Bairnsdale Conservative: Mon 7th Jan Todays News

Labor lies nailed

Piers Akerman – Monday, January 07, 2013 (7:01am)

THE biggest job the Opposition faces this year is nailing Labor’s lies about leader Tony Abbott.

Principal among these are lies about Abbott’s Catholicism and his views on abortion and IVF.

Abbott’s own chief-of-staff Peta Credlin had a crack at killing these lies at the weekend when she revealed an extraordinarily moving personal story about the assistance her boss had given her when she and her husband were trying to conceive through IVF.

As anyone who has known a couple in an IVF program would understand, it is not an easy procedure, there are no promises, there are a lot of frustrations and there can be no guarantee of success.

Abbott himself had said it was a “myth” that he was against IVF and that in fact he had considered resigning from cabinet over a proposal to limit older women’s access to IVF.

“Perhaps not going ahead with the IVF restrictions was my colleagues’ way of atoning for a decision I deplored,” he wrote in the Sunday Telegraph.

He said he had never opposed IVF. “How could any pro-family politician not encourage people to have children and make it easier for them to do so?”

Abbott also said “contrary to myth, as health minister, I never sought to restrict access to the morning-after pill, never sought to prevent the importation of RU486 and never sought to limit access to abortion”.

That has not stopped Labor’s most senior law officer, Attorney-General Nicola Roxon, from attempting to smear Abbott saying he was “ on record with his views of abortion, his views of RU-486, his views of older women accessing IVF”.

“They’re the sorts of comments that people will judge Mr Abbott on. If he’s changed his view, well then that’s obviously a matter for him to prosecute and see if he can convince the public that he has.”

Abbott’s views remain as sound as they ever were.

Abbott has the same views on abortion on former US President Bill Clinton - that abortion should be safe, legal and rare.

Now senior Opposition figure Christopher Pyne has come forward to talk of the support Abbott provided during a five-year period when Pyne and wife Carolyn were trying to conceive through IVF.

After a long struggle, twins Barnaby and Eleanor were born in August 2000.

“The myth that Tony Abbott is against IVF is just that,” Pyne told The Australian.
“We did the IVF for five years. We had many failed cycles. We had well over a dozen before the twins actually came along.”

Pyne said the government was trying to paint a picture of the Opposition Leader that simply did not bear out the reality.

“I am speaking about it because the myth Labor is creating about Tony is false, unfair and repugnant to me, he said.

“He was always keen to talk about progress.

“We talked about IVF and my twins and the process of getting there many times and he was only ever extraordinarily supportive, often raising the subject and being encouraging, hoping it would all be a great success.

“I remember explicitly talking about the fact that the church at the time was not in favour of IVF. His view was the church’s position was simply misguided and that there was nothing more important or exciting than the birth of children and if IVF could help bear children, then it was a good thing, not bad.”

Pyne said Mr Abbott had strongly opposed cuts to Medicare funding for IVF treatment.

He was against that from the very beginning,” Pyne said.

These personal testimonies will not stop Labor’s propaganda juggernaut but honest Australians should not let the lies persist.

The evidence of Abbott’s good character is abundant. Gillard cannot say the same.

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January 7: Christmas (Julian calendar); Victory Day in Cambodia; Flag Dayin Italy

1558 – Francis, Duke of Guise (pictured), retook Calais, England's last continental possession, for France.
1785 – Frenchman Jean-Pierre Blanchard and AmericanJohn Jeffries became the first to cross the English Channel by air, in a balloon.
1948 – Air National Guard pilot Thomas Mantell fatally crashed his P-51 Mustang while in pursuit of a UFO near Fort Knox,Kentucky.
1993 – The Fourth Republic of Ghana was inaugurated with Jerry Rawlings as its president.
2007 – Newly appointed Archbishop of Warsaw Stanisław Wielgusresigned amid allegations that he collaborated with the Polish communist government's secret police.

