Top ten reasons Castro should be hated

The Times has produced a handy list of the top 10 reasons Castro should not be a hero of the left. Let's see the lickspittle felchers of Cuba, George Galloway and Ken Livingstone defend these, or Matt Robson, or Willie Jackson.

1. Sending homosexuals to forced labour camps.
2. Executing people attempting to leave Cuba (as recently as 2003).
3. Urging the USSR to launch a nuclear first strike against the USA.
4. Holding 316 known political prisoners in 2006.
   
5. Banning independent trade unions.
6. Single candidates for all seats in the National Assembly.
7. Computer and internet access is severely restricted.
8. In 2003, 22 libraries raided with 14 librarians arrested with jail terms of up to 26 years, for having banned literature.
9. Opposed even modest economic reforms, including the opening up by Gorbachev.
10. Cuba's imperialist adventures in Africa, including supporting the Mengistu regime that was behind the 1980s Ethiopian famines that Bob Geldof relaunched his career off of.

So how about it? How about the New Zealand supporters of this dictator repenting for their support for this scumbag?

So how many more reasons do you need to vote out Ken Livingstone as Mayor of London?

Meanwhile, Daniel Finkelstein in the Times has an excellent article asking why the left worships dictators, including the Deputy Leader of the British Labour Party - Harriet Harman. Oh and no excuse that Thatcher supported Pinochet. Two wrongs do not make a right.

Silliest British reaction to earthquake

No, it's not the people running into the street and then having to dodge masonry. No it's not the failure to give details about the depth of the epicentre as well as the richter scale reading (both are needed to explain severity).

It is the the GMTV host Ben Shephard.

This morning he asked a British Geologist if the earthquake is attributable to... wait for it ... climate change!!

Did you dream up such a brainless question or did your producer? How utterly banal. It's the sort of thing I'd expect from a NZ based television reporter (you know the sort that talk of North Koreans spontaneously taking a day off work to welcome foreign politicians).

Ben, you have a degree in Dance, Drama and Theatre Arts from Birmingham University, best to stick with that than, um, general knowledge.

Oh by the way, I went into Wellingtonian mode. It felt hellishly strong for a force 5 quake, but that reflects being in a solid building, next to a canal in Manchester!

It woke me up (in a hotel contained in a century or so old building), I shot instinctively into the doorway (lost count of earthquakes I've been woken up with in NZ), waited until it ended then went to sleep, all half dozed. Woke up thinking I must have had a helluva dream, because it didn't feel real.

Initiating force is wrong

Tomahawk Kid has an excellent article reminding us all of why it is wrong to initiate force to get what we want. He said

"There is no more moral system than the voluntary interaction between consenting adults when applied to ANY situation."

Quite and who would disagree with that? Well, every political party in Parliament for starters and most other blogs. You might see some saying yes, BUT... as they justify the exception that they want to see, something they can't convince others about so hey, let's use state power.

If we want a culture of non-violence, which so many on the left purport to support, it should start by an unequivocal condemnation of force initiation against people and their property. That requires acceptance that the state should shrink until it no longer initiates force. That wont happen overnight, or within three years, but it does mean the end to victimless crimes, respect for private property rights, the withering of taxation down to core state responsibilities and moving towards choosing to pay for what you use, rather than force.

Utopian visionore creative as human being as to how to resolve problems and conflicts - peacefully? Well in the sense that it is idealistic yes - but it is moral, and we can debate the hows and the priorities, but shouldn't it be where human beings head? A culture of civilisation, of non-violent voluntary interaction?

The greatest barrier to it all, unfortunately, is that all too many of you are happy to be forced to do what others say, and you are prey to those who are happier telling others what to do.

Bush administration goes forward - on roads anyway

Whilst many pundits decry the Bush Administration as a “disaster” as if it were self evident, it is clear to me that in the field of transport, it is light years ahead of past administrations of both colours.

The current Transportation Secretary Mary Peters (and her last significant predecessor, Norm Mineta) have both made the very clear and blunt points – the status quo doesn’t work. Environmentalists may be surprised that the Bush administration is strongly supportive of road pricing, instead of ongoing politically driven funding of roads and public transport.

Some of the best points she made at a recent meeting of Governors at the White House were:

“in the era of a government mandated monopoly in telecommunications and price controls you'd get a recording: "I'm sorry all circuits are busy. Please try again later." "Your call couldn’t go through the system for the same reason your car can’t get through rush hour – poor pricing," Peters said.”

That's the fundamental point. People put up with chronic traffic congestion roads, but wouldn't with other infrastructure - and it is due to lack of pricing and poor quality investment - those are both due to government's running roads in the same old Soviet era way. She also points out that throwing taxpayer money at the problem hasn't worked:

"The failings of federal tax and earmark programs she said are highlighted by the 300% increase in traffic congestion in the past 25 years while spending on roads and transit is doubling every ten years."

Think also about healthcare, how throwing money at that simply isn't working either. None of this should be a surprise.

"There is no greater symptom of failure than the fact that Americans simply don’t support putting more money into this broken system. Poll after poll shows strong opposition to traditional fuel taxes. The public ranks gas taxes as among the least fair taxes at the federal, state and local levels. And they are rightfully suspicious that higher taxes will (not) translate into more efficient transportation systems."

Quite right too. Fuel taxes are charges for buying fuel, not buying road use. While New Zealand has only just moved to spend all central government fuel taxes on transport (note this includes public transport, walking and cycling infrastructure), the temptation during hard times will always be to use it for general revenue.

"More and more people are seeing that direct charges offer a better deal for taxpayers than increasing dependence on dysfunctional sources like federal gasoline taxes. This simple but powerful technology unlocks enormous new opportunities for communities BOTH to attract new investment capital AND to manage congestion through variable prices."

So let the private sector in and the market mechanism of price in. Letting them both do it removes the political albatross that doing either wont work well. London's congestion charge is severely hamstrung by the political agenda of Ken Livingstone which gives a significant portion of London traffic a discount or exemption, but also earmarks the money for a lot of buses, many of which carry few people.

Hopefully her initiatives to set free private capital for investment in highways at the federal and state levels, set free the price mechanism for charging for highway use, ending "earmarked" pork barrel funding for roads and getting better results from what federal spending that remains will not be jeopardised by the games of Obama, McCain and Clinton. I am not optimistic, but these baby steps are all in the right direction, and are worth watching. It also shows there is a bit of free market thinking in the Bush administration after all.

ARC plays with your money

The ARC, which became a greatly empowered and enriched entity under Labour, is looking to spend $10 million of Auckland ratepayers' money on Eden Park.

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Stuff reports "Council chairman Michael Lee said the proposed contribution would come from its investments, not rates" which is still ratepayers' money, he simply wants to soften the blow by claiming rates wont go up as a result - well they will, as there will be less money than there would have been otherwise.

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The alternative is that $10 million could simply be redistributed to all Auckland ratepayers as a grant. Given around 300,000 or so ratepayers, that extra $30 would be helpful for some, it might even help pay for a ticket to Eden Park - you know, so that people can choose to support it.