Florida to Seek Death for 4 in Murder of Couple
Prosecutors said Monday they will seek the death penalty for four of eight people charged in the killings of a Panhandle couple known for adopting children with autism, Down syndrome and other special needs.
Another boat threatens overflow
MORE asylum-seekers have been intercepted as it emerges the detention centre is nearly full.
Firesale fixer wearing $2500 a day smile
TAXPAYERS are handing Bernie Fraser $2500 a day to fix up a "lover's quarrel" over asset sales.
Defence: Brimble was not force-fed drug
MARK Wilhelm did not force the drug fantasy into the mouth of Dianne Brimble on the night she died aboard a cruise ship, his lawyer has told a jury.
I saved us from global crisis - Costello
FORMER treasurer Peter Costello says policies he implemented while in government saved Australia from the financial crisis.
Collider scientist 'wants to join al-Qaeda'
A SCIENTIST working on one of the world's biggest nuclear projects faces terrorism charges.
Sydney battlers feel housing pain because of global financial crisis
DEMAND for emergency housing and charity relief has surged by 38 per cent as a result of the global financial crisis -- and Anglicare Australia said the pressure on their services is increasing despite signs of recovery.
17-Pound, 4-Month-Old Baby Denied Health Insurance for Being Too Fat
Nothing brings a smile to an adult's face quicker than the sight of a happy, chubby baby. But the sight of 4-month-old Alex Lange, who measures 25-inches long and weighs 17 pounds, is bringing a frown to the hypothetical face of insurance company Rocky Mountain Health Plans, The Denver Post reported on its Web site Monday.
NSW the financially worst of all
NSW is stumbling out of the global financial crisis slower than any other state or territory, embarrassed by little Tasmania which is setting the economic pace.
Aussies cooling on global warming
AUSTRALIANS are becoming less concerned about global warming, pushing environmental issues down the list of threats.
North Korea fires five test missiles
NORTH Korea has test-fired five short-range missiles off its east coast and banned ships from the area from October 10-20, a South Korean official said.
Another Clinton vows to help Northern Ireland
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has pledged investment and political support for Northern Ireland, as its leaders battle to resolve a political standoff threatening the peace process.
Putin's party sweeps polls
RUSSIAN Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's party has tightened its grip on Russian politics by winning a sweeping victory in local elections, but the opposition alleged widespread fraud. - typical left wing accusation, calling fraud when they lose. Berlusconi knows about this ambit claim. - ed.
Britain has Europe's 'worst quality of life'
FRANCE has the best quality of life out of Europe's biggest countries, while Britain has the worst despite having the highest incomes, a study says
Which celebrities have had major dental work done? Here is a partial list of the famous faces that have sported braces or other orthodontic devices.
'King-hit for standing up to bully'
A STAR country footballer is fighting for life after his attempt to help a man ended with a king-hit.
Missing toddler's body found in drain
POLICE had already searched area, but went back to "double check" child was not trapped.
Kokoda landowners demand crash compo
PNG villagers want compensation for damage to their land caused by a plane crash that killed 13 people, including nine Aussies.
Foul-mouthed surprise for mum in store
A MOTHER outraged by a clothing shop's music finds there is no-one she can complain to.
Boss in $2m cash grab as company sank
STAFF were ordered to put $2 million in boss's bank account as company went down, court told.
White House Vs. Fox News
Calling it 'a wing of the Republican Party,' Obama administration ups ante on war of words with Fox News - one guesses, then that the other news services are all members of the Democrats. - ed.
=== Journalists Corner ===
When she's not whipping something up on TV, you'll find her strolling down a runway for charity.
Find out what the busy Rachael Ray's cooking up next!
===
Agonizing Over Afghanistan!
Could the U.S. actually lose the critical conflict? O'Reilly gets answers!
===
Awarded the Nobel Peace Prize
But was it given to the president for his current performance or the promise of future success? Dick Morris weighs in!
