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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The Sunday Telegraph has an article about Winston Churchill’s lifelong battle with the taxman that continued even at the height of the Second World War. Documents covering a 20-year period were published for the first time last week and refer to Churchill’s “latest attempt to minimise liability”. They indicate that he used every lawful opportunity to avoid tax. At one stage he considered setting up an overseas company to ensure that his lucrative extra-parliamentary earnings would be exempt from income tax.
Andrew Roberts, a historian who has written extensively about Churchill, said:
I do not think these disclosures will make people think any less of Churchill.
Au contraire! They further point to Churchill’s excellent judgment as to who the enemies are…
Message to the Inland Revenue
An American scientist, William von Hippel has an explanation for racism. Well, a theory of why elderly people are more likely to be prejudiced than young people. And if his research is right, it’s not just because they grew up in a different era, because Blair’s Britain is a sink pit of immigrant crime, or because old people are brave enough to fly in the face of political correctness. Mary Wakefield explains in today’s Telegraph that a bit of their brain is missing:
According to von Hippel and other psychologists working in the same field, whatever age we are, our immediate thoughts are formed by cultural stereotypes. This means we instinctively think inappropriate and unfriendly things about each other.
…
For a highly social species, the ability to keep these thoughts to oneself is crucial, so we have developed a special part of our brains – a mesh of connections between the prefrontal lobes and the limbic system – to inhibit and temper them.
…
Where von Hippel’s research is new is in suggesting that older people’s brains often suffer the same sort of damage. They become prejudiced because they lack the power to inhibit the stereotypes that form our instinctive thoughts.
The gap in their brain releases stereotypes and they naturally infer that they are doing it on purpose.
I have no idea whether the theory will hold up to further scientific scrutiny. I also do not like the implication that older people’s opinions and behaviour are somehow not results of their rational discourse but determined by a neurological phenomenon. Nevetheless it is an interesting article that caught my attention and so it appears here without any firm conclusions from me as to its goodness or badness. If true, it has highlighted the importance of stereotyping and unexamined prejudices. Get your opinions in order before you are disconnected from them and begin to embarass your offspring. 
Of course, this means that there could be a psychological metacontext.
Having returned to the land of hope and glory after almost two weeks of hectic holiday season and a limited access to internet, I have the need to blog of things I have seen.
I spent Christmas in Bratislava, the capital of Slovakia. After such splendid reviews of the town here on Samizdata.net, I was wondering whether it would live up to his impressions during the cold winter days. The Christmas markets in the centre of town, a tradition established in 1993, have a certain magic that increases with copious quantities of hot mead and wine.
The crowds are impressive, with density matching that of any western shopping experience. There are many international brands present, many a multinational appearing in the ‘small town with big potential’. The most impressive sight, probably because most unexpected, was the vista alongside a new road by-pass relieving the centre of Bratislava of heavy traffic. The road is lined with enormous warehouses, hypermarkets, showrooms for car makers such as Mercedes-Benz, Porsche, Nissan, Audi, Jeep, Chrysler, there is Fuji Film and Coca-Cola. Driving along you could be in any western country. In the centre of town I have seen designer shops frequented mostly by the rich even in the West. I believe I caught a glimpse of Bang and Olufsen. Whatever you think of the brand, it is a huge leap for the design-conscious of Bratislava.
This all is very good and a superficial visitor might conclude that Bratislava represents a successful marriage of the charm of a small provincial city with a multinational presence and that Bratislava benefits from its proximity to Vienna without being reduced to a charmless suburb of its larger and more internationally renowned neighbour. Perhaps I should leave it at that and spread the good word without digging underneath the surface. Unfortunately, I stayed there long enough to encounter what lies beneath or, as we Samizdatistas would say, in the metacontext. → Continue reading: Potemkin village of capitalism
A reader alerted us to an interesting vote happening on the Radio 4 today programme: vote for a law to be submitted to the House of Commons. So far there are five ‘Law Ideas’ and at No.5 is a bill to allow homeowners to defend their property with any force, by deleting “reasonable” from the phrase “reasonable force”.
You can vote by phone or online, if you are registered with BBCi.
