Pharyngula

Posted by: druidbros | June 16, 2009 10:04 AM

Well, I say we drag the court dates out for a year or two and the problem will all go away....OR... we can petition the Shady Acres rest home to start including more fiber in their meals.

Posted by: Heather | June 16, 2009 10:07 AM

Fear and ignorance always seem to go hand in hand. Why aren't these people fearful of what will happen if they keep their kids ignorant about sexuality and reproduction?

I work with HS students. They're interested in sex, and they often experiment. It would be really nice to teach them how to avoid the bad things while not giving them a blanket statement that sex is bad. As a parent, while I don't want my kids to be sexually active RIGHT NOW (well, they're only 10 and 4, so I'm not too worried yet) I do know that they will be active sometime in the future. I would want them to have some information other than the rumors and ideas picked up from their buddies and the TV.

I've seen what happens when kids are kept ignorant. My husband teaches middle school and he had a student who was already a father at age 12. Maybe a nice book with pictures would have helped to avoid that situation, maybe not. I don't think it could have hurt, though.

Posted by: Karl Broman | June 16, 2009 10:12 AM

You shouldn't be hard on Wisconsin generally, just because of West Bend.

Posted by: stogoe | June 16, 2009 10:15 AM

I'm trying very hard to not lump all old people in the same box as these hateful, wrinkled loons. But they're not making it easy, dammit!

Posted by: Virgil | June 16, 2009 10:16 AM

That blog is teh funneh! Their tagline is "A Place Where Wisconsinites Can Come Out to Play". Maybe there's a repressed Wisconsonite behind the whole thing, just waiting to "come out"

The "open letter to Obama" on the front page is a joke! The writer has no idea how he got so rich and can afford such a big house, without any visible means of support. WTF? The guy was a frickin' lawyer! You know, laywers, the ones that earn lots of money and then go on to become politicians? Clearly this person lives on the moon.

Posted by: Janine, OMnivore | June 16, 2009 10:17 AM

"The word 'faggot' is very derogatory and slanderous to all males," the suit continues. "Using the word 'Nigger' is dangerously offensive, disrespectful to all people. These words can permeate violence." The suit also claims that the book "constitutes a hate crime, and that it degrades the community".

is a book about a teen male who thinks he might be gay and is beaten up by a gang of homophobic teens. Sounds like it is trying to deal with the reality of figuring out who one is while under duress. And these jokers are trying to blame violence on the use of a word?

Sorry CCLU but the violence is to be blamed on your clients and on people younger then your clients who feel the need to go after LGBT people instead of threatening violence against books.

Where books are burned, people are soon to be next. Thank you, clients of the CCLU and the CCLU. The only good thing is this, this society is not yet in a position to decend to this act of barbarism.

Posted by: SciencePundit | June 16, 2009 10:19 AM

Do they never learn? (that was rhetorical) Every time they pull this shit and try to get a book banned (or burned in this case), all they do is shine the spotlight on the book and give it--for free--the kind of publicity that the author and publisher can only dream of. This amuses me to no end.

Posted by: dNorrisM | June 16, 2009 10:22 AM

I wonder if they have deeper pockets than the ACLU?

Posted by: Eric Houg | June 16, 2009 10:23 AM

OOOOH, I LOVE banned books. They are almost always the best reads. And, the fact that I am pissing of some pompous, pious fraud makes it even that much sweeter. TO AMAZON.COM>>>

Posted by: Matlock Bolton | June 16, 2009 10:24 AM

Well Geeze PZ, didn't you know all sex education outside of the amazingly useful abstinence programs is reserved for marriage. It's to be reserved for two of God's finest to discover themselves. If they can't happen to figure it out on their own then Satan probably made the woman infertile or she sinned some how when she was younger (It couldn't possibly be the mans fault after all, we all know that woman or the bearers of sexual sin).
How dare a book define how sexual behaviour is declared, books explaining how sex works and promoting bad behaviour should be banned. All we need is the Bible.

Now excuse me satire or not I have to go wash my mouth.

Posted by: littlejohn | June 16, 2009 10:31 AM

Remember the stoy about (naturally) Sarah Palin? She asked the Wasilla librarian (kind of like being the triangle player for K.C. and the Sunshine Band, I imagine*) if the book, "Pastor, I'm Gay" could be removed?
The librarian, bless her, said no.
But the book then mysteriously disappeared and has not been replaced.
I predict a similar outcome in Wisconsin.

*Joke shamelessly stolen from right-wing tool Dennis Miller, who was referring to Vanna White's workload on Wheel of Fortune.

Posted by: Jonathan | June 16, 2009 10:33 AM

In the last link PZ posted to their site (books about female sexuality) they actually put black censor bars over the genitals of crudely drawn stick figures in various sex positions.

How uptight do you have to be to censor stick figure sex?

Posted by: DaveL | June 16, 2009 10:37 AM

I think public libraries should have a special shelf clearly marked "Books They Don't Want You To Read" where they put every book someone has specifically tried to ban at that library.

You know, just so the kiddies know to stay away.

Posted by: Mike in Ontario, NY | June 16, 2009 10:41 AM

Dear Christian Civil Liberty Union,

You owe me a new irony meter. I'll be sending you a repair bill from fixing up the smoldering crater in my office where the old meter was when I visited your website.

Might as well send me a new camera while you're at it. And some bacon.

Posted by: damnedyankee | June 16, 2009 10:44 AM

Without even looking at their site (it's a bit early in the day for me to take a megadose of stupid), I'm going to guess that comments aren't enabled.

Posted by: raven | June 16, 2009 10:49 AM

That has just inflamed them, though, and now the puritans are suing for the right to burn books.

The old xian wackos aren't very smart. There is absolutely nothing stopping them from burning books. They can burn all the books they legally buy and own. Subject to fire season outdoor burning rules in drier parts of the USA.

I'm always amused when xians burn books. Nothing demonstrates their mental and moral bankruptcy better except the terrorism.

They don't do it enough. Last book burnings were Harry Potter books. Bunch of slackers these days.

Posted by: Eric Houg | June 16, 2009 10:51 AM

This bit is hilarious:"Excessive use of profanity and vulgarity.
Swirlie, A**holes, F**king, Hell, A**hole, smear the queer, cut and hunky, blow queen, knocked up, J****, b***hy dyke, bulls**t, bulls**t, Jesus, S**t, “I swear to G**, took a dump, blow job, F**k, f**ked-up, J****, F**king, G**, f**king freak, Faggot, G**, Faggot, Bulls**t, G**, F**k, F**k you, F**k you, f**king bastard, Pr**k, Hell, Pu**y, J****, Pu**y, A**hole, G**, Hell "

What is J**** and G**? Also, why is "cut and hunky" considered profanity and/or vulgarity? Also, Knocked up? Seriously?

Posted by: Watchm,an | June 16, 2009 10:55 AM

MfO:

Might as well send me a new camera while you're at it.

LOLKWOKZ!

LC: Must we deploy the implied death-wish device against our foes?

I'm always amused when xians burn books. Nothing demonstrates their mental and moral bankruptcy better except the terrorism.

Indeed. Nothing evokes or supports the concept of "civil rights" more than a good old-fashioned book-burning!

Posted by: Epikt | June 16, 2009 10:58 AM

stogoe:

...these hateful, wrinkled loons.

They're simply objecting to others doing the things they were too timid to do when they still could.

Posted by: PMC | June 16, 2009 11:02 AM

I don't really know what to say. It would certainly be a bad thing to ban those books, but I think it could be more appropriate to place them in a "parental approval" section or something.

Posted by: Matt Penfold | June 16, 2009 11:04 AM

I don't really know what to say. It would certainly be a bad thing to ban those books, but I think it could be more appropriate to place them in a "parental approval" section or something.

Thus negating the whole purpose of having such books in a public library. Clever idea.

Posted by: Brunsell | June 16, 2009 11:11 AM

It doesn't surprise me that a Minnesotan would make such a lame attempt to disparage Wisconsin. You of the "10,000" lakes. WI has more than that!

If you bothered to read the comments on the "WISSUP" blog, you would have realized that Wisconsonites have come out to play...and repeatedly ridicule The West Bend Citizen Activist (Ginny).

I took a look at her profile. She has a nice image of people saying the pledge -- "Under God - Remember, if you don't believe in God you are not a real American." I wonder if she realizes that the Pledge of Allegiance was originally written by Francis Bellamy (an active socialist) and "Under God" was not added until 1954...

Anyway, thanks for the post. I got a big laugh out of her blog. After taking a look at her "Live Traffic Feed," I think a lot of commentors are going to come out to play - at her expense.

Posted by: Attila | June 16, 2009 11:13 AM

I am thinking can we just get the list of all the men in the CCLU. And send then so good sex guides and Viagra. That should stop them.

Posted by: Walton | June 16, 2009 11:20 AM

I hate to say it, but I can actually see the fundies' point in this case. Notwithstanding the fact that their "morality" is bankrupt and stupid, the fact is that many of these fundies pay taxes, and consequently are being coercively forced to pay for the upkeep of the libraries in question - meaning that they have every right to object to their money being spent on books which they find morally offensive.

The real problem here is perhaps with the concept of tax-funded public libraries.

Posted by: Chris | June 16, 2009 11:20 AM

I have a compromise solution:

Keep the books. Those that are offended by them may don tin foil hats and breast plates. You know, to deflect the "damaging gay-rays."

Posted by: Estonian Pumpernickel | June 16, 2009 11:23 AM

"Imagine some tired old codger, exhausted after a lifetime of aggressive heterosexuality, sitting in his easy chair before the TV, and suddenly he starts feeling frisky at the sight of Matlock reruns..."

i lol'd

Posted by: Bill Dauphin, OM | June 16, 2009 11:23 AM

I think public libraries should have a special shelf clearly marked "Books They Don't Want You To Read" where they put every book someone has specifically tried to ban at that library.

The best way to defeat book banning is to read banned books, and encourage everyone else to do so as well.

One of my favorite coffee mugs is one I bought at the Mark Twain House gift shop that says just that (i.e., Read Banned Books). I was going to post a list, but it's not in their online store catalog; dunno if it's still there in the brick-and-mortar store.

