Posts Tagged ‘socialism’

Gutfeld to Millennials: Communism Doesn’t Work

Sunday, November 3rd, 2019

Seems like we as a society have been remiss in communicating to Millennials what a horrible murderous failure communism has been.

We don’t need more “civics lessons,” we need more movies like The Killing Fields and The Lives of Others. And given how eagerly Hollywood kowtows to China, we’re not likely to get them…

LinkSwarm for August 9, 2019

Friday, August 9th, 2019

Welcome to another Friday LinkSwarm! It’s been both super busy and super-hot here at BattleSwarm headquarters…

  • Leftward ho:

    Ah, the good ol’ days of . . . April, or so, when conservative critics of the Democratic party could still count on being lectured to about the enduring moderation of Team Blue and chastised for paying so much attention to such figures as Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (a member of the Democratic Socialists of America) and Senator Bernie Sanders (a member of the Democratic Socialists of America) and claiming that these self-described socialists are the socialists they describe themselves as being, who want to “abolish capitalism” (the stated mission of the Democratic Socialists of America) and the traditional family to boot (“democratizing the family to get rid of patriarchal relations,” in the words of the Democratic Socialists of America), all of which, the usual media scolds tut-tutted, was unfair. “The Democratic party is the party of moderates,” as Politico magazine editor Bill Scher argued.

    Somebody must have slipped some psilocybin into the Democrats’ potato salad at this year’s May Day picnic. Open borders? Check! Eviscerating the Bill of Rights? Absolutely, with one of those weird barbed Uncle Henry gut-hook knives! What else? I hope that whichever debate moderator finally presses this crew about the limits of late-term abortion is over 35, because Elizabeth Warren was pretty clearly ready to roll up her sleeves and perform an impromptu D&E right there underneath the Art Deco adornments and heavy brocade curtains of the Fox Theater in beautiful downtown Detroit.

  • Speaking of the Democratic Socialists of America, Stephen Green looks in on those lunatics. “No perfume in the quiet room, no misusing doors, no talking to cops, no talking to the press, always display your credentials, beware of right wing infiltrators.” Plus the usual lunacy about pronouns, and triggering, and singing “The Internationale.”
  • Border control policies start working:

    Monthly apprehensions of migrants in Mexico have begun to slow down, indicating that its government’s recent border crackdown is yielding results.

    Authorities in Mexico apprehended 18,758 migrants in July, according to preliminary data from Mexico’s immigration agency, reported by The Wall Street Journal. While this number is more than double the amount detained in the same month last year, it is a decline from the record-setting 31,573 apprehensions in Mexico in June.

  • “China Wants to Hit Back at Trump. Its Own Economy Stands in the Way.”

    China’s imports from the United States only a fraction of the trade going the other way, so it cannot match Washington tariff for tariff. Much of that trade consists of agriculture goods like soybeans, as well as specialized products like Boeing jetliners or the American-made chips for the smartphones China makes.

    There are several things China could do. It could call for a boycott of American goods or stop buying Boeing planes. It could devalue its currency, which would in effect partially nullify American tariffs. It could make life much harder for American business and executives in China, or it could exercise its power over key parts of the global supply chain, like its dominance over key manufacturing minerals called rare earths.

    Some investors on Friday signaled they expect at least one of those moves. China’s currency, the renminbi, fell to its weakest point so far this year. Shares of rare earths companies rose, while Boeing’s shares fell more than the broader market on Thursday.

    But each of these measures has drawbacks. Perhaps the biggest among them is that China’s economy is growing at its slowest pace in 27 years. Many of the arrows Beijing has in its quiver could ricochet and hit its own factories and workers.

    Plus the perils of weakening the renminbi. Also: “As they consider their moves, Chinese officials will also try to parse Mr. Trump’s negotiating strategy. Experts said his capricious style had flummoxed Beijing.”

  • How the media pick and choose which parts of the El Paso shooter’s manifesto to hype.
  • More on the same subject:

    The manifesto is insane. Part of it discussed commonly debated issues such as the environment and the economy in ways that are well within the boundaries of political conversation going on today — indeed, that might have come out of the New York Times or many other outlets. Other parts of it mixed in theories on immigration from far right circles in Europe and the U.S. Then it threw in beliefs on “race-mixing” straight from the fever swamps. And then it concluded that the solution is to murder Hispanic immigrants, going on to debate whether an AK-47 or an AR-15 would best do the job. By that point, Crusius had veered far from both reality and basic humanity.

