Richard Blake Signing

by Sean Gabb

I am  able to reveal that the critically-acclaimed and internationally best-selling novellist Richard Blake will be at Heffer’s in Cambridge on the 15th July, to sign copies of his miraculously glorious novel “Blood of Alexandria”, and to discuss his own genius and supreme goodness of mind. No cameras will be permitted….

Gerald Warner on Good Form re the Coalition of the Anointed

Coalition’s doing awfully well, don’t you think? It began as an exciting opportunity for two political parties, instead of just one, to share the spoils of office. Now, at the present rate of turnover, every Tory and Liberal Democrat backbencher should get a shot at ministerial office by the time the five years of power the coalition is gerrymandering for itself has elapsed. Just 18 days into the New Politics, David Laws, the Chief Secretary to the Treasury, resigned for reasons that, to the untutored eye, look very similar to the old politics.

In his reply to Laws’ letter of resignation, David Cameron told him: “You are a good and honourable man.” That is good to know. So, why is he leaving the Government?

The little local difficulty was that Laws, over an eight-year period, had claimed more than £40,000 in expenses, against the parliamentary rules. It seems that further expenses remain to be scrutinised. According to The Daily Telegraph: “He also regularly claimed up to £150 a month for utilities and £200 a month for service and maintenance until parliamentary authorities began demanding receipts. Claims then dropped to only £37 a month for utility bills and £74 a month for his share of the council tax. Claims for service, maintenance and repairs dropped dramatically to less than £25 a month.”

It is fortunate that we are dealing here with a good and honourable man, otherwise some people might put an uncharitable construction on those facts. Cameron went on to say in his reply to Laws: “I am sure that, throughout, you have been motivated by wanting to protect your privacy rather than anything else.” Reading that and the similar drivel that has cascaded out of the establishment over the past 24 hours, one would think that Laws was under some compelling duress to take £40,000 of taxpayers’ money in order to protect his privacy. On the contrary, his privacy was only invaded because he had taken public money.

Once an individual claims any kind of state subsidy, his privacy is forfeit: the humblest benefits recipient could confirm that. The one certain way to have preserved his privacy was for Laws to have claimed no money – as he could easily have afforded to do. Laws is a multi-millionaire as a result of his previous career in banking: he was a vice-president of J P Morgan and then the managing director of Barclays de Zoete Wedd, before he was 30. That an MP with that kind of personal wealth elected to take more than £40,000 from the taxpayer says it all about politicians’ sense of entitlement.

It was that sense of entitlement that brought him down. His private life was revealed by Laws himself, in a transparent attempt to claim victimhood. To some degree that ploy succeeded, as the Dianafication of the former Chief Secretary among his colleagues and some elements of the media over the past 24 hours testifies. Cameron’s letter also said: “Your decision to resign from the Government demonstrates the importance you attach to your integrity.” It is good to have that on record, Dave, otherwise we might have imagined it had something to do with greed, media exposure and public anger.

Among the political nomenklatura much emphasis is being put on the likelihood that Laws will return to government. That is an expression of the resentment felt by the Entitled Ones that the public’s unreasonable touchiness about the disposal of taxpayers’ money has momentarily compelled them to abandon one of their own; but if the mug punters of the electorate think they have the final say they will be taught the error of their ways. The significance of the Laws affair is it signals that the sleaze which dominated the last parliament has leaped the fire-break of the general election to infect the New Politics. Anybody who ever imagined it would be otherwise is cerebrally challenged.

Another symptom of business as usual last week was HM Revenue and Customs blocking the peerage Cameron intended to bestow on Sir Anthony Bamford, a prominent Conservative Party donor. A minority of the public has succumbed to Stockholm Syndrome towards the political parasite class, masochistically decrying the exposure of Laws and giving him the “Parnell, my dead king!” treatment. The majority, however, has already shrugged off the momentary euphoria of the New Politics, assessed the situation and rightly concluded of its political masters: “They’re at it again.”

