Rule of mob

 Civil Liberties, economics  No Responses »
Jan 312012
 

As is ever my want I’m a little late to press with my ponderings on the matter of Stephen Hesters bonus, but this does mean I can mainly point you at articles written by better authors than I. Which is a good thing for everyone I suspect.

As I may have commented once or twice in the past, I’m rather keen on the rule of law and of contracts being honoured, and as far as I can tell Mr Hesters bonus was a matter of contract. Mr Hester didn’t cause RBS to need a massive bailout he was brought in after the fact by the last Government to sort out the mess. This is by any stretch of the imagination likely to be a tough task, so to get him to leave the rather good job he was in the offered remuneration had to be something to make him want to take the job. This something including bonuses would have been agreed when he signed up for the job, and now due to a baying mob he’s in the position of being told:
“You’re doing a great job, but people who don’t know what you do don’t think you deserve your bonus and will make your life miserable if you take the money we al agreed you should have if you do a good job, which by the way you are”
Not exactly likely to motivate him is it? Can’t help but suspect if say this had been a tube driver being told he couldn’t have his bonus ‘cos the public didn’t like that there might be a strike in the offing and trade tribunals happening, or you know if the Government decided to change public sector workers pensions people might say that was unfair. As he was head hunted from a rather nice job, on the ground of the total package including bonuses which he’s now not taking, it makes you wonder if he wouldn’t just say sod it and look for another job.

As someone who gets a performance related bonus, I rather worry when I see other people in the private sector being hounded like this over private contractual matters. After all there’s nothing but publicity and arbitrary levels of greed separating me from Mr Hester. So if people feel that despite his contract and him reportedly doing a good job it’s fair to call to “occupy this guys house till he donates his bonus to charity”, why not occupy my house? Why is it that it’s terrible for a banker to potentially earn this much but it’s fine for footballers? They’re both employed by private companies, both industries receive Government funding, so surely there should be calls for footballers to give up their bonuses as well? Except of course Footballers generally get cash bonuses where as Mr Hester was being awarded share options so to get any benefit from them he has to stay with the company, and in fact the value of those options are dependent on his making RBS a success. Which is very much in the Government and tax payers interest as if it’s not a success we lose all that money we used to bail them out with.

Ultimately I don’t know if Mr Hester deserves his share options or his wage, I didn’t interview him. Those that did interview him and took the decision to employ him obviously thought they were getting a reasonable deal though, and two Governments seem to have agreed. Yet because a small but vocal part of the population who also didn’t interview him or work with him, think the value of his share options (which he might or might not have ever got) was too high he was forced to give up his fair wage. This hardly seems likely to motivate anyone to take the job, or to take any high profile job in the UK, too big a bonus the mob will take it from you, too much profit the mob will take it from you, doing just a bit too well generally and the mob will pull you down – and then we wonder why our industry isn’t doing so well.

To end on a few slightly tangential points, in their triumphant e-mail message at having “pestered” Mr Hester out of his legal wage 38Degrees said:
John: “A small enough victory but I hope a significant one. On to chasing tax dodgers and saving our NHS :)”
So I’m guessing they’ll be fully behind whistle blowing on people that pay cash, and are every happy to have lost the half million tax Mr Hester might have paid on that bonus. Once the 1% are dealt with, will they then work their way down to those in the top 25%?

 Posted by Giolla at 19:00  Tagged with: , , ,

Internet black out

 Free Speach, internet, laws  No Responses »
Jan 182012
 

Stop SOPA
I didn’t take part in the Internet blackout today, as I’m a lazy sod and also I’m just back at work after a very hard weeks drinking. However I would note that as many many people have observed:

  1. This is very similar to our RIPA act, but from a country with more power to break stuff
  2. It’s utterly pointless, and won’t stop serious piracy in anyway
  3. It will result in an awful lot of collateral damage
  4. It will have a chilling effect and be trivial to be misused

I’d also predict that if it did come to pass then it wouldn’t be applied in the reverse direction to take off line large companies that steal content from smaller on-line artists and content providers. As one of the fundamental shifts which big media is fighting is that anyone can now be a content provider and they’ve actually got to compete on quality*

However unless this move is protested and every move like it sooner or later this sort of censorship at the behest of large media will come to pass and we’ll all be back to the walled garden days of AOL and the internet as a creative environment, medium for the free exchange of ideas and innovative business will cease to be (in the US at least). The problem with the US proposals is the same as we had with RIPA in that it allows for the blocking and removal of content before any proof of infringement, instead the blocked site has to prove it didn’t infringe (roughly speaking).

