Gordon can't have it both ways

Now if you believe in Keynesian economics, and think that the government pouring money into the economy is “good” for it in prime pumping demand, and consequent economic activity, you think that when the government spends more it is a good thing.

Presumably, you would argue that reducing taxation would similarly be good, as it would leave more money in the hands of private citizens to spend or save (the latter typically in banks or repaying debt).

Well according to Gordon Brown the answer is no.

You see he constantly accuses the Conservatives of wanting to “wreck the economy” by cutting spending more quickly than Labour. Yet when the Conservatives promise to NOT increase tax (a form of income tax labelled National Insurance) as MUCH as Labour, it is doom and gloom because it means the budget deficit will be a problem?

Who is right Gordon?

If the economy should have more money in it, then the state taking less makes sense right? If the budget deficit is a bigger concern, then the state spending less makes sense too?

The ONLY reason you can support more state spending, and more tax is nothing to do with economics, but everything about what you think the role of the state is – to do ever more.

Tony Blair’s “New Labour” which long ago promised to contain spending, following on from Thatcher’s modest degree of fiscal prudence, has clearly disappeared. Labour is now the party of ever bigger government.

A libertarian voting in a UK General Election

So “I saved the world” Gordon Brown has finally called 6 May as the date for the next UK General Election. It is worth noting how electoral terms in the UK are longer than in most countries. The last election was nearly five years ago, and that was a shoo in for Tony Blair and Labour, against Michael Howard and the Conservatives (which barely picked up a handful of extra seats). In coming weeks this will be my primary blogging topic for obvious reasons.

The UK election is likely to be close. Recent polls have put the Conservatives ahead by between 2% and 10%, with 7% needed for an overall majority (bearing in mind the UK has a First Past the Post electoral system). Some pundits are picking the Conservatives winning a plurality of seats, but short of a majority, so requiring the support of others to govern (which currently is mostly the Liberal Democrats, the Scottish and Welsh nationalist socialists and the Ulster sectarians).

The big issue for me is who to vote for (or to vote at all). The Libertarian Party UK is more like ACT in NZ, and probably wont have a candidate in my constituency in any case. It may come down to Conservative vs. UKIP, in both cases there are a long list of reasons to say “no”, with maybe only one or two reasons to say “yes” to either. It goes without saying that Labour is beyond redemption as a party of ever growing nanny state in both regulatory and financial terms, and the Liberal Democrats are just a different version of Labour. There is every reason for the Labour government of Gordon Brown to be consigned to the proverbial dustbin of history, but little reason for the Conservative Party of David Cameron to be given the chance to tinker with the nanny state, and slow its growth. Voting for the Conservatives means removing Gordon Brown, but is it right to endorse a different way of cooking the same dish? Poison laced with chocolate instead of lemon is still poison. Is it better to vote UKIP to send a message to the Conservatives that compromising on your principles costs you support? Or is the populist nationalist rant of UKIP so unconscionably awful that it doesn’t deserve endorsement? Should I simply choose based on the candidates themselves (a good small government minded liberal if any exist)?

Greens continue to oppose economics and individual freedom on transport

It's not just because transport is my area of expertise that the Greens particularly annoy me in their treatment of this sector, but it actually displays so much more of their ideology and their approach to reason, economics and individual liberty than many other sectors do.

The Green answer to everything in transport is to take a simple child-like approach to it all. It comes down to:

"People make the wrong choices (according to us), we should force them to make the right choices by taxing the wrong choices and subsidising the right ones, and banning the development of wrong choices."

One of the most liberating development in modern history has been the technology of transport. The steam engine changed the face of international trade and travel by sea, and then nationally and locally by rail. The internal combustion engine did the same for road, sea and rail, and facilitated the development of air travel. Since then, asphalt, mass production, radiocommunications, the jet engine and the continued advances of technology have opened up the planet to exploration, communication, trade, travel, commerce and social exchange.

