=== Todays Toon ===
A cartoon depicting President Rutherford B. Hayes kicking Arthur out of the New York Customs House.
Chester Alan Arthur (October 5, 1829 – November 18, 1886) was an American politician who served as the 21st President of the United States. Arthur was a member of the Republican Party and worked as a lawyer before becoming the 20th Vice President under James Garfield. While Garfield was mortally wounded by Charles J. Guiteau on July 2, 1881, he did not die until September 19 of that year, at which time Arthur was sworn in as president, serving until March 4, 1885.
On the threshold of office, what have we to expect of him?
In an 1881 Puck cartoon, Vice President Arthur faces the presidential cabinet (from left to right, Wayne MacVeagh, William Windom, James G. Blaine, Thomas Lemuel James, Samuel J. Kirkwood, Robert Todd Lincoln, William H. Hunt) after President James A. Garfield was assassinated. On the wall hang three portraits of (left to right) Andrew Johnson, Millard Fillmore, and John Tyler, three other vice-presidents who succeeded to the presidency. A fourth frame hangs next to Johnson with no picture and a question mark underneath meant for Arthur's portrait.=== Bible Quote ===
“But in your hearts set apart Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect,”- 1 Peter 3:15=== Headlines ===
Two GOP senators follow Chief Justice John Robert's lead and call on Obama to stop attacking the Supreme Court — with one calling State of the Union 'a political pep rally.
Health Bill Already Doomed?
Fox News confirms seven House Dems who supported reform last year will oppose Senate bill because it lifts ban on federal funding for abortions
U.N. to Probe Climate Panel
Independent scientific panel to review U.N. climate change panel's 'procedures and practices' — and management — in apparent slap at its embattled chief
Who Needs a Baseball Season?
The first game is weeks away, but a N.J. mathematician claims he already knows who will be in postseason
Calif. Teacher Turns Herself in After Alleged 6-Month Relationship With Student
A 33-year-old Burbank middle school teacher accused of having sex with a teenage male student over a six-month period last year was charged on Tuesday with unlawful sex with a minor, MyFoxLA.com reported. Amy Victoria Beck, a teacher at David Starr Jordan Middle School, appeared in Burbank Superior Court Wednesday. She did not enter a plea and her arraignment was scheduled for March 25.
Einstein Was Right: General Relativity Confirmed
Score one more for Einstein. A new study has confirmed his theory of general relativity works on extremely large scales. The study was one of the first rigorous tests of this theory of gravity beyond our solar system. The research found that even over vast scales of galaxies and clusters of galaxies, the equations of general relativity predict the way that mass pulls on other mass in the universe. The new work also helps rule out a competing theory of gravity that seeks to do away with the need for bizarre concepts like dark matter and dark energy that have irked some scientists. This research indicates those pesky ideas may be here to stay.
Plea for drug-smugglers' lives
PRIME Minister appeals directly to Indonesian President on behalf of Schapelle Corby and Bali Nine. - very late - ed.
200,000 on track for landmark pay rise - unemployment to rise
UNDERPAID workers doing some of our toughest jobs could get a wage rise of up to $20,000 a year. Now ord on how many will be unemployed as a result.
Ex-boyfriend of 'Jihad Jane' speaks out
THE former boyfriend of a Pennsylvania woman charged with plotting to provide material support to terrorists had no clue his live-in girlfriend of five years was living a double life. "We were together about five years," MyFoxPhilly reports Kurt Gorman as saying of Colleen LaRose, or "Jihad Jane" as she referred to herself. Asked what his reaction would have been if someone had told him LaRose, 46, was a threat to national security, Mr Gorman said, "I would never - I would have thought it was a joke". - apparently, anyone can be a fool. -ed.
Mum devastated by wheelchair bashing
A VICIOUS attack on a disabled man caught on security tape makes headlines overseas.
Children at risk in hospitals
ADULT patients are sleeping alongside children in overstretched hospitals despite doctors condemning the practice. NSW Health is defying its own protocols.
=== Journalists Corner ===
Textbook Controversy!
How are some people trying to change America's past ... and how could it impact the future of your child's education?
Guest: Rep. Jason Altmire
Health care hangs in the balance - so, which way will the House swing? Blue dog Dem Rep. Jason Altmire gives Neil inside information!