===
Clearing the Health Care Hurdle!
As partisan politics continues to block the bill, what lawmakers need to do to get the plan back on track!
=== Comments ===
Wise Australia starting to reject this dodgy disaster
Piers Akerman
AUSTRALIANS are seeing through the mass hysteria surrounding human-induced global warming, according to a poll released today.
It’s a miracle the public have any capacity to be cynical about AGW given the almost total msm blitzkrieg [with a few honourable exceptions]; AGW has no scientific credibility at all but the msm has not had the wit or the honesty to pick this up. The recent Wong/Fielding exchange demonstrates this.- You are right, Cohenite, as is Piers. It is a miracle that any sense can be made of the relentless lies espoused by those most people trust. Wikipedia is a natural barometer of left wing views, and it shows in its articles on climate change that the left wing take their views on faith and strong exhortation. The lies are deliberate on the part of lobbyists, including Rudd. Note that people like Rudd and Gore will profit enormously from the creation of an ETS. Gore through his companies, and Rudd through enormous pork barrels. - ed.
After Fielding asked Wong how can AGW be real when, despite increasing CO2, atmospheric temperatures had declined since 1998, Wong, through Professor Steffen, replied that atmospheric temperature wasn’t relevant [contradicting all IPPC reports] but that ocean heat as measured by OHC and thermosteric sea level rise was. Steffen said both these indices were increasing at an increasing rate. The graphs he produced were from this;
http://landshape.org/enm/miskolczis-viral-video/#more-2371
A report Steffen co-authored [see page 8, Figures 1 & 2]. Apart from that incredible flaw all it would have taken was 5 minutes googling for any reporter to find the Uni of Colorado and NODC sites and to discover that sea level increase has stalled and OHC is actually declining. What Steffen said is therefore tantamount to fraud and indicates that AGW is devoid of evidence, but still we see pollies from all persuasions [again with a few honourable exceptions], including the pathetic Turnbull, continuing to act as though the green lie of imminent destruction of the planet is real.
A pox on all of them.
cohenite of newcastle
===
President Obama Wins the Nobel Peace Prize
By Bill O'Reilly
If you listened to talk radio Friday, some are very agitated the president is being honored by the Nobel committee:
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RUSH LIMBAUGH, TALK RADIO HOST: I don't believe this. He's not only the first post-racial president, he's also the nation's first post-accomplishment president. He has risen above incompetence. He is now judged on wishful thinking.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
Critics rightfully point out that President Obama hasn't really done anything concrete to bring peace to the world. The Nobel people say it was Obama's mostly pre-presidential rhetoric that brought him the award — his attempt to bridge the divide between Muslims and the West, among other things. And certainly that is a legitimate point. Is it enough for the award? Well, you make the call.
On the other side, Mr. Obama is a predator drone kind of guy. His administration is blowing the hell out of terrorists in Pakistan from the sky. Justified, but not exactly peaceful. The president is also waging war in Afghanistan and Iraq. Again, justified, but brutal.
So on paper the peace prize looks to be a political prize, and that's what The Times of London editorialized Friday:
"Rarely has an award had such an obvious political and partisan intent. It was clearly seen by the Norwegian Nobel committee as a way of expressing European gratitude for an end to the Bush Administration ... The prize risks looking preposterous in its claims, patronising in its intentions and demeaning in its attempt to build up a man who has barely begun his period in office, let alone achieved any tangible outcome for peace."
"Talking Points" does not share the dissent — understands it, but does not share it — because having a U.S. president honored with a peace prize is good for the country. We should want the world to think we are a nation that gives peace a chance, because that's what we are.
In the past, Teddy Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson won the prize. Jimmy Carter received it after he left office. Yasser Arafat also won the Nobel Peace Prize, if you can believe it. But so did Martin Luther King Jr. and Mother Teresa.
There are times when what's good for America should trump partisan politics. President Obama was honored Friday, and deserved or not, the world is hearing "America" and "peace" in the same sentence. That's good.
