=== Todays Toon ===
Macmillan with Indian Minister and head of Indian delegation Ashoke Kumar Sen and wife Anjana, daughter of Sudhi Ranjan Das
Maurice Harold Macmillan, 1st Earl of Stockton, OM, PC (10 February 1894 – 29 December 1986) was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 10 January 1957 to 18 October 1963.=== Bible Quote ===
“However, I consider my life worth nothing to me, if only I may finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me—the task of testifying to the gospel of God's grace.”- Acts 20:24=== Headlines ===
A Nevada jury finds a serial rapist guilty for the 2008 murder of 19-year-old college student Brianna Denison.BP Pauses to Assess Results
Company temporarily halts efforts to stop Gulf oil leak to monitor effects of 'top kill' procedure as officials say disaster eclipses the Exxon Valdez as biggest U.S. oil spill
Repeal of Military's Gay Ban Advances
Senate panel backs repeal of 'dont' ask, don't tell,' which would openly allow gays to serve in the military
Ranchers: Border Plan Falls Short
Ariz. ranchers say Obama's plan to send 1,200 National Guard troops to border won't provide maximum security
Black Saturday: Leaders faltered as Victoria burned
AS FIRES raged on Black Saturday, none of those who were in command showed any real leadership. That's what the bushfires royal commission was told yesterday in a stinging attack that threatens the reputations of former police chief commissioner Christine Nixon, CFA chief Russell Rees and other senior officers. Emergency services chiefs - including CFA deputy Steve Warrington, DSE chief fire officer Ewan Waller and Emergency Services Commissioner Bruce Esplin - were obsessed with co-ordination rather than command, the commission heard. They focused on overseeing their troops rather than supervising the firefight and issuing warnings to people in the path of the inferno. Jack Rush, QC, counsel assisting the commission, said proper and effective leadership was absent on Black Saturday.
Apple's new Bondi store makes the 8am deadline as hundreds of diehard fans line up for the iPad. Picture: Charles BrewerGenital mutilation - by Australian doctors
PRESSURE on health chiefs to bring circumcision of girls off the streets and into medical clinics.
Diff'rent Strokes star critical after fall
ACTOR Gary Coleman has been admitted to hospital in Utah reportedly suffering a head injury.
Pratt lover 'made Hitchcock jealous'
WOMAN who came between billionaire and long-term mistress is a twice married mum-of-two.
Bar Casanova wins Top End bouncer fight
A MAN who claimed a bar banned him for being too good-looking has had his complaint upheld.
Court wades into mining tax row
FORMER WA premier Richard Court has labelled Kevin Rudd's planned resource super-profits tax "cunning and sophisticated".
Police commissioner Karl O'Callaghan insists Mansell warrant was valid
POLICE commissioner Karl O'Callaghan has leapt to the defence of WA police over their handling of their arrest warrant for Cameron Mansell, saying it was valid despite a page of the affidavit not been signed.
Lock kids in room says parenting expert
HOST of parenting show says parents worry too much about things they can't control.
Suspected British serial killer charged
CRIMINOLOGY student Stephen Griffiths formally accused of murdering three prostitutes.
Ken Moroney paid $2000 a day to investigate F3 debacle
FORMER police commissioner Ken Moroney is being paid $2000 a day to investigate the F3 debacle. With RTA boss Michael Bushby suspended on full pay of $1400 a day until the investigation is over, the inquiry will cost taxpayers more than $150,000. Motorists were stuck in a 12-hour traffic jam on April 12 after a crash involving a B-double fuel tanker at Mount White, north of Sydney, about 11.40am. The main carriageway between Sydney, the Central Coast and Newcastle was blocked for more than 10km before an emergency plan known as the contraflow system was put in place about 9pm. Mr Moroney has interviewed more than 65 people from 25 transport and emergency agencies and expects to continue the investigation for another month. He said the report would be handed in towards the end of June. By then he would have clocked up $90,000 for nine weeks of work.
=== Journalists Corner ===
YOU'RE INVITED!
Saturday June 19th
Daw Aung San Suu Kyi's Birthday
1-3 pm Rally in front of the White House
4-7pm Cultural Performances at Calvary Baptist Church
On June 19th, the Lady is turning 65! This year, U.S. Campaign for Burma and the Burmese community are coming together for a large rally and celebration of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi's birthday. Show your support for Aung San Suu Kyi who is fighting for freedom and democracy in Burma. Bring friends and family to this exciting celebration!The event will also feature traditional Burman, Karen, and Chin dances- a display of unity by Burma's diverse ethnic groups. There are already confirmed supporters driving in from North Carolina, New York, and West Virginia. Will you join us?
A huge turnout on June 19th will send a strong message to President Obama that the U.S. must give more than lip service to end the repressive rule and the system of impunity in Burma. We will rally loud and clear for the U.S. government to support a UN-led Commission of Inquiry into war crimes and crimes against humanity, and bring justice to the country.
Let Than Shwe and his military cronies know that we will not be fooled by their sham elections. Aung San Suu Kyi is the still the true leader of Burma.
The rally will be held at Lafayette Park, in front of the White House, 1600 Pennsylvania Ave., NW, Washington, DC, 20006, 1pm-3pm.
The performance will be held at Calvary Baptist Church, 755 8th Street, NW, Washington, DC, 20001, 4-7pm.
Please RSVP to me at mike@uscampaignforburma.org if you plan to attend or need more information.