Now there is no doubt that there have been some negatives along the way. Millions have died through accidents by faster transport. It has been inevitable that engines would explode, catch fire, or fail to function, or that people would get in the way of vehicles, or would make mistakes while driving them. Yet on a per passenger km basis it is the safest it has ever been.

Many cities suffered from chronic pollution due to high concentrations of vehicles, but few environmentalists today would think that it was the steam locomotive that first caused that concern. The now very sought after suburb of Thorndon in Wellington was once not so appreciated, as the steam locomotives in the Wellington rail yards produced smoke and noise that was less than pleasant for many local residents. However, again the pollution from vehicles on a per vehicle km basis is steadily lower, as they become more and more fuel efficient. The introduction of electric cars promises to take this further, but the Greens are willing to dismiss this.

Why? It will "take too long" to have more electric cars in the fleet (apparently not believing their religious faith that Peak Oil will price petrol powered vehicles off the road), and it wont solve congestion.

Well they are right on that front - congestion is simply due to demand exceeding supply of road space. The answer is to price usage of the road so they are in equilibrium, and surpluses might be spent on additional capacity if it makes economic sense. Nowhere has a new world city reduced traffic congestion by the Green fetish of highly subsidised public transport.

However, embracing the technology of the stone age in the form of walking (and its close cousin cycling) is also telling. Now both are perfectly viable for short trips, for many people. They are useless for freight, useless for trips of more than a few kms and of course many (elderly for example) simply can't use them for much. How can anybody looking forward get excited about walking and cycling?

Of course, the main competitors for walking and cycling are public transport - which the Greens want to heavily subsidise, so that people are more likely to ride a bus or train than to walk or cycle. However, that's about economics, which is simply ignored in the Green view.

The Greens reject reason in ignoring the overwhelming evidence that forcing others to pay huge amounts of money for public transport does not resolve traffic congestion, and still only means a small minority of trips are taken by public transport in cities. They further ignore any talk about public transport sometimes being less environmentally friendly than driving - such as the support for the trains that carried less than a busload of travellers to Napier and Invercargill.

They reject the clear economic case that the main problem with roads is that they are managed and priced as commons, not as economic commodities. They furthermore embrace the slowest modes of transport, despite the obvious evidence that they have a peripheral role in most cases, but reject the private car EVEN when it is to be electric powered, because even then it means people travel not when they are scheduled to do so, on a collective mode of transport, but because they choose.

The rational approach to transport is to let the state get out of the way, use private property rights for roads to manage environmental issues and let users of each mode pay their own way. However, for those who believe in collective brains and collective thought, it somehow seems fair for people to pay for how others move, not how they move, and to ignore that the price mechanism remains by far the fairest and most effective tool to ration scarce resources.

Greenwar, what happens when environmentalists get angry

Greenpeace likes to portray itself as embracing non-violence. However, as people around the world have become increasing sceptical about the agenda being peddled by the left dominated environmentalist movement, the continued use of dialogue and discussion has gotten under their skin. Gene Hashimi is from Greenpeace India, and he clearly has forgotten the "peace" part of the organisation's name (not that it has ever used force, no never) with his two part blog post on the Greenpeace blog.

Why would I post a link to it? Because of the threat contained at the end:

he proper channels have failed. It's time for mass civil disobedience to cut off the financial oxygen from denial and skepticism.

If you're one of those who believe that this is not just necessary but also possible, speak to us. Let's talk about what that mass civil disobedience is going to look like.

If you're one of those who have spent their lives undermining progressive climate legislation, bankrolling junk science, fueling spurious debates around false solutions, and cattle-prodding democratically-elected governments into submission, then hear this:

We know who you are. We know where you live. We know where you work.

And we be many, but you be few."

and you'll be up against the wall when the revolution comes. After all, why should you say such a thing unless you were threatening people at their homes or workplaces? Why should it matter that you tell people where they live and work, unless you want to scare them?

