ETS vote today is Malcolm's test
IT'S Turnbull's make or break day as the Coalition hammers out its carbon emissions position. - The ETS is simple to explain. A farmer harvests apples, there is CO2 involved, so the farmer pays money to the ALP. The apples are brushed and cleaned. there is CO2 involved, so the workers pays the tax to the ALP. The distributor pays more tax to the ALP, then the consumer. Some of the money paid to the ALP will go to re electing ALP politicians, some will go to retirement to embarrassing ALP figures. Some will go to developers who favor the ALP with big donations. - ed.
PM in naughty corner for smacking kids
CHILD experts say Kevin Rudd's admission that he smacked his kids is a licence for bad parents. - just wait for the experts to find out about Rudd's thoughts on an ETS - ed
US budget deficit hits record $1.4 trillion
THE US Government closed its 2009 fiscal year with a record $US1.417 trillion ($1.54 trillion) budget deficit as it poured resources to contain a serious financial crisis that plunged the nation into recession. - Obama's CHANGE won't return anything worthwhile to anyone. - ed.
No treatment before sex offenders freed
ALMOST a thousand criminals judged released from jail early broke the law while on parole.
17,000 'Red Shirts' rally for Thaksin
THE Government is scared of me, says Thailand's ousted prime minister from his self-imposed exile to avoid jail.
Big parties are back, but cost kept secret
THE extravagant work Christmas party is back, but bosses are trying to hide how much it costs.
Huge crowds for Boyzone star Stephen Gately's funeral
HUNDREDS of fans gathered in Dublin for the funeral of Boyzone star Stephen Gately, paying the singer an emotional farewell one week after his death at the age of 33 shocked the pop world
Call to lower blood alcohol limit to .02
PARAMEDICS and truck magnate Lindsay Fox want an inquiry into lowering the drink-drive limit.
Train baby's family 'stressed but ok'
OPRAH Winfrey wants their story, but the father of the baby hit by a train has spoken of their ordeal.
Scientist: More Ice in Arctic Ocean
Peter Wadhams, professor of ocean physics at the University of Cambridge, said some melting will take place within a decade, although the winter ice will stay for hundreds of years.
=== Comments ===
Rivers scandal a blight on Bligh
Piers Akerman
WHEN next you see a “Save Cape York’’ bumper sticker on a car in a suburban shopping mall, ask the car’s muddle-headed owner: save Cape York from what? - Should the conservatives ever win another election I can tell what the follow up of the media will be. I understand that there are some 220 public servants in NSW who are paid over $100k per annum to address the needs of autistic children. Yet those children do not have their needs met. The issue of a bloated bureaucracy under the ALP beggars the question as to what these highly skilled people are doing. Clearly it isn’t public service, but obfuscation. Imagine if conservatives tried to limit the damage done by these bureaucrats? The papers will run a campaign saying the conservatives hate workers.
The conservatives can run the state effectively and more cheaply than the ALP can, because they don’t have to put money in ALP pork barrels.
Under the ALP, government mismanagement can be covered up by its bloated bureaucracy, as with the case of the death of Hamidur Rahman. Outrageously, the parents were blamed for the apparent school negligence and the evidence covered up illegally, but with the compliance of anti corruption bodies.
Piers, you have pointed out an important issue that can be seen in all those other places the ALP are in power. - ed.
===
HE SHOULD TAKE A LESSON FROM THEO VAN GOGH
Tim Blair
A gentle reminder of the consequences should one insult a certain religion: “Kill him. That is the capital punishment.” Although, as the young Presbyterian interviewee says: “Not necessarily that I’m personally going to carry it out.” Nice of him.
UPDATE. Some things are best said – or not said – in verse:
The Pope’s a total Nazi
What’s the deal with those Hindus?
Judaism’s not so bad
Except for all the Jews
Hey, Buddha! Would it kill you
To wear a frickin’ shirt?
