Preston is a (bad word censored)

There where two things I set my face against doing when I took up the pen (well, emacs actually… but you get the idea) and began to blog. One was not to be a swearblogger—although I am foul mouthed in everyday life. Another was not to “Fisk” articles by stupid lefties. Too easy, for one thing.

I nearly made an exception for this awful piece – let me quote the toxic, gritty nub of Preston’s foul emissions:

“You can still drive round Manchester this Christmas and find posters of my six-year-old grandson staring out at you. Charlie is wearing a breathing mask. His blue eyes are somewhere between poignant and reproachful. “Is a congestion charge too much to pay for clean air?” asks the question below. Answer: yes. One in five Greater Manchester children have asthma. But nearly four of every five Greater Manchester motorists don’t give that – or alleviating congestion – even passing priority. Almost 80% said no in a referendum, on a turnout of 52%.”

…

“It was stupid to have a referendum,” my daughter adds balefully. “They should have just done it.”

…

Simply: is saving the environment a fit subject for democratic choice? Can politicians ask the people, when they know that disaster goes with a “no”?

…

“And we can’t even look into Charlie’s bright blue eyes.”

The piece finally dissolves into a kind of slogan salad of incoherence reflecting the underlying breakdown of rational though processes. Don’t bother reading the piece, it only encourages them.

So, then, a simple tyrannical fascist relying on a laughably crude “think of the poor suffering children with their big eyes so full of tears” for justification.

Did you expect something else from the former editor of the Guardian (for 20 years)?

Rothbard’s “Keynes, the Man”

What a great paper this is. If there is any one person who at heart is responsible for the current, well this isn’t a swearblog, the current plight of the economy then look no further than one John Maynard Keynes, for it is he. Well perhaps not really, there where others before and since but he must carry his fair share of the blame, which is a very large share indeed. I knew very little about Keynes and had only a glimmering of what he was on about and in an attempt to rectify my ignorance I fell over this paper by some bloke called Murray Rothbard. Here’s several choice extracts.

The Quote are all from Rothbard’s Keynes, The Man a PDF document.

The abstract:

John Maynard Keynes, the man—his character, his writings, and his actions throughout life—was composed of three guiding and interacting elements. The first was his overweening egotism, which assured him that he could handle all intellectual problems quickly and accurately and led him to scorn any general principles that might curb his unbridled ego. The second was his strong sense that
he was born into, and destined to be a leader of, Great Britain’s ruling elite. Both of these traits led Keynes to deal with people as well as nations from a self perceived position of power and dominance. The third element was his deep hatred and contempt for the values and virtues of the bourgeoisie, for
conventional morality, for savings and thrift, and for the basic institutions of family life.

On the secret society  The Apostles of which Keynes was a member:

Two basic attitudes dominated this hermetic group under the aegis of Keynes and Strachey. The first was their overriding belief in the importance of personal love and friendship, while scorning any general rules or principles that might limit their own egos; and the second, their animosity toward and contempt for middleclass values and morality. The Apostolic confrontation with bourgeois values
included praise for avant-garde aesthetics, holding homosexuality to be morally superior (with bisexuality a distant second), and hatred for such traditional family values as thrift or any emphasis on the future or long run, as compared to the present. (“In the long run,” as Keynes would later intone in his famous phrase, “we are all dead.”)

Summing up

A more fitting term for Keynes would be “charismatic”—not in the sense of commanding the allegiance of millions but in being able to con and seduce important people—from patrons to politicians to students and even to opposing economists. A man who thought and acted in terms of power and brutal domination, who reviled the concept of moral principle, who was an eternal and sworn enemy of the bourgeoisie, of creditors, and of the thrifty middle class, who was a systematic liar, twisting truth to fit his own plan, who was a Fascist and an anti- Semite, Keynes was nevertheless able to cajole opponents and competitors.

No, don’t just read it all. Download it, print it, study it and hand copies of it out. I’m doing that now.

Useful idiots

Other people seem to be interested in my hobby horse of the moment which is the role of ideology in democratic politics:

A day or so after the failed Parliamentary candidate Sayeeda Warsi was elevated to the House of Lords as Shadow Minister for Community Cohesion and Social Action, I happened to be on a television programme with her.

Just before going on I asked her why David Cameron (who had just promoted her) liked her. She answered: “Well, you see Douglas, I’m not ideological and nor’s David, so I think we like that in each other.” I was almost sick on her shoes.

Douglas Murray, Total Politics

Quite.