For far better summations of what the problem is with the legislation, let me pass you over to providers of original content over on the other side of the pond where they’re proposing this stuff Wondermark:
“What’s likely to happen?

• What burglars there are, will take another route. (SOPA/PIPA do not target pirates, but rather sites that link to alleged piracy. Real pirates can easily sidestep the restrictions.)

• Law-abiding business trucks, scared of the dynamite, will ALSO take another route. (The huge legal and financial burden of compliance with the new law will discourage startups, stifling independent businesses based in the United States.)
br/>• The dynamite is likely to go off whenever the trigger person sees anybody who looks slightly suspicious — burglar or not. (Claims of “piracy” could be used as a weapon against websites to silence them for competitive or political reasons.)

Despite the fact that nobody in Congress can agree on health care, the budget, or anything else, bought-and-paid-for politicians from both sides of the aisle have lined up to defend these bills. It’s pretty disgusting. Movie piracy is simply not more important than the safety and integrity of the entire Internet, which is my whole livelihood.”

Also in case you needed more convincing even Hitler is against it!**

Actually even more convincing than Hitler the MPAA oppose the SOPA protests and support the legislation.

* lets face it look how many remakes and re-imaginings etc. there are in the mainstream media, they’re churning out the same level of rip off’s as the internet but on a bigger budget.
** That mashup could result in the whole on YouTube being taken down under the proposed SOPA/PIPA laws.

 Posted by Giolla at 23:07  Tagged with: , , ,

Sneaky, sneaky very sneaky!

 activism, anonymity, bloggers, Civil Liberties, Free Speach, laws, police  5 Responses »
Jan 122012
 

Once again a significant “consultation” that no body new about. It would seem that to they’d like to give the police yet more power:
“This three-part consultation seeks your views on the areas of police powers which the government is committed to reviewing:
– the relevance of the word ‘insulting‘ in section 5 of the Public Order Act 1986
– new powers to request removal of face coverings
– new powers to impose curfews”

And as they’ve had a consultation, which ends tomorrow they’ll claim public support. ArchbishopCranmber and Old Holborn have more details, but if you’d like to once more be able to call me a smegging idiot without risking arrest. The powers that be, seem to currently take the stand that as long as you only get arrested, charged and suffer loss of time, money and distress with the whole process as long as you don’t actually go to court and get found guilty it’s all ok. Their test is are people actually getting found guilty unreasonably, not are people suffering from the impact of the law and likewise they have no concern over it’s chilling effects. See Olly Cromwell’s blog for a prime example of abuse of this sort of power.

I would point out that the police can already ask you to remove face coverings if they genuinely believe you intend to commit an offence, so that those rioting last summer wore face coverings is already covered by existing powers – and lets face it it’s not as if you’re going to comply with a request to uncover your face if you already rioting. The new power would let them remove face coverings at any time if they felt there was “reasonable suspicion of criminal activity” – of course remember that this is the same police force that despite being told numerous times still think it’s illegal to take photographs.

Finally curfews, the police can already force people to disperse, as people who remember the rave scene at all are well aware, and they can since 2003 request a dispersal zone be designated where people won’t be allowed to gather – this apparently takes too long and has too much paper work so they’d like a new law. Of course they’re once more citing the summer looting, ignoring the option of the riot act and that there was clear criminal behaviour taking place so would the looters really have gone home because they were in a dispersal zone? What they’d like instead is:
“The aim of a general police curfew power would be to give the police an operational tool to keep members of the public off the streets in a given location, for a given period, in order to prevent or address serious disorder.”
Now that looks like it’s just begging for feature creep to me, and is if it could be used in very lazy and Stalinist ways. Though I do tend to take the view that if a law can be abused it probably will be. They say that being outside during a curfew wouldn’t be a criminal offence, so just how would they enforce it? A fine, or a going out door tax as it might be known?

So go have your say whilst you can!

 Posted by Giolla at 14:43  Tagged with: , , , , , , ,

Dehumanising demonstrated

 Civil Liberties, Drinking, smoking  No Responses »
Jan 042012
 

Many other bloggers who I may have linked to once or twice in the past have commented before on the denormalisation of smoking, and the dehumanisation of one’s enemies is a tried and tested technique. So it was quite fascinating to watch a very blatant example of such a thing on BBC4 tonight in The Smoking years. Notionally a historical program the propaganda aspects weren’t even thinly veiled with smokers referred to as “creatures” and a separate species from early on and in the blurb on the BBC’s web site:

“Timeshift reveals the story of the creature that is ‘the smoker’. How did this species arrive on our shores?”
….
“The Smoking Years tells the unnatural history of a quite remarkable – and now threatened – creature. Warning: smoke-filled nostalgia may damage your health.”

