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 don’t know why I still bother noting the various examples of the fact that governments are inherently inefficient. I suppose because this one, as government cock-ups (and accounting errors) go, is a whopper. The US Treasury has admitted that is has ‘lost’ $17.3 billion (£11.7 billion) because of shoddy book-keeping – enough to buy a fleet of eight B-2 stealth bombers and still have change for jet fuel, as Chris Ayres of The Times calculates in his article.
The misplaced cash is nearly 30 times greater than the $600 million error in Enron’s reported profits that led to its spectacular bankruptcy last December. The admission, contained in the 2001 Financial Report of the United States Government, is likely to infuriate firms that have been targeted by the Bush Administration for sloppy accounting. I wonder if the anti-capitalist activists screaming about Enron’s malfeasance will be sceaming 30 times louder about this?
To top it up, Paul O’Neill, the US Treasury Secretary, writes in the introduction to the Financial Report:
“I believe that the American people deserve the highest standards of accountability and professionalism from their Government and I will not rest until we achieve them.”
However, on page 110 of the Financial Report is a note that explains that the Treasury’s books did not balance because of a missing $17.3 billion. So no holidays for you then…? Oh, well, it’s not like it’s your money, is it? 
The Sunday Telegraph has commented on the latest and most worrying example of the Labour Goverment’s accumulation of power by controlling information. The good Dr Liam Fox, also the Shadow Health Secretary, alerts us to the fact that last week the Government effectively dismantled the UK system of medical confidentiality. Under new regulations, slipped in using procedural devices to prevent debate in the House of Commons, the Secretary of State will be able to demand that doctors hand over medical records – and fine them if, in order to protect your confidentiality, they refuse to do so. The language of ‘the public interest’ is used to assert the right to demand, and receive, confidential medical information. Boringly, the ‘public interest’ is defined as whatever the Secretary of State says it is….
Having worked as a doctor myself, it horrifies me that doctors will now have to choose between breaching their ethics and breaking the law. To make matters worse, the new law is not restricted to doctors: the behaviour of every health care professional to his or her patients will now be subject to the direct control of politicians. The new law places the administrative convenience of the NHS not only above the bond of trust between doctor and patient, but above the dignity and privacy of patients….the change marks the death of the principle of the patient’s right to give consent before identifiable personal data about them is shared. It is yet another restriction of our liberty – and one we have surrendered to with barely a whimper of protest.
My question is ‘why is this not on the main news but on page 22 in the Comments section….?!’
One of the reasons for my absence on the blog was grieving for my motorbike that was stolen several weeks ago.
For some time now, my mood have been alternating between a profound sense of loss and anger with a burning desire to have my bike back preferably covered with puréed remnants of those who deprived me of it.
I decided to replace it as soon as possible and managed to do so earlier this week. The world seems a happier place, however, not as happy as it ought to be given that I am on two wheels again. This is because I had to switch to a different type of motorbike, which would not necessarily be my first choice.
For the uninitiated, my previous motorbike, Suzuki GSX-R600, is a pure sportsbike designed for a racetrack. It is a highly desirable motorbike both for joy riders but more importantly for thieves who sell them as parts for race bikes. This was certainly the reason my bike was stolen since the various security devices that I had installed would make it impossible to ride by anyone else.
My new bike, a Ducati Monster Dark 900, is a very different affair – bigger engine, stylish and urban. It is still desirable but to a different group of thieving criminals who I hope will be deterred by the bike’s security.
Both are top of the range in their category, so why am I not completely satisfied? The point is that I have been forced to change my preferences because there is a ‘market’ for the bikes I really like and their parts. Short of putting my dream bike in a bomb shelter and/or booby-trapping it with Semtex or some other owner-friendly material, there is nothing I can do to stop those thieving bastards from continuing to steal my sportsbikes.
There is a point to the stolen bike saga and it’s to do with property rights and their protection. My lovely Suzuki was the second sportsbike that I have had stolen in the last two years, so naturally, I have been wondering what to do about this – it is a problem that obviously will not go away, in fact, is getting worse. The local police have admitted that they can’t do anything to stop it and gave me a friendly advice, bordering on counselling, to treat the constant infringement on my property rights as the price one has to pay for living in Central London.
