Quotulatiousness

February 3, 2010

Canada’s economy judged (marginally) more free than the US

Filed under: Cancon, Economics, Government, Liberty, USA — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 09:30

H/T to Power Line blog for the image.

November 19, 2009

Venezuela tops the survey

Filed under: Liberty, Politics — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 08:38

Unfortunately, it’s a survey on levels of corruption in the Americas. It’s not the sort of poll you want to feature in:

The latest Transparency International corruption survey found Venezuela the most corrupt nation in the Americas. Venezuela has also crippled press freedoms, putting increasing restrictions on independent media. President Hugo Chavez makes it clear that he wants to establish a socialist dictatorship for the region. Chavez can’t do this militarily, because he has crippled his armed forces by replacing most of the key officers with men selected for their loyalty to Chavez, rather than their military abilities. Chavez has ruined the economy with similar interference, especially in the national oil business, which represents the major export and largest source of government revenue. To further harm the economy, Chavez keeps closing the border with Colombia, disrupting trade that is vital to people on both sides of the border. The Venezuelans living along the border have become increasingly anti-Chavez because of all this economic damage, and lawlessness. This has just made Chavez more paranoid, and certain that those Venezuelans are secretly siding with Colombia.

In a time honored move, Chavez is trying to increase popular fear of neighboring Colombia by claiming that the U.S. is using Colombia as a base for a campaign to take over South America. The new treaty between the U.S. and Colombia, which allows American anti-drug air patrols to move their base from Ecuador to Colombia, is being used as evidence of an American plot. Ecuador, like Venezuela, has elected a leftist president who promises prosperity and reform. One of the first thing the new Ecuadoran government did was shut down U.S. anti-drug air patrols. As with Venezuela, the leftist policies have crippled the Ecuadoran economy, as well as press freedom. So both countries have been able to push the “an American invasion is coming” line. This has embarrassed other nations in the region, but they are reluctant to speak up. That’s because anti-American rhetoric is very popular, and few politicians are willing to oppose these myths.

November 12, 2009

Britain’s “choice” on Europe

Filed under: Britain, Bureaucracy, Europe, Government — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 08:16

James Delingpole has problems with the headline on his post:

Kenneth Clarke is right about Europe

[. . .]

Look, don’t think it didn’t hurt me writing that headline. Just typing it felt like having my eyelids snipped off by scorpions and my eyeballs chewed by fire ants. But it’s true. Clarke was absolutely right to say, as he did in that maddeningly patronising, brown-suede-shoe-wearing, jazz-endorsing way of his, that Cameron’s allegedly bold new policies on Europe are nothing of the kind.

We’re in. We’re stuck there for the foreseeable future. And if you think Asino the donkey is a waste, wait till you see the extravaganza Brussels is planning for its EU Constitution ratification party.

Think a chorus of white rhinos singing Ode To Joy.

Think schools of blue whales doing synchronised swimming in a fish tank the size of Andorra.

Think of 27 planets being spray painted gold so that they look a bit more like the EU flag.

Think of whatever money-wasting scheme you like. If you don’t, you can be sure that somewhere out there, some bright-eyed Euro Stagiere is busily working on it already.

October 30, 2009

Justice is (belatedly) served

Filed under: Law, USA — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 12:07

A short summary from The Guardian:

The Pennsylvania supreme court has dismissed thousands of juvenile convictions issued by a judge charged in a corruption scandal.

The high court today threw out more than five years worth of cases heard by former Luzerne County Judge Mark Ciavarella. He is charged with accepting millions of dollars in kickbacks to send youths to private detention centres.

The court says that all the convictions are tainted and that the youths may not be retried.

This is very good news for the young people who were railroaded . . . one wonders if a class action lawsuit can now be prepared against the state for the wrongful imprisonment?

