Passports of people possibly tied to NYC attacks found along Afghan border following battle against Taliban.
Man, 112, 'realises dream' to marry teen
A SOMALI man who claims to be 112 years old has married a 17-year old girl."Today God helped me realise my dream," Ahmed Mohamed Dhore said, after the wedding in the region of Galguduud. Bride Safiya Abdulle's family said she was "happy with her new husband". Mr Dhore says he wanted to marry Safiya for a long time but waited for her to grow up. "I didn't force her, but used my experience to convince her of my love; and then we agreed to marry," he was quoted by the BBC as saying.
Eggs and sperm cells have been grown in a lab, paving the way for infertile people to have their own biological children. There's also hope for a pill to stave off menopause for late conception.
No room at the median? Michigan man claims his civil rights were violated after he was ordered to remove his family's Nativity scene — which had stood on a public road for 63 Christmases.
Hostage tells of pirate capture
A BRITISH man being held by Somali pirates today spoke to British TV by telephone.
Police close in on body-in-barrel killer
THE net is tightening on the body-in-the barrel murderer, homicide squad detectives say.
More asylum seekers intercepted
ANOTHER boatload of asylum seekers has been intercepted off the northern Australian coast.
Kayla's dad's heartfelt apology
THE father of teenager Kayla Green choked back tears as he issued an apology to the driver injured in the horror crash that claimed his young daughter's life this week.
Routine cab ride takes hellish turn
THE decision to take a taxi across town almost cost a woman her life and that of her unborn baby.
Satanist's online world lures teen girls
A SATANIST with an eye for teen girls built a gothic society to groom them for sex in a cemetery.
Dozy playboy annoys judge with no-show
PRINCESS Beatrice's ex-boyfriend failed to show up for court because he was sleeping.
Mum's coffin coup takes caskets online
A MUM aims to break into the tight funeral casket industry, setting up an online shop.
=== Journalists Corner ===
Rush Limbaugh speaks out on Republican strategy for the upcoming elections!
Plus -- the radio host talks tough on the future of the GOP.
===
Critical Decision!
Will passing an expensive health care bill cripple our economy? We expose the financial impact & tell you what the experts say!
===
The Adventures of ... Manbat?
Pulling pranks in a bat suit! But, what happens when it goes too far? Bill gets answers on the next 'Factor'!
===
Taxes, Health Care or Economy?
Which issues will matter the most to voters on Election Day? Frank Luntz's focus group reveals the deciding factors!
=== Comments ===
Will Afghanistan Be President Obama's Waterloo?
By Bill O'Reilly
October is now the deadliest month ever in Afghanistan for U.S. troops, with 55 killed so far. And it has now been 59 days since commanding General McChrystal asked for 40,000 more troops to provide security in that theatre.
The request hangs in the air because President Obama says he is continuing to assess the situation:
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: While I will never hesitate to use force to protect the American people or our vital interests, I also promise you this, and this is very important as we consider our next steps in Afghanistan. I will never rush the solemn decision of sending you into harm's way.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
Because "Talking Points" does not have the information the president has, it would be unfair for us to second guess Mr. Obama. However, John McCain does have that information and says this:
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. JOHN MCCAIN, R-ARIZ.: It's time to make a decision and send those troops there. And the longer we delay, the more they're in harm's way and in danger. And the time is up. It's time to act.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
Now there are some people who believe President Obama is waiting until after next Tuesday's election to make a decision. That is speculation, but it does make some sense. Many liberals do not support the Afghan war and angering them before the vote could cause them to stay home.
Again, that's speculation.
What is fact is that the Taliban is growing bolder. On Wednesday they attacked a building in Kabul which was considered to be relatively secure. There is no question the Taliban is making a statement, throwing violence right into the president's face.
There are people on both the left and the right who feel the Afghan war is un-winnable, and that may be true. Col. Ralph Peters doesn't support more troops, nor does New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman.
Writing Wednesday, Friedman says it is impossible to nation-build Afghanistan. But he also says he's not sure if the Taliban would take over should the USA pull back.
"Talking Points" believes that's nuts. What do you think the Taliban is fighting for? They want to regain power, and if the USA pulls back, who's going to stop them? The Italian forces?
This whole situation is very dangerous to Barack Obama, who is perceived in some quarters as being timid. If Afghanistan goes south on his watch, he will get the loss. Terrorism will achieve a great victory and America will be embarrassed. That's why you have to send the 40,000 troops.
