Cameron in the Telegraph

Cameron's article in defence of the conservatism of the Conservative party he leads was a strong one. In particular, the section discussing Conservative policies should assuage the fears of those who worry there might be no significant difference between the two parties come election day. When you consider that the policy reviews have not even reported yet there is actually a fair amount of material. While they are not concrete policy plans they serve to illustrate the direction of the Conservative party going forward.

It appears to have panicked DK as his response is a bit disjointed:

"Businesses, parents, and local communities must be given more responsibility. I believe in social responsibility, not state control.

As I have asked before, what if people don't want it? Are you going to make them have it?"

Either DK is making an argument in favour of gilded cages or he is suggesting that Cameron is looking to force people to be Good Samaritans. The key is the comparison between social responsibility and state control; Cameron is discussing methods of avoiding the use of the heavy hand of the state.

"Instead of simply accepting the political consensus of the time, as Blair did, I am challenging it.

How? With your marvellous "hug a hoodie" campaign?"

Cameron doesn't run a "hug a hoodie" campaign. He argued, in a speech, that the problems of youth anti-social behaviour stemmed from social breakdown and that what these children lack is family love and support. This is a pretty conservative analysis.

"Why do we need a Bill Of Rights, exactly? In what way will it be different from the Human Rights Act, precisely?"

That Cameron is currently discussing broad principles and ideas rather than precise policy is a horse that has been dead for some time and I'm a little dissapointed it is still being beaten. Forming policy slowly is a mark of taking policy formation seriously and giving it time rather than rushing out plans which are not properly thought through. Now is the time to set out broad principles, as a member of the UKIP surely DK can see that there is a fundamental difference between defining rights in UK law and having them defined, and enforced, in Europe?

"It is why I have made the strongest commitment to supporting the family and marriage that any Conservative leader has made for a generation.

What commitment? You have part-published a report written by Duncan-Smith; I haven't heard any concrete policy deriving from that report yet."

The commitment was made during the leadership contest; that government should support marriage through the tax system. Why does a lack of detail make this commitment worthless?

"It is why we are pledged to share the proceeds of economic growth between public services and lower taxes, thereby ensuring that over time the state takes a smaller share of national wealth.

Lower taxes? When? How much? What taxes (since the number of taxes that he can cut is partly controlled by the EU)?

Share the proceeds of growth? How much growth does there have to be before we see tax cuts rather than more money pissed into the public services? What if there is "not enough growth"?

What about tax simplification?What about that Flat Tax that you were so keen on? What about raising the Personal Tax Allowance to a decent level in order to take the poorest out of the tax system? Where are your actual policies, Dave? Where are these clear answers?"

This is actually a pretty clear commitment that at the end of a Tory term the proportion of the economy being consumed by the state will be 0.X of whatever it is when the Tories take over. The state will shrink. While exactly how much (X) and how is not decided it probably shouldn't be. Deciding economic policy years before the event when the state of the public finances and the broader economy is not known would be economically risky and politically dangerous. Now is the time to state direction rather than how far we might be able to travel.

"When I see Cameron's detailed policy, then I might rethink."

Really? (Sorry, I'm just curious and there's at least some chance this post will get a response)

He then goes on to quote EU Referendum and the UKIP about how we can't leave the Social Chapter without the agreement of other members. This is a rather narrow way of looking at things. EU policy formation is a process of negotiation and if a priority of ours is no longer having to follow what was the Social Chapter then we may be able to secure agreement to that end. Particularly when the more integrationist states are accepting the idea that different nations may choose different levels of EU involvement (a multi-speed Europe).

"Our new Movement for European Reform is a pan-European campaign to promote a positive vision of an outward-looking Europe rather than an inward-looking EU obsessed with its own bureaucracy.

Yes, yes, yes; we have heard all of this before from assorted politicians; when will you learn that the EU is not reformable? Both Strange Stuff and EU Serf have discussed, at length and recently, why this should be."

I've rebutted the Serf's argument that it is impossible to reform the EU and I won't repeat myself now.

He then discusses the pledge to leave the EPP:

"The pledge is, in any case, a stupid one to make. If the EPP is unsuitable for Conservatives now, then they should withdraw now. It may, in two years' time, actually be the most suitable grouping for the Tories to be in (unlikely, but you get the picture); in which case, leaving in two years would be fucking stupid, wouldn't it?"

Forming a cross border political party takes time. In an ideal world it would be great to leave now but hurrying the process, making a mess of things and winding up forming a weaker alternative to the EPP than is possible if we take the time to get the new party right just leaves a weaker conservative voice in Europe.

"And Brown wants to keep the pound as our currency: what, precisely, are you offering, Davey-boy?"

Brown's position, in public at least, is that he wants to adopt the Euro when the economic conditions are right. "Davey-boy" does not want to adopt the Euro. Those two positions are rather different.

"But these Conservative intellectual foundations are just the start. We must now apply them to the hopes and aspirations of people and families today, just as Mrs Thatcher applied Conservative principles to the challenges of the 1980s.

How about just fucking off and letting the families apply these principles themselves, you evil, statist cunt?"

This is pretty hysterical. Cameron is arguing for applying the same, conservative, principles as Thatcher to modern problems. How on Earth is that statist?

"The reduction of Thatcherism into a sort of laissez-faire libertarianism does not do justice to her record. She was animated by a vision of the good society – a vision obscured by decades of economic dirigisme and cultural relativism. The task she set herself was to restore not only personal liberty in economic matters, but also a sense of duty, respect and moral obligation in social matters.

Yup. That's why most people talk about the 80s in the same breath as "rampant greed"."

That's actually the socialist caricature of Thatcherism and it is a shame that it has such a strong hold on the popular imagination. Striving to better the condition of yourself, your family and your community without state involvement is not selfish. That is what Thatcherism was trying to encourage.

"I, too, am animated by a vision of the good society.

Oh, god. Dave, what if my vision of a "good society" is not the same as your vision of a "good society", eh? Are you going to force me to accept your vision? I suspect that the answer is, "yes"."

Anyone with a political programme, including libertarians, has a vision of the good society. That good society may include the freedom to pursue your own vision of a good life.

I have some reservations over Conservative policy on a couple of issues, notably the NHS and the environment, but Cameron's leadership still offers the hope of a great conservative government.

Unintended Consequences to the End of the United Kingdom

A little while ago I wrote a post lamenting the end of the United Kingdom. One of the arguments was an appeal to the conservative fear of unintended consequences

"If conservativism can be defined at all then it is the view that human reason is limited and that faced with tasks as complicated as building a state we would do better to rely on the accumulated knowledge of ages.

[...]

In the United Kingdom we have the state that played a serious part in defeating Napoleon, the Kaiser Wilhelm, Hitler and Stalin, built the world's largest empire, abolished slavery, set up the international economy through an early push for free trade, spread institutions and infrastructure around the world in the biggest overseas investment ever and provided a unique environment which incubated the first Industrial Revolution and modern economic growth. Now, it may be that we don't think this was dependent upon the United Kingdom so much as it was on England, luck, coal or some other quality. However, it seems far more plausible that the geographical security and cultural variety of the United Kingdom were a serious asset which there might be unintended consequences to losing."

Trevor Phillips' article for the Telegraph yesterday argues that one of unintended consequences of fracturing the United Kingdom would be that the new nations would be ethnically defined and, hence, more difficult for new immigrants to become a part of. Certainly, most immigrants now tend to adopt the prefix British even if those the census describes as White British call themselves English or Scottish. However, I'm not sure the situation is as simple as Phillips is describing. There would seem to be two possible conclusions to a two or three state solution for the United Kingdom.

The first is the one that Phillips describes: nations defined as English, Scottish or Welsh, understood by the indigenous population to be the property of those of their ethnicity and less accepting of newcomers. In such a scenario immigrants might only be able to associate with their new national identity to the extent that they became more like the English, Scottish or Welsh and, therefore, feel the dilemma in choosing between their new and old cultures more acutely. The other, also plausible, possibility is that nations with a better sense of themselves would be easier to integrate into as immigrants might be more attracted to a better loved national identity and understand more easily what they need to do to integrate.

I don't think that any sufficently humble thinker can really claim to have a convincing case that either of these outcomes is much more likely than the other in the particular case of the 21st century UK fracturing. However, if you look at the rest of world it is hard to argue that Britain actually does a bad job of integrating newcomers and our various ethnic tribes get on relatively peacefully. The question we should be asking ourselves is clear; do we think we are wise enough to found a new state which would do better than the United Kingdom?

One thing I should finally mention is that the description Phillips offers for Britishness, that it asks you "to treat fellow citizens with respect and fairness, to share basic rules of conduct and to contribute to our common good", is desperately weak. I doubt that many civilised nations would say any different. A shared national identity has to be about something that people agree makes our national project special rather than a selection of close to universal homilies. In one of the very first posts on this blog I set out my vision of what that identity might be.

