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]
|
Perhaps Iraq can teach us something Iraq’s US appointed ‘governing council’ has produced a deal on a new national constitution which was described by a Kurdish delegate as one of the most liberal and progressive documents of its kind to have been produced in the Middle East
A coalition official said the charter sets a goal, not a quota, to have at least 25% of the national assembly made up of women. It also includes protections for free speech, religious expression, freedom of assembly and due process.
Free speech and religious expression? Due process? No quotas? At this rate Iraq may end up with a more (classically) liberal constitution that several quota addicted regulatory western nations I would mention. No, not really, as the whole ‘Islamic dimension’ rather precludes that.
There is a long way to go and the devil is not just in the details but the implementation. Nevertheless, this is a very big step in the right direction.
|
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.
|
As I understand it, this is an “interim” constitution. They’ll tear it up and redraft after the first elections.
Not to worry, I understand it has a clause in it that forbids any laws in conflict with Islam, so religious freedom, as long as it’s Islam, speech, as long as Islam is not called into question, etc, etc.
Of COURSE these people are oppressed. Islam is self-oppressing.
Theoretically, the original Soviet Constitution gave some of these same rights, and we saw how much of a Utopia that turned out to be. By the way, the neighboring Turkish and Kuwaiti Constitutions gives equal protection to all political constituencies, and we have all seen how that has worked out?
Media Watch 2004
–Carpe Diem
If the constitution states that no law can contradict Islam, it is basically a blueprint for a theocracy. Legislators couldn’t set the minimum marriage age for girls past nine years old, for example, as that would “contradict Islam.”
If the Coaltion had found the WMD this war may have been worth it. But for now, we have spent hundreds of British and American lives (and thousands of Iraqi lives) and $200 billion to establish another Iran. And it’s entirely possible that Iran I will share its nuclear technology with Iran II.
In the end, we may have created the very situation we sought to avoid — a nuclear armed Iraq.