People who say “Oh! I’m not ideological” are too ignorant to realise they’re unintentionally lying. It’s not actually possible to act without mental models of reality—which is what an ideology is—not even to get a cup of tea, let alone design fiscal policy. People who make such statements show themselves to be ignorant and foolish.

Such fools do have an ideology but are unaware of it—they have some received hegemonic  group think and have no idea how they acquired it, not what it’s basis is nor it’s logical conclusions. They are in fact tools of other actors; I think the Marxists call them useful idiots

Why politicians cannot say pensions are Ponzi schemes

Perhaps you hold views which are contrary to popular opinion. I certainly do. For example, I think guns should not merely be legal but that most private citizens should actually go armed. Or, to take another position, I believe that frauds, such as Ponzi schemes should also be legal and may serve a useful purposes such as hurting the stupid and greedy, acting as a warning and making money for the clever.

The specifics of my outrageous views, of which these are but a taste, are not important. I can defend each and every one of them, show how they fit into a rational, moral framework, are justified by historical evidence and so on. In short I believe I am right, at least mostly, and that people who hold contrary views are by implication wrong and, in some cases, mad or bad. Even when those contrary views are held by the majority, even the great majority, of the public.

Even if everyone or almost everyone believes that the Earth is at the centre of the universe and is orbited by the sun, even if the Catholic Church tortures and kills all who dissent from this view—if I hold that the earth orbits the sun, it would be me that was right and the Church would be wrong, and in this case both mad and bad.

I might well have to remain silent on the matter or flee for my life. But I would be right. The popularity of opinions does not affect their accuracy. If I were a politician this would cause me very real problems.

To give a more prosaic example: If, as a politician, I say “State pensions cannot continue, they’re a sort of Ponzi scheme and the people who were stupid enough to buy into them should loose their money when they collapse just as they would with any other fraud“. someone will bleat “Oh please be quiet David. Millions of voters believe in state pensions, and will suffer terrible hardship. These people will never vote for you and there are so many of them. Even though what you say is true“.

As a politician, if I hold an unpopular but, I think, correct view then I will be counseled to be silent on that matter. If I agree to be silent for pragmatic reasons soon I will find myself under pressure from friends and colleagues to actually lie about my beliefs.

When Paxman asks me “So, David, I understand you think state pensioners are a parasitical class living on monies stolen from the young. Are you really such a monster?” What am I to say:  “Err…. Jeremy, it’s a bit nuanced, bla bla bla” or should I just lie. It would certainly be easier to lie. That is, of course,what most politicians do, or worse.

I think you can generalise from pensions to other policies so I’ll spare you more examples.

At crux, the question is this:

“I believe I am right and that the people are wrong. How can I get elected when those things I truly and believe are rationally the best policies are unpopular, even deeply unpopular, with the people—I cannot. So what am I to do?”

Most politicians do not even ask this question, so remote are they from matters of principle. Instead they unthinkingly and uncritically adopt the views and beliefs they think the public, or some section of it anyway, find palatable. The idea, for at least many, of taking a principle position is unthinkable.

Those politicians, not just MP’s and prospective MP’s, all members of the political class that behave like this do this because, obviously, they seek power. But power to do what?

I would like some measure of political power because there are certain things that I would like to do – dismantling the regulatory state, for example, so that commerce, trade and business might thrive. Politicians on the other hand, rather than seeking power to do things they believe in seem to want to act just as a conduit for mass popular opinion or the perceived will of the people or some such.

This is part of the reason why industrial democracy is a toxic process and has nothing to do with freedom, progress or justice.

And, no I haven’t answered the politicians question. I do wish he would go away.

Planning the planning of plans

Is there really no difference between Cameronism and New Labourism?

Essentially not. Looters both. There may be slight differences in the nature or shape of the attempts to control the fundamental forces of the economic universe by meddling in free markets, but meddle they will.

Not only will they both meddle they’ll both meddle a lot. It’s not just the 43% of GDP looted from the productive workers and spent to create the client state or on, well, basically monuments to hubris such as the Dome, or Jack Straw’s new palace, or the Olympics or propaganda channels or given to bankrupt bankers.

By how many points percentage do you think Cameron’s Tories will reduce that take by? My answer is not even zero. It will go up. It almost always does. It, might for a moment go down but soon back up it will go.

This is but one aspect of the crisis of industrial democracy – for such it is. It’s not even the most serious problem.

The most desperate problem is what the millions of civil servants paid for by a big chunk of the 43% actually do and do not do.