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Events

1325 – Alfonso IV becomes King of Portugal.
1558 – France takes Calais, the last continental possession of England.
1598 – Boris Godunov becomes Czar of Russia.
1608 – Fire destroys Jamestown, Virginia.
1610 – Galileo Galilei makes his first observation of the four Galilean moons: Ganymede, Callisto, Io and Europa, although he is not able distinguish the last two until the following day.
1782 – The first American commercial bank, the Bank of North America, opens.
1785 – Frenchman Jean-Pierre Blanchard and American John Jeffries travel from Dover, England, to Calais, France, in a gas balloon.
1797 – The modern Italian flag is first used.
1835 – HMS Beagle drops anchor off the Chonos Archipelago.
1894 – William Kennedy Dickson receives a patent for motion picture film.
1904 – The distress signal "CQD" is established only to be replaced two years later by "SOS".
1919 – Montenegrin guerrilla fighters rebel against the planned annexation of Montenegro by Serbia, but fail.
1920 – The New York State Assembly refuses to seat five duly elected Socialist assemblymen.
1922 – Dáil Éireann ratifies the Anglo-Irish Treaty by a 64-57 vote.
1927 – The first transatlantic telephone service is established – from New York, New York to London, England, United Kingdom.
1931 – Guy Menzies flies the first solo non-stop trans-Tasman flight (from Australia to New Zealand) in 11 hours and 45 minutes, crash-landing on New Zealand's west coast.
1935 – Benito Mussolini and French Foreign minister Pierre Laval sign the Franco-Italian Agreement.
1940 – Winter War: The Finnish 9th Division stops and completely destroys the overwhelming Soviet forces on the Raate-Suomussalmi road.
1942 – World War II: The siege of the Bataan Peninsula begins.
1945 – World War II: British General Bernard Montgomery holds a press conference in which he claims credit for victory in the Battle of the Bulge.
1948 – Kentucky Air National Guard pilot Thomas Mantell crashes while in pursuit of a supposed UFO.
1954 – Georgetown-IBM experiment: the first public demonstration of a machine translation system, is held in New York at the head office of IBM.
1959 – The United States recognizes the new Cuban government of Fidel Castro.
1960 – The Polaris missile is test launched.
1968 – Surveyor Program: Surveyor 7, the last spacecraft in the Surveyor series, lifts off from launch complex 36A, Cape Canaveral.
1973 – Mark Essex fatally shoots 10 people and wounds 13 others at Howard Johnson's Hotel in New Orleans, Louisiana, before being shot to death by police officers.
1979 – Third Indochina War – Cambodian–Vietnamese War: Phnom Penh falls to the advancing Vietnamese troops, driving out Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge.
1980 – President Jimmy Carter authorizes legislation giving $1.5 billion in loans to bail out the Chrysler Corporation.
1984 – Brunei becomes the sixth member of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).
1985 – Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency launches Sakigake, Japan's first interplanetary spacecraft and the first deep space probe to be launched by any country other than the United States or the Soviet Union.
1989 – Prince Akihito is sworn in as the emperor of Japan after the death of his father Hirohito
1990 – The interior of the Leaning Tower of Pisa is closed to the public because of safety concerns.
1991 – Roger Lafontant, former leader of the Tonton Macoutes in Haiti under François Duvalier, attempts a coup d'état, which ends in his arrest.
1993 – The Fourth Republic of Ghana is inaugurated with Jerry Rawlings as President.
1993 – Bosnian War: The Bosnian Army executes a surprise attack on the village of Kravica in Srebrenica.
1999 – The Senate trial in the impeachment of U.S. President Bill Clinton begins.
2010 – Muslim gunmen in Egypt open fire on a crowd of Coptic Christians leaving church after celebrating a midnight Christmas mass, killing eight of them as well as one Muslim bystander.

