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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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“PAY UP OR SHUT UP” – “TRILLIONS NOT BILLIONS” – “Global North, PAY UP!” These are some of the signs being held up by climate activists in a photograph taken at the recently concluded COP29 conference in Baku. Perhaps the women holding the “Pay up or shut up” sign are unaware of how many citizens of the Global North wish their governments would take the second option. More probably these activists are well aware that, whatever the citizens of those countries might want, said governments are committed to taking “climate action” and are positively addicted to talking about taking climate action. The link takes you to a Guardian article that continues,
It was only on the last scheduled day of two weeks of negotiations at the UN Cop29 climate summit that developed countries put a financial commitment on the table for the first time.
In reality, this offer took not just two weeks of talks to prepare, but nine years – since article 9 of the Paris agreement in 2015 made it clear that the rich industrialised world would be obliged to supply cash to developing countries to help them tackle the climate crisis.
When it finally arrived on Friday, the initial offer of $250bn (£200bn) a year by 2035 was widely derided as too low. Early the following morning, the countries upped the figure to $300bn, which ended up being accepted, albeit amid acrimony and cries of “betrayal”.
The Telegraph‘s account says,
Cop29 ground out a last-minute compromise deal on Saturday night that offers at least $300 billion (£240 billion) per year by 2035 to help poorer countries confront global warming and allows China’s contributions to remain voluntary.
The sum demanded by the less wealthy nations had been much more following two weeks of negotiations in Azerbaijan’s Caspian Sea capital of Baku.
Mukhtar Babayev, the Cop29 president, declared open the final summit plenary after midnight on Saturday, two days after the conference was officially scheduled to end.
A final text was released following several sleepless nights for negotiators, with tensions boiling over as small island states and the world’s poorest countries walked out of one meeting.
A last-minute deal in extra time! Who could have guessed that would happen? Answer: anyone who remembered COP28 in 2023, COP27 in 2022, COP26 in 2021… but I did not come here entirely to recycle my post from this time last year (though I thought the title was amusing), but to point out that rich countries explicitly paying poor countries “to tackle the climate crisis” may have unexpected consequences.
Here is how Wikipedia describes Jizya:
Jizya (Arabic: جِزْيَة, romanized: jizya), or jizyah, is a type of taxation historically levied on non-Muslim subjects of a state governed by Islamic law
Modern writing about jizya as levied in the Ottoman Empire, for instance, tends to emphasize that, for the times, it represented a relatively good deal for adherents of minority religions. It gave those who paid it definite legal status as protected persons. Other descriptions of jizya are less palatable to the modern reader: many Muslim authorities saw the jizya “as a symbol of humiliation to remind dhimmis of their status as a conquered people and their subjection to Islamic laws” and, above all, as an incentive to convert to Islam.
Only it didn’t always work out that way. Robert Hoyland’s book In God’s Path tells of a pious governor of Khurasan called Ashras ibn ‘Abdallah who sent a missionary to bring the dhimmis under his rule to Islam:
…the man they hired preached in the environs of Samarkand, declaring that those who became Muslim would be freed of the poll tax, “and the people flocked to him.” . . . When Ashras realized that a consequence of his policy was a sharp drop in tax revenues, he ordered: “Take the tax from whomever you used to take it from,” and so they reimposed the poll tax on those who had become Muslim, prompting many to apostatize.
Later Islamic rulers learnt from this and similar episodes that they could avoid the trouble such a sharp reversal of policy caused and keep their jizya revenue flowing by quietly discouraging dhimmis from conversion, while, of course, loudly proclaiming how utterly vital it was that they should convert.
Will Hutton: “Farmers have hoarded land for too long. Inheritance tax will bring new life to rural Britain”.
“Inheritance tax springs from the universally held belief that society has the right to share when wealth is transferred on death as a matter of justice.”
It is not universal.
“This is not confiscation, especially if the lion’s share of the bequest is left intact.”
It is confiscation.
“It is asking for a share.”
It is not asking.
“Some 35 years after the collapse of the 20th century’s most rigorous experiment in the failure of central planning, the fall of the Soviet empire, and comparative success of the capitalist West, it is hard to fathom how we’ve got into this climate communist mess. It should be self-evident that the planet doesn’t have a thermostat, let alone one easily adjusted by national leaders ordering technology to improve through a cascade of plans lashed to a target. Decarbonisation will happen regardless and is likely to go faster by inventing better solutions funded from the proceeds from growth, or bottom-up innovation. Rather than five-year battery-powered tractor plans, in the context of mission-led state direction – the latest reinvention of the language of failure by top-down socialist planners.”
