Greens love nukes

The Greens say we must reduce greenhouse gas emissions and yet when the government tries to adopt nuclear power to do exactly that, the Greens are up in arms.

The thing is that greens actually love nucleur, in fact they want as much of our energy from it as possible. It is just that they don't want a reactor near them reducing the value of their squat house.

Yes they love nukes, just they prefer the reactor to be either 8 light minutes up (wind, wave, hydro or solar power), or 6000 km down (geothermal). And the energy collection methods to be extremely inefficient, but then they also tend to be Socialist so loving inefficiency is to be expected.

The Rules of Political Correctness

Andrew's Random Notes explains the rules behind political correctness.

Government sells your identity

One of the ways that New Labour was claiming that their precious ID cards would not be ruinously expensive was because they where going to sell access to the data to private companies. Looking at the horrified faces when this was suggested they said that 'No! No! This isn't the largest privacy hole you have ever seen. They won't be sold to nasty people for nasty purposes. Trust us.'

Being sensible most people didn't. With good reason, despite the 'protection' of the Data Protection Act the government is happily selling access to the DVLA Database to anybody that can think even the remotest connection between their business and motorcars.

Nor does DVLA check that it is not selling the list to people with criminal records: it deals with Aquarius Security — clampers whose management were found guilty of blackmail at Bristol Crown Court and given prison sentences. One of them was already on an ASBO after being accused of driving his truck into a 60-year-old man, breaking his knee. They clamped one young woman’s car in the middle of a three-point turn. But the DVLA saw nothing wrong in selling that company addresses for £2.50 each so that they could find other citizens to harass.

Of course we can trust the government with even more data from the ID Card, amounting to a complete profile of your life if they work as advertised. The nice Labour Party won't do anything bad with it will they?

the EU, a democracy bypass

The EU is being used to curtail freedom and remove rights, shunting power from the nation state to the supranational EU. No change there then, since this has been the modus oprendi of the EU since even before it was the EU. Currently the EU is trying to form it's own judical system

we have Eurojust, which advises on prosecutions; Europol, which has grown from a small, complementary intelligence agency into a large operational force; a putative European public prosecutor, an office that would probably have been established by now but for Britain's opposition; and the European arrest warrant, which can be exercised in any of the 25 member states for 32 crimes.

This edifice has been set up almost without public debate. Indeed, anyone who suggests that common judicial procedures look suspiciously like the trappings of a state is regarded as either a Europhobic zealot or someone who favours organised crime and terrorism. But the fact is that the perfectly reasonable concept of "mutual assistance" in criminal justice matters, first outlined in 1999, has been taken much further than suggested then.

Again no supprise there, a judicial system is a vital part of any nation state, which is what the EU wants (and has always wanted) to turn itself into. The rather strange thing is that this is not being pushed onto the national parliments by the commision, it is the national parliments themselves that want it!

Integration in this area is wholly voluntary and, without coercion, it is Mr Blair and his minions that are setting the pace. That says a great deal for the priorities of our masters.

This fascist government, who's hallmark is micromanagement to the most down to the most obsenely stupid level is not just giving up power, it is actively lobbying for it to be taken away!

Classic Al Guardian

Today seems like a vintage haul for Al guardian hitting all the bases:

First they complain that a woefully ineffiencent bit of the public sector is not ineffiencent enought, and actually has the timidity to give money back to the people it extorted it from in error. Don't they know that once money gets into government it must never be seen again, and certainly not by anybody that actually produces wealth rather than sponging. But on planet guardian giving money back when it is taken in error is 'an outrage against women'.

The standard bit of Islamist propaganda which no edition of Al Guardian would be without. This time complaining that Muslims are not allowed force women to wear only the cloths deemed acceptable by the local Imam. Less strident than normal, I guess that Al Qaeda have other things on their collective minds at the moment.

And what Guardian comment page would be without Moonbat saying that we must all go back to living like medieval peasants or we are all doooooomed! Forgetting that doing this would amount to the biggest deliberate genocide that the world has ever seen.

Two stupid superstitions shift on gay equality

While one wierd superstition becomes more homophobic another relents a little. Instead of murdering them Iran is now going to try to 'cure' gay people with hormone injections. It didn't work in this country, being one of the actors that drove the genius Alan Turing (peace be upon him) to suicide, and it will not work in Iran either.

Met chief to face Menezes probe

Nosemonkey says

Of course, they won't need to do much investigating, because they already know that it was a direct order from Sir Ian Blair that prevented the IPCC going into Stockwell station, in direct contravention of the law.

But perhaps it will shed some light on who authorised the attempted cover up and smear campaigne on de Menezes?

Giving the U.S. Military the Power to Conduct Domestic Surveillance

Bruce Schneier has an interesting post that the eeeevil terrorist aren't just being used as a cover of authoritarianism on this side of the pond. The White House is giving the U.S. military the power to conduct domestic surveillance. Mr Schneier then comments that:

The police and the military have fundamentally different missions. The police protect citizens. The military attacks the enemy. When you start giving police powers to the military, citizens start looking like the enemy.

...This kind of thing worries me far more than terrorist threats.