Liam Fox is not Winston Churchill

I don't think Guido's idea that Liam Fox should quit and become a wilderness figure in order to return as saviour if Cameron fails is a particularly good one.

a) If the leadership did tell him to stop being silly in arguing for Poland and Hungary to be suspended from NATO for spending too little on defence they are entirely right. Poland has been a good ally contributing to many of our recent foreign interventions and neither country's main contribution to the alliance is their military budget.

b) In terms of his own personal ambition quitting now would suggest serious, party hurting, disloyalty which is usually death to dreams of high office. Churchill was a product of a different era.

c) "As it is they treat him like a mushroom (kept in the dark with plenty of fertiliser), his profile is kept deliberately low." I'm not sure this is true. We've seen big Conservative initiatives on Armed Forces conditions recently which would seem to increase the prominence of the Shadow Defence Minister.

The Great Depression and the New Deal

After the gradual destruction of the conventional, Galbraithian view of what caused the Great Depression by Friedman, Bernanke, Sirkin and a host of other great twentieth century economists the right wing bandwagon is now moving on to what fixed it. In particular the New Deal is taking a hammering. Marginal Revolution has some great coverage. First, Alex Tabarrok:

"Imagine, increasing the power of unions to strike and raise wages during a time of mass strikes and mass unemployment. Imagine thinking that cartelizing whole industries thereby raising prices and reducing output could improve the economy. Not everything Roosevelt did was counterproductive - he did end prohibition (although in order to raise taxes) - but plenty was and worst of all was the uncertainty created by Roosevelt's vicious attacks on business."

The causes of the Great Depression are something I have studied at some length and it becomes increasingly clear the idea it was a matter of wildly irrational markets getting their comeuppance is increasingly hard to sustain. While I have not read into as much of the detail of the arguments surrounding the New Deal I think that people are right to be suspicious that policies which are so disastrous elsewhere worked so well in the thirties. I think that as the event was so traumatic and remains so iconic the conventional wisdom surrounding it can be an intimidating target for academic challenge.

Bryan Caplan puts an argument similar to Tabarrok's in rather robust terms by describing FDR as a much milder Mugabe in terms of economic policy. He defends his comparison like this:

"Think about it this way: Out of all the presidents the U.S. has ever had, which one had the scariest rhetoric and policies from the point of view of investors and the rich? As far as I can tell, Franklin Roosevelt is clearly at the top of the list by a wide margin. Who else is even in the running? Cousin Teddy? He was a lot more balanced, and the country wasn't in a crisis."

The comparison is overblown but does make the point that scaring the rich may be popular but has awful effects on the economy by taking capital out of active use; whether in Zimbabwe or the United States.

It's an interesting discussion. The debate on the causes of and solution to the depression started in 1929 and I expect it'll still be going strong for some time to come.

West Brom Thievery

If this is some massive coincidence or a mistake then I apologise but at the moment it looks like West Brom blog has rather stolen one of my posts. Compare this from my blog on Friday:

"However, Weyman Bennett, of Unite Against Fascism, said: “There should be no difference between a private racist opinion and a public racist opinion.”"

This is possibly the most disgustingly illiberal statement I have ever heard from someone supposedly within the political mainstream.

It is a direct assault on freedom of thought. The idea that private opinions are in any way equivalent to public incitement to racial hatred is a manifesto for witch hunts. This is a non-political figure who never openly stated her beliefs but could be hounded out of her job for being making the wrong political choice in private. To make people's private thoughts and beliefs, no matter how idiotic, a subject for public censure is the final death of meaningful freedom.

With this from the West Brom Blog today:

I was totally disgusted by UAF and shocked at the totally illiberal statements they made.

Weyman Bennett, of Unite Against Fascism, said: “There should be no difference between a private racist opinion and a public racist opinion”.

UAF are directly assaulting freedom of thought. The idea that private opinions are in any way equivalent to public incitement to racial hatred is a manifesto for the type of witch hunts UAF seem to so enjoy. Simone Clarke was not a political figure. She never openly stated her beliefs but was outed by the Guardian Newspaper. Yet she could be hounded out of her job for making the choice she made in private. To make people's private thoughts and beliefs, no matter how idiotic, a subject for public censure is the final death of meaningful freedom. The only thing UAF have demonstrated is the fact that they too are fascists, and that they lack the collective intelligence to realize it.

There are far too many similiarities. Without crediting me this is just plagiarism. If Pete reads this then, please make it right; if he doesn't could someone please educate him about proper netiquette.

Update: Apparently this was an honest mistake. He read my article and then wrote his own and my turns of phrase had just stuck in his head. Fair play, mistakes happen, no hard feelings.

A Big Clunking Fist?

Gordon Brown has somehow achieved a reputation for being a 'serious' thinker but his column for the Telegraph is another example of how he has failed to live up to that billing. His article is about the importance of Britishness but what are his proposed solutions?

More emphasis on British history; I'm pretty certain your average Tory four year old could have come up with this. An Institute for Britishness; isn't the "lets have an institute" approach always indicative of a lack of ideas? A permanent display of important British documents; doesn't the British Library already do this? And, finally, let's do something about the flag; no idea what.

Of course, if this article were a masterful exposition of the problems facing Britishness then a lack of a solution might be acceptable. There aren't any tried and tested routes to increasing national unity and not every article needs to answer that question. However, this piece was even more facile when dealing with the causes of a breakdown in Unionism. He decided to blame "some Conservative writers" who "now embrace anti-Unionist positions, from independence to "English votes for English laws" – a Trojan horse for separation". English votes for English laws is a, fairly moderate, response to the constitutional inequities of a system his government introduced and the idea of blaming conservatives for this is, as Iain points out, rather unimpressive. But shouldn't Brown be asking why conservatism, a movement which has been pro-Union through thick and thin for hundreds of years, is now reconsidering that position?

The answer would seem to be that the English are feeling put out. When looking at devolution they see the Celtic fringe gaining more autonomy while England gets attempts to fracture it into component parts. When looking at the public finances it sees public money raised in England flowing to the Celts. When looking at Westminster representation it sees English votes counting for less than those of the Scots or Welsh. The English also know that, despite all this subsidy and inequity in favour of the others, the other nations still regard the English as a yoke. A reaction of 'good riddance' is understandable.

English opinion feeds eventually into conservative opinion. That the Conservative party and the conservative commentariat are still almost uniformly unionist despite the English being 56% in favour of Scottish independence is a testament to how loyal to the unionist cause the movement is. Blaming that party and movement for the decline of Unionism is shallow and unimpressive.

Perhaps having been near the top of British politics for so long has meant that people had to look for qualities in Brown to explain his success despite a lack of charisma. I think that substance may have been assumed to fill this gap in our ability to explain a success that was probably more about being in the right place at the right time, both in inheriting a superb economic legacy and coming of political age when Blair led the Labour party to electoral sucess. It seems clearer and clearer he will be a dismal Prime Minister.

Browne leaves BP

From Times Online.

With a share price performance like that Browne is quite an act to follow. BP is promoting from within which can signify a governance problem when a company looks short of ideas but with BP performing so well there seems little reason to worry about the possibility of the company becoming too insular.


Appointing the head of Oil Exploration seems a sensible move if it indicates a renewed focus on the exploration side of the business. With more and more stocks of oil subject to serious security concerns finding new sources is increasingly paramount and any additional focus on this challenge has to be a good thing. The more 'laid back' personal manner seems relatively unimportant by comparison.

Unite Against Thought Crime

"However, Weyman Bennett, of Unite Against Fascism, said: “There should be no difference between a private racist opinion and a public racist opinion.”"

This is possibly the most disgustingly illiberal statement I have ever heard from someone supposedly within the political mainstream.

It is a direct assault on freedom of thought. The idea that private opinions are in any way equivalent to public incitement to racial hatred is a manifesto for witch hunts. This is a non-political figure who never openly stated her beliefs but could be hounded out of her job for being making the wrong political choice in private. To make people's private thoughts and beliefs, no matter how idiotic, a subject for public censure is the final death of meaningful freedom.

This Unite Against Fascism (UAF) position is also rampantly counter productive. It achieves the remarkable in making members of the BNP liberal martyrs, gives their claims to fighting an establishment conspiracy credibility and upsets broad swathes of the public. It looks almost certain to me that UAF is contributing to the rise of the BNP.

Any mainstream bodies affiliated to UAF who believe they are helping to maintain liberal democracy should sever any ties they have to the organisation.

David Cameron is The Evil Lord Xenu

Apparently the Labour Party is taking money from Scientology front groups. Classy. As both this, priceless, clip from South Park and Dave's, rather cautious, analysis demonstrate these are some seriously nutty people. Then again, at least it dilutes Labour's reliance upon the unions.



This is why whoever is responsible for the Labour party's funding scandal deserves serious sanction. By making donating to the Labour party socially disreputable they force the party to either accept donations from those without a reputation to risk or return to being the political arm of the union movement. This is not an enviable choice.

