For those who do not know, almost every square inch of every English city is covered by the lens of one of it’s 4 million CCTV (Closed circuit television) cameras. If you’re in London, you are most certainly covered by some CCTV. This Orwellian measure is supposed to prevent crime, even though it has been found that the whole program has not been effective at stopping crime.

With the progress of technology, comes that of England’s CCTV. Now there are talking cameras that will scold you for littering. Now, taking photos of police in England is illegal as of February 2009, and punishable by up to ten years in prison and a fine. All in the name of counter terrorism. Also noteworthy is the recent announcement that CCTV will be placed inside the homes of the 20,000 worst families in England. To make it worse, this is the leftist government’s idea, the conservatives wanted to take things much further.

Next thing you know, they’ll be putting cameras in bathroom stalls of 11 year old schoolchildren. Oh wait, they have.

If this mess of a government policy were ever to make its way to Canadian shores, I would hope that people would cause as much of a shitstorm about it as is deserved, so that the people we elect will not let it happen. To quote Benjamin Franklin:

Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both.

First quick story comparison: A new military drone robot has been developed to be energetically autonomous (emphasis added):

The system obtains its energy by foraging – engaging in biologically-inspired, organism-like, energy-harvesting behavior which is the equivalent of eating. It can find, ingest, and extract energy from biomass in the environment (and other organically-based energy sources), as well as use conventional and alternative fuels (such as gasoline, heavy fuel, kerosene, diesel, propane, coal, cooking oil, and solar) when suitable.

Trust Fox News to put a neat twist to the story: Upcoming Military Robot Could Feed On Dead Bodies.

In more important news, Stephen Harper said in an interview with the Globe And Mail:

You know, there’s two schools in economics on this. One is that there are some good taxes and the other is that no taxes are good taxes. I’m in the latter category. I don’t believe that any taxes are good taxes.

The author of the article, Jeffery Simpson, proceeds to vilify the PM for what he said. Even making the link that only “libertarian anarchists” think that way:

Only libertarian anarchists believe that all taxes are bad, and that society can get along without them. But who will pay, if not citizens, for the military on which the Harper government is lavishing billions of dollars? Who will pay for the police, the courts?

[...]

Indeed, the comment hearkens back to Mr. Harper’s days shilling for the National Citizens Coalition and early years with the Reform Party, when he believed that just about everything governments were doing was bad and wasteful and led to huge deficits. Since then, and especially as Prime Minister, Mr. Harper has shelved many of those views, since a distinguishing characteristic of his government has been a reluctance to cut government spending.

It didn’t take long for The National Post’s Terence Corcoran to respond:

But what is really going on here is a mounting Liberal campaign to set the state for tax increases to cover future deficits. Liberals cannot officially plant this idea, and they would much rather have Mr. Harper bear the burden by forcing him to raise taxes. As Rev. Simpson says, donning his economic hat, “economic growth alone will not restore Canada’s balanced budget.”

If that’s true, then the real alternative is is to cut spending. Now that, in Rev. Simpson’s Liberal church, is really, really scary, scary.

Can you guess what do the articles have in common? It’s just as much about ad homiem attacks as policy debate. I want to see an intelligent discussion on taxation, it’s benefits and shortcomings.

(More below the fold)
Read on… »

…the more I realize how little I know” has never been so resounding. The crisis in Iran has been viewed, in most Western countries, as a good thing. It’s a clear-cut case of supporting democracy versus dictatorship, right? It seems so, at least. But once you look into it a bit more, you’ll learn that Mousavi, the man who is being supported by protesters, is just as anti-American as Ahmedinejad, he just has different economic policies (Ahmedinejad promised to turn oil money into food on the poor’s tables. He failed miserably)

But then I realize that comments on articles are much more enriching than the articles themselves. Slashdot has an amazing thread, presenting awesome arguments from pretty much any angle. In this, I read a long, but very interesting re-post of Fark.com user Tatsuma’s blog. I have copied it and placed it below the fold, should you want to read it.

Read on… »

In Iran’s recent election,  incumbent president Mahmoud Ahmedinejad has claimed victory. I’m sure this wasn’t such an easy feat, considering that his main opponent, Mir Hossein Mousavi, seemed to have the support of most of the constituencies.

Nothing to fear though. Ahmedinejad had a few tricks to garner enough of the electorate’s support:

Ebrahim Yazdi, ex-foreign minister of Iran, said in an interview:

Do you know that last night the security forces occupied the offices of many newspapers, to make sure that their reporting on the election was favorable? They changed many headlines. They fixed the election.

[...]

There were many, many irregularities. They did not permit the candidates to supervise the election or the counting of the ballots at the polling places. The minister of the interior announced that he would oversee the final count in his office, at the ministry, with only two aides present.

In previous elections, they announced the results in each district, so people could follow up and make a judgment about the validity of the figures. In 2005, there were problems: in one district there were about 100,000 eligible voters, and they announced a total vote of 150,000. This time they didn’t even release information about each particular district.

Three people going to oversee the tally of the millions of votes? Iranian newspapers don’t report any violence?

It seems 500,000 Iranians know better:

These people are still protesting, in the hundreds of thousands, despite many violent crackdowns on the part of Ahmedinejad’s guard. Many have been killed, but protesters march onward. I really feel for these people, but one thing really does scare me, just as much as corrupt government officials – that protesters are going to attribute any victory to Allah, and not their continued efforts.

I’ll spare you from the videos of people being shot.

A man died from a heart attack, during the G20 protests in London. He was allegedly walking home from work when he was hit with a police baton and pushed to the ground.

I have this to say, not in defense of the cop, but in explanation: I have the impression there is a certain demographic of people who choose the profession of city police officer. And I think that as an officer at a protest, where you have been briefed to the nines, are given a shield and a facemask, you get just as charged up emotionally as protesters themselves. It must be easy to be that pumped up, when you wield power in a situation where you are pretty much asked to use it.

So I think I understand the officer’s actions, but that it’s still wrong. A friend of mine put it well:

Sometimes they forget they’re supposed to protect the public, not just diplomats.