Posted by: TheLoneIguana | June 16, 2009 11:25 AM

I'm surprised they don't want to go all the way, piling up the books around the librarians tied to stakes.

"Those books turned me into a newt!"

Posted by: Svetogorsk | June 16, 2009 11:27 AM

My school library had a copy of Boccaccio's Decameron with some of the best censorship I've ever seen: it was unexpurgated - but the rude bits were in French. (Not the original Italian for some reason).

Presumably the publisher's attitude was "well, if the reader knows French we're already talking incurable depravity, so there's no harm done", though it had the very happy side-effect of highlighting the bits we weren't supposed to read AND giving our French a thorough work-out.

So maybe there could be a special edition of these appallingly corrupting and evil books with the offensive material in a language that only teenagers understand, like txtspk, so their elders simply won't notice?

Posted by: Richrd Eis | June 16, 2009 11:31 AM

-I hate to say it, but I can actually see the fundies' point in this case.-

Considering the sex, violence and torture inherent in their own holy book, i don't see their point. Well no, i do, it's just so stupid it hurts.

Posted by: AwesomeRobot | June 16, 2009 11:32 AM

#48 "The real problem here is perhaps with the concept of tax-funded public libraries."

Pfft!

Posted by: MacT | June 16, 2009 11:36 AM

The WISSUP blog's tagline:

"A Place Where Wisconsinites Can Come Out to Play!"

The said "come out." Heh.

Sure this isn't a parody?

Posted by: Louis | June 16, 2009 11:40 AM

It was a book that turned me gay. Oh no, wait, it wasn't, I'm not gay. It must be a book that turned me into a kinky bastard. Yeah that was it, it's all a books fault. I blame books!

All those years before basic literacy and the wide spread use of books, most people weren't fucking, and even if they did, they weren't enjoying it as is right and proper. Little known fact. Why do you think the population exploded around the time that books were invented? Coincidence? If so, how do you explain PAMPHLETS and DOCUMENTS? HUH.

Damn you atheist pervert evolutionists and your sex making books. DAMN YOU!

{shakes fist}

Louis

Posted by: Acronym Jim | June 16, 2009 11:41 AM

Jonathan@24:

they actually put black censor bars over the genitals of crudely drawn stick figures in various sex positions.

And here I thought is was a depiction of the use of marital aides.

Posted by: AZSkeptic | June 16, 2009 11:42 AM

My father-in-law and his wife live in West Bend. He was a councilman or alderman or something like that a few years ago, and lost a run at mayor. I'm sure he's not involved with this, but I'll have to ask him if he knows any of the players.

Good cheese there. And, JEEBUS, do those people know how to drink!!

Posted by: DRobe24 | June 16, 2009 11:45 AM

What does FOX News have to say about this??

http://www.foxnews.com/video/index.html?playerId=videolandingpage&streamingFormat=FLASH&referralObject=6009074&referralPlaylistId=playlist

Posted by: lordshipmayhem | June 16, 2009 11:45 AM

Matlock Bolton #20:

It's to be reserved for two of God's finest to discover themselves

Um, did you mean the Pope and Ted Haggard?

Posted by: Knockgoats | June 16, 2009 11:52 AM

The real problem here is perhaps with the concept of tax-funded public libraries. - Walton

No. The real problem is that you're a fucking moron.

Posted by: Dancing Cultist | June 16, 2009 11:54 AM

Apparently, a copy of the Gaynomnicon has been unearthed in Wisconsin; few other books possess such cosmic power. And what if, just if, the stars are also right?!?

Ia ia Cthulhu fhtagayn!

Posted by: Lauren Ipsum | June 16, 2009 11:55 AM

meaning that they [fundies] have every right to object to their money being spent on books which they find morally offensive.

If I can specify that not a single dollar of my tax money is spent on faith-based government programs, vouchers for parochial school tuition, abstinence-only curricula, the Boy Scouts, or to cover tax breaks to houses of worship or clergy, the fundies are free to specify that their tax dollars don't go to buy those naughty books about TEH SEX. Fair?

Posted by: Bill Dauphin, OM | June 16, 2009 12:04 PM

Walton:

many of these fundies pay taxes, and consequently are being coercively forced to pay for the upkeep of the libraries in question - meaning that they have every right to object to their money being spent on books which they find morally offensive.

Implicit in this comment is the assumption that each taxpayer ought to have a personal veto power, in minute detail (and what detail could be more minute than individual books in a library?), over all the acts and instrumentalities of the state. I find that position ludicrously extreme, but if we stipulate it for the sake of argument, it stands as an argument against all public institutions (not excluding national defense or the police power, since the specific exercises of even those most L-word-acceptable state powers are invariably morally objectionable to some taxpayer somewhere)... but it does not legitimate the discrete, preferential banning of specific acts (e.g., the purchase of sex-positive books) or the preferential abolishment of specfic public institutions (e.g., public libraries or public schools).

That is, if you argue for this sort of granularity of public institutions' responsibility to individual conservative moral objections, you must also recognize similar responsbility to everyone else's moral objections... and in a country of 300+ million people, nothing will escape everybody's dislike.

Arguing for strictly individualized social decision making rather than the synthetic decision making embodied in our existing democratic republic amounts to an argument for the total dissolution of the state (are you sure you're not an anarchist?)... but it does not amount to an argument for bias (e.g., in favor of one version of sexual morality in preference to all other versions) in the actions of a state, once you allow that it exists.

Posted by: Desert Son | June 16, 2009 12:10 PM

Russia in the early-to-mid 1990s would seem to be pretty close to the kind of perfect society that Walton envisages, given that law and order was virtually suspended for a time.

The example I always heard was present day Somalia. Centralized government controlling the market? Nope. Publicly available support and institutions funded through taxes? No way! Privatized infrastructure? You betcha!

It's a veritable libertarian paradise!

Course, you gotta be a helluva shot with the various Kalashnikov and Kalashnikov-compatible firearms. But just think! If you're man enough, you don't even have to declare allegiance to a warlord! You might even aspire to be one yourself!

One of the biggest issues I have with libertarians is the romantic idea they have about the society they envision.

No kings,

Robert

Posted by: Svetogorsk | June 16, 2009 12:15 PM

Yes, you're absolutely right - Somalia knocks early 90s Russia into a cocked hat.

And even better, that society exists right now for Walton to go and investigate for himself.

I know the media all say it's a hellhole and then some, but that's surely because they're petrified of people finding out the truth about this libertarian paradise.

Posted by: Dahan | June 16, 2009 12:15 PM

I know it's already been commented on a few times, but "Christian Civil Liberties Union"? WTF?!

We had some record burners (rock and/or roll only) come to the school I attended back in the late 1970's. I was only about 8 or 9 then, but I still remembering how insane those people were.

Posted by: GregB | June 16, 2009 12:20 PM

I think it was "Family Guy" that had an episode where Meg became a Christian. Part of her new life included going to a bood burning where they would burn any book that was deemed to be damaging to the Christian faith.

Among the books tossed on the bon fire were:

Dawkins, The God Delusion.

Darwin, On the origin of species.

and the book "Logic for 3rd graders"

Posted by: Johnny Vector | June 16, 2009 12:21 PM

This really is my favorite part of the suit:

"The word 'faggot' is very derogatory and slanderous to all males," the suit continues. "Using the word 'Nigger' is dangerously offensive, disrespectful to all people. These words can permeate violence." The suit also claims that the book "constitutes a hate crime, and that it degrades the community".

Did they really say that?

"Why are you stoning him?"
"He said 'faggot'"
"Ooh, now you said it!"
"Said what?"
"'faggot'"
"No I didn't!"
"Stop saying 'faggot'! Oh, now I'm saying it!"
[Enormous rock crushes them all.]

Also, permeate? Dictionary much?

Posted by: Walton | June 16, 2009 12:28 PM

Or do you really think that it's a problem Christians are supposed to pay taxes to let some books in the library but it's not a problem that my tax money is going to pay for the local library stocking the Bible and the latest insipid Max Lucado bullcrap?

No, that's equally as much a problem. That's my point, in fact.

I am 100% anti-censorship. If you want to purchase and read any book whatsoever in the privacy of your own home - whether it be the Bible, hardcore scat porn or The God Delusion - then as far as I'm concerned, you should have the absolute freedom to do so. The fact that other people might be offended by your choice of reading material is neither here nor there.

But what you ought not to have, IMO, is the right to force other people to pay for your preferred cultural experience. You would rightly be angry if Christians were able to tax you in order to fund the upkeep of churches. Why, then, do you assert the right to tax them in order to fund the purchasing of books about sex?

Bill Dauphin: Yes, I realise that this is an argument against any and all kinds of government action, even the necessary ones. (Are we justified in forcing pacifists to pay for the upkeep of the military, for instance?) Hence it can only be a prima facie argument, not a conclusive one, against government activity. But the difference between libraries and national defence is that libraries can conceivably and practicably be provided by the private sector, and it is not essential for government to provide them.

Posted by: Pareidolius | June 16, 2009 12:33 PM

Mmmmmmmmmaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaatloooooooooooooooooooooooock! Oh good lord . . . Edna, I need a towel.

Posted by: Paul | June 16, 2009 12:39 PM

But the difference between libraries and national defence is that libraries can conceivably and practicably be provided by the private sector, and it is not essential for government to provide them.

It is if you do not want the rich to be able to dictate what information the poor can access. The private sector isn't magical fairy dust, no matter how much you want it to be.

Posted by: Matt Penfold | June 16, 2009 12:41 PM

Because having teenagers and young adults is of demonstrable benefit to society.

Should read:

Because having teenagers and young adults well educated about sex is of demonstrable benefit to society.

Posted by: JeffXL | June 16, 2009 12:44 PM

I'm a librarian, and we've had surprisingly few challenges (the most recent being about 2 months ago). They train us in how deal with these in library school.

I've been hearing more whack jobs say that someone else's rights infringe on their own. WTF?

BTW, it is very very rare that items are removed after a challenge.

Posted by: Bill Dauphin, OM | June 16, 2009 12:51 PM

Walton:

But the difference between libraries and national defence is that libraries can conceivably and practicably be provided by the private sector, and it is not essential for government to provide them.