===
Guest: Sen. Jon Kyl
Fighting reconciliation! Sen. Kyl weighs in on the GOP's strategy to stop the Dems' health care push!
===
Special: History of Extremism
Beck exposes the political extremism in America you won't find in the history books!
=== Comments ===
Turning our backs on an Aussie in trouble
Piers Akerman
JAILED drug runner Schapelle Corby might gain some satisfaction in knowing that two artists have entered her portrait in this year’s Archibald art prize.
It is unlikely, however, to be of much comfort to Corby’s supporters, who believe she was wrongfully convicted. - Reading up on Mauritius I had to laugh at the article which included the lines
According to the 2009 Ibrahim Index of African Governance, which measures governance using a number of different variables, Mauritius' government earned the highest rank among African nations for "participation and human rights" and "sustainable economic opportunity", as well as earning the highest score in the index overall. Mauritius came second in "rule of law", and fourth in terms of "human development"It is well placed as an African nation, although it doesn't have the GDP of Libya. Small in population terms, it doesn't so much rely on agriculture these days but tourism. Tourism is code for the UN with economic minnows. It means they rely on exploiting their populace for the pleasure of foreigners with their leisure issues. Drugs are endemic among western youth, and the timid Rudd won't want to oppose the drug youth lobby. Nor will the timid Rudd want to tell Mauritius that it will offer appropriate resources to expedite the problem. Rudd doesn't seem to care about aid for poor nations. - ed
===
The Truth About Unemployment
By John Lott
Had the stimulus not delayed the recovery, the unemployment rate would never have reached such a high rate in the first place.
According to Friday's announcement by the Labor Department, the nation’s unemployment rate remains unchanged from the previous month at 9.7 percent. The number was generally greeted as good news by the media. The Wall Street Journal's headline reported Outlook Brightens for Jobless." The Los Angeles Times headline said: "Employment outlook brightens in U.S., state." But the cheeriness overlooks the fact that most of the new jobs are largely temporary, part-time jobs. And not the types of jobs workers held before the recession.
36,000 jobs were lost in February, according to the Labor Department's survey of businesses, up from the 26,000 lost in January. Nevertheless, the increase in job losses is viewed by some as good news because fewer jobs were lost than the 50,000 the 20 forecasters surveyed by Reuters had expected. Claims are made that jobs could very likely have been added if it wasn't for the snow storms on the East coast, but no empirical evidence is offered. Cutting down the number of work days may have delayed people being hired, but it might just as well delayed some employees from being laid off.
While the unemployment rate held steady at 9.7 percent in February, the percent of the workforce "employed part time for economic reasons" rose from 5.3 to 5.7 percent. They work between 1 and 34 hours per week, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, "because of an economic reason, such as their hours were cut back or they were unable to find full-time jobs."
Other survey evidence suggests that the number of underemployed workers might be even higher than the government's survey. A Gallup survey of 20,000 indicated that 19.9 percent of US workers are working part-time even though they want a full-time job.
The big area of job growth has been in "temporary help-services," adding 47,500 jobs in February. But many of these jobs are only part-time. They are hardly the great jobs most people are looking for, though these temporary jobs might eventually turn into full-time, permanent jobs.
While the overall total number of jobs fell, The Wall Street Journal emphasized the rosy job numbers that increased this way:
"The professional and business-services sector, a broad category that includes legal work and consulting, added 51,000 jobs. Another encouraging sign: The temporary-help services sector added 47,500 jobs and has added 284,000 since September 2009, a sign employers need workers and may eventually add permanent positions."Alas, there is some double-counting here -- "temporary-help service" jobs is part of the total that goes into "professional and business-service" jobs. Consider "professional and business-service" jobs that are not "temporary-help service" jobs and the increase is only 3,500. In contrast, Federal government jobs continue to grow, to the tune of 40,000 since September.
All that said, there is still some bright news, though it comes from a different set of numbers than the Obama administration and media are citing. A big problem over the last year has been that about 3 million workers simply gave up looking for work and left the labor force, thus they are no longer counted as unemployed because they aren't looking for a job. Some of these discouraged workers are returning to the labor force, even if it frequently seems to be for part-time jobs. The positive news is that in February 176,000 workers rejoined the workforce, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics Household survey, and that occurred without the unemployment rate rising.