===
CHARGE DENIED
Tim Blair
A close examination of legal issues in Australia’s north.
===
THEY’RE ILLEGAL
Tim Blair
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd ends an ongoing semantic debate:
Kevin Rudd has called in the Indonesian navy to detain a boatload of 260 illegal migrants headed to Australia declaring today he made “no apologies” for the hardline policy …Rudd has been using the phrase (” … this global push in illegal immigrants …") for some time, despite The Collective’s opposition. The Press Council is going to be so angry.
The decision to turn back the boat has successfully repelled the largest boatload of asylum-seekers attempting to enter Australian waters since the election of the Rudd Government in 2007.
“First of all the Australian government makes no apologies whatsoever for deploying the most hardline measures necessary to deal with problems of illegal immigration into Australia,” Mr Rudd told ABC Radio today.
===
SEIZE THE LIGHT
Tim Blair
Inspired by yesterday’s post, reader Rod F. hit the shops:
“I’m hoping they will last me a while,” writes Rod. “I managed to secure a number of 100W clears. How good do I feel?”
===
POST-WARMING SOCIETY
Tim Blair
Piers Akerman reports:
Australians are seeing through the mass hysteria surrounding human-induced global warming, according to a poll released today …In related news, the UK Telegraph‘s Damian Thompson ponders Paul Hudson’s no-warming piece:
Data from the Lowy Institute’s 2009 poll shows Australians are cooling over climate change at an ever faster rate.
In 2007, when they voted for Kevin Rudd, who proclaimed climate change as the greatest moral dilemma facing the globe, Australians rated tackling climate change as the equal most important foreign policy issue.
In this year’s poll they rate it seventh.
The poll also shows fewer Australians see global warming as a threat, with those surveyed ranking it as fourth of 12 possibly critical threats facing the nation, down 14 points since last year.
The climate change correspondent of BBC News has admitted that global warming stopped in 1998 – and he reports that leading scientists believe that the earth’s cooling-off may last for decades …The nuts-going has commenced.
Climate change campaigners will go nuts, particularly in the run-up to Copenhagen.
So, I suspect, will devout believers inside the BBC. Hudson’s story was not placed very prominently by his colleagues – but a link right at the top of Drudge will have delivered at least a million page views, possibly many more.Right again.
UPDATE. “Hi there, Global Warming! How are you today?” asks Simon Scowl. “Not so (pardon the term) hot? Yeah, that’s understandable. I’d be bummed too if my friends were starting to turn on me.”
UPDATE II. The Australian‘s Christian Kerr:
The federal opposition is in a mess over the emissions trading scheme because its pitch is bad. Barnaby Joyce and his friends have got it right. The ETS is a tax on everything …They should have been uttering similar phrases much earlier: “The politics are tough now because conservatives years ago allowed the debate to get away from them; frightened of being labelled nature-haters, they declined to attack anti-progress green arguments as they were being formed. Result: in 2009 they’re dealing with a full-blown religion, and they’re discovering that logic isn’t much of a weapon against faith.” - Of course the Liberal Party lost an election over the issue, no thanks to recent journalist converts to the anti warming religion who don't seem to realize that the ALP priests are still trying to get pork barrel money from it. - ed.
There’s a great political pitch there: the ETS equals whacking 25 per cent on the GST … the ETS is only seen as a positive because it is only seen in abstract terms. Start talking about a 25 per cent hike in the GST and people will soon change their minds.
Still, the opposition front bench just seem incapable of uttering a phrase that could end their woes.
===
CLEAN VICTORIA
Tim Blair
Severe water restrictions in country Victoria are over, thanks to rain and the Wimmera-Mallee Pipeline. Some 38 towns are now liberated from bucket tyranny. Sydney led the way last year.
