, the viscous, sweet soy sauce common in Indonesian cuisine. The recipe mentioned at the start of this post benefits from a light soy sauce.
And what is this recipe? Perhaps you have had Hainanese chicken – this dish is very similar and very easy to prepare. You need a whole chicken, some roughly chopped shallots (spring onions), a handful of roughly chopped ginger and eight to ten star anise cloves. Put the shallots, star anise cloves and ginger into a large pot and place the chicken on top of it. Fill the pot with cold water – enough so that the chicken is comfortably submerged. Heat until boiling, then allow to boil for a further thirty minutes. Turn off heat and allow to cool for several hours; overnight is ideal. Remove chicken and place on a platter – it should fall apart with little effort and be very tender. Sprinkle flesh with light soy sauce immediately before eating – “immediately” as in when the chicken is on your plate and you are about to stuff it in your mouth.
Some asides – a whole chicken works best with this dish, but you can use whatever chicken you have, as long as it is on the bone. DO NOT use breast fillets – they will become unacceptably tough. Breast meat is over-rated, anyway. It may well be the leanest part of the bird, but it is also the chewiest and least succulent. Why would you pay more for it? It is crap. Thigh meat is by far superior.
Strain the ginger, star anise and shallots out of the remaining water, skim any fat off the surface and add some salt – you now have a pot full of proper, home-made, not-bought-from-the-supermarket, gourmet-approved chicken stock!
This recipe may not sound so tasty – cold, boiled chicken – but trust me, it works. It is ideal picnic food and goes brilliantly with a salad. Perhaps this salad. Enjoy.
Meet the new Soviet, same as the old Soviet:
Teenagers will learn about the threat to the environment from climate change and what they can do about it, under reforms to geography teaching.
They will be encouraged to recycle consumer goods and to question whether they really need another imported pair of trainers. Other topics to be studied include the Asian tsunami and Hurricane Katrina.
Alan Johnson, the Education Secretary, said: “With rising sea temperatures, melting ice-caps and frequent reminders about our carbon footprints, we should all be thinking about what we can do to preserve the planet. Children are the key to changing society’s attitudes to the environment. Not only are they passionate about saving the planet but children also have a big influence over their own families’ lifestyles.”
In due course, and perhaps even early course, children will be encouraged to rat their parents out to the authorities for ‘unGreen’ behaviour. Such is the pattern for the legitimisation of ruling class ideologies;indoctrinate the young and persuade them of the need to meekly accept poverty, austerity and political control for the sake of ‘saving the planet’.
‘Global warming’ does indeed present a grave threat; as a tool of political power it is a threat to freedom, prosperity, trade, progress and all the health, wealth and happiness that those things make possible and if anyone has been inclined to regard the whole ‘climate change’ nostrum as a joke, then I humbly suggest that this is a mistake. Our masters are clearly taking it very seriously indeed and we have a momentous battle on our hands if we intend to stop them from going down the path that they already begun to forge.
This is a battle we must win – for the sake of the children.
Update: the Libertarian Alliance is also calling foul on this exercise in political propaganda for children.
According to the Spanish newspaper El Pais, Cuban doctors have performed a number of experimental ass treatments on the 79-year old president-for-life since he first fell ill in July 2006. These treatments have reportedly included cork blockage, cork removal, high-pressure steam cleaning, violent stomach-punches from the Cuban national boxing team, Santaria chicken sacrifice, and mandatory public anti-constipation rallies.
Seeking to reassure citizens that El Jefe remained in control, a photo in Havana’s official newspaper last week showed a him relaxing and chatting with visiting Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez while receiving a colonoscopy. This appeared to be administered via an auger bit attached to the rear axle of a 1953 Plymouth.
– Iowahawk
“The length of a film should be directly related to the endurance of the human bladder”.
– Alfred Hitchcock, who was always a practical fellow.
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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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