=== Todays Toon ===
McKinley fires a cannon into an imperialism effigy in this cartoon by W. A. Rogers from Harper's Weekly of September 22, 1900
William McKinley, Jr. (January 29, 1843 – September 14, 1901) was the 25th President of the United States, and the last veteran of the American Civil War to be elected to the office. He was the last president to serve in the 19th century and the first to serve in the 20th.
=== Bible Quote ===
“[More Than Conquerors] And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.”- Romans 8:28=== Headlines ===
GOP lawmaker Rep. Issa (left) says White House committed 'crime' if it offered Rep. Sestak (top right) a federal job for dropping Senate bid against Arlen Specter.
Dems in Health Bill Turmoil
Rep. Stupak takes on his party's leaders, saying they don't want stronger abortion-related language because more U.S. births will cost the country too much money
Is Second Terror Arrest Jihad... Jamie?
Small-town mom Jamie Paulin-Ramirez is 2nd U.S. woman nabbed in alleged plot to kill Swedish cartoonist
Future Is Now: Jetpacks for Sale
This Jetsons-era vision of the future is very real: Soon you'll be able to buy your own strap-on jetpack
Microsoft Workers Hide Their iPhones
For many top Microsoft executives, seeing so many iPhones around the office is a bit like how a Coca-Cola Co. ...
Break-up turns nasty as underwear model's relatives try to cash in with promise to reveal the true face of star cricketer.
Hunt for snatched children
FUGITIVE mums and dads believed to have hidden children to deny former partners access.
Officials : N.J. Al Qaeda Suspect Tricked His Yemeni Guard
An American Al Qaeda suspect detained in Yemen fooled his hospital guards into unshackling him by asking to join them for prayers, security officials said Saturday. He then killed a guard who laid down his weapon as he went ahead at prayer time.
Jamie's f-word warning to parents
TEACH children how to cook or nation faces "f***ing scary" future of obesity, warns celebrity chef.
Obama cancels family trip via Twitter
WHITE House deflates Australian hopes of playing host to President's wife and daughters.
Virgin Blue's new low: 2100 axed flights
BRANSON'S budget airline holds the dubious record of highest number of flight cancellations.
Nude Gaga video leaves internet agog
SINGER'S Tarantino-inspired duet with Beyonce is being touted as successor to Thriller.
Lady Gaga gets raunchy with Beyonce in new Tarantino-inspired video
IT'S hard to believe, but Lady Gaga has shocked the world again. Known for pushing boundaries with her barely-there outfits and provocative performances, the US pop singer has stirred more controversy with her latest big-budget video. The nine-minute clip for her song Telephone, also starring Beyonce Knowles, has been labelled unsuitable for younger fans because of its explicit content. It features graphic violence, a lesbian kiss, mass murder, nudity and expletives. Within 12 hours of the video being released on the internet it had half a million hits and nearly as many blogs dissecting its possible meanings.
Poisons found in school drinking fountains
HUNDREDS of children have been exposed to dangerous toxins after tests revealed that seven public schools failed to comply with drinking water guidelines. Tank water supplies in seven schools recorded traces of E. coli, lead and copper higher than the maximum recommended levels. Bubbler fountains at a further seven schools were found to be contaminated. Students and teachers were given bottled water to drink in the affected schools, which are located in regional and metropolitan fringe areas in NSW. Two of the schools - Dunedoo Central School and Ebenezer Public School near Richmond - have more than 100 students. The NSW Department of Education refused to disclose the lead and copper readings at each of the 14 schools, but the National Health and Medical Research Council states lead levels in drinking water should not exceed 0.01 milligrams per litre.
State wants to outlaw race-based abortions
REPUBLICAN pushes for law that has already inspired claims that a racial conspiracy is behind pregnancy terminations.
Woman saved, BMW down the drain
A 26-YEAR-OLD woman had a lucky escape in Cabramatta yesterday after her BMW X5 careened off the road and became submerged in a deep, water-filled ditch.