Perhaps, if my local council (a local government body in London) installed secure parking for motorbikes, it might make it more difficult for the thieves who would look for a more convenient bounty… Or perhaps if my street had CCTV cameras, the thieves would avoid it (or more likely find some clever ways of disabling them or simply ignore them)…. Or if the local residents decided to hire private security that would constantly patrol the area, the thieves might be permanently deterred…
I like the third option. Residents in three streets in Kensington (a desirable residential area in Central London) decided to do just that and the crime rate has been reduced to almost zero in the year the secret pilot scheme has been running.
As expected, the reactions have been mixed. The Sunday Telegraph reported this with a generally positive take:
Eldon street is a public street but the uniformed man with an Alsatian at his side making its way between the stucco-fronted buildings of one of London’s most desirable roads is not a public servant; he is not a policeman but a private – albeit highly-trained – security guard who keeps this Kensington avenue free from crime. The catch is that residents have to pay for the peace of mind they now enjoy; the scheme is funded by payments of up to £1,000 a year from householders.
However, the scheme has not left everyone happy. It was criticised by the Police Federation, which represents rank-and-file officers. The chairman of the constables’ branch of the Metropolitan Police Federation, said it was “denigrating the role of the policeman”:
The Government has announced it wants to introduce civilian auxiliaries under police control and also accredit private security firms to patrol streets…but by doing so, they are taking away the role of the police officer as a professional person and also getting policing on the cheap.
Hmm, £1,000 a year doesn’t seem so cheap, constable. Or perhaps your understanding of the cost is skewed by the knowledge of how much of taxpayer’s money is spent on ineffective policing…
The final twist on the story, which worried me more than finding the extra money on top of the local tax, was a throwaway line by the same policeman:
If rich communities can afford to do this, it is unfair on those areas which can’t.
I am not sure whom I detest more now – those who steal my property or those who take my money to protect me and my property, fail and then prevent me from doing so myself and from blowing up the criminals to the kingdom come. Let me think about that while getting used to riding my Ducati Monster Dark…
😀
As someone who knows Tony Millard outside the blogosphere I can vouch for the fact that, yes, he was kidding in the two posts you find less agreeable (the reference to Chianti should have been a dead give-away)  . As with any good joke though, there was an underlying serious point to both of them, although I believe it had little to do with the proposed increase in petrol prices or depopulation of Britain.
His was a Pythonesque (Monty) take on the type of discourse committed in the name of libertarianism and various other ‘-isms’. That is a quasi-economic analysis, perhaps based on reasonable assumptions somewhere along the line but with a destination firmly in the barking moonbat land.
None of the above disputes, let alone refutes, your points about such increases being anything but a form of taxation, which we know is evil , and I agree that no-one in their right free-market mind would consider this as a solution to any economic problem.
So let’s carry on fighting for Liberty in our varied ways. Tony Millard’s may be on the funny side, but the serious point is there. You just have to dig deeper for it. How British!
Hooray for the new Star Wars film, Attack of the Clones. I haven’t seen it yet, it comes out in London on 16th May, but as a fan of the most successful film series of all time I already know that it will be about the increasingly cruel and devious Senator Palpatine, President of the Galactic Senate, who creates a false enemy – the clones – as an excuse to seize more power for himself.
This is excellent news for libertarianism. Why? In an age when classic fairytales, of the read-to-you-at–bedtime sort have become nearly extinct, the Star Wars trilogy, quite deliberately, filled that vacant space in the minds of children (and adults, I might add) with incredible success. The Star Wars films have been the most sociologically successful stories of all time – the characters, the underlying plot and the universe it depicted have become universally recognisable stereotypes of our age.
