The Prices, the prizes, the colors (yes ‘colors’)…. unbelievable.

After reading “Everything you love comes from capitalism” the character of and feeling you get from The Price is Right changes dramatically. Any apprehension you may have had about it from decades of anti-capitalist brainwashing is blown away, and you see that show for what it really was; an incredible exposition of the abundance produced by the free market, even as practiced under the severe duress of the state.

Watch it for yourself:

https://thepiratebay.org/tag/The+Price+Is+Right

And the music is to die for.

KILLIAN IS LYING TO YOU!

PRICELESS!

Now that the coalition has a full grasp of the scope and seriousness of the deficit, and they are practically and philosophically minded to take the necessary austerity measures to attempt to ameliorate the problem, its clear that the new Department for Education must permanently abolish Ofsted.

In a system where parents have greater, real control over schools, and those schools are directly accountable them, an organisation whose sole purpose is to inspect schools and produce reports on them for central government is surplus to requirements.

Parents have all the feedback they need from their schools directly since the schools are to be made responsible to them, and not the state. That makes the generation of annual reports that very few people read or make use of a complete waste of scarce resources.

The performance of schools is better monitored by the examination results that they produce; parents who are not getting what they require are to be given the power to change how schools are run; Ofsted clearly has no role to play in any of this. It is only in a system where the parent has no say or control over a school, and where everything is run by a monolithic central government that a structure like Ofsted has anything like a meaningful purpose.

Ofsted has no control over the day to day running of schools. They can only comment, recommend and generate yearly assessments that have no direct impact on how schools run between their reports. In other words, the work that they do is next to worthless when it comes to how a school is run, the services and the outcomes that affect students and parents daily.

There is a clear and logical case for Ofsted to be closed down permanently. Fine grained, locally accountable schools that report to and that are controllable by parents make Ofsted obsolete. With a budget of £236m in 2007, and no useful function, Ofsted is a prime candidate for the axe.

It’s not perfect. In fact it is FAIL, this expulsion of the foetal police state. Two articles demonstrating some of the limited progress, bearing in mind that the sinister, racist, apartheid style ID Cards are still… on the cards. It’s a catalogue of FAIL, with each measure leaving just enough cancer behind so that it can return one day to kill the body.

Face-to-face passport interviews catch only eight fraudsters

A multi-million pound scheme to tackle passport fraud has been branded a failure after it was revealed that only eight people have been caught as a result of the project.

Since 2007, first-time applicants for passports have been required to attend face-to-face interviews with officials from the Identity and Passport Service (IPS) in an attempt to spot fraudsters.

Out of half a million people interviewed so far, just eight have been refused passports on the basis of the evidence obtained, according to official figures.

Although 4,000 fraud investigations have been triggered as a result of the interviews, not one has led to a prosecution or conviction.

Yet the government has admitted that on its own estimate, 4,400 fraudulent applicants per year are still managing to slip through the net and obtain passports.

Phil Booth, of campaign group NO2ID, said: “This expensive project was an attempt to introduce a network by stealth for the national identity card scheme. These figures show it has failed to have any significantly effect on passport fraud.”

The system of face-to-face interviews cost £93 million to set up, with £30 million a year running costs on top. It has helped push the price of a standard passport up from £28 in 2001 to £77.50 today.

Mr Booth added: “Now the ID card scheme has been binned and we have seen off, for the time being at least, proposals to fingerprint for passports, will this network be closed and will the cost of a passport be cut by this Government?”

Under the new system, applicants for passports aged 16 or over, who have never held a UK passport before, must first pass a background check and are then told to arrange an interview at one of 69 offices across the country.

[…]

While the interviews appear to have make little impact on levels of fraud, traditional paper checks continue to detect thousands of bogus applicants a year.

In 2006/7, 6,100 applicants were identified as fraudulent by the existing safeguards and prevented from obtaining British passports.

In the same year, according to an official government estimate, 9,700 slipped through the net and obtained passports to which they were not entitled.

By 2008/9, the most recent year for which data are available, the number identified as fraudulent and stopped through paper checks had risen to 9,200, while the number estimated to have slipped through the net had fallen to 4,400.

[…]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/immigration/7823456/Face-to-face-passport-interviews-catch-only-eight-fraudsters.html

Remember, this is 9,700 out of an undisclosed number of passports that are issued or renewed every year. Without the number of passports that are issued correctly, this number is meaningless. If the total number of passports renewed or issued for the first time is 9,701 then the problem is huge. If the number of passports renewed or issued for the first time is 1,000,000 then the problem is very small, and the vast majority should not be penalised. Also, if this 9,700 number is correct, it shows that the state is able to detect these passports and intercept them in order to make a count, rendering the number of carriers of bad passports at any one time very small indeed compared to the tens of millions of people who are British passport holders.