Rudd rubs it in
A DAY after publicly humiliating Premier Kristina Keneally, Kevin Rudd offered her Queensland counterpart a warm and jovial welcome, further highlighting the animosity between Canberra and the NSW Government. The bizarre cold shoulder for Ms Keneally has fuelled perceptions the already strained relationship between the NSW and federal governments is deteriorating.
Lin family murders: suspect identified
POLICE investigating the shocking and baffling murder of a newsagent and his family have identified a person connected to the family as a prime suspect. Police have narrowed the search for the killer of Min Lin and Min Lin, his wife Yun Li "Lillie" Lin, her sister Yun Bin "Irene" Lin, and the couple's young sons Henry and Terry. The Sunday Telegraph knows the identity of the man, but cannot publish his name for legal reasons.
=== Comments ===
Why Labor looks to women to save facePiers Akerman
SOUTH Australians will make political history should they elect Isobel Redmond their first woman premier next weekend. - When I see how bad the SA gavernment has been under Rann I am staggered that they are in the running. It should be disturbing for any fair minded person that the ALP will possibly win next weekend, but they may. One reason why the ALP may win next weekend is because conservative press is almost non existent in Australia. There is none who will report consistently from a conservative point of view, bar a few commentators. All the daily news is skew, and the headlines. So that it becomes difficult for a conservative leader to maintain party loyalty and be assertively pro active in pursuing government.
Commentators need to be balanced, but they need a viewpoint too. If commentators only point out what they 'see' they risk becoming (as the ABC, SMH and many other have) propagandist, and worse, being dismissed in that vein. Bill OReilly is clearly conservative and yet often is calling for moderate positions, much as Alan Jones does. It results in absurdity when OReilly claims there is virtue in some dumb Dem position, but it maintains their centerist position and the validity they hold with centerist readers .. recognizing they can never appeal to the left. Still, it also results in the denunciation of conservatives too. Like when Barry OFarrel was castigated by Jones recently for his water policy, which he wouldn't announce, but after he had criticized the ALP water policy which included desalination but no dams. Australia requires the infrastructure that dams provide. But no one is willing to get beaten up over the matter by the insane left, who rule the press.
Bligh won in Queensland from a dishonest campaign that said the conservatives were divided for wanting a united party. The press ran with it. Rann also has won on similar fatuous claims. It hasn't been conservative policy which has kept the libs out of office, but well resourced scare campaigns. Whenever the ALP look like losing their biggest campaign holds the line "Nobody can be trusted, but the ALP is the devil you know." - ed.
Merilyn Williams repliedSoon after Mr Howard won government, Gareth Evans was in Victoria giving a talk. Gareth said he felt that the Australian government could reasonably sustain debt of 30 percent GDP, and not the mere 10 percent or so that Mr Howard fielded and saved Australia from. It becomes interesting that Gareth made that point when you realize that in Rudd’s first term in his first year he aimed for $300 billion debt which is about 30 percent.
You covered pretty much what I was going to write, another fact that is astonishing, is how over the last few years there has been no money to hand out to various things that needed doing, e.g. carer hours cut back for those who needed it, [that’s just one, but there are many others] but since the start of the election, there has been money to burn, yet NOT ONE major media person has asked where this money has suddenly appeared from.
Today the editor of the Sunday-Mail is backing Rann, saying he deserves another term, beat that.
ALP require substantial amounts of money to pay for their bad policy. They do give money to some of the things they promise, but their eye is on the prize of paying off those that give them power. There is a substantial possibility of endemic corruption in ALP governance. - ed. Tim replied
All good points Dave.
The UK would be the puppy to watch as Gordon burns the last of that nation’s credit to get back in. Britons will be ruing the day after the election - Whoever wins will have little choice but to slash government spending to nothing. Failing that the IMF will step in and do it for them.
A few things I do know 1) If Labor wins the pound will be crushed and gilt rates will soar into the stratosphere. 2) If the Torys win thousands of public servants will be fired and many parts of the welfare system will be dismantled.