Like Iraq, you give it one more push to stabilize the situation. With the stakes so high, you have to try.
===
LIFE NEGOTIATED
Tim Blair
Mark Steyn picks up on a telling comment from our favourite alarmist:
I’m always appreciative when a fellow says what he really means. Tim Flannery, the jet-setting doomsaying global warm-monger from down under, was in Ottawa the other day promoting his latest eco-tract, and offered a few thoughts on “Copenhagen"—which is transnational-speak for December’s UN Convention on Climate Change. “We all too often mistake the nature of those negotiations in Copenhagen,” remarked professor Flannery. “We think of them as being concerned with some sort of environmental treaty. That is far from the case. The negotiations now ongoing toward the Copenhagen agreement are in effect diplomacy at the most profound global level. They deal with every aspect of our life and they will in?uence every aspect of our life, our economy, our society.”This will now guarantee Kevin Rudd’s attendance.
Hold that thought: “They deal with every aspect of our life.” Did you know every aspect of your life was being negotiated at Copenhagen?
===
ABC SEXISM
Tim Blair
Fired for being male: “In the meeting where I was told I would be replaced, the reason given was they wanted a girl on the show.”
UPDATE. In other sexism news …
===
AISLES OF RACISM
Tim Blair
Following Australia’s Nazi biscuit scandal, Joe Hildebrand scans supermarket shelves in search of other racist products – and finds them!
===
Speaking for the belittled….
Andrew Bolt
Anne Davies, the Age’s Washington correspondent, demonstrates the bias that she professes to abhor:
Fox dominated the news channel ratings. Its top host, Bill O’Reilly, who offers right-wing ideology and belittles liberals, attracted an average 881,000 viewers, while CNN’s award-winning Anderson Cooper, who bills himself as a serious journalist who actually goes to war zones, rated only 211,000 viewers.It’s precisely because of failures from journalists like Davies that explains the success of a Fox News.
===
Don’t exploit Deveny
Andrew Bolt
Catherine Deveny strikes me as a deeply unhappy and angry woman who seeks affirmation by shocking, as if begging forgiveness. I’ve said before I think she needs help, not exploitation by media outlets. I’d say that opinion is shared even by many ABC viewers who watched Q&A last night, and saw her demean a debate.
===
Praying to Gaia for pay
Andrew Bolt
Take away all the free money, and who’d be left to believe in a man-made climate catastrophe?
Europe is to breathe life into the faltering search for a new global deal on climate change by pledging billions of pounds in financial support for poor countries, the Guardian can reveal. European heads of state will formally recommend this week that rich countries should hand over around EUR100bn (£90bn) a year to nations such as India and Vietnam by 2020 to help them cope with the impact of global warming… Such a move would leave the US with a bill running to tens of billions a year, unlikely to go down well in Washington.How much will Kevin Rudd hand over from Australian taxpayers?
===
A climate of fast money
Andrew Bolt
PSST. Want a surefire way to get a grant - maybe $300,000, or even more - for your university research?
Then gather around, my dear professors, and say these magic words.
Climate change.
You scoff? You say it’s too crazy to work, given that your expertise is actually in Bible studies, Aboriginal history, ceramics or sorghum?
More fool you. Just check the 1136 grants of the Australian Research Council that were approved this week by Science Minister Senator Kim Carr.
That’s $392 million Carr has splashed out in this year’s funding round for university research into everything from history and anthropology to physics and genetic engineering.
Yet with so much to choose from, an astonishing 10 per cent of that entire budget for ARC Discovery and Linkage grants went on projects submitted by academics who’d squeezed in some reference to “climate change”, no matter how preposterous.
Ten per cent! Oh, those cunning academics. Those wind-sniffers.
How well they understand the far-Left Kim “Il” Carr’s fierce need to have all scientists sing the Rudd Government’s hymn of global warming doom. How closely they heeded his decision to make climate change research this year a “priority”.
Still, I must laugh at the inventiveness some showed to scramble on to this greatest of gravy trains.
My favourite? It’s the proposal from two Australian Catholic University academics to study “Crisis management in late antiquity: the evidence of Episcopal letters”.
===
The great Australian smear
Andrew Bolt
JILL Singer yesterday used on this page a form of argument that now perverts almost every big debate.
“It takes a certain person to rejoice in the suffering of others. In the real world they’re called sociopaths - in politics, they’re called conservatives.”
Jill, of course, is of the Left, and was denouncing conservatives for “rejoicing” in the suffering of boat people to attack poor Kevin Rudd.
