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Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]
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Arguments are getting quite heated among libertarians about the claim that the US is a potential threat to freedom versus the view that the US is the best guarantor of freedom in the world today. I happen to agree with both statements.
It would be absurd to claim that the US is a worse place to live than peacetime Iraq, unless one happened to enjoy being part of a quasi-fascist police state. It is reasonable to worry about the potential threat to freedom posed by the world’s only superpower: there is no one to overthrow that state if it should go rotten.
I am disappointed in the complacency of some US libertarians and conservatives who ought to remember that wartime is the time when most encroachments on freedom can be justified. I have been accused of hype for using Hillary Clinton as an example of what a horrible US could be. Surely there can’t be anyone who thinks that none of Presidents Lincoln, Wilson, Hoover, F.D.Roosevelt, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Carter, Bush senior and Clinton were ever a threat to freedom? Or that no one will ever be elected to the US presidency who is a bad person?
I certainly wish the US forces in the Middle East a speedy and successful trip. I equally hope that the plan is to remove the tyrant with no or low civilian casualties, both for humanitarian reasons, but also because a post-Saddam Iraq will be less resentful of US troops if there hasn’t been carpet-bombing, or bad target intelligence.
I remain convinced that the British forces will either be as symbolic or ineffective as the Piedmont-Sardinian contingent during the Crimean War, or worse that they are headed for a repeat of Isandlwana, Majuba Hill, or Dunkirk. Bluntly the best troops in the world are cannon fodder when they run out of ammunition, the comms equipment doesn’t work and their boots have melted in the sun.
As for ID cards for use against terrorism. Yes they can help. Yes they are also a violation of personal liberty. But I would be rather more convinced if the British government weren’t providing safe havens for terrorists whether leftist, Islamist or Irish.
As a dual national I have a French national identity card. As a British national who doesn’t have a driving licence and whose passport expired in December of last year, I have no state approved form of identifying myself.
Naturally I have never been asked to produce a form of identification in France by a state official except when crossing a border. Equally naturally I have been asked numerous times by police officers in the United Kingdom to identify myself (despite this being illegal without some probable cause, but then I suppose I have a shifty look).
Therefore I fear that a British identity card will become the pretext of even more bullying of white middle-class people by the low-life pigs that pass for law-enforcement officers in the UK today.
During the Second World War, I am told that a well known local dignitary in Ulster was chatting to a police officer at a railway station whilst waiting for a relative to arrive from Belfast. After twenty minutes the police officer said to the local businessman he’d known for years: “Mr Smith, please show me your identity card.” He then proceeded to arrest Mr Smith for failing to carry proper documentation. I suspect that a Gestapo officer would have shown more common-sense.
The chances are that the present loutish types will not behave better than the Royal Ulster Constabulary’s treatment of a Protestant businessman in 1942. Unfortunately, there is a genuine security advantage to identity cards (even when they can be forged). They provide an audit trail for car hire, bank accounts etc.
But of course in France, of course no self-respecting hotelier would dream of asking a single male for identification, unless they wished to cash a cheque…
Last night I attended a political fundraising dinner where the speaker was a Conservative MP. Because he deals with defence issues, he was quizzed (often heckled) by members of his party about the Iraq war. Last November I heard an American ‘informed source’ give an explanation as to why war with Iraq was just and necessary.
The problem I have is that there was no common ground at all between the case presented by both speakers. According to one, the hunt for Al-Qaeda is the background goal. According to the other, Al-Qaeda will be cheering when that secularist Saddam falls. One said that nuclear, biological and chemical weapons were the single jusification. The other said it was a smokescreen to get UN backing. One said that there was eidence that Saddam had financed Al-Qaeda. The other said there was no such evidence, but he was financing Hezbollah instead (which is bizarre given the long-standing Iranian connection).
So we are left with this conclusion, the politicians haven’t a clue what they are talking about, and the intelligence services are playing their pet theories off against each other.
If the war against Iraq is about the right of one country to disarm another I am against it. Today Bush thinks Iraq should be disarmed, who will President Hillary or President Gore pick on? Switzerland? Israel? The United Kingdom? If it is to overthrow tyrants then why not start with North Korea? If the war is supposed to install a pro-American government in Iraq then how will bombing Iraqi cities help?