With one of his commenters adding

Huh? The police don't protect citizens. It's not in their job description.

Which is also quite true. At times it seems that the police are there more to stop people form protecting themselves.

Consumer Privacy Top 10

A quick list of 10 things that you can do to protect your privacy if you are in the US,

1. OPT OUT OF PRESCREENED OFFERS OF CREDIT. By calling 1-888-567-8688 or by visiting https://www.optoutprescreen.com/, you can stop receiving those annoying credit and insurance offers.
2. STOP YOUR PHONE RECORDS FROM BEING SOLD. Call your landline and wireless phone companies and request to opt-out of "CPNI" sharing. CPNI is your call records information; most telephone companies sell this data.

3. KEEP YOUR BANKING RECORDS PRIVATE. Under federal law, your bank can sell your account information, including your bank balances, unless to direct them not to. Call all the banks that you use and ask to opt out from all information sharing.

4. GET FREE CREDIT MONITORING. All Americans are now entitled to a free credit report from each of the three nationwide consumer reporting agencies. You can perform a free form of credit monitoring by requesting one of your three credit reports every four months. Visit https://www.annualcreditreport.com or call 1-877-322-8228.

5. DO-NOT-CALL REGISTRY. Enroll your telephone numbers (both landline and wireless) in the Federal Trade Commission anti-telemarketing list by calling 1-888-382-1222.

6. SAFEGUARD YOUR SSN. The Social Security number is the key to your identity databases. Those who have it can steal your identity and engage in fraud. Do not keep your Social Security Card or any other document that contains your SSN in your wallet. And don't give out your SSN unless it is in a tax or employment context.

7. END STUDENT PROFILING. Your children's schools can sell personal information to marketers and recruiters. Federal law allows you to opt out of this information sale.

8. AVOID LOYALTY PROGRAMS. Supermarket and other "loyalty" cards track your purchases and make it easier for companies to sell your information. Be loyal to stores without loyalty cards. If you have to use a supermarket shopping card, be sure to exchange it with your friends or with strangers.

9. SECURE YOUR ACCOUNTS. Be sure to place a password on your banking, telephone, and utilities accounts. With a password in place, it makes it more difficult for others to access your information.

10. ENGAGE IN PRIVACY SELF-DEFENSE. Don't give your phone number or other personal details to businesses unless they really need it. Don't complete product warranty cards, surveys, or sweepstakes--these are just tools used to collect and sell your data. Be sure to ask businesses how they use your personal information, whether they sell it, and how they protect it.

If you are in the UK however your basically fucked with New Labour in charge.

EU is killing Mrs Tiggiewinkle

Not content with deporting people and raiding there homes for acts that are not crimes in the country where they where 'commited', stiffling trade, or being used as a democracy bypass for the authoritarian facists of New Nabour. Now the EU is going after cute little animals, their stupid regualtions the EU is killing Mrs Tiggiewinkle.

Police who executed Brazilian on Tube to escape charges

It appears that the Police who shot de Menezes to escape charges, this despite there being absolutely no reason to shoot him. There was no evidence at all that he was doing anything remotely suspicious, despite the spin that the Met tried to put on it concocting all sorts of lies about the case, he was acting like any other average commuter.

Campaign for capitalism

Snafu of Not Proud Of Britain (But Would Like To Be) asks:

Does David Cameron welcome the entrepreneurial spirit shown by drug dealers as young as 14 who do not consider 'profit' to be a dirty word and are customer focused, offering a broad range of drugs to people who enjoy "a private life" 24/7?

since I support the legalisation of all drugs I hope so. At least they are working to get their money, rather than simply taking other peoples without earning it.

We have a responsibility to look out for all children - not just our own

A fascinating article about the death of society from becoming massively risk averse and scared of helping others. This is not just guardianista hype either, but fairly obvious everywhere, and not just with children.

Look at the fear of confronting a burglar, not because of the burglar themselves but because of the knowledge that if you do it will be you not the thieving scum that the police prosecute.

Look at louts and chavs, perhaps in the past people would have felt able to step in early rather than letting them get away with it to the point where they think they are untouchable, because they are.

The need to engage people with maintaining the society that they want to live in is not a new idea, it is one of Sir Robert Peel's nine points of Policing

Police, at all times, should maintain a relationship with the public that gives reality to the historic tradition that the police are the public and the public are the police; the police being only members of the public who are paid to give full-time attention to duties which are incumbent on every citizen in the interests of community welfare and existence.

The problem is old and well know. As is the solution, praise, rather than prosecute, the people that aid the interests of community welfare and existence by standing up to the thieving scum. But it is not likely to have anything done about it while the police continue to target their efforts on the low hanging fruit provided by the law abiding, especially when they show up the police by doing what the police should be doing.

Poor little rich ... traindrivers

There used to be a cliche that all little boys wanted to grow up to be train drivers. Now that North Sea Diaries has unearthed the benefits given to a french train driver it actually looks very sensible. Over £50,000 a year to work 25 hours per week and a guaranteed pension that starts at 50. And yet they still strike far more than anybody else. Obviously they are upset about something, and considering the amount that they get paid it isn't going to be that they are paid to little. Perhaps they are paid too much?

