The latest surveillance security technology in development in the US threatens to become yet another expensive encroachment upon our civil liberties.
Future Attributable Screening Technology (FAST), which is being developed by the US army, uses surveillance cameras with advanced software to pre-empt crimes taking place. This is done by cameras recognising certain traits or signals which may indicate criminal activity. For example, it may be able to identify and follow people who leave objects in public places, or identify facial micro-expressions associated with people under stress or who are acting hostile.
The arguments for this technology are that it would be more efficient and reliable as a security guard watching a screen may not be able to effectively monitor every single person’s actions within a crowded public place.
But at the same time, the potential threat this poses to our right to privacy is worrying. I'm not sure I want to live in a world where we are individually targeted, tracked and recorded purely for acting ‘suspiciously’.
It would be even more problematic if – as seems inevitable – data from these CCTV images was collated and stored on a database. This could result in past offenders being traced and tracked continuously by cameras without having actually broken the law.
This technology may have a place within military organizations, but once 'domesticated' it is only likely to fuel further the surveillance society that we increasingly live in.
An interview in the Daily Telegraph with Tourism Minister Barbara Follett prompted me to check out the new "Tourism Strategy" recently published by the Department of Culture Media and Sport.
The strategy is almost entirely devoted to making the Olympics a booster for tourism. More importantly, it shows just how true the old adage is about any pot of taxpayers' money being like honey for the busy bees of the public purse.
In her remarks about her plans, the minister revealed some unintentional truths about government support for tourism. Eight government departments have responsibilities relating to tourism, but she also pointed to five other publicly funded organisations and four QUANGO-managed initiatives chewing on the public purse to "promote" tourism.
Unravelling QUANGO budgets is as always nigh on impossible, but if we take an average of 50 staff members in each entity or initiative paid at the average wage of £25,000pa involved in the above that's £11.25 million in wages alone on this industry "support". If you double that for the cost of interference by the eight government departments you get a public-expense equal to almost exactly a quarter of the entire £85 million turnover of the industry.
How about disbanding them all. Taking that expense off National Insurance taxes in a staff intensive industry and you' could have a 20% price reduction on all UK holidays – which 95% of people say are overpriced.
Governments love to govern, but they so often achieve outcomes that are the opposite of their intentions.
A few weeks ago I attended the launch of The Plan: twelve months to RENEW BRITAIN, the new book by Douglas Carswell and Daniel Hannan. I've had the chance to read it now, and I can confirm that it's excellent stuff.
Hannan and Carswell (an MEP and an MP respectively) are the driving force behind Direct Democracy, a group set up in the aftermath of the Conservatives' 2005 general election defeat to develop a new agenda for the party. Their first book, also called Direct Democracy, had a significant impact, really putting the localist agenda at the forefront of the political debate. A series of papers published with the Centre for Policy Studies last year further developed the theme.
The Plan deserves to be their biggest hit yet. Like their previous work, it forcefully and convincingly makes the case for radical policy reform in the UK, covering everything from healthcare (where they advocate health savings accounts) and education (where they call for vouchers), to the reform of local government, parliament and, indeed, British democracy itself (though a much greater role for referenda). Throughout, the emphasis is on empowering the individual, and moving decision-making power as close to the people it affects as possible.
What makes The Plan particularly impressive though is that Carswell and Hannan bring their insight as parliamentarians to it, laying out the legislative steps that would be needed to make their vision a reality. According to their calculations, it would take 12 months and thirty acts of parliament to turn things around. Frankly, I wish someone would let them get started...
The US economics publication Econ Journal Watch has issued a call for papers for a symposium entitled Economic Notes from Underground.
The idea is for economists to write confessional essays about their existence as economists, and to explore preference falsification – the idea that people publicly express views or attitudes that are false to his or her true private views or attitudes – and other forms of moral or intellectual compromise within the profession. Papers may be published anonymously.
The crisis is, as we know, bringing out everyone and their uncles with their pet plans for sorting out the world. Can we just remind ourselves that there's nothing big and nothing clever about the idea of energy independence? The arguments for trade don't break down just because something is important.
Schumpeter's Wager is the opposite of what he actually thought himself: that these downturns are simply the necessary flipside of the creative desctruction that makes us all so wealthy.
On why we need the Milton Friedman Institute now more than ever.
Netsmith isn't quite sure he believes this headline figure but there is your real economy for you.
Imagine my surprise on finding a cogent, well thought out and sensible article at the Guardian's Comment is Free site. But there it is, they've managed to do it.
It is perhaps tasteless to say so, but we are fortunate that we face a social plague very similar to that of gin – the illegal drug trade. And as in the mid-18th century, we see the failure of abolitionist policies to control the menace. The total value of this trade amounts to between £2bn and £6.5bn a year – all untaxed........The total benefit of such legalisation to the Exchequer is likely to be between £3.5bn and £6.3bn a year, including excise duty, VAT and income tax from the dealers and allowing for additional costs.