Like the pathetic and paranoia, vendor snake oil fuelled US VISIT system, this absurd face to face interview system is a total waste of time.

The vast majority of passports are correctly issued. Even the ones that are correctly issued can be misused at will by criminals and murderers, especially now that cloning them is meade simple by the RFID chip in each passport. That is why, by the way, you should hammer the chip page in your biometric passport if you are unfortunate enough to have one.

When it is proposed that a working system is altered to accommodate a problem caused by a statistically small number of cases, that is a good indication that the proposed changes are wrong and should be rejected.

See our other posts on this subject:

The Times on Biometric Passports: Do they FINALLY understand?

Fingerprints as ID – good, bad, ugly?

What about the Children?

and one from 2005 etc etc.

And now, on to the insanely stupid ‘vetting and barring scheme’:

Ministers slammed the brakes last night on Labour’s controversial scheme to force millions of parents to undergo anti-paedophile and criminal records checks.

Home Secretary Theresa May pledged to change ‘fundamentally’ the deeply unpopular Vetting and Barring Scheme which was due to expand dramatically from next month – but she stopped short of scrapping it entirely.

The plans for new registrations from July 26 have been scrapped and Home Office officials are working out how the scheme will be scaled down.

Nine million adults were due to undergo intrusive checks by a new government agency, the Independent Safeguarding Authority.

But there was outrage after it emerged parents taking their children to Scouts or sports events could face fines of up to £5,000 if they failed to comply.

The scheme, which was designed to protect children and vulnerable adults, prompted major civil liberties concerns over its size and intrusion into private lives.

Last night Mrs May said checks on vulnerable groups should be ‘proportionate and sensible’.

She said: ‘The safety of children and vulnerable adults is of paramount importance to the new Government.

‘However it is also vital that we take a measured approach in these matters. We’ve listened to the criticisms and will respond with a scheme that has been fundamentally remodelled.

‘Vulnerable groups must be properly protected in a way that is proportionate and sensible.

‘This redrawing of the VBS will ensure this happens.’

Civil liberties groups welcomed the move, but urged Mrs May to abolish the scheme entirely.

Dylan Sharpe, campaign director of Big Brother Watch, said: ‘A review is not a solution.

‘The vetting and barring scheme should be scrapped and the Independent Safeguarding Authority should go with it.’

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1286639/Vetting-plans-parents-scaled-ministers.html

You cannot be a little bit pregnant. This scheme, like the foul ID Card and NIR must be entirely abolished forever. Absolutely appalling that they are even considering keeping it, especially when they have the perfect storm of pretexts for getting rid of it.

I had a chance to watch this again. What struck me about it was how it highlights the complete reversal of right and wrong, normal and abnormal that we are suffering today.

In the 1960’s its clear that the ideas of mistrust by default, preemptive war, attack as the best defence was the line that the purely evil, venal, greedy villain took, whilst peace, patience, negotiation, understanding, empathy for strangers (and in this case, VERY strange strangers) was the position of the absolute hero, the ideal and model human being, the normal, decent and true spirit of man.

This episode is startling, because it reminds anyone who watches is that the world really was a very different and better place even with all the unpleasant things that were happening at that time.

There is absolutely no reason why the better nature of human beings should not re assert itself in the 21st century. All decent people refuse to go along with the anti human Zero Trust Society, the economic slavery, the systematic silencing of anyone who does not go along with the group think.

It looks to me that thanks to the internet, it is now nearly impossible for a lie to have a long life. This means that means that all lies that are used to reshape the world now cannot do so, since reshaping the world with a lie takes time. If the truth is told all the time everywhere, then the end result must be more liberty and not less. This is why it is vitally important for people to retransmit the truth; it is more important than demonstrating, violence or any of the the 20th century ways of making things that are wrong, right.

And while we are talking about the truth, do take the time to watch all of the documentary ‘Free to Choose‘. The facts that make up the science of Economics are not a matters of opinion. It is up to you to make yourself familiar with the truth, to face it, embrace it and spread it.

For great justice!

Today, we read an irrational nauseating and completely wrong headed Defense of what amounts to ID Cards through the back door, delivered uncritically by the incorrectly named ‘Liberty Central’, which is in fact, Fail Central when it comes to your rights and defending them:

ID cards: gone for good
Scrapping the costly ID card scheme will be just the first act of this coalition to stop the state stealing people’s liberty

The title of this piece is false. ID Cards are not ‘gone for good’, since foreigners are still compelled to hand over their fingerprints and be registered in an NIR Lite®.

