Tim Worstall

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The "pirate mothership" destroyed by the Indian Navy in the Gulf of Aden last week was actually a Thai fishing boat that was itself being hijacked and whose crew was tied up below decks. The sunken vessel, which was destroyed by INS Tabar, an Indian frigate, on the night of November 18, was the Ekawat [...]

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Sir James Crosby, a former chief executive of HBOS, told ministers that for the first time since records began, banks and building societies are likely to take in more in mortgage repayments next year than they give out in new loans. Such negative net lending could push house prices into a new “self-feeding” downward phase, [...]

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Here. It’s the usual hogwash. But Europe’s focus must be on encouraging the development of local agriculture. Doing so is the only way to achieve greater global food security and reduce poverty. It will also make it possible to ensure that today’s high prices for agricultural products are transformed into opportunity for poor farmers. This [...]

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But we ought to uphold the right of the British National Party to express its views, however vile, after Merseyside Police arrested 13 of its members for distributing leaflets. I’m afraid that free speech means freedom for fools and scumbags, too.

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The effects of melting permafrost are not incorporated in any global climate models. That’s a bit of a surprise actually.  Dramatic changes to the lives and livelihoods of Arctic-living communities are being forecast unless urgent action is taken to reduce greenhouse gases, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).Its Working Group II predicts [...]

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On Labour’s watch the top 10% consumed nearly a third of national earnings… Isn’t "generated" a better word here than "consumed"?

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To get an ID card, people will have their faces scanned and will have to give 10 fingerprints. Campaigners fear that this will put off celebrities like American singer Madonna from setting up home here and so damage the cultural life of the nation. Now I give way to no one in my hatred of [...]

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Apparently this one is doing the rounds again. "Editor: Steve Harvey". Any five of you bored enough to carry this on can consider yourselves tagged.

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From 2011, if Labour win the next election, earnings above £150,000 will be taxed at a new higher rate of 45 per cent. The new higher rate of tax – the first income tax increase in decades – will raise £670m a year. Trivial….the politics of envy, no more. At current rates of spending this [...]

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This really sounds rather bizarre: Around 10 per cent of newly-married women are seeking counselling to cope with their "secret sadness", according to psychologists. Many are turning to marriage guidance websites for reassurance about what they should expect after the excitement of their big day wears off. Did anyone really ever believe the "get married, [...]

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That’s what we should do, not this piddling around with VAT rates. Go read the proper briefing paper with real numbers and all that.

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Here, with Mick.

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Seems rather illogical actually. The bankers weren’t creating value but were getting high pay. So we should tax them more. Instead, he suggests cutting taxes immediately for those on lower incomes, balancing this out by raising those for the wealthier. Although in the LibDems’ proposals this is gained through clampdowns on capital gains tax and [...]

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At the ASI. So, what’s wrong with pimps?

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He had an unerring eye for the approach which would rankle most with his recipients. Writing to Harriet Harman, then of "The National Council for so-called Civil Liberties", he began: "I saw you on television the other night… Why should an attractive lass like you want to confuse her pretty little head with complicated matters [...]

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Umm, not sure the readers here are precisely Woolies target market but still. Go here, print out the voucer and get money off everything at Woolies. Heck, why not?

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Wish I’d thought of this myself. But I didn’t. Between businesses of course the VAT rate doesn’t matter, unless you want to argue minor points like cashflow. In order to work, to provide a fiscal boost, VAT needs to change the prices paid by consumers in the shops. But prices aren’t determined by anything so [...]

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I’ve never seen the attraction of prostitution. If a man wants quick unfulfilling sex with a woman who despises him, he should get married.

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Then his South African friends asked him how he did it. He typed up some sample multiple-choice questions for them, all based on his swotting-up of Life in the United Kingdom, the Home Office text on which the official exam is based. They passed. So he put his questions and some coaching notes on his [...]

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