The average length of time people are unemployed also declined slightly from 30.2 to 29.7 weeks. Much has been made in The New York Times and other places about how the record number of weeks that people are remaining unemployed justifies the record unemployment insurance and other benefits. Unemployment insurance now lasts up to 99 weeks. Just a little over a year and a half ago it was a mere 26 weeks. But what is left out of the discussion is how the largest unemployment benefits ever provided unemployed workers has itself increased how long workers remain unemployed. Economic studies have confirmed over and over again that extending unemployment insurance benefits just means more unemployment. Possibly one-and-half or more percentage points of the unemployment rate are due to these record benefits.
The economy is finally, if slowly, bottoming out, even if a lot of workers are moving from having dropped out of the labor force to taking part-time work. Having some job is better than no job. Still, had the stimulus not delayed the recovery, creating chaos by shifting around a trillion dollars and the jobs associated with that money, the unemployment rate would never have reached such a high rate in the first place.
John R. Lott, Jr. is a FoxNews.com contributor. He is an economist and author of More Guns, Less Crime (University of Chicago Press). The book's third edition will be published in May.
===
President Obama Declares War on Health Insurance Industry
By Bill O'Reilly
The president has settled on one very simple point to promote Obamacare: the health insurance companies are not your friend.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: We can't have a system that works better for the insurance companies than it does for the American people. Every year, insurance companies deny more people coverage because they've got pre-existing conditions. Every year, they drop more people's coverage when they get sick, right when they need it most. Every year, they raise premiums higher and higher and higher.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
And that's true. Blue Cross in California recently announced it wants an almost 40 percent rate hike. Millions of Americans simply cannot afford health insurance.
The president has seized on a clear strategy to try to get his very murky health care bill passed. If you dislike the insurance companies, you are much more likely to support Obamacare.
On Tuesday, about 2,000 folks demonstrated against some health insurance executives who were conferencing in Washington. These protesters are not everyday folks. They are activists. Far-left guy Howard Dean showed up to egg them on.
Now, I buy my own health insurance and often the company gives me big-time jazz when I submit a legitimate claim, and my premiums rise almost every year. So there are legit beefs against the industry.
The question then becomes: Can the feds run the health care industry better? Opinions abound but the truth is it is impossible to know.
The latest Rasmussen poll says 57 percent of Americans believe Obamacare will hurt the overall economy, and a whopping 81 percent say it is likely to cost more than the president is telling us. Also, 78 percent of voters believe Obamacare will lead to higher taxes for the middle class.
So the only chance Mr. Obama has in the court of public opinion is to demonize the insurance companies, make them even more loathsome than the federal intrusion.
The whole health care controversy is a no-win situation for we the people. The insurance companies will not control prices on their own, but Obamacare could lead to even more chaos and expense. To be fair, experts like Harvard professor David Cutler say the feds could well succeed in controlling health care costs.
But again, "Talking Points" believes nobody knows for sure.
So the best plan is to institute strict government oversight on the health insurance industry, mandate more interstate competition among companies and print medical price guidelines on the Net so we know when we're getting fleeced. Those things cost very little, and America should try them before going to a massive Obamacare plan.
===
IGNORANT GROUPTHINKING TAX-MOOCHER ALARMISTS TOLD
Tim Blair
Change at the ABC:
The Chairman of the ABC Maurice Newman has attacked the media for being too willing to accept the conventional wisdom on climate change.Reaction is bound to be amusing.
In a speech to senior ABC staff this morning he said climate change was an example of “group-think”.
Contrary views had not been tolerated, and those who expressed them had been labelled and mocked.
Mr Newman has doubts about climate change himself and says he’s waiting for proof either way.
Before his appointment to the ABC board Mr Newman had a long career in stockbroking and investment banking.
He says it used to puzzle him why journalists did not see through ‘corporate wizards’ such as Alan Bond and Christopher Skase.
Again Mr Newman blames “uncritical group-think”.
UPDATE. Not in reaction to Newman, but still hilarious. George Monbiot: “There goes my life’s work.” Further on George’s despair from Gerald Warner.