    But the question is, was he inspired by President Trump? It is hard to make that case looking at the manifesto in its entirety.

    Crusius worried about many things, if the manifesto is any indication. He certainly worried about immigration, but also about automation. About job losses. About a universal basic income. Oil drilling. Urban sprawl. Watersheds. Plastic waste. Paper waste. A blue Texas. College debt. Recycling. Healthcare. Sustainability. And more. Large portions of the manifesto simply could not be more un-Trumpian.

  • Dayton shooter was indeed a “Pro-Satan Leftist Who Supported Elizabeth Warren.”
  • How President Donald Trump changes the political calculus.

    This is a colossal fraud, and it won’t work. The public doesn’t buy it; the candidates aren’t talking about it; when Congress returns in September, Lindsey Graham’s Senate Judiciary Committee will grill the authors of the politicization of the intelligence agencies, the FBI, and other parts of the Obama Justice Department as well as the propagators of the false Steele dossier and the fraudulent FISA warrant applications. Graham (R-S.C.), will get the publicity, and the bare-faced liars who chair the House Judiciary and Intelligence committees, Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.) and Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), will be talking to themselves about their “solid evidence” of the president’s crimes. Weissman and the lesser Democratic Torquemadas couldn’t find them; Nadler and Schiff can’t declare what their evidence is (because there is none).

    This is the last echo of this attempted rape of the Constitution and no one will be listening when the Congress returns in September. They will listen to the Graham committee’s exposés of the Democrats who acted corruptly, and they will notice the indictments when the special counsel, (John Durham, who unlike Mueller does have full retention of his faculties), starts bringing them down.

    The president deliberately has escalated the controversy by attempting to make the four extremist freshman Democratic congresswomen the real face of the Democrats, and by pointing out, in the case of Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.), the inappropriateness of Cummings’ assault on the integrity of the acting secretary of the Department of Homeland Security.

    The president undoubtedly knows that he is playing with fire assaulting the most holy of the taboos of political correctness so explicitly, though his grasp of the political arithmetic is almost certainly correct. I assume he can reassure his own followers and whatever independent voters may be left in this fierce partisan crossfire that he is not racist. In sober times, it would be clear that no case whatever exists that he is a racist. But these are not sober times and he has contributed something to their insobriety, though—one must remember—in reaction to immense provocations.

  • Is the UK headed for a November 1st election the day after Brexit? (Hat tip: Ed Driscoll at Instapundit.)
  • How Trump’s legal team of “nobodies” defeated Robert Mueller’s team of credentialed elites.
  • Liberals just come out and admit that yes, they do indeed want to seize the guns of law-abiding Americans.
  • More on “Red Flag” laws:

  • Active shooters are a rounding error. “If you feel the need to take training to protect your life and the lives of your loved ones, take a Defensive Driving Course.” (Hat tip: Karl Rehn.)
  • “AT&T employees took bribes to plant malware on the company’s network. DOJ charges Pakistani man with bribing AT&T employees more than $1 million to install malware on the company’s network, unlock more than 2 million devices.”
  • Two Amazon subcontractor drivers stole an estimated $10 million worth of goods over several years, selling many items through pawn shops.
  • “Minimum Wage Hikes in NYC Are Forcing Businesses to Cut Jobs and Raise Prices.”
  • Washington Post writer goes through Sugar Detox.

    But here’s the part that blew my mind: I started to lose weight. Before the detox I weighed 166 pounds. Twelve weeks later, I hit a new low adult weight: 155. I’ve cinched in my belt a notch. My bloodwork looks much better (my triglycerides dropped by half in six weeks). And as my belly fat has reduced, I do feel better and more energetic.

    The weight-loss and triglyceride reduction mirrors my own experience when I first went on Atkins.

  • Speaking of meat: the vegetarians who became butchers.
  • New York Times revenues continue to decline. I’m sure that somehow this is all Russia’s fault…
  • Leftwing protestors call for the murder of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. Naturally Twitter suspended the account…of his reelection campaign, for showing videos of leftwing protestors calling for his murder:

  • Lunatic tranny balls-waxing lawsuit filer Jonathan Yaniv arrested for brandishing a stun gun.
  • Uber lost $5.24 billion this quarter. That’s with a “B”.
  • At least two people on Joaquin Castro’s list of San Antonio Trump donors also donated to him. (Hat tip: Director Blue.)
  • ”Democrats Propose Creation Of National Trump Voter Registry.
  • “Experts Warn We Have Only 12 Years Left Until They Change The Timeline On Global Warming Again.”
  • LinkSwarm for February 15, 2019

    Friday, February 15th, 2019

    There’s a much criticized spending bill with a lot of poison pill provisions and a tiny bit of border wall funding President Trump is expected to sign, and then declare a national emergency to get the wall built.

