I have a bunch of pictures that I've saved on my laptop for future use. Some of them may have been posted before. I don't know. Don't remember.
I have no idea where most of these came from. Will give attribution if someone wants it.
That's all for now. If these get linked and Tweeted a lot, I'll post the rest later on.
This is from the ending of Matt Ridley's "The Rational Optimist", probably last year's best libertarian book. The ending is pure, undiluted greatness. Ridley argues that the world is NOT going to hell in a handbasket, as long as people are free to freely exchange goods and services, and most important - ideas. The item on the left, a primitive handaxe, is one of the oldest human artifacts. One person made it. The item on the right is approximately the same size and was made by hundreds, if not thousands of people, each one working on a small part of the project and reflecting "multiple strands of knowledge". The one on the left is the result of a system with cultural, geographic and trade barriers in place. The product on the right can only be efficiently manufactured when people are left alone to seek their own self-interest. Pick a side, pick a side.
Here's Matt Ridley:
Politicians are increasingly corks tossed on the waves of public opinion. Dictators are learning that their citizens can organise riots by text message. 'Here comes everybody' says the author Clay Shirky.
People will more and more freely find ways to exchange their specialised production for diversified consumption. This world can already be glimpsed on the web, in what John Barlow calls 'dot-com communism': a workforce of free agents bartering their ideas and efforts barely interested in whether the barter yields 'real' money. The explosion of interest in the free sharing of ideas that the internet has spawned has taken everybody by surprise. 'The online masses have an incredible willingness to share' says Kevin Kelly. Instead of money, 'peer producers who create the stuff gain credit, status, reputation, enjoyment, satisfaction, and experience:. People are willing to share their photographs on Flickr, their thoughts on Twitter, their friends on Facebook, their knowledge on Wikipedia, their software patches on Linux, their donations on Globalgiving.com, their community news on Craigslist, their pedigrees on Ancestry.com, their genomes on 23andMe, even their medical records on PatientsLikeMe. Thanks to the internet, each is giving according to his ability to each according to his needs, to a degree that never happened in Marxism.
This catallaxy will not go smoothly, or without resistance. Natural and unnatural disasters will still happen. Governments will bail out big corporations and big bureaucracies, hand them special favours such as subsidies or carbon rations and regulate them in such a way as to create barriers to entry, slowing down creative destruction. Chiefs, priests, thieves, financiers, consultants and others will appear on all sides, feeding off the surplus generated by exchange and specialisation, diverting the life-blood of the catallaxy into their own reactionary lives. It happened in the past. Empires brought stability at the price of creating a parasitic court; monotheistic religions bought social cohesion at the price of a parasitic priestly class; nationalism bought power at the expense of a parasitic military; socialism bought equality at the price of a parasitic bureaucracy; capitalism bought efficiency at the price of parasitic financiers. The online world will attract parasites too: from regulators and cyber-criminals to hackers and plagiarists. Some of them may temporarily throttle their generous hosts.
....There is even a new reason for such pessimism: the integrated nature of the world means that it may soon be possible to capture the entire world on behalf of a foolish idea, where before you could only capture a country, or perhaps if you were lucky an empire.
....Imagine if the globalised world of the twenty-first century allows a globalised retreat from reason. It is a worrying thought. The wrong kind of chiefs, priests and thieves could yet snuff out future prosperity on earth. Already lords don boiler suits to destroy genetically modified crops, presidents scheme to prevent stem-cell research, prime ministers trample on habeas corpus using the excuse of terrorism, metastasising bureacracies interfere with innovation on behalf of reactionary pressure groups, superstitious creationists stop the teaching of good science, air-headed celebrities rail against free trade, mullahs inveigh against the empowerment of women, earnest princes lament the loss of old ways and pious bishops regret the coarsening effects of commerce. So far they are all sufficiently localised in their effects to achieve no more than limited pauses in the happy progress of the species, but could one of them go global?