UPDATE II. Here comes the fun:
[Newman’s] comments, in particular those on climate change, drew an angry response from senior journalist Jonathan Holmes. Witnesses report that Holmes, who last week wrote about the media’s role in reporting climate change on the ABC’s opinion site The Drum, congratulated Mr Newman on his speech but then said that he was so angry he could barely concentrate.The poor lad. More from Andrew Bolt.
UPDATE III. Most predictable response yet:
ABC chair Maurice Newman, who is not a climate scientist …Neither is Tim Flannery. The ABC doesn’t have any problem with him, however.
UPDATE IV. Fairfax economics writer Peter Martin thinks calling for balance in climate reporting is the same as calling for balance in coverage of apartheid and the war in Vietnam; so it’s a moral issue rather than a scientific one.
UPDATE V. JoNova: “It must be tough watching your cult fall apart.”
===
PETER PREDICTS
Tim Blair
Age headline on Peter Roebuck’s column, December 31:
Pakistan will prosper with a leader like YousufToday:
Mohammad Yousuf has been banned indefinitely by the Pakistan Cricket Board.By contrast, captains opposed by Roebuck tend to remain in charge.
===
LARS ATTACKS
Tim Blair
Counter-terrorism from a cornered cartoonist:
A Swedish cartoonist whose controversial image of the Prophet Muhammad led to a series of death threats said today that he had secured his property with a homemade panic room and booby-trapped artwork.This sort of art is very popular in Australia. We call it insulation.
The latest threat to Lars Vilks emerged yesterday when seven people were arrested in Ireland accused of plotting to kill the 63-year-old artist.
Mr Vilks responded by saying that he was ready for them. “If something happens, I know exactly what to do,” he said.
His home in southern Sweden now contains a barbed-wire sculpture that could electrocute potential intruders …
===
Even Rudd’s selling of his insulation was a fraud
Andrew Bolt
Billions of your dollars have been wasted on a useless program that we now learn was built from the first on a lie:
THE Rudd government ramped up the environmental benefits of its botched $2.45 billion home insulation scheme by grossly overstating the cuts in greenhouse gas emissions that could be achieved by households, expert independent analysis says.And that was before the Government unveiled a new program to pull its foil insulation out of houses.
(Associate professor Terry Williamson, a thermal performance expert at the University of Adelaide) has relied on the official government figures and studies from the Environment Department and the former Australian Greenhouse Office into household energy use and household emissions.
He concludes that the benefits - as currently claimed - are bogus. Two other experts who provide advice to federal government departments on greenhouse gas emissions told The Australian yesterday Dr Williamson’s analysis was correct…
Dr Williamson said the most optimistic scenario could see the emission reduction get to 0.4 tonnes per household, which meant that the total carbon reduction by 2020 would be about 10 million tonnes. This would mean that the scheme had cost taxpayers more than $200 a tonne.
The independent analysis undermines claims by Kevin Rudd and Environment Minister Peter Garrett that the retrofitting of insulation into 2.7 million homes would produce reductions of 49.4 million tonnes of carbon by 2020.
Not just incompetents, but liars.
(Thanks to reader steve,)
UPDATE
What an amazing waste of that $2.5 billion Rudd spent on free insulation for people who thought it not worth their own money to install:
An initial inspection of around 1000 homes fitted with foil insulation found three per cent had electrical safety risks, (Assistant Minister for Energy Efficiency Greg) Combet said. This included 15 homes with `live’ foil.The Government refuses to say what all this will cost:
Of the 50,300 homes that had foil installed, the vast majority were in Queensland and northern NSW…
“The removal of foil insulation may be the most appropriate safety measure in houses where electrical wiring is old, degraded or damaged, or cannot be inspected because a blanket of insulation has been laid over the wiring,” Mr Combet said…
Mr Combet said that in relation to the more than one million households installed with non-foil insulation products, the government was committed to a large scale home inspection program.
Analysis of inspections to date has revealed 66 per cent of installations were fully compliant, 7.6 per cent had fire safety hazards, 16 per cent had other quality issues and 0.5 per cent involved fraud.
The Opposition’s environment spokesman, Greg Hunt, says the Government needs to say how much the new safety measures will cost.UPDATE 2
“The National Electrical Contractors Association has referred to potentially $450 million as the cost of repairing a program that was already on track to be $1 billion over budget,” he said.