    While that’s up in the air, enjoy a Friday LinkSwarm:

  • Democrats don’t want to detain or deport violent felons. If that’s the hill they want to die on, bring on the shutdown. (Hat tip: Director Blue.)
  • “National Border Patrol Council president Brandon Judd told Breitbart News Tonight on Wednesday that Congress had ignored the advice of experts when reaching a deal to provide less than $1.4 billion for border fencing.”
  • The ludicrous nature of the Democrats’ “Green New Deal” continues to haunt them, leading to a lot of walking back economically insane socialist goals. NPR has the original text of the proposal.
  • Jonah Goldberg on the subject:

    These people think that they can adequately plan and run — for all time — an economic system from Washington that would guarantee: “a job with a family-sustaining wage, adequate family and medical leave, paid vacations, and retirement security to all people of the United States” as well as “access to nature.”

    But they can’t even plan the roll out of a non-binding resolution and some press-release materials? And, when confronted by their own words, their immediate response was to accuse their enemies of sabotaging them? Gosh, by all means, let’s give them control of the entire economy. That couldn’t work out badly. I mean “Mistakes happen when doing time launches like this coordinating multiple groups and collaborators,” when uploading FAQs, not when doing anything as simple as commandeering the bulk of the U.S. economy.

  • Republicans pull the dirtiest trick on Democrats ever: forcing them to vote on the Green New Deal lunacy they just endorsed. (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)
  • Bill Barr confirmed as Attorney General.
  • Amazon cancels it’s New York City HQ2 expansion plans. Government shouldn’t be throwing subsidies at targeted corporations (nor picking winners and losers). The decision is also rich, zesty schadenfreude for Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez screwing over New York Governor Andrew Cuomo and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, who both pushed hard for the Amazon deal.
  • This story should be absolutely infuriating to everyone on all sides of the political spectrum: rather than preserving or processing DNA rape kits, Oklahoma destroyed them.
  • How do Democrats expect to get socialism to work nationwide when they can’t even get it to work at one Panera Bread location?
  • Twitter bias is real. “Of 22 prominent, politically active individuals who are known to have been suspended since 2005 and who expressed a preference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, 21 supported Donald Trump.” (Hat tip: Director Blue.)
  • Democrats cause climate change. The science is settled!
  • Those pesky peasants are threatening the EU by daring to vote for parties of which the EU elite disapproved.
  • Brexit update:

  • “Migrants” banned from Finnish schools and daycare centers because of all the rapes.
  • Here’s a phising scam that targets not only credit unions, but the credit union officers in charge of enforcing anti-money laundering laws.
  • Pro-tip: If you’re a phone scammer, try not to target the former head of the FBI and the CIA.
  • Meanwhile in Australia: “$500 per family for a single day’s electricity. There’s your Green New Deal.”
  • Germany and Japan are teaming up to oppose American foreign policy. I’ve seen this movie before, and I don’t think they’ll like how it ends…
  • Islamic State executioner enjoys death by tank. (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)
  • More semi-informed speculation than insider knowledge: “The Notorious RBG…is not dead. But she probably soon will be.” (Hat tip: Doug Ross on Twitter.)
  • New frontiers in unconstitutional legislation: “The Los Angeles City Council voted yesterday to require companies who want to contract with the city to disclose their relationships with the National Rifle Association.” (Hat tip: Ace of Spades HQ.)
  • Disgraced former Democratic state senator Carlos Uresti sentenced to five years for bribery. Unfortunately it will run concurrently with his fraud conviction, and therefore result in no additional time in prison. (Hat tip: Dwight.)
  • Don’t mess with Texas, Part 8,192. Doesn’t say whether the attackers were illegal aliens or not. (Hat tip: HeidiL_RN.)
  • There’s low, and there’s “constable stealing Hurricane Harvey donations” low.
  • Tesla’s Buffalo Gigafactory workers are not happy campers.
  • Jussie Smollett’s hate crime allegations fall apart.
  • New Jersey hates high school football.
  • I don’t keep up with celebrity culture at all, but this is freaking hilarious. (Hat tip: Ann Althouse, who provides context for celebrity-challenged.)
  • “Millennials Have Discovered ‘Going Out’ Sucks.” And they only discovered this after cities pushed densification policies to hurd them all downtown where the clubs and bars are… (Hat tip: Millennial Conservative.)
  • “Nicolas Maduro must go.”

