Some bloke was being questioned about how he became such an expert sculptor with so little experience. After masterfully creating a perfectly sculpted rabbit, he was asked, “How did you do it?”. He replies, “Simple, I just removed everything that didn’t look like a rabbit.”
Made me laugh.
This:
“A job such as leading the International Monetary Fund might attract Brown, who has made many impassioned speeches about restructuring the world’s financial architecture.”
from this.
Where’s that buggy eyed shocked emoticon??
Oh here it is
Some children learning about inter-generational lending
I have some hope that this new Con-Lib coalition may well end up being one of the most classically liberal governments we’ve had in a long time. But not a lot of hope.
What I suspect will happen is that the government will have to make some very unpopular decisions. Lefty Lib Dem members will tear up their membership cards and those who voted Lib Dem to keep the Tories out will start voting Labour. The coalition will collapse by next year and we’ll have a voting system where an ignorant tyrannical majority elects centre-left governments from here to eternity.
I’m a 30 year old entrepreneur. I’m about to get married and start a family. I want my children to grow up in a society that understands the virtues of liberty. I’m thinking of my exit strategy.
This is a genuine and serious question: Where should I be heading?
I don’t know where I stand on PR. It sounds good but then you ask what the effect would be on parties like the the BNP. I did some fag packet accounting and based upon the BNP’s shocking 1.9% of the vote I figured that they would have perhaps 12 MPs under a PR system. I decided to go check this out and found the following recent blog post
http://www.vote-no-to-bnp.org.uk/2010/05/proportional-representation-pr-and-the-bnp.html
They’ve done their homework and discovered what actually happens in those countries that have already adopted a PR system.
In reality this really isn’t the case, most countries that operate a PR System of voting have a percentage cut off, this cut off is typically 5 or 10%, meaning a prospective MP would first have to achieve either 5 or 10% of the popular vote in order to progress through the PR system of selection.
In the case of the BNP they would based on the 2010 General Election results only have 3 candidates that could have progressed through the PR selection process if we applied the 10% cap (which seems from my research to be the most popular), so at best the BNP would have 1 and at an outside the BNP would have 2 MPs.
So the BNP wouldn’t get their share of the pie. Great! Good riddance. But if you’re argument is that PR is representative then you have to ask yourself if you’re just fixing the rules to suit your own situation. Where does this leave parties like the Greens?
What the 10 or 5% system seems to propose is a system in which every party is equal but some parties are more equal than others. The result is messy ethical knot spaghetti. Isn’t it simpler to recognise that the democratic process has some serious failings whichever way you cut it? My concern would be that PR would create an environment where centre-left liberals would flourish for the simple reason that the majority of the UK is economically illiterate and historically ignorant. Do I want a system that ignores the wishes of the ignorant? You bet ya! and so do you.
So what’s the answer? I don’t know. Transferable Vote?
Democracy is a reasonable way to throw out a complete bastard and pretty useless for everything else. The democratic process seems like the tyranny of a numerical majority to me. Another option would be competing governments and Scottish independence would be a good start towards that.
I suppose my ideal would be a strong constitution where democracy was reduced to a simple administrative task of selecting guardians.
Just as you thought libertarianism couldn’t get any geekier…
I went and created a UK Libertarian Chatroom.
The stuff you need to join in:
Have fun!
EDIT - It’s even easier than that! - Just go to http://webchat.freenode.net/?channels=uklibertarian. Type in a username and start chatting!
BLOG AND WEB ADMINS - Perhaps try putting an image link in your sidebar that links to the chatroom.
Come join the party.
Help promote the #uklibertarian chat room on your own blog with the following button which opens the chat room in a dedicated pop up window:
I don’t think anything could sum up my attitude to the recent UK elections better than this quote from C.S. Lewis’ “God in the Dock”:
Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.
And whilst we’re at it - a picture speaks a thousand words. I don’t think I’ve ever seen such an eloquent argument for the right to bear arms as this one:
“He’s definitely a utilitarian libertarian, which is acceptable in some academic circles. If the evidence showed coercive government action was a net social gain, he would be all for it.”
I like my job. It’s very complex and demanding but sometimes it just screws my brain. I need to learn stuff like
this…
It’s an old post but all credit to him. It’s an important lesson for anyone involved with the Ruby language.
A group of scientists proved for the hundredth time today that lazy journalists will gorge themselves on pseudo scientific waffle.
A group of control journalists called ‘bloggers’ were fed on a diet of raw information and dull research papers whilst MSM journalists were fed preformed biased and unscientific press releases from a marketing company keen to peddle the latest quasi health drug.
The results showed that the journalists gulped down the information until their fat little fingers could barely type out ‘Thank you. It’ll be in tomorrows paper if we have a slow news day.’
—-
In other news(?)… if you feed rats a load of crap they get fat.
What is it about european culture and more specifically us brits that we are unable to comprehend why republicans are so vehemently opposed to Obama’s healthcare bill?
Having written these people off as uncaring wackos, incapable of kindness to their fellow man, there is no attempt to dig any deeper. No attempt to find out why nearly 50% of congress opposed the bill or why such a huge swathe of America feels so uncomfortable with Obama’s plans. “They’re just crazy bible bashing, creationist red necks.” - that seems to be the final conclusion. I’m not sure that’s true. Why hasn’t this bill been approved decades sooner? “They’re crazy southerners!” just doesn’t cut it for me. Know your enemy - what are their arguments and reasoning? Why would anyone oppose a bill that intends to improve health care for some of the poorest members of American society? Too much Fox news?
Also, given that the new bill effectively forces american insurers to take on new customers. Why aren’t insurance companies actively seeking out this untapped market already? Do poor Americans neglect health insurance because they can’t afford it or because they judge it to be of lesser importance than something else? Is it a lack of desire on the part of the customer or the provider? If its the customer, why mandate them to buy? If its the insurance company, why wouldn’t you want to take on a new customer who’s willing to pay the money? Are middle and upper class Americans willing to pay for the insurance of those who don’t wan’t it?
How free is the American health care market? Why can’t you purchase health insurance in a neighbouring state? Are there health insurance comparison websites? If you’re unhappy with the quality of care you’re receiving, how simple is it to move to another service provider? What prevents insurance policy owners moving to another insurance company if they see that their fellow customers are receiving sub standard care or value for money?
Why is the AMA given a monopoly on licencing medical practitioners? Why should accreditation be left in the hands of a public body like the AMA and FDA? … a slight diversion… If you eat in a Michelin star restaurant, how confident are you that the food will be good or excellent? Would they give a star rating to a bad or mediocre restaurant? Are restaurants or hotels mandated to have external accreditation? Are these accreditation systems such as the AA or Michelin, state funded or privately owned? Why would this system not work if it were applied to healthcare? Is access to another person’s time, effort, medical skills and equipment a human right? Are we entitled to demand it?
But most importantly, why is there such a reluctance to get inside the head of those opposing the bill or ask some of the questions above?
So many questions! So few asking them.
Nope. The British media has made it’s mind up. They know where public sentiment’s at - “We Love The NHS. This should have been done long ago. These republicans are crazy. No more questions, Your Honor.”
“The study of history is a powerful antidote to contemporary arrogance. It is humbling to discover how many of our glib assumptions, which seem to us novel and plausible, have been tested before, not once but many times and in innumerable guises; and discovered to be, at great human cost, wholly false.” - Paul Johnson