In the classic British television comedy “Yes, Minister” the bureaucracy engineered the elevation of a conviction-free mediocrity to the post of prime minister. The episode, called “Party Games” involved the following altercation between Jim Hacker, the minister who is looking for a “big idea” to campaign about and a French-speaking Brussels bureaucrat1:
Jim Hacker: “Do you know, there’s an office at the European Commission where they pay people to produce food and next door there’s another office where they pay people to destroy food?”
European Bureaucrat: “It is not true!”
Sir Humphrey Appleby (British bureaucrat): “Oh really?”
European Bureaucrat: “They are not even on the same floor!”
Now consider that exchange in the light of my Case for “War on Chirac” versus this defence by Gemini, presumably a Chirac fan:
Just a few things – Chirac as PM wasn’t sacked, he’s the only PM of the 5th Republic who actually willingly quit. Second, the bicentenary of the execution of Louis XVI couldn’t have been in 1992, since he was executed on 21/01/1793. So out of the 7 wrong-doings in 27 yrs, 2 at least are wrong….
The first objection is of the “yes he was pushed… no he jumped” variety. See this page for a very different view than the “official Chirac” line. I might add that Chirac’s nicknames include “Chameleon Bonaparte” and “Supermenteur” – Super Liar. → Continue reading: It isn’t true…they aren’t even on the same floor!
The wonders of capitalism, or the false needs of the alienating consumer society? This gadget is designed to fulfill a role which is obviously important in badly ventilated homes and offices.
The question I would like to know is, does this methane filter reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and therefore should it be made compulsory under the terms of the Kyoto Climate Change Treaty?
Three pints of gas a day for an average person? You mean it’s more for politicians?
I have never been to Illinois, where the decision has been taken by an out-going State Governor to pardon four convicted murderers and commute the sentences of all “death row” inmates to life prison sentences. Unlike some libertarians, I see nothing especially wrong in a court sentencing a person to death for a crime. I would prefer the court not to be an instrument of the state. But more important than who pays the hangman’s wage is the question of due process and presumption of innocence.
Assuming that a person cannot be charged without evidence having been presented to a magistrate or (better) a grand jury. Assuming that the charge is for a crime: murder, as opposed to not wearing a seat belt in the back of a taxicab, or having a cardboard cutter in the trunk of one’s car, or other bizarre regulations of the ‘welfare’ society. Assuming that the suspect is made aware of his rights: to silence, to legal counsel, that any statement made to police may be used. Assuming that the accused is presumed innocent until convicted, has the benefit of not having to assist the prosecution, or even presenting no evidence to the court if he so wishes. Assuming the right to trial by jury (although in France there is the oddity that murder suspects prefer to be tried by a panel of judges than face juries, who tend to convict killers and whose verdicts cannot be easily appealed against). Assuming the right of appeal in the grounds of error, mistrial, new evidence.
Despite all these safeguards, which certainly no longer exist in the United Kingdom, there will always be miscarriages of justice so long as there are incompetent, corrupt or simply mistaken criminal investigations. As a libertarian, I take the view that individual people are not to be used without their consent and in violation of their lives, liberty or property as the means to other people’s ends, unless they have forfeited such rights by initiating agression against other people. As far as criminals go, there is no problem, they have declared war on society: violating the rights of their victims. But a wrongly convicted person is the victim and the culprit is the legal process that resulted in the error of justice.
There is a defence from the charge of murder, where the accused believed that killing the victim was a necessary act, even if this belief was mistaken. But such a defence is dependent on being a able to sustain a credible plea that one wasn’t reckless: shooting at passers-by at random in the street because one of them might be a mugger is plainly not justifiable.
In the same way, I cannot support the application of the death penalty in any jurisdiction where there is evidence that a wrongful conviction may have taken place. Governor Ryan would have felt doubts about this when he reprieved a convicted killer who was exonerated within 48 hours of being executed. At least if a person serving a life sentence is found to be innocent, we can release him, say sorry, and negotiate some sort of compensation. This is – to say the least – difficult where the hangman’s noose has come into play.
This year we are likely to see a regime change in Bagdad and if we’re very lucky in Pyongyang. Brussels would be taking optimisim perhaps a bit far!
It occurs to me that this is an area in which libertarians who are sceptical of the public relations exercise known as the “Saddam’s the worst thing since Hitler” can agree with the libertarian interventionists. It also shows up the fundamental dishonesty of the leftist “peace” campaigners.