I can say most anything
And I’m never getting hurt
But let’s not mention Islam
We’ll play it safe instead
It’s hard to make religious jokes
When you don’t have a head
===
DANGEROUS AND WRONG
Tim Blair
Historian (and doomstruck apocalyptic climate frightmonger) Robert Manne rewrites history:
In recent times, the phenomenon of denialism has come to be called, in Australia at least, the phenomenon of scepticism. This change in language seems to me to be both dangerous and wrong.Manne’s timeline is backwards. Does he actually mean to say that initial warming doubters were first dubbed “denialists”, and that the sceptic tag came later? Wrong-o, Robert.
Scepticism is in general, as it should be, a positive word, denoting scientific or humanistic curiosity and in particular the presence of an open mind. That is not the mindset of those who are now denying the reality of climate change.Behold the presence of an open mind. At least Manne acknowledges a Holocaust connection to the “denialism” slur; in fact, he’s all for it:
Denialism, a concept that was first widely used, as far as I know, for those who claimed that the Holocaust was a fraud, is the concept I believe we should use.So he’s not a denialism denialist. Among other highlights, acadoomic Manne claims that the threat of climate change is greater than that presented by World War Two (and more difficult to overcome) and that how we deal with global warming will “determine both the human future and the future of the earth.” The future of the entire earth.
Manne also invents the word “strungle”.UPDATE. Andrew Bolt detects a flaw in the reasoning of Manne’s co-alarmist Clive Hamilton.
===
STORY CHANGED
Tim Blair
Simon Scowl on hopey-changey artist Shepard Fairey:
In addition to being a plagiarist and a serial hypocrite, the plagiarizing serial hypocrite also tells big fat lies when it suits him.UPDATE: “Fairey has said that he first designed the image in early 2008, after he was encouraged by the Obama campaign to come up with some kind of artwork.”
Keep on hopin’, Shep. Like for a reduced legal penalty.
===
MORE REPORTS NEEDED
Tim Blair
SMH panic puppy Tim Dick can’t believe it:
The Lowy Institute poll published this week showed the proportion of Australians who think global warming is a serious and pressing problem that needs to be addressed, even at significant cost, dropped from 68 per cent in 2006 to 48 per cent this year.Yes, it dropped. Pretty cool, huh? Shows that people aren’t easily led. They question authority and so on. But Dick is dismayed:
It dropped.
After the Garnaut and Stern reports said it will cost less to act now than later, after the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change issued its most certain warning in 2007, and 44 years after Lyndon Johnson’s scientific advisory panel sounded the alarm.But before anything bad has actually happened.
Those who accept proven science are slurred as ‘’believers’’ and the ‘’faithful’’.Oh dear. His feelings are hurt. Still, there are worse things to be called. Been compared to a Holocaust denier lately? Hmm?
===
BIG HITS
Tim Blair
Meghan McCain gets ‘em out, gets attention, gets upset, gets some advice:
In related developments:
The insurgent group Al Shabaab has sent gunmen into the streets of Mogadishu to round up any women who appear to have a firm bust, residents claimed yesterday.UPDATE. Spot the Dog in comments: “The irony of Meghan McCain reading a biography of Andy Warhol as her 14th minute ticks away is delicious.”
The women are then inspected to see if the firmness is natural …
===
NO RUSH
Tim Blair
The unsmearing of Rush Limbaugh is underway – but it’s a slow process, delayed by more urgent priorities:
CNN is literally more interested in “disproving” satire about Obama than bothering to confirm bizarre and scandalous things said by Rush.
Apologies interest them even less. CNN host Rick Sanchez, for example, offers only this. (Update: Sanchez subsequently released a more substantial apology.) MSNBC can’t bring itself to apologise or retract; nor can a certain blogger. Dig up, people! Up!
(Via Instapundit, who notes: “Limbaugh’s got a libel suit if he wants one.” Further on that aspect of this illuminating episode from Hugh Hewitt and Mark Steyn.)