When the second reading of the Identity Documents bill takes place in the House of Commons later today, the coalition government will meet its commitment to scrap the ID card scheme. This bill is the first step the government will take to reduce control by the state and hand power pack to the people. It is not the job of government to collect and store vast amounts of biographical and biometric data belonging to innocent people.

We agree with this entirely.

It is not the job or proper role of government to do this to innocent people, no matter where they come from or who they are. That is the qualification missing from this correct statement.

People do not want the state keeping information on its citizens for some ill-defined and unproven benefit. Fewer than 15,000 people have bought an ID card since last November – and around 3,000 of those were issued free to workers at Manchester and London City airports.

When has what people want had anything to do with the proper role of government, or what it decides to do or not do? This is window dressing, and as for ‘ill-defined and unproven benefit’, you, Damien Green, fall into this trap yourself in this very article.

Many claims have been made in recent years for supposed benefits of the identity card scheme – from tackling terrorism and fighting organised crime to preventing identity fraud. I don’t believe these have, or ever would have, materialised. This is incredible given that the scheme, while delivering no increase in public protection, would also erode hardwon rights and freedoms and requires huge spending.

We have been talking about this for years. All the claims made for ID Cards were completely disproven by us and many other people. Which makes what Mr. Green says later quite astonishing.

The estimated spend of £835m in costs over ten years on the scheme is a significant amount of money, not “diddly squat” as Alan Johnson, the former home secretary, has publicly stated.

What do you expect from a communist post man? In any case, what the liars in New Labour said is now irrelevant. The bills have been put on the table and they need to be paid and repealed.

This huge sum would have been extracted from all of us one way or the other – either because we would have been forced to buy the wretched cards or through taxation.

And the issue of money is an entirely separate issue from the basic immorality of the project.

With the introduction of the Identity Documents bill, the coalition government has acted swiftly to turn back the increasing tide of government bureaucracy. We want to dismantle the scheme at minimum cost to the public and see early destruction of the personal data held on the national identity register and of the register itself.

You may be turning back the tide, but the country is still flooded up to the neck in laws that violate the rights of everyone who lives in Britain. Until you have drained all the leech filled waters completely, you cannot make any claim that the work is finished.

Now we come to the nasty, ridiculous, irrational, illogical, xenophobic clap trap…

Some campaigners have criticised our decision to continue issuing biometric residence permits while scrapping the ID card for UK citizens. This is misguided because the documents are very different.

No, they are not different at all in nature. Foreigners will be compelled to hand over their fingerprints and be registered on an NIR Lite® which will be subject to all the same vulnerabilities as the full NIR. It is discriminatory and xenophobic since it targets only one group of people – foreigners. It is illogical because anyone who does not look the part will be subject to investigation as we have detailed over and over instantly legitimising the need for a National ID Card of the type you are rejecting. It will create confusion, suspicion, division, disharmony and hatred; the complete opposite of what any mandated interfacing with the state should produce.

These biometric residents permits offer no advantages over the traditional ones, just as biometric ID Cards do not offer any benefits to anyone. If they are going to be brought in, as was the case with ID Cards, Damien Green needs to explain in detail, with evidence to back up his claims, how these residence permits are going to deliver the benefits he lists. I note that he does not do this in this article, because he knows full well that this system is being kept on solely to placate the vendors who are having their NIR related contracts cancelled.

We are required by European Union law to provide biometric residence permits to non-EU foreign nationals.

This is the Nuremberg Defense. “I was only following orders”. All the people who committed serious crimes and who used this defense were hanged.

If something is immoral, you have no option as a moral and ethical person but to reject and refuse to impliment it. You cannot lay the blame elsewhere for your crimes of violation. If you are acting as a public servant, you cannot engage in acts of violence against anyone on behalf of your masters, under the same principle that covers your behaviour in the Nuremberg Defense.

This excuse simply does not hold water, and there are any number of EU laws that could be enacted that are offensive to liberty that I could list, where I might say, “if X law was passed would you be obliged to obey it?”. The UK opted out of the parts of the Shengen Agreement that were not to its liking. There is no reason whatsoever that this too should not be immediately stopped.

They are issued under entirely different legislation.

This is the sort of argument a child makes. Whatever the legislation is, you should not be implementing it, period.

They are not “ID cards for foreign nationals”, as the previous government called them.

That is exactly and precisely what they are. As we describe, anyone who does not look the part will be made to identify themselves against the National Biometric Identity Service (NBIS) system, to which the police will have access so that people can be fingerprinted in the street, like criminals.