The scale of the disaster, as outlined by Greg Combet to Parliament. First, the size of the scheme until the Government last month killed it:
Homes installed with non-foil insulation: 1,050,000Now for what we got for all that money:
Homes installed with foil insulation: 50,000
Cost so far: $1.5 billion.
Homes with foil causing fire safety risk: 2500That’s 340,000 bad, dangerous, incomplete or fraudulent installations out of 1.1 million, and four deaths.
Homes with foil causing electrical safety risk: 1500
Number of installers killed: 4
Homes burned from fires caused by insulation: 105
Homes with non-foil insulation causing fire safety hazard: 76,000
Homes with non-foil insulation that’s substandard or badly laid: 160,000
Homes with non-foil insulation not installed completely: 95,000
Homes where installation seems fraudulent: 5000
And the cost of cleaning up?
$41 million to retrain sacked workersNumber of politicians or bureaucrats sacked: zero.
Up to $450 million to fix the damage.
Homes with non-foil insulation
===
More waste: not solar, not needed, not entitled
Andrew Bolt
Yet more scandalous waste from the Rudd Government - this time in its stimulus spending on solar hot water systems, which were actually meant only for homes:
Tiny Koondrook Barham Football Club (pictured above) on the Murray River has been handed 17 new hot water systems - almost one for every player in a team. President Rod Barrington said the club knocked back even more units....Here’s another thing hard to explain:
Catani football ground, in Gippsland, said it was given 12 units for its six showers but has turned them off because they were too expensive to run.... Ellinbank Football Club was given 12 units but was operating on six after the rest were stolen…
As Energy Efficiency Minister Greg Combet tried to restore confidence in the insulation program, his department scrambled to explain the latest abuse of the handouts. Mr Combet’s spokesman said the hot water rebate was only available for households, and could not explain how sporting clubs had benefited.
Environment Minister Peter Garrett, who was demoted over the disastrous home-insulation scheme when he should have been sacked, hailed the Government’s solar hot-water program a success in cutting greenhouse gases.(Link to second item, the Herald Sun editorial, is broken.)
But none of the hot water services at the Barham club is connected to a solar panel. They’re all plugged into mains power, though the installers argue they save on emissions by using air warmed by the sun. Other installers regard this as a rip-off.
===
But all the right forms were filled
Andrew Bolt
We live in an age in which process trumps judgement:
A MAN raped his two daughters and fathered nine babies with them during 35 years of physical and sexual abuse…
Agencies involved with the family repeatedly failed to take action even though the father was accused of incest on seven separate occasions, with a further 12 reported incidents of violence…
The 57-year-old man, from Sheffield, England, was jailed for life in November 2008 after one of his daughters accused him of incest…
Between 1975 and 2008 the family came into contact with 28 different agencies and more than 100 professionals… However, no staff were sacked or disciplined as the case was seen to be a “collective failure”.
===
Government freezes when Rudd’s away
Andrew Bolt
Finance Minister Lindsay Tanner has an odd list of excuses for this Government not releasing the Henry report on tax reform:
KERRY O’BRIEN: Okay, okay, but I’m coming back. We’re talking about tax here. The Government has had four months to consider the Henry report so far… Do you acknowledge that with each month that passes before the report is released from now on, the more it will look as if the Government is scared of the debate in an election year?Is Tanner confirming the Government is led by an opportunistic control freak?
LINDSAY TANNER: Well, no, I don’t accept, Kerry and over that four months we’ve had the Copenhagen conference on climate change; we’ve had complete turmoil and mayhem in the Opposition side with Malcolm Turnbull being replaced by Tony Abbott; we’ve had the holiday season and Kevin Rudd, I think rightly, had a significant holiday. Even though everybody says he works too hard, well, he actually had a break and that was a good thing.
(Thanks to reader Chris.)
===
Danish patsies
Andrew Bolt
Michael J. Trebilcock, professor of economics at Toronto University, says Denmark’s wind power is a con:
There is no evidence that industrial wind power is likely to have a significant impact on carbon emissions… Denmark, the world’s most wind-intensive nation, with more than 6,000 turbines generating 19% of its electricity, has yet to close a single fossil-fuel plant. It requires 50% more coal-generated electricity to cover wind power’s unpredictability, and pollution and carbon dioxide emissions have risen (by 36% in 2006 alone).(Thanks to reader Bob.)