TUConomics

Brilliant quote from Jackart:

"Talking about yesterdays surprise rate rise by the bank of England,

Adam Lent, head of economics at the Trades Union Congress, said the decision "smacks of panic".

Head of Economics at the TUC? A post about as relevant as Lead Ballerina in The Parachute Regiment..."

I think it's possibly worse than irrelevant; Professor of Evolutionary Biology at the Texas Christian University might be a more apt comparison.

Terrorism in Athens

Apparently an RPG round has been fired at the front of the US Embassy in Athens. From the description in the BBC report, "just above the US emblem", it sounds to me like they may have been trying to blow the emblem off.

The big question now is whether this is the work of a successor to the, disbanded, 17 November Marxist group which has attacked US targets in the past, as well as killing British military attache Stephen Saunders, or the work of international Islamist terrorists. It was a wrong call on a similar question that led to Jose Maria Aznar's departure from power after the Madrid bombings. The police are making no predictions so far.

From my, admittedly limited, knowledge of how these things work this sounds like a small scale domestic terrorist group rather than the, rather bloodier, work of Islamist terrorists. Choosing to attack just before six in the morning with a single RPG was never going to produce the gruesome images the Jihadis look for.

Now the task is to find whoever did this. 17 November managed to operate for almost thirty years, from 1975, without a single arrest before their group quickly unravelled in 2002. If this is the start of a similar campaign and the Greeks do a similarly poor job in tracking down those responsible then we'll be hearing stories of terrorist attacks in Greece for some time to come.

Gordon Brown and the Scots

It is pretty widely held that being Scottish is a handicap for Gordon Brown in securing the English vote. This should be at least partially compensated for by enthusing Scottish voters, shouldn't it? That would certainly be the logic in the US where southern John Edwards, for example, was supposed to offer the chance of delivering a Republican safe seat.

However, it seems implausible in Scotland for two reasons. Firstly, most Scottish seats are Labour's to lose. The key Conservative-Labour marginals are in England. Any influence Brown might have in helping to beat the SNP or Liberal Democrats is of less electoral importance than his impact in the South though still significant.

More importantly I have the vague impression that although Scots are often very nationalistic they aren't exactly overly keen on each other. They're a contentious people and express their nationalism more in a disdain for other nationalities, in particular the English, than in some great enthusiasm for their own.

At a time of such nationalistic fervour they also might see a Scot running to be leader of the United Kingdom as something of a turncoat. Especially if he constantly celebrates how British he is in an effort to get on the good side of the English. In fact, I imagine they might find an actual Englishman far less offensive.

I guess we'll see.

Tory Finances

I think the news that the Tories are managing to raise far more money than normal and are in a fine financial position is even better news than the obvious election advantage it gives over a financially moribund Labour party. It is good news because of what it signals about Cameron's approach to leading the Conservative Party.

A new Conservative leader looking at the fortunes of his predecessors might well come to the conclusion that the best course of action is to spend money now as, in all likelihood, the crunch will come under some future leader. When the crunch comes do whatever is necessary to keep the party afloat but nothing more. By contrast, Cameron has the Tories in excellent financial shape. This, like the lengthy policy reviews, makes the charge that Cameron is interested only in short term poll ratings rather than the long term health of the party ring hollow. It is reassuring.

Less importantly, the difference between the financial health of the Labour and Conservative parties is supposed to tell us that Brown can't call a snap election. I doubt he would anyway. Snap elections are a gambling man's game and Brown is far too cautious; that's the lesson of the pre-budget report.

We need to track this boy down and give him his luckiest boy in America medal right away...

"McMINNVILLE, Tenn. — A former teacher serving an eight-year prison sentence for having sex with a 13-year-old student agreed Wednesday to serve two more years for sending him nude photos of herself."

Globe and Mail.Com

This story really earned its own South Park episode.

Sanctimonious Hippy Garbage Strikes Again

Sue Blackmore is terribly proud. She's given up flying. In fact, she's so proud that she has used a Guardian Unlimited piece to tell us all about how enlightened she is.

"How could someone be that selfless and brave? I knew I couldn't. I spend my life flying around the world giving lectures and going to conferences. It's my job. It's fun, it's prestigious, it's exciting. Anyway, one person's actions are a drop in the ocean to the scale of the problem of climate change, aren't they?

Yet two years on I find I have made that same decision myself. As of the start of 2007 I will make only the trips I've already booked (the US this month and Basel next) and after that I won't be flying for work any more."

How can she be so selfless and brave? How can someone write those two paragraphs without cringing at their own self-satisfaction and retreating from the keyboard?

I think its interesting that she's going to stop "flying for work". So she'll still be joining the EasyJet crowd to Ibiza but conferences in the States are off limits. Hardly puritan self-denial is it?

"This decision, that I once thought impossible, really made itself. I was sitting one day in a huge 747 when, before my lunch, served in a disposable plastic tray, the steward brought me gin in a disposable bottle, tonic in a throwaway can, a plastic cup to drink it out of and, for good measure, a spare plastic cup in which to put the little plastic stirring stick.

I realised that it's not just the fuel the plane uses but the whole crazy, wasteful enterprise of travelling the world."

Firstly, disposable drinks containers on planes probably aren't wasteful. Imagine a plane carrying a full load of non-disposable cutlery, cups etc. The extra weight and space used would add far more to the pollution footprint of the flight.

Secondly, if you don't want a stirrer, cup for stirrer or cup just tell the flight staff. I'm sure they can adjust their service and just give you the can. That kind of step is a little too practical, though, isn't it? Not quite the lifestyle statement you get with giving up flying.

Thirdly, between that Guardian article and her website I count at least four shades of hairdye going into her statement of hippy identity. She hasn't got rid of the purer examples of waste in her life.

Finally, a large part of her career has been parapsychology. Can she acknowledge that, while her "work" trips might be a waste of time and airfuel, other business travel is quite worthwhile?

"There's not only the plastic, the bottled water, and the ludicrous practice of duty-free alcohol, but the luxury hotels I'm lucky enough to be put in, with all those unnecessarily frequently washed sheets and bright white towels."

I've stayed in quite a few decent business hotels recently and they have all been quite clear about the rules: to avoid this kind of waste leave the towels on the floor if you want them washed and on the rack if you don't. Evidently she was too blinded by Guardianista rage to be able to notice such simple measures.

"We all know that, for most journeys, flying puts far more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than would driving somewhere or going there by train."

That's mostly because we're travelling a lot further. Flying is often, per mile, pretty efficient increasingly as high oil prices create a powerful incentive for airlines to increase efficiency. As such, this isn't waste but a price we pay for seeing new countries and new people.

It is telling that she gives no thought, in her article, to the benefit side of the cost/benefit calculation of flying. First, many flights are a chance for people to experience different cultures and peoples. The Guardian has become the paper of the modern little Englander mentality unwilling to see the value of people getting out in the world. Sure, some flights don't achieve this objective but the pure party trip to a hot country to get drunk is a caricature. Most will, at least to some extent, come home with a better understanding of how things are outside Britain and will be better people for it.

Second, conferences, whether academic, political or business, are important in enabling an international dialogue on important issues. The most likely outcome of more British people adopting Blackmore's decision to "choose conferences closer to home" is that more people will have to fly from foreign countries; no decrease in flying or emissions. If this movement is taken up worldwide it will mean people from different nations no longer talking, face to face, with each other. Do we really want people from different parts of the world talking to each other less?

This article was a fine example of what is wrong with the modern environmental movement.

Stumbling and Mumbling on the Undeserving Poor

Stumbling and Mumbling has stumbled across Celebrity Big Brother and is so alarmed by the insult to Darwin that is Jackiey Budden that he's calling for global redistribution. After all, none of us 'earned' being English so why do we deserve the wealth that comes with it? From reading his account she does sound a truly awful woman but that doesn't necessarily create a case for redistribution.

This is an application of the principle of moral luck which avoids the thorny question of free will. However, it still has to answer to the question of whether the proposed redistribution can be justified on efficiency grounds. International redistribution is sometimes effective but often desperately ineffective or actively counterproductive. Spending within our own borders is far easier to control and direct. Bauer's criticisms of the effects of foreign aid imply that there are limits on the extent to which our money can improve the lives of those in foreign countries. Would we be just as likely to waste our money encouraging Third World corruption as we would looking after people like Jackiey Budden?

We then return to the idea of the state as a social contract. For all Jackiey Budden's awfulness she is a party to that contract and is subject to the accompanying laws. If her awfulness manifests itself as something beyond the pale, something criminal, she can be punished. In return for setting people these basic standards we guarantee them a material standard of living. As such a contract cannot be enforced on those living abroad they may be less deserving despite being better people.

I think that the problem of Jackiey Budden is better solved via the idea floated by Dwight Lee on TCS Daily. Allow people to sell their citizenship and it seems close to certain that someone who is so underutilising the advantages of being British will wind up selling in a fit of shallowness. We could trade her for a more productive foreigner.