This is completely indefensible.

The biometric data is not kept on the national identity register

No, it is kept on the NBIS database, which is for all intents and purposes, identical to the NIR. To use these words as as a balm to reassure the public that the danger is really over is pathetic, childish and shows that Damien Green is falling into the same traps that New Labour fell into when they were trying to sell the snake oil of ID Cards. They start by using childish thinking, illogic, diversions, mischaracterisations and end up lying through their teeth to save face.

, and there is no legal obligation for foreign nationals to carry their permit with them,

This is a New Labour style misrepresentation and fact omission. Everyone and their dog now knows that in a biometric system with a central database, your fingerprints are the card. Once you give over your fingerprints, they can be checked anywhere at any time, instantly. You do not need a physical card; this is the sinister nature of biometric identity systems, and it is why the NIR had to be destroyed. The NBIS is no different, and anyone who says so is either:

1. Computer illiterate
2. A liar

so no one should ever be stopped and asked to produce the card.

Firstly, we all know that the anti terror laws have been abused beyond imagination and all reason. No one SHOULD have been abused under these laws, but they WERE and CONTINUE TO BE abused.

If this requirement for foreigners remains, then reflexive xenophobic forces WILL come into play and people WILL be abused. That is an absolute fact. And whilst no one will be asked for their card, they will be forced to put their finger on a scanner to be identified.

First, this will happen to brown people. Then, there will be yet another toothless outcry of racial profiling from the usual suspects, and then to make up the numbers, ‘white’ indigenous people will be targeted at random for street fingerprinting and fingerprinting down at the police station, so that the police can demonstrate that they are not using racial profiling, and being in the new Orwellian doublethink of the day, ‘fair’.

Think about it carefully. If they need to prove that they are not racially profiling, they will need to fingerprint (at any place and any time) the indigenous British, and then record their details along with the fingerprint that they took for the purpose of gathering statistics. That data is going to have to be stored somewhere.

Are you starting to get the picture yet?

ID Cards for foreigners will by their very existence, bring into being ID Cards and an NIR for the entire population.

We must also bear in mind that it only takes an act of Parliament to make the carrying of foreigner ID Cards compulsory. The word of one decent, if slightly confused man in a single article in a Marxist newspaper is no Defense against the future abuses of a rogue Parliament and the totalitarian beasts who man it.

Unlike the identity card for British citizens, this card serves a purpose by helping foreign nationals easily prove they have a right to live and work freely in the UK.

This is a claim that biometric resident permits have a utility greater than the residence permits that were being issued previously. Damien Green has not said how this is so, but I can tell you that proving you have a right to “live and work freely in the UK” means that you will, at a minimum, be required to produce your foreigner ID Card to a potential employer.

Any employer who does not ask for this card, could open himself up to prosecution. Any person who does not look or sound the part will be asked for this card. If an employer asks a person who does not look the part but who is British, could find himself being prosecuted for discrimination.

Once again, the only way a system like this can work is if everybody has a card showing their status; a National ID Card, which the coalition have conceded is unacceptable to decent people living in a free country.

What they must now admit is that the foreigner ID Card is also unacceptable for the same reasons, and more, since it will create the need for the very thing they have railed against so eloquently.

This government wants to bring to an end the practice of the state gathering data for the sake of it. It is imperative the government is held accountable to the people it represents and does not abuse its position in key areas of personal freedom and liberty.

If that is the case, then they should not be gathering the fingerprints of anyone, since doing so serves no purpose but to line the pockets of IBM.

This government represents not only the indigenous people of Britain, but of all people who enter this island legally for whatever reason. By mandating that foreigners are to be fingerprinted, this coalition government aligns itself with the worst abuses of places like Dubai, where workers are routinely abused.

The coalition is setting up a system of second class persons, just as the Apartheid government did, through its system of pass laws. This is anathema to all moral people.

The Identity Documents bill is a major step on that road. Making the repeal of ID cards bill the first to be brought before parliament by the new government demonstrates how serious we are about creating a free society and reducing expenditure.

This is simply not true.

In a free society, you do not fingerprint and catalogue one section of the public, whilst leaving the remainder at liberty. Liberty is for all, no exceptions, no compromises and no excuses.

Cancelling the ID cards scheme and abolishing the national identity register is a major step in dismantling the surveillance state, but this bill is just the first step. It will be followed by a series of reforms to restore British freedom to our citizens.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/libertycentral/2010/jun/09/id-cards-damian-green

The British are not YOUR citizens. Someone who believes in liberty would never use the possessive pronoun to describe human beings; you, Damien Green are THE SERVANT, not the OWNER or THE MASTER.