Flemming Nissen, the head of development at West Danish generating company ELSAM (one of Denmark’s largest energy utilities) tells us that “wind turbines do not reduce carbon dioxide emissions.” The German experience is no different. Der Spiegel reports that “Germany’s CO2 emissions haven’t been reduced by even a single gram,” and additional coal- and gas-fired plants have been constructed to ensure reliable delivery…
Industrial wind power is not a viable economic alternative to other energy conservation options. Again, the Danish experience is instructive. Its electricity generation costs are the highest in Europe (15¢/kwh compared to Ontario’s current rate of about 6¢). Niels Gram of the Danish Federation of Industries says, “windmills are a mistake and economically make no sense.” Aase Madsen , the Chair of Energy Policy in the Danish Parliament, calls it “a terribly expensive disaster.”
===
ABC chairman: do not mock the sceptics
Andrew Bolt
Astonishing. ABC chairman Maurice Newman demands a tolerance of debate on global warming. If only he had a more powerful job, such as reporting for Four Corners or presenting ABC Melbourne’s radio morning show:
MARK COLVIN: The Chairman of the ABC Maurice Newman has attacked the media for being too willing to accept the conventional wisdom on climate change.Bravo. Sane stuff. But will his own staff heed his advice? Judge that by the offensive question the ABC reporter goes on to ask in this very same interview:
In a speech to senior ABC staff this morning he said climate change was an example of “group-think”. Contrary views had not been tolerated, and those who expressed them had been labelled and mocked…
MAURICE NEWMAN: The media hasn’t been good at picking these things up and it’s really been the question of what is conventional wisdom and consensus rather than listening perhaps to other points of view that may be sceptical.
And I brought in as well in that vein what’s been going on in climate change where there’s been clearly a point of view which has been prevailing in the mainstream media, and the fact that again perhaps consensus and conventional wisdom may not always stand us in good stead.
BRENDAN TREMBATH: Do you think the ABC has been too quick to accept the conventional wisdom that climate change is a fact of life that it’s happening according to eminent scientists?
MAURICE NEWMAN: I think the ABC has probably been more balanced than most in the mainstream media.... But climate change is at the moment an emotional issue but it really is the fundamental issue about the need to bring voices that have authority and are relevant to the particular issue to the attention of our audiences so that they themselves can make decisions. So that we are seen to trust and respect them sufficiently that they can make up their own minds about the various points of view that are being expressed through the medium of the ABC.
BRENDAN TREMBATH: Would you say you’re a climate change denier or not as obvious as that?UPDATE
MAURICE NEWMAN: I am an agnostic and I have always been an agnostic and I will remain and agnostic until I’ve found compelling evidence on one side or the other that will move me.
The chairman may request, but the staff deny, deny, deny:
(Newman) warned ABC staffers that he would not tolerate anyone suppressing information, citing the fact that a BBC science correspondent knew for a month before the scandal broke of damaging emails at the University of East Anglia in Britain highlighting the politicised nature of climate science but did not report them…Odd, that two ABC staff at the same meeting attack Newman as either a) being wrong to say the ABC muzzled sceptics, or b) being wrong to say the ABC should unmuzzle sceptics. Make up your minds, gentlemen! Either you do and that’s good, or you don’t and that’s good.
“Which raises an important question for a media organisation,” Mr Newman said in the speech obtained by The Australian. “Who, if anyone, decides what to shelter from dispute? And when?
“Should there be a view that the ABC was sheltering particular beliefs from scrutiny, or failing to question a consensus, I would consider it to be a dangerous perception that could lead to the public’s trust in us being undermined.”
Sources said the speech drew an immediate rebuke from the ABC’s Media Watch presenter Jonathan Holmes, who rose to his feet and said he was angered by Mr Newman’s remarks.
Sources said Holmes had told Mr Newman he was wrong to assert that sceptics were silenced on the ABC… ABC science journalist Bernie Hobbs also spoke, supporting Holmes’s view and saying the ABC could not give undue weight to the sceptics and thereby push a sceptics’ agenda.