October 23, 2009

Corruption quadruples the price of military transport aircraft

Filed under: Africa, Military — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 12:33

South Africa has a serious corruption problem with their yet-to-be delivered A400M military transport planes:

Yet another corruption case in South Africa. This time, members of parliament are asking why the military is suddenly paying $809 million each for eight A400M four engine transports. The price other nations are paying for the aircraft are under $200 million each. The price South Africa agreed to pay, in 2005, was about $279 million, and included training, maintenance support and some spare parts. It is believed that the price went up so that government officials could siphon off large bribes. Meanwhile, the A400M aircraft is four years behind schedule, and has not flown yet. It was originally to start deliveries to European customers this year. South Africa is supposed to begin getting its A400Ms in seven years. South Africa has already paid $400 million for its A400Ms, and more progress payments will soon be due.

Such blatant corruption is not new in South Africa, but lately the crooks have been winning. Last year, the South African parliament passed a law disbanding an elite government investigation unit nicknamed the “Scorpions.” Investigations by this unit had led to dozens of corruption prosecutions of government officials. That’s why the unit is being dismantled. Corruption is a major problem throughout Africa, and many nations are now setting up units like the Scorpions, after having realized that corruption was the major cause of the poverty and civil wars that afflict most Africans.

July 20, 2009

I look forward to Gordon Brown’s “Paul Martin” moment

Filed under: Britain, Cancon, Politics — Tags: , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 12:56

For those of you who have already forgotten the premiership of Paul Martin, one of the most striking moments of his term in office was his leaving of it. His final speech, after the election results were in, was the best speech I think he ever made. There was a jauntiness, a cheerfulness in his voice that had been totally lacking at any point before that. After a successful term as Finance Minister under Jean Chrétien, Martin, like Gordon Brown, couldn’t wait to get the current PM out the door.

Martin, for all his faults, was not the ongoing disaster for his party and country that Brown has been. Martin also knew when to bow out. Brown has not been willing to go — and has been unwilling to risk the opinions of the electorate in a general election. Yet.

Christopher Hitchens looks at the wreckage:

Early this past June it became hard to distinguish among the resignation statements that were emanating almost daily from Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s Cabinet. The noise of collapsing scenery drowned out the individuality of the letters — one female minister, I remember, complained that she was being used as “window dressing” — but there was one missive from a departing comrade that caught my eye. It came from James Purnell, a man generally agreed to have done a more than respectable job as minister for work and pensions, and it began like this:

Dear Gordon,
We both love the Labour Party. I have worked for it for twenty years and you for far longer. We know we owe it everything and it owes us nothing . . .

I sat back in my chair. Yes, it’s true. One suddenly could recall a time when membership in the Labour Party (or “the Labour movement,” as it would call itself on great occasions) was a thing of pride. [. . .]

The true definition of corruption, it seems to me, is the diversion of public resources to private or politicized ends [. . .] There are other and lesser definitions, such as milking the public purse or abusing the public trust by “creative accounting.” The cloudburst of lurid detail about the expenses racket, which has made the current Parliament into an object of scorn and loathing, is a cloudburst that has soaked members of all parties equally. However, the Brownite style is by far the most culpable. It was Brown’s people who foisted a Speaker on the House of Commons who both indulged the scandal and obstructed a full ventilation of it. As if that weren’t bad enough, Gordon Brown still resists any call to dissolve this wretched Parliament — a Parliament that is almost audibly moaning to be put out of its misery and shame — because he still isn’t prepared to undergo the great test of being submitted to the electorate. Say what you will about Tony Blair, he took on all the other parties in three hard-fought general elections, and when it was considered time for him to give way or step down, he voluntarily did so while some people could still ask, “Why are you going?,” rather than “Why the hell don’t you go?” For the collapse of Britain’s formerly jaunty and spendthrift “financial sector,” everybody including Blair is to blame. But for the contempt in which Parliament is held, and in which a once great party now shares, it’s Blair’s successor who is the lugubrious villain.

H/T to Ghost of a Flea for the link.

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