The reference to smokers as a separate and worth less species was fairly unrelenting, with the first world war being described as providing the ideal breeding ground, and smokers benefiting from the ingenuity of others – with the development of mass production allowing for cheaper cigarettes to be produced. The obvious comfort and enjoyment of cigarettes by soldiers was closed over as quickly as possible to discuss how importing cigarettes prevented the import of vital food and munitions, and the use of pre-war tobacco cards by the Nazi’s to identify allied ships.

Moving into the fifties we learn that cigarette smoking is the direct cause of 95% of lung cancer. Though there is hope as apparently only one in two smokers die, so take up smoking and you’ve a 50/50 chance of immortality! Unless of course in fact everyone dies regardless of if they smoke or not. But that 50% mortality rate is why big tobacco need to “recruit new customers”. Into the 60′s and when a small survey asked if there should be optional non-smoking sections 80% said yes, this was seen as over whelming hostility to smoking rather than maybe people being considerate and in favour of choice? But it’s ok because we’re told that the “Smoker has been herded into a new ecosystem.” where they can be easily identified. After all the smoker has apparently “accepted it’s fate to live in a smoke free world“, as apparently asking to smoke in someone’s house is now as horrifying as asking to shoot up would be!

As a final interesting adjunct to the program it was followed by a trailer for a show that challenged celebrities to give up drinking for Christmas. Not subtle but then the puritans never have been. As a final thought watch the show and just substitute the word “smoker” with any approved of minorities you like and think how many complaints the BBC would get for that.

 Posted by Giolla at 23:46  Tagged with: , , ,

It may be beer is best

 activism, Campaign, Civil Liberties, Drinking, smoking  4 Responses »
Dec 282011
 

New Cavaliers Given our Glorious leaders recent warming up of an oft mooted idea to introduce Alchohol price fixing I thought I’d revisit a bunch of articles I’ve had sat open for months now, after of course first observing that such price fixing is verbotten by his masters in the EU as numerous bloggers have observed every time the idea is returned to. They’ll just have to resort to increasing tax (already about a third of the cost of a pint) and ever more dire warnings on bottles as they did for smokers. This re-use of the same tactics is something that other commentators have mentioned time and time again, and every time it gets mentioned the list of places where the same processes can be seen grows longer. If any of this was really for health reasons they’d just ban things out right, rather than forcing simple pleasures (like meat) out of the reach of the 99%*. The way that it’s not just what we imbibe or inhale that gets clamped down on but all manner of expression of free thinking association and fun does rather suggest that the state has once more got a bad case of the puritans.

Sticking mainly to beer and drinking which is a subject close to my heart and even closer to my liver, I’ll observe as many other have the way the age limits in supermarkets has crept up? Remember you can legally buy your own booze at 18 but supermarkets now ant you to be 21 or 25 (has anyone seen higher?). Pubs reportedly now balk at selling a drink to people accompanied by children. Even that CAB article I linked to claims you have to be over 14 to have a drink with a meal, which is odd as I’m sure that I had the odd small drink when out at the restaurant with my family at a far more tender age. Has my memory failed me with advancing years, or has that law been changed quietly whilst I wasn’t looking?

That’s the problem really so many of these changes that whittle away at merry England are done on advice or un-remarked changes to minor regulations. Look at the salami slicing that resulted in smoking being banned almost everywhere and they’re working on the few remaining places. Of course given we spend almost £60,000 on booze in a lifetime that’s a fair chunk of tax they want to keep. So get yourself a home brew kit (works out at about 50p a pint after initial costs or less – even with start up costs it’s only £1.50 a pint) and break out the speak easy signs. If we’re making our own booze (and tobacco) that’s less tax they’ll have to stop us enjoying other things, and they’ll be happy as their figures will show fewer people drinking and smoking. At least until they notice and try to work out how to stop us making our own fun, which judging by human history to date would be a task more futile than King Cnuts.

Perhaps 2012 may be the year for the rise of the New Cavaliers, the outfits are better and it’s more fun than puritanism. Save money, fight the state and have fun all from the comfort of a warm seat and a foaming brew. Being as self sufficient as you can has become a radical act, it deprives the state of revenue, and weakens their control on us. Mind be careful if you swap your own brew with friends as the taxman wants his share from barter as well. So answer the call to arms for New Cavaliers, drink up in the struggle against Islamism and consider it may be beer is best.

* Sorry couldn’t resist that.