We're Prepared To Pay The Price Of Freedom.

Blairwatch is asking who would be prepared to publish the memo where george Bush threatens to bomb Al-Jazeera. Well add me to the list, not that that it is likely that I be the one to find them especially given all the other worthy people out there. Nor would it do much good my publishing them considering how few people read my ramblings. So if I get it I'll publish it and email it to everybody else so that it might actually get read.

Take the clean, green alternative of macho nuclear rod-waving

Polly is against nuclear. Therefore nuclear must be the best way to solve our future energy needs. Quod erat demonstrandum.

The solution to the rich

In a comment piece on The Guardian raging about the horrible way that people that do lots of work get lots of money. The stand out quote was this one:

"Future historians are unlikely to look back with approval if the longest-serving Labour government presides over the biggest maldistribution of incomes."

How do they know that this is a maldistribution of income? These are the rates set by the market, the best mechanism known for ensuring the correct distribution of resources. Does The Guardian have some secret economic formula for calculating the perfect way to distribute resources, and they are just keeping it to themselves out of spite forcing the rest of us to rely on imperfect method od markets. Or are they just speaking out of their colective arseholes.

Brightest are failed by state schools

Not exactly a suprise but the Brightest are failed by state schools

The most able children are only half as likely to achieve top grades at A level in state schools as they are in the fee-paying sector, a government adviser told head teachers.

Pupils in private schools who were among the country’s brightest 5 per cent at age 11 were virtually certain to get three A grades in their A levels at 18, putting them in contention for places at Oxford and Cambridge.

But only a third of the most able 5 per cent went on to achieve the same results in state schools.

So equally bright kids, put some in a school where they are all bright (thanks to selection) and some not. The ones where they are slowed down by teachers having make sure that the less bright kids can keep up do less well. Not exactly a suprise. Kids in the independent sector will also have the advantage of parents that really care about their getting a good education, since they are willing to pay twice to educate them, but the results are quite clear. Selection works. Bring back Grammar Schools!

UPDATE:
just noticed a typo, which I've corrected. Must be my inner socialist trying to get out.

Calm night after pub law change

The extension to the licencing laws has come into force. Was there a massive alcholic frenzy of drunken debauchery? Er no, in fact it was quieter than normal. Just as we said it would be, the longer hours men that the same alcochol is drunk over a longer period therefore less drunkeness. Which goes to show if you treat people like responcible adults they will act like adults. But if you try to treat them like rebellious children that need a nanny then they will act like cav scum.

strange weather

Out of the office window at the moment I can see very heavy thick snow. The snow is actually settling on the palm trees! Weird.

New crisis for Blair's War

I was against the War in Iraq, not a popular position in this section of the Blogosphere. I felt that our resources where better spent in Afghanistan and Pakistan hunting down Bin Laden in order to bring him to justice for orchestrating the murder of 3000 innocent people. Saddam was a monster and needed removing, but he was a monster in a cage not an immediate threat. We needed to deal with him, and Mugabe in Zimbabwe, and Kim in Korea, and the Mullahs of Iran. But later. First things first.

My views have softened since then as I see Saddam gone and a new democratic Iraq emerging. But getting rid of the psychopathic despot was never one of the reasons given, in fact Blair explicitly rejected it as a reason for going to war (coming back to this, the strongest reason he ever had, only in retrospect). So I am not displeased to see that there is a motion going to be put before parliament for a proper inquiry into the Iraq War. So long as New Labour do not cripple it, or drop it before it can report if it looks like being embarrassing (powers that they have given themselves), then this could well produce another blow to Blair and help reign in the tyrant, and hopefully the authoritarian New Labour Project as well.

Thoughts on Torture

A post,Thoughts on Torture and Slavery, highlighted by Andrew Sullivan, I do not go along with al of it but this passage really struck a cord:

This is, of course, a situation in which an "activist" like Noam Chomsky is totally useless. Nearly every statement that the far left makes concerning "'Uhmurika" is an insult. Klauswitz said that the man who defends everything defends nothing. Similarly, the man who finds everyone guilty legitimizes the truly guilty.

This is a situation in which the right needs to recognize a moral absolute, and the left needs to become more comfortable with defending a moral absolute. Torture is morally indefensible- in every case, and every situation.

Our civilisation is better than that of the Islamists, we do not need to lower ourselves to their level.

If you thought 90 days was bad ...

Blair wanted 90 days imprisonment without charge, it appears that President Bush has managed to hold US citizens for over 1090 days without charge.

he is an American citizen, presumed innocent, and it took the government three years even to charge him. Anyone who cares about liberty - which obviously does not include many members of the Bush administration, should be appalled by what has occurred and what it means for the future of freedom in this country.

Wow, someone even worse for liberty than blair, but at least he got a majority of the population to vote for him. Rather than 22%.

comparing tax systems

A little more on Tax. To examine which is the best tax system I have made a series of graphs of how they affect household income. These are all based just on the tax take without personal allowances, or tax credits for the sake of simplicity. I am not an economist and where I needed numbers and had no source I picked some for illustrative purposes that seemed reasonable.