Less than a week ago I wrote that the Cameron project “has the smell of political death about it” – at a time when coalition scepticism ranked close to “climate denial” in establishment obloquy. The coalition is already unravelling, subverted by its own internal contradictions. Vince Cable has been passed over for Treasury office – the only role he deems worthy of his talents – twice in one month: the core of the Lib Dem reactor is close to meltdown. Dave is a loser: he lost the election, he lost the fight he picked with the 1922 Committee and now he has lost David Laws. This Government will end in epic disaster.

David Laws and His Sexuality

David Webb

I feel obliged to give me view on this. As the person who was more interested in cuts, Laws is a loss to the coalition – and let’s be frank, Laws was a more serious Treasury minister than Osborne, and arguably a more serious politician than Cameron too. Of course all ministers have to meet the law with regard to expenses, and I don’t believe Laws’ protestations that even his close family don’t know his sexual proclivities.

I think he was trying to claim victim status to cover up his booboo on expenses. But on the specific issue of whether a “gay partner” is a spouse – no, a gay partner is not a spouse. Sleeping with your same-sex landlord does not make that landlord a spouse. I suppose Laws is hoist with his own petard – he has never spoken against all this gay-friendly legislation. But let’s be clear: marriage is marriage, and nothing that is not marriage is marriage. If he had opposed attempts to define gay partners as spouses, I would accept Laws was in the right on this issue, but he didn’t.

I do feel sorry for him on the privacy issue though. We are moving increasingly towards a state where everyone’s sexual proclivities will be listed in a government database. How can you monitor homophobia if you don’t know who is and is not attracted to the same sex? There was that old folks’ home in the south where the residents were required to state their sexual inclinations. We must resist this. People ought to have the right to privacy – and Laws was right on this one point – and so a relationship that falls short of marriage is simply not something that should be required to be reported to the authorities for any purpose.

In many cases, individual people don’t know the full boundaries of their own sexuality and so could not give an honest answer to the question anyway. I disagree with a sexualised society where all this information is constantly in the public domain. Why not require decorum from everyone? And in fact Laws did conduct himself with decorum – in contradistinction to the vast majority of “gay” men in the public eye.

Review – The Terror of Constantinople by Richard Blake

 

Blake, Richard – ‘The Terror of Constantinople’
Paperback: 432 pages (Jan. 2010) Publisher: Hodder Paperbacks ISBN: 034095115X

The best type of books are those that lift you out of your surroundings and immerse you completely in the action, sounds and atmosphere of another time and place. Blake does just this with THE TERROR OF CONSTANTINOPLE and it was a real shame to finish the final page, as Constantinople was a fascinating place to visit, albeit just in my head. It is so very obvious that Blake, a historian, knows a great deal about the Roman Empire and goings-on at that time. The details in this book are so life-like that they carry you away on a tide of ancient history….and blood.

Aelric, a young and ambitious English man, is sent, by the Roman authorities, to Constantinople, in order to seek out and copy religious texts in their various libraries and solve some of the doctrinal controversies of the new Christian faith. Aelric is smart and streetwise but none too happy at the prospect of leaving his lady and unborn child alone for who knows how long. However, he has no choice in the matter and soon finds out that there are other, more sinister, reasons for his trip. He becomes embroiled in solving a murder and, indeed, has more than one attempt on his own life. He is taken captive, but escapes, is put in impossible situations by the emperor, Phocas, and has to rely on his wits and charm to save not only his own life, but those of his slaves and close companions.

Aelric is an extremely likeable character. He is a delightful mixture of energy, cheekiness, intelligence and, even, vulnerability – although he wouldn’t be at all happy for being described in this way. He longs to just go home and be with Greta, his lady, and wants to be present at the birth of his child. He shows real compassion regarding his slaves and not only treats them well but frees more than one of them in gratitude for their service to him. The book is written in terms of being his memoirs, as he sits in a monastery in England in his old age and reflects fondly on the memories of his somewhat reckless youth.

