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 recent massive U.S. government increase in subsidy to its domestic farmers comes in for a deserved and amusing mauling from Daily Telegraph journalist and Tory MP Boris Johnson. He is right to point out that by signing off the vast increase in aid to American farmers, Bush has compounded the damage to international free markets made when he agreed to steel and lumber tariffs earlier in the year.
On a broader point, this makes me wonder whether Bush is headed for going down in history as one of the most protectionist Presidents since the Second World War. On the domestic front his pre-election agenda seems to fallen apart with the exception of the tax cut. Instead, Bush is resorting to pork-barrel politics to shore up support in supposed key states for the Republicans ahead of the Congressional elections this autumn. Of course, we libertarians hold no illusions about politicians as a group, so I suppose Bush’s slide into cynicism should not surprise us. But I never thought I could write the following words – I am beginning to miss Bill Clinton. At least he believed in free trade, if nothing else.
It was bound to happen. Writers in Europe have woken up to the fact that Americans do not regard the European chattering classes with particular fondness and respect. Paul Gottfried in a singularly bad-tempered article in this week’s edition of The Spectator magazine, broadly tries to argue that there is a right-wing smear campaign in American intellectual and political circles to discredit Europe and to portray Europeans as anti-Semitic, cowardly, cynical, socialistic idiots.
Well, Gottfried makes a few decent points, and it is undoubtedly true that there has been a strain of hostility towards Europe in some of the commentary emanating from Jefferson’s Republic (den Beste at USS Clueless and some of the Weekly Standard writers are particular offenders). But Gottfried does not pause to consider why this hostility has arisen. It is not because Americans are jealous of Europe, why should they be? It is not fear of us…that’d be the day! It is a lack of patience with the sneering, dishonest rubbish coming out of the lips of the likes of Chris Patten and the rest. From what I read, I get the impression that all but the most bigoted paleo-conservative commentators appreciate that most European folk like and are sympathetic to the U.S., want it to beat terror, and will help in that cause.
God Save the Queen and God Bless America.
People occasionally ask me why I work as a journalist. Is it the thrill of interviewing British Chancellor Gordon Brown, covering aspects of the Enron disaster or implications of September 11th?
Well I guess the answer would be yes to all of the above. But, gentle readers, it is stories like this one that really make working for Reuters so rewarding. It is libertarian, in a not terribly intellectual kind of way. Enjoy.
Well, it seems hapless former UK transport minister and all-round-twit Stephen Byers learned the hard way of why the once-magnificent British railway system was to prove his downfall. As they say, it could not have happened to a nicer guy.
Meanwhile, Patrick Crozier, at his excellent UK Transport blog, confesses to being totally surprised at the resignation of Byers. I confess to feeling the same way. But of course I am not kidding myself that anything will change in the quality of our transport network as a result of Byers’ departure. The trains will still be late and dirty, the Tube (underground subway) will still be noisy, late and hot; our roads will be jammed, and the cost of motoring will still be extortionate.
Britain is a member of the Group of Seven industrial nations and yet we have an increasingly third world transportation system.
Well, it seems the Communist state of North Korea is not letting its downtrodden citizens get so much of a sniff of the World Cup tournament, which kicks off this weekend. Anti-football snobs may claim this is a rare example of the benefits of Communism, but as an (admittedly currently depressed) Ipswich Town and England fan, this story surely demonstrates the evils of what Marx has spawned,
Anglosphere writer Jim Bennett weighs in with another fine salvo against EU Commissioner Chris (oh no, not him again!) Patten. Rather than repeat my earlier comments last week about the wretched Commissioner, just take a look at what Mr Bennett has to say. What impresses me so much about Bennett’s writing is that he manages to maintain a civil, pleasant tone even when trashing ideas he regards as dumb.
Oh, and changing the subject, another excellent article, if one has the time, is Andrew Sullivan‘s Sunday Times column on the vast wealth of what he calls the Western world’s “overclass”. Sullivan makes the point – obvious to we libertarians if not to collectivists – that the tremendous wealth of Bill Gates and the like is not made at the expense of we humbler mortals, but is part of an ever-increasing pie. However, Sullivan frets that the growth of such an overclass” is a problem, since society can become fragmented if the very rich are seen as detached from the mores and concerns of the middle class. A sort of mirror-problem of the “underclass”. I am not entirely sure he is right, but agree this is worth thinking about. It is also instructive to look at what Sullivan says about the proportion of tax paid by rich Americans. Completely undermines the idea that supply-side tax cuts are unfair. If anything, the rich were entitled to a bigger cut than that which Bush gave them last year.
However, Sullivan backs away from the obvious conclusion – the moral tax rate is Nil!
Nice profile of UK scientist Dr Terence Kealey in the latest online edition of U.S. technology and venture capital magazine Red Herring, which draws out Kealey’s claim that it is wrong to suppose science will die without generous funding from the taxpayer. The man knows what he is talking about, having worked as a research scientist at a number of British institutions.
