Ronald Kitching: Dangerous Termites Eat Out The Foundations of Western Society

Facts about Termites and Carbon Dioxide (CO2):

• Termites produce more Carbon Dioxide (CO2) each year than all living things combined.

• Termites alone produce ten times as much carbon dioxide as all the fossil fuels burned in the whole world in a year.

Ronald Kitching: The Planet, The People and Global Warming

By volume, there are 259 Trillion cubic miles of solid mass with an average temperature of at least 2500F, in planet Earth. There are 310 Million cubic miles of oceans and lakes.

This total amount of water is 0.023 percent of the earth’s mass and the total atmosphere is 0.00008 percent of the planet’s mass. Carbon dioxide is then 0.004 percent of the atmosphere and the human caused CO2 is just 0.03 percent of that.

Ronald Kitching: The Disaster of Interventionism

It is obvious that many if not most politicians make stupid and socially damaging decisions. This occurs because they are ignorant of the science of economics. But economics, as taught in all of our universities is a course in interventionism.

Ronald Kitching: About Tax and the Economic Progress of a Nation

All a free people need a government for, is the protect their person and their assets from internal and external thugs. As the government has a monopoly of coercion, that means that a police force and a judiciary has to be introduced and paid for, to monitor and administer the law. And suitable defence forces to protect our boundaries.

Ronald Kitching: Socialism and Economic Calculation

The Essay titled “Economic Calculation in The Socialist Commonwealth” published in 1920 by Ludwig von Mises, showed conclusively that in a socialist state, rational economic activity cannot occur. Mises’s original thesis stands on its own against all counter arguments and without any need for qualification or emendation: without private ownership of the means of production, and the competition of the spontaneous market order for them, there cannot exist economic calculation and rational allocation of resources under conditions of the social division of labor. In short, socialist economy and society are impossible.

Ron Smith: War and Humanitarian Restraint in the Contemporary World

The first Geneva Convention of 1864 began a period in which the notion of independent parties, who would protect and support the victims of war, became increasingly accepted. Essential to this project was the idea that persons who did this work would be protected by all the belligerent parties. For their part, the independent Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs), who provided this aid eschewed any commitment to the ‘cause’ of any belligerent party. The undertaking of the International Committee of the Red Cross (and the other humanitarian agencies who became involved) was to provide help to all parties in an even-handed way and, in the case of ICRC, remind them of their obligations under the (now) multiple conventions.

Roger Kerr: The Struggle for Consensus on Good Policies

Blimey, stone the crows! A few weeks ago something happened in Australia that I never believed possible. An inveterate critic of Australia’s economic reforms over the past 25 years came out and said he was wrong. John Carroll is a professor of sociology at La Trobe University in Melbourne. He authored a book Shutdown: The Failure of Economic Rationalism and How to Rescue Australia, which was published in 1992.

Ronald Kitching: About Crowds

"The renewal of civilisation has nothing to do with movements which bear the character of experiences of the crowd; these are never anything but reactions to external happenings. But civilisation can only revive when there shall come into being in a number of individuals a new tone of mind independent of the one prevalent among the crowd and in opposition to it, a tone of mind which will gradually win influence over the collective one, and in the end determine its character. It is only an ethical movement which can rescue us from the slough of barbarism, and the ethical comes into existence only in individuals..." So wrote the late Dr. Albert Schweitzer.

Ron Smith: The Assassination of Indira Gandhi

Recent controversy surrounding the depiction in certain South Auckland Sikh temples of the killers of Indira Gandhi as heroes raises a number of thorny questions. When is political assassination justified, if it ever is? Was the 1984 killing of Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi justified? Was it ‘terrorism’? Should we have a view about the honouring of such people?

Ronald Kitching: Ludwig von Mises, Interventionism

Here is an extract from Ludwig von Mises’ book "Interventionism: An Economic Analysis", from Chapter V11 The Economic, Social, and Political Consequences of Interventionism, which I hope will inspire readers to examine his works ......

Ronald Kitching: Ludwig von Mises, The Anti-Capitalist Mentality

Here is an essay that I hope will inspire readers to get Ludwig von Mises’ book and study it. It is an extract from his book titled The Anti-Capitalist Mentality: A nation is the more prosperous today the less it has tried to put obstacles in the way of the spirit of free enterprise and private initiative...

Ronald Kitching: Bureaucracy by Ludwig von Mises

It is my intention to try and enthuse readers to start reading some of the works of Ludwig von Mises who I believe was the greatest economist and social scientist of the 20th Century commencing with some of his smaller books which I’ll mention in future essays.

Here is an extract from “Bureaucracy” by Ludwig von Mises.

Ronald Kitching: Ludwig von Mises - The Economist of the 20th Century

Without any doubt whatsoever, the greatest economist and social scientist of the 20th Century was Ludwig von Mises. But until recently relatively little was known about his life story. All is revealed in Jorg Guido Hülsmann's great 1,143 page book titled “MISES - The Last Knight of Liberalism”. The book describes not only the life of Mises but also the history of the times in which Mises lived. And, the many associates and enemies of Mises.