Paul (@98) has already expressed the doubts he and I share about the private sector's ability to fulfill the function of public libraries, but let's stipulate your point for a moment: It still doesn't amount to an argument that public libraries, as long as they exist, should be placing the objections of individual taxpayers ahead of the consensus views of the communities that fund them.

Posted by: Ranson | June 16, 2009 12:56 PM

You would rightly be angry if Christians were able to tax you in order to fund the upkeep of churches. Why, then, do you assert the right to tax them in order to fund the purchasing of books about sex?

Actually, they do tax me for that, inasmuch as they do not pay their fair share of the tax burden, thus increasing mine.

Posted by: Joe Bleau | June 16, 2009 1:09 PM

Son, we live in a world that teenagers who are inclined to do all sorts of icky stuff that makes me uncomfortable, and those teenagers have to be guarded by septuagenarian cowards with lawyers. Whose gonna do it? You? You, God/Jesus/Holy Ghost? I have a greater responsibility than you could possibly fathom. You weep for reason and the dissemination of knowledge, and you curse the CCLU. You have that luxury. You have the luxury of not knowing what I know. That promulgating ignorance, while tragic, probably saves lives. And my existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, saves souls. You don't want the truth because deep down in places you don't talk about at parties, you want me on that wall, you need me on that wall. We use words like homo, pee-pee, Jeezy-Peezy. We use these words as the backbone of a life spent defending something. You use them as a punchline. I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very ignorance that I provide, and then questions the manner in which I provide it. I would rather you just said Praise Jeebus!, and went on your way, Otherwise, I suggest you pick up a zippo, and stand a post. Either way, I don't give a damn what you think you are entitled to.

Posted by: xebecs | June 16, 2009 1:15 PM

permeate violence?

They meant "permute". Lots of mathematicians in West Bend. They're just mad because they couldn't get their book of Escher-porn published by the university press.

Posted by: raven | June 16, 2009 1:18 PM

West Bend Wingnuts for Fascism:

No burning or banning of books is desired by West Bend Citizens for Safe Libraries. We do not believe in nor condone such actions.

Bunch of wimps. Real Xian Terrorists would burn the books in a pile. With a librarian or two on top tied to a stake.

And then go out and hunt some witches down. Also Democrats, gays, commies, MDs, biologists, and Unitarians. I guess when you get old, you get slow.

Posted by: Zar | June 16, 2009 1:21 PM

Walton---

Chances are, everybody is offended by at least one of the books in the library. Many libraries also keep "Mein Kampf" and "the Satanic Verses" and "the Taming of the Shrew" and "the Fountainhead" and whatnot. To make a library inoffensive, we'd have to reduce it to about three books, one of which is an instruction manual for an 8-track stereo.

Libraries are all about making information available to everyone, for free. Doesn't matter what your opinion is on the material; it's about information, not propaganda, not indoctrination. It's a wonderful, noble institution and all thinking people should have immense respect for librarians who protect free and open exchange of ideas. Mass literacy and the widespread availability of books are pretty recent phenomena that we are incredibly lucky to have.

Posted by: Notagod | June 16, 2009 1:24 PM

I like burning christian bibles, christians should too, the burning releases the holy spirit from the pages that bind it.

Posted by: Knockgoats | June 16, 2009 1:31 PM

It is if you [Walton] do not want the rich to be able to dictate what information the poor can access. - Paul

But that's exactly what Walton does want.

Posted by: SteveM | June 16, 2009 1:39 PM

re 108:

You have the luxury of not knowing what I know. That promulgating ignorance, while tragic, probably saves lives.

While costing countless more.

Posted by: Agoraphobic Kleptomanaic | June 16, 2009 1:47 PM

To make a library inoffensive, we'd have to reduce it to about three books, one of which is an instruction manual for an 8-track stereo.

My grandmother was killed by an 8-track stereo, you offensive Clod!

Posted by: Gilian | June 16, 2009 1:53 PM

@94
. You would rightly be angry if Christians were able to tax you in order to fund the upkeep of churches. .

Like you mean, they have been doing since the creation of churches ?
In the past Christians actively taxed us, in the present they avoid taxes the rest of us have to pay.
A politician in my country said something in the news about property-tax, and bang poof, next week the ambassador from the Vatican made an appearance wanting to know WTF he thought he was doing.
So yeah, I'm quite rightfully angry.

Posted by: Jadehawk, OM | June 16, 2009 2:03 PM

But the difference between libraries and national defence is that libraries can conceivably and practicably be provided by the private sector, and it is not essential for government to provide them.

1)Private libraries would result in the poor having even less chance to educate themselves (if you can't afford food, you sure as fuck can't afford a private library membership); it would not let kids learn things their parents refuse to let them learn (because such parents control their children's expenditures); it would limit students learning experience to school-approved text books; it would dramatically curtail readership of books in general, and rare/expensive/non-profitable books in particular. Basically, private libraries are completely fucking useless

2)Blackwater would like to disagree with you on the impossibility of privatized defense.

Posted by: Laura | June 16, 2009 2:19 PM

To the poster above who name-checked Dawn and Drew (I can't find your post now, but I know you are there):

Nicely done! I used to work with them, years ago. Seriously awesome folks. Every day in the office started with me laughing my ass off at some goofy thing Drew had done, and Dawn's succinct eyebrow-raise of a response.

Posted by: Raiko | June 16, 2009 2:28 PM

Why is it always that these Christian-OHMYJESUS-OFFENDED-BY-LIFE-people are completely unable to make a decent-looking website? I mean, there's FREEWARE for that, for crying out loud! Or they could at least get a stupid myspace.

It seems Christian-OHMYJESUS-OFFENDED-BY-LIFE sites always have to kill some brain cells of people whose life requires any form of good public presentation.

Posted by: flea | June 16, 2009 2:32 PM

You would rightly be angry if Christians were able to tax you in order to fund the upkeep of churches.

The fuck? That's got to be a joke.

Posted by: Matt Penfold | June 16, 2009 2:42 PM

Someone told me a defintition of a libertiarian the other day.

A libertiarian, he said, is a person who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.

Walton, stand up so we can see you.

Posted by: Walton | June 16, 2009 2:46 PM

Re privatised national defence: I didn't say that defence services can't be provided by private contractors (such as Blackwater). But they do have to be funded by the state - for the simple reason that defence is a non-excludable public good. If we made it optional to pay for the military, then everyone in the country would still inevitably receive the same level of military protection whether they paid for it or not - meaning that there would be no incentive to pay for it, and so most people wouldn't.

This isn't the case with libraries. It's perfectly possible to exclude those who can't pay from a library, and so it is possible to run libraries at a profit. Whether this is a good idea is another question, but it's clearly not in the same category as defence.

Walton, Christian churches are exempt from most taxation, specifically property taxes. Therefore my property taxes are subsidizing them quite directly. Just saying.

And do you think this is right? My guess would be no.

Some people find churches appealing. Other people find libraries appealing. Other people find nightclubs appealing. It's a matter of personal preference - and we shouldn't subsidise anyone's personal preference using coercively-extracted taxpayer funds, IMO.

Posted by: Joe Bleau | June 16, 2009 2:58 PM

A libertiarian ... is a person who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.

I've heard that definition attached to the word 'critic', but darn if it doesn't apply nicely to glibertarians as well.

Here's the way I described it to my kid when she asked me the difference between a liberal and a libertarian -

Liberal response to witnessing a condemned man heading to the gallows: "There but for the Grace of God go I".

Libertarian: "Better him then me"

Posted by: Jim | June 16, 2009 3:00 PM

It's perfectly possible to exclude those who can't pay from a library, and so it is possible to run libraries at a profit. Whether this is a good idea is another question, but it's clearly not in the same category as defence.

Posted by: Helene | June 16, 2009 3:05 PM

OK. I don't get it. If the elderly plaintiffs find the book(s) disturbing, why in the hell are they looking at the ‘darn’ thing? To get their BP going or what? Sorry, but I am sick of other people attempting to push their values (and I use that word loosely here) on me & my family. As a parent of teenage girls, I would want these books to remain in the library. The more good, solid scientific information (which I am assuming it is) they have at their fingertips the better. As a teacher who has worked with at risk youth - many of them young, pregnant girls – I can tell you that it IS NOT the availability of this type of information that encourages them to have sex, or do drugs, or even (gasp) play loud music.

Posted by: dean | June 16, 2009 3:47 PM

1) How long until walton totally derails these posts with long, rambling, poorly thought out screeds that contradict each other, with points retracted by "well, I need to think that through further."?

2) I think #108 is a hoax

Posted by: tsg | June 16, 2009 4:06 PM

2) I think #108 is a hoax

#108 is a parody of Col. Jessup's courtroom speech from "A Few Good Men".

Posted by: Joe Bleau | June 16, 2009 4:22 PM

If there was ever a place you did not want to confuse "then" and "than", this would be it.

{facepalm} How embarrasking.

Although the typo kinda also makes sense, after a fashion, insofar as glibertarianism in practice pretty much inevitably would devolve into a kleptocracy, which usually doesn't end all that well for the kleptos in question. So maybe the (intellectually honest) libertarian response would be something like "First him, then (eventually) me"...

2) I think #108 is a hoax

Not a hoax.

Posted by: CanadaGoose | June 16, 2009 4:25 PM

>> books that discuss human sexuality in the library

Well, I understand completely. I don't think sexuality in the library is a good idea. You should at least wait until you leave the building.

Posted by: tsg | June 16, 2009 4:39 PM

Well, I understand completely. I don't think sexuality in the library is a good idea. You should at least wait until you leave the building.

No way. Library sex is totally hot!

Posted by: JohnnieCanuck | June 16, 2009 4:53 PM

The trouble with Canadian Geese is that they do everything in flocks. That includes pooping all over the place.

––

Probably not a day goes by that somebody doesn't have sex in any given University's library stacks.

Posted by: Skeptic Coach | June 16, 2009 5:17 PM

I grew up in West Bend and fled after high school with just a few tattered shreds of my sanity left, so I can't say this surprises me. We are, after all, talking about the area that elected the toxic wingnut Glen Grothman as a state senator.

Posted by: dean | June 16, 2009 5:23 PM

To Joe and tsg: thanks - guess I've shown my lack of knowledge of popular culture and movies.