You have NO RIGHT to fingerprint ANYBODY, British Citizen or not.

You are NOT making the first step unless the NBIS is abandoned permanently; in fact, yo are TRIPPING YOURSELF UP with this absurd and illogical retention of an immoral and inhuman Apartheid system, that is sure to grow like a cancer that will impede the recovery of the healthy liberties of Britain.

Lew Rockwell has a great article about the Civil Rights Act of 1964:

It seems incredible that in the last days, a fundamental right of the whole of humanity, the freedom of association, has been denounced by the New York Times and all major opinion sources, even as a national political figure was reluctant to defend his own statements in favor of the idea, and then distanced himself from the notion. Has such a fundamental principle of liberty become unsayable?

Or perhaps it is not so incredible. An overweening government, in an age of despotism such as ours, must deny such a fundamental right simply because it is one of those core issues that speaks to who is in charge: the state or individuals.

We live in anti-liberal times, when individual choice is highly suspect. The driving legislative ethos is toward making all actions required or forbidden, with less and less room for human volition. Simply put, we no longer trust the idea of freedom. We can’t even imagine how it would work. What a distance we have travelled from the Age of Reason to our own times.

Referencing the great controversy about the 1964 Civil Rights Act, Karen De Coster put the issue to rest by turning Rachel Maddow’s question on its head. She demanded to know whether a white businessman has the right to refuse service to a black man. Karen asked: does a black businessman have the right to refuse service to a Klan member?

I don’t think anyone would dispute that right. How a person uses the right to associate (which necessarily means the right not to associate) is a matter of individual choice profoundly influenced by the cultural context. That a person has the right to make these choices on his or her own cannot be denied by anyone who believes in liberty.

The right to exclude is not something incidental. It is core to the functioning of civilization. If I use proprietary software, I can’t download it without signing a contractual agreement. If I refuse to sign, the company doesn’t have to sell it to me. And why? Because it is their software and they set the terms of use. Period. There is nothing more to say.

If you run a blog that accepts comments, you know how important this right is. You have to be able to exclude spam or ban IP addresses of trolls or otherwise include and exclude based on whether a person’s contribution adds value. Every venue on the internet that calls forth public participation knows this. Without this right, any forum could collapse, having been taken over by bad elements.

We exercise the right to exclude every day. If you go to lunch, some people come and some people do not. When you have a dinner party, you are careful to include some people and necessarily exclude others. Some restaurants expect and demand shoes and shirts and even coats and ties. The New York Times includes some articles and excludes others, includes some people in its editorial meetings and excludes others.

When business hires, some people make the cut and others do not. It is the same with college admissions, church membership, fraternities, civic clubs, and nearly every other association. They all exercise the right to exclude. It is central to the organization of every aspect of life. If this right is denied, what do we get in its place? Coercion and compulsion. People are forced together by the state, with one group required at the point of a gun to serve another group. This is involuntary servitude, expressly prohibited by the 13th amendment. One presumes that a freedom-loving people will always be against that.

As Larry Elder says: “This is freedom 101.”

What about the claim that government should regulate the grounds of exclusion? Let’s say, for example, that we do not deny the general right of free association, but narrow its range to address a particular injustice. Is that plausible? Well, freedom is a bit like life, something that is or is not. Slicing and dicing it according to political priorities is exceedingly dangerous. It perpetrates social division, leads to arbitrary power, mandates a form of slavery, and turns the tables on who precisely is in charge in society.

[…]

And this is precisely why racialists, nationalists, and hard-core bigots have always opposed liberal capitalism: it includes and excludes based on the cash nexus and without regard to features that collectivists of all sorts regard as important. In the imagined utopias of the national socialists, the champions of commerce are hanged from lampposts as race traitors and enemies of the nation.

That’s because the market tends toward an ever-evolving, ever-changing tapestry of association, with patterns that cannot be known in advance and should not be regulated by federal masters. In contrast, government’s attempts to regulate association lead to disorder and social calamities.

http://www.lewrockwell.com/rockwell/freedom-of-association145.html

Indeed; all of this is absolutely true, and I agree with it.

Government has no business forcing association or preventing association by law. Which puts into sharp relief the next part of this post.

It seems like the arguments questioning the logic of forcing anti discrimination by asserting that the state does not force people to enter restaurants or forbid people from engaging in boycotts are deflated in one aspect. It is indeed illogical that the state forces restaurants to serve but does not force patrons to enter… actually, they DO force people to trade with each other, and forbid boycotts.

In the USA, the Federal Government has enacted a law that forbids people from boycotting Israel.