Sir John Fielding and Guantanamo

Gracchi offers a review of new work by Professor John Beattie on Sir John Fielding's contribution to the British justice system and the contemporary response to the challenge his changes posed to liberty.

"Its interesting as a last thought to reflect upon what this says about our current system- the Prime Minister and Head of the Metropolitan Police (chief police officer in the UK) continually tell us that we see new threats and need new ways to prosecute and police those threats. It may be that at the same time, just as in the eighteenth century, we as private citizens and therefore potential defendents need new rights to counter new prosecutions- perhaps in matters like data protection you can already see both trends taking place, government now holds a great deal more information about us and we now have rights to see that information."

I think that the emphasis on new rights here is important. Too often people are distinctly unimaginative in these debates and tend to resolve the question down to old rights versus new threats. The reality is often that the old liberties are no longer useful or appropriate in changing circumstances and this is the reason they are no longer protecting the vulnerable from overzealous attempts to confront new threats.

Guantanamo seems a prime example. A common refrain is that they should be afforded the protections of the Geneva Protocols. However, these protocols were never designed to be granted to anyone the military happened to pick up. A few of the conditions placed upon gaining Geneva protection:

• That of being commanded by a person responsible for his subordinates.


• That of having a fixed distinctive sign recognizable at a distance (there are limited exceptions to this among countries who observe the 1977 Protocol I).


• That of carrying arms openly


• That of conducting their operations in accordance with the laws and customs of war.

Geneva protection is, therefore, the reward to staying within the social contract which is the rules of war. If it is granted to those who pay no heed to its laws then that social contract can be expected to break down.

Perhaps more convincingly for those who want to see extra protection for inmates there is little imperative to quickly try and release those captured on the field of battle. This is for fairly obvious practical reasons; do you think we could have assembled a case against many of the PoWs we held during WW2? The basic environment required for evidence gathering is not present. We also often do not have the right to try them merely for being the soldiers of our enemy or committing crimes in foreign countries.

Instead Prisoners of War are prosecuted or released at the end of the war (except in exchange situations but these are matters of diplomacy rather than law). However, this is clearly not going to be a humane solution in a War on Terror which is unlikely to end so neatly. Prisoner of War status could well be a recipe for indefinite detention for many of those captured.

Equally, domestic law cannot apply to those at Guantanamo because, although they are not Prisoners of War, the same restrictions on the ability to gather evidence and prosecute a trial are present. Many of these people, under the standard of domestic law, should not be held but it is utterly unrealistic to hold a state fighting a war and dealing with foreign enemies to the same standard it is expected to afford its own citizens. This is neither true to the historical norm nor conducive to the slightest military efficacy.

What is clearly needed is some new liberties which we grant to those who do not deserve the honour of the status of Prisoners of War but do deserve some basic human dignity. The failure of the Bush administration, as I have noted before, is that it has made no attempt at creating new liberties but has, instead, ignored the problem. Those who condemn the Bush administration for its record on foreign prisoners should not pretend that its failure has been to defend existing liberties but that it has not done the work of an enlightened government in defining new ones.

You think you're not a Little Englander and then...

...you come across a tool to plot the countries you've visited via Marginal Revolution and realise just how insular you are.

It was while I was in Vancouver for Worlds that I realised that it was the first time I'd seen the Pacific (my trip to Russia was to Lake Baikal and my trip to China to Beijing); it's a big ocean to miss in twenty three years. But look, I still haven't even made it below the equator. I might as well write "Here be Dragons" on Latin America and Africa. How pathetic!



Create your own Visited Countries Map

I think things will improve as I get older but at the moment even my European coverage is looking a bit shaky. How dissapointing.

A really bad reason to vote Labour

Dave 'Red Dave' Cole is enthused by Alistair Darling's promise to better enforce the minimum wage. Three things to note:

Firstly, here's Greg Mankiw with a quick round up of the strong evidence showing that the minimum wage depresses employment. Dave's response to this will be simple: "But unemployment is low". This rather misses the point that the minimum wage will do its worst in times of economic misfortune and among a vulnerable minority of the unskilled (witness the Banlieue's in France) and that its effect can, in the short term, be masked by wider changes in our economic fortunes (i.e. the beautiful economy the Tories left Labour). Both theory and practice suggest that the outcome of setting or increasing a minimum wage is to force people to live unemployed, supported by the state, instead of getting on the ladder and providing some share of their own income.

Secondly, I think that the Labour party, which takes crowds of unpaid interns to do what would, in other circumstances, be described as "work", might want to take a look at its own policies before starting a crackdown.

Finally, to respond directly to Dave's point that we can avoid "the days under the Tories when it was perfectly acceptable for people to have to work for a pound an hour". This is akin to someone from Saudi Arabia saying that adultery is perfectly acceptable in the West. It isn't but we don't ban everything that isn't perfectly acceptable if the result of a ban will be illiberal and/or counterproductive. Under the Tories few people would have worked for under a pound an hour because they could usually make more through claiming benefits. Equally, there isn't an unlimited supply of people willing to work for a pound an hour and, therefore, the idea that the minimum wage is the only thing keeping people's wages above one pound an hour is absurd; even unskilled labour is competed for by employers to a certain extent.

In the end, the minimum wage should be a mechanism to ensure greater returns to low paid work because we want these people to be better off. We can either do this by making their labour artificially expensive, the minimum wage, which punishes those employers who employ the unskilled and therefore hurts employment of those we most want to be keeping in work, or we can spread the cost more widely through a negative income tax of some kind.

Where are all the young Conservatives coming from?

There is a very interesting post over on ConservativeHome's CF Diary (for some reason the thing isn't credited so I have no idea who writes it; identify yourself if you read this) about an increasing conservatism among the young. It cites a recent survey for the Scouts Association and an older one for Bliss Magazine and the Social Attitudes survey of 2004 both of which highlighted what appears to be conservative attitudes. I would add this 2003 LSE study, for that year's Social Attitude's study, which found young people less willing to pay for increased taxes to secure higher spending.

Despite having now left university I am still, at 23, comfortably in the Conservative Future age range and, as such, feel entitled to comment on what might be driving an increased conservatism among younger people.

1) A Decline in the Social Stigma attached to Conservatism

I think that the social stigma attached to being an evil, heartless, Tory is more important to young people. Without careers and the like to hang their social status on young people are generally more careful about anything which might endanger their hard won social standing. There would seem to be a few factors working to undermine the social stigma around conservatism.

Firstly, any ideology which is very electorally successful, as the social democrats are at the moment, will necessarily be the party of a lot of voters and these voters will often be those that young people think little of; to look at the Scouts Association survey that would be the likes of Pete Doherty and other assorted trendies of the sort that backed Blair in 97. Related to this is that the socialists can no longer sustain the idealism of opposition and have had to do unpopular things, such as the Iraq war, and now are forced to argue at the realist level of conservatives.

Secondly, David Cameron is clearly doing good work in making the party sound less miserly and grouchy. Although the process of young people becoming more positive about conservatism was clearly ongoing before he took over it seems almost certain he has enabled it to progress more easily with the changes he has made and is making to the Conservative Party. It seems reasonable to expect that young people are generally less certain of their ideological bearings (apart from a small minority who are politically active) and, as such, addressing a broader range of issues than the traditional conservative battlegrounds has to be helpful in making the party seem more relevant.

Thirdly, as conservatism is admitting defeat on "think of the children" social issues it becomes more palatable to young people. Young people don't necessarily disagree with socially conservative attitudes on these things, witness their relatively pro-life position on abortion on demand, but they tend to regard those who push social conservatism as either patronising or vaguely crazed; they expect these views to be personal and largely private. They then worry that if they are openly conservative they will be regarded as equally patronising or crazed. A similar trend is at work in the wider electorate but it is more pronounced among young people.

2) Social Democracy is No Longer a New and Ideological Movement

Those born in the post war generation grew up in an era with a popular memory of when the debate had been Conservative-Liberal and the socialist challenge from Labour was still something new and exciting. There was a genuine ex ante hope that it might be possible to, through the beneficent actions of an enlightened state, create a society shorn of inequality, misery and with a much higher standard of living for all. This didn't work out.

First, the revolutionary movement associated with socialism descended into atrocity and madness. Second, the Social Democratic states failed to guarantee the material wellbeing and security they had promised. The conservative backlash, Reagan in the States and Thatcher here, proved more successful in reversing national declines than even its supporters can have hoped. While the Thatcher/Reagan successes could be disputed by the socialists, and still are, socialists were reduced to arguing about records and empirics rather than emotively contrasting hope with fearful decline.

While those who were young when the socialist movement was still full of promise still see the socialist cause as essentially youthful and hopeful it now has to fight a rather more even fight with conservatism among the contemporary young who will not give it the benefit of the doubt.

3) The expanding Conservative Movement gives Conservatives more to Do while Young

Left wing young people have always had plenty to do politically. They will start protesting from a young age; if their parents are left wing then almost from birth. Right wingers have relatively few ways to express their conservatism. Conservative Future and its predecessors have primarily been social circles, except at election time, and probably not a circle that will often appeal outside the ambitious. Right wing protests are rare and usually comparatively poorly attended.