===
SIX YEARS ON
Tim Blair
Fox-watching website News Hounds sustains a creature now living through its second Presidency:
Back when President Bush posed for his photo op with the troops in Iraq with a Thanksgiving turkey, I didn’t hear Faux Noise tell people it was a fake turkey, with fake trimmings, on a fake platter, by a fake president, in a fake war started over fake WMDs.That’s because the fake turkey story is fake. You might be on to something with that fake platter, though.
===
Insist on your right to be spared a lawyer’s help
Andrew Bolt
Andrew Norton on the bizarre campaign to convince us our human rights are in danger and we need a new Bill of Rights and lots of lawyers to save us:
The public opinion research accompanying the report of the National Human Rights Consultation suggests that those proposing a charter of rights have a tough task ahead....Strange, how the public don’t really want the help that so many human rights lawyers are offering so insistently.
(O)nly 7% of respondents disagreed with the proposition that human rights are adequately protected (with a large 29% not expressing a view).
Worse for the main advocates of putting general human rights into legislation or the Constitution, the public isn’t in general very sympathetic on some of the issues that are driving the human rights push in the first place.
Only 28% think that the human rights of asylum seekers need more protection, and 30% think that asylum seekers need less protection. Only 32% think gays and lesbians need more protection (18% less).
While 57% think that Indigenous people in remote areas need their rights better protected, other polling shows overwhelming support for the NT intervention human rights advocates opposed.
===
Save the planet! Burn your dog’s poo
Andrew Bolt
Fight global warming by chaining Rover’s backside to a power station:
Municipalities are examining other approaches to treating animal waste as well. There’s a hope that the methane gas emitted by heated pet feces can be harnessed for its energy as electricity, natural gas and even fuel, instead of leaching into the atmosphere where it may contribute to global warming.
===
Ashamed for the happy dwarfs
Andrew Bolt
Midget jockeys riding horses are fine. But midgets riding humans are disgusting:
A MIDGETS’ race at a major country cup meeting has angered racegoers and Racing Minister Rob Hulls… Three punters piggy-backed the dwarfs, wearing racing colours, in the 50m “Midgets’ Cup"… Mr Hulls said the race was an embarrassment and would do nothing to promote the racing industry.Seeing that Hulls’ comments appeared in a story about the stunt, I’d say Hulls is actually wrong about the lack of promotion. And why is Hulls complaining about the offence given to dwarves when the dwarves involved weren’t offended at all?
PS
If this jockey is a dwarf, Hulls is disgusted.
UPDATE
One of the dwarves involved is puzzled - if he’s not offended, why should Hulls be?
A DWARF “jockey” involved in a race at a country cup that has triggered a furore, angering racegoers and the Racing Minister says it was “all in good fun”.Unless, of course, Hulls thinks dwarves are just like children and can’t be trusted to think for themselves. But that would be insulting, wouldn’t it?
Professional entertainer Jeremy Hallam said this morning he thought if anyone should be going into bat for dwarves, it should be dwarves themselves.
===
Environmental journalists aren’t
Andrew Bolt
It’s an unfortunate truth that “environmental journalism” is an oxymoron. In most cases, the “environment reporter” of a newspaper or television station becomes a cheerleader, an activist, a partisan.
Example: the host of an environmental current affairs show once told me he’d interviewed a global warming activist who wanted us all to cut emissions by riding bikes. The reporter turned up for the interview to find the activist was badly bruised and unable to walk - he’d taken his own advice, only to be cleaned up by a car. But the reporter refused to show the activist suffering the consequences of his impractical advice, and positioned the man so the camera couldn’t see bruises, crutches or mangled bike. What could have been a hilarious, honest and informative piece became just the usual PR stodge. Cause advanced, but viewers betrayed.