=== Comments ===
Man who thought he wore the pantsPiers Akerman
IF ANOTHER ancient Easter Island statue falls flat on its stony face, who cares? If the statue was in fact Malcolm Fraser, then the Canberra press gallery and the Left-wing bloviators get most concerned, even though former Liberal Party prime minister Fraser has made a career out of such pratfalls. - I don't feel Fraser understands conservatism. As PM, he was asked, running into the '83 election why he felt he should be re elected as PM. He hesitated, and talked about security of money for Australians, and the interviewer asked if he felt that 'Reds under the beds' would be taking cash from elderly or nervous Australians who wouldn't want to bank their savings.
History shows that Hawke and Keating presided over a decline in Australian wealth .. but Fraser didn't seem to get it or be able to enunciate it. And the decline for Hawke and Keating was not sudden and precipitous, as if based on a few events. It was a steady decline over a long period of time because their policies were useless.
It is always fascinating to see how people of substance move in history. One looks at the educational achievements of the Packers compared to the Murdochs and one might feel they can see why Murdochs have always been an order of magnitude greater in wealth. I don't mind being corrected on this because it is something I heard, rather than know, but I understand Gorton was rolled after he upset a much younger Rupert Murdoch. The lightweight MacMahon with his acolyte Fraser were the incompetents responsible, on the Liberal party side, for the rise of Whitlam too.
There is substantial room in the Liberal party for all conservatives, even social conservatives. But there isn't room for fools wishing to shrink the big tent to fit only a few. The best policies are broad, and Mr Abbott has given the party an agenda to pursue policy which benefits all. In terms of practice, liberals like Fraser only seem to achieve self interest. - ed.
===
Obama uses a few national guard
By Bill O'Reilly
With most Americans demanding the federal government finally secure the Southern border, President Obama has announced that 1,200 National Guard troops will be sent to back up the Border Patrol.
As you may remember, "The Factor" was the first TV news program to suggest using the military to help stop the massive influx of illegal aliens and narcotics from Mexico. That was way back in the year 2000.
But the problem remains, and now states like Arizona have so much trouble, they are passing their own immigration laws.
President Obama's announcement that he will move the soldiers is a bit perplexing. He doesn't seem to want to do it, and 1,200 are not nearly enough.
Ten thousand is a good number. Why not move 10,000 Guardsmen to the border, Mr. President?
The answer may be that the American left generally does not want the border secured. Liberal Sen. Bob Menendez from New Jersey issued this statement after the president's Guard announcement:
"The Obama administration's militarization of the border amounts to a submission to the political forces brought by the Republican Party. If there is a greater border presence necessary, it should be in the form of additional regular Border Patrol agents."
Again, this is perplexing. Why does Sen. Menendez object to action that might secure the border? The military can do that, so why does Menendez oppose it?
We've asked the senator to come on "The Factor" Thursday. We don't expect him to, but I'll take an answer to the question in writing, Senator.
There comes a time when BS walks. The border situation could have been solved 20 years ago. Everybody knows that a solid fence and additional Border Patrol backed up by the military will stop the chaos. Everybody knows that. But the federal government will not do it.
Meantime, the drug problem causes an incredible amount of crime and suffering, and the illegal alien problem is off the chart.
The failure to control the Southern border is flat-out irresponsible. It is worth pointing out that President Bush didn't want to move the military to the border either. He finally did, but with little enthusiasm.
I mean, I just don't get it. Are we afraid of offending the drug cartels? The coyotes who smuggle people? Are we afraid of offending them?
What if you lived 10 miles away from the border? How do you think your quality of life would be?
One word sums it all up: awful.
===
DINNER
Tim Blair
It should be a short speech:
Ms Nixon will deliver the 2010 Community Leadership Oration, titled ‘What Really Matters’ …
===
KEVIN’S CRISIS
Tim Blair
Run for your lives! It’s a national emergency:
Wayne Swan is preparing to escalate his pitched battle with the mining industry over the resource super-profits tax, obtaining a special exemption under national emergency powers to waive the government’s own advertising rules for a campaign against the miners.In 2007, Kevin Rudd described political advertising as “a cancer on our democracy”.
The exemption granted this week to the Treasurer by Special Minister of State Joe Ludwig will allow the government to rush out an advertising campaign to counter a mining industry blitz against the new 40 per cent super profits tax.
===
MUTILATION NATION
Tim Blair
As in the United States, Australian medics waver:
Australian doctors are considering a controversial form of genital mutilation on baby girls.What’s to discuss? Today’s editorial says it straight.
The practice involving cutting a girl’s genitals, sometimes with razors or pieces of glass, could be allowed in a clinical setting to stem illegal backyard procedures which are leaving young girls scarred for life.
The Royal Australian New Zealand College of Obstetricians will next month discuss backing “ritual nicks”, a modified form of genital mutilation.
UPDATE. Secretary of the Royal Australia New Zealand College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists Dr Gino Pecoraro is interviewed by the ABC: “Dr Pecoraro says it may well be better for the girls involved if the parents had a far less severe but culturally acceptable alternative.”