USA Today reports that face-scanning technology designed to recognize registered sex offenders and missing children has been installed in a Phoenix school in a pilot project that some law enforcement and education officials hope to expand.
Two cameras, which are expected to be operational next week, will scan faces of people who enter the office at Royal Palm Middle School. They are linked to state and national databases of sex offenders, missing children and alleged abductors.
Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, a tough-talking sheriff who has previously gained notoriety for his chain gangs and prison-issued pink underwear said:
If it works one time, locates one missing child or saves a child from a sexual attack, I feel it’s worth it.
Civil libertarians have raised red flags about the idea, pointing to potential privacy violations, and biometrics experts say facial recognition programs are not foolproof.
According to an account from Major Bryan Reed, an operations officer for the US army’s 4th infantry division, in an exchange before he was pulled from the hole in the ground he was sheltering in, the former dictator said to US troops in English:
“My name is Saddam Hussein. I am the president of Iraq and I want to negotiate.” US special forces replied “regards from President Bush”.
Times has an article up that contains notes from Saddam in custody. Many bloggers and their readers have been wondering what Saddam will reveal in interrogations. The first questioning has not produced much it seems, the transcript was full of “Saddam rhetoric type stuff,” according to the official who paraphrased Saddam’s answers to some of the questions.
When asked “How are you?” said the official, Saddam responded, “I am sad because my people are in bondage.” When offered a glass of water by his interrogators, Saddam replied, “If I drink water I will have to go to the bathroom and how can I use the bathroom when my people are in bondage?”
More importantly, Saddam is denying everything and replying with really dumb answers to questions that might incriminate him.
Saddam was also asked whether Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction. “No, of course not,” he replied, according to the official, “the U.S. dreamed them up itself to have a reason to go to war with us.” The interrogator continued along this line, said the official, asking: “if you had no weapons of mass destruction then why not let the U.N. inspectors into your facilities?” Saddam’s reply: “We didn’t want them to go into the presidential areas and intrude on our privacy.”
Hm, Saddam as a champion of privacy?
It was wonderful to see the footage of Saddam after his capture as he was given a medical. It fulfilled at least two objectives – it put pictures to the words (an important message in this image driven times) and showed the captured dictator unkempt, disheveled and in an undignified situation. I imagine the contrast between the images of Saddam at the height of his power and those broadcast in the last 24 hours will go a long way in demolishing his personality cult.
This leads nicely to my reference to Stalin in the title of this post. Saddam Hussain is of the same breed as the monstrous Josef Dzhugashvili – a powerful, resilient, personally courageous, charismatic, megalomaniac and psychopathic dictator. It may be banal to compare Hussain to Stalin when there are still people who consider Stalin just a bit authoritarian but let’s face it, the man industrialised Russia and you can’t make an omelette without breaking…blah, blah, blah… I expect the familiar herds of barking moonbats to come out in droves with words ‘human rights, international law, due process and fair trial’ on their lips and the hate of all things American and Western in their hearts and minds. They have already learnt how to look over the mass graves of innocent Iraqis while protesting against the coalition’s war on the Ba’athist regime in Iraq, so it should not be too difficult to gloss over Saddam’s crimes yet again as they attack the coalitions efforts to “give Saddam the justice he denied to millions of Iraqis”.
It is an unfortunate historical fact that Stalin died a natural death. Since Nazism there has been no precedent about how to deal with murderous dictators and the international law, created by the impetus of the Nuremberg trial, has failed miserably to deliver what could be, even remotely, considered justice. The scores of African and Middle Eastern tyrants roam free and inflict untold suffering on their subjects under the benign gaze of the international and human rights community. Genocidal national leaders and their retinue are getting treatment and ‘fair trial’ that make their victims weep with despair as retribution for their crimes disappears in the maze of international law and its convoluted processes. Nowhere the gap between law and justice has been greater than in international law.
So when I hear the commentators calling on international and human rights experts hours after Saddam’s capture, the good news turns sour. I worry that in the coming months justice will be the next concept bandied about and stretched beyond recognition. Tony Blair has already talked about “putting the past behind” and has called for ‘reconciliation and unity’. (Judging from recent actions I fear this means sucking up to the French, Germans and Russian.)
