Access to all free articles and posts in one place.
Log in
A Newsletter from Duncan Whitmore
Subscription Tiers
FREE
Free Subscriber
1 subscriber
$5
per month
Supporter Tier
Access to all of my premium and free content in one place.
0 subscribers
Features
- Regular articles and essays dedicated to building a freer world of peace and prosperity.
- Access special, premium content for just £5 per month.
Life and Liberty
Jul 15, 2022 05:03 pm
Public post
Why Brexit Still Matters
[An Article from Free Life]
Quite a lot has happened since the United Kingdom officially left the European Union on January 31st 2020. Barely two months had passed before we were subjected – with the mere stroke of a pen – to mass house arrest, compulsory mask wearing, absurd distancing rules and a general shutdown of the economy before being threatened with the possibility of mandatory or coerced vaccinations. While, touchwood, the COVID panic seems to have subsided for now, today the West is fighting a proxy war with Russia in Ukraine, the global economy is in tatters, inflation is rising, and food and energy security have become a top priority in the rich world. The infliction of impoverishment and destitution in order to fulfil globalist, technocratic agendas has met the response of widespread protests on the continent (and even more notably in Sri Lanka, which has ousted its President).
Quite a lot has happened since the United Kingdom officially left the European Union on January 31st 2020. Barely two months had passed before we were subjected – with the mere stroke of a pen – to mass house arrest, compulsory mask wearing, absurd distancing rules and a general shutdown of the economy before being threatened with the possibility of mandatory or coerced vaccinations. While, touchwood, the COVID panic seems to have subsided for now, today the West is fighting a proxy war with Russia in Ukraine, the global economy is in tatters, inflation is rising, and food and energy security have become a top priority in the rich world. The infliction of impoverishment and destitution in order to fulfil globalist, technocratic agendas has met the response of widespread protests on the continent (and even more notably in Sri Lanka, which has ousted its President).
Moreover, all of this has taken place against the backdrop of an accelerating culture war. Real and imagined divisions or fault lines based on gender, race, sexual orientation and religion have been exploited and exaggerated; Western values are denigrated as “imperialist” and “supremacist”; today, the definition of a “woman” seems to be a major political talking point, and yet even only five years ago it would have been laughed off the agenda.
In light of these cataclysmic developments, it is not unusual to see one or two commentators on the right stating that the now distant memory of Brexit no longer has much importance. Frequent among these is journalist James Delingpole, who has tweeted words to this effect on more than one occasion. In terms of magnitude, it is true that any victory achieved by Brexit seems dwarfed by these later events, together with the growth of state power they have enabled. Nevertheless, I think such a view is short-sighted, and at least the spirit, if not the act of Brexit, remains crucial to resisting the onslaught of tyranny.
It’s important to realise that none of the events described has occurred in isolation. Rather, Brexit was the first battle in what is likely to prove a long war against the consolidation and centralisation of power and decision making authority into an ever dwindling handful of supranational institutions. Such global governance is operated at the behest of elites and technocrats whose radical visions for the social and economic order are scarcely within the interests of the populations they rule.
It’s important to realise that none of the events described has occurred in isolation. Rather, Brexit was the first battle in what is likely to prove a long war against the consolidation and centralisation of power and decision making authority into an ever dwindling handful of supranational institutions. Such global governance is operated at the behest of elites and technocrats whose radical visions for the social and economic order are scarcely within the interests of the populations they rule.
Prior to 2016, it is likely that the political establishment believed that they could coast along to around the year 2050 (or farther), implementing their series of transformative visions in a piecemeal fashion without encountering any serious opposition. After all, any major ideological differences – such as that between “capitalism” and “socialism” – seem to have been killed off after the demise of Soviet Communism, subsumed by a liberal democratic consensus. It was difficult not to believe that we were destined for a “rules-based” world order of open borders, neo-liberal economic policies, managed trade, “decarbonised” industry, and a global monoculture based on openness and tolerance of all lifestyles, religions, and choices under the banner of “human rights”.