===
JUNKIES BETTER THAN JOE
Tim Blair
Shannyn Moore, an idiot, introduces herself to the Palin-McGinness rental stalking scandal:
The home Joe McGinniss is renting used to be an Oxford House from 2005 until 2008. The tenants were men recently released from prison who were recovering addicts. What? No fence to protect sexy Sarah in her tank top? Dear God! Who was lurking in that house watching her children play?Just harmless and twitchy ex-junkies, apparently, who weren’t planning on writing anything about the former Alaskan governor.
The Palins themselves rented the home McGinnis is staying in for six months in 2009, but weren’t interested in purchasing it. They didn’t want to spend the money.Another leftist talking point against Sarah Palin: she was too cheap to buy the house next to hers, in anticipation of Joe McGinniss moving in.
Here’s a hint, Sarah - if you want to dictate who lives in the house, you should have probably bought it first.It’s more a matter of guarding privacy than dictating occupation. Meanwhile:
In a parallel universe, a noted writer just moved next door to former Senator Barack Obama. Well, the servants’ quarters.
===
SOLEY POLEY
Tim Blair
It used to be that the entire planet was at an environmental “tipping point”. Now the danger is limited to a sole species, as the BBC reports:
Climate change will trigger a dramatic and sudden decline in the number of polar bears, a new study has concluded.The tipping point comes shortly after the bending point. A full-grown poley’s weight on those slender, ice-mounted turbine stalks is simply unsustainable.
The research is the first to directly model how changing climate will affect polar bear reproduction and survival.
Based on what is known of polar bear physiology, behaviour and ecology, it predicts pregnancy rates will fall and fewer bears will survive fasting during longer ice-free seasons.
These changes will happen suddenly as bears pass a ‘tipping point’.
(Via Struth)
UPDATE. In other endangered-critter news, observe the remarkable Toledo-Sydney hybrid buffalo girl.
UPDATE II. Tipping pointer Tim Flannery, already disenchanted with Kevin Rudd, now reaches a … well, a tipping point:
Prominent scientist Tim Flannery has said he is unlikely to vote for Labor again after Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s ‘’profound betrayal of trust’’ on climate change …Maybe he’d trust them more if they continually predicted events that never happen.
‘’Politicians only have one thing that they trade in, which is trust … unfortunately, my trust in the [Labor] Party’s been corroded,’’ the former Australian of the Year said.
===
WOW
Tim Blair
Art news from the old home town:
A design for the Princes Freeway western interchange gateway art project has been scrapped by Wyndham Council because it lacked the “wow” factor.More than three hundred grand for a freeway wheat decoration? That’s your “wow factor”, right there. Besides, the freeway has always been perfectly beautiful, in a minimalist kind of way.
In March 2008, councillors gave in-principle support for 23 six-metre, yellow-gold fibreglass reeds designed to light up and sway in the wind, creating a wheat-like image for motorists as they exited the freeway, near Wests Road.
The cost was put at $327,394 …
===
Another victim of shonky batts
Andrew Bolt
It seems that Kevin Rudd’s free pink batts - meant to cut emissions - have started yet another fire:
A FIRE fought single-handedly by an 80-year-old woman in Ormond this morning was caused by faulty insulation.
John Rees from the Metropolitan Fire Brigade confirmed this afternoon that the fire started when blow-in insulation came into contact with the wiring of a ceiling exhaust fan.
It is understood insulation was installed in Edith Preston’s house within the past six months.
===
Rudd backflips again: steals your money to pay for Labor ads
Andrew Bolt
(UPDATE - This item as been retitled, and the original pre-updates post dopped to the bottom.)
An extraordinary decision - scandalous, even:
WAYNE Swan is preparing to escalate his pitched battle with the mining industry over the resource super-profits tax, obtaining a special exemption under national emergency powers to breach the government’s own advertising rules for a campaign against the miners.The Government already has access to almost every newsroom in the country to put its case. Now it wants to help itself to your cash to make a strictly political argument - and will deny the Opposition equal access to that cash to make its own.
The exemption granted this week to the Treasurer by Special Minister of State Joe Ludwig will allow the government to rush out an advertising campaign to counter a mining industry blitz against the new 40 per cent super profits tax.
Mr Swan on May 10 sought permission from Senator Ludwig, in his role as Cabinet Secretary, to mount a tax reform advertising campaign.
“Given that co-ordinated misinformation about the changes is currently being promulgated in paid advertising, I accept the need for extremely urgent action to ensure the Australian community receive accurate advice about the nature and effect of the changes,” Senator Ludwig said in a special statement granting Mr Swan permission for the campaign.
“As the changes also affect the value of the capital assets and impact on financial markets, I am satisfied that a compelling reason for an exemption exists, particularly given the nature and extent of misinformation against a backdrop of continuing market volatility.”
This is close to corruption. Speak out against this theft of your money and this dangerous abuse of power.
UPDATE 2
Katharine Murphy describes just how brazen and grubby this is - and how Rudd once promised an end to this “cancer”:
Kevin Rudd comes to office in 2007 promising he will not abuse the process of government funded advertising like the Howard government did so egregiously.UPDATE 3
If climate change was the “great moral challenge of our time” government advertising, according to Rudd in 2007, was “a long term cancer on our democracy.”
He wins. He appoints the Auditor-General to police government ads.
The Auditor-General runs a ruler over everything, thinking he’s doing his job (given the cancer and all that). He asks lots of questions.
The government gets annoyed and bones him.
The government installs a new independent committee of former public servants to play the auditors’ role.
These public servants report to the government, (unlike the Auditor-General, who is independent from Government and reports to the Parliament.)