The UK needs the Torys to win - The debt situation is that serious. - Davo 5 replied
“their eye is on the prize of paying off those that gave them power”
Spot on, like the $2.5 million of taxpayers money Rudd Labor gave to Cornelia Rau for her “tormented” time spent in detention after she consistently refused to give her real name to investigators, for whatever reason. I personally dont go for the mental illness excuse used by Rau and her supporters for the tissue of lies she spun around her identity. I also query why Rau was not posted as a missing person with phoptograph by her family friends or psychiatrist which was have resulted in her immediate release from detention. Especially as her close family are jounalists with The Age and would have had plenty of help in posting the missing alarm and perhaps even writing a heartstring tugging article about Cornelia for public consumption to help with the search for her whereabouts. Successfully used to beat up John Howard and his government as cruel mean cold hearted Rau and the sledgehammer team backers certainly made an impact on Australian politics as Labor’s spinners successfully outsted Howard and his government. - DT replied
DD Ball debt is not a problem if applied to quality projects, but as you know Labor is the party of waste and incompentence when in power, look at the insulation debacle, the school buildings excessive costs and mistakes, and the list goes on. And when Labor have there hands on our money the possibility of corrupt behaviour is ever present, they have proven this time and time again over many decades. I wonder what the China connections behind the scenes are right now.
===
The Truth About "Green Zone"
By Richard "Monty" Gonzales
As principle military adviser on the just-released thriller "Green Zone," I have an obligation to the soldiers and civilians with whom I served to ensure that my involvement in the production of the film does not lend the appearance of accuracy to the assertion that a massive conspiracy led us into the war in Iraq.
My role as the principle military adviser on the film had absolutely nothing to do with making political statements; in fact, to the extent possible, the most important role I played as an adviser was to push the plot as far away from reality as possible. After receiving assurances from Paul Greengrass, the Director of “Green Zone,” that he would not allow the film to be turned into an exploitive polemic, I agreed to participate.
Paul warned me that I should be prepared to discuss which elements of the film were factual and which were pure fantasy. As I watched the plot develop into a larger than life, unrealistic conspiracy theory, I felt there could be no mistaking it for anything other than a great Hollywood action thriller.
But, as some have pointed out, “Green Zone” is not a typical thriller. There are a number of assertions made throughout the film that have caused some, on both sides of the political spectrum, to react in a measure completely disproportionate to a film that I consider largely a work of fiction.
===
Google’s Brin won’t help impose what he fled
Andrew Bolt
Big move by Google:
GOOGLE Inc. executives are “99.9 percent” sure they will pull the plug on their Chinese search engine after talks with Chinese officials over censorship concerns have broken down.You might be wondering why Google would do something so commercially damaging, or, on the other hand, you may be looking for the cynical reason behind Google’s apparant attack of principle.
The reason, I’m told by a confidant who’d know, is quite simple and once again lies in the psychology of the individual. No, it’s not about money. As the Wall Street Journal reports:
As a boy growing up in the Soviet Union, Sergey Brin witnessed the consequences of censorship. Now the Google Inc. co-founder is drawing on that experience in shaping the company’s showdown with the Chinese government.
Mr. Brin has long been Google’s moral compass on China-related issues, say people familiar with the matter. He expressed the greatest concern among decision makers, they say, about the compromises Google made when it launched its Chinese-language search engine, Google.cn, in 2006. He is now the guiding force behind Google’s decision to stop filtering search results in China, say people familiar with the decision…
Mr. Brin was born in Moscow in 1973. He emigrated to the United States with his family in 1979, he has said, in part because of anti-Semitism there before the fall of the Soviet Union. He has said in past interviews that the move and its circumstances had a profound impact on his life.
(Thanks to reader nowranorm.)