    Wednesday, January 23rd, 2019

    Well, this is a shame:

    Venezuela plunged deeper into turmoil Monday as security forces put down a pre-dawn uprising by national guardsmen that triggered violent street protests, and the Supreme Court moved to undercut the opposition-controlled congress’ defiant new leadership.

    Socialist party chief Diosdado Cabello said 27 guardsmen were arrested and more could be detained as the investigation unfolds.

    The mutiny struck at a time when opposition leaders have regained momentum in their efforts to oust President Nicolas Maduro. They have called for a nationwide demonstration Wednesday, urging Venezuelans — especially members of the armed forces — to abandon Maduro.

    The uprising triggered protests in a poor neighborhood just a few miles (kilometers) from Venezuela’s presidential palace. It was dispersed with tear gas as residents set fire to a barricade of trash and chanted demands that Maduro leave power.

    The military said in a statement said that it had recovered all the weapons and captured those involved in what it described as “treasonous” acts motivated by “obscure interests tied to the far right.”

    I guess “the far right” includes “people who want to be able to feed their children.” Plus those who want to avoid being tortured for alleged disloyalty to the regime.

    Meanwhile, the Venezuelan opposition is planning a mass protest.

    More context:

    Venezuela is officially a dictatorship. The Organization of American States does not recognize Nicolas Maduro as its president. Nor does nearly all of Latin America, with the exception of maybe three governments: Cuba, Bolivia, and Nicaragua….Everyone except those three aforementioned countries now recognize National Assembly president Juan Guaidó as the democratically elected leader of the country. He has been leading rallies nationwide in an effort to galvanize public support to oust PSUV from power.

    Keep in mind that, thanks to The Magic Power of Socialism™, inflation in Venezuela hit 80,000% last year.

    What needs to happen is for the Venezuelan military to finally abandon Maduro’s illegitimate government en masse, but so far that’s not happening, even though “more than 4,000 low-ranking officers deserted last year.”

    Vice President Mike Pence penned an editorial in The Wall Street Journal nicely summing up the situation:

    The Venezuelan people will march Wednesday for freedom and democracy. They will do so at the urging of the National Assembly—Venezuela’s legitimate legislature—and its courageous president, Juan Guaidó. As I told Mr. Guaidó last week, President Trump and the U.S. stand resolutely with the Venezuelan people as they seek to regain their liberty from dictator Nicolás Maduro.

    The National Assembly has rightly called Mr. Maduro’s rule illegitimate, following a sham election last May. It has called for protests on Jan. 23 because on that date in 1958 the Venezuelan people toppled their country’s military dictatorship.

    As I have heard many times from Venezuelans over the past 2 years, Mr. Maduro has exacerbated the country’s corruption and socialist policies, accelerating its descent from one of the richest countries in the Western Hemisphere to one of the poorest and most despotic. He promised prosperity, but his actions have caused Venezuela’s economy to shrink by nearly 50%. He promised safety and security, but cities and streets are now overrun with murderous gangs, kidnappers and thieves. He promised to respect democracy, but instead followed the advice and example of his communist mentors in Cuba, imprisoning opponents, banning major parties, and undermining fair elections.

    Snip.

    Venezuela’s crisis will worsen until democracy is restored. That is why under President Trump, the U.S. strongly supports the National Assembly and Mr. Guaidó. Nicolás Maduro has no legitimate claim to power. Nicolás Maduro must go.

    Venezuela Socialist President Nicolas Maduro Target of Drone Attack

    Sunday, August 5th, 2018

    The only thing surprising about this story is that it didn’t happen two years ago.

    Information Minister Jorge Rodriguez said in a live broadcast Saturday that several dronelike devices armed with explosives detonated near Maduro during his appearance at a military event, according to AP.

    It quoted Rodriguez as saying Maduro was safe and unharmed. According to Reuters, seven National Guard soldiers were hurt.

    Just think how much better off Venezuela might be if someone had taken out Maduro before he admitted socialism was a failure, or even before people started eating their dogs and children started dying because his socialist paradise can’t afford antibiotics?