To cap off the backflip, it amends it own guidelines to give itself more discretion to bypass even the new watered down process to respond in cases where someone in the government decides there is a ‘‘compelling reason’’ to — how can I put this delicately — go for broke at the taxpayers expense. Then, today, it fulfils its own disappointing prophesy.
Let’s savour the full deceit of the Prime Liar:
Rudd promises to spend less on adsHow can anyone believe a word this man says? This backflip proves just what a panic Rudd is in over his super profits tax, whose failure would kill his leadership.
May 23, 2007
Opposition Leader Kevin Rudd has promised to spend less than John Howard on government advertising, branding the prime minister’s current ad campaign a “cancer” on Australian democracy.
He reiterated his pledge that a Labor government would get the auditor-general to vet all taxpayer-funded ad campaigns above $250,000 before going to air, and would require state governments to adopt the same process…
“This actually is a long-term cancer on our democracy.”
Mr Rudd said a Labor government would put processes in place to prevent the wrongful use of taxpayer funds to pay for government propaganda.
“I’m serious about this stuff, I think it stinks,” he said.
“For all advertising campaigns in excess of $250,000, either the auditor-general or the auditor-general’s designate would be required to vet those advertisements before public funding went to them...”
UPDATE 4
Since the Liberals, unlike Rudd, can’t steal $38 million from you to pay for their ads, I’ll help out by running its latest shoe-string effort:
UPDATE 5
Stephen Bartholomeusz:
Omigod! Australia is facing a national crisis so threatening that the federal government has had to invoke national emergency powers. The crisis? Someone disagrees with the government!UPDATE 6
The Rudd Government denies it’s a national emergency because people disagree with Kevin Rudd. It’s just a matter of “extreme urgency”:
As Cabinet Secretary Senator Ludwig can exempt a campaign from compliance with the guidelines on the basis of a national emergency, extreme urgency or other compelling reasons.UPDATE 7
A spokeswoman for Senator Ludwig said the minister had relied on extreme urgency or other compelling reason rather than the national emergency provision to grant Mr Swan’s application.
The Minerals Council says Rudd’s new ads use taxpayers money to deceive the public:
Statement from Mitch Hooke, Chief Executive Officer, Minerals Council of AustraliaUPDATE 8
New Federal Government advertising on the proposed mining super tax is misleading.
An advertisement, played this afternoon on Sydney radio, focuses on the mining industry’s royalty payments, but fails to acknowledge the sector’s company tax contribution in the total tax paid.
The head of the Treasury’s Consultation Panel has already described the current company tax regime as a de facto resource rent tax.
The Government has acknowledged that failing to include the mining industry’s company tax contribution is not the full picture of the sector’s taxation contribution, but this is what the advertisement aired on Sydney radio (2GB) this afternoon does.
Last year, the minerals resources sector paid $7.6 billion in royalties and $14.3 billion in company tax – and over the decade to 2008/09 $80 billion.
It is ironic that the Government has resorted to misleading advertising given its stated justification for the new taxpayer funded campaign.
Tom Ormonde is astonished that more Australians don’t protest at the Rudd Government’s earlier taxpayer-funded campaign ads:
For those of you who haven’t seen the first ad (and that in itself would take some doing), it is a slick little production promoting the government’s revamp of the health system. The ad is interesting for all the wrong reasons - first, for the almost complete absence of information that the public actually needs to know and, second, for the thinly disguised party-political messages in the voice-over.(Thanks to readers John and Steve.)
===
A Tax Office insider says he’s sick of the spin
Andrew Bolt
A reader requesting anonymity writes:
As a loyal employee of the ATO for the last 8 years I can no longer keep quiet on all the lies being broadcast by Labor in their budget:
1) They are trumpeting the fact that there will no longer be a need for “rummaging through your shoebox” and you can automatically claim a $500 tax deduction. In no forum ever have they mentioned that NOW you can already claim a $300 deduction without any receipts. They are talking about like it is a new thing but in fact all they are doing is raising the threshold.
2) They have not mentioned the fact that the threshold for being able to claim the 20% tax offset on net medical expenses threshold is being raised from $1500 to $2000, affecting those who need it most
3) The line being pushed is that the resource rent tax is there to increase the superannuation contribution rate from 9% to 12%. This is an absolute lie as the increase is being paid by employers; and
4) The line about the reduced tax rate for small business going from 30% to 28% - this will only affect small businesses which are companies – an extremely small percentage as most of them are sole proprietors or partnerships.
===
Another Australian ally harpooned
Andrew Bolt
A great week for Australia’s allies. First Kevin Rudd slings out a diplomat from Israel, and now he takes Japan to court:
AUSTRALIA is taking Japan to international court to stop whaling in Antarctic waters, following through on a threat made earlier this year.Oddly enough, the world is close to a deal to allow commercial whaling:
Foreign Minister Stephen Smith said today that Rudd government would lodge an application in the International Court of Justice in The Hague next week.
Threats of court action made by Kevin Rudd risked a major diplomatic rift, Japanese officials warned earlier this year…
Environment Protection Minister Peter Garrett told reporters in Sydney: “We want to see an end to whales being killed in the name of science in the Southern Ocean.”
The head of the International Whaling Commission is expressing optimism that nations gathering next month in Morocco can settle a long-running dispute between pro- and anti-whaling forces.