===
Labour ads banned for lying about warming
Andrew Bolt
If only our own watchdogs were as scrupulous:
TWO government advertisements that use nursery rhymes to warn people of the dangers of climate change have been banned by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) for exaggerating the potential harm.But back here, any old rubbish gets through:
The adverts, commissioned by Ed Miliband, the energy secretary, used the rhymes to suggest that Britain faces an inevitable increase in storms, floods and heat waves unless greenhouse gas emissions are brought under control.
The ASA has ruled that the claims made in the newspaper adverts were not supported by solid science ...
They attracted 939 complaints — more than the ASA received for any advertisement last year.
(Thanks to reader oldguy.)
===
Five more boats in a week
Andrew Bolt
You know how Kevin Rudd last month said he’d get ASIO onto the people smugglers, and how last week he said he’d signed a deal with Indonesia to crack down really hard?
Any chance of him actually doing something that works?
A boat carrying asylum seekers has been intercepted north-west of Christmas Island…Please define the difference between “intercepted” and “welcomed”?
It is believed 35 passengers and two crew members were on board.
The group will be taken to Christmas Island for identity, security and health checks. It is the fifth boat of asylum seekers picked up in Australian waters since last Sunday.
===
Flannery flops
Andrew Bolt
John Izzard attends Alarmist of the Year Tim Flannery’s latest talk:
Firstly, without being rude or discourteous, Professor Tim’s lecture would have to have been the worst presented, most head-bangingly-boring and uninformative address that this writer can remember.Read on!
Oh, and the man who’s made so many dud predictions already tries yet another:
In his book Now or Never, Professor Tim quotes James Hansen “who is the world’s leading thinker in this area” saying that “we are on the brink of triggering a 25 metre sea-level rise”. Tim goes onto say “So anyone with a coastal view from their bedroom or kitchen window is likely to lose their house as a result of that change”. The Australian of 5th March 2010 quotes a Tim Flannery estimate of a 60 metre sea-level rise.(Thanks to reader handjive.)
In Launceston on Friday evening during his lecture, Professor Tim, who is in charge of the Rudd government’s response to sea-level rises, repeatedly claimed we are now experiencing an annual 3mm rise in the sea-level along Australia’s coastline. The Australian Bureau of Meteorology Official record puts last year’s sea-level rise at 1.7 mm.
UPDATE
Reader Roger reports:
As someone who attended the talk (yeah, I know, I should get myself a life), I can add several facts to the article:
1. Flannery claimed to “not support this or other side of politics” during his lecture. Never mind that his entire lecture was more or less dedicated to the singing of praises of Rudd’s CPRS, but he also referred to the Liberal party as “the Polluter’s party” and condemned the Greens for siding with the “Conservative Climate Deniers” (he explicitly used the term “Climate Deniers” and not “Climate Sceptics” as wrongly reported in the article). Hard to guess who he wants us to vote for, isn’t it? (Also may be worth a mention that Tasmania was a week and a day - now a week less than a day - before a crucial elections between the Liberals, Labor and the Greens.
2. He claimed that he “doesn’t make predictions”, only “projections” yet made some (of course they were his typical alarmist ones) in his lecture.
3. He blamed the campaign to discredit the East Anglia scientists (climategate, according to Flannery, was “virtually nothing at all") for the failure of Copenhagen, only later in his (indeed, boring) lecture to inconsistently go into complicated political analysis of why Copenhagen failed that had to do with Sudan, G77, Vanuato and whatnot.
4. He mentioned the breaking of icesheets from Antarctica (a fact), but neglected of course to mention that on the whole the Antarctic ice extend has NOT shrunk.- Just a few examples of the many inconsitencies in his very uninformative and boring lecture.
===
JM Coetzee is not amused
Andrew Bolt
(Via Quadrant.)
===
Rann slapped silly
Andrew Bolt
An outraged husband slaps Mike Rann, who falls and falls and falls:
A Galaxy Poll, conducted exclusively for the Sunday Mail , has found voters are continuing to tilt towards the Liberals, paving the way for desperate final days of campaigning before the March 20 State Election.UPDATE
It also showed Premier Mike Rann, who once enjoyed an approval rating higher than 80 per cent, has fallen well behind Isobel Redmond as preferred premier and is seen as far more arrogant, much less trustworthy and more talk than action…
On a two-party preferred basis, the Liberals lead 51 per cent to 49 per cent, a swing of 7.8 per cent since the 2006 election.