UPDATE. “Y’all got played.” The word from Bo Snerdley:
Yo, my fellow homeys, especially those of you who play in the NFL: Every single one of you who shouted out against Rush, check yourself, dog. You got played, okay? Rush ain’t your problem, yo. He never was your problem. He never will be your problem …
You get all puffed up behind some Obama flackie, jump on TV, start mouthing off about “Rush said this! Rush said that! Slavery this, slavery that,” whatever, whatever. It was all made up, yo! Some of these clown reporters on TV who fed all the stuff to you, yo, you know what they doing now? They are out here trying to apologize quietly so they don’t get their asses sued, yo! Check that out. Y’all got played.
Read on. By the way, if you’re black and you defend Limbaugh, you’ll be sent to the porch:
(Click on link for embedded object)- ed
UPDATE II. In other people-who-lie news, Shepard Fairey – who designed that iconic Obama propaganda image – confesses:
Fairey said in a statement issued late Friday that he knowingly submitted false images and deleted others in the legal proceedings, in an attempt to conceal the fact that the AP had correctly identified the photo that Fairey had used as a reference for his “Hope” poster of then-Sen. Barack Obama.It was more of a “Change” poster, then.
UPDATE III. Who needs facts?
UPDATE IV. Dennis Miller: “The NFL is the most politically correct environment I’ve ever seen in my life.”
===
The Prime Minister hits children
Andrew Bolt
Seriously yuk. Do we really want a Prime Minister not just endorsing the smacking of children, but showing the way?
Asked on Melbourne radio yesterday whether he smacked his children, Mr Rudd was unapologetic: ‘’I think I would be absolutely misleading your listeners to suggest that I had not. I have,’’ he said.Contrast:
‘’And the rule that’s been applied in our family ever since they were tots is that if they’re doing something dangerous they’ll get a, you know, whack across the knuckles.’’
John (Howard) never smacked his children, though Janette did; he preferred to reason with them. The family called him “United Nations” because he would talk through the reasons for their misbehaviour until they were worn out.UPDATE
Labor supporter and TV star Eddie McGuire is at odds with the man who may one day be his boss:
So why do we allow parents, who set the tone for their children in the first place with diet, discipline, example and rest patterns, to whack their little children when you can’t get away with whacking adults?
===
Manne uses Holocaust to smear sceptical scientists
Andrew Bolt
Robert Manne, a Jewish academic, wants to use the Holocaust dead to smear sceptics who dare see evidence that man may not be heating the world disastrously:
Scepticism is in general, as it should be, a positive word, denoting scientific or humanistic curiosity and in particular the presence of an open mind… Denialism, a concept that was first widely used, as far as I know, for those who claimed that the Holocaust was a fraud, is the concept I believe we should use.Manne’s deliberate use of the smear over reasoned argument - and of such a smear! - shows not just a despicable lack of the respect for the victims of the Holocaust, but a contempt for the facts and for the very many prominent scientists who sincerely advance them, and understand the issue rather better than does this political scientist.
Not surprisingly, given Manne’s record as a propagandist of the “stolen generations”, his account of the history of scepticism on man-made apocalyptic warming is also historically inaccurate.
UPDATE
On the same video, Gaian preacher Clive Hamilton (another non-scientist of the far Left) not only endorses Manne’s use of the term “denialism”, but urges believers to attack sceptics as the kind of people who’d deny smoking causes cancer, too.
And, like Manne, he rewrites history - and in a way that reflects an astonishing lack of self-awareness is he purports to explain the origins of this evil scepticism:
They lie in the reaction of American conservatives to the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991… The energy that conservatives put into opposing communism sought other outlets...Let us rewrite this to make the statement far closer to the historical reality of the origins of Hamilton’s new green faith:
They lie in the reaction of American conservatives the Left to the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991… The energy that conservatives anti-capitalists put into opposing building communism sought other outlets...Here’s the real concern with these two amateurs, so free to demonise the real experts: both are academics who teach students.