Cristian Maquieira said Thursday that talks will be complicated but success will allow the IWC to gain control over international whaling. He says a contentious IWC proposal to allow limited commercial whaling in return for strict quotas is only meant to spur negotiations, not be a final agreement.
U.S. Commissioner to the IWC Monica Medina says the United States and other pro-conservation countries want a deal with lower quotas than the current proposal. But she says the U.S. is willing to continue talks to see if a stronger accord can be settled in Morocco.
===
These guys are actually running the country
Andrew Bolt
How utterly childish, and how characteristic of this Government:The ALP has taken its attack on Opposition Leader Tony Abbott to social media, launching what is believed to be the first party-sanctioned fake Twitter account.Hawker Britton must be doing booming trade on all the playgrounds of Australia’s most feral schools.
The Labor Party set up @Phoney_Tony last week after Mr Abbott’s appearance on The 7.30 Report, in which he told Kerry O’Brien that what he said in interviews was not always “gospel truth”.
The Phoney Tony account has some accusing the ALP of turning to gutter politics...
Jennifer Hewett notes a more serious example of the Government’s immaturity in debate:
A federal treasurer effectively calling major mining executives liars and tax cheats hardly signals a mature or sensible political debate over such an important issue. Even Paul Keating, in his glory days of treasurer’s invective, would not have made such a mistake.She’s talking about this kind of language from Wayne Swan:
THOSE companies are not telling the truth in their advertising. Their claims are fundamentally dishonest. Even if you added in the royalties they are paying it goes to nothing towards the sort of hysterical figures that they are including in their advertising.
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Claws out for Kristina
Andrew Bolt
I’ve often noted that it’s women who are hardest on female politicians, especially the prettier ones, and more likely to judge them on appearance:The Sexist Morning Herald, part one. Elizabeth Farrelly yesterday:
IN the four years since Kristina Keneally felt impelled to assure parliament she had “never worn a pair of stilettos” she has achieved a far, far greater thing, to which many strive but few finally attain: ascension by hair. I’m having a one-more-shot-of-Keneally’s-blowdried-coif-and-I-throw-up moment when it strikes me who she’s channelling.
Perhaps it’s the combination of hair and throwing up that triggers my epiphany, since the glowing figure at its centre is the soi-disant bulimic Princess Di. It’s the same same lip-gloss insouciance, the same doe-eyed “I’d like to be a queen of people’s hearts” deep-lens look, the same flicky blonde hair.
The Sexist Morning Herald, part two. More serious political debate from Fairfax columnist Jacqueline Maley yesterday:
IF Julie Bishop intended to take a low profile after Tuesday’s passport forgery faux pas, she chose the wrong jacket. It was more amber than a traffic light and brighter than a Jaffa. It fizzed on the eyeball like Fanta from the freezer. If she had been in her home state of Western Australia, she could have been a sunset. She and the other frontbench Bishop must negotiate their outfits in advance. On Tuesday Bronwyn also worked a citrus theme: lemon blazer and ruby-grapefruit toenails. Teamed with a knotted silk scarf, pearls and a corsage, it’s possible the elder Bishop over-accessorised, but one must not quibble.
===
Henry disses the miners, eyes their cash
Andrew Bolt
Who to trust, the Member for Wombat Hollow or the determinedly unpartisan Governor of the Reserve Bank?
KEN Henry’s view that the resource industry had little to do with Australia’s escape from recession is at odds with opinions of the Reserve Bank and even some of his own officers.Henry fails to make it clear just why he stopped at 40 per cent of “super” profits when urging the Rudd Government to go for the miners, these ”plunderers” of our natural world. Why not seize it all?:
Dr Henry told the Senate Economics Committee that far from cushioning the downturn, the mining industry had itself suffered a severe recession.
“In the first six months of 2009, it shed 15.2 per cent of its employment. If that was applied to the national workforce, unemployment would have risen from 4.6 per cent to 19 per cent in six months,” Dr Henry told the committee yesterday.
“Mining investment collapsed and mining output collapsed. The Australian mining industry had a deep recession and suggestions that it saved Australia from the recession are spurious, to say the least.”
And yet, when asked why the Australian economy had performed so well during the downturn, Reserve Bank governor Glenn Stevens told the same committee last September that “ongoing strength and demand for resources has kept Australia’s exports growing and our terms of trade, even though well short of their peak, remain quite high by historical standards”.
Ken Henry at the Senate select committee yesterday:UPDATE
SENATOR Eric Abetz: Is there sufficient accuracy in the modelling to accurately assess the impact at different RSPT rates of, let’s say, 30, 40 or 50 per cent?
Henry: An RSPT at the rate of 50 per cent would have no different economic impact from an RSPT at the rate of 40 per cent. There would be no different economic impact. It should not have an impact on the level of mining sector investment.
Senator Barnaby Joyce: That obviously means that we have to pose the question: if we took the rate to 70 per cent or 80 per cent, would that make a difference?
Henry: In concept it should not make a difference.
Joyce: Even if it went to 70 per cent or 80 per cent?
Henry: That is correct.
Joyce: What if it went to 100 per cent?
Henry: At 100 per cent we might find that the government had to finance all of the investment itself. I do not want to make too much of this, but other countries, take Norway, have managed to attract very substantial amounts of private capital investment while taking 95 per cent of the profits.
Professor Sinclair Davidson corrects Henry, pointing out that much higher taxes can indeed force up prices.
