I want to ‘build back better’. I don’t know what the world leaders and international organisations are calling for when they parrot this phrase. But after the pandemic, we need far more critical thinking, rationality and constitutional protections. As soon as our liberties are restored, we must make sure they can never be taken away again. That is the cause to rally around now.
|
|||||
|
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] Authors
Arts, Tech & CultureCivil LibertiesCommentary
EconomicsSamizdatistas |
This is the cause to rally around nowMarch 23rd, 2021 |
 26 comments to This is the cause to rally around now |
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. CategoriesArchivesFeed This PageLink Icons   |
|||
All content on this website (including text, photographs, audio files, and any other original works), unless otherwise noted, is licensed under a Creative Commons License. |
|||||
“…are restored”?
Are retaken.
Make no mistake.
As soon as our liberties are restored……. OK love, it’s obvious you’re not an historian
I want to ‘build back better’. I don’t know what the world leaders and international organisations are calling for when they parrot this phrase.
I can help you here. It means never let a crisis go to waste. You thought that meant that the dark side would lockdown your freedom while they had the cover of THE COVID CRISIS !!!!! ; and do all sorts of horrible stuff they’ve always wanted to do before but couldn’t get away with without the cover of THE COVID CRISIS !!!!!
You were wrong. What they mean by “building back better” is they have no intention whatever of relinquishing their opportunities for megalomania, merely because the crisis is subsiding. No, siree Bob. This crisis is going to be milked until its udders are raw and bleeding. You are going to get it good and hard, without even the fun of voting for it.
Just look at how long they have been able to keep the climate change nonsense going. Three decades of failed doomsday predictions and no sign of an end to it.
I’m with Ms Dodsworth.
It’s easy to agree with Lee Moore and others, but it’s also futile. Rather than say “We’ll never get our freedoms back”, we should indeed be saying “We must never let this happen again”.
Never let a crisis go to waste, eh? Nor should we.
Many of the things we have always warned about have come to pass and more, things that we would previously have been called alarmist for predicting. The public now has had a taste of a police state, and while many seem reconciled to it now, many others will indeed be open to a message about “the lost childhood of the class of 2020”, “2020: the year without lovers”, and so forth.
We need to create our own narrative, not only critique the other side.
“Oxford Street was once among London’s most important retail destinations. But it is now economically barren, thanks to a year of lockdowns and social restrictions.”
Cui bono?
“As soon as our liberties are restored….”
Don’t hold your breath.
Step one: ban PPE graduates with no life experience from standing for parliament.
“Build Back Better” is an international slogan, pushed by the World Economic Forum and various Governmental and Corporate bodies, meaning push for the “Reset” – “Stakeholder Capitalism” (vast government and a vast “pet” Corporations – the Corporate State) for “Sustainable Development”.
“Ah but we can use the slogan “Build Back Better” to mean liberty – not the crushing of liberty”.
Good luck with that – I am not being sarcastic, I would love “Build Back Better” to mean more liberty and the end of the power of the state to take away fundamental liberties.
We were told that taking the terms “Social Reform” and then “Social Justice” and “Sustainable Development” would change the meaning of these terms – it did not, their meaning remained the same. Even bigger and more interventionist government – the decline of liberty.
Perhaps “Build Back Better” can indeed be used to mean more liberty rather than less – as I said (and I repeat – I was not being sarcastic), good luck with that.
Ahh diddums! She actually thinks we’re going to get our liberty back! How sweet!
(In response to some cynical comments above) our chance of getting our liberties back will be poor indeed if we assume that all struggle for that outcome is already pointless.
Quite soon, everyone in the UK will either be fully vaccinated or else feeling sorry for Perry because his risk of dying from the virus, though tiny, nevertheless much exceeds theirs. At that point, anyone who loves keeping us in lockdown will have to push a changed line. We either obey the new excuses, commenting cynically here on samizdata about how wise we were to expect it, or we can push a line somewhat like Laura’s, that of course we’ll all be out and about when the vaccinated or minute-risk state is reached, and ready our prepared-phrase/T-shirt/medallion/whatever proclaiming
Doubtless the phrasing or whole approach could be much improved (suggestions welcome), but I qualify Laura only by saying that, to get our freedoms back, we need now to be preparing a no-more-excuses-will-be-tolerated approach. (What you go on tolerating, you go on being forced to tolerate. Conversely, it has advantages to pick an exit state that can hope for a majority and exploits the government’s own current line.)
As one of the aforementioned cynics, I would simply comment – since I am on a mostly libertarian blog – that what libertarian folk would most benefit from is …. a huge injection of extra cynicism.
Libertarianism is a strictly minority religion. To have an effect in pulling the ship of state in a (classical) liberal direction, libertarians need allies who are not themselves libertarian.