The systems

• Poll Tax everybody pays exactly the same flat fee. This is also equivalent to the kind of Contracts Insurance required in an Anarcho-Capitalist system.


• Flat Tax (at 30%), explained better here.


• Banded, the current system as a comparator using the same percentage values and bands, but no allowances for simplicity.


• Supertax, the same as the current system but with an additional even higher tax band as suggested by Jonathan Freedland. He did not give a value for where it should fall so I placed it at about the salary of an NHS Consultant, seeing as this is one of the professions he is likely to still consider 'worthy'.


• Progressive, The percentage taken as tax increases in direct proportion to the amount earned. You can obviously see that I am taking this all the way up to the logical conclusion of a 100% tax. This is not an extrication that would never happen in the real world to make this system look bad, even if it obviously does, but an indication of the logical outcome of this system. It has happened in the real world, and more, at one point swedish author Astrid Lindgren (best known for her character Pippi Longstocking) was paying 102% tax.


• Communist/equality of outcome, "from each according to their ability, to each according to their need.".

Graph of take taken by government

From this graph you can see that for most of the time the communist system is the one where you are giving the most money to government. However not always. At the extremes it changes so for very high earners pay less than under a progressive tax system, and for very low earners they pay less than any of the other systems as the tax system tops up their income to make sure that everybody is equal. You can also see that an extra tax band, as proposed by Jonathan Freedland would make that system closer to the progressive system that he thinks is a good idea.

You can also see how similar that graphs of the amount taken by the Flat Tax and the system required to fulfill the Marxist dogma of "from each according to their ability, to each according to their need.". If you add in the large personal allowance that features in most Flat Tax systems it becomes obvious that the system needed in a Communist system is actually a special case of Flat Tax. Which should give both Al Guardian and the Adam Smith Institute something to chew on.

Now onto the more important graph, how much money each individual is actually left with.

Graph of take home pay after tax

The first thing that jumps out is that under a Poll Tax type system the very poor actually end up taking home a negative amount of money, and while many people do better under this system (some substantially better) this is obviously a problem.

Again you can see that an extra tax band will bring the current banded tax system closer to a the progressive system. But the most interesting feature of the tow versions of a banded system is what happens at the bands. By getting a salary increase that crosses one your actual take home pay decreases, and takes a substantial increase in salary simply to get back to where you started. This is a disincentive to work harder if you are close to a band for fear of crossing it. The poverty trap again, just for people that are not in poverty.

In a banded system by working harder at least you can get back to your peak salary from before crossing a band. In a progressive system beyond the median salary however much extra effort that you put in will simply decrease the amount that you get to take home further. An obvious and rather brutal disincentive to work hard.

In a communist system there is no incentive all to work hard, or even to work (other than the secret police shipping you off to Siberia).

The only system of the ones given that retains an incentive to work hard, and keep on working harder, but without any strange distortions and poverty traps is the Flat Tax. So of the systems that I have described I am still completely happy that it is the best on offer.

Galloway and the Zionist conspiracy

More on the political realignment. The extreme of the 'left' looks more and more like the extreme of the 'right', having had to hide it's Marxist baggage (since Marxism has failed) the authoritarianism of the left becomes ever clearer. Now both are even smearing Jews as some kind of evil conspiracy that prevents their assention to power and the utopia that would obviously follow. Antisemitic twats.

they want to do something about the hard working

Jonathan Freedland in the guardian is raging against the oh so horrible disparities in wealth created by people getting rich. Now I am willing to bet that I make substancially less than Mr Freedland, so what is my view on dropping more than a year's worth of my wages on a boozy night out?

No problem really.

It was their money they should be able to spend it any way they like. Personally if I was going to spend that much I would want to buy some sex as well, but everybody's tastes differ.

But for some reason Mr Freedland doesn't like the fact that they just dropped £15,000 into the local economy in the most efficient way possible (Perhaps he objects to efficiency?). The solution to this perceived problem being to recreate a supertax so that the richer pay at a much higher rate. If you want to know why this is economically stupid Tim Worstall explains it better than I could.

What I am interested in is why progressive taxation is seen as fair at all. Asking Google to define fairness comes up with this definition of fairness:

conformity with rules or standards; "the judge recognized the fairness of my claim"
ability to make judgments free from discrimination or dishonesty
paleness: the property of having a naturally light complexion
comeliness: the quality of being good looking and attractive

While I do tend to go a little pale when looking at how much the government steals from me each month I think that you can discount the last two as not being relevant in this case. The first also does not really fit as whatever system that is imposed will be in conformity with rules or standards since it is a set of rules and standards. Which leaves:

ability to make judgments free from discrimination or dishonesty

A progressive tax system is by not free from discrimination. By design it affects people with high earnings disproportionately more than people with less. So it is not free from discrimination, in fact the opposite discrimination based in income is and intrinsic part of it so it cannot be fair.