Posted by: Walton | June 16, 2009 5:27 PM

Knockgoats: Military and police protection are essential to a free society because there can be no freedom without property rights. The anarchocapitalists are wrong to think that property rights are somehow "natural" and would continue to exist without the state; in reality, property rights are creations of the state and are defined and maintained by it. Thus, since property rights are essential to freedom, and the existence of a state (with the ability to use coercive force) is essential to maintain property rights, the existence of a state is essential to freedom.

Posted by: Inky | June 16, 2009 5:34 PM

http://www.afa.net/youscareme.asp

Ugh, I checked out that prude blog out of curiosity, and came across Lou Pritchett's "Obama You Scare Me" letter.

Talk about spewing forth all the Republican Talking Points for the Stupid Masses (tm).

Lou Pritchett scares me.

Posted by: Notagod | June 16, 2009 5:41 PM

Paul,

So lets formalize that by providing the basics at minimal cost by not imposing a profit into the cost. Also, when you give a bum 5 dollars it is likely to be spent on alcohol or drugs, if the community provides a minimal but nutritious food service then you can simply direct the bum to the food center.

Posted by: maureen Brian | June 16, 2009 5:58 PM

Walton,

You're arguing against yourself now.

Posted by: Paul | June 16, 2009 6:25 PM

@Notagod

That was tongue in cheek. I was paraphrasing past statements of Walton's I've seen about how charitable donations can sustain the poor.

@Walton

Yes, but in such a scenario who defines what is "his", and what is not? In such a situation, the strong would own anything they desired and the weak would own nothing - meaning that profit would not correlate with productivity. Hence there would be no incentive for an able worker to produce, knowing that what he produced could be taken from him by people with bigger guns.

I must admit I am absolutely shocked to hear that explanation. After all, you talk a lot about how the state cannot be trusted to acting your best interests. It's why the state must be weak enough to drown in the tub. So how can you trust the state with something so fundamental as your property rights? And why do you say it is the only entity capable of doing so? Defining property rights as something created by the state is just a dodge. All that changes when you abrogate the defense of property rights to the state is...well, nothing. In the end it is still the "people with bigger guns" calling the shots.

Posted by: Rob | June 16, 2009 7:19 PM

Anyone from a state that elects Michele Bachmann has no business criticizing a state that elects Russ Feingold.

Posted by: Callif | June 16, 2009 7:41 PM

*sigh* I'm ashamed to live in Wisconsin...
Or the U.S. for that matter.

Posted by: dude | June 16, 2009 8:02 PM

clearly that book is the work of santa.

ps. I lolled so hard when I reached "gay-rays" that I think my spleen is resting next to my vocal chords now. oh god. that was AWESOME.

Posted by: Jimi | June 16, 2009 9:01 PM

Before we give Wisconsin too hard a time we should recall that they passed the very first legislation in the nation barring discrimination against gays for jobs and housing under my grandfather's administration .

Posted by: Knockgoats | June 17, 2009 3:05 AM

The anarchocapitalists are wrong to think that property rights are somehow "natural" and would continue to exist without the state; in reality, property rights are creations of the state and are defined and maintained by it. Thus, since property rights are essential to freedom... - Walton

As others have pointed out, this makes your claim that you want a weak state ridiculous - you want these allegedly essential rights protected by something weak enough to drown in a bathtub? The state as guard-kitten? In fact, of course, non-state systems with property rights have existed and in some places still do (add learning a bit of anthropology to all your history, politics, psychology and sociology homework) - such rights are socially defined and maintained, but not necessarily state defined and maintained.

However, you admit that property rights are not natural, but are social constructions; and since you claim that property rights are essential to freedom, freedom is also socially constructed. Your deontological claims for the basis of "libertarianism" thus collapse, and we have to consider likely consequences. So who is to decide what property rights there should be? I know you think the answer is "Walton", but I think it should be done democratically.

Posted by: Citizen of the Cosmos | June 17, 2009 7:20 AM

Why would they want to remove sources of knowledge that are very much relevant for teenagers? Sounds like an amazingly stupid thing to do.

Posted by: Walton | June 17, 2009 7:52 AM

In fact, of course, non-state systems with property rights have existed and in some places still do (add learning a bit of anthropology to all your history, politics, psychology and sociology homework) - such rights are socially defined and maintained, but not necessarily state defined and maintained.

Yes, but it would be very difficult, in a modern complex commercial society, to sustain a working system of property rights without any kind of universally accepted system of arbitration. As H.L.A. Hart highlighted, there are many advantages to having a system of rights based on law rather than on mere social convention. In particular, the latter suffers from an inevitable lack of certainty and agreement, and therefore risks descending into chaos.

This is why I think a state is needed. However, I am also an individualist. I support the existence of a state because I think a system based on clearly-defined private property rights is the best way of giving individuals the chance to control their own lives and make their own choices without being coerced by others. In my view, the existence of a (minimal) state facilitates this goal. If the state were simply abolished and not replaced with any alternative arrangement, government coercion would simply be replaced with private coercion, and some sort of quasi-feudal society would eventually develop in which the strong controlled the weak through force of arms.

At the same time - keeping in mind that my goal is to give individuals as much control as possible over their own lives - a state which does more than the minimum, and which takes substantial control over the economy, inevitably takes more control over individuals' lives and therefore reduces individual freedom. As Friedman highlights in Capitalism and Freedom, it is very difficult to sustain effective political opposition to the government in a society where most wealth is controlled by agents of the government.

Hence why I support a minimal state, but not the total abolition of the state.

Posted by: Walton | June 17, 2009 8:33 AM

Your argument that without the state, government coercion would be replaced by private coercion, applies in a parallel way to economic rather than military power.

Depends on what you mean by "coercion". Pointing a gun to someone's head and ordering them to comply is unquestionably a coercive act. By contrast, it is debatable whether offering someone a job, in the knowledge that s/he must take that job in order to avoid starving to death, constitutes "coercing" him or her into taking that job.

There is a meaningful distinction. In the former case, I actively reduce someone's freedom by pointing a gun at his or her head. S/he has less freedom as a result of my act. By contrast, in the latter case, I have enhanced that person's freedom by offering him or her a job; I have increased his or her range of options. This applies even if the job in question is poorly-paid and involves working in bad conditions; it's still better than starving to death. I have therefore done nothing wrong in the latter case, whereas I have in the former case. And if I am stopped (by worker protection laws, etc) from offering the person a job, then that person's range of options is thereby constricted.

Posted by: Svetogorsk | June 17, 2009 8:50 AM

And if I am stopped (by worker protection laws, etc) from offering the person a job, then that person's range of options is thereby constricted.

So you'd rather live in a society where people take unbelievably scummy, poorly-paid, dead-end jobs out of a basic necessity to survive than one in which that survival is cushioned by a modicum of state protection funded by those higher up the social hierarchy, purely in the name of a largely illusory (because hopelessly compromised) promise of "freedom"?

I just can't see how your notion of a perfect libertarian paradise would be anything other than a barely imaginable hellhole for the overwhelming majority of people. Has there ever been a real-life example to the contrary throughout human history? Or do you cleave to the Communist mantra that perfection is still attainable, but no-one's really tried it properly yet?

Posted by: Matt Penfold | June 17, 2009 9:06 AM

Victorian Britain? Didn't they pretty much invent free museums and public libraries? We all know what Walton thinks about those!

Fair point. I should have said from the beginning of the Industrial Revolution to the Early Victorian period. They still had shitty working conditions, and no museums or libraries.

Posted by: KI | June 17, 2009 9:15 AM

Walton, being English perhaps you are unaware that one of the greatest American proponents of public libraries was Benjamin Franklin, founding father, etc. We had a revolution to get your monarchy and its rules out of our hair. The public library is the greatest invention of a civilized people. Knowledge should be available for free to all who want it.

I feel a libertarian is one who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing. I don't know where I paraphrased that from, I hope I don't owe anybody royalties.

Posted by: Walton | June 17, 2009 11:17 AM

And you still haven't satisfactorily answered my question: how dare you coerce people into paying taxes for military and police they don't want?

Because, as I have demonstrated above in rational argument (and you haven't successfully challenged it), state provision of these things is essential to individual freedom.

Fundamentally, I don't believe in authority. I don't believe that anyone - whether it be a monarch, a cabal of self-appointed experts, or the majority of voters of a democratic nation - has any moral right to tell others what to do. Each person should, on a day-to-day basis, decide for him- or herself what the right course of action is, and should take that course of action, regardless of what others think.

Sometimes, of course, the morally right course of action is to obey the law, because the law happens to prescribe actions that are morally right; this is the case, for instance, with prohibitions against rape and murder, or (returning to the main topic at hand) with taxation to pay for police, courts and national defence. When the law is right, then it should be obeyed - not because it is the law, nor because it is democratically approved, but because it is substantively right, and can be justified as such in rational argument.

Yet this does not involve a concession that the democratic majority has any inherent moral authority. It doesn't. If the democratic majority enacts laws which are morally iniquitous, then the correct course of action may be to disobey them (depending on how immoral these laws are, and whether the negative moral consequences of disobedience are outweighed by those of obedience). A rule does not have any special moral authority because it is law, nor because a majority of people approve of it (since, as we have seen time and time again, the majority is capable of being disastrously wrong).

Accordingly, I believe that I have the right to coerce others into paying for military, police and courts because, as per my arguments above, I believe that state provision of these things is the only morally acceptable option, as it is the only way to secure individual freedom.

This does not mean that I am imposing my own preferences on others. I like the music of J.S. Bach, for instance; yet I strongly object to government subsidies for Bach concerts (or for any other form of cultural or artistic expression), because I have no more right to force others to pay for my preferred music than they do to force me to pay for theirs. Similarly, I think it's clear that homeopathic "remedies" are a load of bullshit, and I strongly object to them being provided on the NHS. Yet I recognise that it is perfectly legitimate for supporters of homeopathy to spend their own money on these treatments; and just as they shouldn't force me to pay for homeopathic treatments, so too I have no moral right to force them to pay for conventional treatments.

This is qualitatively different from the matter of state provision of military/police services; for these things, unlike Bach concerts or medical treatment, lose their positive character unless they are provided equally to everyone at public expense.

