The Last Ditch

Julian Assange: which side are you on?

Julian Assange: Sweden issues fresh arrest warrant for WikiLeaks founder | Media | The Guardian.

The most interesting thing about the Wikileaks story is not the information published (was anyone really naieve enough to be surprised?) but the responses of state power everywhere. Totalitarians, kleptocrats, democrats; their angry reactions barely differ. The criminal charges brought against Julian Assange in Sweden, for example, are not so much stitched up as haute couture. All the casual observer will recall is that he was accused of rape. So much for the benevolence of states.

If Assange has endangered lives in Afghanistan or elsewhere that is to be deplored, but most of the leaked material is merely embarrassing to politicians and their servants. It reveals them (to whose surprise?) to be petty, stupid and monumentally careless with our money. He has provided a useful litmus test. People you should like and trust admire his courage and worry about his future. People you should fear and despise call for his head.

Every state represents a dangerous concentration of power and resources, all too tempting for those in charge to deploy against those who irritate them. If Assange is able to name Litvinenko's killers, for example, who can doubt he is in danger of an expensive and painful death? Yet even social-democratic Sweden is prepared to trump up charges. He is a brave man taking great risks.

Hilary Clinton is coldly furious, but who ever doubted which side she is on when it comes to State vs. Citizen? Sarah Palin - supposed friend of the people - has unmasked herself too. A former advisor to the Canadian PM is calling for a hit, and Mr Harper does not disown him. At the other end of the political food chain, Iain Dale quivers with indignation. Look around you. All over the place, people are revealing their true colours. For this, Julian Assange has put himself in harm's way. It's an odd choice but, as Dr King said,

If you haven't found something worth dying for, you aren't fit to be living.

Good luck, Mr Assange. Watch your back.

Booze crisis?

The booze crisis!.

Hie thee over to Tim Worstall's blog for an interesting (and sometimes scary) discussion on the extent to which it is right to use state power to achieve social goals. "Jacob" began the discussion on Tim's post about the economics of alcohol consumption, by saying;

I’m not sure I understand. Why exactly do we not want to corrall people into making certain choices? Seems to me that threat of a prison sentence corralls people into not breaking the law.

An interesting debate ensued, with more such interventions by "Jacob" Eventually this led "Stephen" to make my favourite blog comment of the week;

I’m wondering if Jacob is a bot. That’s possibly the first time I’ve seen a human fail the Turing Test…

Touché. Stephen of Zenvestor, blog commenter at Tim Worstall's blog, is hereby appointed my "Person of the Month."

Dr. Arif Ahmed

Link: Faculty of Philosophy: Dr Arif Ahmed.

...is my person of the month. Here's why. Well said, that man although - to quibble slightly - I don't think we should feel free to mock the over-sensitive only when their beliefs are "...a tissue of superstition and prejudice..."

In a free society, one should sometimes mock beliefs just for fun, if only to test them, or to harden the believers up for life as free men. They will thank us for it one day, when they are no longer mullah-struck victims clinging to the apron strings of the Nanny State.