Ignoring that is is unfair Socialists often argue that this is fine as being rich they will have more money than the less well off and so should throw it away on government so that everybody ends up getting the same. But why should everybody get the same? They are not doing the same, some people will be doing jobs that require more effort than others why should they not be rewarded for this extra effort? Again to me it simply seems unfair that in order to get the same some people would have to work disproportionately harder than others because of their vocation.

The moral the argument in pictures

There is a good image going around the blogs to sum up the moral argument against ID Cards. It can be seen at Tim Worstall's place.


But if you think that the atrocity mentioned is ancient history and no longer relevant how about a more modern example.

Perv-O-Vision to be tested at Paddington Station ?

The use of Perv-O-Vision is expanding but exactly how will the "see through your clothes" scanners be tested at Paddington Station ?

Neil Harding changes his mind

Neil Harding has changed his mind on ID Cards, because of the technical issues rather than the matter of principal.

The meaning of freedom

There is an interesting disgusion going on at Devil's Kitchen about freedom. Mostly about the difference between the freedom TO and freedom FROM. DK is arguing that Jahdi twats are not freedom fighters (and a I agree) because they are actively fighting against other people having the freedom to do many things. Whereas some people are trying to muddy the waters by saying that they are fighting for the freedom from most products of the last thousand years.

A similar digussion is also going on at Harry's Place about freedom, sparked by a Madeleine Bunting article in Al Guardian. She says how Muslims feel excluded because in native culture the pub acts as an important part of social networks on account of their religion forbidding them to drink.

The commenters at Harry's Place seem to have quickly pointed out the falicy of the Bunting argument, and the freedom from arguement in general, that just because something is possible does not make it manditory. You can go to a pub and not drink. You can also hang around with people in short skirts and not be turned into a sex crazed monster, you can even live in the 21st century while rejecting most of it. You do not have to kill everybody that chooses to do these things to exercise your own ability to choose not to.

As Harry says 'Liberty, if it means anything, is the right to tell people what they don't want to hear.'

Losing their religion

A note of hope form the Drink Soaked Trots that the rise of Islamism could be masking something much more low key but far more important that Muslims in Britain are losing their religio: "what if the rise of radical Islamism among Muslim youth in Europe is in fact a symptom of a crisis of belief? What if the young men who turn to jihadism do so for the most part because they can't get laid and because the girls they think should be theirs are turning them down because they can't stand the idea of life with a dickhead 20-something would-be patriarch and have given up the religion?"I can only hope. Once they get rid of the medieval superstition, or at least relegate it to a much lower station, long delayed integration can finally happen as they will be no longer stopping themselves.

Junkie politician

Cameron is not the only Conservative politician to have drugs in their life.

Churchill was in Downing Street off his tits not only on a daily intake of whisky, champagne and brandy, but Benzedrine

More on social mobility

Jonathan Calder of Liberal England blogs the reverse side of something that I posted about a a few weeks ago. He is talking about why the children of (non-Muslim) Indian and Caribbean immigrants do so much better than the children of non-immigrants to better there social position. The answer in brief is

the tendency of migrant parents to encourage and expect their children to do well at school

In my post I noted that it was the Muslim attitude of putting Islam ahead of education that was why they did not do well at getting jobs and bettering their social position.

iNuclear: Why Greens are Converting to Nuclear

iNuclear: Why Greens are Converting to Nuclear

NEI Nuclear Notes

NEI Nuclear Notes an interesting blog on nukes.

Dutch MP to make gay Islam film

Via Andrew Sullivan, the courageous Ayaan Hirsi Al is planning on making a gay film. We are not talking p0rn here, but it might cause less controversy if she did. No she is going to make a film about the horrible way that Islam treats gay people.

"I examine the position of homosexuals in Islam in the film Submission II," she told the De Volkskrant newspaper.

Which I am very much looking forward to seeing on the BBC ... ha, fat chance of that ever happening. Not when Islamofascists tend to do more than just shout a lot when you do not 'submit' to there wishes.

Peel's Principles

The Pedant-General in Ordinary reminds us of Sir Robert Peel's Nine Points of Policing which where the original (and generally successful) ground rules for running the police service. Most of which are being rapidly eroded, with the erosion having increased under New Labour, along with police effectiveness.

Prostitution ... it's great.

The Devil's Kitchen is talking about Prostitution. arguing against Tiny Judas who says

in Prostitution it is women who are sold and men who buy

To which he replies

No, in consensual prostitution, the women sell themselves, not "are sold". Yes, men are generally the buyers, that is true.

I have to disagree with that however as it would be more accurate to simply say they sell sex. They no more sell themselves than I do by providing services (of a less fun kind) to my boss in exchange for a salary.

That is not to say that people are not bough as slaves to be used as prostitutes. However where this service industry legal and regulated that could be stopped very easily, as it would no longer be worth the risk. So in fact it is the people that are against legalization that are arguing, indirectly, for women being sold for sex.

religion remains the greatest enemy of ethics

Here is a good article found from Religion is Bullshit by Simon Blackburn read it all.

Back already?