Talking to a “peace” protestor a couple of weeks ago I was informed of the following alleged facts:
- that Iraq was a client of the US and armed by the Reagan and Bush senior presidencies.
- that the people of Iraq would bear the brunt of any US led military intervention.
- that the sanctions against Iraq were killing hundreds of children every day;
- that the US was only interested in manipulating the oil price, though I’m clear whether it is supposed to go up or down.
- that the “peace” protestors are against any war and in no way endorsing the Iraqi regime (which remains nameless).
Contrast the claims with the attitudes of the same people about the regimes of general Pinochet in Chile and the apartheid regime in South Africa.
- The left claimed that both were US client states, so why didn’t the peace protestors defend those regimes from proposed US sanctions? Obviously the “client state” claim is irrelevant or untrue.
- If the people are going to suffer most from military action, how come they don’t defend the German people who suffered from a terrible invasion in 1945: Soviet troops were ordered to rape every German woman they could find in Berlin. The “peace” protestors are not normally known for minimising the trauma of multiple rapes on women and children.
- How come the South African children who presumably suffered from the leftist inspired sanctions against South Africa weren’t worth defending? Perhaps they were meant to suffer and become useful puppets in a Soviet war of liberation.
- So where were these “peace” protestors when Argentina invaded the Falkland Islands in 1982, or when the Soviets invaded Afghanistan in 1979, or Vietnam invaded Cambodia in 1980 (admittedly they must have been confused by this one)?
Funny how it’s only the regimes that support socialism (preferably of a racialist tendency) or anti-modern theocracy that are deemed worthy of “peace” protestor support.
A Commie is a Commie is a Commie. There are grounds for opposing war, but the Communist Dictator Defence League isn’t one of them.
“America is fighting the War on Terrorism for one reason: to Secure the American Homeland, whatever it takes. If that takes Empire, fine.”
Trent Telenko
I hope that the US destroys the North Korean Communist regime by the time I’ve posted this text. If there is a legitimate nuclear target anywhere on Earth right now, the North Korean plutonium refinery has to be it.
I also would give a cheer if Saddam Hussein were to end up dead in a traffic accident, or choke on caviar, or find breathing under a pillow difficult, or take a cruise missile up his fundament.
And I am crtainly not one of those people who hopes that lots of American troops die in Iraq over the next few months.
I fear that the British military capability is over-stretched and less effective than its champions would like us to believe. For this reason I am wary of jingoistic talk in London. I would prefer to hear about orders for a decent rifle, a decent tank, a fighter that’s actually operational and reassurance that the anti-chemical warfare suits work.
I also question the double talk about nukes in Iraq when the good reasons for toppling/killing Saddam are…
- he’s a national socialist tyrant
- he’s allegedly one of Al-Qaeda’s main financial and logistical backers.
I’m told there is evidence to back up this claim, so why the red herrings?
BUT, the comment which opens this posting worries me. First it is obvious that if President Bush were seriously taking this line (I don’t think he is, but Mr Telenko may know better), then Europe had better do a deal with the fundamentalists, because America is clearly prepared to sacrifice allies as part of “whatever it takes”, it has the ring of the Yalta betrayal about it. The history of Japan from 1902 to 1945 and its deteriorating relations with the British and Americans is a nasty precedent.
Second “if that takes empire, fine” is precisely the scenario in which libertarians should not (and many will not) support the US. Waco was not a crime because Americans were killed, September 11th would have been a crime if the only victims had been Latino office cleaners. “Homeland” is a very nasty term to the four thousand seven hundred million people who don’t have a US passport or a Green Card. If the War on Terrorism is about protecting the US at the expense of the rest of the world, we’ve got a new Iron Curtain coming down, this time in front of the Statue of Liberty.
I really didn’t expect my warnings about the long-term temptation of absolute power to be vindicated so quickly.
Reading David Carr’s criticism of the Galileo system reminds me of the Lord of the Rings.
Specifically the question is whether it is better for there to be one superpower, or several powers. David seems to take the view that the EU is evil, but the US is good… or at least less evil). As a centralised state emerges on the European continent, this may appear to some British Libertarians like nothing less than the re-emergence of the Dark Lord in Mordor.