Brexit, and the election of Donald Trump on his “America First” platform shortly after, were the first indications that this cosy vision of the near future was, to put it politely, inaccurate. To anyone who bothered to peer outside of the M25 or the Washington beltway, neither of these two events was a tremendous surprise. But for those living in the bubble we just described – a cadre largely insulated from the negative economic and social consequences of the policies they championed – these elections were an earthquake. Such shock wasn’t manifest solely in what seemed to be the mere unlikelihood of the outcomes; rather, it was the apparent absurdity that bowled them over. How could any right thinking person possibly want to extract a tiny island from one of the world’s largest trading blocs to “go it alone”? How could anyone in their right mind want to hand the potty mouthed, oafish orange man the keys to the Oval Office? After seventy years of progress in the name of global peace and co-operation (under the West’s terms, of course), weren’t we now retrogressing to the dark days of the 1930s – back to fascism, nationalism, racism and war?
Like(0)
Sign Up or Log In to comment on this post
Life and Liberty
May 31, 2022 05:24 pm
Public post
Let them Eat Bugs
If memories of school dinners make your stomach turn, you may wish to be grateful that you no longer languish in what passes for the UK’s full time education system. Primary school children could soon be offered a course of insects as part of their daytime meals “in order to help the environment”.
According to GB News:
Four primary schools in Wales will be piloting a scheme educating children on "alternative proteins" from sources such as insects.
Crickets, grasshoppers, silkworms, locusts and mealworms will all be discussed with children in Pembrokeshire, with the view of potentially offering them as an alternative protein.
[…]
Insect farms are believed to emit 75% less carbon than traditional livestock.
This, no doubt, is a prelude to inducting a bug-based diet to the rest of the population as part of the so-called “Green Industrial Revolution” – that utopian vision of a future free of things we should apparently do without, such as carbon dioxide and civilisation.
Whether insects and the like are either an “adequate” or even a “good” source of nutrition in a technical sense is beside the point. I am even happy to accept that, according to the report, there are already over “30 parts of bugs in every 100g of chocolate…bread, fruit juices, hops.” Fine. What bugs me (pun intended) is this: there is no reason on God’s green earth to impoverish ourselves with an “alternative protein” source solely because of the unfounded climate hysteria of the urban, liberal left. We should in no way accept the alleged “necessity” of shoving aside the delights of a juicy joint of beef or a bulging breast of chicken simply because of the misidentification of carbon dioxide as a dangerous pollutant.
We seem to be living in an age of anti-innovation in which all of our productive effort – whether its in food, energy, transport, housing or whatever – is geared towards making our lives worse rather than better. We are being ever-so-gently nudged into a life of mere survival in accordance with the dictates of a wealthy, Malthusian elite that views humanity as an aggressive cancer in need of cutting back and subjecting to their rigorous control – all at the same time as they themselves indulge in luxuries that few of us could afford. To add to the irony, it is their own statist-corporatist-leftist policies that are decimating Western society and breeding social decay; they then have the gall to ascribe the resulting problems to rampant overpopulation and the wanton consumption of the great unwashed. Ordinary people should no longer put up with this.
In contrast to any forced “Great Reset” or “Fourth Industrial Revolution”, the path to sustainability, productivity, innovation and progress is, in fact, remarkably simple:
- First, rid ourselves of the scourge of paper money that induces only debt and consumption rather than saving and productivity. Force the politically and financially well-connected to earn their money like the rest of us instead of having it flow from the printing press.
- Second, restore full, private property rights in all resources so that owners bear the cost of depletion. It should be remembered that profits are equal to revenue minus costs. The free market furnishes as much of an incentive to minimise waste as it does to maximise income.
- Third, cut all taxes and regulation so that control over the economy is returned to consumers from the hands of the state and large, favoured corporations.
All of this, moreover, will furnish us with the wherewithal to become more resilient to climate-related problems, whether they be induced by nature or human activity. Indeed, deaths caused by such problems are already at an all-time low.