UPDATE 2
Joseph Sternberg in the Wall Street Journal says Rudd’s plans most help China, by making our mining assets cheaper:
In the short term, Chinese steelmakers have particular reason to rejoice, because Mr. Rudd has just made common cause with them against his country’s own mines…(Thanks to readers Kent and Terry.)
With respect to the valuation of mining assets, Canada shows where Australia is headed. Ottawa in 2006 changed its tax law in a way that, inter alia, hikes rates on many resource companies to 31.5% starting next year, from zero. Average valuations among companies affected by the move plummeted by 35% in two days after the announcement.
Why so cheap? In tax-happy Canada, as in Mr. Rudd’s Australia, the most willing resource investors will be those for whom the precise economic rationale of a mine is secondary to the basic interest in securing the minerals. That tends to rule out many Western investors and mining companies beholden to decadent shareholders, and less demand for ownership leads to a lower price. Already, U.S.-based Peabody Energy cut its bid for Queensland’s Macarthur Coal by 7%, citing the tax plan.
But Chinese companies buck those norms. They have not invested in resources in Africa, Central Asia, Latin America or elsewhere because it was excessively profitable. They do it to guarantee supply, and because they have ample spare cash to spend. For them, low valuation brought about by policy risk can be an opportunity, not a warning. Again Canada’s oil industry is instructive… In moved the Chinese, among others, with cumulative investments of more than 5 billion Canadian dollars ($4.6 billion) since April 2009…
Imagine a speech five years from now in which a future prime minister says his government will approve a major Chinese mining deal for the sake of employment. Beijing’s smartest central planners couldn’t have concocted such a clever scheme to wedge their way into Australia’s mining industry.
===
The wrong kind of hypocrites
Andrew Bolt
HYPOCRISY is a virtue, which is why I’m so down on amateurs like “Sir” Bob Geldof, who give it a bad name.If only Geldof could learn the art from David Campbell, the family man MP caught last week leaving the gay bathhouse Ken’s of Kensington.
Bob, the key to being a virtuous hypocrite like Campbell is to at least conceal, as best you can, the gap between what you preach and do.
And ‘fess up when you’re found out. Pay tribute to the standards from which you’ve secretly excused yourself.
But see how Geldof, the world famous champion of the starving, last week fluffed his act.
He flew into Melbourne to give his usual speech about helping the needy, which in his case apparently includes former Boomtown Rats stars.
His sermon to a fundraiser for a specialist cancer unit at St Vincent’s reputedly cost the organisers - the Pratt Foundation and social-page regular Heloise Waislitz - many tens of thousands of dollars.
But so far, so discreet, since Geldof’s manager refused to reveal the size of his cheque or even discuss the ethics of charging big for a cancer charity do.
Indeed, this pay-to-preach thing promised to be a whole lot more discreet than Geldof’s visit two years ago, when organisers, including the Brumby Government’s Education Department, did a noisy tin-rattle for the reported $100,000 it took to pay the Irishman to tell them they should help other needy foreigners, too. Only not Irish millionaires, this time, but people actually starving somewhere in Africa.
So it all was going swimmingly at Waislitz’s Toorak mansion, with everyone getting what they wanted: Geldof his cheque, the $1000-a-head crowd a sense of moral purpose, and St Vincent’s $350,000 to cure the sick.
To crown her triumph, Waislitz, daughter of the late cardboard billionaire Dick Pratt, even got to sing to Geldof from her own stage.
But once again Geldof couldn’t help but lift the lovely skirts to show a little too much ugly leg.
===
Schools teach bad language
Andrew Bolt
IT was a dud idea the day Premier Jeff Kennett decreed in 1998 that all children should learn a foreign language up to year 10.
Even more doomed was Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s $62 million plan two years ago to make yet more of these poor children learn an Asian language.
The results are now in, thanks to a study from Melbourne University’s Asia Education Foundation.
For many students, it seems those years of forced study have been largely wasted, and wasted most with Asian languages. Moreover, what was sold as a way to reach out to other cultures has divided students on ethnic lines.
Compulsory teaching of foreign languages was always unnecessary because we’re blessed to have English as the national tongue - the language of business, diplomacy and tourism in almost every corner of the world.
Worse, we’ve taught these languages with too few trained teachers, and in a ludicrously unco-ordinated way.
My youngest son has gone from one primary school that taught Indonesian to another that taught only German, yet he most wants to learn the Italian he’ll be offered only in secondary school.
That’s common. Countless children now find the language they learned in one school not offered in the next, so that their classes are made up of both beginners and the advanced. The best students are bored as the teacher repeats what they already know, or lessons become just cultural studies.
So what does the AEF find about the teaching of the languages Rudd most wants to push: Indonesian, Mandarin, Korean and Japanese?
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You cannot lead from your table at the pub
Andrew Bolt
Proof of a government culture of process, not leadership - and I’d doubt it’s limited to these individuals:
AS Victoria burned on Black Saturday in Australia’s worst peacetime disaster, none of those who were in command showed any real leadership, but instead were passive, as though they were “powerless, behind the glass, unable or unwilling to influence or attempt to influence the tragedy that was unfolding”.Rush gives a rather good lecture on leadership:
There was a bewildering and lamentable lack of leadership, said counsel assisting the bushfires royal commission Jack Rush, in a brutal final submission that eviscerated the reputations of former police chief Christine Nixon, Country Fire Authority chief Russell Rees and the state’s senior emergency services personnel.