THE TERROR OF CONSTANTINOPLE is a very absorbing and interesting read. It is extremely well written but at the same time isn’t a particularly challenging book to read – just perfect for reading in bed or on the bus.

Amanda C M Gillies, Scotland
January 2010

Review – The Terror of Constantinople by Richard Blake

Heres mine

Michale Winning

Another Test of Libertarian Credentials

Sean Gabb

This one is from the Center for a Stateless Society – http://c4ss.org/quiz

Here, for what it may be worth, is how I score:

Meetings of the Other Libertarian Alliance

We meet on the second Monday of the month at 7pm at The Institute of Education, just off Russell Square – student bar, Room S16, Thornhaugh Street, London, WC1B 5EA.

On Monday, 14 June Christian Michel will talk on “Our Northwest Passage, How to go from here to a free society”

On Monday, 12 July Jock Coates will speak on “Mutualism”.

On Monday, 9 August Derrick Silver will speak on Global Warming.

On Monday, 13 September Tim Evans will speak on ‘Thoughts on the UK’s Libertarian Movement’

On Monday, 11th October, Detlev Schlichter will speak on “Paper Money Collapse – The Folly of Elastic Money and the Coming Monetary Breakdown”.

Detlev is a long-standing libertarian who has worked for almost 20 years in the financial industry as a trader and portfolio manager. He has recently completed work on a book of Austrian Economics aimed at an audience in the City and the world of finance.”

On Monday, 8 November Anthony J. Evans will present “A Proposal for Sound Money”

All are welcome, admission free. So do come along.
DAVID McDONAGH

Backlash Press Release: Tiger Porn defendant miscarriage of justice averted

 

By Nick | Published: May 28, 2010

BACKLASH PRESS RELEASE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE – 28 May 2010

“Tiger Porn defendant miscarriage of justice averted”

The sexual civil liberties organisation Backlash have assisted in
averting a miscarriage of justice.

Andrew Holland was charged with one count of possessing extreme
pornography under the Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008 at the
Mold Crown Court. He stood to be sentenced for the offence, having
pleaded guilty mid trial under advice from his local legal team in
Wrexham. Backlash contacted Holland to offer advice to discover that
he may have been misadvised by his local legal team; and that he did
in fact have a defence to the charge. Backlash provided funds for
provisional legal advice and research to be performed. We put Holland
in contact with our legal adviser, who is a solicitor specialising in
extreme pornography offences, Myles Jackman of Audu and Co in King’s
Cross, London.

Holland transferred representation to the specialist solicitors and
was given leave on Friday the 28th May 2010 by His Honour Judge Rogers
sitting at the Mold Crown Court to vacate his plea from Guilty back to
Not Guilty. That means that he will stand trial again; this time in
the knowledge that he has a defence. However, had he not contacted
Backlash in the first place he would have been sentenced for an
offence which he may have been misadvised that he did not have a
defence for.

Holland’s case gained notoriety as he had previously been charged with
a second, separate extreme pornography charge relating to a video clip
purportedly depicting a sexual act between a human and a tiger. This
charge was withdrawn when it was discovered that the prosecutor had
failed to listen to the video’s soundtrack, whererin one of the
“actors” made a comment about Tony the Tiger from the Frosties
commercials, proving the video was an elaborate joke and the tiger was
not real; leaving the prosecution deeply embarrassed.

Myles Jackman commented that: “it is ridiculous and dangerous that the
CPS are trying to criminalise the posession of dirty jokes”.