As for this latest, entomophagic “initiative”, one can hope that the unfortunate children designated as guinea pigs will, themselves, give it short shrift. After all, it’s difficult enough getting kids to finish plate of vegetables; one might have to promise an awful lot of ice cream if they are to finish their creepy crawlies as well.
Life and Liberty
May 25, 2022 05:34 pm
Public post
Windfall Tax Woes
In response to large profits posted by BP and Shell, the UK government is considering a so-called “windfall” tax on oil and gas companies. The aim of this measure is to redistribute, to consumers, the proceeds from those profits so as to ease the burden of the spiralling retail cost of fuel and heating.
In a free market, a sudden rise in price in response to an influx of demand – usually due to an equally sudden change in circumstances, such as a natural disaster – can, indeed, furnish handsome profits to companies which happened to purchase their inputs while prices were still low. Ordinarily, this would serve as a signal to entrepreneurs that there is a grave shortage of capacity in that particular industry, relative to the height of demand. Such entrepreneurs would then rush to expand their investment in the industry, increasing production of the heavily demanded commodity so that its price could be brought down again. Indeed, it is likely that the initial, extraordinary profits – rather than being distributed to shareholders to be spent on mansions and yachts – will be the first source of that fresh investment. Such profits are, therefore, of a benefit to the consumer, but it is also worth noting that they are just as temporary as high, consumer prices. Increased investment in the industry will have the effect of raising the cost of inputs while lowering that of outputs, shrinking profits back to relatively “normal” levels.
A windfall tax, however, would completely destroy this important incentive mechanism. By robbing the companies of those profits, the opposite signal is sent to entrepreneurs and investors: stay away from this industry or your returns will be confiscated! With no fresh investment forthcoming, that industry then struggles to cope with meeting the increased demand through its existing capacity, the only consequence of which can be scarcity and permanently high prices. The proceeds of the tax itself can, at best, provide only temporary relief - and that is assuming that the government doesn’t find some way of wasting the money completely.
Further, in the case of oil and gas, the reason why large profits cannot be used to expand capacity as efficiently as they otherwise could be is because of green-centric government policies that make it difficult to do so. In fact, for the past generation or so, the strategy of governments towards so-called “climate change” has generally consisted of running down the existing fossil fuel infrastructure while throwing subsidies at inferior alternatives such as wind farms. We are now feeling the squeeze as the dilapidated capacity that remains is struggling to cope.
Another destructive mechanism that governments often resort to in these situations is price fixing, although price ceilings are normally applied directly to consumer goods rather than to capital goods. The initial effect here is to stop any kind of extraordinary profits from being made in the first place. The long term consequence, however, will be the same: desperately needed investment in a vital industry stays away.
The only solution to the rising cost of energy is to get governments out of the business of energy entirely, so that companies are able to deploy resources freely to where they are most demanded. In tandem, governments will need to cease all of their activities which are causing the inflationary pressure in the first place, namely: the incessant printing of money, and their geopolitical adventurism that has wrecked supply chains still reeling from the insane COVID lockdowns.
See something you like? Subscribe to see even more!
Star Stats
69 posts
Goals
0.0%
collected
to reach
to reach
The more generous support you can lend me the more time I can invest in producing quality material for you to read and enjoy. Thank you!
Other stars
hardtailparty
Hardtail Mountain Bike reviews and advice
YaronBrookShow
Yaron Brook is the host of the Yaron Brook Show, renowned speaker and best-selling author. Brook travels extensively promoting Ayn Rand and her philosophy-Objectivism, Capitalism, Political & Economic Freedom.
QUANTUM VIBE
QUANTUM VIBE is a sci-fi adventure set in the far future, as remarkable characters seek freedom in the Great Human Diaspora
Max Rich Music
Guitar technique through a scientific, anatomical approach. Optimizing a player's ability based on physiology so they can achieve the most progress in the shortest time possible.
Brett Vachon - Fingerstyle Guitar
Get easy access to all my tutorials