This made the sacrifice of facing the social stigma of being a conservative appear rather pointless for many who might have been tempted by conservatism. It has started to be eroded by the new media, such as blogs, which allow young conservatives to participate on their own terms in adult political dialogue and an increased ease in combining conservatism with publicly caring about other issues such as humanitarian crises and the environment.

4) Exposure to Britain's New Underclass

Ann Widdecombe, in a quote near the end of the Telegraph article, questions the results of the survey for the Scout's Association on the grounds that she has seen "increasing disaffection among young people who are growing up without aspirations". Of course, the Scouts survey, which looked at majority attitudes, and Ann Widdecombe's experience are not contradictory and hint at a reality of a majority of fairly well rounded young people and a minority with very serious problems.

Now, while an adult will be segregated away from the underclass of the materially and socially deprived, both at work and at play, comprehensive schooling means that young Middle England meets them everyday. This contact makes it more obvious that something is going wrong beyond a lack of economic wealth and opportunity. Troubled children at my school were growing up with the same access to education as I was and with all of the opportunity afforded by living in rich Hertfordshire. This makes it more obvious that the kinds of causes conservative analyses like Iain Duncan Smith's report discuss, family breakdown and the other such issues, are the more numerically important causes of social deprivation.


What it is important to note is that all of these changes are incomplete, most young people are still broadly left wing, and some can be reversed. The rise of the Young Tory is neither complete nor certain. However, there is good reason to hope that the party and movement can continue to gain in support across the age range. Particularly if conservatives can continue to address the social causes of deprivation, give young people plenty of opportunities to get involved and avoid hectoring social conservatism. Also, particularly if the social democrats continue to sound so nostalgic for a fifties golden age which really existed only in their imagination and certainly has no hold on the memory of the young.

Celebrity Madness

Credit where credit is due. This article from CommentisFree is genuinely amusing with this excerpt scarily plausible:

"If George Clooney called a globally televised press conference, then plucked out two of his eyelashes and announced he would donate them free of charge to the first viewer to turn round and murder their entire family, thousands would perish. Read that again. It is a fact."

I don't actually think people are getting more stupid. The past contains the Children's Crusade, massed apocalypse cults and eunuchs all of which I think are probably almost as idiotic as Heat.

The change that has come with rising incomes is a rapid decline in the extent to which working class imaginations spend most of their time and energy focussed upon bread and butter issues which require a certain common sense. Rising leisure time and jobs which are not as physically exhausting free the common man to indulge his inner idiot. Instead of moments of idiocy being a vocation for minorities like eunuchs or parents indulging their children's crusading fervour they can be undertaken by all in their spare time.

Also, I think feminism, socialism and the other liberation movements have induced something of an internal relativism which means that only at the extremes of reality TV can we call someone as stupid as a spade as stupid as a spade. Jordan isn't a smart enterpriser; she's ironically somewhat similar to a eunuch in that she has mutilated herself for pecuniary gain. Little Britain isn't clever and witty; it's an unimaginative caricature of Python. The Harry Potter series are children's books and adults reading them are lazy. Elitism is the instinct that allows us to make these simple but important judgements and the gratuitously anti-elitist movements of the twentieth century are responsible for making us guilty about expressing them.

If my wings should fail me...

It may sound morose but I have a pretty good idea of how I'd like my own funeral to play out. This clip illustrates it pretty perfectly.



Of course, I don't need a sword or the other old English paraphenalia and lighting the boat on fire with flaming arrows may require specialists who are hard to come by but the general idea of being put on a boat which is then lit on fire and floated out to sea is very appealing. The Cornish coast is probably the best for this purpose thanks to its ruggedness.

Before this film came out my old plan was to be burned on a pyre with coins on my eyes as the various heroes are in Troy but the clip above seems far more classy and doesn't leave the issue of ashes.

Unfortunately, it appears that burning people in the open air after they are dead is illegal. Hopefully the Sikhs and Hindus will manage to get this ban removed and make my plan possible. If not perhaps I'll be okay anyway what with my burning not taking place on land.

Finally, a quick review of the film. It is very well directed with an excellent soundtrack and some epic vistas to keep the rather simple story interesting. It is quite different to the old mythical and Wagnerian Tristan and Isolde tales but that works quite well. The major weakness is that the lead spends too much time wearing his sulky face and, therefore, struggles to overcome the challenge of portraying love almost at first sight. I think the population of young British actors may have contained someone more suitable, with a more expressive face in particular.

There's always a bigger fish...

...which deserves an ASBO.

Mr. Eugenides is adding to his sphere of influence. It used to be that he was the 'go-to guy' for Comment is Free bashing. Now he informs us of the Scottish Parliament's increasingly dismal output.

The latest is a ban on live bait for anglers. Now, a ban on angling is, if utterly illiberal and rather philosophically questionable, at least somewhat defensible in terms of preventing animal suffering which is not strictly necessary. However, clearly the act of placing hooks in fishes isn't what is being targetted here. Rather, the problem is setting a fish up to be eaten by another fish. However, in terms of sheer numbers it seems pretty certain that far more fish are made prey independently by carnivorous fish than are made prey by human intervention; this is an entirely natural process.

The usual separation of natural animal carnivores and unnecessary human eating can't really be made here as we are not the ones doing the eating but are merely facilitating a fish eating another. The only "unnatural" event is when the pike is removed from the water following its meal but this is little different to other forms of angling.

Surely the answer, if you have a problem with fish lower down the food chain being eaten by fish further up the food chain is some kind of mass pike detoothing programme?

I want a Yurt

Having one of these would be so cool. I was first exposed to a Yurt when in Siberia near Buryatia. They're a distinctly cosy style of abode and well suited to Khan-like pretention. Sadly I expect they're mostly bought by hippies but I think they'd be ideal for someone looking for an affordable and unique social environment. Run it like a nineteenth century salon; steady drink, food and conversation over the best part of a day.

I'm Back

As should be obvious from the flurry of posts I'm back in the UK and Sinclair's Musings is back in action.

I'll trade you my "British" for a "Russian" and Five Million Dollars

Arnold Kling highlights an absolutely fascinating article over at TCS Daily about the idea of selling citizenship.

Dwight Lee writes,

The suggested policy is straightforward. Simply give Americans the right to sell their citizenships to non-Americans, with the sellers having to leave the country and the buyers allowed to move in with all the rights and opportunities of any other U.S. citizen.

Lee suggests that the very poor would be the ones who sell their citizenship rights. However, this may not be the case. The people who would sell citizenship rights would be people who get the least value for those rights at the margin. This might be someone who is getting ready to marry someone from another country or to retire to another country.

UPDATE: "PGL" recasts Lee's argument in tariff-vs.-quota terms.

Putting price tags on human beings [might] sound objectionable to some, but some economists find the restrictions of the mobility of people even more objectionable.

I'd add a more conservative argument in the idea's favour: New entrants put a higher value on citizenship so it seems plausible this will lead to a more patriotic, loyal populace. As the earning potential attached to a citizenship is determined by shortages of skills this is a market solution to creating a points like system to ensure the immigration of those with needed skills.

Despite all this I'm still deeply troubled by the idea of making citizenship an alienable right. I'm not sure why the idea troubles me though which is what makes it so fascinating.

EU-Serf on Reforming the EU

The Serf has written a reply to the post I wrote a while back defending the EU. Apparently despite the "beguiling" nature of my argument that the EU can be reformed he is unconvinced. I'm not sure his arguments add up:

"Whether we like it or not, the EU’s founders deliberately set up a political project, of which financial and economic issues were just a part of the overall whole. Those working at the heart of the project are driven by this vision. Take it away and the very reason for the EU’s existence ceases to exist. As it is political aspects that most Brits dislike (hence the constant lies from our politicians about it being all about economics) we are faced with an immovable object. Why should the other side ever give up their reason to start the club in the first place?"

The European Union certainly had political objectives at its inception although those objectives will have varied from founder to founder but this is no reason to abandon hope for a reformed union.

Some of those political objectives were quite laudable e.g. the ending of wars between the European powers, the achievement of this was more a result of nuclear weaponry but that is neither here nor there, and there seems no reason why an attachment to a political role for the EU must necessarily be an attachment to a negative role. The EU may need a political raison d'etre but there is little reason this cannot be an essentially liberal one of free movement and trade and standards legislation to make this feasible rather than an attempt to do something like control foreign policy.

"The sight of Conservative MEPs going native is a particularly painful one for Eurosceptic Conservatives. However, with vast amounts of our cash available to buy the loyalties of those involved in the whole project, the prospects for MEPs not going native are poor. As this group is in the best position to keep us informed, this is a serious impediment to reform."