What they are saying is that american firms are FORCED to deal with people that they may, for whatever reason, prefer not to deal with.

From the ‘Bureau of Industry and Security’, a department with a distinctly un-American name:

Antiboycott Compliance

The Bureau is charged with administering and enforcing the Antiboycott Laws under the Export Administration Act. Those laws discourage, and in some circumstances, prohibit U.S. companies from furthering or supporting the boycott of Israel sponsored by the Arab League, and certain Moslem countries, including complying with certain requests for information designed to verify compliance with the boycott. Compliance with such requests may be prohibited by the Export Administration Regulations (EAR) and may be reportable to the Bureau.

Boycott Alert

U.S. companies continue to report receiving requests to engage in activities that further or support the boycott of Israel. U.S. companies may receive similar requests in the future. If you have questions, please call (202) 482-2381 and ask for the Duty Officer or you may contact us by email.

This is a law that forbids private companies from refraining from association.

Antiboycott Laws:

During the mid-1970’s the United States adopted two laws that seek to counteract the participation of U.S. citizens in other nation’s economic boycotts or embargoes. These “antiboycott” laws are the 1977 amendments to the Export Administration Act (EAA) and the Ribicoff Amendment to the 1976 Tax Reform Act (TRA). While these laws share a common purpose, there are distinctions in their administration.

Objectives:

The antiboycott laws were adopted to encourage, and in specified cases, require U.S. firms to refuse to participate in foreign boycotts that the United States does not sanction. They have the effect of preventing U.S. firms from being used to implement foreign policies of other nations which run counter to U.S. policy.

Primary Impact:

The Arab League boycott of Israel is the principal foreign economic boycott that U.S. companies must be concerned with today. The antiboycott laws, however, apply to all boycotts imposed by foreign countries that are unsanctioned by the United States.

Who Is Covered by the Laws?

The antiboycott provisions of the Export Administration Regulations (EAR) apply to the activities of U.S. persons in the interstate or foreign commerce of the United States. The term “U.S. person” includes all individuals, corporations and unincorporated associations resident in the United States, including the permanent domestic affiliates of foreign concerns. U.S. persons also include U.S. citizens abroad (except when they reside abroad and are employed by non-U.S. persons) and the controlled in fact affiliates of domestic concerns. The test for “controlled in fact” is the ability to establish the general policies or to control the day to day operations of the foreign affiliate.

The scope of the EAR, as defined by Section 8 of the EAA, is limited to actions taken with intent to comply with, further, or support an unsanctioned foreign boycott.

What do the Laws Prohibit?

Conduct that may be penalized under the TRA and/or prohibited under the EAR includes:

• Agreements to refuse or actual refusal to do business with or in Israel or with blacklisted companies.
• Agreements to discriminate or actual discrimination against other persons based on race, religion, sex, national origin or nationality.
• Agreements to furnish or actual furnishing of information about business relationships with or in Israel or with blacklisted companies.
• Agreements to furnish or actual furnishing of information about the race, religion, sex, or national origin of another person.

Implementing letters of credit containing prohibited boycott terms or conditions.

The TRA does not “prohibit” conduct, but denies tax benefits (“penalizes”) for certain types of boycott-related agreements.

Note the double talk, the act does not prohibit conduct, but penalises for agreements. Later on the page says:

Penalties:

The Export Admnistration Act (EAA) specifies penalties for violations of the Antiboycott Regulations as well as export control violations. These can include:

Criminal:

The penalties imposed for each “knowing” violation can be a fine of up to $50,000 or five times the value of the exports involved, whichever is greater, and imprisonment of up to five years. During periods when the EAR are continued in effect by an Executive Order issued pursuant to the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, the criminal penalties for each “willful” violation can be a fine of up to $50,000 and imprisonment for up to ten years.

Administrative:

For each violation of the EAR any or all of the following may be imposed:

• General denial of export privileges;
• The imposition of fines of up to $11,000 per violation; and/or
• Exclusion from practice.

Boycott agreements under the TRA involve the denial of all or part of the foreign tax benefits discussed above.

When the EAA is in lapse, penalties for violation of the Antiboycott Regulations are governed by the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA). The IEEPA Enhancement Act provides for penalties of up to the greater of $250,000 per violation or twice the value of the transaction for administrative violations of Antiboycott Regulations, and up to $1 million and 20 years imprisonment per violation for criminal antiboycott violations.

[…]

http://www.bis.doc.gov/complianceandenforcement/antiboycottcompliance.htm

Amazing isn’t it? It does not prohibit conduct, but puts you in GAOL for doing it, removes your ‘export privileges’ (doing business is a privilege?), imposes incredibly large punitive fines, and finally (I presume) can revoke your license too practice your trade.