I doubt it....Said Lord Macaulay, 'We see in almost every part of the annals of mankind how the industry of individuals, struggling up against wars, taxes, famines, conflagrations, mischievous prohibitions, and more mischievous protections, creates faster than governments can squander, and repairs whatever invaders can destroy.'
....The twenty-first century will be a magnificent time to be alive.
Dare to be an optimist.
I hope you'll check out this book when it's released in paperback. It's greatness.
Rep. Ron Paul, R-Tex, has made a career out of being the contrarian in Congress, and with uprisings sweeping across the Middle East he took the opportunity today to point out one of the inconvenient truths of American foreign policy: its support across successive administrations for key Middle East leaders who ally themselves with the United States in a difficult region, yet do not respect basic human rights and democracy in their own countries.
“A lot of people in this country have come to the conclusion that our policy overhaul has been inconsistent; that sometimes we support the bad guys and the bad guys become our enemies,” Paul told Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during a hearing of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs.
Rep. Paul pointed to America’s support for Osama bin Laden when he was fighting the Soviets in Afghanistan, its collaboration with Saddam Hussein against Iran in the 1980s, and its propping up the Shah in Iran for decades before that.
“But we keep supporting Algeria, Morocco, Yemen, all these dictators, and yet we pretend that as soon as, well, it looks like the dictator might fall, we're all for democracy and we're for freedom and we're against these dictators,” he said.
Here's the money quote from She Whose Name Is Not Spoken:
“Congressman, you make a very passionate argument, and my response is that, you know, the United States, over the course of its entire diplomatic history, has had to make some very difficult decisions,” she said.
“We try to balance what we believe to be in our interests. Sometimes, and I would argue most times, we get it right. Sometimes we don't,” America’s top diplomat conceded.
Precisely. That's why James Monroe came up with something eventually known as The Monroe Doctrine. We're going to stay out of everyone else's business, because we "sometimes don't" get it right. In fact, I'm going through a mental list of dictators, trying to think of one we've supported and got it right by doing so.
Can anyone out there help me out? How many of these guys were instances where we got it right? I've swiped a list of dictators supported by the U.S. from this dude.Lord have mercy, I wish that the Congressman had done a roll call through the list, asking when we "got it right".
{Update from 3-3-2011, to eliminate any confusion....If you follow all of the links back to the originator of this list, his basis for inclusion is"rulers who received aid (economic/military), training of military/intelligence/security forces, and/or political support from the US". It's freakin' terrifying. See the comment field below about Pol Pot.}
Please respond with the names that give you that warm, fuzzy feeling of supporting a great cause.
Africa
MOBUTU SESE SEKO
Dictator of Zaire 1965-1997
MOHAMMED SIAD BARRE
President/Dictator of Somalia 1969-1991
GEN. IBRAHIM BABANGIDA
Military Dictator/President of Nigeria 1985-1993
GEN. SANI ABACHA
Dictator of Nigeria 1993-1998
HASTINGS KAMUZU BANDA
Dictator of Malawi 1966-1994
LAURENT-DÉSIRÉ KABILA
President/Dictator of the Democratic Republic of the Congo 1997-2001
GNASSINGBE ETIENNE EYADEMA
Dictator of Togo 1967-2005
FELIX HOUPHOUET-BOIGNY
Dictator/President of the Ivory Coast 1960-1993
HASSAN II
King of Morocco 1961-1999
TEODORO OBIANG NGUEMA MBASOGO
President/Dictator of Equatorial Guinea 1979-present
ZINE EL ABIDINE BEN ALI
President-Prime Minister/Dictator of Tunisia 1987-2011
ANWAR EL-SADAT
President/Dictator of Egypt 1970-1981
HOSNI MUBARAK
President/Dictator of Egypt 1981-present
IAN SMITH
Prime Minister of Rhodesia (white minority regime) 1965-1979
PIETER WILLEM BOTHA
Prime Minister of South Africa (white minority regime) 1978-1984, President 1984-1989
DANIEL ARAP MOI
President/Dictator of Kenya 1978-2002
HAILE SELASSIE (RAS TAFARI)
Emperor of Ethiopia 1928-1974
WILLIAM J. S. TUBMAN
President/Dictator of Liberia 1944-1971
SAMUEL KANYON DOE
Dictator of Liberia 1980-1990
Asia
MOHAMED SUHARTO
Dictator of Indonesia 1966-1998
NGO DINH DIEM
President/Dictator of South Vietnam 1955-1963
GEN. NGUYEN KHANH
Dictator of South Vietnam 1964-1965
NGUYEN CAO KY
Dictator of South Vietnam 1965-1967
GEN. NGUYEN VAN THIEU
President/Dictator of South Vietnam 1967-1975
TRAN THIEM KHIEM
Prime Minister of South Vietnam 1969-75
BAO DAI
Emperor of Vietnam 1926-1945, chief of state 1949-1955
LEE KUAN YEW
Prime Minister/Dictator of Singapore 1959-1990; behind-the scenes ruler since then.