One bit that I would like to expand on is this:

"the association of religious belief with dogma, intolerance, and illiberalism, and the corresponding association of atheism and agnosticism with liberalism and toleration. The very word 'sectarian' alerts us to this, and a religion is only a sect with an army. The 'real standards' of religions, as Voltaire saw all too often in his own lifetime, are those of authoritarianism and separatism, of conformism within and persecution without."

What Voltaire saw of religion driven societies in in his time is just as we see them today, in a religious society there is only one god given truth, only one god given morality, and only one god given way to live. All that do not follow it must be hunted down and driven out, or killed. It is intrinsically authoritarian and can be no other way. The only time that religions start saying how 'peaceful' or tolerant they are is when they are safely down at heel. As soon as religion starts to gain power that soon disappears and the hard face of the religious policeman, the true face, is once again revealed.

The best defence against faith is knowledge, which is why religion fears it. Sometimes dressing up it's superstitious nonsense as if it where fact. Sometimes simply trying to make sure that knowledge is kept safely out of the hands the people that the religious authorities are hoping to control.

When Richard Cobden, the great reformer, looked back on his campaign for public schooling, he said:

"I took the repeal of the Corn Laws as light amusement compared with the difficult task of inducing the priests of all denominations to agree to suffer the people to be educated."

Which puts Blair's, the most instinctively authoritarian politician (or fascist to help with DK's google-bomb) that there has been in this control for a while, love of faith schools in a different light. Not trying to get selection back against Labour Party dogma because it will help education, but to reintroduce religion at the expense of education because it will help control. Good education is the sure way of helping to improve your lot in society, something that has been known for a very long time. Writing about his life in 1845 about how he managed to free himself and become the great writer and orator that he was the abolitionist and freed slave Fredrick Douglass wrote:

It was a new and special revelation, dispelling a painful mystery, against which my youthful understanding had struggled, and struggled in vain, to wit: the _white_ man's power to perpetuate the enslavement of the _black_ man. "Very well," thought I; "knowledge unfits a child to be a slave." I instinctively assented to the proposition; and from that moment I understood the direct pathway from slavery to freedom.

That pathway being education, so he taught himself to read. It is a well known and well trodden path, but also a pathway that some religions deny themselves even when it is freely offered, preferring the simply certainties of a slave submitting to his master.

ID Cards

Just a little snippet on ID Cards, by Frederick Douglass

These instruments they were required to renew very often, and by charging a fee for this writing, considerable sums from time to time were collected by the State. In these papers the name, age, color, height, and form of the freeman were described, together with any scars or other marks upon his person which could assist in his identification.

It may sound a lot like the ID cards that the Tyrant Blair wishes to introduce, but a much older set used to disginuish slave from free. That was their only purpose, once the horror of keeping a person as property of another was finally realised they where got rid of. Now New Labour wishes to reintroduce them, the question who is it that are to be the slaves this time? However he may not find it easy as Mr Douglass said

One cannot easily forget to love freedom

The Times Online guest contributors Opinion

Mr Worstall gets into the Dead Tree Media.

Hussein Nasseri, now a little comment

It is regrettable that any individual should ever feel to take his/her own life.

No shit.

We recognize that many asylum claimants will be very disappointed if their applications are unsuccessful. Where the Home Office knows a particular asylum claimant is at risk of suicide or self-harm, it will of course take steps to minimise that risk. This includes at the time when the claimant is informed of a final removal and on arrival in the country of return. Unfortunately, it would be imposible for any government to monitor the state of mind of all claimants who are unsuccessful and we were unable to prevent the suicide of Mr Nasseri.

OK government are not mind readers, it is nice to hear them admit it. Yet they are perfectly happy to claim that they can know the state of peoples minds when it suits them. Such as when they feel that they might have breached one of the new 'thought crimes' that New Labour hopes to bring in.

It would be wrong, however to conclude from the death of Mr Nasseri that the decision to reject his claim was incorrect.

Personally I think blowing your brains out is rather a good demonstration that you are deeply afraid of something. Persecution maybe?

Both the home Office and independent judiciary have a duty to the public to administer an effective and fair immigration control. All decisions are subject via the Human Rights Act to the European Convention on Human Rights. The decision to refuse the application of Mr Nasseri was made in good faith after he had failed to demonstrate he would be persecuted on return to Iran.

What more could Mr Nasseri have done? It was not as if he needed to prove that he was gay, or that he was going to be persecuted for it. He had already spent three months in prison in Iran for being gay and was most likely going to be executed on his return. Iran's idea of human rights is well known. As is their treatment of gays, with 16 year old boys like Mahmoud Asgari hanged in public squares.

The Government is committed to providing a safe haven for those who genuinely need it and will not seek to return anybody to a country where their life is considered to be at risk.

Good, it is our duty to aid people fleeing persecution. So why did they try to send him back? And why is Jamaica on a 'White List' of countries where asylum will not even be considered yet is a country where we know Gay people face persecution, are imprisoned, are routinely beaten up, and murdered in significant numbers. Doesn't exactly sound safe to me.

However there is also need to preserve the integrity of our asylum system by returning to their home countries those who have not been able to demonstrate that they are in need of international protection.