– Andy Mayer.
In case you’re wondering, the apostrophe in the title is not a contraction for “is”. It marks the possessive and refers to the large amount of garbage in Puerto Rico. Apparently Puerto Rico’s landfill sites are overflowing, and this has been recognised as an environmental problem for years.
It would be amusing to do a whole post about the deficiencies of waste disposal in an unincorporated territory of the United States without ever mentioning what brought the subject to the forefront of my mind. I seek to amuse, so that is what I am going to do, although readers from the future who seek context might like to click on one or two of the names to which I link below.
I did a quick internet search for articles containing reference to “Puerto Rico” and “trash” or “garbage”, but containing no reference to “Hinchcliffe” or “Trump” or “Biden”. Here are some news reports from the last few years that demonstrate that Puerto Rico’s garbage problem is not new:
Trash Crisis Leaves Puerto Rico Near ‘the Brink’ – Global Press Journal, February 16th 2021.
Puerto Rico Landfills: Is the Problem Around Capacity or Noncompliance? – Waste360, August 7th 2019.
An island littered with trash: How Maria highlighted Puerto Rico’s poor waste management. Accuweather, 29th March, 2018 (“Maria” is a reference to Hurricane Maria.)
The following quite lengthy report was apparently published just today. I admire them for resisting the temptation to bring politics into it:
Puerto Rico Trash Problem: Understanding the Crisis and Working Toward Solutions – The Environmental Blog, October 30th 2024.
A good article by “The Liberal Patriot”, Ruy Teixeira: “The Progressive Moment is Over”. The four main points he addresses to his fellow Democrats are:
1. Loosening restrictions on illegal immigration was a terrible idea and voters hate it.
2. Promoting lax law enforcement and tolerance of social disorder was a terrible idea and voters hate it.
3. Insisting that everyone should look at all issues through the lens of identity politics was a terrible idea and voters hate it.
4. Telling people fossil fuels are evil and they must stop using them was a terrible idea and voters hate it.
Twenty-two years ago, alongside John B. Judis, Mr Teixeira was one of the co-authors of a book called “The Emerging Democratic Majority”, which itself was inspired by a book written in 1969 by Kevin Phillips called “The Emerging Republican Majority”. Judging by the popular vote in US elections over the last two decades, Mr Teixeira wasn’t wrong, but all such theses have an expiry date. I would not care to place a bet on who will win the coming US election in eight days’ time, nor on the next one, but I would place a bet on the winners of the 2028 election not being progressives.
The news today is full of stories that laud the proposal in the Tobacco and Vapes Bill to ban disposable vapes. The first link takes you to a Guardian report, the second to an almost identical BBC report that says,
“Disposable vapes are difficult to recycle and typically end up landfill, where their batteries can leak harmful waste like battery acid, lithium, and mercury into the environment, the government said.
Batteries thrown into household waste also cause hundreds of fires in bin lorries and waste-processing centres every year.”
I am glad that the BBC has discovered that lithium-ion batteries can cause fires, but I think their focus on the tiny little batteries in disposable vapes might be missing a bigger problem. A report on the British Safety Council website says that,
“Batteries that power electric vehicles such as e-bikes, e-scooters and electric cars were responsible for almost three fires a day across the UK last year, according to data collected by [Business Insurer] QBE from freedom of information requests sent to UK fire services.”
After quoting the Circular Economy Minister (did you know we had one of those?) about how disposable vapes need to be banned to discourage “this nation’s throwaway culture”, the BBC finally gets round to talking about the original reasons that prompted Rishi Sunak’s government to table this legislation and Sir Keir Starmer’s government to continue with it:
“It is already illegal to sell any vape to anyone under 18, but disposable vapes – often sold in smaller, more colourful packaging than refillable ones – are a “key driver behind the alarming rise in youth vaping”, the previous government said when it first set out its plan.
The number of people who vape without ever having smoked has also increased considerably over recent years, driven mostly by young adults.
Vaping is substantially less harmful than smoking, but it has not been around for long enough for its long-term risks to be known, according to the NHS.”
