The Waste Ombudsman looks for government waste
by Fredrik Runebert
The Waste Ombudsman looks for government waste, by Fredrik Runebert
Before the election in 2006 two TV channels broadcast the documentary 1200 billion – a chase for finding government waste. The film was also shown in movie theatres around the country. In 2014 there is a new documentary called 1600 billion, 400 billion later. The documentary filmer Martin Borgs has funded the new film through Fundedbyme – private citizens have participated in financing the film, not The Swedish Film Institute, run by the government. The Swedish Taxpayers Union has appointed Martin Borgs as their Waste Ombudsman and asked him to continue chasing government waste. Part of it displayed at his Waste Museum in Garpenberg, Sweden. Where you can find the government-funded plastic bicycle, a flop manufactured in the 1980s, and invitation cards to a government authority 15 year anniversary banquet costing 185.000 kronor (30.000 dollars) – the invitation cards only, not the banquet itself.
When it was a criminal offence to help people find a job, by C G Holm
Not a very long time ago it was a criminal offence to help people find a job. The crime was called ”running illegal employment agency” and it included fines as well as a maximum of six months in prison. The law 1935:113 on illegal employment agencies was not abolished until 1992. Since then a completely new business has emerged, staffing agencies, now employing 60 000 people, 1.3 per cent of the total Swedish workforce. Approximately 500 companies are active in the business. One of the pioneers was Ulla Murman (now 87) who started an office services agency in 1953. She was convicted six times for the crime of running an illegal employment agency (there was no way of running a legal employment agency). Her company Stockholms Stenografservice expanded into other services and reached 11 000 employees in Sweden under the name Teamwork. It was a few years ago acquired by the US company Manpower.
Violent extremism – leftist extremists are treated with kid gloves, by Géza Molnár
The Swedish Security Police often talks about three groups that are a threat to individuals with political views, although not a threat to society itself. The neo-nazis, the leftist extremists (including anarchists) and militant islamists. They for unclear reasons exclude animal rights extremists, as they see them as a threat to businesses and not private individuals. The government has asked the police to compile a report on violent extremism. Contra has read it and concludes that leftist extremists are treated with kid gloves.
The new Pope heads in the wrong direction
The new Pope Francis has, like the former Pope John Paul II, started a dynamic process of change in the Vatican. A change of the large bureacracy in the Vatican and a change in the moral standards of the clergy. He has shown himself as an humble servant of man, not a bon vivant, like the Bishop of Limburg, Germany Franz-Peter Tebartz-van Elst who built an official residence costing 4 million dollars. But parallell to this interest in rearming the ethical standards of the Catholic Church, Francis shows a complete inability to understand the foundations of the economy and the basis of human progress in work and enterprise, all shown in his pastoral letter Evangelii Gaudium.
The eternal Myth of the Apocalypse
by C G Holm
For millenia mankind has been threatened with the apocalypse. It used to be a religious thing and the prophet promised a postponemnet in exhange for repent and an ethical renewal. Today scientists are threatening with the apocalypse but promise a postponemnet in exchange for repent, now meaning lowering emissions of CO2 and other similar acts of environmentalism. Three who do not agree has written a new book on the not so imminent Doomsday: Svenolof Karlsson, Jacob Nordangård and Marian Radetzki.
East Germany supported the RAF and neonazis,
by Tommy Hansson
East Germany was officially called the German Democratic Republic. But there was nothing Democratic in East Germany, everything controlled by the Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands, the Communist Party. All citizens were controlled by the Stasi and even during peace time signicant parts of the army was mobilized and ready to march (towards the West). After the fall of the Berlin Wall it has been disclosed that the East Germans supported West German terrorists as well as neonazis.
Karl Marx was a racist and antisemite
by Allan C. Brownfeld
Karl Marx supported slavery and in his ideology he saw some peoples as ”unhistoric”, doomed never to take a signicant role in the development of mankind. And in spite of his Jewish ancestry he was a glowing antisemite.
Russian missiles threatens the island of Gotland and Southeast Sweden
In November 2013 Russia based Iskander-M missiles in the Kaliningrad area at the Baltic. The missiles have a range of 450 kms (300 miles) thus reaching almost the entire Baltic, including the Swedish island Gotland, and the entire southeast of Sweden, with southern parts of Stockholm the most distant target reachable by the Iskander-M.
Swedish Defense Forces are not able to fullfil their mission
The Swedish National Audit Office has studied the ability of the Swedish Defense Forces to fulfill the mission put on them by the Governemnt and the Parliament. The conclusion is that they don’t have the ability and agility needed, in spite of the fairly low expectations from the Parliament.