“The idea that freedom is merely the ability to act upon one’s whims is surely very thin and hardly begins to capture the complexities of human existence; a man whose appetite is his law strikes us not as liberated but enslaved.  And when such a narrowly conceived freedom is made the touchstone of public policy, a dissolution of society is bound to follow.  No culture that makes publicly sanctioned self-indulgence its highest good can long survive: a radical egotism is bound to ensue, in which any limitations upon personal behaviour are experienced as infringements of basic rights. Distinctions between the important and the trivial, between the freedom to criticize received ideas and the freedom to take LSD, are precisely the standards that keep societies from barbarism.”

Theodore Dalrymple

“There are some brave folk who suggest that Britain will experience a sharp V-shaped recovery and the economy will grow buoyantly next year. But this is not credible. This recession is unique in terms of its combination of difficulties. In addition to the prospect of sharp tax increases and/or tough public spending constraints, the continuing impairment of the banking system and the restrictions on bank lending will, at the very minimum, act as a drag on recovery.”

Ruth Lea