 Posted by Giolla at 22:37  Tagged with: , , , ,

How laws really work

 Civil Liberties, Intermission, laws  No Responses »
Dec 172011
 

Once more I’m stealing content via the much better informed Katabasis, but hey it’s easier than writing my own content :)

So without further ado, “The Ugly Face of Tyranny” by Matt Giwer (which means Katabasis borrowed it as well).

  1. Any law the electorate sees as being open to being perverted from its original intent will be perverted in a manner that is worse than the manner of perversion seen at the time.
  2. Any law that is so difficult to pass it requires the citizens be assured it will not be a stepping stone to worse laws will in fact be a stepping stone to worse laws.
  3. Any law that requires the citizens be assured the law does not mean what the citizens fear, means exactly what the citizens fear.
  4. Any law passed in a good cause will be interperated to apply to causes against the wishes of the people.
  5. Any law enacted to help any one group will be applied to harm people not in that group.
  6. Everything the government says will never happen will happen.
  7. What the government says it could not foresee, the government has planned for.
  8. When there is a budget shortfall to cover non-essential government services the citizens will be given the choice between higher taxes or the loss of essential government services.
  9. Should the citizens mount a successful effort to stop a piece of legislation the same legislation will be passed under a different name.
  10. All deprivations of freedom and choice will be increased rather than reversed.
  11. Any government that has to build safeguards into a law so that it will not be abused is providing guidelines for abusing the law without violating it.
 Posted by Giolla at 14:48  Tagged with: , ,

Climate sceptics the new Wikileakers?

 bloggers, Civil Liberties, climate change, Must read post, police  1 Response »
Dec 152011
 

Via the ever well informed Katabasis my attention has been drawn to the rather worrying seizure of computers owned by UK climate sceptic bloggers. Apparently at the behest of the U.S. Department of Justice as other climate bloggers have received nasty grams (cache) from our friends across the pond. Last I checked the climategate e-mails where mainly (allegedly) pilfered from UK sources, and even ignoring that the emails are widely available so the US Department of Justice could just download their own copy. All in all a quite worrying development, state funded “scientific” research into climate change wasn’t a matter of national security last I checked. Rather generally the scientific method in the past has been to share research far and wide for verification and the like, so why are the powers that be on both sides of the pond going for climate bloggers?

I can’t help but suspect there may be more to this than meets the eye.

Do spread the word, and don’t forget to keep off site backups.

Updates: JoNova observes:
Now, more than ever, all the people that value their freedom need to stick together. Whistleblowers and radio personalities need blogger back up, big bloggers need small bloggers, every blogger needs commenter and emailer support, with letters to editors and friends. Every link in the chain helps. The establishment need to know that we will not be intimidated, there are many of us, and the more they push, the more we will tell the world.
and in the comments there:
They took away a DSL router? That would only be done by “experts” to frustrate access to the Internet.

And Watts Up With That? have been in contact with Roger (Tallbloke) and he tells me that he is not a suspect, and that they’ll clone his hard drives and return the computers to him.

Which is good news, and hopefully they’ll return everything quickly and undamaged (which doesn’t always happen) – this still seems really rather odd.

 Posted by Giolla at 13:27  Tagged with: , , , ,

Occupy where ever

 activism, Campaign, Civil Liberties, Cuts, economics, follow up, London, Was all better in my day  No Responses »
Dec 092011
 

We need more government Yes once more I’m returning to those crazy kids of the occupy movement, in a week where the LAPD have reportedly been destorying occupy tents* apparently up in Edinburgh the little bit of weather they’ve been having has cleared that camp quite effectively. As the lovely picture from Punk rock Libertarians wonderfully illustrates despite objectionable (and they have objected) tactics from the police the occupy movement seems to continue to call for more government control (of everyone else).

Over her on the more civilised side of the pond our police sent round a badly titled memo warning business people in the city that they’d had reports that some elements of the occupy movement might get up to unpleasant shenanigans and hijinks in the run up to Christmas. No doubt fuelled by copious amounts of non-alchoholic fair trade organic egg-nog. The occupy lot rather took objection to being on the same standard memo as other more nasty people, I’d have thought they’d have been chuffed to be being taken seriously. The warning seems reasonable given the mess that previous related marches and such like have caused.

The London crowd though seem to be made of cannier stuff and have prepared for winter by on the back of the strikes the other week, have “occupied” a variety of unoccupied buildings – something that used to be called squatting when I were an even younger lad. My current favourite of these is the Bloomsbury square squat.