Greenpeace has noticed this has caused some alarm. It has engaged in enormous spin to DENY that he is any kind of violent guy. It says "Gene's blog entry is about encouraging PEACEFUL civil disobedience - the kind of peaceful methods that liberated Gene's country (India) from imperialism. I know Gene, and he's a genuinely peaceful guy who believes in the power of peaceful protest to change the world. Some people are trying to portray him as otherwise. Just read what he had to say in context. He is very specific about what he thinks people should do."

Really? In context?

OK. So what does his blog entry say otherwise. Besides the classic anti-US propaganda "Why did the US, despite being responsible for the largest per capita share of global CO2 emissions" - it's not Gene, Qatar is, but too scary to confront Arab monarchies is it?" and then getting upset that the oil industry does what his side has done for many years "The smoke and mirrors created by the fossil fuel lobby are impenetrable. Their own tracks well covered, they operate through front groups, shell companies and think tanks.", it's all just a lot of anger. He is basically upset that some people have a lot of money to put forward their point of view, not that Greenpeace is lacking cash of course.

He talks about how the Micronesian government wrote to the Czech government to tell it to stop the expansion of a coal fired power plant (funny how it didn't write to the Chinese government, except of course China is a generous provider of aid and is unlikely to be responsive). Then lies about it, because the Czech government ignored Micronesia saying "this has revealed that a watertight legal case, a high moral ground and a credible support base are no match for infinitely-resourced and well-muscled think-tanks." Now the coal sector is in cahoots with the oil sector, this "watertight legal case" simply doesn't exist, and what he doesn't say is that the expansion includes modernisation to reduce the rate of emissions. Ahh, Gramsci is alive and well.

So what does he propose to do? "We need to join forces with those within the climate movement that are taking direct action to disrupt the CO2 supply chain". Direct action is code for breaking the law and ignoring private property rights. He endorsed the view of this peaceful person:

"The politicians have failed. Now it's up to us. We must break the law to make the laws we need: laws that are supposed to protect society, and protect our future. Until our laws do that, screw being climate lobbyists. Screw being climate activists. It's not working. We need an army of climate outlaws"

Seems to me a little like another movement that existed in China around 40 years ago.

So the lesson is, if you don't get your way, you break the law and you threaten those who disagree with you.

It's always been nonsense that Greenpeace is about non-violence, as it has heartily embraced state violence to ban, tax, subsidise or compel whatever it wants - now it's more open, Greenpeace supports threatening directly.

UK Election 2010: Libertarian Party UK

Gordon Brown is widely expected to announce the date of the UK general election on Tuesday, and so as a libertarian, it would seem automatic to at least consider the party called the Libertarian Party here in the UK.

The Libertarian Party UK is relatively new, having only been founded at the start of 2008. According to Wikipedia it has 500 members. In the context of New Zealand, which has been running far longer, and has more members, LPUK as it seeks to be known, is truly embryonic.

It has ran a couple of candidates in recent local elections and by-elections, and is solely represented by Gavin Webb, a councillor on the Stoke-On-Trent City Council. This is because Webb defected from the Liberal Democrats.

OK, so it's small.

How does it describe itself? "The Libertarian Party UK is a minarchist party utilising political philosophy based on support for individual liberty" is what was said on its press release announcing Webb has defected. Minarchist means "a political ideology which maintains that the state's only legitimate function is the protection of individuals from aggression". All very well then.


However, do the policies match this?

Well um, only in part.

The economic policy shows it seeks income tax to be abolished, company tax reduced to 10% and the abolition of inheritance and capital gains tax. All well and good (in the right direction). However, then it argues replacing VAT with local and national sales taxes, initially at the same rate as VAT. Hardly ambitious, and handing over taxation to local authorities is rather scary.

Monetary policy is more promising, supporting the Gold standard and free banking.

It is rather limp wristed on quangoes, seeking to make them into departments if they have statutory powers. A better approach would be to go through them and see if any are consistent with the core role of the state, if not then abolish.

However, LPUK would eliminate the statutory minimum wage, which was only introduced under Labour since 1997.

Health policy has low ambitions, seeking competition and a transition to an insurance based model, with no sale of state assets. Far better would be to allow people to opt out of the NHS, give them back their national insurance and then move the NHS to an insurance model that people can opt out of altogether.

