The Downfall of Camila BruceWayneJelly

I'm amazed. So someone who was fêted by a series of Prime Ministers and unaccountable bureaucrats, assisted by over-entitled Beeb management, troughing on taxpayer money, went from being a helpful charity doing important work to an overstaffed, completely unaccountable quango with overly lavish offices dishing out benefits on the whim of the founder?

What did you think was going to happen?

And what do you think is happening at all those other "charities" that exist solely because our tax money is shovelled at them?

Shock! Horror!

I'm afraid my appalling lack of British modern history has once again let me down. However, Andy Bolton has come to the rescue:

It was recently the 70th anniversary of William Beveridge’s famous report on the welfare of the UK people (‘Report of the Inter-Departmental Committee on Social Insurance and Allied Services’).

In it he identified five ‘Giant Evils’ in society: squalor, ignorance, want, idleness and disease. After seven decades the United Kingdom now has a ‘welfare state’ based loosely on the recommendations within this report. On all sides of political debate, from ‘left’ to ‘right’, from statist to libertarian, the welfare state can be seen to have fallen short of the ideals for which it was established. This article focuses on the changes to the welfare ‘benefits’ system that were proposed, implemented and subsequently evolved in the interim period.

Right, so this is the Beveridge report, that lefties always wibble on about as the source of the infinite kindness of the state in Britain.

The report’s initial objective was to “survey … the existing national schemes of social insurance” that were available at the time and “to make recommendations”. Existing schemes, surely not? Weren’t people left to die in the streets before the founding of the welfare state, that’s what I was taught at school? Well, surprisingly not; the survey documents considerable legislation. Over the preceding 45 years, beginning with the Workmen’s Compensation Act of 1897, there was a plethora of legislation designed to make certain insurances compulsory. The above act was initially limited to a small number of occupations but was extended in 1906 to cover all, with compulsory health insurance beginning in 1912. Similarly unemployment insurance began for a small number of industries in 1912 but extended in 1920. The Pensions Act came into force in 1908 giving a non-contributory pension to all over 70; this was added to in 1925 by contributory pensions, which also covered widows and orphans. The Unemployment Act of 1934 replaced several earlier unemployment insurance schemes and introduced a national Unemployment Assistance service. Adding to this huge growth in social insurance were medical services, disability assistance, child welfare services (including pre-school), death and ‘other contingencies’. These services were mainly funded by life assurance companies, friendly societies and trade unions.

The report’s authors found the existing landscape “impressive”: it showed “that provision for most of the many varieties of need through interruption of earnings and other causes that may arise in modern industrial communities has already been made in Britain on a scale not surpassed and hardly rivalled in any other country of the world“. The only areas of social care that the committee could fault were healthcare, funerals and maternity. However where they did rail against the existing array of systems was its organisation: “a complex of disconnected administrative organs, proceeding on different principles, found invaluable service but at a cost in money and trouble and anomalous treatment of identical problems for which there is no justification” (as if voluntary interaction needs ‘justification’). They concluded: “It is not open to question that, by closer co-ordination, the existing social services could be made at once more beneficial and more intelligible to those whom they serve and more economical in their administration.” Anyone who has dealt with the Department for Work and Pensions, with its lack of communication and coordination, would question that we’ve made that much progress under a state-centralised system in 70 years. The claim of improved efficiency by providing insurance services through the state is laughable; you don’t need to know about Friedman’s Law to recognise this.

So, in essence, the state saw a thriving area where the market was providing everyone with all the cover they needed and decided they could do it better and more cost-effectively than the market could. Much like British Rail. Or British Airways. Or British Leyland. (The latter not technically nationalised, but utterly fucked by Tony fucking Benn coercing a functioning business to absorb one that should have gone under but was deemed to big to fail. Why does that fucking ring bells?)

If you look back at anything that the British state has done, it has inevitably taken functioning, competing businesses that delivered good services, nationalised them, let them become an overgrown complicated bureaucratic mess with utterly shitty service and a jobsworth corporate culture and then outsourced it equally badly.

Why the bastarding cunting fuck do lefties always think that the state is the only way to provide anything? British Rail was a nationalised industry, it didn't spring out fully formed. British Airways was a nationalised industry, it didn't spring out fully formed. The welfare state was a nationalised industry, it didn't spring out fully formed.

Get to fuck, lefties, with your crazy fucking idea that the state ever does anything useful. Just get to fuck.