EMOMALI RAHMONOV
President/Dictator of Tajikistan 1992-present
NURSULTAN NAZARBAYEV
President of Kazakhstan 1990-present
ISLAM A. KARIMOV
President/Dictator of Uzbekistan 1990-present
SAPARMURAD ATAYEVICH NIYAZOV
President/Dictator of Turkmenistan 1990-2006
MARSHAL LUANG PIBUL SONGGRAM
Dictator of Thailand 1948-1957
FIELD MARSHAL THANOM KITTIKACHORN
Prime Minister/Dictator of Thailand 1957-58, 1963-1973
CHIANG KAI-SHEK
President/Dictator (Nationalist) of China 1928-1949
President/Dictator of Taiwan 1949-1975
CHIANG CHING-KUO
President/Dicator of Taiwan 1978-1988; Prime Minister 1972-1978
DENG XIAOPING
De facto ruler of China from circa 1978 to the early 1990s
FERDINAND MARCOS
President/Dictator of the Philippines 1965-1986
SYNGMAN RHEE
President/Dictator of South Korea 1948-1960
GEN. PARK CHUNG HEE
President/Dictator of South Korea 1962-1979
GEN. CHUN DOO HWAN
President/Dictator of South Korea 1980-1988
SIR MUDA HASSANAL BOLKIAH
Sultan of Brunei 1967-present
GEN. LON NOL
Prime Minister/Dictator of Cambodia 1970-1975
POL POT
Dictator of Cambodia 1975-1979
MAJ. GEN. SITIVENI RABUKA
Dictator of Fiji 1987-1999
ASKAR AKAYEV
President of Kyrgyzstan 10/27/1990-2005
Europe
FRANCISCO FRANCO
Dictator of Spain 1939-1975
ANTONIO SALAZAR DE OLIVEIRA
Dictator of Portugal 1928-1968
COL. GEORGIOS PAPADOPOULOS
Prime Minister/President/Dictator of Greece 1967-1973
Latin America
ANASTASIO SOMOZA GARCIA
Dictator of Nicaragua 1937-1947, 1950-1956
ANASTASIO "TACHITO" SOMOZA DEBAYLE
Dictator of Nicaragua 1967-1972, 1974-1979
MANUEL ESTRADA CABRERA
Dictator of Guatemala 1898-1920
GEN. JORGE UBICO CASTANEDA
Dictator of Guatemala 1931-1944
COL. CARLOS ENRIQUE CASTILLO ARMAS
Dictator of Guatemala 1954-1957
GEN. JOSE MIGUEL YDIGORAS FUENTES
President/Dictator of Guatemala 1958-1963
COL. ENRIQUE PERALTA AZURDIA
Military Junta, Guatemala 1963-1966
COL.CARLOS ARANA OSORIO
Dictator of Guatemala 1970-1974
GEN. FERNANDO ROMEO LUCAS GARCIA
Dictator of Guatemala 1978-1982
GEN. JOSE EFRAIN RIOS MONTT
Dictator of Guatemala 1982-1983
MARCO VINICIO CEREZO ARÉVALO
President/Dictator of Guatemala 1986-1991
MAXIMILIANO HERNANDEZ MARTINEZ
Dictator of El Salvador 1931-1944
COL. OSMIN AGUIRRE Y SALINAS
Dictator of El Salvador 1944-1945