Posted by: Paul | June 17, 2009 11:46 AM

Because, as I have demonstrated above in rational argument (and you haven't successfully challenged it), state provision of these things is essential to individual freedom.

Public welfare spending and unemployment programs bring more freedom to people on a day to day basis than the military or the police force. But you've got yours, so who cares about government spending other than what you consider yourself needing?

Posted by: Walton | June 17, 2009 12:06 PM

No, Walton, you just think libraries, which are essential to a free nation, should be private, so that only the rich can afford them. Yay! Once again you've shown your colors: You don't care about the poor, or normal folk. Only folk with money.

Yes, I do care about the poor. And I know that the greatest boon for the poor in all of world history - the reason we are not all now living in mud hovels - is consumer capitalism. Free trade has lifted millions out of poverty, and is in the process of lifting billions more.

Welfare schemes help some of the poor, and they have a legitimate place in helping those thrown out of work due to illness, economic recession, or other vicissitudes of life. But if they are made too generous, they end up hurting everyone in the long run, because they discourage enterprise and harm the economy, and become unsustainably expensive.

Posted by: Jadehawk, OM | June 17, 2009 12:43 PM

So you end up in a situation where the law is effectively laid down by a tiny handful of unelected, unrepresentative oligarchs - which is pretty much what happened in Russia in the 1990s, and the problem was only resolved by a strong shift to a more authoritarian system. Which was welcomed by the masses with open arms (Vladimir Putin has a far bigger democratic mandate than Barack Obama, and there's little doubt that it's genuine), because they were far more clear-sighted about the logical consequences of your philosophy than you appear to be.

speaking of clearsightedness, I've just finished reading an article about the problems in South Africa since the institution of the Glorious Capitalist Democracy(TM). And strangely enough, many people weren't happy with it! one man actually said: "My life was better during apartheid. Freedom turned out to be just a word. Real freedom, real power, that comes from money -- and I haven't got any money."

this is incidentally the same sentiment a lot of East Germans and Poles express when you ask them. They never wanted capitalism, they wanted democracy.

Posted by: Bill Dauphin, OM | June 17, 2009 1:04 PM

Walton:

...the greatest boon for the poor in all of world history - the reason we are not all now living in mud hovels - is consumer capitalism. Free trade has lifted millions out of poverty, and is in the process of lifting billions more.

Since you're touting the historical success of moderated, mixed-economy capitalism — and while there are millions of people around who would quibble with you about that if they weren't so busy trying to stay alive, I think there is some broad truth in this point — I can't help wondering why you seem so eager to replace it with an ahistorical, unproven, extreme version of capitalism.

As with medicine, it does not necessarily follow that if a little capitalism is a good thing, a whole lot more capitalism will be even better.

While we're at it, I think it's amusing that you claim to oppose authority, yet continue to promote a social system (or, more correctly, the lack of same) that couldn't fail to devolve into a new feudalism. No authoritarianism in that, right?

Posted by: Paul | June 17, 2009 1:18 PM

@Bill Dauphin

It's not authoritarianism if the elites are in charge. They are in charge because they have proven themselves more capable by reaching a position where they could be in charge. It is not their fault the lesser peoples failed to reach the same position due to their insufficiency. As long as this "state" construct isn't the one enshrining said elites at the top, all is right with the world.

Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM | June 17, 2009 1:39 PM

I see Walton is again showing why his libertarian philosophy is a morally bankrupt. The moral bankruptcy, enshrined in the lack of common good by government, is why most intelligent people avoid that philosophy.

Posted by: Bill Dauphin, OM | June 17, 2009 1:57 PM

Walton:

Why do you consider "social system" to be synonymous with state control? Social institutions can, and frequently do, exist and flourish in the absence of coercive government intervention.

Sure they can. I don't dispute that.

I said you advocated the lack of any social system, because your "every man for himself" approach falls parsecs short of my standard definitions of both social and system... but I did not say the ultimate result would be the lack of "social institutions." Indeed, I think humans naturally create social structures no matter how desperately people like you try to avoid it.

You say...

I don't advocate the abolition of all government infrastructure.

...yet you affirm the absolute right of each individual to make every decision — including which of the few laws you admit might might be legitimate to actually follow — entirely for him/herself. Effectively, that is advocating the abolition of all government infrastructure, whether that's your intent or not. Of course, I don't believe it's constitutionally possible for any significant group of humans to strictly apply that principle. In practice, any attempt to so thoroughly institute individual sovereignty in the absence of formal social structures would lead to the most powerful individuals (which is to say, those most favored, in one way or another, by the circumstances of their birth) gathering less powerful individuals into their private spheres of authority (i.e., fiefdoms), and then using their "inferiors'" abilities and resources to defend their spheres against other powerful individuals.

That is, feudalism. Sound like fun to you? Not me. Perhaps you think you're naturally destined to be a feudal lord, and not a vassal or serf, but I'm not so confident that I, or my loved ones, would fare so well.

BTW...

This is true; yet introducing capitalism into areas of the economy which were previously state-controlled has seen, almost invariably, massive success. (School vouchers, for instance.)

In what alternate universe have school vouchers been a "massive success"? And what standard are you applying for "success"? In the U.S., AFAIK vouchers have (thank FSM) never been tried on any sufficiently large scale to determine their "success," but in any case, what voucher advocates would count as success — significant shifts of the student population from public to private schools, if not the eventual dissolution of the public schools altogether — would be the polar opposite of a Good Thing™ from my POV, since I think the single most important aspect of public schools is that they are public, and hence responsible to the public.

Of course, I can see where, as someone who doesn't believe the public even exists, you might scratch your head at my position. But apparently success = conformance to Walton's personal ideology.

I've been trying to resist joining Knockgoats in calling you, personally, an egoist, but it's increasingly difficult to avoid that conclusion.

Posted by: Knockgoats | June 17, 2009 2:11 PM

And those countries which previously had highly socialised economies have, in the last few decades, shifted back towards a capitalist economy. -Walton

With the result of reduced growth rates, higher unemployment, and much greater inequality. The period 1945-75 showed both the longest sustained period of rapid growth in history, and the highest level of state intervention in the economy. Of course the rich have done very well out of the subsequent privatisation, which is all you really care about.

The French economy is going to hell in a handbasket

No it isn't: http://www.economist.com/countries/France/profile.cfm?folder=Profile-Economic%20Data. Like most economies it is under strain because of the deregulation-caused financial crisis, but the European countries in real trouble include Ireland, Latvia and others which followed your "free-market", noninterventionist, low-tax nostrums. The Scandinavian countries remain both the most egalitarian and among the richest, and the "reforms" of the current centre-right coalitions in Denmark and Sweden have not protected them from the downturn.

Posted by: Svetogorsk | June 17, 2009 2:46 PM

but the European countries in real trouble include Ireland, Latvia and others which followed your "free-market", noninterventionist, low-tax nostrums.

Damn, you beat me to it!

And of course Hungary, which is a very interesting case study indeed, as it would seem to be an exemplary example of a state adopting pretty unrestrained turbo-capitalist policies and suffering the consequences.

I'd be genuinely interested to hear Walton's take on Hungary's economic history over the last two decades, and specifically where he thinks it went wrong - as few would dispute that it's now an absolute basket case, and far worse off than many of its more regulation-inclined neighbours.

Posted by: Walton | June 17, 2009 2:52 PM

The period 1945-75 showed both the longest sustained period of rapid growth in history

Of course it did - because most European economies were devastated by the Second World War, and recovered rapidly due to loans from the US. Those were exceptional circumstances.

Tell me, why do you think Thatcher came to power with a large majority in 1979? Or Reagan in 1980? The economic policies pursued in Western countries in the 1970s led to catastrophic failures. If you deny this, then why were the people ready for a change? Do you seriously suggest that Britain and America were in a better economic state in the 1970s than in the 1990s?

Posted by: Jadehawk, OM | June 17, 2009 3:12 PM

Do you seriously suggest that Britain and America were in a better economic state in the 1970s than in the 1990s?

in 1970's, the average U.S. family managed to save 9% of their income. in 1990's, it was half that, and just before the crisis it was actually negative.

while in evil socialist countries like france and germany, the savings rate is still 10-13 percent.

hm...... seems like people in evil socialist countries where the government takes all their money away are left with more money that in good capitalist countries.

Posted by: Paul | June 17, 2009 3:58 PM

Vouchers have allowed poor kids, who would otherwise have been stuck in failing sink schools, to get a good education and fulfil their potential. I call that "success". What do you call it?

Failure to properly fund public schools.

The best of the poor kids will be allowed to get out of underfunded public schools and into the private schools that now get government money to take them, while the developmentally delayed or those with issues that the private schools monitor to disqualify them will still be stuck in the now even worse funded "sink" schools.

Posted by: Matt Penfold | June 17, 2009 4:08 PM

How many fee paying schools do not have some kind of selection criteria ?

Posted by: Alyson Miers | June 17, 2009 4:14 PM

@#218: Pretty much...none of them. They get funded on a per-student basis, they get to decide which services to provide or not, AND they get to decide which students with all their emotional and behavioral and academic issues to take on or not...but the onus is on public schools to "compete" with them.

There goes my lunch again.

Posted by: Paul | June 17, 2009 4:29 PM

but paul, don't you know that's those kids own fault for not being good enough for private schools to want them?

I would love for Walton to admit that is a consequence of his pet voucher idea. I've seen him play blame the victim for adults, but I don't recall it happening for kids yet. But that is the logical conclusion for voucher programs. They suck government money away from helping any but those who are "good enough" for the private schools, good enough meaning the ones that will take the least amount of money to educate while keeping up the school's pristine image.

incidentally, I'm all for special programs for highly gifted students, because they tend to do shitty in regular school-curriculums. but you can only be both fair AND supporting of excellence when you build the special programs on top of a good general basic education, not instead of it.

Wholeheartedly agree. But you cannot hold up the existence and/or prevalence of "gifted and talented" programs to show the success of a given approach to educating the general public. Which is the issue when you mention vouchers as a success because they let in poor kids (what happens to the kids they don't let in? Oh, they're still at the sink schools that now have even less government money).