It may be time to get to know Isobel Redmond a bit better. From her website:
Born and raised in the very outskirts of Sydney Isobel’s parents instilled in her and her four siblings a strong work ethic and understanding for people less fortunate than themselves...’More from The Advertiser, when she won the leadership last year:
Coming from a family of modest means and before university fees were abolished, Isobel worked in the public service to pay her own way while studying with the NSW Barristers Admissions Board at night.
After marrying her American husband Jim and while deciding where they might live, Isobel remembered visiting the Adelaide Hills as part of a three-week bus tour around Australia at the age of 18… Isobel and her husband Jim moved to Stirling.
Isobel worked at several law firms in the City and at Murray Bridge before opening her own firm in the Hills with the winnings from a lottery ticket her parents had sent her.
A SEPARATED mother of three, who decided to live in Adelaide after a visit on a $99 around-Australia Greyhound bus pass, has created political history.Video of her here. She certainly seems competent and, unlike Rann, far from manufactured. In fact, to tell the truth, a little more grooming for TV could help. But maybe voters are ready for the real.
Lawyer Isobel Redmond, who used to have “unbelievable screaming battles” with her mother because she wanted to study law, ...is now the first woman to lead a major political party in this state.
Ms Redmond – a Rotary Club member, former solicitor and Stirling councillor – ... moved to Adelaide ... to work at the University of Adelaide, then as a solicitor in the Hills and also as a general practice lawyer for Labor breeding ground Duncan, Basheer, Hannon…
“When I was first admitted to the bar, I was one of only two women,” she said yesterday. “When I was first elected to Stirling Council, I was the second female. When I stood for leadership of the Rotary Club in the Hills, I was the first female and the only one for 4 1/2 years. I was the only female on the Road Safety Advisory Council.
“On any number of occasions, I’ve been the first or one of the first females in any number of roles, and I’ve just taken the view that I get on with the job.”
===
Dr Jeckyl and Mr Rudd
Andrew Bolt
The snub was meant:
A DAY after publicly humiliating Premier Kristina Keneally, Kevin Rudd offered her Queensland counterpart a warm and jovial welcome, further highlighting the animosity between Canberra and the NSW Government.
The bizarre cold shoulder for Ms Keneally has fuelled perceptions the already strained relationship between the NSW and federal governments is deteriorating.
Furious NSW MPs rallied around Ms Keneally yesterday. Others lashed out at the Prime Minister’s odd snub on Friday, when he refused to meet the NSW Premier’s gaze during a press call, then curtly ended a chat.
===
How Chavez inspires our Left
Andrew Bolt
Two years ago a collection of our snowfield socialists - including the ABC’s Phillip Adams, propagandist John Pilger, the Greens’ Kerry Nettle and Kevin Rudd’s nephew Van Thanh Rudd - begged Venezuelan strongman Hugo Chavez to come teach Australians a lesson:
Every country has its own traditions and culture and has to find its own solutions, but what Venezuela has been able to achieve in so little time will be a source of inspiration and ideas for many in Australia.So what lesson has this “source of inspiration and ideas” been teaching our closet totalitarians lately?
An energy crisis has battered Venezuela’s economy and President Hugo Chávez’s popularity, prompting severe rationing to avert nationwide blackouts and paralysis.Refusing to build vital infrastructure, forcing people instead to use less of what they need, handing out trinkets such energy efficiency bulbs as a substitute for action, launching propaganda campaigns ... Gosh, it seems Chavez has indeed inspired similarly Use-less governments here.