    Here’s footage of the attack. You can’t see the drone attack itself, but you can see reactions to it and people running from it.

    It’s actually surprising we haven’t seen more drone assassination attempts. The technology is mature and the strike can be carried out from several blocks away, even out of line-of-sight with an onboard video camera. Get a medium-sized quadcopter, pack it full of Semtex and roofing nails, and detonate a few feet from your target.

    Not only have we been using Predator drones since 1994, the Predator has actually been retired in favor of the much larger and faster MQ-9A Reaper…

    Nicaragua: It Hits The Fan

    Saturday, July 14th, 2018

    Violence escalated in Nicaragua as a nationwide strike demanding that corrupt, brutal communist scumbag Daniel Ortega resign triggered a violent crackdown by pro-Sandinista paramilitary groups.

    The clashes between forces that support President Daniel Ortega and demonstrators calling for his resignation mark the deadliest protests in Nicaragua since its civil war ended in 1990.

    At the Divine Mercy Catholic Church in Managua, at least three people were injured, according to a post on Twitter by Paulo Abrao, an official with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.

    One of the injured has been shot through the leg, a Washington Post reporter at the church posted on Twitter, and along with others was allowed out by police and met by waiting ambulances.

    It was unclear how many people remained trapped in the church where earlier in the evening gun shots prevented those inside from leaving.

    At the National Autonomous University of Nicaragua, also in the capital, some students barricaded themselves on the campus earlier in the day as paramilitary groups that support Ortega shot at the building from outside, according to media reports.

    It was not clear how many people had been injured at the university.

    Nicaragua has been convulsed by unrest since April when its leftist president proposed reducing pension benefits to cover a social security shortfall. The plan, later dropped, provoked deadly demonstrations and led to demands for Ortega’s resignation and early elections.

    A nation-wide strike emptied streets on Friday as businesses shut their doors, heeding the call of civil society groups that have demanded Ortega’s resignation after more than three months of bloody civil unrest.

    The general strike followed mass protests that fanned out across the Central American nation on Thursday.

    Nicaragua has been trending this way for a while. The Trump Administration has called for Ortega and his family to step down:

    U.S. Ambassador Michael Kozak, of the State Department’s bureau of democracy, human rights and labor, told a House Foreign Affairs subcommittee on Thursday that demonstrators have even been blocked from getting treatment for their injuries and government-run hospitals have reportedly required families to sign certificates that falsified the cause of deaths as a condition of retrieving relatives’ bodies.

    Kozak and other administration officials told Congress that the only way to address the ongoing crisis in Nicaragua is with new elections that would allow the Nicaraguan people to pick new leadership.

    “Nobody is going to be able to reconcile with the regime in power,” Kozak testified. “It’s really important for them to get out of the way and let the country make a future for itself. It’s how do you make that happen mechanically. How do you put enough pressure on the family basically to make that choice and get out of the way.”

    More than 250 people have been killed since daily peaceful protests in April turned into a political uprising. Most deaths have been at the hands of the national police, state security forces and government-led gangs who target peaceful demonstrators, officials said.

    While some have expressed surprise at the violence in what was once known as the most stable country in Central America, Rep. Paul Cook, R-Calif., chairman of the subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere, said this crisis did not occur overnight.

    “In my view, it is a result of more than a decade of Ortega’s authoritarian rule and built-up resentment from the Nicaraguan people who have seen the Ortega family enrich themselves at the expense of the country,” Cook said, calling on the United States to take stronger actions.

    Even the lefty Washington Post editorial board has gotten a clue-by-four on Nicaragua, comparing it to Venezuela, Latin America’s other socialist basket case:

    THE DEATH TOLL in Nicaragua continues to rise. A bloody assault on protesters Sunday by police and pro-government paramilitary forces left 31 civilians, four police officers and three members of President Daniel Ortega’s black-hooded paramilitary groups dead. This was the highest one-day body count since pro-democracy demonstrations began April 18; it left the cumulative total at more than 300, according to human rights monitors. Monday, masked pro-Ortega thugs armed with clubs and handguns invaded a church where protesters had taken refuge and roughed up the Roman Catholic auxiliary bishop of Managua, Silvio José Báez. There are reliable reports of sniper fire against peaceful civilian protests.