Posted by: Walton | June 17, 2009 4:33 PM

Failure to properly fund public schools.

In Britain, we've poured tons of money into the state education system (and into the NHS, and into most other state services) over the last ten years. Have we seen a substantial improvement? No.

The UK Libertarian Party has actually pointed out that, if we returned to the pre-2000 level of government spending in the UK, we would actually be able to abolish income tax. While I don't necessarily advocate this, it illustrates beautifully that more spending is NOT the solution. Spending more money on government services just means that more money gets wasted on pointless bureaucracy. Competitive market mechanisms, by contrast, have a demonstrated ability to improve the quality and value of service provision.

Posted by: Walton | June 17, 2009 4:38 PM

how exactly is this argument different from AfricanGenesis' suggestion to you to get yourself a Thai mail-order-bride? after all, you wouldn't be coercing her to anything and thus reducing her freedom; on the contrary, you'd be enhancing her freedom by offering her a jobmarriage; you'd have increased her range of options!

True; and I certainly wouldn't suggest that the practice of marrying "mail-order brides" should be illegal. If both parties consent to it, then it's no different to any other voluntary contractual relationship.

I wouldn't personally enter into such an arrangement for the reasons which I explained on the other thread: namely, (like most people), I want the emotional experience and confidence boost which comes with being in a relationship with someone who likes me for who I am, not for what I can provide. But different people want different things out of life; and if someone else wants to marry a "mail-order bride" (or groom, for that matter), then it's up to him (or her).

Posted by: Jadehawk, OM | June 17, 2009 4:47 PM

i give up. someone needs to transplant walton's brain into the body of an actual, poor, disadvantaged person, because it seems there's no other way to teach him what kind of heartless cruel world he's supporting

Posted by: Jadehawk, OM | June 17, 2009 4:51 PM

(Before you ask: no, I don't really account myself one of the gifted. I have a fairly good brain and can write quite well, but I don't have any exceptional practical talents, I'm not very mentally or emotionally stable, and I'm certainly not a natural entrepreneur or innovator. I don't expect to become fantastically wealthy - whereas some of my peers will. And that's the way it should be; because those with more talent and ability than me ought to have more success.)

spoken like a true privileged spoiled brat

Posted by: Paul | June 17, 2009 4:56 PM

Competitive market mechanisms, by contrast, have a demonstrated ability to improve the quality and value of service provision.

Which is why private health insurance companies maximize quality of care instead of trying to keep the number of claims they pay out to the minimum possible amount, amirite? I'll grant value. Market mechanisms are great at maximizing value for stockholders. They have no interest in quality, only efficiency in how much return a given investment will make. So at best, a competitive market will get us the absolute worst possible system they can still get people to pay for (and many people will not even get that choice, since they are excluded because it is impossible to offer them a plan that offers them a product at a price they can pay, like health insurance for people with pre-existing conditions or education for autistic kids). I can hardly contain my enthusiasm.

Posted by: maureen Brian | June 17, 2009 5:02 PM

We cannot provide a great education to everyone ...

Why not? We are a wealthy country, even in the present global economic shambles, and we have any amount of proof that raising the level of education benefits both the economy and the individuals within it.

Remember, Walton, it costs a damn sight less to educate people than to keep them in jail for even a couple of years. If you took up criminology along with all that history you'd already know that those whose schools failed them are heavily over-represented in the prison population. Or are you up for building ever more and more expensive detention facilities now that we can no longer export such people to Australia?

Posted by: Jadehawk, OM | June 17, 2009 5:05 PM

and what? you think your petty little charity donations will make a difference? unless you become bill gates, it won't make ANY difference at all, no matter what.

you should really learn about how charities and even international aid doesn't actually help anyone with anything. you're not fixing the systemic problems that create the situations you're trying to ameliorate; worse, you're perpetuating them by

a)making yourself feel less guilty, thus removing any impulse for actual change (basically, you're the equivalent of a Prius driver claiming they're doing their best to alleviate environmental damage)

b)making it look superficially like the problem can be fixed without actually requiring to change the system that's causing it (anologously, no amount of patching will make Windows a good OS; but it sure keeps people from ditching it)

P.S.: obviously SIWOTI is keeping me from doing the right thing and ending this sisyphean task of trying to get any knowledge past your thick skull. Morton's demon is strong in you.

Posted by: Paul | June 17, 2009 5:09 PM

I know it sounds callous. But the reality is that there will always be winners and losers. We cannot provide a great education to everyone, just as we cannot provide a great standard of living to everyone.

Nice screed on how because not everyone will take advantage of academic opportunity equally, there is no reason to offer them equal access to academic opportunity. You're disgusting.

In the end, my philosophy (influenced by Rand and many others) is not that we should hate the poor (we certainly shouldn't), but rather that it's OK to be successful, and to enjoy the fruits of one's success. I fully intend to do what I can with my own mind and resources to create a better world for the poor and disadvantaged; because I want to do so. But I have no right - and nor do you - to coerce other people into living for others, rather than for themselves.

It would be great to see your work, Walton. We've been "coercively" taxing for the entire length of recorded history. What makes you think your dream world where we don't tax would work better? Must be all that data the Cato Institute is hiding from the unenlightened. Taxation has been present for the entire lifespan of capitalism, and the engine has not stopped. Why the fearmongering and bald, factually untrue assertions?

Well, I should say you want a world where we only tax to support the causes that YOU think it is worth taxing to support. Not where we don't tax. You're not even consistent there. Your non-excludable argument about law enforcement doesn't hold water, either, but you've been shown that in the past and continue to persist in that line of argument.

Posted by: Jadehawk, OM | June 17, 2009 5:10 PM

But the point I'm making is that, in a (relatively) meritocratic society, my early privilege won't necessarily translate into massive success later in life.

actually yes, yes it will. and that you can't and won't see that is what makes you a privilege-blind brat capable of spewing this bs about a meritocracy even being possible in a libertarian society.

Posted by: Matt Penfold | June 17, 2009 5:14 PM

Surveys indicate that most people are satisfied with their experience of the NHS, but many think it's getting worse because that's what much of the press says.

The surveys also show that those who have either accessed NHS care recenty, or have a close relative who has, consistantly show more satisfaction than those who have not.

Posted by: Svetogorsk | June 17, 2009 5:17 PM

But what we can't afford as a society is to coercively confiscate money from the successful and productive, and give it to the poor and disadvantaged. As much as our natural sympathy with them might make us wish to distribute wealth from the wealthy to the poor, the fact is that, by doing so, we will destroy the engine of capitalism which drives virtually all human progress.

Only if you adopt a polarised either/or approach - a libertarian one where the government gives nothing to the poor, or a socialist one that tries to equalise everything. I think both philosophies are utterly misguided, and that it's far more sensible to strike a pragmatic balance, whereby we tax people at a relatively painless level (and Britain and the US have markedly lower tax rates than in many countries in, say, western Europe) and use that levy to provide a safety net for the disadvantaged.

I've been paying income tax for half my life: it's deducted at source, and it's never bothered me one iota, because there's still more than enough left over for me to enjoy a very comfortable lifestyle - and I don't earn much more than the national average. And I'm perfectly happy to let specialised agencies decide how best to distribute this money, because I have neither the time nor the expertise to do it myself.

An excellent illustration of why letting individuals pick their favourite charities is a bad idea is demonstrated by the fact that British donkey sanctuaries are rolling in cash while far less cute'n'cuddly but possibly more societally important projects are crying out for support.

Posted by: Walton | June 17, 2009 5:58 PM

Maureen brian:

If you took up criminology along with all that history

I'm actually about to do just that - I'll be studying Criminal Justice and Penology as a module next year. I find it a fascinating field, and am even considering doing an MSc in criminology after I graduate.

Or are you up for building ever more and more expensive detention facilities now that we can no longer export such people to Australia?

No, I'm up for reducing the number of crimes for which we imprison people. In my view, the purpose of imprisonment should be simply to protect the public from those with a demonstrated propensity to use violence. Non-violent drug users should certainly not go to prison; nor should white-collar criminals. Imprisonment is absurdly expensive, mentally traumatic, and is highly likely to cause people to re-offend. We really need to re-think our approach to criminal justice. The Daily Mail "lock 'em up and make 'em suffer" approach needs to be abandoned in favour of a rational, intelligent pro-liberty strategy.

Knockgoats:

...greatly increased participation in further and higher education...

Yes - thousands more now study such worthwhile courses as "leisure studies", "football culture" (colloquially labelled by the press as "David Beckham studies") and "media studies". I personally know students at various third-rank universities who've spent most of their three years getting drunk and going to parties, do one essay a year, and are still set to receive degrees. And, of course, all this is heavily subsidised by the taxpayer (we pay £3000 a year in tuition fees, when the real cost of undergraduate education is closer to £10-12000). Hence why British higher education is becoming financially unsustainable, because of Labour's arbitrary target of getting 50% of young people into higher education come what may.

...rising numbers and grades in exam passes.

Ah yes - good old grade inflation.

Jadehawk:

and what? you think your petty little charity donations will make a difference? unless you become bill gates, it won't make ANY difference at all, no matter what.

My donations on their own won't make a difference - but the month-by-month donations of millions of ordinary people can, and do, make a difference. Why do you think mass charity events (such as Children in Need) are so popular? These events can genuinely raise millions for worthy causes - without any coercion being involved. I'm not saying charity can solve all our social problems; it certainly can't, and there is a major problem with some worthy causes not getting adequate publicity or donations. But private charity is, nevertheless, a great thing.

(anologously, no amount of patching will make Windows a good OS; but it sure keeps people from ditching it)

Well, it's always been good enough for me. (I absolutely hate Apple Macs, and have never used Linux.) I've honestly never understood why people complain so much about Microsoft products. I use them on a day-to-day basis and have found them intuitive and reliable.

Posted by: Paul | June 17, 2009 6:17 PM

Why do you think mass charity events (such as Children in Need) are so popular?

In addition to what Jadehawk noted, a big reason is they allow people to lower their tax liability. Get rid of taxes or tax write-offs for charitable giving and you'll notice a large downturn in the amount given to charity. Does your Libertarian utopia take this into account when declaring that charitable philanthropists can provide for the less fortunate?