One of the worst droughts in decades has crippled the hydroelectric plants that supply most of Venezuela’s power, plunging cities into darkness and forcing industries to go slow and even shut down… Businesses have reported a collapse in sales and employment, which is expected to aggravate a recession already the deepest in South America… Blackouts and rationing have become increasingly frequent since December, prompting an estimated 25% fall in economic activity, according to business leaders… Chávez has told big businesses and government offices to cut energy consumption by 20% and warned of tougher measures to come…
A recent opinion poll found 62% thought the country’s situation was negative and 54% had little or no confidence in Chávez… Critics say the drought would not have been so damaging had there been more investment in power plants…
The government has launched a marketing campaign to educate Venezuelans – Latin America’s biggest per capita energy users – about profligacy. The army and local councils are distributing millions of energy-efficient bulbs.
(Thanks to reader Steve.)
===
Lowe act
Andrew Bolt
Astonishing. Professor Ian Lowe really does still repeat Al Gore’s old fraud and blame Hurricane Katrina on global warming. Listen here.
I don’t think there’s any doubt that the severity of Hurricane Katrina was the direct result of the unusual warmness of the Gulf of Mexico at the time and the science was saying 25 years ago that the intensity of tropical cyclones is a direct function of sea surface temperatures, so with warming we’d expect more intense cyclones. So In a rational world you would expect that Hurricane Katrina and the devastation of New Orleans would have been seen as convincing evidence of something needing to be done about climate change.This nonsense wouldn’t matter so much if Lowe was merely the president of the Australian Conservation Fondation, but he’s also emeritus professor of science, technology and society at Griffith University. In a rational world you would expect that Hurricane Katrina would not be touted as “convincing evidence” of anything to do with climate change, other than that alarmists now infest that field.
After all, it’s barely a month since World Meteorological Organisation nailed the exaggeration - or lie - about the use of hurricanes as evidence of global warming. Professor Roger Pielke Jr explains:
A team of researchers under the auspices of the World Meteorological Organization has published a new review paper in Nature Geoscience (PDF) updating consensus perspectives published in 1998 and 2006…UPDATE
On North Atlantic hurricanes the paper states...:Hurricane counts (with no adjustments for possible missing cases) show a significant increase from the late 1800s to present, but do not have a significant trend from the 1850s or 1860s to present… Landfalling tropical storm and hurricane activity in the US shows no long-term increase…The paper’s conclusions about global trends might raise a few eyebrows.In terms of global tropical cyclone frequency, it was concluded25 that there was no significant change in global tropical storm or hurricane numbers from 1970 to 2004, nor any significant change in hurricane numbers for any individual basin over that period, except for the Atlantic (discussed above). Landfall in various regions of East Asia26 during the past 60 years, and those in the Philippines27 during the past century, also do not show significant trends...The paper states that projections of future activity favor a reduction in storm frequency coupled with and increase in average storm intensity, with large uncertainties:These include our assessment that tropical cyclone frequency is likely to either decrease or remain essentially the same. Despite this lack of an increase in total storm count, we project that a future increase in the globally averaged frequency of the strongest tropical cyclones is more likely than not — a higher confidence level than possible at our previous assessment.Bottom line (emphasis added)?. . . we cannot at this time conclusively identify anthropogenic signals in past tropical cyclone data.
A new study in Geophysical Research Letters detects some global warming, but says there’s no evidence it’s increasing storm days:
However, the global total number of storm days shows no trend and only an unexpected large amplitude fluctuation driven by El Niño-Southern Oscillation and PDO. The rising temperature of about 0.5oC in the tropics so far has not yet affected the global tropical storm days.(Thanks to readers Trent and ABC News Watch.)
UPDATE 2
About that predicted increase in the intensity of tropical cyclones:
Nature Geoscience study co-author Christopher Landsea of the National Hurricane Center in Miami, ... says the potential increase in strong hurricanes is “pretty tiny. We’re not looking at any drastic increase by 2100.” For example, he says, a 150-mph hurricane might increase only to a 157-mph hurricane. “In my perspective, that’s a little change, a long ways in the future.”It’s also worth remembering that Katrina was only a category 3 hurricane when it hit New Orleans.
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