Bloomsbury square squat Renamed by the squatters as the “Bloomsbury Social Centre” the comrades are keeping the read flag flying with an inclusive “communism” banner hanging out the upstairs window. Rather wonderfully they have both a Facebook and WordPress presence to truly demonstrate their anti-captilist stance. The WordPress site also has a Bookign form as the squat is apparently “a community space” and they’d “love for you to host your event here. All welcome!” (Told you that banner was inclusive). I wonder if they’d accept corporate bookings and if any of the students would be prepared to work as table service? After all times are tough and we’re all in it together and surely they’d not begrudge a bit of festive cheer to the working classes at this time of year. If anyone is worried about the risk of booking the venue they have reportedly had a health and safety assessment done so the “police can’t get them on health and safety grounds – from which I assume there are no law students involved. One of their main objections seems to be that the University plans to start using the building again and horror the new dean of post-grads will get “a luxury apartment in the top-floor of the building.” the bastard. Though I do agree with them that “our social spaces as well as our ability to organise are under attack” and whilst they may hope that squatting in a university building will tackle the issue, I can’t help but think helping to repair a run down old church hall might not achieve more.

As with every squat/occupation they have a Wish list, and looking at that I can’t help but observe that if someone did want to really cause any of these protests problems the wish lists are the way in – but then I’m not a very nice person. Of course many of these wish list items could apparently be gained by intercepting them before retail stores deliberately destroy them. All businesses obviously loving to spend time and resources destroying things rather than just throwing them out. I suspect those particular “occupiers” are too young to recall the times when you could buy electrical goods in jumble sales and the like, before the safety elf degreed that that was too dangerous as the cables might be a bit threadbare, so then they could only be sold for spares and now not at all. So the stores that used to donate food to shelters and might pass on electrical goods to charity now have to destroy them for fear of liability.

Still to end on a high note the lot over at St. Pauls have at least finally (I’m a bit late on this) after a mere six weeks decide what they want to ask Santa for for Christmas. Strangely the list doesn’t define the cut off point for being counted amongst the wealthiest nor what their “share” might be. Even more strangely they’re not asking Santa for a pony perhaps someone read them LegIrons story.

As the septicisle observes just six weeks to come up with the same list as UK uncut – they’ll prove the infinite monkeys theory right yet.

* As reported the police action strikes me as criminal destruction of property but I don’t know US laws.

 Posted by Giolla at 00:50  Tagged with: , , , , ,

On the subject of symbols

 activism, Campaign, EU, extremism, Free Speach, religion, Sparticus  No Responses »
Nov 082011
 

Whilst I’m on the subject of the power of symbols a while back Captain Ranty reported that it’s now terribly naughty according to the EU to use the “Keep Calm and carry on” image that the Government created back in 1939 as:
The EU has granted an EU Community Trade Mark to ‘KEEP CALM AND CARRY ON’ meaning that only one company may use the slogan for clothing, mugs, posters and other memorabilia.

Of course it’s quite possible our own trademark officials would have been just as stupid, in which case I’d no doubt be suggesting ignoring them and protesting about their actions. In more recent news of course some excitable chaps got excited at a French magazine putting a cartoon on their cover and fire bombed the offices of said magazine to register their distaste of this image:

100 lashes if you don't die of laughter! Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/charlie-hebdo-mohammed-2011-11#ixzz1d8xQPkcA

Rather reassuringly various other publishers helped them out by giving them office space whilst their now burnt out offices were dealt with, and to show that there were no hard feelings about the incident Charlie Hebdo are now running with this cover (H/T Katabasis):
Love is stronger than hate

Which seems a terribly polite response to people that like to burn both buildings and poppies.

 Posted by Giolla at 20:09  Tagged with: , , , , ,

Best walk so far

 activism, anonymity, bloggers, Civil Liberties, conformity, Cuts, Drinking, economics, Free Speach, London, photography, police, Video  3 Responses »
Nov 072011
 

All activities monitored by video camera Another November the 5th gone and another “quiet” walk around London with the indomitable Old Holborn, Olly Cromwell, Katabasis and others whose presence has been erased by alcohol (remind me if you want) – which was an utter blast. As has become our want we met in the pleasing environs of Chandos to exchange niceties, don costumes and imbibe a bracing drink before braving the autumnal air. Our dapper and well presented crew headed off down Whitehall, pausing to admire the security in place at that bastion of democracy that is Downing street. Setting the theme for the day they didn’t seem pleased to see us, undeterred we continued unto the very doors of the palace of Westminster where some terribly nice people told us that as the politicans don’t work on a Saturday it’d cost us 15 quid a head to get in:
Continue reading »

 Posted by Giolla at 20:25  Tagged with: , , , , , , ,
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