Please email for contact requests: info@backlash-uk.org.uk

Notes for Editors

1. Previous coverage of Mr Holland’s case can be found at

The Daily Telegraph:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/6918001/Man-cleared-of-porn-
charge-after-tiger-sex-image-found-to-be-joke.html

And The Register: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/01/06/tiger_police/

www.theregister.co.uk/2010/03/22/six_second_clip/

2. Backlash is an umbrella organisation providing academic, legal and
campaigning resources defending freedom of sexual expression. We
support the rights of adults to participate in all consensual sexual
activities and to watch, read and create any fictional interpretation
of such in any media.

www.backlash-uk.org.uk

3. Section 63 of the Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008 bans the
possession of various ‘extreme images’ which can include faked images
and depictions of
adults engaging in consensual sexual activities. For details of the law
see:

www.backlash-uk.org.uk/wp/?page_id=7

Backlash Press Release: Tiger Porn defendant miscarriage of justice averted

You intellectual blokes might like this

Michael Winning

Interesting review of a new book about Ayn Rand, on Tribune.

Reasons to smoke, revisited

David Davis

Rather more than two years ago, I suggested on here, at this place, some reasons why you might choose to smoke.

Things have moved on, the GramscoFabiaNazis have moved forwards and we that defend liberty and sovereign individualism are retreating still. This is sad but we did predict it.

However,  Over at this blog (which has some excellent photos on it every day) is one of an embattled smoker, in London. The comment thread is interesting as it reveals the emotions of some “antis” towards other fellow human beings. WE here did warn you all, time and time again, about the ineffable evil-ness, and astonishingly detached inhumanity, of “anti-smokers”, which are droids that we have always said that we would conflate with sub-humans, for they do not register human emotions or responses to individual behaviour. Hitler, for example, was a vegetarian anti-smoker. I am sure that Pol Pot and Mao-tse-Tung did not smoke either.

Found commented, at Legiron’s place. Read him, GramscoFabiaNazis, to find out about the seething undercurrent of hatred towards you, that by your repression and by your surveillance-state, and by your control-philosophy, you are stoking – as a fire, for yourselves.

When you will have “won” in your eyes, and there is nothing, for anyone, amywhere, then we shall simply have to come for you, and kill you and eat you.

Kevin MacDonald: Libertarianism under intellectual scrutiny — and a call for papers « The Occidental Observer Blog

 

So the intellectual and moral issues remain.  I have recently become editor of the Occidental Quarterly. (Formal announcement and plea for subscriptions TOQ later, but you can subscribe now, if you want.) Greg Johnson, the previous editor, initiated a contest for the best essay on “Libertarianism and Racial Nationalism.” (The deadline is June 1, but it will be extended to July 1. $1000 to the winner!) Great topic.

Kevin MacDonald: Libertarianism under intellectual scrutiny — and a call for papers « The Occidental Observer Blog

Review of an Old Brian Micklethwait Podcast

David Robert Gibson

http://brianmicklethwait.signal100.com/podcast/2007-10-06-brian-and-antoine-22.mp3

I have downloaded the mp3 then listened to it twice. Initially, I thought how civilised it was, and I liked their approval of Sean’s individualistic approach to libertarianism, and of his recent writing about Epicurus – a worthy subject and one of the greatest philosophers. However, I became a tad *alarmed* – Brian and Antoine gave me the impression of
belonging to the cigar and brandy chattering class school of politics. They disagreed with Sean’s notion of the ruling class, what I call The Regime, looking upon our rulers as mere unco-ordinated incompetents floundering around for a way to compensate for the failure of the Communist economic ideals of their youth, to replace them with the social equivalent. They are probably in part correct, but this world is not a university debating society – out in the real world people get hurt, and even those who don’t directly are, I think like me, developing a growing sense of anomie. Our culture is no longer our own, but rather a plaything for the increasingly interventionist Regime to inflict whatever fashionable Leftist, and lucrative, scheme they choose, and the imported multi-culturalism, which Brian and Antoine appear to welcome, is a *central* part of that deconstruction. The Enemy Class, as Sean rightly calls them, are not a
bunch of Hippies, they have vast power and wealth – our power and wealth – and they are *co-ordinated* in their plan to re-engineer this country. They steal from us to fund it, and they will imprison and kill us if we resist. We should not regard them complacently!

