Tim Worstall

The Supreme Court said cramped conditions in the state’s prison system were causing “needless suffering and death.” However, at the 1,600 capacity county lock-up in Castaic, north of Los Angeles the population currently stands at just two and the inmates can choose from hundreds of beds. In the American system a prison is run by [...]

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The Prime Minister announced that he was setting up a committee urgently to consider how to address the issue, but he immediately came under pressure to act more swiftly and issue new instructions to the judiciary. The law may well be an ass but that really isn’t how it works. Judges implement the law that [...]

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And their defence fails, badly. Their defence being that ignorance of the law is a defence. Nope, it ain’t matey. If I by some appalling mischance find myself in Lllantrillichturdbuggery on a wet Monday night and breach some prissy little rule that your (ex—Har Har!) mates have passed into law to oppress the Principality, you [...]

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See? It’s true, the NHS has become the new national religion.

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“Why all the fuss? It’s merely a bit of hanky-panky with the help,” said Jean-François Kahn, the crusading editor of the Left-wing Marianne weekly. Blimey…..

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Somewhere in the voluminous comments sections of Guido’s blog (recently mind) there’s a link to a not too inaccurate listing of all the injunctions etc. If anyone’s sufficiently bored would they like to find it for me?

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One that delivers the promise of a better, more sustainable way of living in the UK that will help people in this country fulfil their potential – which I believe to be the goal of macro economic policy. Oh Dear Lord. Macro’s all about aggregate demand, the short term stuff. It’s Micro which is about [...]

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On an article discussing Sakharov’s 90 th birthday, including how the zeks returned from the Gulag, we get this delight: Dekulakisation was a necessary strategy moving forward. If you will not play ball, then consequences must be suffered. Stalin understood that the Dictatorship of the Proletariat was in actual fact not an option, particularly when [...]

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There are books on our shelves we haven’t read and doubtless never will, that each of us has probably put to one side in the belief that we will read them later on, perhaps even in another life. The terrible grief of the dying as they realise their last hour is upon them and they [...]

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Antisemitism, sex and beavers What with this “all newspapers must become international because of the internet” thing might be worth reminding the Guardian’s subs that for some 95%/97% of the population, sex and beavers are rather intimately connected. In American English that is. The addition of antisemitism is less popular.

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Publishing what it called “the most authoritative ever report of bowel cancer risk” today (MON), the World Cancer Research Fund (WCRF) is recommending that people limit their intake of red meat to 500g a week, or just over a pound in weight. That is “roughly the equivalent of five or six medium portions of roast [...]

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There’s two bits to a tax. The rate at which it’s levied, the marginal rate, and the amount at which that rate is levied. Some expatriates, who are considered residents, also pay a wealth tax as well as income tax which reaches 41 per cent for those earning over £62,000. In the UK the higher [...]

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Yesterday the Sunday Herald, which is not bound by the terms of the injunction because it is published north of the border, intensified the row by publishing the footballer’s picture on its front page and naming him inside. The injunction only covers media based in England and Wales. This blog may or may not come [...]

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The research suggested that by 2050, the UK will be forced to spend 21.6% of GDP on long-term care, pensions and health services to cope with the rise in elderly people requiring state assistance. This is an increase from 16.5% of GDP spent in 2010, and equates to a rise of about £80 billion in [...]

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The table that arrived in Madrid’s Puerta del Sol square was part of the swirl of creative chaos, naive enthusiasm and pent-up frustration that has transformed it into a makeshift camp for thousand of protesters who call themselves los indignados, the indignant ones. Tents and mattresses, armchairs and sofas, a canteen, portable toilets and solar [...]

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In Greece. Yes, that really is piano playing by penis. Via.

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Charlatans and Cranks from Paul Krugman by By PAUL KRUGMAN They’re all that’s left. Or rather, the RSS feed from Paul Krugman’s blog is dispensing wisdom. For it is indeed true that all that is left on the left is a series of charlatans and cranks. For as Brad DeLong continually points out, Rule No. [...]

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Take it away Prof. Friedman: It apparently did not occur to him that the contrast between his experience in getting services provided by government and his experience buying groceries on the private market, where you simply pay your money and walk out with what you have bought, might say something about the relative workability of [...]

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And the tarts got a stamp on their arm for each service performed: What’s with the stamping numbers on peoples’ arms? Didn’t those madcap Germans already try that?

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…..as a general rule, any research trumpeted in the opinion column of the Times is probably on its way off the frontier. Or, the opinion columns of the New York Times are Joe Kennedy’s shoe shine boy.

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