    Such bloodshed, so reminiscent of the political carnage that plagued Central America in the 1970s and 1980s, is repugnant enough on its own. What was especially ominous about this latest spasm, however, is that it came just after Mr. Ortega declared at a rally on Saturday his unequivocal rejection of the leading compromise proposal for resolving Nicaragua’s crisis: holding early national elections, rather than waiting for 2021. And on Monday the Ortega government issued a proclamation declaring its opponents “terrorists” and canceling any further political talks until such time as “the serious problem of terrorism, insecurity and violence . . . has been addressed and resolved in a verifiable manner.”

    In short, the Ortega regime has now opted for all-out repression similar to that practiced against the democracy movement in Venezuela. It is true that protesters in Nicaragua have blocked key roads with heavy brick barricades, a tactic opponents of the erstwhile Somoza dictatorship, including Mr. Ortega’s Sandinista front, employed when that regime forced them into it — just as Mr. Ortega’s regime is forcing its opponents into strikes and civil disobedience today. This is taking a toll on the Nicaraguan economy. Yet the government is responsible for the vast majority of the deaths and injuries. Contrary to regime propaganda, the opposition remains overwhelmingly peaceful and unarmed; the only terrorism in Nicaragua today is the official kind.

    There’s even an Austin angle here, with two cousins describing how they were kidnapped and beaten by paramilitary forces. (Warning: Autoplay video.) Though the piece doesn’t mention that it was pro-government paramilitary forces until 90 seconds in.

    Things will continue to deteriorate in Nicaragua until Ortega either steps down or is removed from power.

    Alfie Must Die So That The Glorious Dream of Socialism Might Live

    Thursday, April 26th, 2018

    Thou Shalt Have No Other Gods Before the NHS.

    A UK court has decided that not only must toddler Alfie Evans, who has “a rare undiagnosed degenerative neurological condition,” be denied treatment in the UK, but that he he must not be allowed abroad for some other country to pay for saving his life.

    Remember how Democrats scoffed at the ideas of death panels?

    Well, a UK death panel decided a small boy must die, and the state will use force to make sure he does die.

    Alfie must duffer so that the state won’t be embarrassed by their attempts to kill him.

    Every. Knee. Must. Bend.

    Alfie Evans must die so that the glorious dream of socialism might live:

    The NHS simply cannot afford the extremely expensive prospect of keeping alive a little boy who most likely will not live much longer due to an incurable condition. Alfie’s chances of any meaningful recovery were slim to none. It isn’t outside the boundaries of reason that the government tasked with his treatment would deem it simply not worth the effort expended.

    It’s cruel, but logical…the inevitable result of a single-payer system.

    I may not agree with such reasoning, but I can at least derive the path that such woeful decisions must take in a place like the UK.

    What is not logical and nearly incomprehensible is the decision of the court not simply to deny Alfie further treatment, but then deny his right and the right of his parents to leave the country to seek treatment elsewhere. Even that decision might make a tiny bit of sense if it were to add to the NHS’ costs. That would be a problem for that pesky algorithm. However, Italy had already sent an airlift equipped to take the young child. His transportation and hospital provisions were covered by donations and the state of Italy. In fact, to move Alfie out of the care of the NHS would only save them money and labor. Alfie’s parents would have one more shot at rescuing his life. It seems like a win-win for everyone.

    And still, the courts have barred the family from leaving the country.

    Let’s ponder that for just one moment. Great Britain is a nation with a proud history of freedom and democracy. Most other nations around the world and Britons themselves would describe it as a “free country”, and yet here is a case where its free citizens are not allowed to leave its borders.

    Is this something that should happen in a “free country”? Would Alfie’s parents be barred from taking a vacation? Would anyone in their right mind in that country find it acceptable or consistent with British values to deny any family the right to leave for a vacation or to visit a relative abroad? Why then is it allowable for this family to be virtual hostages in their land simply because their reason for travel is medical care rather than pleasure?

    Some years ago I watched a documentary on the design and building of the Berlin Wall between East Germany and West Germany. It included extremely rare clips of interviews with the architects (I was shocked to learn there was actually a deliberate design to that monstrosity).

    Snip.

    In one clip, an aging (former) East German Wall architect spoke briskly about the strategy of his designs. Although the interview was conducted during what must have been the last years of his life, he still seemed deeply resentful that he was being asked to defend the wall’s erection even after the fall of the Eastern Bloc. I’ll never forget what he said in that interview – it made the hair stand up on my arms.