It seems that the lesson from “purging of the fascist elements” in post-war Germany and Japan has been long forgotten. Many of the problems in Central and Eastern Europe originate from the photogenic pseudomoral posturing of the dissidents that rose to power after the communists vacated their seats. “Forgive and forget”, “draw the line behind the past”, “move on to a better future” and platitudes to that effect resonated across the former communist bloc and the West marvelled at the civilised and moral manner of the Velvet Revolution(s).
In my book, forgiveness comes after repentance. In post-communist societies, forgiveness was the only thing left that the battered populations felt had any control over. And so ex-communists, although no longer communists in the name but still embedded in the fabric of the society, unrepentant and powerful, could make sure that the future is to their advantage. Justice does not even get a foot in the door.
Nevertheless, let’s not be unduly pessimistic. For once. We will certainly be following with interest how and what justice will be dispensed to Saddam and his cronies and what the Big Media make of the whole affair. We live in interesting times and with blogosphere there is a way of making them even more interesting.
The scale of Russia’s disillusionment with western-style democracy became apparent yesterday as the country’s two largest pro-western parties were all but wiped out in parliamentary elections.
President Putin’s United Russia came out the clear winner with 37 percent of the vote and a majority in the new State Duma and will most likely end up controlling two thirds of the Duma enabling the president to change the constitution at will. This may not be a revolutionary change from the past as the constitution was rendered feeble and Duma castrated by Yeltsin. Another quarter of the seats will be shared by anti-western reactionaries nostalgic for the days of Soviet superpower status.
The election made clear one thing – that I have argued here on Samizdata.net in the face of indignation by some commenters – Russia is not (and was not) heading the right direction. The reasons for this are more fundamental than Putin’s taste for power or Yeltsin’s penchant for gestures of a ‘Leader of Mother Russia’. Although they both fossilised what was wrong with the political and state institutions in Russia, their attitudes and actions originated from the country’s political and social values and traditions and were often supported by the majority.
Here are some quotes that sum up the political development in Russia:
Yesterday’s election shows what the people actually think: they are stridently nationalist, want wealth redistributed and have little interest in liberal or democratic values.
An analyst at a financial firm, Aton
It is a sad day for liberalism. The liberals in Russia are finished in the short term.
Igor Mintusov a political campaign consultant at Nikkolo M
Our main impression of the overall electoral process was one of regression in the democratisation of this country.
Bruce George of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe
The first two statements are spot on, the last one confuses democracy with liberal values. The Russian elections were probably democratic alright. It is freedom, liberal constitutionalism, individual and civil rights that have suffered a defeat in Russia. My point is that they were not even taking part.
Lawrance M. Bernabo, Amazon reviewer #2 with 6700 reviews behind him faces a Hamletesque (Hamletian?) dilemma:
To review, or not to review: that is the question:
Whether ’tis better to post reviews and cover
The pros and cons of action figures,
Or to write reviews about best sellers,
And by reviewing diss them? To critique: to review;
No more; and have a life again we end
The long-nights and the thousand misspeeled words
and buy things instead, ’tis a consumption
Amazon devoutley wish’d. To critique, to review;
To review: perchance be voted: Yeah, there’s the fun;
For in those votes for reviews what ranking may come
Whence we may achieve a cute little badge,
Must make us crazed: such obsession
Surely makes such big time fun of reviewing life;
For who would bear the wit and scorns of posts,
The counter review, the second page oblivion,
The pangs of negative votes, posting delay,
The insolence of edits and revisions
The steady rise of the unworthy reviewer,
When anyone might their ascension make
With some extra accounts? who would freebies take,
To read and review someone’s new book,
But that the fun of something never reviewed,
The undiscover’d product for the nounce
No reviews critique, inspires the mind
And makes us rather review everything we have
Than review those things that we know not of?
Thus ranking does make competitors of us all;
And thus the constant cry re: ranking
Is debated o’er with constant call for reform,
And reviews of great length and insight
With words counts the elves judge too high,
Do lose the chance of posting.– Submit you more!
Fair Amazon.com! Jeff, on thy pages
Be all my reviews spotlighted.
