Articles with the Tag open mouth insert foot

Another winning moment for science fiction

science fiction
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If, like me, you’ve made the mistake to read one or more of Larry Niven’s and Jerry Pournelle’s collaborations, you know they got a mighty high opinion of the abilities of science fiction writers. For example, in their alien invasion novel Footfall, they put in thinly disguised versions of themselves and their sf writer friends as advisors to the government on how to deal with the invasion, and actually got them listened to, while in Fallen Angels it was science fiction fans who formed the underground against the evil treehugging fundamentalist Christian feminists that rule America. A few years ago they actually gotten a real live version of their power fantasies going, when they created SIGMA, which apparantly is a group of a two dozen or so science fiction writers dedicated to giving the government national security advice, whether they want it or not.

Here’s an account of the group in action, showing by their careful, considered proposals how the science fiction community can help America cope with its problems:

Among the group’s approximately 24 members is Larry Niven, the bestselling and award-winning author of such books as “Ringworld” and “Lucifer’s Hammer,” which he co-wrote with SIGMA member Jerry Pournelle.

Niven said a good way to help hospitals stem financial losses is to spread rumors in Spanish within the Latino community that emergency rooms are killing patients in order to harvest their organs for transplants.

“The problem [of hospitals going broke] is hugely exaggerated by illegal aliens who aren’t going to pay for anything anyway,” Niven said.

“Do you know how politically incorrect you are?” Pournelle asked.

“I know it may not be possible to use this solution, but it does work,” Niven replied.

(Via James Nicoll.)

Germany’s tax scandal: an opportunity for the left

Life under Capitalism, socialism
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Germany is currently in the grip of a tax scandal, after it became known that hundreds of wealthy Germans, including Deutsche Post CEO Klaus Zumwinkel have been using Liechtenstein as a tax haven:

It is rapidly becoming one of the largest economic scandals ever in Germany’s post-World War II history. As many as 900 wealthy Germans — many of them well-known — might be involved. Berlin may have been shorted up to 4 billion euros in taxes. And the accusatory finger is pointing increasingly at what many feel is rampant greed among of many of Germany’s top earners — and at a handful of banks and foundations in the tiny principality of Liechtenstein that help the affluent hide their assets.

With dissatisfaction at Germany’s current righwing government already high, The International Herald Tribune sees the tax scandal as a chance for the left to gain ground in local elections:

The jury is still out on how the scandal will unfold politically. Just two weeks ago, the Left Party, an amalgam of former East German and radical Westerners that sharply criticizes the unchecked power of big business, made a strong showing in two state elections. Next week, German voters in the city-state of Hamburg go to the polls, and conservatives fear a blowout if the public seizes on it as a chance to vent frustrations about tax evasion and what it seems to symbolize. Hamburg could end up as another victory for the left.

In a good leftist tradition the Left Party immediately shot itself in the foot when a representative in the parliament of Lower Saxony put forth her views on former East Germany, saying the Stasi had been necessary to protect the country from “reactionary forces” and that the Berlin Wall had been built to keep West Germans from crossing into the East. Which did use to be the official DDR explenation for these things, but it seems a bit silly to still believe this almost twenty years after the fall of the wall…