Another example is the one we reported yesterday, and which has Mark Tapscott wondering what journalistic values the Society of Environmental Journalists actually stands for:
It’s been years since former Vice President Al Gore took questions from journalsts willing to ask challenging and probing questions about either alleged flaws in the evidence for his global warming views or details of his financial interests in the adoption of government policies based on those views. But for at least one question at the annual conference of the Society of Environmental Journalists (SEJ), Gore was presented with an opportunity to address his critics and defend his views. Unfortunately, as this video of the encounter shows, not only did Gore do what politicians usually do – evade the question – but his SEJ buddies made sure there would be no followup questions by turning off the microphone and forcing the questioner to leave.The video of that confrontation:
===
Steal this generation: Labor
Andrew Bolt
South Australia’s Government wants to steal a generation to save it:
ABORIGINAL gang members responsible for a series of armed hold-ups in Adelaide were “pure evil” with no hope of rehabilitation, the South Australian Attorney-General Michael Atkinson said yesterday.Atkinson is a Labor politician, I should underline. And the problem he’s discussing is very real, whatever you may think of his language. A critical factor, he says, is that these youths have been effectively abandoned by their own families:
In comments that outraged Aboriginal leaders, Mr Atkinson said members of the so-called Gang of 49 were “glorying in their criminal rampage” and would be better off in jail where they could get regular meals and an education.
He said he was weary of “hand-wringers” with a “1960s hippie” outlook on life who were stopping the state Labor government from giving young Aboriginal boys a better life behind bars.
But he conceded that many young Aboriginal boys had “wretched lives” where they did not know their fathers, had mothers who couldn’t cope and were “farmed out to grannies and aunties”. When these relatives couldn’t cope, they let them drift to the city.Priests, nuns, welfare workers, patrol officers, Aboriginal administrators and politicians faced precisely this same problem last century, too.
UPDATE
Somehow our more compassionate solutions have produced more evil consequences. Also in today’s papers:
A FOUR-year-old Broome girl was lured from her home and allegedly raped by a man bailed only six weeks earlier on child-sex offences.===
The 23-year-old indigenous man, described as a “serial sexual predator”, was granted bail by a magistrate 120km away in Derby, despite facing three child sex offences, including a count of sexual penetration of a child under 13 years…
Speaking by phone from Broome, the girl’s mother blasted Western Australia’s Department of State Housing for ignoring her appeals to be relocated to a safer residential area. The mother of three said state housing compounds near Cable Beach had degenerated into havens for alcohol-fuelled violence and drug dealing.
We’ll be talking boats again
Andrew Bolt
A familiar issue stirs again, revived by the Rudd Government’s unravelling of the Howard Government’s solution:
KEVIN Rudd and the architect of the Howard government’s Pacific Solution, Philip Ruddock, yesterday clashed over whose administration was tougher on boatpeople, with Mr Ruddock claiming recent policy changes left Australia exposed to a “pipeline” of 10,000 unauthorised arrivals a year…That’s too many, with more to come. The boatpeople issue is now back on the table, and every boat that arrives from now on will become a debating point.
Speaking in Sydney yesterday, Malcolm Turnbull said there was no question Mr Rudd had softened the policies of the previous government, a development that people-smugglers had noticed and which they were using as a marketing tool…
A total of 1809 asylum seekers have been intercepted in boats since the surge in arrivals began in September last year after the government started unwinding the Howard government’s border protection policies.
===
Won’t work but will hurt
Andrew Bolt
Does the Rudd Government actually want to bring in its colossal tax on emissions - and jobs?
Economic modelling on an emissions trading scheme (ETS), commissioned by the NSW government and conducted by the same firm used by the federal opposition, has found a four per cent drop in GDP and a likely eight per cent fall in real wages.Why was this information not freely released to the public? Surely we deserve to know what Rudd’s tax will actually do?
This modelling, according to the NSW government, generally received a tick from the Commonwealth Treasury.
The document was obtained by the Seven Network through a Freedom of Information application, with details broadcast on Monday night.
Next, let’s see the Government’s best modelling on how much Rudd’s tax will lower world temperatures. My guess: zero.