Posted by: Paul | June 17, 2009 6:37 PM

There is, of course, a "but". If we are to reduce the numbers in prison and the wastefulness of much that happens there then we have to come up with alternative ways of persuading people to turn their lives around and to compensate in a meaningful way for the damage they may have done.

Posted by: Notagod | June 17, 2009 11:18 PM

Paul, re: 168. Yeah, I caught that after I commented.

Sorry.

Posted by: buck09 | June 18, 2009 12:55 AM

FYI - Robert C. Braun, who is one of the people representing the plantiffs in this case is a litigious a-hole and all-around Wesboro-ish nutbag member of the "Christian Patriot" (i.e. militia) movement.

His litigation history, including litigation against cops he doesn't like: http://wcca.wicourts.gov/simpleCaseSearch.xsl

Posted by: Svetogorsk | June 18, 2009 4:42 AM

I'm actually about to do just that - I'll be studying Criminal Justice and Penology as a module next year. I find it a fascinating field, and am even considering doing an MSc in criminology after I graduate.

I just knew you were a student - your writing betrays an unmistakable combination of intellectual overconfidence blended with wild impracticality and naivete so extreme that it's rather touching.

I bet Peter Hitchens is glad that online discussion forums didn't exist in the 1970s when he was spouting extremist revolutionary dogma (Trotskyite in his case), as I'm sure it would be exquisitely embarrassing today. In his case, he became a journalist, ended up examining the real world in extreme close-up and consequently did a spectacular U-turn to become the authoritarian ultraconservative that he now is. Which I genuinely admire (though I usually disagree with him) - it takes guts to be so honest about how utterly wrong you were in the past.

No, I'm up for reducing the number of crimes for which we imprison people. In my view, the purpose of imprisonment should be simply to protect the public from those with a demonstrated propensity to use violence. Non-violent drug users should certainly not go to prison; nor should white-collar criminals. Imprisonment is absurdly expensive, mentally traumatic, and is highly likely to cause people to re-offend. We really need to re-think our approach to criminal justice. The Daily Mail "lock 'em up and make 'em suffer" approach needs to be abandoned in favour of a rational, intelligent pro-liberty strategy.

Surprisingly, I actually agree with most of this, though there's no way you could get away with a term like "a rational, intelligent pro-liberty strategy" in PR terms.

But I do agree that prison is far too blunt an instrument and often actively counterproductive - though I paradoxically disagree with you that it's ineffective on white collar criminals. On the contrary, I think loss of liberty is the only thing that really had an impact on the likes of Jeffrey Archer and Conrad Black - certainly much more than fining them amounts that constituted small change to the likes of them.

Yes - thousands more now study such worthwhile courses as "leisure studies", "football culture" (colloquially labelled by the press as "David Beckham studies") and "media studies".

Well, I did a leisure studies module as part of a business degree - initially with some reluctance, as it was the only leftover option to fit my timetable after I'd selected other subjects I was keener on studying, but in the end I found it surprisingly engrossing and very definitely worthwhile.

That's largely because it combined history, sociology, politics and economics in new and sometimes surprising ways, and made me look at nineteenth-century history in particular from angles that I hadn't explored before. I even alluded briefly to my studies earlier in this comments thread when I referred to the Victorians being very keen on free museums and public libraries as an essential counterbalance to the social harm caused by the by-products of the industrial revolution.

In all seriousness, I recommend reading The Devil Makes Work: Leisure in Capitalist Britain by John Clarke and Chas Critcher - not least because it challenges some of your more dogmatic and unrealistic assumptions about the way a civilised society should function.

Posted by: maureen Brian | June 18, 2009 6:57 AM

I reiterate that I believe that £37,500 could be better spent! I'm taking Walton's word for this figure - have not checked.

One of the problems in real-life politics, though, is that all parties will however grudgingly eventually cough up the needed funds for the prisons. The alternative programmes are the ones they are constantly trying to cut "to save money" - even when it does no such thing. Both history and recent experience suggest that the Conservative Party has an even worse record on this than the others.

I speak here from direct experience in both the voluntary sector doing some of its work on government contracts and in a commercial company running job clubs again on the government's behalf - work in both cases being threatened by constant budget cuts, constant demands that we make a silk purse out of a sow's ear! Gory details are available on request.

We could massively reduce the UK's prison population overnight if we shipped out all those who are mentally ill, all those whose main problem is drug addiction and all those who are by now far too old to hurt a fly. Well, we could were it not for the fact that mental health in the community, care of the elderly and addiction programmes are all massively underfunded. Even inside prisons education and anger management courses are the first things to fall apart when someone decides to save a few quid.

It is clear that we cannot afford both a prison population which will hit 100,000 one of these days and the necessary alternative programmes. Where, though, will we find a set of politicians brave enough to get itself elected on a promise to halve the prison population during its first term?

Prison they understand, or think they do, and so they press on. The alternatives require, shall we say, more thinking than they are currently prepared to put into it.

I agree with Svetogorsk that deprivation of liberty may sometimes be the only way to deal with the "top end" of white collar crime. They have too many caches in too many countries and too many friends in high places for anything else to make the necessary impact. Ex-cabinet minister Jonathan Aitken is good on this - just a pity that he discovered god while the other beneficial effects were happening.

Walton, could we please know your definition of a victimless crime? It is harder to take this one further without some understanding of what you include here.

Posted by: Knockgoats | June 18, 2009 3:01 PM

Yes - thousands more now study such worthwhile courses as "leisure studies", "football culture" (colloquially labelled by the press as "David Beckham studies") and "media studies". I personally know students at various third-rank universities who've spent most of their three years getting drunk and going to parties, do one essay a year, and are still set to receive degrees. And, of course, all this is heavily subsidised by the taxpayer (we pay £3000 a year in tuition fees, when the real cost of undergraduate education is closer to £10-12000). Hence why British higher education is becoming financially unsustainable, because of Labour's arbitrary target of getting 50% of young people into higher education come what may.

I agree that the 50% target is arbitrary, but your claim was that increased spending had achieved nothing. It was, not to put too fine a point on it, utter crap. Nor have you provided any evidence that what you regard as worthless degrees are worthless, or make up a significant proportion of the additional students. But then, evidence has never been something that bothers "libertarians".

...rising numbers and grades in exam passes.

Ah yes - good old grade inflation.

And of course if grades had not risen, you'd have taken that to prove your point. How about some real evidence that grade inflation accounts for the rise? You, Walton, made the claim that the additional money spent on the NHS and education had achieved little. Now back it up with real evidence, not Daily Mail talking points, or withdraw it.

Your claims about caring about the poor don't fool many people here, even if you've managed to fool yourself - I honestly don't know whether you're a conscious hypocrite, or just very good at self-deception. All the policies you espouse are aimed at increasing inequality of wealth and power, and making those inequalities hereditary - evidence I've cited before shows clearly that social mobility declines with increased inequality, and you have, IIRC, supported the abolition of inheritance tax. You whine about progressive income tax, ignoring the fact that the rich, with their trust funds, offshore accounts and accountant's dodges often pay very little. You even cited progressive income tax as an example of equality before the law being violated - revealing, rather alarmingly for a law student, that you don't have the slightest idea what that term means.
The move toward privatisation and deregulation over the past three decades has pushed many into poverty, and culminated in the most astonishing cases of reward for failure for the rich, and the worst financial crisis in decades - yet all do is call for more of the same.

Those not from the UK may not realise quite what a good posiiton Walton is in to get rich and stay rich, even if his knowledge and talents are as mediocre as appears to be the case. Oxford (and Cambridge) are where the children of the English rich go for their university education, even if they're not very bright - IIRC, about 50% of their students have been to private, fee-paying schools. Particularly as a law student, and as a prominent student Conservative, he will be mixing with members of many of the richest and most influential families in the country, and many who will go on to high positions in politics, the law, business and journalism. As the saying has it, "It's not what you know, it's who you know". So Walton's views - given the latitude for wackiness traditionally allowed to students - are precisely what one would expect if they were dictated solely by considerations of his own advantage. Of course, this does not in itself show they are wrong - that's shown by the abundant evidence that has been presented against them in thread after thread. But anyone who has seen his brazen disregard for that evidence, and his inability to put forward any substantial evidence or arguments of his own rather than simplistic slogans, need not look far for an explanation.

Posted by: maureen Brian | June 18, 2009 5:07 PM

Knockgoats is right and, given the truth of the situation, relatively moderate about it. Don't write him or me off as the middle classes whining and, please, let him use as many words as he wants - there are an awful lot of thick skulls to drill through on this one.

Walton, as so often, is in a position well recognised in the UK - his sense of entitlement leaves him dangerously ill-informed. This might be a person who ends up making decisions about his so-called third-rate universities without ever setting foot in one. Or deciding not to admit a very bright kid because she holds her knife differently than him. We have a lot of those already.

Posted by: Paul | June 18, 2009 7:36 PM

Don't write him or me off as the middle classes whining and, please, let him use as many words as he wants - there are an awful lot of thick skulls to drill through on this one.

I did not intend to write him off; I was simply pointing out that the vast majority of his statements about Walton follow purely from his (Walton's) Libertarian ideology. That is, of course he's privileged and has not had a taste of the real world, or had to experience life like the proles -- that's why he's still a doctrinaire Libertarian (he seems to still be at the point where it's a lack of exposure instead of a lack of empathy).

I'm rather offended by that. Discussing politics is virtually the only thing I'm good at. Maybe I'm not great even at that; but I do my best, and people tell me I'm a reasonably good writer and a fairly clear political thinker.

You've referred to your own abilities as mediocre more than once in comment threads here. You're surprised when someone takes it at face value instead of trying to talk you up? I think you don't give yourself enough credit, at times, but then you tow the Libertarian line without analyzing it from any perspective but your own and the impulse to give you the benefit of the doubt disappears.

Posted by: Jadehawk, OM | June 18, 2009 10:35 PM

Morton's demon in action. I've given you one set of stats I've easy access to: savings rates

another set you might want to look into: real wages; healthcare costs; education costs; volatility of market;

then come back and tell me again how much better the average American was in the 90's then they were in the 60's (yes, the 60's, not 70's. to pick a depression as a starting point is disingenuous)

Posted by: Knockgoats | June 19, 2009 6:08 AM

Walton,

I notice that you have not replied to the post where I pointed out that your constant assertion that 1945-75 saw the fastest economic growth in history, while technically true, is vacuous and misleading. Of course recovery was fast at that point, because many world economies, having been devastated by WWII, were recovering from a very low base - with the help, incidentally, of loans from the eeeviiilll capitalist United States.