Small problem the government has not preserved the integrity of our asylum system, with people like Bakri living here as an asylum claimant on with vast state handouts while publicly preaching that britain should be destroyed, and faced no threat in his home country. Yet he was given unnecessary asylum while the truly persecuted are sent back to their deaths.

Hussein Nasseri, an update

Some time ago, August 25, 2005 in fact, Tim Worstall highlighted what had happened to Mr Hussein Nasseri, linking to a piece by Willie Lupin of Musings from Middle England. He asked people to write to their MP's about it. I did and received this response via my MP Richard Younger-Ross.

It is regrettable that any individual should ever feel to take his/her own life. We recognize that many asylum claimants will be very disappointed if their applications are unsuccessful. Where the Home Office knows a particular asylum claimant is at risk of suicide or self-harm, it will of course take steps to minimise that risk. This includes at the time when the claimant is informed of a final removal and on arrival in the country of return. Unfortunately, it would be imposible for any government to monitor the state of mind of all claimants who are unsuccessful and we were unable to prevent the suicide of Mr Nasseri.

It would be wrong, however to conclude from the death of Mr Nasseri that the decision to reject his claim was incorrect. Both the home Office and independent judiciary have a duty to the public to administer an effective and fair immigration control. All decisions are subject via the Human Rights Act to the European Convention on Human Rights. The decision to refuse the application of Mr Nasseri was made in good faith after he had failed to demonstrate he would be persecuted on return to Iran.

The Government is committed to providing a safe haven for those who genuinely need it and will not seek to return anybody to a country where their life is considered to be at risk. However there is also need to preserve the integrity of our asylum system by returning to their home countries those who have not been able to demonstrate that they are in need of international protection.

Yours sincerely

Andy

Andy Burnham

UK's '24x7 vehicle movement database' begins

Our double plus good government continues on it's quest to tag and monitor everybody. Now New Labour, not content with ID Cards, the explosion in CCTV, and all their other measures to make sure that we keep in our proper places and keep them in their's (power) have come up with a new wheeze. Lets set up a national grid of cameras so that we can monitor everybodies movements! New Labour wants

A "24x7 national vehicle movement database" that logs everything on the UK's roads and retains the data for at least two years

and is

what promises to be one the most pervasive surveillance systems on earth.

parliment, having shown signs recently of growing a spine, is to be bypassed.

Already 50% of what gets before the courts is traffic related un-crime. While real crimes, such as burglary, most of the time aren't even reported to the Police anymore since everybody know that the chances of a real criminal ending up in front of a judge is practically nothing. This has already hit Slashdot which has come up with some interesting comments:

The thing is speeding is not actually the problem they need to solve, accidents are. With the level of cameras now on the road, I find I am paying far more attention to, what the last speed sign said, where the next camera is and how fast I am going. However what i probably should be doing is looking at the road conditions, other vehicles and people/objects near the road for potental hazards.

Which is completely true, revenue speed cameras increase accidents and make roads less safe.

The speed limits here in the UK are now so absurd in many places that the vast majority of motorists exceed the limit, yet no accidents ever result (literally; speed limits have been dropped on roads that haven't had even a minor injury accident in a decade).

Yep, speed is not a problem, accidents are (which revenue speed cameras cause). If this was really about safety not raising more money for Gordon Brown to waste and furthering New Labour's authoritarian political project then they would be taking down revenue speed cameras, not putting more up.

This is just another power play by Blair's dictatorship and his ever more draconian Home Secretaries, right along with ID cards for everyone, the National Identity Register, electronic strip searching on the way onto the London Underground, the RIP Act, detention without trial for as long as they can get away with, installing CCTV everywhere (yes, we're still the most spied-upon nation in the world), reversing the burden of proof and/or attempting to do away with jury trials for increasing numbers of cases...

All of these things, of course, are "justified" by arguing that they increase national security, help to prevent crime, or otherwise benefit Joe Public. Unless he's in the wrong place at the wrong time, in which case he loses his benefits because some junior staffer in a government office mistyped one number out of 1,000 they entered that day into the master database. Or the ANPR system misreads a number plate, and sends him a fine for doing the physically impossible, which he then has to challenge in court after several weeks of concern, with no compensation for the time wasted or grief caused. Or his daughter's the one being rendered naked for the pervert watching the screens at the Underground station. Or he's late for the train, and since he ran through the screen he's obviously a terrorist so they shoot him dead. Or he's black, old, bald, young, or a registered member of an opposition political party, the biometric recognition doesn't work, and he's held for three months as a suspected terrorist on the whim of a senior politician, by which time he's lost his job, his home, and the trust of all his family and friends, not to mention the ability to challenge the statements of absolute fact issued by our political leaders (and I use the term loosely, since they didn't even win the popular vote in England, never mind an overall majority that might justify their absolute control of parliament, not that this particular abuse ever went before parliament) to justify all these Big Brother efforts.

Our New Labour masters are building

what promises to be one the most pervasive surveillance systems on earth

to protect us. So let joy be unconfined, because under New Labour everything else will be.

11 years, and still they don't add up.