CIVILIAN-MILITARY JUNTA, EL SALVADOR
1961-1962
COL. ARTURO ARMANDO MOLINA BARRAZA
Dictator of El Salvador 1972-1977
JUNTA, EL SALVADOR
1979-1982
ALFREDO FÉLIX CRISTIANI BUKARD
President/Dictator of El Salvador 1989-1994
TIBURCIO CARIAS ANDINO
Dictator of Honduras 1932-1948
COL. OSWALDO LOPEZ ARELLANO
Dictator of Honduras 1963-1975
ROBERTO SUAZO CORDOVA
President/Dictator of Honduras 1982-1986
GEN. OMAR HERRERA-TORRIJOS
Dictator of Panama 1969-1981
GEN. MANUEL ANTONIO MORENA NORIEGA
Dictator of Panama 1982-1989
AUGUSTO PINOCHET UGARTE
Dictator of Chile 1973-1990
GEN. JORGE RAFAEL VIDELA
Dictator of Argentina 1976-1981
COL. MARCOS PEREZ JIMENEZ
Dictator of Venezuela 1950-1958
GEN. ALFREDO STROESSNER
Dictator of Paraguay 1954-1989
ALBERTO FUJIMORI
Dictator of Peru 1990-2000
FRANCOIS "PAPA DOC" DUVALIER
Dictator of Haiti 1957-1971
JEAN-CLAUDE "BABY DOC" DUVALIER
Dictator of Haiti 1971-1986
MILITARY JUNTA / LT. GEN. RAOUL CEDRAS, GEN. PHILIPPE BIAMBY and LT. COL. MICHEL-JOSEPH FRANCO
Haiti 1991-1994
GEN. RENE BARRIENTOS ORTUNO
President/Dictator of Bolivia 1964-1969
GEN. HUGO BANZER SUAREZ
Dictator of Bolivia 1971-1978
DR. GETULIO VARGAS
Dictator of Brazil 1930-1945, 1951-1954
GEN. HUMBERTO DE ALENCAR CASTELLO BRANCO
Dictator of Brazil 1964-1967
CARLOS PRIO SOCARRAS
Dictator of Cuba 1948-1952
FULGENCIO BATISTA
Dictator of Cuba 1933-44, 1952-1959
GERARDO MACHADO MORALES
Dictator of Cuba 1925-1933
RAFAEL LEONIDAS TRUJILLO
Dictator of the Dominican Republic 1930-1961
Middle East
MOHAMMED REZA PAHLAVI
Shah of Iran 1941-1979
SADDAM HUSSEIN
Dictator of Iraq 1969 (1979)-2003
GEN. MOHAMMED AYUB KHAN
President/Dictator of Pakistan 1958-1969
GEN. AGHA MUHAMMAD YAHYA KHAN
President/Dictator of Pakistan 1969-1971
GEN. MOHAMMAD ZIA UL-HAQ
President/Dictator of Pakistan 1977-1988
PERVEZ MUSHARRAF
Dictator of Pakistan 1999-2008
ABDUL IBN HUSSEIN I
King of Jordan 1952-1999
TURGUT ÖZAL
Prime Minister of Turkey 1983-1989, President 1989-1993
SHEIK JABIR AL-AHMAD AL SABAH
Emir of Kuwait 1977-2006
Prime Minister of Kuwait 1962-1963, 1965-1978
FAHD IBN ABDUL-AZIZ AL SAUD
King and Prime Minister of Saudi Arabia 1982-2005
The Business Insider website recently published this as "The only chart you need".