Dick Murphy falls straight in

Oh, how I laughed:

£1.8bn is to be spent on monitoring Facebook and Twitter. That’s exactly the same as is being taken out of care for the elderly and disabled
-- Dick "The Weapons-Grade Cock End" Murphy

Well, that's the thing, Dick: there's always going to be some disagreement about how our taxes are spent. You're quite happy with pissing it away on Diversity Outreach Co-ordinators and so on, I'm not. On the other hand, some people are quite happy with the government pissing it away on Protecting The Cheeeeeldren, and you're not.

But you're the fucking idiot telling us we should happily render unto Caesar so that he can piss it away on whatever he deems important.

The truth is, there isn't one person in the whole country who can honestly proclaim himself or herself 100% happy with the way every single penny of tax money is spent. The only way to achieve happiness in that respect is to not tax anyone and let everyone decide for themselves how their money should be spent.

Thanks for proving me right and yourself wrong.

Dick.

Too much government

I found this article via twitter. An absolutely fascinating read on why government consultations tend to generate so little useful response and why the whole concept of getting people affected by legislation to comment on it is largely pointless and self-defeating.

If I was a cynic, I'd almost say it was designed to be a self-defeating object.

Isn't it ironic that the same people who demand clarity from business in their dealings with the public commit the most egregious crimes against plain speaking themselves?

We don't need more regulation. I don't believe we need ANY regulation, but if we must have regulation it should be reasonable to expect that you do not need to spend 20 years in government to be to decipher the rules that apply to you.

Stupid Regulation

The Wisdom of Governments

The next time you think the government can spend your money better than you can, think about this.

"All anarchists should be made to go live in Somalia"

Hur! Hur! Hur!

The only difference between paying for private protection of property rights is that the costs are transparent. The biggest fear of government is that people see how much they pay and how little they get back in return.

All you statist cunts can suck my hairy balls.

Suing the US government

I hope they win.

In which I agree with a Labour supporter

The tribalist cunt:

Meanwhile, Tory Treasury spokesman Philip Hammond blasted ‘superficially attractive thinking about means testing benefits that go to people who apparently don’t need them, but once you start introducing means testing you get perverse incentives’. Anybody fancy a game of ’spot the progressive’?

Less than a year later, coalition thinking is drifting in the opposite direction, with winter fuel allowance and child benefit seen as possible victims of the October spending review.

Labour’s work and pensions spokeswoman Yvette Cooper has been quick to condemn the government’s ‘shocking attack’ on OAPs, and rightly so. But it is a shocking attack that Labour itself was prepared to contemplate less than 12 months ago.

The fact of the matter is this: there is a huge welfare dependency in this country. Means testing is simply a way in which the welfare dependency is increased. I would far rather everyone had a basic citizen's income and a simple tax relief taper, something that could so easily be implemented today.

But of course, that wouldn't keep the fucking DWP in fucking jobs, would it?

Cunts.

In which I wholeheartedly endorse one of Tom Harris's idea

Yep:

THERE really isn’t a decent excuse not to support Eric Pickles’ initiative in publishing details of his own department’s spending on every item worth £500 or more.

The opportunity it gives the media to run sensationalist stories about massages and trips to Blackpool Pleasure Beach on the public purse is less important than the far more positive consequence: it will make everyone in the public sector think twice before authorising spending.

So my friend and colleague, Tom Watson, is right to call on all parties to applaud Eric’s judgment on this one.

I would go further, however.

Presumably, in time, every department – not just Eric’s – will adopt this policy. At least, I hope so. But what about local authorities? What about hospital trusts and quangos? It’s unlikely that they will voluntarily open their books to public inspection. But if they were forced to, then every local government officer in the land would know that they would have to justify buying any item or service to the public and the to media – as well as to their bosses.

Now, come on! Anyone out there think that’s a bad idea?

I reckon this would be a fucking brilliant idea. Every bit of taxpayer-funded expenditure should be put up on the web for anyone to look at. Including salaries. And attached to it, should be the name, email address and phone number of the person who signed it off.

I can promise you that money would be spent much more wisely in a very fucking short order.

"Holy fucking Jesus" ...

... was my reaction when I read this:

It's a shame to let accountants spoil the charming romance of war, but sometimes they insist. Recently the Congressional Research Service reported that our military undertakings in Iraq and Afghanistan have marked an important milestone. Together, they have cost more than a trillion dollars.

That doesn't sound like much in the age of TARP, ObamaCare, and LeBron James, but it is. Adjusted for inflation, we have spent more on Iraq and Afghanistan than on any war in our history except World War II. They have cost more in real dollars than the Korean and Vietnam wars combined.