Absolutely immoral and illegitimate.

On the other hand, you have many states that enforce a boycott of Israel, which is an illegitimate and immoral denial of the right of association.

Not only do all of these countries violate the right of association, but they are violating the right of individuals to freely enter into contracts.

If someone wants to draw up a contract that contains a boycott clause, it is the absolute right of the parties to agree to this. Period. Obviously, the mandating of the insertion of such clauses is a clear violation; you should be able to remove or add clauses as both parties see fit.

Take a look at a representative sample of the clauses:

Office of Antiboycott Compliance

Examples of Boycott Requests

Following are recent examples of boycott requests that have been reported to the Office of Antiboycott Compliance. These examples are illustrative and not exhaustive. Companies should call our advice line (202) 482-2381 with questions concerning these or any request to comply with restrictive trade practices or boycotts.

BAHRAIN

Prohibited Boycott Condition in a Purchase Order:

“In the case of overseas suppliers, this order is placed subject to the suppliers being not on the Israel boycott list published by the central Arab League.”

Reportable boycott condition in an importer’s purchase order:

“Goods of Israeli origin not acceptable.”

Reportable boycott condition in a letter of credit:

“A signed statement from the shipping company, or its agent, stating the name, flag and nationality of the carrying vessel and confirming … that it is permitted to enter Arab ports.”

Prohibited Boycott Condition in a Contract

“Israeli Clause:
The Seller shall not supply goods or materials which have been manufactured or processed in Israel nor shall the services of any Israeli organization be used in handling or transporting the goods or materials.”

Prohibited Condition in a Contract

“The Contractor shall comply in all respects with the requirements of the laws of the State of Bahrain relating to the boycott of Israel. Goods manufactured by companies blacklisted by the Arab Boycott of Israel Office may not be imported into the State of Bahrain and must not be supplied against this Contract. For information concerning the Boycott List, the Contractor can approach the nearest Arab Consulate.”

Prohibited Condition in a Letter of Credit

“Buyer shall in no way contravene the regulations issued by Bahrain Government and or Israel Boycott Office. Buyer shall not nominate a vessel blacklisted by the said office.”

BANGLADESH

Prohibited Boycott Condition in instructions to bidders on a contract

“No produced commodity shall be eligible for … financing if such commodity contains any component or components which were imported into the producing country from Israel and countries not eligible to trade with … the People’s Republic of Bangladesh. The equipment and materials must not be of Israeli origin. The supplier/bidder who are not black listed by Arab boycott of Israel will be allowed to participate in this bid.”

IRAQ

Prohibited Boycott Condition in a Questionnaire

“1. Do you have or ever have had a branch or main company, factory or assembly plant in Israel or have sold to an Israeli?”

“2. Do you have or ever have had general agencies or offices in Israel for your Middle Eastern or international operations?”

“3. Have you ever granted the right of using your name, trademarks royalty, patent, copyright or that of any of your subsidiaries to Israeli persons or firms?”

“4. Do you participate or ever participated or owned shares in an Israeli firm or business?”

“5. Do you render now or ever have rendered any consultative service or technical assistance to any Israeli firm or business?”

“6. Do you represent now or ever have represented any Israeli firm or business or abroad?”

“7. What companies in whose capital are your shareholders?” Please state the name and nationality of each company and the percentage of share of their total capital.”

“8. What companies or shareholders in your capital? Please state the name and nationality of each company and the percentage of share of their total capital.”

“N.B. The above questions should be answered on behalf of the company itself and all of its branch companies, if any.”

Prohibited Condition in a Contract

“The Contractor shall, throughout the continuance of the Contract, abide by and comply in all respects with the rules and instructions issued from time to time by the Israel Boycott Office in Iraq.”

Prohibited Condition in a Trademark Application

“Requirement for the registration of pharmaceutical companies:

Certification letter regarding the boycott of Israel (i.e., do not comprise any parts, raw materials, labor or capital of Israeli origin).”
“Requirement for the Registration of Medical Appliances, Disposables producing companies, and Laboratory diagnostic kit manufacturers:

Certification letter regarding boycott of Israel.”
Prohibited Condition in a Purchase Order

“Supplies of our purchase order should never be consigned or shipped by steamers included on Israel Boycott list.”

Prohibited Condition in a Contract

“The bill of lading shall bear a note that the vessel delivering the cargo is not on the “Black List” and does not call at Israeli ports.”