Education policy looks like the Conservative one of moving to a voucher based system, but no notion of user pays for the tertiary sector. After all, if income tax is to be abolished then surely this offers greater opportunity for students to finance education from future earnings, and the voluntary sector.

Defence and energy policy is mixed too. Defence is all very well, except armed neutrality as well as remaining a member of NATO. Quite simply incompatible. Either you have allies or you don't. Armed neutrality would have meant the UK conceding continental Europe to the Nazis. By contrast, energy policy is to leave it all to the market, which is welcome.

Welfare policy appears to endorse retaining the welfare state, with most of the policies being about winding back dependency. Far simpler transitions would be to state that non-British citizens could no longer apply for welfare, abolish all welfare for those above the "poverty line" and declare a date after which new applications would welfare would no longer be accepted. Weaning people off of state pensions over time makes sense, but again this might need a little more to it.

Housing and planning policy is perhaps most disappointing. Reviewing planning laws rather than abolishing them. No mention of private property rights. Most disturbing is "ensuring local populations have a strong voice in planning decision making". Nothing libertarian about that at all!

Transport policy is about meddling, with detailed nonsense about seat-belt laws (leave that up to road owners), but OPPOSING "non-freight vehicles" being charged for road use. Taxpayer funded roads are not exactly libertarian either.

Law and order is more promising. Plenty about rolling back intrusions of the state into personal freedoms, legalisation of drugs for adult use and decriminalisation of adult prostitution. Significant steps to legalise ownership of weapons for self defensive purposes. Much detail about the role of the Police.

Finally, Constitutional Policy has some useful gems, such as abolishing the TV licence, Human Rights Act, withdrawal from the EU, and "regionalising" legislation so that MPs from Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland could not vote on legislation that is about matters devolved to their local executives. There is a fair bit about transparent lobbying and only allowing individuals to donate to political parties, which seems almost irrelevant if you don't deal with the more serious issues like - abolishing or reforming the House of Lords and creating a written constitution. Supporting electoral reform is all very well, but unless the system is reformed to eliminate the elected dictatorships on individual rights, it will do little good.

SO all in all a bit of a mish mash. What is lacking is the selling of principles. Principles like private property rights and the individual freedom to act as you see fit, as long as you respect the rights of others. Such fundamental concepts that should be easy to sell to more than 500 people in the UK.

That was the view taken by myself and three of the most libertarian men in the UK (all kiwis) when we visited the South-East Branch of the Libertarian Party meeting the other evening. There was much nodding of heads in agreement, but maybe a classic English lack of passion and lack of willingness to be fired up and argumentative about individual liberty. I had to leave early, but the conclusion I got was there was some good intentions, just not the "fire in the belly" to argue convincingly with the "statist quo".

After all, it isn't about getting elected, especially in a First Past the Post system - it is about ideas, and about changing the terms of the debate. The other minor parties trying to do this are the Greens, which clearly proudly sit on principles (because they are often mainstream today), UKIP (which is anti-EU for reasons of nationalist state sovereignty not individual freedom) and the BNP (which is a bunch of inept racist state worshippers).

It should be about saying NO to those seeking to bribe voters by spending more of their own money or promising new laws for this or that. It should be about making your terms ones of individual rights and for politicians to argue why they should take those rights away or spend your money, rather than to argue about what rights to take away and how to spend it.

I doubt the Libertarian Party will have a candidate in my electorate, although if so, I would likely vote for him or her after asking a few basic questions. However, it is clear LPUK is far from being a compelling electoral grouping at present.

The leader, Chris Mounsey, has a blog called the Devil's Kitchen, which isn't half bad, though I hadn't notice it till today. So that will be worth watching.

The other major libertarian outlet in the UK is the non-political (as in not a party) Libertarian Alliance. It has a blog too, but its utterings are largely ignored as well (and LPUK members I spoke to had no time for the LA).

Dare I have the audacity to say that a bit of Ayn Rand might do them both some good?