But we can only wish we were getting off so lightly. Neither war is over, and neither is going to be soon. The House just approved $37 billion in extra funding to cover this year, and the administration wants another $159 billion for 2011. That won't be the final request.

Worse, the CRS figure is only part of the bill so far. It noted the sum doesn't include the "costs of veterans' benefits, interest on war-related debt, or assistance to allies." All of those will go on after these wars are over, which someday they may be.

Scholars Joseph Stiglitz of Columbia and Linda Bilmes of Harvard published a book in 2008 called The Three Trillion Dollar War, which gives a more realistic estimate. But that, too, is an understatement. They figure that when all long-run costs are factored in, the tab will be at least $5 trillion and could reach $7 trillion, or nearly twice as much as this year's entire federal budget.

And that was two years ago. I asked Bilmes for an update, and she said some obligations, like veterans' medical and disability compensation costs, "have exceeded our earlier projections." Do I hear $8 trillion?

Gentle Jesus on a pedal-powered three-wheeled cycle.

$8,000,000,000,000.00

That's a fucking lot of money, spent on what appear to be one pointlessly won war and one war that will never be won.

Now I know there's a school of thought that says that wars generate economic activity, but the reality of it is that ANY activity channelled through a government has a negative multiplier. A certain amount of any government budget is just wasted on shuffling income from one department to another, and doesn't find it's way back into the real economy, for example.

The "broken windows" fallacy also comes into play here, so for all the money actually spent making weapons and military kit, and paying for VA care, etc., there is an unseen pile of money that could have been spent on many other things.

And eight trillion dollars dished out directly to the citizens of the USA would probably be enough to turn the US back into a massive economic powerhouse, dwarfing China.

Eight fucking trillion dollars.

Fuck.

Oh for the sake of fucking fuck

A cash-strapped council has been criticised after it announced plans to spend nearly £40,000 of taxpayers' money on iPads for every councillor.

Oh, yeah?

One councillor justified the move claiming her laptop was ''heavy'' making it difficult to take to several meetings a day.

Keep digging.

Labour councillor Sarah Russell, who is awaiting delivery of the highest-spec 64 gigabyte model, said: ''We're trying out the iPad to see whether it improves the way we work as councillors.

Dear thieving bastards, you are just trying to give your councillors the latest toy at the taxpayers' expense, as usual. I offer one of many possible alternatives. Note the £600 price difference.

You really are just taking the fucking piss. End of story.

As if by magic

*snigger*

So much for localism.

I could go on about it

Or I could just point you at this.

Why government doesn't work

This article ridicules government-issue brownies:

The Pentagon’s brownie recipe is 26 pages long. Among the ingredients: water that conforms to the “National Primary Drinking Water Regulations (Copies are available from the Office of Drinking Water, Environmental Protection Agency, WH550D, 401 M Street, S.W., Washington, DC 20460),” eggs in compliance with “Regulations Governing the Inspection of Eggs and Egg Products (7 CFR Part 59),” and baking soda “which meets the requirements of the Food Chemicals Codex.”

Wondering about adding nuts? Simply consult section 3.2.5.3: “Shelled walnut pieces shall be of the small piece size classification, shall be of a light color, and shall be U.S. No. 1 of the U.S. Standards for Shelled English Walnuts. A minimum of 90 percent, by weight, of the pieces shall pass through a 4/16-inch diameter round hole screen and not more than 1 percent, by weight, shall pass through a 2/16-inch diameter round hole screen. The shelled walnuts shall be coated with an approved food grade antioxidant and shall be of the latest season’s crop.”

And that, in a nutshell, is why government doesn't work. Somewhere along the line, someone baked brownies using dirty water. So, instead of relying on everyone working to the assumption that dirty water doesn't make good brownies, we need a regulation for it. Then someone made brownies using old nuts. Most people wouldn't anyway, but now we need a regulation for that.

And so on and so on.

My daughter bakes brownies quite often. The recipe (including the ingredient list) is less than half an A4 page. They're delicious and no-one has died from eating them yet, nor do I think they ever will.

In this small microcosm of bureaucratic life, we find how government fucks everything up. All that extra regulation burdening (for example) banks now is because someone learned a lesson somewhere and the government wants to enforce that lesson on everyone. The fact that the banks have learned that lesson pretty well, thanks very much, and certainly won't be making that mistake again in a hurry.

But no, that's not good enough, the government has to add another rule to the book, with all sorts of unforeseen consequences and catastrophes. And simply complying with all these rules makes it more and more difficult to enter that market and provide effective competition. Existing banks already have compliance teams and know where the bodies are buried, so it's no real hassle for them to comply with more rules.