[edit]Births

1355 – Thomas of Woodstock, 1st Duke of Gloucester, son of Edward III of England (d. 1397)
1502 – Pope Gregory XIII (d. 1585)
1528 – Jeanne d'Albret, Queen of Navarre (d. 1572)
1634 – Adam Krieger, German composer (d. 1666)
1647 – Wilhelm Ludwig, Duke of Württemberg (d. 1677)
1685 – Jonas Alströmer, Swedish industrialist (d. 1761)
1706 – Johann Heinrich Zedler, German publisher (d. 1751)
1713 – Giovanni Battista Locatelli, Italian opera director, impresario and owner of a private opera company (d. 1785)
1718 – Israel Putnam, American Revolutionary War general (d. 1790)
1746 – George Elphinstone, 1st Viscount Keith, Royal Navy admiral (d. 1823)
1768 – Joseph Bonaparte, King of Naples (d. 1844)
1786 – John Catron, Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court (d. 1865)
1796 – Princess Charlotte Augusta of Wales (d. 1817)
1800 – Millard Fillmore, 13th President of the United States (d. 1874)
1827 – Sir Sandford Fleming, Canadian engineer; introduced Universal Standard Time (d. 1915)
1831 – Heinrich von Stephan, German labor organizer (d. 1897)
1832 – James Munro, Premier of Victoria (d. 1908)
1834 – Johann Philipp Reis, German physicist and inventor (d. 1874)
1837 – Thomas Henry Ismay, founder of the White Star Line shipping company (d. 1899)
1844 – Bernadette Soubirous, French saint (d. 1879)
1845 – King Ludwig III of Bavaria (d. 1921)
1858 – Eliezer Ben-Yehuda, key figure in the revival of Hebrew as a spoken language (d. 1922)
1860 – Emanuil Manolov, Bulgarian composer (d. 1902)
1870 – Lord Gordon Hewart, British judge (d. 1943)
1871 – Émile Borel, French mathematician and politician (d. 1956)
1873 – Charles Péguy, French poet and essayist (d. 1914)
1873 – Adolph Zukor, Hungarian producer (d. 1976)
1875 – Gustav Flatow, German gymnast (d. 1945)
1875 – Thomas Hicks, American runner (d. 1963)
1876 – William Hurlstone, English composer (d. 1906)
1879 – John Bissinger, American gymnast (d. 1941)
1880 – Jerome Steever, American water polo player (d. 1957)
1885 – Edwin Swatek, American backstroke swimmer and water polo player (d. 1966)
1887 – Oskar Luts, Estonian writer and playwright (d. 1953)
1888 – Vera de Bosset, Russian artist, wife of Igor Stravinsky (d. 1982)
1891 – Zora Neale Hurston, African-American writer (d. 1960)
1895 – Hudson Fysh, Australian aviator and co-founder of Qantas (d. 1974)
1895 – Clara Haskil, Romanian pianist (d. 1960)
1896 – Arnold Ridley, British playwright and actor (d. 1984)
1899 – Al Bowlly, British jazz singer (d. 1941)
1899 – Francis Poulenc, French composer (d. 1963)
1900 – John Brownlee, Australian tenor (d. 1969)
1900 – Robert Le Vigan, French actor (d. 1972)
1903 – Alan Napier, English actor (d. 1988)
1906 – Bobbi Trout, American aviator (d. 2003)
1907 – Nicanor Zabaleta, Spanish harpist (d. 1993)
1908 – Red Allen, American musician (d. 1967)
1910 – Orval Faubus, Governor of Arkansas (d. 1994)
1911 – Butterfly McQueen, American actress (d. 1995)
1912 – Charles Addams, American cartoonist (d. 1988)
1912 – Günter Wand, German conductor, composer (d. 2002)
1913 – Johnny Mize, American baseball player (d. 1993)
1916 – Paul Keres, Estonian chess player (d. 1975)
1917 – Ulysses Kay, American composer (d. 1995)
1921 – Chester Kallman, American writer (d. 1975)
1922 – Alvin Dark, American baseball player and manager
1922 – Vincent Gardenia, Italian-born actor (d. 1992)
1922 – Eric Jupp, British-born Australian composer, arranger, conductor (d. 2003)
1922 – Jean-Pierre Rampal, French flutist (d. 2000)
1923 – Hugh Kenner, Canadian literary critic (d. 2003)
1924 – Geoffrey Bayldon, British actor
1924 – Pablo Birger, Argentine racing driver (d. 1966)
1925 – Gerald Durrell, British naturalist (d. 1995)
1926 – Kim Jong-pil, South Korean politician