My hatred of modernist culture is not mere idealism but, rather, visceral, and I would love to see a return of much, not all, of traditional English life. That is why I find Sean’s conservative libertarianism both refreshing and comforting. He and I may not agree on everything, but we are not mesmerised by the fashionable notion that if something is new or foreign it must be better. No! – the way culture is, it is almost certainly worse. Freedom, especially responsible freedom, isn’t something invented in the 1960′s in the LSE, the Sorbonne or a Hippy commune. It existed in the minds
of Indian and Chinese mystics and in those of Greek philosophers thousands of years ago. It grew in England during the Protestant Reformation and with the ideas of the Renaissance, given the opportunity to grow during the relatively enlightened reign of Elizabeth I. Its foundations were cemented by the integrity of Pym, Hampden and Cromwell and the victory of Parliament in the English Civil War. Newton, Locke, Hume and Smith (to be fair, these two were Scots, but admirers of English culture), the Mills, Wilberforce and their like helped to develop it, together with the peaceful relinquishing of some power by the aristocracy to the people. All these are English and British achievements. They all began to be undermined by government intervention during The Great War and World War II, which was continued
after 1945, particularly by Socialist governments, little restrained by the Tories, and accelerated by the current one from 1997 – our actions and even our utterances are legally constrained as never before. Consequently, I think a ‘return to the past’ would be a good thing, and I too am nostalgic for it. It would be a vastly sounder foundation for developing liberty rather than the current creeping totalitarianism. Libertarianism focuses upon people, rather than countries, but it is more possible in some countries, and cultures, than others.

I am very pleased that your media contacts despise ‘The Enemy Class’. I have long argued that beating about the bush when criticising, and when possible actively undermining, The Regime only allows them to claim their fraudulent ‘high moral ground’. The Tories have for example, with few notable exceptions, been compromising for decades, to such agree that they are now almost indistinguishable from the Socialists; effectively they are their allies.

New LA Publications

Sean Gabb Actually, rather old ones, but made available on-line for the first time.

35. Alex Stanway, Privatising Foreign Policy, 2000, 2pp.
ISBN: 1 85637 480 7
(html) – (pdf)

34. Roderick Moore, Foreign Policy in the Post-Communist World: The case for Selective Intervention, 2000, 4pp.
ISBN: 1 85637 479 3
(html) – (pdf)

33. David Botsford, Misunderstanding Europe: A Reply to Mark Littlewood, 2000, 4pp.
ISBN: 1 85637 474 2
(html) – (pdf)

32. Mark Littlewood, Why Libertarians Should Stop Worrying and Learn to Love the European Union, 1999, 4pp.
ISBN: 1 85637 467 X
(html) – (pdf)

31. Nigel Meek, Libertarianism and War: A Personal War, 1999, 4pp.
ISBN: 1 85637 p:`6 450 5
(html) – (pdf)

30. David Botsford, Liberty and Language: Further Reflections on Why Britain Must Leave the European Union, 1997, 4pp.
ISBN: 1 85637 381 9
(html) – (pdf)

29. Dr. Nigel Ashford, Open Borders: The Morality of Free Trade, 1997, 4pp.
ISBN: 1 85637 360 6
(html) – (pdf)

I often wonder about North Korea

Michael winning

My colleague David Davis thinks Kim Jong=Il is dead and has been for some years. Perhaps so, perhpas not. There’ll be no shortage of starving sods wanting the job of body-double anyway.

Now it says over at Samizdata that things could be getting rocky over the “torpedoed” S Korean corvette. But secretary-of-state Clinton does n’t seem to get it.

Time’s overdue for people with a more libertarian turn of mind to get involved in foreign affairs theory more. It ought to be an indignity, that state like North korea are still allowed to get away with what they do to their people.