An entire generation has grown up, especially in the United States, taking much of their basic morality from these films. That morality, despite being simple and unoriginal, has become part of that generation’s meta-context. The new films are likely to be just as popular and influential with today’s children. This is the good news because any child growing up on the new “Star Wars films will absorb the basic idea that the most dangerous enemy of them all is a slick politician, who promises to make the world better by taking more power for himself, whilst being publicly apologetic about the necessity to do so. Years from now, when little Jimmy comes to cast his first vote, in the back of his mind will be the memory from the most powerful fairytale of his childhood – you can’t trust politicians, especially the ones who want more power. No matter what they say. And whilst that may not be enough to create a libertarian wonderland just yet, it certainly goes straight for the meta-contextual jugular.
And if that’s not good enough to make you love the new Star Wars film, let’s face it, Attack of the Clones is just too good a title to bash Britain’s New Labour with to resist.
Editor’s note
I agree with Brian Micklethwait’s insistence on getting the nuances of spelling and nationality correct. So I am sure he would want me to point out that there is no such thing as a Slovakian – the adjective is Slovak. 
Concerning Brian’s article below on Euro-Britain for fruitbat read moonbat throughout.
This morning on the tube (a mode of shifting vast crowds of people from one place to another, aspiring to the name of London’s underground transport system) the person sitting next to me was drowsing over an article in an issue of today’s newspaper called The Soviet threat was a myth. That really caught my attention so I spent the rest of the journey trying to work out which newspaper was gently resting on my neighbour’s lap. Many furtive glances later I discovered it was The Guardian, a left-wing (to put it mildly) daily. Shock horror but no surprises there with regard to the title then… Nevertheless, I was intrigued and decided to read the online version as soon as I could get to my computer.
The conclusion of the argument was predictable and I am now torn between a point to point response to Andrew Alexander, the author of the article, who apparently is writing a whole book on the subject and just a few well placed words of wisdom, backed up by my personal experience, that would put him in his place. Something tells me that the latter approach would not satisfy the discerning Samizdata audience, so I will briefly highlight the most contentious of Mr Alexander’s statements and assumptions.
The conclusion that Stalin had no intention of attacking the West and that therefore the West is to blame for the Cold War just doesn’t hold. Just because the orthodox view of the Cold war as a ‘struggle to the death between Good (Britain and America) and Evil (the Soviet Union)’ may seem today as a simplistic ‘Manichean doctrine’, it does not follow that the Soviet Union’s actions such as installing communist governments throughout central and eastern Europe can be interpreted merely as a frightened response of the war-weary Russia to the speeches made by Churchill (the Iron Curtain speech of March 1946) and Truman (the phrase ‘stand up to Stalin with an iron fist’).
There are two lines of reasoning employed by those who challenge the Cold War orthodoxy, often combined to achieve greater emphasis. One is examination of the internal ideological struggles of Stalin with Trotsky and other opponents within the communist camp such as Tito and Mao to point out that Stalin was not driven by ideology. The logic blind spot is obvious here – Stalin’s version may have been different from the others but not necessarily less virulent and aggressive. And so, this flimsy and unsupported conclusion is then applied to his foreign policy and in combination with the realpolitik school of thought used to argue that Soviet Russia was acting in its national interest. The forceful communisation of central and eastern Europe is transformed to a natural reaction of a state defending its territory and security. By extension, Poland, Hungary and Czechoslovakia were necessary as part of the ‘cordon sanitaire’ around Russia and the invasions of Hungary in 1956 and of Czechoslovakia in 1968, however brutal, were ‘aimed at protecting Moscow’s buffer zone’.