There is the danger in all politics of becoming too attached to the trappings of office to risk change which might endanger your position. However, first note that this is likely to be thanks to idealism, the EU is an MEPs ability to change the world which makes it problematic for them as ambitious people who want to change the world to denigrate it, as material rewards. This attachment will make MEPs resistant to calls to slash and burn the EU but that is simply a reason to make the case for EU reform as a case for hope rather than punitive action of the Better Off Out variety.

"Our new allies to the East are subject to a similar monetary pressure. Using our hard earned cash, the EU is bribing them to stay on side. After all what Polish politician would really wish to put billions of Euros of free cash at risk. The fact that like all free money, this cash is not really that beneficial to the recipient, is not a factor that would sway a politician who has the chance to spend it."

This makes them attached to specific policies such as development aid but these are hardly the worst of the EU (they have largely been written out of the CAP). Those Eastern European states which are currently succeeding through liberal economic policies, such as Estonia, do have a powerful interest in resisting any encroachment on the independence which allows such policies. This is likely to make it significantly easier to oppose the most harmful EU policy proposals such as tax harmonisation as well as more general infringements on the freedoms available to individual nations; Eastern Europeans understand that they are doing well out of their policy differences with France/Germany.

"Whilst allying with Stalin to defeat Hitler was a pragmatic necessity, the aftermath was half a century of tyranny across half of Europe. So whilst we can vote, campaign and generally work together with other sceptics, those found in much of Europe are actually protectionists. Their vision for the EU is in many cases even worse than the current reality. They would in many cases reject our vision for a free trading EU more fiercely than they do the current setup."

This is entirely the wrong way around. The difference between British and continental euro-sceptics highlights the difficulty attempts at further integration will face. Every measure will be too liberal to pass muster with French sceptics and too controlling for the British or Eastern Europeans. It was this conundrum which made buying off the intransigent impossible in the case of the Constitution. The logical conclusion is that integration has become a far more tenuous project with expansion increasing the amount of diversity to be papered over.

"The many people who work for the EU, from the commissioners down (and don’t forget that we have far too many commissioners) need to constantly justify their positions. This involves inevitably the production of more rules and regulations."

Bear in mind that this bias is present in any professional political body but that it produces a bias towards activity rather than necessarily more regulation. Peter Riddell noted this in the book Honest Opportunism when describing the rise of professional politicians in the UK and US. A need to justify a salary requires activity but this can be deregulating activity (as under Thatcher) instead of regulating activity.

"When the French and the Dutch made rude noises at their betters over the EU constitution, we enemies of Brussels got a little thrill at the thought of the juggernaut coming to a halt. The reality has been however that as much as Mr Blair likes to pretend that the treaty is dead, much of it is being introduced piece meal."

This is an overstatement. Most of the material which was in the constitution hasn't been introduced, some integrationists are proposing that it should be but they have yet to get their way, and there isn't a constitution which is, itself, important.

"Viewed from the prism of free market oriented Anglo Saxon philosophy, the EU is little short of ridiculous. Rules have to be made which describe in detail every little thing that we are allowed to buy, every transaction is subject to the permission of our rulers. The metric martyrs were a tragic example of rules overrides common sense."

This is the most misconceived part of the Serf's analysis. After the Second World War the Japanese could not impose tariffs but did stop imports via non-tariff barriers; it was quite conceivable that many industries would respond in the same manner to the end of protectionism within Europe. It is this that European standardisation is designed to prevent. If the EU has sometimes been overly draconian this is a response to how insidious these barriers can often be rather than anything more conspiratorial.

After all Serf's arguments for hopelessness I remain stubbornly wedded to the view, fairly unfashionable among Conservative bloggers, that for all the legitimate criticisms of the EU on policies like the CAP leaving now would be a bad idea.

Christians and Eugenics

A very interesting post from a friend of Alykhan's, Razib over at Gene Expression, about how improbable it is that modern eugenics will not be used if the state does not get involved, some possible effects of eugenics on policy and the effects of a plausible rejection of eugenics by the religious.

"4) A bizarre thought, if homosexuality is predominantly biological, and if we could predict and "correct" (or abort) this likelihood at the fetal stage I have little doubt that the majority of parents would opt to prevent their child being homosexual. That being said, a minority would not, and I am willing to bet that a hard core of "naturalists," generally conservative and motivated by deep religious beliefs, would avoid these screens on principle. Not only do I suspect that Down Syndrome children in the future will be born predominantly to religious and social conservatives, but I suspect that a disproportionate number of homosexuals might!"

The Main Final

In the main UBC Worlds final the motion was something along the lines of "This house believes that economic growth is the solution to environmental problems". This is an absolutely brilliant motion inviting a bold first prop willing to make the Lawson case against curbs on climate change.

Unfortunately the actual first prop didn't quite get the point of the motion and ran creating a carbon trading scheme. In response the opposition proposed a flat rate emissions tax. As these two responses to climate change are too similar to really have a debate over their differences it degenerated into an utter mess.

What a shame. Hopefully people won't worry too much about this motion having been set at Worlds and will use it again as it is an interesting and important topic for debate.

Kudos to whichever member of the adjudication panel thought up the motion as it is an excellent one. Congratulations to the winners and all the finalists but it is such a shame we couldn't end the tournament on a high note in terms of debating quality.

Master Debater

This evening we were awarded the title of winners of the Masters competition of the UBC Worlds University Debating Championships (British Parliamentary debating is done in two person teams). This required winning the two preliminary rounds and then a final where we were defending the motion "This house would introduce a 35 hour maximum working week".

We were the second proposition team and extended by arguing Layard's case that the importance to happiness of relative income creates a significant externality to working longer hours by pressuring others to follow suit. The debate was not as good as it could have been because we were all kept to a five minute time limit (seven is more common for finals) but still the standard was pretty high.

In the Worlds Masters competition it is traditional to name your team after your country of origin. In an attempt to upset the Canadians we chose to debate as Quebec. Ironically, the joke was somewhat undermined by them all finding it vaguely amusing. Still, probably Quebec's first international debate victory.

Quite a few people were recording our final and I'm trying to get a copy so I can prove, to my mother in particular, that all the various trips where I've claimed to be debating have actually been spent doing something productive. If I can track down the video and it isn't too embarassing then I'll post it on YouTube and add it here.

Power and Foreign Legions

The motion for the last preliminary round of this tournament was "This House Would Grant Citizenship in Exchange for Military Service". It is a fine motion which, unfortunately, didn't get quite the examination it deserved in the room I was judging although I've heard it got thought about in more detail in other debates. It came up a little while ago on National Review's Corner but I don't remember anyone saying much interesting on the subject.

Thinking about it before and after the debate it occurred to me that mechanisms to enlist and ensure the loyalty of foreigners have been devised by many of history's great powers. The Romans recruited legions from the provinces. Britain had the collosal Indian Army, including the Gurkhas which are still a part of the army today. France had its foreign legion which was used in numerous imperial deployments. The Persian army was composed almost entirely of troops summoned from its various provinces.

By contrast, while the Americans can rely upon allies, such as Britain, to help them fight certain wars the lack of a formal mechanism implies that this support is always to some extent conditional on the war and that country's domestic politics at the time, witness Vietnam. Also, somewhat paradoxically, an ally is less likely to deploy independently as they can only be asked as friends to contribute to a shared engagement rather than ordered to engage and fix a problem themselves. The independent missions of Britain and Australia recently have generally been peacekeeping actions on a limited scale such as Sierra Leone or regional crises in Australia's sphere. America asks its allies to come to war with it but does not use them as it would its own armies.

This would seem important as it means that any foreign intervention necessitates putting Americans in harms way. As such, American interventions are far more costly to Americans than the mean British intervention was to Britons or Roman intervention to Romans. This combines with greater popular democracy to make foreign wars more politically significant. While the British limited, propertied electorate can't be credibly accussed of not sending their own children to the military they were not the rank and file. This cost would seem to combine with Niall Ferguson's other explanations such as the American anti-imperial national myth to explain just why America's foreign interventions tend to be so limited compared to those of earlier empires.

An informal empire such as America's cannot set up and long control foreign armies in the way Britain did but offering citizenship to buy the loyalty of foreigners would seem to offer another option. One option would be to recruit into standard US Army units but an American Foreign Legion, to provide flexibility and avoid hurting the élan of the main army, might be more appropriate with citizenship after a long period, say ten or more years, so that anyone only interested in serving a minimum military term then entering the US would be unable to do so.

I'm not sure if the US can reconcile itself to such an idea but it might make maintaining Pax Americana significantly more practicable.

Worlds 2007 So Far...

Happy New Year!

Just after midnight the break (those who have got through to the knockout stages) was announced. This is only my second Worlds but from the picture I've built up of old trends this looks like a return to a tradition of a massive English presence in the later stages; particularly Oxbridge, of course, but other schools such as Manchester, Kings, Durham and Middle Temple also made it through. Australia also did as well as they always do.

Last year was a massively strong year for the US, loads of teams and breaking first, and Canada, all the University of Toronto teams breaking and winning the tournament, but this year they had a far more muted result. The Irish got a few teams through but not as many as it appeared they might earlier in the tournament.