    With great sincerity – almost pleading with the interviewer – he said, “We had to build the wall. Too many people were leaving for the West and you need people to make socialism work. We had to build the wall to keep them in so they could see how great socialism was, so they could see that it works.”

    Snip.

    This is exactly the point in the ruling by the NHS and the courts to forbid their free citizens from leaving the country. If they are allowed to flee the heart-wrenching consequences of socialism, then others will want to do the same. How can a socialist system work without the cooperation of everyone? And how can you force people to participate in that socialist system when they discover that system may kill them or their loved ones?

    You build a wall.

    Great Britain doesn’t yet have a wall to keep its citizens in, but the courts have built one with the law. Just as East Germany could not tolerate the massive loss of defectors who were leaving with their training, intellect and tax dollars, Great Britain’s healthcare system cannot tolerate the defection of those who might find better healthcare somewhere else.

    After all, how would it look if Alfie were allowed to leave England (allowed to leave a free country! Even to write the words feels absurd!) and then found a successful treatment in another country?

    It would be an abject embarrassment to a government that holds up their socialist healthcare as one of the wonders of the Western world. Not only would they be forced to admit that their own doctors and bureaucrats were wrong for denying this baby life-saving measures, but they would then have to deal with hundreds, maybe thousands of other citizens fleeing the bondage of NHS algorithms for a chance at swifter, more modern healthcare.

    For some bizarre reason, a nation that boasts figures like Winston Churchill and Margaret Thatcher, a tiny island nation that was once so powerful and broad it was said that the sun never set on the British empire…for some inexplicable reason that nation has chosen to hang its pride and joy on socialized medicine.

    If you think I exaggerate just look up the opening ceremonies of the London Olympics.

    To release this child to the care of any other nation would be to admit failure, and heartless bureaucrats who will never have to watch young Alfie struggle for air or dehydrate to death have decided that their misplaced pride is more valuable than the lives of their citizens.

    Borepatch is even blunter:

    Doctors cut off water from a baby. How could that have happened?

    The religion of socialized medicine rules the land that used to be Great Britain. That religion has a priesthood, trained in the Universities and ruthless in their demand to be appeased. They control the purse strings of the hospitals, and therefore the doctors. Their sacred writ (the “Liverpool Pathway”) is enforced – and they pay cash money for sacrifices, to the tune of millions of pounds sterling each year.

    The priesthood’s rule is so complete that the parents were forbidden to take their baby out of the country, even though there were other countries willing to take him.

    There’s an Ursula K. Le Guin story called “The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas,” about a utopian city whose prosperity is dependent (how it is never stated) by keeping pne child locked away in torment and misery. It won a Hugo Award, back when they actually meant something, despite all but having a giant blinking neon sign proclaiming COME SEE THE METAPHOR!

    The story ends with those whose conscience is shocked by this one great injustice walking away from the city, but now we know that’s not true. Now we know that the “good” people, the one’s most insistent on their own virtue, wouldn’t walk away, Instead, like NHS, they’d be indignantly guarding the child’s door to prevent him from escaping.

    Formerly Bankrupt Stockton Lays Plans For Next Bankruptcy

    Wednesday, February 7th, 2018

    If you just emerged from bankruptcy, part of your plan to stay solvent probably doesn’t include “handing out free money,” but that’s precisely what the city of Stockton, California is going to try.

    Michael Tubbs, the 26-year-old mayor of Stockton, California, thinks handing out $6,000 a year to low-income residents (with no strings attached) is the way to lift people out of poverty.

    “Stockton is absolutely Ground Zero for a lot of the issues we’re facing as a nation,” Tubbs told CBS San Francisco (video below). “Ideally, I would like to serve 100 families for 18 months at $500 a month.”

    Stockton is experimenting with a welfare program called “universal basic income,” which gives low-income residents $500 a month, no questions asked. The money is coming from a private grant.

    The California city, which went bankrupt in 2012, has recently made strides to become more economically viable, but is still struggling.

    Mayor Tubbs, who was endorsed by Barack Obama, took office in January 2017. He is Stockton’s first black mayor, and its youngest-ever at age 26.

    You may remember Stockton from such hits as “Hey, let’s give lots of money to a downtown developer for 14 units of affordable housing,” “Even though we went through bankruptcy, we didn’t address our huge underfunded pension liabilities,” and “our mayor was arrested for embezzling from a kids club.” Mayor Tubbs owes his office to the last scandal involving previous mayor Anthony Silva.