Tolkien would possibly see as more complicated: the US acting perhaps like the doomed kingdom of Numenor. The US military hegemony as analogous to Galadriel taking the One Ring:
[Sam Speaks]
“But if you’ll pardon my speaking out, I think my master was right. I wish you’d take his Ring. You’d put things to rights. You’d stop them digging up the gaffer and turning him adrift. You’d make some folks pay for their dirty work.”
[Galadriel replies]
“I would” she said. “That is how it would begin. But it would not stop with that, alas! We will not speak more of it. Let us go!”
The Fellowship of the Ring, Chapter Seven, The Mirror of Galadriel
How many American readers of Samizdata would agree that the British Empire was a force for world freedom? Not many judging by the numbers who think it was wrong for the US to intervene in both World Wars. The problem is that the British Empire was at times a force for free trade and at other times a mercantilist extortion racket.
The US empire to come is unlikely to be as restrained as the British Empire, because of the socialist ethos of state imposed education, and crusades such as ridding the Third World of cheap (child) labour, the War on Drugs, the War on Tax Evasion, trying to impose a worldwide age of sexual consent, banning alcohol before 21, but making it almost compulsory thereafter, the imposition of American patent law worldwide, and of course, global weapons control.
In other words, although US global supremacy starts better than the Soviet dream of a worldwide Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, it could end up the same:
“That is how it would begin. But it would not stop with that, alas!”
Which is why I hope the Galileo system works, and that other countries develop stealth bombers… and that nuclear weapons proliferate.
The story so far: The Labour government which promised to nationalize the railways in 1996 has regulated (with massive public support) the private railway companies to the verge of bankrupcy. History repeating itself in other words, as this is exactly what happened between the 1880s and 1945.
What is new is the Conservative Party’s reaction? If I understand this correctly, the Conservatives believe the following:
- The government may have acted illegally in bankrupting Railtrack and in the accounting rules which allow the debt of the new company to remain outside the national debt.
- Costs are spiralling out of control in the absence of any shareholder value or accountability.
- Therefore the Conservative Party promises to leave things as they are for the foreseeable future.
I note that the world’s best railway is privately owned (Japan) and that the French government is likely to move towards privatisation soon. Having pioneered privatisation the Conservative loss of nerve means that we could soon live in the only country in the developed world without a capitalist railway system. Unless of course that the Labour government decides to re-privatise, as it is doing with the Channel Rail link.
Conservative ‘spokesperson’ Tim Collins also has this dire threat for the government:
“When there were future accidents, he would not be calling automatically for a public inquiry or saying it was the fault of the government.”
The government must be quaking in its boots with mirth. The railway fiasco of its own making will not be challenged by the opposition. The Tories are committed to matching Labour’s wasted billions.
And this is the first transport policy of that new leader with the nervous cough the Tories elected a year ago… what compromises would they make if they actually won? (aargh!)
Azedine Berkane, held in France for the stabbing of Bertrand Delanöe, the homosexual Mayor of Paris, in October this year, may be refused a trial on the grounds that he is a nutter.
Two psychiatrists have concluded that the Islamic fundamentalist who was assumed to have acted in accordance with Islamic hatred of homosexuality, is in fact suffering from a psychosis which often leads to violent behaviour “within a religious context”.
A second opinion is expected before prosecutors have to decided whether Mr Berkhane, 39 years old unemployed and without fixed abode, can be considered mentally fit to stand trial for attempted murder.
In fairness to the psychiatrists, Mr Berkhane has a history of mental illness, and has allegedly claimed that he was being pursued by a “satanic cult”. In 2001, Mr Berkhane was a voluntary patient at a psychiatric hospital in the Paris suburb of St Denis. In March 2002, he was reported missing to police by his mother.
If the French authorities deal with homophobic attacks by Muslims by shaking their heads, saying “poor chap, he’s off his rocker”, locking them up indefinitely, and giving them drugs or electroshock treatment, it doesn’t seem a very glorious path for a young Mudjaheddin to follow. Might this be better than the death penalty? Or is it too cruel?
I don’t read cyrillic script, but I’m I’m told that this link takes one to a book by Yuri Muchin which is about the “murder” by “the Jews” of Beria and Stalin.
All I can say is, if it is true, where do I send my check to the global Zionist conspiracy. It is hard to think of a greater service to mankind.
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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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