Nowhere in her column did she try to counter what really bugged her - conservative arguments for stopping the boats.
I’d shown that Rudd’s weakening of our laws had helped lure 42 boat people to their deaths. I’d also shown the evidence that the boats from Sri Lanka could well contain former Tamil Tigers.
I’d further said that not stemming the boats would invite more, so that people already assessed as refugees and waiting years to get here would be pushed further down the queue.
I’m not asking you to agree with my arguments, but to note that Jill did not counter them with reason. She just called conservatives “sociopaths”.
It’s true, Jill represents no one but herself. But her abuse is representative - of a form of argument now typically unleashed in all our most value-loaded political debates. Some examples?
If you point out the world has in fact cooled since 2001, you are to be called a “denier”, which warming believer Prof Robert Manne admitted in September he meant as a slur to liken you to those who “claimed that the Holocaust was a fraud”.
===
Rather be in Nauru
Andrew Bolt
Peter van Onselen, although playing the tired “we’re racist” card, says John Howard’s Pacific Solution was better:
KEVIN Rudd should ask himself one simple question - would he rather be locked up in a detention centre in Nauru run by Australia or one in Indonesia run by the Indonesians?UPDATE
If his answer is the latter then he can go on believing he has improved the humanitarian standards of Australia’s approach to border protection. Otherwise, he should drop the moral superiority act lest he be embarrassed by the emptiness of his rhetoric.
And another:
Another boatload of asylum seekers has been intercepted off the northern Australian coast. The vessel is the 37th intercepted by Australian authorities this year.... Home Affairs Minister Brendan O’Connor said the vessel, thought to have 34 passengers and four crew members on board, was first spotted by a surveillance aircraft crew.Meanwhile, Rudd is so desperate to avoid looking bad that he’ll pay the Sri Lankans still on our patrol boat Oceanic Viking to act nicely:
Rudd has not ruled out using cash payments to entice them to disembark.UPDATE 2
I’ll repeat, Rudd’s Government is the most spin-mad and deceptive in my memory:
SENIOR Indonesian officials have rejected outright a claim by Kevin Rudd that women and children asylum-seekers aboard the Oceanic Viking could be accommodated in regular housing, rather than behind razor wire in an Australian-funded detention centre.UPDATE 3
“We’ve already got a detention centre (at Tanjung Pinang) and in it we already separate men and women,” the Foreign Ministry’s most senior official for international security, Sujatmiko, told The Australian…
President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s most senior adviser on international affairs, Dino Patti Djalal, also refused to confirm claims made by Mr Rudd in parliament that the women and children among the 78 Sri Lankans would be housed separately.
How to solve the Oceanic Viking standoff:
Dear passengers, this ship’s next stop is Sri Lanka. Those passengers wishing to get off should do so now.
===
IPCC author warns: going it alone will kill the economy
Andrew Bolt
If this is true for the giant US economy, how much crazier is it for small Australia, with its tiny emissions, to rush through an emissions trading scheme now:
Dr. Steve Running ... is a co-author of the Nobel Prize winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and founder of the Climate Change Studies program at the University of Montana.
He added, ”If the US passed a cap and trade and other countries did not, it wouldn’t work. It would ruin the US economy and it wouldn’t save the climate either. ..”
===
Billions gambled
Andrew Bolt
This is no way to run the country - or blow a Budget:
THE Rudd government has failed its own test for assessing major infrastructure projects, according to a new Productivity Commission analysis...
The nation’s key economic advisory body says the government has not “universally applied” its own promise to subject all major infrastructure spending to detailed and transparent cost-benefit analysis.
It cites the controversial $43billion national broadband network announcement, which was not subject to a cost-benefit analysis, and several projects in the $22bn “nation-building” infrastructure plan that formed the centrepiece of the May budget, which had either not been evaluated by Infrastructure Australia or had not been deemed “ready to proceed” but had been funded anyway.
The criticism of infrastructure decision-making comes after similar concerns were raised in a recent report to the Business Council of Australia
It strikes me as a deeply characteristic failing of Rudd’s - and one for which he will become infamous - to be so sure of his intuitive wisdom that he will command into being things he does not properly understand, and which he lacks the patience to see through.
UPDATE
Yet so convinced is Rudd, against the evidence, that he can do it better:
PRIME Minister Kevin Rudd is testing public support for an outright federal takeover of hospitals, even though his expert advisers recommended only a partial takeover or a slow transfer of power in stages.
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