But to Newman’s specific example of an unforgivable refusal to report on Climategate - and Holmes’ angry denial that such a thing occurs. Here’s just one example, of Melbourne 774 morning host Jon Faine explaining why he would not be covering the Climategate scandal:
We make decisions every day [based] on our own opinions about what we think are the main stories. And what we leave out is often as important as what we put in, and that was my judgement of this issue..Or as I reported on December 4:
That was my assessment of whether this was actually of any significance or not, and I decided that it wasn’t and we wouldn’t spend time on it. It suits the conspiracy theorists beautifully…
Search on Google for the term “Climategate”. Wow: 18.6 million 27 million mentions already.Then there’s the faked “debates” on, say, the 7.30 Report. But speaking of the angry Holmes, note how he used his own program - ostensibly about media malpractice - to lash sceptic Lord Monckton for thought crimes, and to subject his views to a (ineffectual) fact checking that it’s not once given the plainly mendacious alarmist Al Gore.
Now search for “Climategate” on the ABC’s online site. Er, just two? And one just a reader’s retort?
Do the same search at The Age and the results show much the same wild mismatch. And in that cavern is where blogs now bloom, and some papers die.
(Thanks to readers bennoba and Steve. Oops - and to many other delighted readers, too.)
===
He’s our cartoonist, too
Andrew Bolt
It’s madness, this lethal intolerance - and the ideology and Iranian Government which foster it:
Irish police arrested seven Muslims suspected of conspiracy to murder Tuesday over an alleged plot to kill a Swedish cartoonist who drew the Prophet Mohammed with the body of a dog, they said.Why would seven people who are allegedly so violently against a fundamental freedom of Western society then choose to live in that freedom’s air - and why on earth were they allowed to?:
The four men and three women were arrested in the southern Irish towns of Cork and Waterford following an international operation.
A police source confirmed press reports that they were Muslims arrested over an alleged plot to assassinate Swedish cartoonist Lars Vilks [above], who has a A$110,000 bounty on his head from an Al-Qaeda-linked group.
The seven people arrested range in age from mid 20s to late 40s, Irish police said, while state broadcaster RTE reported that they were originally from Morocco and Yemen, but were all legally in Ireland.UPDATE
An American is charged:
The self-dubbed “Jihad Jane” who thought her blond, all-American profile would help mask her plan to kill a Swedish cartoonist is a rare case of a U.S. woman inciting foreign terrorism and shows the latest evolution of the global threat, authorities say.Even more important that we all stand by the right of Vilks to draw the world as he sees it, and to defy those who seek to impose their faith or strictures by terror. After all, it is merely for this that Vilks must die:
The suburban Philadelphia woman, Colleen R. LaRose, was accused in Tuesday’s indictment of trying to recruit jihadist fighters, and pledging to murder the artist, marry a terrorism suspect so he could move to Europe and martyr herself if necessary…
The indictment paints a picture of a woman whose devotion to the cause grew as she prowled the Internet and conversed with a loose band of terrorist suspects in Europe and South Asia. She eventually agreed to try killing Swedish artist Lars Vilks, who had angered Muslims by depicting the Prophet Muhammad with the body of a dog…
LaRose had targeted Vilks and had online discussions about her plans with at least one of several suspects apprehended over that plot Tuesday in Ireland, according to the U.S. official.
===
What is Rudd’s red carpet costing?
Andrew Bolt
This is getting right out of hand:
A navy patrol boat has intercepted an asylum seeker boat in waters off Australia’s north-west coast…
Home Affairs Minister Brendan O’Connor said initial indications suggested 46 passengers and three crew were on board the vessel.
It is the 21st asylum seeker boat to be intercepted in Australian waters this year and the third in less than a week.
===
Billions to install, hundreds of millions to remove
Andrew Bolt
How much more will this rolled-gold disaster cost taxpayers?
The Federal Government has announced that the owners of every home installed with foil insulation will have the choice to have it removed or have a safety switch installed...And not one politician or bureaucrat has lost their job over this? I’m utterly, utterly astonished.
The Opposition’s environment spokesman, Greg Hunt, says the Government needs to say how much the new safety measures will cost.
“The National Electrical Contractors Association has referred to potentially $450 million as the cost of repairing a program that was already on track to be $1 billion over budget,” he said.
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