So, vaping is certainly less harmful than smoking, but it might not be completely harmless. The reason I am confident that it is largely harmless is that vaping has, in fact, been around for twenty years at least, and if they had solid evidence of harm they would have told us faster than an e-bike explodes. Personally, I think people have the right to make their own judgement of risk against pleasure in their own lives, and hence should be allowed to buy e-bikes, disposable vapes, non-disposable vapes, and tobacco.
The Sunak/Starmer government disagrees. The long title of the Tobacco and Vapes Bill, as stated on the Parliamentary website, is “A Bill to Make provision about the supply of tobacco, vapes and other products, including provision prohibiting the sale of tobacco to people born on or after 1 January 2009; and to enable product requirements to be imposed in connection with tobacco, vapes and other products.”
The British law is modelled after a similar age-discriminatory tobacco prohibition law passed in New Zealand in 2022 when Jacinda Ardern was prime minister: “New Zealand passes legislation banning cigarettes for future generations.” It was reversed by Christopher Luxon’s government. We should be so lucky.
The UK experienced a nationwide blackout after its main energy plant failed, officials said.
Its power grid collapsed at around 11:00 (15:00 GMT), the energy ministry wrote on X.
Grid officials said they did not know how long it would take to restore power.
This follows months of lengthy blackouts on the island – prompting the prime minister to declare an “energy emergency” on Thursday.
Other stories
Fuel in the UK to become five times more expensive
The UK laments collapse of iconic sugar beet industry
‘The violence is getting out of hand’: Crime grips the UK’s streets
Friday’s total blackout came after the UK’s final coal-powered fire station, the last on the island – went offline. Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said the situation was his “absolute priority”.
That’s all bunk, er, the future: Here is the real news, from the BBC:
Cuba experienced a nationwide blackout after its main energy plant failed, officials said. Its power grid collapsed at around 11:00 (15:00 GMT), the energy ministry wrote on X. Grid officials said they did not know how long it would take to restore power. This follows months of lengthy blackouts on the island – prompting the prime minister to declare an “energy emergency” on Thursday.
Fuel in Cuba to become five times more expensive
Cuba laments collapse of iconic sugar industry
‘The violence is getting out of hand’: Crime grips Cuba’s streets
Friday’s total blackout came after the Antonio Guiteras power plant in Matanzas – the largest on the island – went offline. President Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez said the situation was his “absolute priority“. “There will be no rest until power is restored,” he wrote on X.
Earlier on Friday, officials announced that all schools and nonessential activities, including nightclubs, were to close until Monday.
Non-essential workers were urged to stay home to safeguard electricity supply, and non-vital government services were suspended. Cubans have also been urged to switch off high-consumption appliances during peak hours, such as fridges and ovens, according to local media.
Don’t worry folks, non-vital government services suspended? it won’t happen here.
In response to the CMN, Tom Greatrex, Chief Executive of the Nuclear Industry Association, stressed the importance of new investments in nuclear power. Tom Greatrex said: “Without fresh investment and decisions on new nuclear projects at Sizewell C and Wylfa as well as Small Modular Reactors, these warnings will become more commonplace and we will have to continue relying on volatile gas markets to fill the gaps in supply, threatening out energy security and driving up bills and emissions.”
Price gouging during disasters is good. It saves lives.
Think of it this way. When the hurricane is on its way do you want people to panic-buy double what they need “just in case”, causing the shops to run out? Why wouldn’t they do that if prices are artificially stopped from rising? Wouldn’t it be better if people limited the amount they bought because “it’s so expensive right now”, leaving more available for others?
When the disaster strikes, would you like businesses and individuals from hundreds of miles away to drop whatever they were doing previously and start transporting emergency supplies into the area affected – and keep doing it until there are no more shortages? Would you like factories hundreds of miles away to shift production to whatever the people in the afflicted area need most? You would? Then let them sell their stuff at a higher price than usual.
But the U.K.’s climate agenda is now decades old. The Climate Change Act (CCA) was made legislation in 2008, 16 years ago, but the drive towards decarbonisation started much earlier in the days of the Blair Government. The years ahead of the CCA saw the formation of a cross-party Westminster consensus on climate change, rather than a conversation with the public about what it would require of them and to seek their support. Consequently, the apparatus for the climate agenda was established through intergovernmental agencies and agreements, deals with the EU, legally-binding legislative measures to allow the enforcement of the green agenda by wealthy interests in the courts, and the construction of domestic carbon bureaucracies.