Where does one start?! Rather than getting into a detailed discussion about the validity and interpretations of this or that surviving historical evidence of Stalin’s world view (which I plan to do anyway at some stage), I think it is important to point out the power of one’s own propaganda, especially when carried out in the Soviet proportions. Most students of communism tend to forget that it may be impossible to resist such intense and pervasive ‘brainwashing’ (including your own) without a deeply rooted alternative world view. So, how can we assume that Stalin was not susceptible to the effects of his own megalomaniac personality cult? Here my personal experience comes in handy as I remember only too well how insulation and ignorance create a breeding ground for a warped perception of reality and how those who perpetuate it fall victims to their own lies. Therefore, to attribute a perspective of an international relations academic to a dictator of Stalin’s calibre who wielded an ‘unlimited power’ over human lives using an elaborate ideology and a totalitarian regime is at best naive, at worst… well, let’s not be beastly to the Guardianistas in this enlightened day and age…
The most we can acknowledge is that there is no hard evidence (as yet) to prove or disprove the claims that Stalin had a masterplan for invasion of Europe and that only the determination of the West had prevented the Red Russia from taking over the world. However, to say that ‘any post-war Russian government – communist, tsarist or social democratic – would have insisted on effective control at least of Poland, if not of larger areas of eastern Europe, as a buffer zone against future attacks’ as Mr Alexander does, is just plain wrong, bordering on a serious lapse of judgement. The balance of power argument cannot possibly apply in the case of democratic Russia, as Germany, the main threat to Russian security, had been defeated by democratic countries and subjected to forceful democratisation by the US. The only way such an argument can be made, is if it contains an implicit assumption that communism is a morally equivalent (or morally neutral) alternative to the Western democratic regimes. Welcome back to meta-context!
And meta-context is where I want to remain for the moment in the Cold War debate as I do believe that its origins are not as clear as the orthodox or revisionist interpretations would have us believe. The methodology of discovering the causes of the Cold War is crucial as I believe this period of history to be steeped in meta-contextual clashes and misperceptions. This is not to ignore the moral dimension, far from it, but merely separate it from the rubble of the usual academic discourse that hides so many skeletons in its own meta-contextual closet.
I have gone straight from the buzz of London to the grey nostalgia of Prague and am now sitting in an internet cafe named appropriately Globe. I can hear English being spoken as this is a favourite place for the English-speaking ex-pats and my inner Anglospherometer is telling me that it’s time to blog. I have been in Prague for two days now and given that this place is in a different world in terms of mentality and time, please take the following comments as potentially confused ramblings of a travelling blogger…
In the short time I have been here I have managed to cover a multitude of activities – checked out (no pun intended) what is new in Prague since my last visit two years ago, visited a monstrous museum of modern art (previously communist archives, the building, not the pictures, obviously…), had a blazing row about nationalism and political discourse in the Mittel Europa and managed to send two Jehovah’s witnesses on their way amicably and within twenty seconds! I am particularly proud of the last one…
I have been thinking about the best way of debating in a place like Central Europe where a Western style of discourse does not create the expected responses. Roll on the popularisation of shared meta-contextual discourse…! The usual evolution of an argument from a thesis through antithesis to a synthesis, does certaintly not apply here. A statement is made, often categorically, so a thesis is born. However, presenting an anti-thesis is dangerous as the aforementioned blazing rows are certain to ensue….What is needed is some kind of validation of the grains of truths carefully exctracted from the original statement. This is interesting (and frustrating) but I think it springs from the need of the Central Europeans to assert their intellectual identity by having it first recognised by their debating opponents. Then, perhaps, room for sneaking an anti-thesis in is created, en route to a wonderful and all encompassing synthesis, providing ample justification for gallons of lovely alcohol to be consumed. As a second thought, who needs shared meta-context when you have alcohol?
On my wanderings through Prague I have been walking along Wenceslas Square, the main square where the 1989 demonstrations of the ‘Velvet Revolution’ took place. I noticed that some shops are hiring people to walk around holding large placards to advertise their wares. This is a familiar sight in the West, especially in Oxford street, the main shopping street in London and I have often looked upon these as another sign of ‘unbridled’ capitalism. Here the locals tell me in a voice dripping with moral satisfaction that such advertising is going to be banned soon as it insults the human dignity. Mindful of my debating experience in this place, I meekly pointed out that perhaps these people may be quite content to earn some money by an activity that does not involve much effort and that by banning it, they will be deprived of the opportunity to have their human dignity offended at a price they are prepared to be paid… As expected I did not get far but I have acted as the lone voice of free market and capitalism. Today, I have seen a girl reading a book whilst at the same time holding a large sign advertising an Irish Pub… So much for insulted human dignity!