The profile is refreshingly fair-minded. In fact, this edition of Red Herring is excellent, with lots of good stuff on biotech, nanotechnology, telecoms and much besides. It is generally pro-free enterprise without being tiresomely ideological and is often a good way to pitch capitalism to the neutral observer. I once met its main editor and founder, Anthony Perkins, in his Californian home about five years ago and am impressed to see how his publication has surged over the years. More power to Red Herring’s elbow.
No doubt anti-market commentators will be using the current troubles of U.S. broking giant Merrill Lynch to bash the capitalist system. But they would be wrong, just as wrong, in fact, as to say that the demise of U.S. energy titan Enron was a slap in the face for we free-market types.
Not so. What I think the Merrill saga shows is that in a dynamic marketplace where more and more wealth is attached to the realm of ideas rather than physical capital, it is crucial to ensure good behaviour. Merrill has suffered over doubts about the impartiality of the analyst advice given to clients. It shows how the brutal forces sweeping global capitalism can chasten the brashest of Wall Street players.
And it ought to show investors in stocks and bonds something else – let the buyer beware!
EU Commissioner Chris Patten, who has famously chided George W. Bush for his stance on the war on terror and who stated the September 11th attacked were ‘the result of globalization’, turns his attention to matters closer to home in The Spectator, namely how to forge a common European political identity where none now exists.
Patten is no doubt troubled by the rise of various anti-establishment political forces in EU member states, notably that of the National Front in France and that of murdered libertarian Dutch nationalist Pym Fortuyn. But Patten, in his usual delusional way, misses the essential point that one cannot impose a national or supranational identity where none previously exists. For a man who once was chairman of the Conservative Party, Patten seems curiously ignorant of the insights of such conservative thinkers like Edmund Burke and Michael Oakshott that national feeling is something that grows from below and takes organic form rather than be imposed from above. Patten thinks of national or supranational identity like a technocratic engineer. In this sense, then, he is heir to that strain of thinking which has been a key part of the French political system since the 1789 Revolution.
And there, of course, is the problem. The EU creates undemocratic institutions with considerable power like the European Central Bank and the European Commission, but then once problems present themselves, the likes of Patten scramble to figure out how to generate some kind of popular legitimacy for these bodies. That is surely putting the cart before the horse.
In his final paragraph, Patten writes: “A healthy European democracy will develop only when people begin to feel an emotional commitment to their European identity.”
But Mr Patten, people don’t WANT to be part of a European nation, hence they feel no need to create a common European polity. Until the elite political class of which Patten is a classic specimen grasp this obvious point, European countries will continue to be roiled by characters such as the ghastly Le Pen.
It seems British Prime Minister Tony Blair can hide his love for the European single currency no longer. On Tuesday’s Newsnight television programme on the BBC channel, Blair claimed it would be a ‘betrayal of national interests’ for Britain to stay out of the €uro for political reasons and said he would persuade voters to join.
Well, it looks like the grinning insurance salesman/trendy vicar character who has been our Prime Minister these last five years has decided to plunge Britain into the €uro at a time when developments in Euroland make it even less attractive as an idea. The rise of the Far Right in France, the murder of Dutch leader Pim Fortuyn in Holland, high unemployment and worries about massive unfunded pension obligations make the idea of shackling ourselves to the euro mighty unattractive.
Of course the creation of the euro has made it easier for big firms to tap into a pan-European bond and equity market and made prices of goods and services on the Continent more transparent, which are benefits not to be sneered at. But I very much doubt whether Blair is going to flog this risky venture to the public on the grounds that it makes it easier for his Big Business chums to tap the world’s capital markets. Not very touchy-feely, is it? In an age of Visa and Mastercard, instant cash withdrawals and sophisticated derivative markets, it no longer is much of a hassle to operate in a multi-currency world as €uro-protagonists claim.
All in all the case for the €uro is weak and Blair is going to have a fight on his hands. Blair wants his place in history. But by staking his future on the €uro, he could become history.
The following news item appeared on the Reuters website this morning. It certainly proves the point that martial arts can be useful as a form of self defence for women. One wonders how long it will be before a victim-disarmament twit tries to ban it.
A quick thought for ye – why do we hardly hear a peep from the UK Conservative Party any more about tax cuts and the importance therof in spurring entrepreneurship…not to mention the moral case for such cuts. Has that party, the party that once bravely slashed the insane top rate of income tax from near-100 percent to a more tolerable but still-too high 40 percent, totally given up the fight? Shadow Chancellor Michael Howerd has said nothing on the subject.
Truly pathetic. And yet, contrary to conventional wisdom, I reckon that an aggressive tax-cutting agenda linked to a wholesale critique of our monopolistic public services like health care and education could reap dividends. By buying the Blairite idea that tax cuts equals putting granny on the streets and letting little Johnny without enough teachers, the Tories are playing straight into socialist hands. Come on you pathetic Tories, take a slide on the Laffer Curve!
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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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