    “Universal basic income” is the latest repackaged welfare state socialism, and its been tried before in the SIME/DIME “negative income tax” experiments. The results, as anyone not on the left could have predicted, were disasterous: people worked less and families broke up more often.

    Those who can’t learn from the mistakes of others are doomed to repeat them. We have plenty of evidence that guaranteed income rewards idleness and discourages work. Combine that with California’s legal cannabis, and you have the Full Subsidy for Potheads to Play Video Games All Day Act. The only question is whether its a sincere (doomed) attempt at implementing a socialist fantasy, or a cynical ploy to payoff off supporters under the guise of “guaranteed income.” Either way, it’s destined for failure, and will help lay the groundwork for Stockton’s next bankruptcy.

    Venezuela Officially Bankrupt

    Thursday, November 16th, 2017

    The inevitable has happened: The Magic Power of Socialism™ has officially bankrupted Venezuela:

    Milton Friedman once joked that if you put the government in charge of the Sahara Desert in five years there would be a shortage of sand. He could have been talking about Venezuela and its oil wealth. But it is no joke.

    On Monday Caracas missed interest payments due on two government bonds and one bond issued by the state-owned oil monopoly known by its Spanish initials PdVSA. Venezuela owed creditors $280 million, which it couldn’t manage even after a 30-day grace period.

    Venezuela is broke, which takes some doing. For much of the second half of the 20th century, a gusher of oil exports made dollars abundant in Venezuela and the country imported the finest of everything. There were rough patches in the 1980s and 1990s, but by 2001 Venezuela was the richest country in South America.

    Then in 2005 the socialist Hugo Chávez declared that the central bank had “excessive reserves.” He mandated that the executive take the excess from the bank without compensation. Today the central bank has at best $1 billion in reserves.

    Falling oil prices are partly to blame, but the main problem is that chavismo has strangled entrepreneurship. Faced with expropriation, hyperinflation, price controls and rampant corruption, human and monetary capital has fled Venezuela.

    As of Tuesday evening, the Investment Swaps and Derivatives Association still had not declared Venezuela in default. That matters because this will trigger the insurance obligations inherent in the credit default swaps. But S&P Global Ratings declared the country in default Monday. On Tuesday morning the Luxembourg Stock Exchange issued a suspension notice for the bonds with missed payments.

    From the richest nation in latin America to one where people have to eat their own pets to stave off starvation.

    Venezuela: Lynching, Riots, General Collapse

    Monday, June 19th, 2017

    Time for an update on everyone’s favorite socialist paradise, where the collapse of the economy (and civil society) continues apace:

  • Things have degenerated enough that lynching has made a comeback:

    The public-safety infrastructure in Venezuela has been degraded to such a degree that citizens now take justice into their own hands. Agence France Presse reported that lynchings have risen sharply over the last year and a half as political and economic instability in the crumbling socialist republic has worsened. Witnesses who spoke to AFP said a 22-year-old man who was set on fire at an anti-government demonstration in May was actually lynched after being accused of stealing by the crowd – not because he was a government sympathizer, as President Nicolas Maduro had suggested at the time.

  • Protestors set fire to the Venezuela Supreme Court. “The incident comes after the Supreme Court voted to reject a motion blocking Maduro from rewriting the country’s constitution, despite recent polls showing that up to 85 percent of Venezuelans oppose the reforms.”
  • Tearing down a statue of Hugo Chavez doesn’t get you sent before a civilian judge, it lands you before a military tribunal:

    Maduro is following the playbook of other tyrants facing the collapse of socialism page by page. The anger in the streets against his failed regime is so intense that protesters might not be convicted in a jury trial handled through the regular order of civilian law enforcement. So instead, the troublemakers are being rounded up and taken off to face a court martial in an environment which the government can closely control.

  • Brazil has suspended tear gas sales to Venezuela.
  • Venezuela’s collapsing oil industry is also screwing over Cuba.
  • Venezuela in 20 pictures. Including a really sad one of a starving elephant. (Hat tip: Director Blue.)
  • Are the government’s Twitter accounts suspended?
  • There’s also a Washington Post piece that asks if Civil War is imminent I’m not linking to because the words “starvation” and “hyperinflation” are conspicuously absent. As the Hot Air piece on military tribunals states, “the citizens are effectively in a state of war with their own government” already…