No one at the top level distinguished themselves, Mr Rush said, as communities were engulfed by fire, often without warning, leaving 173 people dead. Not Ms Nixon, who knew when she went out for a pub meal that the state was facing a disaster; nor Mr Rees, who was divorced from fundamental aspects of his responsibilities. Ewan Waller, chief fire officer of the Department of Sustainability and Environment, and senior CFA officers Geoff Conway and Steve Warrington all failed to ensure clear and timely warnings reached communities, he said.
Mr Rush said those who oversaw the disaster at the Integrated Emergency Co-ordination Centre adopted a passive management style, lacking in initiative, almost without exception, and took the position that “it was not my responsibility”.
In comments clearly directed at Ms Nixon, Mr Rush said: “Command demands a presence both to inform and, if necessary, reassure and inspire. Leadership and command is not exercised by a retreat to so-called co-ordination, or to broad oversight. Leadership and command is not exercised by being available, if necessary, at the end of a telephone. It is unacceptable, in the submission of counsel assisting, that at the height of the fire and emergency, as people sought refuge in CFA sheds, at ovals, on main streets, as others fought, many in vain, to save themselves and their families, that those at the apex of the legislative structure in this state were not present, actively on duty, exercising and showing leadership by their presence at this critical time.
“This removal of responsibility and accountability is heightened by the fact that there was a clear knowledge of the disaster that was to come.
“In our submission, no excuse or spin can justify what we say is a removal from the responsibility at the very hour of crisis.”
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A lucrative faith
Andrew Bolt
That’s enough to make me believe in catastrophic man-made warming, too:
Tony Blair is set to earn millions of pounds advising an American businessman on how to make money from tackling climate change.But if you really think mankind faces doom from its gases, why would you insist on being paid millions for the secrets to saving ourselves?
The former prime minister will be paid at least £700,000 a year to act as a “strategic adviser” to Khosla Ventures, a venture capitalist firm founded by Indian billionaire Vinod Khosla.
(Thanks to reader David.)
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No surrender to this mutilation - or to the creed that desires it
Andrew Bolt
When you compromise with barbarism you actually surrender:
AUSTRALIAN doctors are considering a controversial form of genital mutilation on baby girls.How much has multiculturalism and moral relativism destroyed our judgment and our confidence to defend our principles?
The practice involving cutting a girl’s genitals, sometimes with razors or pieces of glass, could be allowed in a clinical setting to stem illegal backyard procedures which are leaving young girls scarred for life.
The Royal Australian New Zealand College of Obstetricians will next month discuss backing “ritual nicks”, a modified form of genital mutilation.
But experts are divided on whether to allow the practice, given that in some cultures it is used to remove the sexual feelings of women.
Female genital mutilation has been outlawed in Australia since the 1990s but is common among African, Asian and Middle Eastern communities.
With the rise in Somali and Sudanese living in Australia, doctors are seeing more cases of young girls, and women, needing surgery after illegal operations. Backers of “ritual nick” said it was a superficial procedure leaving no long-term damage.
Let’s extend the same reasoning. Will police will instruct husbands on the “safe” beating of wives to avoid worse damage?
What’s at stake here is not just the abhorrent mutilation of girls, but an abhorrent presumption that these wicked things need to have their sexual appetites permanently and sugically controlled and drastically reduced. It’s that presumption that also suggests we will surrender our principles without actually convincing many to surrender their practices. I suspect the reality of the mutilation is desired more than the mere ritual.
One more thing to consider. It’s now accepted almost without comment that people we’ve brought in consider this treatment of girls to be desirable. Why they hold primitive views so violently at odds with our own, what chance is there of a successful integration?
UPDATE
Ayaan Hirsi Ali describes what we’re talking about:
Female circumcision is a custom in many African and Asian countries whereby the genitals of a girl child are cut. There are roughly four procedures. First there is the ritual pinprick. This is what Pediatrics refers to as the “nick” option. To give you an idea of what that means, visualize a preteen girl held down by adults. Her clitoris is tweaked so that the circumcizer can hold it between her forefinger and her thumb. Then she takes a needle and pierces it using enough force for it to go into the peak of the clitoris. As soon as it bleeds, the parents and others attending the ceremony cheer, the girl is comforted and the celebrations follow.UPDATE
There is a more sinister meaning to the word “nick” if you consider the fact that in some cases it means to cut off the peak of the clitoris. Proponents compare “nicking” to the ritual of boy circumcision. But in the case of the boys, it is the foreskin that is all or partly removed and not a part of the penis head. In the case of the girls, the clitoris is actually mutilated.
Then there is the second method whereby a substantial part of the clitoris is removed and the opening of the vagina is sewn together (infibulation). The third variation adds to this the removal of the inner labia.
Finally, there is a procedure whereby as much of the clitoris as possible is removed along with the inner and outer labia. Then the inner walls of the vagina are scraped until they bleed and are then bound with pins or thorns. The tissue on either side grows together, forming a thick scar. Two small openings roughly equal to the diameter of a matchstick are left for urination and menstruation respectively…
I am familiar with this debate in two ways. First, I come from a culture where virtually every woman has undergone genital cutting. I was 5 years old when mine were cut and sewn. Second, while serving as a member of parliament in the Netherlands, I was assigned the portfolio for the emancipation and integration of immigrant women. One of my missions was to combat practices such as FGM.
