We know that the big new head office is a death knell for the prospects of a company: but did you know that the house of the CEO is a similar sign?

Freeborn John reminds us of the underbelly of current Russian life.

It’s a common complaint in American leftist politics, the danger of foreigners owning all the debt. The Skeptical Optimist has the actual figures on who owns what.

As Dizzy points out, shouldn’t a conference on ticket touting have made a profit?

Well, yes, if we’re to have a Ministry of Justice, why not one of Truth as well?

On the subject of justice, are Bag and Netsmith the only people who think that David Hicks didn’t actually get it?

And finally, Ilkka reviews 300.

From Adam Smith Institute

Tags: Libertarian, Politics, Liberty, Freedom

As Kevin pointed out, Jack Murtha is calling for a new draft. Of course, the military brass don’t want a draft, and every military member I’ve spoken to who has served in the conscript and the volunteer army doesn’t want conscription.
But if Murtha is so enamored of citizen service, why don’t we replace our […]

From The Liberty Papers

Tags: Libertarian, Politics, Liberty, Freedom

The man who commenter and self-proclaimed neo-libertarian leader Eric Dondero holds up as a strong leader of our time has fallen into yet another scandal. This one concerns his good friend, Bernard Kerik:
Federal prosecutors have told Bernard B. Kerik, whose nomination as homeland security secretary in 2004 ended in scandal, that he is likely to […]

From The Liberty Papers

Tags: Libertarian, Politics, Liberty, Freedom

Cindi was ecstatic when she heard she was pregnant
“I wonder if it’s mine?” she speculated excitedly.

From Adam Smith Institute

Tags: Libertarian, Politics, Liberty, Freedom

UK interest rates will have to rise again, according to John Stepek, in his Money Morning daily email.

Britain is booming, apparently. The Confederation of British Industry retail survey suggests that high street sales in March rose at their fastest pace in more than two years. Despite the Nationwide mumbling about a housing downturn, the February mortgage approvals figures remained at 119,000, above expectations. And the money supply continues to expand, with M4 annual growth up 12.7% in February, much the same as January’s figure.

To Stepek, and to me, this all looks like a warning that rates must rise in order to get inflation back in the bag. Inflation is a great trial to people – it makes planning ahead impossible because it’s so hard to tell the real price increases from the nominal ones. And it does not hit people evenly: it’s bad for everyone, but for some people (such as those on fixed incomes) it’s a disaster.

I had actually thought that rates would have gone up a little more by now, which might have calmed the inflationary expectations a little. Then I thought they would have to come down again because the weak performance of the European economies, our largest trading partners, would be depressing business which would need a rate cut. In fact Europe’s doing better than I feared.

But what am I doing? An economist reminding people of what he predicted?

From Adam Smith Institute

Tags: Libertarian, Politics, Liberty, Freedom

Stand by for a political upheaval. Scotland is going to change everything. The latest YouGov poll shows the Scottish Nationalist Party well ahead of Labour in the polls, and set to secure the largest number of seats in May’s election. Labour in Scotland could be back to where they were a quarter of a century ago. SNP leader Alex Salmond might well become First Minister, say George Jones and Kate Devlin, and is pledged to hold a full-scale referendum on independence for Scotland. Without its phalanx of Scottish MPs, Labour would be hard put to gain a majority at Westminster.

This is very bad news for Gordon Brown. His reign as Prime Minister might see a rump of Scottish MPs deciding English, but not Scottish, policies, and the start of a break-up of the Union. If that were not enough, the poll also shows David Cameron consolidating a Tory lead, indicating that the electorate didn’t buy Brown’s budget.

We’ve said it here many times: it’s Scotland’s turn now, and Scotland’s time. This tide is going to change the political shoreline for ever. Cameron’s Conservative group in Scotland might just decide to go along with that tide, and go into a coalition government there with the SNP. Now that really would be an upheaval.

From Adam Smith Institute

Tags: Libertarian, Politics, Liberty, Freedom

You’re away from your desk, maybe in the car, and a thought strikes you. It might be a memo to do something, or it might be the ultimate solution to the problem of dark matter. Either way, how do you make a note of it? Other drivers would be alarmed if you took your hands off the wheel to dig out your notebook, but you don’t have to. You simply use your phone (hands free unless you’ve stopped) to call Jott, then dictate a message. In a short time a transciption of that message is being sent to whomever you want, including yourself, by e-mail. Wade Rousch reports that it works, and that it’s free. If it rolls out successfully, there might be a premium service with add-ons that some might find worth paying for, but the basic Jott service is free. It’s a simple idea.

Even the speech-to-text process at Jott is low-tech. Jott’s phone system makes sense of contact names such as “myself” using speech recognition software, but such software is still far too primitive to deal with the unrestricted vocabulary that callers use in their actual messages, not to mention rushed or garbled speech or audio junk such as ums and uhs. So Jott saves messages as sound clips on central servers. Human workers at a large call center in India log onto the servers, listen to the most recent clips, and transcribe them manually. In case a transcription is murky, every e-mail from Jott also contains a link to the original sound clip.

This is another innovative service that’s sadly only currently available in the U.S. (although they say they’re working on providing international support). I like the fact that this service combines converging mobile and Internet technologies with something made possible only by globalization - an Indian call centre that handles the “low-tech” manual transcribing process. As present 100 percent of calls go via a human being, but that might change as software gets better. This is a great idea. Remind me to send myself an e-mail about it.

From Adam Smith Institute

Tags: Libertarian, Politics, Liberty, Freedom

Not this shit again. Another liberal Democrat calls for slavery.

From The Liberty Papers

Tags: Libertarian, Politics, Liberty, Freedom

I seldom encounter much in the way of verbal discussion attached to Flickr photos, because the kind of Flickr photos I usually look at are things like pictures of footbridges, concerning which there is really not a lot to be said, given how many such snaps abound on Flickr. But this snap (catchily entitled "DSC07222.JPG") is different because it is a photo of a rather violent political demo in France. This was taken by an…

From Samizdata.net

Tags: Libertarian, Politics, Liberty, Freedom

Whatever you may be doing this weekend, whether it's playing a few rounds of golf or taking a trip to the seaside or pruning your rose bushes, let us help you to set the mood and deepen your sense of tranquility and peace with this admirably tolerant, progressive and diversity celebrating video. Relax and enjoy!…

From Samizdata.net

Tags: Libertarian, Politics, Liberty, Freedom