Judging at various IVs this year I've often been a little sceptical about the strength of the British circuit: Yale A's success at Oxford seemed to suggest, like Hart House's at Cambridge last year, that British teams were struggling to cut it against international opposition. However, it appears that these concerns were unfounded and last year may, indeed, have been something of a blip.

Colm's analysis supports the suggestions above; a huge number of English teams and a collapse in Canadian and American success.

None of LSE's three teams made it which was dissapointing but LSE A (Travis and Patrick) came pretty close. Also, myself and Ali didn't break as judges but I'm struggling to feel too put out. If I'd been offered, at the start of the tournament, a choice between getting to the Master's final and judging a break round or two I know I'd have chosen speaking in a heartbeat.

I've enjoyed judging Worlds. In particular, I found chairing some of the mid and lower range rooms felt genuinely worthwhile instead of the chore it tends to be in British competitions as international teams often genuinely listen to your advice rather than sitting and fuming at you. The idea of offering my services to LSE as a judge again next year and heading to Thailand is seeming more and more attractive.

"Being Muslim: A Groundwork Guide" by Haroon Siddiqui

I often find that reading or arguing with an opinion I completely disagree with can be as conducive to clear thinking on my own beliefs as reading a persuasive account of my own views. This book was something of a whitewash of Muslim behaviour while overexaggerating the West's influence when he accepted that things do go wrong in the Muslim world. A recurring example of this was the almost total responsibility for Saudi Arabia given to the United States. There are rather too many important mistakes in this book for a comprehensive fisking to be helpful so I'll describe some common misdirections instead. I'll also leave out the discussion of Islam's older history as it takes a long time to analyse and is less important than the parts about the present and recent events.

His style somewhat grates as it is very heavy on rhetorical questions. This tends to be used to cover up for rather tenuous assertions. The first example to hand, he takes the statement which does, indeed, preface some articles my moderate Muslims "I am a Muslim but I am not a fundamentalist Muslim" and follows it with "(Do Christians say "I am a Christian but I am not an evangelical Christian?")". The answer to this question is that, in discussions where they defend the majority Christians as moderates, many do say just that. These rhetorical questions are not designed to be genuinely thought about but to encourage outrage and they are rarely helpful.

He also blows some, rather trivial, Western criticisms of Islam, such as that Mohammed's marriage to an underaged wife was immoral, way out of proportion into a caricature of obsession. If this obsession does exist in the Western media I have not seen it and the only time I have seen the issue of Mohammad's marriage come up is in connection with the discussion about Mohammed following the Danish Cartoons crisis as people try to build a balanced picture of the man being discussed.

His biggest error though was in his assessment of what was going wrong in the Western engagement with European Muslims. His contention was that the main Muslim grievance was Western foreign policy and that the demonstrations over the Satanic Verses and the Danish Cartoon crisis were largely legitimate responses to a serious offence.

His response to the threats and violence over the Satanic Verses and Danish Cartoons was the fatuous line that I've heard before from an associate of Hizb ut Tahrir. He argues that it is legitimate to argue that freedom of speech does have limits. This is correct but he does nothing beyond arguing that they involve a mischaracterisation of Muhammed to argue that either the Satanic Verses or the Danish Cartoons were beyond a sensible limit. A common bar to that limit is the encouragement of violence which neither offence can be construed as doing. His other strategy was to argue that these are exceptional cases but this is also not true as South Park's censorship and the other Dutch cases which sparked Jyllands-Posten to act attest.

Equally, the bigger problem wasn't that the Muslim demonstrators were wrong but that there were far too many Muslims threatening violence in an attempt to get their way in policy. If the extent of free speech is decided not by rational debate and democratic choice then speech is not free and an awful incentive is set up to use this threat more regularly. This is an existential threat to free speech. It is a particular problem for public policy, and distinct from other violations of free speech such as holocaust denial laws, because it cannot be challenged through democratic means which means it can only be confronted through defiance, as Jyllands-Posten attempted, or through draconian security measures.

A similar critique applies to his judgement that much Muslim discontent is due to foreign policy. Disagreeing with foreign policy is fine but a community becomes dangerous when it cannot accept that the decision on foreign policy by the country they live in belongs to its government. Equally, it is unfortunate that the Muslim population takes any attack on someone who is a Muslim as an attack upon themselves. Saddam attacked Muslims as much as Milosevic did so why, the quality of execution of the war aside, is an attempt to remove him, which would prevent him doing this further, any less pro-Muslim than our actions in Kosovo or Bosnia which, he believes were received gratefully?

I also challenge his assertion that all was well before the Iraq war apart from Israel-Palestine. We know that many of the 9/11 bombers were recruited with stories of abuses in Bosnia despite that being a war the US was on the "Muslim" side of; this would not appear to be a response to genuine foreign policy grievances with the West. The vigil post-9/11 in Tehran which he mentions is also far from representative as many in 'Muslim lands' celebrated the attacks.

Finally, we come to the Quranic link to violence which he argues does not exist as the verses often quoted are, when read in context, only supportive of violence if the faith is under attack. The problem is that too many Muslims have a very low bar to seeing things as an attack upon their faith. If a cartoon showing Muhammad in a compromising position or a war against a majority Muslim nation, unfortunate in its leaders, abroad are attacks on a Muslim's faith then the religion clearly does become a deeply violent one.

This leaves the most serious problem with Muslims in the West being that an intense and often misguided sensitivity to attacks on the faith leaves many Muslims vulnerable to an understanding that the Quran's calls to violence are applicable in the West today. This then feeds, in a minority, into a lack of respect for democratic and peaceful process which liberal societies have a very hard time dealing with even if the offending minority is only small in number. In order to defend democratic decision making any liberal society which is not lucky enough to have sufficient voices in the media and politicians willing to risk violence will require draconian security measures which may still fail to provide security despite their strength. Unfortunately, the Muslim attitude which makes such security measures necessary is supported by their implementation as measures like racial profiling are seen as further attacks.

This problem is incredibly serious and unless the Muslim community can get over the siege mentality Siddiqui's book may, I fear, have contributed to in some small measure then Muslims in the West will continue to be associated with a massive threat to democratic stability and there will be more of the policies coming from Western governments, aimed at forcing the pace of integration or ensuring security, which Siddiqui so loathes.

Toronto vs. Vancouver

Yesterday I flew from Toronto to Vancouver for the World Universities Debating Championships. Since then I've become a finalist in the Master's competition (a separate mini-competition for judges); the final is next Tuesday. Till then I'm judging which might leave me a bit more time for blogging.

I enjoyed Toronto. There's a lot to do. However, just like Berlin I was somewhat left wondering what the point of the city was, at least from a visitors point of view. But for having friends there I'm not sure I'd have gone any time soon and I'm not sure what would drag me back. It operates somewhat like a sanitised New York and I am pretty certain guarantees a superb quality of life for its residents, felt very safe and was clean and good looking but had a shortage of what makes a city really interesting; to me at least. It seemed rather too new.

Vancouver is absolutely beautiful. Set against the mountains with a lower skyline than many North American cities but design that seems far more settled. I don't think I have ever seen the Pacific before (my trip to China was only to Beijing and I was in the middle of Russia) but I am told this is what a West Coast city feels like. It has some European character to it which makes it an interesting contrast to New York, Philadelphia, DC or the other East Coast cities. It is probably closest to Boston. We went to an Italian restaurant today which combined North American ease with European quality and distinctiveness. I would recommend it, Savory Coast on Robson Street if anyone should find themselves in the city any time soon.

My only real reservation over Vancouver is that I'm told to expect hippies. This may cause my current good temper to fray.

Basketball

I went to see a basketball game yesterday (the Toronto Raptors beating the Golden State Warriors) and, of all things, was struck by how middle class the whole affair was. The cheering was quiet and subdued. Every time there was a break there was entertainment of some kind (from competitions to the cheerleaders). About half the audience were families. I was actually asked to prove my age to buy a beer (I'm twenty three but look about forty). The game even had a soundtrack; a DJ connected to the soundsystem was somewhere among the crowd.

The comparison with football crowds in the UK, even today, who have swearing, angry chants and maintain a vague sense of tribalistic threat was stark. In football you are constantly reminded that the effeminacy of the stars and occasional delicacy of the game is a veil for a sport whose roots and fan base are still primarily the unvarnished working class. These reminders did not seem to be present at the game I saw yesterday.

I think I enjoy watching football more. We had good seats and the game was high scoring and fluid but, for all the efforts to build things up, there wasn't the overwhelming sense of event which comes with a football match.

I'd like to see how American Football stacks up, unfortunately the Canadian league's season recently ended, to see if it is much different. In particular, I'm told college football is an incredible spectator experience.

Apologies once again for posting so slowly. Come the 5th of January I'll be back in the UK and able to blog regularly again.

Was Allende a sheep in sheep's clothing?