You object to my repeating the simple truth, because it shows your simplistic crap about high taxes and government ruining the economy for what it is. The postwar recovery would not have happened without the Marshall plan - which was probably the greatest piece of government economic intervention and enlightened self-interest in world history. Oh, and cut the attempts at sarcasm - you're no good at it.

Few can seriously deny - and no one has really attempted to deny, when I pointed it out above - that by the late 70s, the British and American economies were in a mess.

They were indeed - due partly to inflationary factors which had affected all economies - the US's attempt to fight the Vietnam War without raising tax rates, and the politically-inspired oil price hikes by OPEC; partly by the failure of the US and UK (unlike West Germany and Japan which weathered this inflation much better) to achieve workable systems for negotiating wage rates. Note that the West German and Japanese governments were far more interventionist than those of the US and UK.

Will you seriously suggest that Britain was in a better state in 1979, economically speaking, than in 1989?

Yes indeed: in 1979 we still had the manufacturing industry which Thatcher had wantonly destroyed by 1989 in her hate-fuelled campaign against the trades unions. Inflation was certainly lower - but unemployment was much higher (even though you've cherry-picked the year 1989 which was a low point in unemployment). In real terms, it's never been below 3 million since the recession of the early 1990s, but various statistical fiddles (by both Tory and New Labour governments) have disguised its level. I lived through the 1979-89 period; I saw the massive increase in the number of beggars on the streets, and the growth of "cardboard cities". But of course the rich did very well, and have continued to do so - which is all you care about.

I'm not part of any social elite or powerful cabal. - Walton

Yes you are - you're an Oxford University law student - that is a social elite in relation to your age-group, and your failure to recognise it is laughable. Your fellow-students, and members of the Conservative and "libertarian" groups, will include members of the richest and most influential families in the country. The policies you espouse are aimed at entrenching and extending the inequality from which they benefit.

Discussing politics is virtually the only thing I'm good at. Maybe I'm not great even at that; but I do my best, and people tell me I'm a reasonably good writer and a fairly clear political thinker.

Then they have low standards. Admittedly, one might get that impression from a brief acquaintance - but the more you comment, the more obvious it becomes that there's nothing there but simplistic nostrums.

I am not an economic genius; it's not my field, and, indeed, I've never studied economics formally at all. So please forgive me if I am not capable of reeling off thousands of facts from memory.

And yet you have no hesitation whatever in making sweeping pronouncements about economics. As to facts - look them up, then make your pronouncements, if the facts are actually there to support them. OK, pretty much everyone, me included, is sometimes guilty of making the pronouncement first in the heat of argument - but you do it habitually, and seldom if ever back it up with facts even when it is challenged.

Having had a very hard couple of weeks, I don't have the energy to do any research right this second. But you have not answered my points above, and, until you do so, insulting my abilities, and making insinuations about my personal economic circumstances, is not particularly constructive.

As Paul noted, I'm partly just taking your own expressed estimate of your abilities at face value. Aside from that, I'm going on your performance here. I'm not bothered about being constructive any more as far as you're concerned - I'm sick to the back teeth of your whining (see above for yet one more example), your egoism, your callousness, your invincible ignorance, your self-righteousness, and your empty sloganising.

Posted by: Walton | June 19, 2009 6:47 AM

Knockgoats,

I don't understand your resentment and hostility towards me. Yes, I am at Oxford (and I am very lucky to be here, particularly as I went to an ordinary state school), and yes, I do know a few people who are from wealthy and well-connected families - but many more who are not. Please don't perpetuate stereotypes. Most people at Oxford are from ordinary backgrounds; about 55% went to state schools, and it is only a small minority who are from well-known families. (Yes, I realise that it is still disproportionate, as only 7% of the population as a whole is privately educated. But I'm just pointing out that the majority of people at Oxford are not wealthy.)

The majority of serious academic economists today will acknowledge that Thatcher saved the British economy. The corporatist model which existed after WWII stifled innovation, perpetuated inefficient and unsustainable industries at the public expense, and made us less competitive. Britain today - for all its flaws - is a better place to live than Britain at any other time in history, and I feel very privileged - as are we all - to live in the present day.

But I feel it could still be made better, if we trimmed down the bureaucratic state. Just go on the Guardian Public Sector Jobs website - what the hell does a "Local Committee and Partnership Officer" do exactly? What we need is what Daniel Hannan is suggesting - a major dispersal of power away from Whitehall and Brussels, to local communities. We need to significantly strengthen local government (including giving it a much more solid tax base of its own, rather than forcing it to rely on ring-fenced Treasury grants), and we need to get rid of centralised, unaccountable quangos (Regional Development Agencies, the Health and Safety Executive, English Partnerships...).

This is why I hope that Cameron's Conservatives - while leaving much to be desired, and I'm certainly not an uncritical supporter - will pave the way for a better, less centralised and more free Britain.

Posted by: maureen Brian | June 19, 2009 8:11 AM

I have no idea, nor do I care, whether this is the job Walton is complaining about. I simply googled and it came up.

It does, though, seem to be about ensuring that government and the relationships between bodies both formal and informal work together well at the most local of levels.

Wasn't that something - powers devolved, decisions made as close to those affected as was humanly possible - that our Walton was on about not so long ago?

Or am I simply going mad?

Posted by: Bill Dauphin, OM | June 19, 2009 1:00 PM

Walton:

I think you may be associating privilege too closely with wealth and social prominence, or (and this is really just another way of saying the same thing) you're defining wealth and social prominence too narrowly.

Most people at Oxford are from ordinary backgrounds; about 55% went to state schools, and it is only a small minority who are from well-known families. (Yes, I realise that it is still disproportionate, as only 7% of the population as a whole is privately educated. But I'm just pointing out that the majority of people at Oxford are not wealthy.)

I suspect the numbers are fundamentally similar at Yale, where my daughter is now a rising sophomore (indeed, AFAIK Oxford and Cambridge are the models upon which the older elite U.S. universities were originally based). Because it is focused on academic excellence, and because its endowment enables extraordinarily generous financial aid, Yale is by no stretch of the imagination mostly populated by the sort of polo-playing, yacht-owning old-money elites that the movies and TV sometimes portray.

But, and here's the key point, that doesn't mean the students there aren't privileged elites. First, Yale students (and, I presume, Oxford students as well) are by definition intellectual elites (the relatively few who might be academically undeserving "legacies" are by definition elites of the other sort). But more broadly, simply being a college-educated member of the American or British middle class — and regardless of a person's origins, a Yale or Oxford (or similar) degree is an automatic admission ticket to the middle class, at least — represents a dizzying level of privilege and wealth, compared to the vast majority of the world's population.

It's this last point, and your apparently impenetrable resistance to understanding same, that frustrates many of us here. You keep pointing at your wealthier, more aristocratic "betters" and saying (whining, it sometimes seems) "hey, I'm not one of them, so why are you picking on me?" You seem incapable of seeing — or, which would be worse, unwilling to see — that for ever person wealthier or more privileged than you, there are thousands or tens of thousands of people less well off.

Mind you, I don't partake of the disingenuous anti-intellectual "populism" of the American right wing: I think elites are good... but only if they remain mindful of the existence of, and their responsibilities to, those less fortunate.

The philosophies you promote here with regularity seem distinctly unmindful on that score: They would (at least theoretically) benefit individuals of your own station, and of the higher stations to which you seem to aspire, but they hold no promise for those who begin from disadvantaged positions, nor do they embrace any sense of community with your fellow humans.

The frustration this provokes in some of us is made all the more piquant because you appear to possess the intellectual "equipment" to be something so much better than the selfish Randite you come off as so often.

Does that help explain it for you?

Posted by: Knockgoats | June 19, 2009 1:44 PM

as I'm highly sceptical about anthropogenic "climate change" - Walton

You know absolutely fuck-all about climate science, but because its conclusions conflict with your ludicrous ideology, you reject them. Exactly like a creationist.

Posted by: Mpeterson | June 19, 2009 1:45 PM

Thank you for keeping this issue in front of the public. (I notice we finally made ABC News.)

Attention from outside has done wonders for morale here, among those fighting off this nonsense.

Best from West Bend,

Mark

Posted by: Knockgoats | June 19, 2009 2:03 PM

All government should do is provide mechanisms to give the gifted a chance to succeed, and accept that some will succeed and others will fail. - Walton

And if, because they fail, their children starve to death or have to prostitute themselves - well, tough shit. They should have chosen their parents better. You fucking scumbag, Walton.

Posted by: Jadehawk, OM | June 19, 2009 2:10 PM

KG, didn't you see Walton above agreeing with AG about there not being anything wrong with import wives from poor countries like Thailand? now where would all those lovely mail-order-brides come from, if we made people not be desperate enough to find that an acceptable option???

Posted by: Walton | June 19, 2009 5:00 PM

I've been under a lot of stress this week. I apologise for the fact that my posts on this thread have not been especially coherent or well-argued. Please don't take this as indicating intellectual shallowness in my general worldview.

Posted by: NinjaEema | June 19, 2009 7:54 PM

"That must be one powerful book. It sits on a shelf balefully, emanating damaging gay-rays that permeate the whole town, and disrupting the sexual health of its inhabitants. Perhaps the elderly are especially fragile and sensitive to its effects. Imagine some tired old codger, exhausted after a lifetime of aggressive heterosexuality, sitting in his easy chair before the TV, and suddenly he starts feeling frisky at the sight of Matlock reruns — it must be distressing. And the fault must lie in some kids' book sitting in a library a few miles away, undermining their ancient manliness."

Thank you for that paragraph. After dealing with these people for the last few months (I live in West Bend) I need all the laughs I can get.

Posted by: MichaelL | July 1, 2009 9:41 PM

...Damaging Gay Rays...

OMFG... ROFLMAO.... I hope they don't experience the dreaded "Gay Ray Burster"...