They were mistaken.
This is only the first of two charts that you need. This one explains that we are screwed.
Here is the second one, from The Department Of Numbers website. It shows tax revenue as a percentage of our Gross Domestic Product.
You can tax people at 20% of their income, and you might get lucky and take in around 20% of the GDP.
Or you can tax the rich at a 75% rate, you can punish the greedy corporations, you can end the evil Bush tax cuts, and you'll still take in around 20% of the GDP, which will be much smaller than its potential as a result.
People alter their behavior as a result of higher taxes. How much risk would you have taken in the 1950's, back when there was a 70% confiscation rate on earnings?
So why in the hell would people call for a higher tax rate? What could possibly motivate an economic idiot to lobby for a higher and higher tax rate on productive investments?
Taxes on capital gains and dividends should be higher, for "fairness," even if this results in less investment, lower growth, more joblessness, smaller revenues for the government and more federal debt, according to Obama, as revealed during a presidential debate in his exchange with moderator Charlie Gibson regarding his proposal to increase the tax on capital gains from 15 percent to 28 percent.
"In each instance when the rate dropped, revenues from the tax increased -- the government took in more money," said Gibson. "And in the 1980s when the tax was increased to 28 percent, the revenues went down. So why raise it at all, given the fact that 100 million people in this country own stock and would be affected?"
Replied Obama, "Well, Charlie, what I've said is that I would look at raising the capital gains tax for purposes of fairness."
Yeah. He really said that. God help us all.
So there are your two charts. We're spending far more than 20%. We can only collect 20%.
That's all.
All other debate and discussion is just noise.
One of my sisters sent me a link to this open letter, recently published in The Washington Post, from a Texas school district superintendent. It is in the style of the famous William Barrett Travis letter from the Alamo.
Gentlemen,
I am besieged, by a hundred or more of the Legislators under Rick Perry. I have sustained a continual Bombardment of increased high-stakes testing and accountability-related bureaucracy and a cannonade of gross underfunding for 10 years at least and have lost several good men and women. The ruling party has demanded another round of pay cuts and furloughs, while the school house be put to the sword and our children's lunch money be taken in order to keep taxes low for big business. I am answering the demand with a (figurative) cannon shot, and the Texas flag still waves proudly from our flag pole. I shall never surrender the fight for the children of Perrin.
Then, I call on you my legislators in the name of Liberty, of patriotism & everything dear to the American character, to come to our aid, with all dispatch. The enemy of public schools is declaring that spending on a shiny new high-stakes testing system is "non-negotiable"; that, in essence, we must save the test but not the teachers. The enemy of public schools is saying that Texas lawmakers won't raise 1 penny in taxes in order to save our schools.
If this call is neglected, I am determined to sustain myself as long as possible and fight for the kids in these classrooms like an educator who never forgets what is due to his own honor & that of his community. Make education a priority!
With all due respect and urgency,
John Kuhn
Superintendent
Perrin-Whitt CISD
I went to sleep last night thinking of this letter, and like most weak-willed, highly suggestible people, my dreams were centered around my bedtime reading. So in last night's dream, Superintendent John Kuhn and his ragged band of teachers, curriculum advisors, diversity consultants, defensive line coaches, guidance counselors and administrators were at The Alamo, holding off Santa Anna, 1,500 Mexican troops, a few Tea Party protesters, a horde of Chinese bill collectors, and a piper demanding to be paid. Somewhere in the middle of the mass of attackers was governor Rick Perry, frantically trying to move to the front of the procession.
A lone rider appeared on the horizon, carrying a white flag and a message from taxpayers. Santa Anna graciously ordered his troops to give the messenger safe passage into the Alamo.
After the Alamo's defenders verified that the messenger wasn't trying to use a School Voucher to gain admission, he was allowed into their fortress.