No not the product of the comprehensive schooling system, the EU accounts. Every year for the last 11 year we have been waiting for the EU to get it's accounts signed off. This year was no different EU fraud is still so rampant that the accounts cannot be signed off. And the EU's proposed solution to this (a part from firing whistle blowers, and claiming anyone they think might whistle blow is crazy in order to get them out of the way)? Give even more power to the EU, disguiesed in Eurospeak but the EU Referendum blog provides a translation:

Cutting to the chase, this simply means more power to the commission to vet member state accounts, an inevitable consequence of a supranational system where the central government – in this case the commission – is disbursing funds to its subordinate tiers.

Technology will save us ...

From Bird Flu.

Police Versus Politics

Now this is something that even with my hatred of Blair I didn't see. The real reason for the police lobbying parliment to help New Labour

What ever your point of view on this, why are we surprised when Chief Officer positions are subject to Home Office approval, that Chief Officers are called upon to support the government when things begin to look dicey?

Especially as it would appear that the number of police forces in the UK are set to be drastically reduced - There's bound to be loads of competition for the senior posts in the newly restructured UK police service.

French Intifada, Day 17

Yep it's still going Day 17 now. And yet the Mainstream Media still refuses to come out and say that the rioters are Muslim.

The EU iscrazy, according to it's own psychiatrists

I read this in the Telegraph about how the EU treats it's staff today, and was going to do a lengthy pst. Except that Tim Worstall, and the Englishman or the Englishman's Castle got there first.

the commission has resorted to tactics "worthy of the KGB"

No this is not hyperbolic as it sounds, the KGB did really use psychiatry as a pretext for picking up their victims and even had psychiatric prisons for 're-educating' people. It is a good way of getting people out of circulation when you have no legal way of doing so, and making sure that their views are discounted if they ever return. The reasons are not as nasty as the KGB, but in other ways rather more scary.

The practice is alleged to have developed unofficially because the commission's generous employment terms make it all but impossible to dismiss staff. In the past, employees who have had run-ins with the commission, or simply underperformed, have generally had to be persuaded to leave by offers of expensive early retirement packages.

Among those who claims to have been a victim of the new tactic is Jose Sequeira, 58, a Portuguese official who is now taking the commission to court over what he says was a deliberate attempt to sack him using psychiatric tests.

So because of the stupid and unworkable working practices, the same working practices that they want to impose on the result of us, make it impossible to get rid of people they have decide to get around it by slandering their employees rather than admit that it is the system that is at fault. Very socialist, but not very nice. The excuses that they dreamed up as part of the slander where:

1. verbal hyper-productivity
2. lack of conceptual content
3. megalomania and paranoia
4. an astonishing lack of daily awareness in the world of work

which are all "signals a pathological state." They are also what psychologists call 'transferance' being far more applicable to the structures of the EU rather than Mr Sequeira. And now we come to the reason why they so desperately wanted rid of this long standing diplomat. Was he crazy? Was he incompetent? Was he plain lazy? No none of these, something for worse as far as the EU is concerned. They where worried that he was honest.

Mr Sequeira, a career diplomat first employed by the commission in 1987, claims that his relationship with his superiors soured when they became wrongly convinced that he was planning to blow the whistle on an internal fraud scandal.

And you cannot have somebody honest in the EU.

Tim Worstall: Nuclear Revisited.

Tim Worstall responds to this post by Rochenko on the Pro-nuke argument. Tim covers the technical parts but the paragraph that I want to talk about is the last one:

"As you might gather, the deeper problem I have with the current pro-nuclear publicity is with its recurrent underlying assumption: that the best solution to a perceived technological problem is a technical fix that focuses on that problem alone, as opposed to the problem as rooted in a global economic, political and ethical context."

There is a trend amongst the environmental movement to have this romantic idealised view of life as it was when people lived in tune with nature. Moonbat is the most extreme example, and there are shades of this attitude visible in this last paragraph. But this is factually wrong.

As Tim points out that currently with our current levels of growth the world is getting a better place to live. More people live longer, happier lives than at any other time in human history. And so long as the world economy keeps growing it is only going to get better.

This is partly due to the simple fact that thanks to our technology there are more people living than at any other point in human history, and less having to scrape an existence at the subsistence level. There is a reason that in every developing country as fast as the economy develops to allow it people move from the countryside to cities. Life in cities is easier than trying to live off the land.

I can only think of two instances where a society tried to deliberately reverse this on a large scale. Zimbabwe under Robert Mugarbe, and Cambodia under Pol Pot. In both instances there was an economic collapse and famine (plus massive repression to force people onto the land against there will, which in the case of Pol Pot extended to genocide). Subsistence farming and 'living in tune with nature' simply cannot sustain current population levels. If people are really advocating returning the world to the environmentally lower impact life style of a few hundred years ago (Rochenko isn't suggesting this, but Moonbat certainly is) then the world population will have to drop to a level similar to that of a few hundred years ago.

Pro-nuke people like me or Tim advocate a technical quick fix (if only as a stop gap) because to try and reorder the world society based on current, non-poluting, non-nuke, technology to be environmentally sustainable will require a lot of people living a lot harder lives, for shorter lengths, and a lot less of them. I don't see this as a morally defensible position.