Gary Smith was the sole member of the panel at what was intended to be a debate for the same reason that it has not been possible for critics of Net Zero to get answers out of the likes of the U.K. Climate Change Committee (CCC). The CCC, as with any other agency or organisation, does not debate because it does not need to. The matter is settled. The cross-party consensus was established by green lobbyists without debate. And consequently, ostensibly democratic institutions have been wholly aligned to green ideology and the Net Zero policy agenda. It’s not up for debate.
– Ben Pile
The wedding scene from Flash Gordon:
Celebrant: “Do you, Ming the Merciless, Ruler of the Universe, take this Earthling, Dale Arden, to be your empress of the hour?”
Ming: “Of the hour, yes.”
Celebrant: “Do you promise to use her as you will?”
Ming: “Certainly.”
Celebrant: “Not to blast her into space…” [Ming gives him a warning look] “…until such time as you grow weary of her?”
–
Sadiq Khan’s deputy mayor for environment pledges to curb plane trips after clocking up 40,000 air miles, the Standard reports.
Mete Coban, a 32-year-old former Hackney councillor, was appointed to the £147,769-a-year City Hall role in July that involves him leading efforts to make London “net zero” in terms of carbon emissions by 2030.
While Hackney’s cabinet member for the environment, Mr Coban was revealed to have clocked up 40,000 air miles in two years.
I didn’t know that the London Borough of Hackney had a cabinet, let alone a cabinet member for the environment with worldwide responsibilities.
He said the “majority” of trips related to his job at an organisation, My Life My Say, that aims to get young people interested in politics and democracy.
But asked by Tory assembly member Thomas Turrell at a City Hall meeting about his travel habits, Mr Coban pledged to avoid “unnecessary” flights and to “lead by example”.
He told the London Assembly’s environment comittee: “I’m very clear that the majority of those flights relate to my previous role as chief executive of My Life My Say, where we are standing up for young people across the country, but also globally, to stand up for democracy.
“I don’t make any apology for making sure I am banging the drum for young people at some of the highest institutions, including the United Nations.
The need to make speeches at “the highest institutions” located in Miami, Dubai, Guatemala, Istanbul, Washington DC and Malta allowed “High Carbon Coban”, a member of the political class, to have 40,000 unapologetic air miles before he felt obliged to say that he would “avoid” flying while in his present role. Except when flights are absolutely necessary for his work as Deputy Mayor of London for Environment and Energy, obviously.
‘The system is the problem, not people’: how a radical food group spread round the world
Incredible Edible’s guerrilla gardening movement encourages people to take food-growing – and more – into their own hands
Pam Warhurst insists she’s no anarchist. Nevertheless, the founder of Incredible Edible, a food-focused guerrilla gardening movement, wants the state to get out of people’s way.
“The biggest obstacle is the inability of people in elected positions to cede power to the grassroots,” she says.
[…]
Her big idea is guerrilla gardening – with a twist. Where guerrilla gardeners subvert urban spaces by reintroducing nature, Incredible Edible’s growers go one step further: planting food on public land and then inviting all-comers to take it and eat.
I doubt this idea would scale up, but if growing food to give to others gives people pleasure, go for it. I cannot bring myself to feel outraged about the odd unauthorised carrot in a municipal flowerbed. And long have I waited to see lines like those I have put in bold type appear in the pages of the Guardian:
But as much as Warhurst’s idea has simplicity and wholesomeness, it also has a radical streak. At its heart, Incredible Edible is about hijacking public spaces – spaces nominally owned by communities, and paid for through their taxes, but administered and jealously guarded by public authorities.
And that is where Incredible Edible meets its biggest challenge: the dead hand of the state.
Earlier this month, the Met Office claimed that climate change was causing a “dramatic increase in the frequency of temperature extremes and number of temperature records in the U.K.”. Given what we now know from recent freedom of information (FOI) revelations about the state of its ‘junk’ nationwide temperature measuring network, it is difficult to see how the Met Office can publish such a statement and keep a straight face.
[…]
It’s almost as if the Met Office is actively seeking higher readings to feed into its constant catastrophisation of weather in the interests of Net Zero promotion. Whatever the reason – incompetence or political messaging – serious science would appear to be the loser. As currently set up, the Met Office network is incapable of providing a realistic guide to natural air temperatures across the U.K. Using the data to help calculate global temperatures is equally problematic.
– Chris Morrison
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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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