I have another three days to go and depending on my ability to access the internet and my mental stability, I may blog again. If not, once in London I will no doubt find plenty to write about privacy and security, computers, markets and other far less nostalgic topics.
I seem to be stuck with the privacy and security topic but since it is what interests and worries me, here it is. According to an artricle in CNET New.com Is your email watching you? the spam choking your e-mail inbox may be loaded with software that lets marketers track your moves online, and you may not even be aware that you’ve been bugged.
Apparently, enhanced messages that share the look and feel of Web pages are being used to deliver the same bits of code through e-mail, in many cases without regard for safeguards that have been developed to protect consumer privacy on the Web. E-mail also seems to be the focus of the security and privacy issues on the Web at the moment. While web sites now cloak visitors’ identities and collect data anonymously, junk emailers and marketers have begun to use cookies and other techniques to link specific addresses to surfing behaviour. In some cases, spammers can link surfers with their e-mail addresses.
Lance Cottrell a privacy services expert warns:
“In many ways, email tracking is more powerful because they can correlate the email address with online history….there isn’t an opportunity to be fully informed when you receive a spam with remotely loaded graphics used to track your computer. It’s a bit of a loophole in the whole process.”
An article in Computerworld responds to the fears for privacy as a trade-off to security after September 11th. Jay Cline lists a number of scenarios that would signal that privacy and American’s civil liberties are in danger and actually being reduced.
If a nationwide loss of privacy has occurred, we should be seeing at least one of the following scenarios: a widespread expansion in the scope of the government’s collection of personal data, courts setting dangerous legal precedents or a surge in the number of people harmed by abuses of government-collected data. These are the speed bumps on the road from liberty to tyranny, and none has been crossed.
So far in the war on terrorism, there has been no widespread increase in the government’s collection of Americans’ personal data….and there is no pattern of government abuses of personal data stemming from Sept. 11. The congressional oversight committees have certainly been busier, but so far, we haven’t seen any members seeking hearings on privacy abuses.
The Patriot Act, passed in October last year giving the FBI new powers to monitor the e-mail of suspected terrorists, is mentioned in a relaxed manner:
The Patriot Act also enables government agencies to share more law-enforcement information. Many Americans think the federal government already has a huge big brother computer file on each person. But the reality is that big brother is a hodgepodge of little cousins — the same sort of motley collection of stovepiped and uncoordinated databases that most large corporations have..and…the FBI certainly hasn’t taken upon itself to conduct random keyword searches of all the e-mail coursing through the servers of U.S. ISPs.
There are two reasons for drawing attention to this article. First, I have blogged about privacy and security before where I applauded an article in the same magazine for pointing out the dangers of the drive for security at the cost of privacy. To balance that concern, the inefficiency inherent in governments and their bureaucracies often seems more tangible to me than extensive and elaborate conspiracies. Secondly, I would welcome any information about measures that do pose a definite threat to privacy as a result of September 11th and indeed any comments regarding privacy versus security issue. As they say, the truth is out there.
When the state watches you,
dare to stare back
American Express Co. agreed on Monday to turn over to U.S. tax authorities information on offshore accounts held by Americans suspected of evading taxes, the second major card company to do so after MasterCard International Inc. A settlement agreement between the government and American Express, filed in federal court in Miami, allows the tax agency to collect identifying information, such as passport and driver’s license numbers, of customers with accounts in Antigua, Barbuda, Bahamas and the Cayman Islands. The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is looking for records showing charges greater than $2,500 for purchases of cars, boats, hotels or travel services in the U.S. In trying to detect unreported income and prosecute people who are failing to file tax returns, the IRS is pursuing a form of tax evasion that uses credit cards issued by offshore banks.
I find it hard to comment on such news as there is nothing I could add to fire up the appropriate sentiments concerning this topic among us, libertarian bloggers. The warning is contained within the words of Internal Revenue Service Commissioner Charles Rossotti:
“Simply put, the guarantee of secrecy associated with offshore banking is evaporating…”
although I am sure he was swelled with pride as he said them and not fear for liberty and property rights….
When the state watches you,
dare to stare back
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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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