We conclude that he needs a blog. Now!
Via Many-2-Many
Chris Addison of the Guardian shares a letter from tax authorities he received as a reply to his earlier missives on the topic of tax gathering. The Guardian? Tax authorities? This does not bode well for the entertainment potential of this post. Nevertheless, I reproduce the letter below in full as it made my day1:
Dear Mr Addison,
I am writing to you to express our thanks for your more-than-prompt reply to our latest communication, and also to answer some of the points you raise.
I will address them, as ever, in order.
Firstly, I must take issue with your description of our last as a “begging letter”. It might perhaps more properly be referred to as a “tax demand”. This is how we, at the Inland Revenue, have always, for reasons of accuracy, traditionally referred to such documents.
Secondly, your frustration at our adding to the “endless stream of crapulent whining and panhandling vomited daily through the letterbox on to the doormat” has been noted. However, whilst I have naturally not seen the other letters to which you refer, I would cautiously suggest that their being from “pauper councils, Lombardy pirate banking houses and pissant gas-mongerers” might indicate that your decision to “file them next to the toilet in case of emergencies” is at best a little ill-advised.
In common with my own organisation, it is unlikely that the senders of these letters do see you as a “lackwit bumpkin” or, come to that, a “sodding charity”. More likely they see you as a citizen of Great Britain, with a responsibility to contribute to the upkeep of the nation as a whole.
Which brings me to my next point. Whilst there may be some spirit of truth in your assertion that the taxes you pay “go to shore up the canker-blighted, toppling folly that is the Public Services”, a moment’s rudimentary calculation ought to disabuse you of the notion that the government in any way expects you to “stump up for the whole damned party” yourself. The estimates you provide for the Chancellor’s disbursement of the funds levied by taxation, whilst colourful, are, in fairness, a little off the mark. Less than you seem to imagine is spent on “junkets for Bunterish lickspittles” and “dancing whores”, whilst far more than you have accounted for is allocated to, for example, “that box-ticking facade of a university system”.
A couple of technical points arising from direct queries: 1. The reason we don’t simply write “Muggins” on the envelope has to do with the vagaries of the postal system; 2. You can rest assured that “sucking the very marrows of those with nothing else to give” has never been considered as a practice because even if the Personal Allowance didn’t render it irrelevant, the sheer medical logistics involved would make it financially unviable.
I trust this has helped. In the meantime, whilst I would not in any way wish to influence your decision one way or the other, I ought to point out that even if you did choose to “give the whole foul jamboree up and go and live in India” you would still owe us the money. Please forward it by Friday.
Yours sincerely,
H J Lee
Customer Relations
Notwithstanding the purpose and the origin of this letter, I think its style is commendable2.
Note (1): This article has been published on 27th September, so it may have circled the planet Blog by now. Please skip, if I am merely reposting the ‘joke of the month’ from two months ago long after the party.
Note (2): Yes, it is a joke and not a real letter.
Wired has an article about the Supreme Court hearing on whether the federal government should reimburse individuals whose sensitive data was disclosed illegally, even if no harm can be proven.
At issue before the court, according to privacy advocates, is how valuable privacy really is. The Privacy Act of 1974 prohibits the government from disclosing private information intentionally, without the individual’s consent, and provides for a $1,000 minimum fine if the individual is “adversely affected.”
Marcia Hoffman, staff counsel at the Electronic Privacy Information Center, argues that Congress preset the penalty precisely because it is so hard to put a price on an abstract concept such as privacy or to prove damages in absence of others’ misuse of that data.
If your Social Security number is disclosed, there is a real potential harm from identity theft.
Lucy Dalglish, executive director of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, argues that if the government has to pay damages in the case of any improper release of someone’s Social Security number, then reporters will not get information from the government that they need and are entitled to.
In the spirit of releasing as much information to the public as possible, we think he should have to prove damages. If every time you release information about an individual, you are going to be threatened with this $1,000-per-record fine, you are going to have agencies so nervous that they are going to err on the side of not turning over something. Government guardians of information are going to be way overly cautious.
And we would not want the government agencies nervous, would we…?
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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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