Quite, in these straitened times, while all are looking for new sources of tax revenue, why don't we legalise something which we know we cannot beat by prohibition? As we've shown by trying said prohibition for the past few decades?
The tax revenue would not be the only benefit, of course. There is the simple civil liberties aspect: my or your desire to ingest oddities carries no diminution of the rights of others, nor threat to their person or property, so it should not be something which is constricted by the law. Legalisation and the subsequent competition amongst legitimate suppliers would lower prices (even with the high tax rates we'd impose) and thus reduce the crime associated with addicts looking for the money with which to score.
Prisons could be filled with real criminals rather than those only damaging themselves, we'd save many billions in policing costs. The quality of the drugs on offer would rise, thus reducing the physical damage that they do and the associated costs to the NHS.
All in all, we reduce the costs to the Exchequer, increase the revenues and advance freedom and liberty in one fell swoop.
It's something of a pity that we've not done it already really, isn't it?
Perhaps this could be one of those Naomi Klein moments, from her book The Shock Doctrine? Where we neo-liberals use a shock, a crisis, to advance our agenda?
I have a little confession. I've been a member of the Obama campaign for nearly a year. I signed up when the inspiring, energetic junior Senator from Illinois was the long-shot candidate struggling against the Clinton machine and its sense of entitlement. As a member of the campaign I get regular updates, letters from the candidate, and the occasional request for a campaign contribution. But lately I have been stunned by the deluge.
With less than two weeks till the election, almost every day, I receive emails asking me to donate money. Emails from Sen Joe Biden, the would be Vice-President, from Mr Plouffe, the manager of the campaign, from Mrs Obama, the lady who would be first, and from Sen Obama himself. Pleading, cajoling, prodding. Telling me of their desperate need. Urging me to give. I've been scratching my head in bewilderment. Sen Obama has raised more money than any other presidential candidate in history. By recent count he has raised in excess of US$ 600 million (over US$ 150 million in the month of September alone). He has raised more than twice the sum Sen McCain has raised and is out-spending the Arizona senator, several times over, in almost every state and county. How much is enough?
In response to the most severe financial crisis in 70 years, Sen Obama often crows about the economic hardships that hard working, blue collar Americans face. Yet with this gross, bloated, obscene political treasure chest, Sen Obama has the temerity to ask these people who struggle to feed their families, to pay their rent or mortgages, to school their children, for more money. It's simply astonishing. During the Great Depression, men would pull the tongues of their trouser pockets out to show they were penurious. They called them Hoover Flags, as a sock to the then President. I've just reached into the pocket of my neat Saville Row suit and pulled the tongue out. I'm waving it at the Obama campaign. Joe the Plumber, Tito the Builder, and Ed the Dairyman ought to do the same.
In the latest issue of the Cato Policy Report, William Niskanen calls for a different kind of Libertarian Party in America. He calls for a more effective LP that would trade it’s vote for influence on the candidate who is most closely aligned to the Libertarian Party's ideals, rather than trying to fight elections on its own. This would only work if certain criteria were met in each district: (1) there must be no separate LP candidate; (2) the size of the party must be larger than the expected vote difference between the major party candidates; (3) after the major party candidates are selected the LP must have bargaining power with them; (4) the LP's members must act in concert to support their preferred candidate.
This call is perfectly rational in light of the evidence, whereby around 20 percent of people have libertarian leanings, but then come election time only 1 percent vote for the Libertarian candidate. David Boaz and David Kirby investigated this in depth in the Policy Analysis paper, The Libertarian Vote and found that there are in many districts a key 10-20 percent of voters that can swing an election. William Niskanen’s idea is a way of utilising this and then building influence into it. The Libertarian Party of the US (and indeed of the UK) should look at how this can be developed to become effective in shaping the policy ideas and pronouncements of politicians.
There is of course one drawback, the large amount of risk involved, in that you have to trust a politician. Somewhat easier in the US, with it’s looser party system, distinctly harder here in the UK. But worth a shot nonetheless.
The latest surveillance security technology in 
An interview in the Daily Telegraph with Tourism Minister Barbara Follett prompted me to check out the new "Tourism Strategy" recently published by the Department of Culture Media and Sport.
A few weeks ago I attended the launch of The Plan: twelve months to RENEW BRITAIN, the new book by Douglas Carswell and Daniel Hannan. I've had the chance to read it now, and I can confirm that it's excellent stuff.
I have a little confession. I've been a member of the Obama campaign for nearly a year. I signed up when the inspiring, energetic junior Senator from Illinois was the long-shot candidate struggling against the Clinton machine and its sense of entitlement. As a member of the campaign I get regular updates, letters from the candidate, and the occasional request for a campaign contribution. But lately I have been stunned by the deluge.