American libertarians missed the boat with Trump. For all his grievous faults, he was the best ally American libertartians could realistically have wished for. Against the Swamp. Against the Democrats. Against China. But golly gosh, how rude he was! And his immigration and trade policies, how shocking ! So American libertarians leapt like Hamelin rats off the Never Trump cliff. So now they’ve got Biden, or rather the Committee that runs Biden.
Boris too has grievious faults, but where are British libertarians going to find a better ally ? On this planet, I mean, not in some junior common room fantasy.
You need allies, even if they don’t wash very often. Be more cynical, guys and gals. You got Boris or Starmer. The Archangel Gabriel is not an option.
So… Boris shuts down civil society for a fuckin’ year (so far) & supports the utterly insane ruinous NetZero malarkey, but British libertarians should regard Boris as a viable ally? Ok, not joking, honest question when I ask this: if that’s not enough, what would he have to do to make himself beyond the pale for anyone who values liberty? At this stage I’m no longer sure if Starmer in No. 10 would be noticeably worse, making Boris a lesser evil by a hair’s breadth at best.
Really can’t see myself voting for anyone at this point & I live in one of the most marginal Tory seats in UK.
I voted Tory in the last general election because of Brexit (voted BXP in the final Euros). Now Brexit is done, two cheers for that. So fuck the Tory Party. Seriously, fuck ’em sideways with a lawnmower.
I haven’t figured out what the way ahead is, I really don’t know. But I do know it sure as hell ain’t Boris Johnson or his laughably misnamed ‘Conservative’ party, not in its current form.
Ok, not joking, honest question when I ask this: if that’s not enough, what would he have to do to make himself beyond the pale for anyone who values liberty?
Be worse than Labour ?
“I’m no longer sure if Starmer in No. 10 would be noticeably worse”
Then you lack both historical knowledge and imagination. However bad the Tories are, Labour are worse. Always. It’s a law.
Perry makes my point and double underlines it in red. At what point in the COVID panic has the Labour Party jumped up and said that Boris is going too far ? You are getting Lockdown Lite with the Tories.
And what sane person imagines a Tory Party led by Theresa May would have bravely stood up to the baying of the prog mob to close Britain down ?
I repeat. Be more cynical. When von Mises is leading in the polls, by all means vote von Mises. But when it’s Kerensky at 48%, Lenin at 48% and von Mises at 4%, you vote Kerensky.
Nope, sorry Lee, you are part of the problem if you think lesser evil voting make things better in anything but the tactical short run. The only way to make the Tory Party stop being (at best) a Blairite Party is to stop voting for it, not by confirming their assumption that they only have to be ever so slightly less ghastly than Labour in order for genuine classical liberal to still vote for them. You are providing them with perverse incentives not to actually be any better.
And you didn’t actually answer my question.
It seems I am the cynical one, whereas you on the other hand seem to have faith that ever so slightly slower death-by-green-Tory is actually a viable survival option. You are the optimist, old chap, not me 😉 If I vote for anyone, it will be for Reform UK (or I might just stay home).
The ONLY reason we don’t still have Theresa May running the Tory Party? Nigel Farage. They took one look at the Euro election and realised that for the first time in at least a century the Conservative Party was facing an existential crisis. They eliminated the threat of Farage by (more or less) doing exactly what he want them to do. THAT is how you change things, not by voting for the fuckers regardless. Otherwise all you get is another Theresa May.
I used to think like Lee Moore but I’m with Perry now. I’ll vote for Laurence Fox in the Mayoral elections. If he wasn’t standing I’d probably vote for Piers Corbyn. I might put the tory guy as second choice, as I really cannot stand Khan – such a total loser gamma condescending ****. On a less emotional level I am now seriously worried about London being ‘Detroited’ and there is some logic to an ‘anybody but Khan’ strategy. (Of course, Boris is a much greater threat to London than Khan.)
Even the good guys in the tory party – Baker et al – are no good. I do wonder – what would it actually take for Steve Baker to leave the Tory party? Boris covering High Wycombe in mustard gas to kill ‘ze bug’? We need somebody like Farage to stomp up and down the house of parliament like he did in wherever it was again in Europe.
One of the reasons we have Biden instead of Trump today is that too many people decided that, if they couldn’t have “perfect”, they’d screw us all over, and so enough of them voted for the Libertarian Party’s nullity Jorgesen instead of Trump to hand it over to Biden.
I do believe Jorgensen is still in hiding. Smart choice.
Perry makes the point ‘The only way to make the Tory Party stop being (at best) a Blairite Party is to stop voting for it’. However, what tends to happen to a party that loses a couple of elections is the opposite.
