Friday, June 30, 2006

Tim Berners-Lee on Net Socialism / Corruption and unsafe driving

Tim Berners-Lee, considered the driving force behind the creation of the Internet, has piped in on Net Socialism. He thinks we should support it, and that "[t]his is serious". I agree that the statist assault against the integrity of the Internet is serious. I just think it's sad, but expected, that the father stands against his creation.

And of course, the writer of the article once again mentions the opponents of Net Socialism having millions of dollars. Can one of those writers who say these things send me a million dollar? I really would like to fit their pathetic stereotype.

But here is the statist clincher:

The simple truth that you can't have a free market without government regulation...


Hello? Come again? We can't have a peaceful system of trade without a gang of thugs? Says who? Apparently Jon Hannibal Stokes is either a retard, or he knows some arcane secret of economy that we don't... But what do you expect from statist propaganda, right?


A new study has been published recently on the effects of government corruption, as tested on "driver's licences" (driving is a privilege, not a right, doncha know?) in New Delhi.

Several interesting facts regarding corruption emerge. First, the bureaucracy responds to individual needs. Those who want their license faster (e.g. [the group who was given money to bribe officials with]), get it 40% faster and at a 20% higher rate. Second, the bureaucracy is insensitive to social needs. The bonus [bribing] group does not learn to drive safely in order to obtain their license: in fact, 69% of them were rated as “failures” on the independent driving test. Those in the [group that was given driving lessons], despite superior driving skills, are only slightly more likely to obtain a license than the comparison [control] group and far less likely (by 29 percentage points) than the bonus group. (...) Together, these results suggest that bureaucrats raise red tape to extract bribes and that this corruption undermines the very purpose of regulation.

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