Here's the text of his letter from an unknown taxpayer....
To John Kuhn and the brave defenders of the Public School Alamo,
We appreciate your willingness to sacrifice your lives and careers for a broken system, but we have no troops available for your relief. 6,000 of our fighting men and women are stationed in England, defending Great Britain from the French. We have 70,000 troops in a permanent defense of West Germany, still heroically keeping Munich safe from Nikita Kruschev. A huge number of soldiers are on permanent alert in South Korea, keeping our manufacturing competitors safe from their enemies.
The defense services we provide to the rest of the world at no charge, well, those armies aren't cheap.
All we can afford to offer are some suggestions. Your Federal, State, and Local spending per pupil is now approaching $11,000.00. Assuming a maximum class size of 21 kids, that's a cost of $230,000.00 per classroom. Is there any number that would be enough? Can you name a sum that wouldn't be consumed instantly?
Do you think you could possibly save your system by throwing some administrators and educrats over the walls of your besieged fortress? Wouldn't it be fun to throw some Federal consultants to the Mexican Army? Unless you're already paying your teachers something like $175,000.00 per year, those hangers-on and parasites are the ones eating you out of existence.
The Federal and State mandates are only happening because you have allowed them to happen. They've taken your loyalty (and votes) for granted.
Lie down with dogs, you get up with fleas. Lie down with the government, you get up with burdensome software contracts, No Child Left Behind programs, and mandatory re-training every summer.
Second, have you considered letting people have a choice? Your stubborn defense of your educational Alamo has created more White Flight suburbs than the most ardent segregationist could've imagined. The Dallas ISD is even experiencing a wave of "Black Flight".
Please, please, please, for the love of God and all things holy, let the people have a voucher system so they can send their kids to non-government schools of their own choosing.
You have probably noticed that there aren't very many families rushing to your aid. In fact, some of the people you think are your supporters, especially those who can't afford a White Flight suburb, are secretly trying on Mexican Army uniforms, just to see how they fit.
As Mark Twain once said, "Almost any man worthy of his salt would fight to defend his home, but no one ever heard of a man going to war for his boarding house."
Your best teachers could then make far more money and experience fewer headaches, including those headaches brought on by politically-connected software contractors.
Third, every military campaign needs an element of propaganda to help win the hearts and minds of the people back home. The taxpayers need to understand that your people are making sacrifices. Have the Alamo defenders considered how their exemption from Social Security plays with the tax-paying public, the people who are having to pour more and more money into the Gaping Maw Of The Beast?
Do those in the private sector get to retire with a pension at age 53?
People are wondering if your benefits package is truly sustainable, a question that NPR's "Sustainability Desk" has never covered.
Mr. Kuhn, please encourage those in Fortress Alamo to drop their Cadillac Health Plans, their Social Security exemptions and their guaranteed retirements.
Or you could just throw yourself to the Mexicans. That might be more pleasant.
Fourth, why are your Fort Worth schools churning out high school graduates who can't read, write, or understand a damn tape measure?
In closing, Mr. Kuhn, we appreciate your willingness to sacrifice yourself for the system. Yes, you are besieged, but only at the front door. You have a clear exit available. Look in other directions, away from the Mexican Army and the software developers and Rick Perry. There's a big world out there, a world of people and companies that trade things, sell things, cook food, provide services, transport things, and manufacture cars, clothing, homes and fruitstands.
The large corporations that you have criticized for wanting to keep more of their own money, despite the fact that you....just want a lot more of it? Those large corporations are already paying one of the highest effective tax rates in the world, but they would probably find a way to hire someone with your talents.
Some of them would probably like to open a school.
The exit door is open. No one is blocking your exit, no one is blocking a voucher program, no one is blocking school choice except....
You.
The picture of Mr. Kuhn defending The Alamo from taxpayers came from here.
That's all for now. If these get linked and Tweeted a lot, I'll post the rest later on. 