They don’t think ‘hmm, our supporters are not backing us for being too moderate’ but instead conclude that the public doesn’t like its policies and starts to ape their opponents. This happened with Labour under Blair and Conservatives under Cameron.
Andy is correct.
To repeat – libertarianism is not popular. It may be mostly wise and just, but it is not loved. Perry’s approach is that of the fat ugly girl at the party, who refuses to dance with the geek with excessive nasal hair, in the hope and expectation of an invitation from the cool handsome guy that all the hot chicks fancy. Never gonna happen, hun.
Brexit was a wonderful, unexpected, escape. But it took forty years, and even then it was a bit of a fluke. Say yes to the geek with nasal hair, Perry. Or dream your life away looking at a poster of Brad Pitt.
Fuck “libertarianism”, I will support anyone who will move the nation in a vaguely more classically liberal direction, whereas you’re just happy the Tory Party is arsenic rather than cyanide.
Wrong. I’m the one who isn’t deluding himself that all the current “dance partners” aren’t rapists. Farage was far from perfect, but I supported him to the tune of thousands of pounds, money well spent… so I’m perfectly willing to kiss a few frogs to find where the prince is hiding if that is what it takes to make things better. What I’m not in favour of is pretending openly pro-tyranny gradualists who want to ‘build back better’ are actually a ‘lesser evil’.
I’m not looking for perfect, I’d settle for not utterly toxic. I’m ok with any choice that isn’t just a choice between Mugger A or Mugger B, because in UK right now, that is indeed the choice when comparing Tory & Labour. Remember those TV images of Met plod ‘taking the knee’ for BLM in London? Can someone remind me who the Home Secretary is & which party she belongs to? And why does Cressida Dick still have a job? Thatcher solved the problem of loony left London mayors by destroying the entire tier of government. Naturally like a zombie it returned after Thatcher was gone, but hey, she showed it can be done.
Lee Moore – I opposed Donald John Trump (I supported Ted Cruz), but I was pleasantly surprised by how President Trump turned out, very far from perfect – but he sometimes, in the end, did the right thing.
I supported Mr Johnson for Leader of the Conservative Party (in spite of being personally warned that he was not what he appeared to be) – and the results are now very clear.
Mr Trump and Mr Johnson are often lumped together, but they are very different. Donald John Trump was SOMETIMES prepared to go against the officials and “experts” (not nearly enough – but sometimes), Mr Johnson is just not like that.
On the “Climate Change Emergency” and everything else, Mr Johnson will follow the advice of the officials and “experts”.
That is the reality – one can not successfully operate on the basis of what one would like to be true, one has to try and see reality as it actually is.
This does not mean that Labour and the Lib Dems would not be worse – I have never denied that.
“Libertarianism” – like Perry I deny the conversation is about that.
It is not that Mr Johnson will not deliver some libertarian position (no one ever seriously thought he would) – the discussion is about whether Mr Johnson will help make society a little more free, or go along with the general establishment policy of generally increasing the size and scope of government.
The answer to that question is now quite clear.
Niall – you are making the assumption that the vaccination process turns out well, it could turn out badly.
We will know in a year or so how the vaccination program has turned out, let us keep our fingers crossed that it turns out well (rather than making the problem vastly worse – by harming the immune system in the long term, or leading to the virus evolving in the wrong, more lethal, direction).
However, let us make the assumption that the vaccination process turns out WELL – as many friends of mine are being vaccinated I certainly hope it does.
What will then happen is that the “Climate Change Emergency” will kick in.
There is also the financial and monetary position of the United Kingdom to consider.
There is no need for me to go into details about that – we all know what the position is.
Nicholas (unlicensed joker) Grey in New South Wales Australia may be O.K. – but even Australia is going to face very severe problems.
We will not be O.K.
We will be very far from O.K.
If Gladstone himself returned from the grave and became Prime Minister and Chancellor (at the same time) – I am not sure what ever he could do at this point. The situation being what it is.
WRT the debate about ‘the lesser evil’, i submit that there should be no fixed principle.
(This is where Sun Tzu comes in handy: All warfare is based on deception.)
Perry wrote above that he voted Tory at the last general election because of Brexit.
We should generalize the idea: we should vote on consequentialist grounds.
Another example: in 2016, i would have voted for Trump, not because i thought (at the time) that Trump is a better human being than Hitlery, but because the head of the FBI had essentially declared that Hitlery was above the Law.
The idea of a ruler above the Law is just intolerable to me.
But at the next UK general election, i definitely would not vote ‘Conservative’.
Snorri – voting for Donald John Trump against Hillary Clinton was indeed the correct thing to do.
As for elections in this country – no comment.
There is this …
https://summit.news/2021/03/22/covid-restrictions-to-remain-in-place-for-years-says-public-health-official/
The key takeaway?
There you have it … the new normal because, reasons.