To understand this problem, we need to begin with parental motives. The “nicking” option is regarded as a necessary cleansing ritual. The clitoris is considered to be an impure part of the girl-child and bleeding it is believed to make her pure and free of evil spirits.
But the majority of girls are subjected to FGM to ensure their virginity—hence the sewing up of the opening of the vagina—and to curb their libido to guarantee sexual fidelity after marriage—hence the effective removal of the clitoris and scraping of the labia. Think of it as a genital burqa, designed to control female sexuality.
When the motive for FGM is to ensure chastity before marriage and to curb female libido, then the nick option is not sufficient.
Readers below tell me RANZCOG secretary Gino Pecoraro has just denied on Sydney radio that his college would ever endorse a ritual “nick”. If so, it seems to be a change from what he said yesterday:
RANZCOG secretary Gino Pecoraro said the policy would be discussed at next month’s Women’s Health Committee meeting.
”We will need to start to think about [its introduction] but we would have to speak to community leaders from Australia,” Dr Pecoraro said.
“If a nick could meet the cultural needs of a particular woman, then it might save her from going through what can really be drastic surgery...”
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Union turf war goes bananas
Andrew Bolt
Utterly brainless vandalism of the kind I thought we’d grown out of:
A UNION turf war at the Epping wholesale fruit and vegetable market has already cost at least $1.4 million and involves a contractor who will employ about six people, The Age believes.(Thanks to reader CA.)
The blockade at the $290 million Brumby government project has been in place since May 19, with Federal Court orders now calling on the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union to end it…
Australian Building and Construction commissioner John Lloyd said the CFMEU was ‘’aggrieved’’ that earth-moving contractor Fulton Hogan had struck a deal with a rival union, the Australian Workers Union.
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Testing reform
Andrew Bolt
Both inspiring and depressing - in that real progress in education can be opposed by those who should demand it most:
A BREAKFAST club and a radical new method of teaching are greatly improving student learning in two north Queensland communities.UPDATE
At the start of this year, a staggering 178 out of 193 Prep to Year 7 students in Aurukun and Coen could not read above the kindergarten level.
Four months on, one advanced Prep class is out-reading older students, while the star in the crown is Year 4 student Imani Tamwoy, who is the only student to be reading at the “age appropriate” level.
The “spectacular” figures are boasted by Cape York Partnerships, under a $7.72 million trial which sparked controversy earlier this year.
The method taught at the trial Cape York Aboriginal Australian Academy in Aurukun and Coen is radically different from the one in Education Queensland schools.
Under the method - called direct instruction - students are tested every 10 lessons to see if they have mastered a level… In class, students recite back sentences to teachers who instruct from workbooks in smaller classes.
But the workbooks have come under fire for containing American references, while the direct instruction method was cited by five teachers as their reasons for leaving Aurukun earlier this year.
Parents at Coen signed a petition asking for the Academy to be dropped earlier this year before agreeing to give it time.
It’s the culture more than a few criminal elements that produces such deadly results. And the brutal logic is that the fastest way to break the cycle is to “steal” the children:
THE chronic violence in north Australian Aboriginal communities is showing no signs of abating and it could be a further 25 years before any meaningful progress is made, the Northern Territory’s retiring Chief Justice, Brian Martin, said yesterday…As I said, “steal” them. More boarding schools, more scholarships, more mainstreaming and more insistence that the parents move to where there’s work and a future for their children.
Justice Martin said jail had become an ineffective means of rehabilitation and that he had become tired of seeing a growing tide of Aboriginal men repeatedly before the courts for violent crimes against women..
“We see many offenders who come from homes in which they were the victims.
“They end up becoming offenders. We have to break that cycle somehow.”
Justice Martin said stamping out the violence would take generational change and special attention needed to be given to children.
“The project in my view is at least a 25-year project,” he said. “It starts with getting the very young children out of the dysfunctional lifestyle and circumstances and get them into the right lifestyle and break the vicious cycle that has been set up.”
(Thanks to reader CA.)
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The insulation buck stops with Rudd
Andrew Bolt
I’ve said before that Peter Garrett wouldn’t have moved a step without first clearing it with Kevin Rudd, a notorious control-freak - and now comes proof he indeed did alert Rudd to the dangers of his $2.5 billion disaster:
Cabinet documents reveal Prime Minister Kevin Rudd was told of safety concerns associated with the Government’s home insulation scheme several months before it was axed.What is Rudd trying to hide?
The $2.5 billion program was scrapped in February after it was linked to four deaths and more than 100 house fires.
The Government has now released a series of letters between the minister responsible for the scheme, Peter Garrett, and Mr Rudd.
A letter from Mr Garrett on October 28 last year raises concerns about safety, asking that the proposed reduced rebate take effect from the date of announcement to prevent a rush for installers that may have negative consequences for the quality of installation, including increasing the risk of fire.
That same month in a separate letter Mr Garrett informed Mr Rudd he was working with various stakeholders to improve safety.
In November the Government banned the use of metal fasteners with foil insulation before suspending the scheme in February.
The Government has refused to release a fourth letter written to Mr Rudd last August, citing cabinet confidentiality.
UPDATE
A FATHER has revealed he repeatedly pleaded with Peter Garrett to fix the botched ceiling insulation program after his son was killed, but well before three others died.
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