David Robert Gibson on Consumerism

David Robert Gibson

I will try to reply to most, or hopefully all of your points under these
headings (as Kevin rightly wrote, I have also written much on this in the
LAF over recent years):

What do I mean by Consumerism?

In this context, I mean a dictionary definition of “Attachment to
materialistic values” – colloquially ‘keeping up with the Joneses’, the
attitude embodied by the Harry Enfield character who proclaimed ‘loads of
money’, by the ‘Yuppies’ with their Champagne and Porsches, and by the “Wall
Street” Gordon Gekko character who said “….Greed is Good”. The cache
attached to acquiring as many materials goods as one can afford (or more
commonly what the mortgage and credit card companies will allow). The cache
attached to owning goods made by Gucci, Chanel, Nike, etc.

Consumerism and Character:

Consumerism is demeaning – its vanguard is advertising, most of which is
trivial, superficial, garish and misleading, altogether tasteless. Its main
body involves travelling through congested roads, parking in narrow spaces,
walking through industrialised aisles picking up goods with a dearth of
discrimination, queuing, then the reverse back home. Its back-end involves
reading bills, paying them, borrowing money, working more than one needs to,
and giving large gratuities to the tax man. IMO in each of these cases,
people would be better off spiritually and psychologically doing other
things – looking at a pleasant country scene and fine art, listening to
Mozart and Beethoven, indulging in some sensual pleasure, watching a good
film (preferably downloaded or purchased from a charity shop so one avoids
tax), prayer, meditation, reading a charming or enlightening book,
exchanging emails with libertarians, etc. We have only so much time in this
life!

Consumerism and Government:

Consumerism increases the wealth and power of government – most goods are
subject to tax, national and local, indirect and direct, and most people
most of the time cannot evade that tax. Governments, again national and
local, derive their major source of power from their income via tax. If you
agree with me that their activities are mostly malign, that malignancy must
be funded so they can employ staff to execute their plans with buildings and
equipment funded also by tax

I am strongly in favour of private enterprise, sellers making a fair return,
buying useful and pleasurable goods discriminatingly, but that is not
consumerism.”]

David Robert Gibson

…but some are more equal than others…

I am a “FAR RIGHT social libertarian”!

David Davis

Sean is a Right Social Libertarian!

My Political Views
I am a right social libertarian
Right: 6.47, Libertarian: 7.39

Political Spectrum Quiz

Richard Blake has updated his Website

http://www.richardblake.org.uk/index.htm

My friend Richard Blake has just updated his website. This contains many links to some most flattering reviews of his novels. Bear in mind that he is not just the acclaimed, best-selling author of “Blood of Alexandria”, which has not even been published yet. There is so much more that you can all buy!

I see that Gold is quite rocky, today…

David Davis

One of my pet achievements is to have been able to paste “widgets” such as the excellent Kitco charts that you see beside you on this sidebar. Not being a tech-guy, and not knowing even the square-root-of-effing-all about something called “HTML”, or even “cascading style sheets” (search me, guv!) I gave myself a pat on the back for these being on here at all.

It is an interesting and fun exercise to watch them, even down to the hour, as they react to what the loliticians on the MSM are saying and doing. Gold seems especially rocky today, I am not sure why, but it has not really tested the heights of the last week or fortnight or so. I wonder why it’s so jumpy, and yet not stratospheric? Can anyone enlighten us?

Well what an absolute surprise

Michael Winning

So we are to be told, now, to “put books in the home”… I wonder what we are to be told that the books ought to be about, then? Is not that the crux or nub? Bettre watch out you book-people, for your books may not measure up, all 20 of them.

If they are not about David Beckham or Cerril Coal and called “my life”, then they perhaps arent allowed. And what if you have more than 20? Are you a dangerous conservative?

You’d be forgiven for thinking the State knew all along about how to educate. Thats what they have always said anyway, is it not?