UPDATE
Atmospheric researcher Lucia Liljegren shows how scientists accidently make hockey sticks from trees. Or, to better explain, she shows that selecting tree ring data that best fits recent temperature measurements tends to give you dodgy proof that the past decades have been the warmest for many centuries.
She must be a “denier”, right, Robert?
===
How many more must die, lured by Rudd’s kindness?
Andrew Bolt
Just hours before two more boats founder, Nationals’ leader Warren Truss spoke no more than the sober truth:
The fact that at least 25 people have died trying to get to Australia since the Federal Labor Government signalled its new open door policy on border security should be enough for Labor to rethink its failed strategy.In fact, the number of boat people who have died this year trying to get to Australia is at least 37, going by reported tragedies such as this, this, this and this.
But watch the ABC beat up Truss’s perfectly accurate comments (ignoring the touch of hyperbole about “open door):
Rudd to blame for asylum seeker deaths: NationalsAnd watch Labor feign outrage, desperately trying - by the Rudd playbook - to switch attention from a Government failure to the Opposition, with the help of too-willing journalists:
Nationals Leader Warren Truss has blamed the Government for the deaths of asylum seekers at sea who are trying to reach Australia.
Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard has lashed out at Mr Truss, describing his remarks as “vile” and “despicable” allegations.This is rich, coming from a party which did its best, with the help of playwrights and activists, to smear the former Howard Government as murderers of the 353 boat people on SIEV X who died in the seas off Indonesia, far from Australian territory and aid..
She has called on Opposition Leader Malcolm Turnbull to force Mr Truss to apologise.
Here, for instance, are extracts from the disgraceful and baseless attacks, rich in insinuation of foul play, made by Senator John Faulkner, now a senior Rudd Minister:
At no stage do I want to break, nor will I break, the protocols in relation to operational matters involving ASIS or the AFP. But those protocols were not meant as a direct or an indirect licence to kill....But leave aside the hypocrisy. Focus instead on the terrible and predicted loss of life as illegal immigrants resume trying to sail to Australia, inspired, many say, by Rudd’s weakening of our laws.
We know Kevin Enniss admitted to reporter Ross Coulthart from the Sunday program that he had paid Indonesian locals on four or five occasions to scuttle people-smuggling boats with passengers aboard...We want to know if others were involved in the sabotage of vessels and we want to know why the government is avoiding an independent inquiry into these very important issues.
And note that just as Gillard huffs how terrible it is to mention the dying at sea, we read these reports:
The Australian navy is on standby to assist in the rescue of two boats in distress and possibly loaded with asylum seekers off the Indonesian coast.How close are we to seeing this prediction fulfilled, made by me last December:
Hundreds of people believed to be heading to Australia are reportedly aboard the vessels, but there is no confirmation at this stage that they are asylum seekers.
A rescue operation is under way to help the roughly 270 people on board the two boats. The operation is being led by search and rescue authorities from Malaysia and Indonesia.
But perhaps even more serious: the last time the people smugglers were busy, people died at sea. John Howard ended the dying, and was called cruel and racist. How long before Kevin Rudd’s kinder, gentler policies lead to the next Siev X?
===
The lynching of Limbaugh
Andrew Bolt
Of course Rush Limbaugh crowed about ”slavery having its merits”. And of course he said he missed the killer of Martin Luther King, too. He’s a Right-winger, right? So obviously there’s no need for the media even to check if he actually did say something so unbelievably offensive. (And I mean unbelievably.) Nor is it necessary to apologise much - or at all - once these quotes and others prove to be completely fake.
Just another example how the Leftist media feels licensed to smear their ideological opponents - and with falsehoods. Think ”plastic turkey”. And the vilification of Sarah Palin.
UPDATE
Limbaugh explains what was done to him by people guilty of all the depravity they claimed to see in him. And he tells of the moral feebleness of his former business partners.
Note also the role of Wikipedia.
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