UPDATE
Finally a debate on the insane cost of this useless fix:
HIP-POCKET concerns about the cost of emissions trading for households and small business have emerged as key battlegrounds between Labor and the Coalition as both sides prepare for high-stakes negotiations that could begin as early as next week.That’s meant to reassure? Small problem, of course: if power prices go up by “only” 25 per cent, they’ll barely cut our emissions - which is the whole point of this useless sacrifice.
Coalition frontbencher Ian Macfarlane says electricity price rises will be as high as 30 or 40 per cent by 2020, and the Coalition will demand amendments to the government’s proposed “inadequate and temporary” compensation…
But the government says Mr Macfarlane has got his figures and the details of their compensation scheme wrong. According to Treasury modelling released last year, the price of electricity will rise by an average of 25 per cent by 2020, with large variations between the states.
UPDATE 2
Remember when Family First Senator Steve Fielding finally forced Climate Change Minister Penny Wong to try explain why she still believed in man-made global warming when the planet’s atmostphere had in fact cooled for the past eight years? First the first time Wong and her chief advisers argued that the temperatures of the land surface and troposphere weren’t the true measure, after all:
in terms of a single indicator of global warming, change in ocean heat content is most appropriate...So Wong will of course be revising her faith in man-made global warming now that she’s got the latest data on ocean heat content, suggesting cooling may now be occurring there, too:
UPDATE 3
Remember when global warming was going to ruin skiing in Europe’s alps?
Scientists are warning that global warming is melting Alpine glaciers at an unprecedented rate… Low level skiing resorts have the most to lose as they could end up with no snow at all.Remember how we got the usual suspects wailing about less snow?
The Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development warns in a report this month “that climate change poses serious risks to the snow reliability of Alpine ski areas, and consequently to the regional economies that depend upon winter tourism.”So last year’s great snows were of course just an anomaly - a rare bucking of the apocalyptic warming trend:
Ski resorts across Europe and North America have opened early this season after heavy snowfall in the last month.But two years in a row? Today’s snowy news:
Austria’s provincial capitals are expected to see their earliest snowfalls in history today (Mon) as Arctic air sweeps the country.
===
The big scare isn’t working so well
Andrew Bolt
Hmm, Australians still think we face a global warming armageddon, but have learned to stop worrying so much about it:
Climate change continues to drop as a priority for Australians, according to the 2009 Lowy Institute Poll, to be released today.Looks like the debate that was declared over by Kevin Rudd and much of the media has been declared open now by the voters. As I’ve found myself, there’s suddenly an interest in (and acceptance of) the sceptical arguments that wasn’t there even just a year ago.
In 2007, Australians ranked tackling climate change as the equal most important foreign policy goal for the Federal Government. This year it ranked 7th out of ten possible goals – down ten points since last year and 19 points since 2007.
Global warming is also seen by fewer people as a threat to our national interests. Out of 12 possibilities, global warming ranked as the 4th most critical threat facing Australia, down 14 points since last year…
Commenting on the findings, Lowy Institute Executive Director, Dr Michael Wesley, said Australians seemed to be moderating their views on climate change just as world leaders were preparing for negotiations in Copenhagen.
“When Australians were presented with a choice among three options for dealing with global warming, the most popular was still for the most pro-climate position – that ‘we should begin taking steps now even if this involves significant costs’, but support for this option was down 12 points since 2008 and 20 points since 2006”, Dr Wesley said.
“This is also the first year that this position has not had majority support”, he said.
Of course, the explanation could simply be that many people are growing bored with the absurb doom-mongering and exaggerations of the believers, or they’ve relaxed now that the drought has broken. But whatever the explanation, the Liberals should now rue the opportunity they’ve missed in not arguing louder and longer against the global warming scare that has so devasted them these past few years. True, public opinion is still on the Do Something side of the warming debate, but where might it be had the Liberals thrown the switch to attack two years ago or, better, more?
PS: Now you know one reason Kevin Rudd is desperate to get his emission trading scheme passed now, rather than next year. The way the debate is shifting, it may be now or never.
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