What they do is create and enforce regulations and rules which have the direct effect of making the rest of us less productive. Millions of bureaucrats spending their days deciding absurd details, planning the planning of plans to plan the lives of others.

What they do not do is any productive work. Let me hammer the point: a quarter, an entire quarter of the working population create no wealth. They are removed from the productive economy. You could read the classic essay by Bastiat What Is Seen and What Is Not Seeon this, if you feel the urge to say “but surely they do create wealth, surely they are productive”.

The core, pivotal question is not so much “what is the role of the state” but simply “how big should it be”. I think the state is too big. Much, much too big.

Today, the home civil service alone has more than three quarters of a million bureaucrats; yet India, a vast and complex place, was managed by the British Raj with just over a one thousand two hundred civil servants. The difference is scale is almost breathtaking.

I, in my madness, might think that it might be possible to go from a few thousand state administrators to ten or none. But that matters not for the purposes of this debate – if we get near to a thousand perhaps the argument becomes something other than “how many Rothbard clones can dance on a pinhead”.

The big one, the real deal, is crossing the chasm from millions of state employees to a few thousand.

I don’t think the ballot box is going to be much use here because a large portion (~1/4) of the electorate <em>is</em> the state and an even larger chunk is indirectly dependent on the state, suppliers, sub-contractors, suborned charities etc. That’s before you get to the benefit recipients, they’re extra.

What does it take to change that? Desperation maybe. An economic collapse perhaps? And look! There on the horizon, here comes one.

Sell the schools! … or at least the Post Offices?

The North Briton looks forward to the arrival of “The BMWs and Hondas of mail delivery”:

First Class Christmas bonuses for all? More like two million parcels lost or delayed over Christmas alone, and a target structure that registers a ’sorry you were out’ card as a successful delivery.

The BMWs and Hondas of mail delivery can’t arrive fast enough.

The North Briton

I agree. I’m a “Sell the Schools” sort of guy.

But… but … but … (Kinnock voice) “a Laaaabour goverment”. I was more than a little supprised to see these proposals coming out of the this 1960’s remix mob of labour looters. So I assumed there was something fishy about it. And there is of course. Richard North has some clues for us:

As we pointed out in our May piece, the real objective – as always – is entirely political. The plan is to destroy national services, those with a unique national identity, replacing them with cross-border entities which owe nothing to any particular country. Then, in the fullness of time, when the “service” is partly or mainly “trans-national”, the EU steps in with a proposal to regulate on a cross-border basis and creates an EU authority with full powers to dictate the rules.

EU Referendum

Need I say it? Read the whole thing.

I remain certain that we should end the Post Office monopoly, break up the post office and sell the bits off.

But who does the selling off and breaking up matters greatly. Their beliefs and goals will shape the nature of the privatisation effort quite markedly.

For instance, I favour the destructionof some state enterprises, such as the BBC and the UK Statistics Authority not their privatisation. I also support the return of the looted properties to the original owners, or the paying of reparations. In general, I’m much more interested in allowing new enterprise to emerge than allowing state enterprise to continue in another guise. Rather than creating another regulated industry, remove the regulations.

I mention all this not in any expectation of being asked to execute this program but to make clear that the motivations and objectives of those actually doing the privatisation will have drastic effects.

Some of the previous privatisation where done so absurdly badly. Contemplate Railtrack. Was that ever gonna work? You guys have got the trains, but these guys have got the track – come on. That cannot have been anything other than planned failure. I have similar thoughts on “you’ve got the gas and I’ve got the pipes” but that seems to have stumbled along, kinda.

Similarly, the current moves in respect of the post office. Is one seriously expected to believe that the goverment has seen the free market light? I rather think not. This “privatisation” is actually at the behest of the EU as is not likely to be carried out or operated in our best interests. Quite the opposite in fact.

The intention is to destroy significant national symbols, create havoc (al la Railtrack) and then impose “order”, but order at a European level. I should expect red post boxes to continue, but a discreet ring of stars will appear at some point.

Neither the government, nor their masters, has any belief in free markets. We should treat their proposals with skepticism and assume the worst.

Oops—Can I Say That?

This is quite old (2004) but still relevant, Reason on the McCain-Fiengold (the US Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act) indicating why you don’t want the state interfering in the funding of politics.

Fix the McCain-Feingold Law

Oops—Can I Say That?

Now it is official: The United States of America has a federal bureaucracy in charge of deciding who can say what about politicians during campaign season. We can argue, and people do, about whether this state of affairs is good or bad, better or worse than some alternative. What is inarguable is that America now has what amounts to a federal speech code, enforced with jail terms of up to five years.