In the comments section to an earlier post Dave has described Allende as essentially similar to Clement Attlee. By way of rebuttal I offer this Time magazine reportage from a year before the coup that a friend pointed me to; things then got a lot worse (there is more after the link):

After almost two years in power —the anniversary will be on Nov. 3 —Allende presides over an increasingly angry country that is sinking ever deeper into economic quicksand. Everything from beef to butter and matches to auto parts is in short supply. Inflation has spiraled 63.5% during the past eight months; in August alone, the inflation rate was 22.7%, and the price of food soared an estimated 60%. The reason: in an effort to buy political support, the government increased the money supply by 115% last year, and is doing the same in 1972. The black-market rate for escudos has now reached 300 to the dollar, more than six times the official rate. Chile's foreign exchange reserves have been used up, and its nationalized copper mines have been cut off from traditional lines of international bank credit. The economy limps along through deficit financing and aid from Communist countries.

Allende blames the U.S. for many of Chile's problems, particularly the drying up of Santiago's credit lines. But most international banks consider Chile a poor risk. To help keep its economy afloat, Chile has deferred payment on its foreign debt of some $2.5 billion, including more than $1 billion to the U.S.

At the same time Chileans have been hit by an inflation of violence. A carabinero (national policeman) was killed in a clash between pro-and anti-Allende forces in Conception in August, and a 17-year-old student died when a tear-gas grenade exploded in his face during a Santiago street brawl last month. As the violence increases, political parties have begun to organize for street warfare. The Communist Party has set up "self-defense committees" throughout Santiago. The Socialists talk of establishing "antifascist brigades." On the other side, a youthful group of extreme rightists called Patria y Libertad talks vaguely of an organization of "shock troops" to combat leftists.

Pinochet did truly awful things but, if we are to choose between bad and worse, between him and Allende Pinochet was clearly the better option. We do, in the developed West, have the luxury of refusing to choose either tyrant but this is not an option that was open to Chile.

Another very interesting point, somewhat related, is made by Alykhan about the developed world functioning as a testing ground for capitalist policies first in Chile (where Reagan and Thatcher followed) and now, perhaps, in Eastern Europe with the flat tax. It makes some sense given these countries have less to lose, more to gain and fewer long entrenched institutions. It also fits with the pattern of the debate over the flat tax here with people citing the Eastern European example so frequently in support of the flat tax.

Leaving LSE

Yesterday I had the presentation ceremony for my Master's and it felt like quite a composed goodbye to an institution I was a part of for four years. The LSE has changed me a lot and broadened my perspective massively. However, I think it now probably is time to move on, to find a new institutional home which can hopefully keep me as engaged as I was at LSE (not always with my studies) while perhaps providing a more professional environment which I have often thrived in.

Two interesting things to note from the ceremony. First, Robert Mundell received an honorary doctorate from the LSE on the grounds of his achievements in economics (a Nobel Prize and more) and his connection to the school (he wrote his thesis at the LSE). During the speech Danny Quah mentioned Mundell's appearances on Letterman. So far this is the only one I can dig up:



Plus this, not video but the same basic idea:

"If you missed last night's Late Show with David Letterman, you missed Robert A. Mundell, 1999 Nobel Prize Winner in Economics, read "Top Ten Ways My Life Has Changed Since Winning The Nobel Prize":

Top Ten Ways My Life Has Changed Since Winning The Nobel Prize

10. Can end almost any argument by asking, "And did you ever win a Nobel Prize?"

9. Whenever I bring it to Applebee's restaurant, I get a free plate of riblets heading my way

8. When I enter a room, I shout, "Nobel Prize winner in the hizzouse!"

7. At most 7-11s, I can get service even if I choose not to wear shoes or a shirt

6. Instead of saying, "Kiss my ass" to guys who cut me off in traffic, I now say, "Kiss my Nobel Prize-winning ass"

5. I've been banned from casinos in seven states

4. When I call K-Rock to request Aerosmith, they play Aerosmith

3. Any meaningless crap I say, the next day it's in the Wall Street Journal

2. Another Friday, another P. Diddy party

1. In Stockholm, I get more tail than Frank Sinatra"

Finally, on a slightly more serious note, my uncle was at the graduation ceremony and wasn't impressed by Howard Davies' plea to screw with league tables:

"Should any market surveyor approach you to ask your salary, please put down the highest figure you can bring yourself to put, he told them. No-one will ever check.

'I thought the LSE was a hotbed for radical socialist thought,' I said to my right-wing nephew after the show. I'd spent all these years fearing he was misplaced.

'What happened?'

'That all went out with the sixties,' he replied.

Before his current job , Howard Davies was head of the Financial Services Agency, the UK's single financial regulator. Previously he was Deputy Governor of the Bank of England after three years as Director General of the Confederation of British Industry. 1987 to 1992 saw him as Controller of the Audit Commission. His whole official role has been one of enforcing financial probity. His rallying call to his graduating students is that no-one will even check, go out and lie on behalf of your School, because the amount you earn is what it's all about. In this week of 8.8 billion pounds of bonuses paid in the city, maybe he's simply jealous - and I suppose that in advocating lying he was at least being honest about his true values - but how sad, pitiful and desperate it all truly is."

I'm afraid Martin has gotten a little overanxious about the particular quote. Davies spent some time earlier describing how little he thought of league tables and, more generally, those who think of education primarily as a contributor to economic welfare rather than the search for truth. The joke was intended to be a snipe at league tables and how easily they can be manipulated.

On the more general theme of the death of radicalism at the LSE I think it is important to note the second half of the "It went out with the 60s" answer, which Martin doesn't quote, which was that the influx of international students killed it. Having over half the students be from outside the UK with far less interest in UK domestic politics and high, international, fees to justify in their post university earning power made a return to the radical protest movement of the sixties impossible.

Note that this means that the LSE has traded radicalism for cosmopolitanism. This is, perhaps, a trade Martin might find rather more noble than exchanging radicalism for City bonuses.

Request for Recommendations

The reason I'm posting so little, as mentioned before, is that I'm getting ready to leave for Canada and am getting my affairs in order before leaving.

To prepare for my trip I went looking for books in the big Piccadilly Waterstone's (my local bookstore in one of the bizarre consequences of living where I do) and couldn't find the books I was looking for (the "American Ceaser" biography of Douglass MacArthur and Fritz Stern's "Einstein's German World). I picked up Jasper Becker's book on North Korea as his work on China is so utterly definitive but could use some more ideas, perhaps a novel or some more political history/thinking (nothing too dry before anyone gets academic on me).

I have four flights of upwards of five hours so will need more to read and none of the books I have in my "waiting to be read" list seem suitable. As I am leaving on Saturday recommendations before then would be greatly appreciated.

The Washington Post on Pinochet

The Washington Post makes the case I was trying to make on Pinochet with admirable clarity. Both the horror of his regime and its achievements are properly accounted for and the comparison with Castro is an important one.

By way of contrast, Fidel Castro -- Mr. Pinochet's nemesis and a hero to many in Latin America and beyond -- will leave behind an economically ruined and freedomless country with his approaching death. Mr. Castro also killed and exiled thousands. But even when it became obvious that his communist economic system had impoverished his country, he refused to abandon that system: He spent the last years of his rule reversing a partial liberalization. To the end he also imprisoned or persecuted anyone who suggested Cubans could benefit from freedom of speech or the right to vote.

On Pinochet

By far the best and most balanced obituary of Pinochet was in the Telegraph.

I think that Pinochet is interesting because he is a rare right wing example of a phenomenon the left faces quite rarely; a man putting foward very satisfying politics via the mechanism of killing many of his own people by extra legal means. While right wing leaders have backed tyrants in foreign countries they rarely see them as much more than least bad options in the face of other tyrants who combine their tyranny with some infringement of our own national interests.

By comparison, Pinochet certainly left a great many good things behind him. A free market economy which delivered the most successful development in Latin America, a democratic country as he was one of the few to give up power peacefully following a narrow defeat in a plebiscite and his foreign policy which was of great importance to the United Kingdom's interests in particular. Under Allende the country was an utter mess and had little prospect of the improvement which it saw under Pinochet.

Equally, many of those he killed almost certainly did have little respect for Chilean democracy themselves and were, in the sense he described it, at war with him. However, he did kill them and there were, certainly, many killed merely guilty of speaking the truth about the ugliness of his regime. Also, although this is less serious, he did fall prey to the corrupting influence of such great power.

This brings questions of utilitarianism versus liberalism into focus. The greatest happiness of the greatest number was certainly well served by Pinochet yet for this to happen some people did have to suffer and die and democracy was delayed. Ironically, although they won't admit it and will cling to some foolish pretence that Pinochet didn't make the lives of most Chileans far better, this is far more of a problem for the left who are rather more attached to utilitarianism. As for the right the answer should be simple: if faced between the choice of him or a left wing tyrant he would have been the better choice, he was an evil man who did truly evil things but he left Chile in a better condition than it was when he first ascended to power. There seems no need to simplify beyond this.