KUWAIT

Prohibited Boycott Condition in a Custom’s document

“[The vessel entry document asks the ship’s captain to certify that,] no goods, dry cargo, or personal effects listed on the document of Israeli origin or manufactured by a blacklisted firm or company are to be landed as they will be subject to confiscation.”

Prohibited Boycott Condition in Letter of Credit

“We hereby certify that the beneficiaries, manufacturers, exporters and transferees of this credit are neither blacklisted nor have any connection with Israel, and that the terms and conditions of this credit in no way contravenes the law pertaining to the boycott of Israel and the decisions issued by the Israel Boycott Office.”

Reportable Boycott Condition in Letter of Credit:

“Importation of goods from Israel is strictly prohibited by Kuwait import regulations; therefore, certificate of origin covering goods originating in Israel is not acceptable.”

Prohibited Condition in a Purchase Order

“All shipments under this order shall comply with Israel Boycott Office Rules and Regulations.”

Prohibited Condition in a Purchase Order

“Goods must not be shipped on vessels/carriers included in the Israeli Boycott list.”

Prohibited Condition in a Contract

“The vendor (as person or organization) or his representatives should not be an Israeli national. So the vendor should not be owned, managed, or represented by any companies that carry an Israeli nationality and there should not be any sub-contractors that carry Israeli nationality.

The vendor should not involve any person or representatives that carries the Israeli nationality in importing or exporting the software or hardware mentioned in this contract and its appendices and the vendor should provide all documents that support the above information.”

LEBANON

Prohibited Boycott Condition in Power of Attorney from Lebanese firm

A Lebanese firm sent a power of attorney affidavit to appoint a local agent in Iraq to a U.S. firm. The affidavit asked that U.S. firm answer a series of questions concerning the Arab boycott. These questions included whether the firm had a plant in Israel, has sold to Israel, had offices in Israel, owned shares in an Israeli firm, had provided services for an Israeli firm, or had granted any trademarks, copy or patent rights to Israeli persons of firms.

Reportable Boycott Condition in letter of credit:

“Certificate issued by the shipping company or its agent testifying that the carrying vessel is allowed to enter the Lebanese port…”

LIBYA

Prohibited Condition in a Letter of Credit

“Original commercial invoice signed and certified by the beneficiary that the goods supplied are not manufactured by either a company or one of its subsidiary branches who are blacklisted by the Arab boycott of Israel or in which Israeli capital is invested.”

Prohibited Condition in a Contract

“The Second Party shall observe the provisions of the Law for Boycott of Israel or any other State which the provisions for Boycott are applicable and shall ensure such observation from any other sub-contractor. In case of contravening this condition, the First Party shall have the right to cancel the contract and confiscate the deposit by mere notice by registered letter without prejudice to his right of compensation.”

Prohibited Condition in a Contract

“Boycott Provisions:
The Contractor shall observe and comply with all the provisions and decisions concerning the boycott to Israel or any other country the same is valid. The Contractor shall secure the respect of such boycott by any other party he might have subcontracted with him.”

Prohibited Condition in a Certificate of Origin

“The goods being exported are of national origin of the producing country and the goods do not contain any components of Israeli origin, whatever the proportion of such component is. We, the exporter, declare that the company producing the respective commodity is not an affiliate to or mother of any company that appears on the Israeli boycott blacklist and also, we the exporter, have no direct or indirect connection with Israel and shall act in compliance with the principles and regulations of the Arab boycott of Israel.”

[…]

http://www.bis.doc.gov/antiboycottcompliance/oacantiboycottrequestexamples.html

Did you know that if you have a stamp from Israel in your passport, none of these countries will issue a VISA?

In the USA, it is clearly illegal for a greengrocer to require a wholesaler to only provide products that do not come from Israel. The law says that it is illegal to participate in foreign boycotts, but how can anyone separate a foreign boycott from a USA led boycott? If the terms are exactly the same, and a foreign boycott started first, then how could you prove that your domestic boycott is not an extension of a foreign one?

The people who drafted this law knew that the constitutionality of this law would have been challenged immiediately if it had been an outright ban on boycotting, so they put it in the context of foreign boycotts to get around that pesky piece of paper.

It’s an interesting question.

There are certain trades, like the gem trade, where people from these two supposedly separate spheres, who publicly are unalterably opposed, do business together as if they were members of the same family.

They make agreements on a handshake, where vast amounts of money are involved, and everyone behaves like rational human beings.

This is what happens when you remove the malevolent influence of the state. Without the state interfering, on both sides, people behave rationally and manage to live together without conflict.

This is the truth, it always has been the truth, and the only people who are against the sort of peace that we all expect are the statist collectivists who, with their foul and artificial divisions of humanity, cause every act of violence in the world.