Reason

In America, if you want to organize people to do something, you form a corporation. Most advocacy organizations and citizens groups are, of necessity, nonprofit corporations. “The law drew no distinctions between General Motors and the ACLU,” says Joel Gora, a Brooklyn Law School professor who advises the American Civil Liberties Union. As a result, he says, “there are no ACLU ads challenging President Bush on civil liberties in the war on terror.”

Reason

The article concludes: “Either way, fix the law before 2006. One election with a speech code is more than enough.”

Indeed. As Glen would say.

You can read some briefer, more topical remarks by Matt Welch: here in again. Money quote:

The first thing people who believe in political freedom need to understand is that the opposition—the regulators—are relentless. They care about this issue. They care a lot about it. Even now, they are pushing very hard for what they call “full public financing of campaigns.” They’ve come up with this new name, “clean elections.” Because if you go to voters and say, we’re going to give candidates your tax dollars to campaign with, they’ll vote against it. But if you ask them to vote for “clean elections,” they’ll vote for it, because it’s kind of like asking voters to vote for a good economy or warm fuzzy rabbits.

Reason

On Liberty

This isn’t quite as topical as most blog quotes, but it is superb: 

The beliefs which we have most warrant for have no safeguard to rest on, but a standing invitation to the whole world to prove them unfounded. If the challenge is not accepted, or is accepted and the attempt fails, we are far from certainty still; but we have done the best that the existing state of human reason admits of; we have neglected nothing that could give the truth a chance of reaching us; if the lists are kept open, we may hope that if there be a better truth, it will be found when the human mind is capable of receiving it; and in the meantime we may rely on having attained such approach to truth as is possible in our own day. This is the amount of certainty attainable by a rational being, and this is the sole way of attaining it.

J. S. Mill, On Liberty

Sound’s like critical rationalism to me! I must read On Liberty soon. Dunno why I haven’t to date give that I have been known to bang on about liberty. Something put me of Mill when I was a teen and I’ve ignored him since, but I’m embarrassed to say I cannot remember what it was. I do hope he’s not a monster or something after that brilliant quote (which I found in a paper about Karl Popper).

The collapse of Ponzi schemes

As part of my economic re-education programme and in the light of recent events I’ve read the excellent WikiPedia article on Ponzi schemes:

A Ponzi scheme is a fraudulent investment operation that involves paying abnormally high returns to investors out of the money paid in by subsequent investors, rather than from the profit from any real business.
…

The reality of the scheme is that the “return” to the initial investors is being paid out of the new, incoming investment money, not out of profits. No “global currency arbitrage”, “hedge futures trading” or “high yield investment program” is actually taking place.

Wikipedia

If you can spare the time, do read it.

Perusing that article I read that Albania got into, difficulties, shall we say. In the immediate aftermath of a multi-decade rogering by communism the nascent economy was destroyed by Ponzi schemes. The result was anarchy, not market anarchy, but crazy chaos killing thousands. Read the IMF article:

The Rise and Fall of Albania’s Pyramid Schemes

Christopher Jarvis, March 2000
Finance & Development (an IMF publication)

The pyramid scheme phenomenon in Albania is important because its scale relative to the size of the economy was unprecedented, and because the political and social consequences of the collapse of the pyramid schemes were profound. At their peak, the nominal value of the pyramid schemes’ liabilities amounted to almost half of the country’s GDP. Many Albanians—about two-thirds of the population—invested in them. When the schemes collapsed, there was uncontained rioting, the government fell, and the country descended into anarchy and a near civil war in which some 2,000 people were killed.

…

By March 1997, Albania was in chaos. The government had lost control of the south. Many in the army and police force had deserted, and 1 million weapons had been looted from the armories. Evacuation of foreign nationals and mass emigration of Albanians began. The government was forced to resign. President Berisha agreed to hold new parliamentary elections before the end of June, and an interim coalition government was appointed.

…

The interim government inherited a desperate situation. Some 2,000 people had been killed in the violence that followed the pyramid schemes’ collapse. Large parts of the country were no longer within the government’s control.

The Rise and Fall of Albania’s Pyramid Schemes

I though the folk spouting “blood on the streets” over the house price bubble were loons. So many of the things I used to think have turned out to be nonsense. I’m starting to think all sorts of crazy survivalist thoughts. I really, really, hope I am just a bit nutty.

posting will be light to none existent today

I have to go and work in the ontology mine today. I’m then free to bloviate until Jan 5.