And so, in brownies and in banking (and, indeed, in every aspect of life) the government does lots to protect incumbents and does nothing worthwhile to protect you.

Comparing the state with individuals

Douglas Carswell has an excellent post here contrasting two different ways of giving people power.

The Coalition is currently in the process of trying to implement my idea of a Great Repeal or Freedom Bill. Launched by officials as Your Freedom (but with a tone that implies their terms), it's moderated by people in Whitehall. Unsurprisingly, it has, at times, been overrun by angry trolls, and it is hard to see how it differs from every other on-line government consultation.

Meanwhile, the completely unmoderated and totally open Great Repeal Bill site, goes from strength to strength.

And as a micro example of how people can self-regulate perfectly reasonably, and discuss something significant and important without succumbing to "criminal elements", it's pretty good.

It also contrasts the government's superficially glossy but ultimately useless delivery of a service with the slightly less snazzy but infinitely more useful and usable solution created by individuals.

I'm also willing to be a fiver that the government solution cost thousands of pounds while the privately created solution simply piggy-backed off something that was already there -- something that the government could quite easily have done, but chose not to.

You might claim that this is a triviality and that it's not that important in the grand scheme of things.

I would turn that on its head and say if the government couldn't get this absolutely trivial thing done properly and cost-effectively, how on earth can you justify them trying to deliver even more complex, important and inherently expensive things properly?

How unspeakably depressing

Cameron has staked his reputation on the Big Society and Labour will gun for it on any pretext (a fig-leaf for cuts being the current refrain). Cameron cannot afford to fail twice.

I hope to God that analysis is wrong. The Big Society is a monumental clusterfuck waiting to happen, the last thing that can happen is for it to succeed.

Goodbye to the Grundiau!

Eric Pickles, the one Tory who still behaves like a Tory, looks like he's going to make good on one pre-election promise: to take public sector job advertising away from the Grun and put them on a website.

Several things come to mind here:

1. Good. I hope the fucking Grun collapses in a hand-wringing pile of shit.
2. I bet the on-line effort winds up costing more than the Grun did.
3. At least it will be easy to prove how many non-jobs and how little cutting back on the state their will be in reality.

Get a fucking grip (for @JDFicklin )

My piss was boiled yesterday by reading Carpsio's mention of how his brother is taking a £9,000 pay cut to qualify for more benefits which would leave him £350 a month better off.

In a fit of rage, I tweeted:

Welfare works. Oh yeah: http://bit.ly/cPoHAI <-- read that and see if you don't want to strangle some fucking bleeding heart cocksniffer.

Some fucknut piped up out of the blue:

@obotheclown did YOU read it? Honestly, your depth of understanding is as thin as your 'irreverent libertarian' schtick.

I was frankly rather baffled by this. So I asked him what he meant. His reply came forth:

@obotheclown oh sorry. I thought you impugned the welfare state by implying that everyone on benefits was intentionally opting for a 1/2

@obotheclown handout instead of earning their own money. Nice straw man douchebag. Does the shitty thinking come on with the make-up? 2/2

He then went on to add:

@obotheclown uh-uh. You keep up the great contributions to libertarian thought. We all wait with bated breath.

Well, frankly I was baffled. Where had I even intimated such a thing?

Au cuntriare, twat, I think most dole bludgers are too fucking lazy to do any such thing. What fucks me off is that anyone can defend a dole system whereby it's to your benefit to earn less so you can butt-fuck the taxpayer for the difference and then some.

I actually admire Carpsio's brother's initiative for looking at a fucked system and gaming it like that, but crucially, isn't it a fucking condemnation of the system that it pays you more to earn less?

Seriously, who, in that situation, looking at it rationally, would not say: fuck the work for a game of soldiers. Instead of being motivated to work myself out of "poverty", let me sit on my hands and have more money?

And the fault here is not that of the entirely rational dole bludger. The fault is in the system and the cunts that defend it and say it needs more money.

So, Mr Ficklin, don't make stupid fucking assumptions about what is pissing me off.

If you're happy to defend a system that encourages people not to work by penalising them when they do and rewarding them when they don't, you're a fucking idiot. But if you agree that punishing people for taking care of their own and rewarding them for sitting on their hands is stupid, then you're a step closer to being a libertarian.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. FUCKING FUCK. FUCKING FUCKING ...

... fuck.

AAAAAAAAARGHHHH!!!!!!!