1928 – William Peter Blatty, American screenwriter
1929 – Robert Juniper, Australian painter and sculptor (d. 2012)
1929 – Terry Moore, American actress
1932 – Joe Berinson, Australian politician
1933 – Elliott Kastner, American film producer (d. 2010)
1934 – Jean Corbeil, Canadian politician (d. 2002)
1934 – Charles Jenkins, American sprinter
1934 – Tassos Papadopoulos, President of Cyprus (d. 2008)
1935 – Kenny Davern, American jazz clarinetist (d. 2006)
1935 – Tommy Johnson, American tubist (d. 2006)
1935 – Valeri Kubasov, Soviet cosmonaut
1935 – Ducky Schofield, American baseball player
1936 – G. Robert Blakey, American attorney
1936 – Ben Cropp, Australian shark hunter and photographer
1938 – Lou Graham, American golfer
1938 – Roland Topor, French illustrator (d. 1997)
1939 – Prince Michael of Greece and Denmark
1941 – Iona Brown, British violinist and conductor (d. 2004)
1941 – Frederick D. Gregory, NASA astronaut
1941 – Manfred Schellscheidt, German American soccer coach
1941 – John E. Walker, English chemist, Nobel Prize laureate
1942 – Vasily Alexeev, Russian weightlifter
1942 – Jim Lefebvre, American baseball player and manager
1942 – Danny Steinmann, American director and screenwriter (d. 2012)
1942 – Danny Williams, South African singer (d. 2005)
1943 – Richard Armstrong, British conductor
1943 – Sadako Sasaki, Japanese child victim of the Hiroshima atomic bomb (d. 1955)
1944 – Arne Scheie, Norwegian sports commentator
1944 – Tony Whitlam, Australian judge
1945 – Tony Conigliaro, American baseball player (d. 1990)
1945 – Gilles Marotte, French Canadian ice hockey player (d. 2005)
1945 – Dick Marty, Swiss politician
1945 – Raila Odinga, Prime Minister of Kenya
1946 – Michael Roizen, American anesthesiologist, internist and author
1946 – Jann Wenner, American publisher
1946 – Mike Wilds, British Formula One racing driver
1947 – Shobha De, Indian writer
1948 – Kenny Loggins, American singer (Loggins and Messina)
1948 – Ichirou Mizuki, Japanese voice actor
1949 – Marshall Chapman, American singer-songwriter
1949 – Anne Schedeen, American actress
1949 – Steven Williams, American actor
1950 – Juan Gabriel, Mexican singer-songwriter
1950 – Erin Gray, American actress
1950 – Ross Grimsley, American baseball player
1950 – Malcolm Macdonald, English footballer
1951 – Helen Worth, British actress
1952 – Sammo Hung, Hong Kong actor
1953 – Morris Titanic, Canadian ice hockey player
1954 – Jodi Long, American actress
1954 – José María Vitier, Cuban composer and pianist
1956 – David Caruso, American actor
1956 – Mike Liut, Canadian ice hockey player
1956 – Uwe Ochsenknecht, German actor and singer
1956 – Kostas Petropoulos, Greek basketball player and coach
1957 – Nicholson Baker, American novelist
1957 – Katie Couric, American television host
1957 – Reena Roy, Indian actress
1957 – Julian Solis, Puerto Rican boxer
1958 – Linda Kozlowski, American actress
1958 – Donna Rice, American sex scandal figure
1959 – Jon Larsen, Norwegian musician and composer
1959 – Kathy Valentine, American musician (The Go-Go's)
1960 – David Marciano, American actor
1960 – Loretta Sanchez, American politician, U.S. Representative from California
1961 – Supriya Pathak, Indian actress
1961 – Andrew Thomson, Australian politician
1961 – John Thune, American politician, junior senator of South Dakota
1962 – Aleksandr Dugin, Russian politician
1962 – Hallie Todd, American actress
1963 – Clint Mansell, English musician and composer (Pop Will Eat Itself)
1963 – Rand Paul, American politician, Junior Senator from Kentucky
1964 – Nicolas Cage, American actor
1966 – Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy, American publicist (d. 1999)
1966 – Corrie Sanders, South African boxer (d. 2012)
1966 – Ehab Tawfik, Egyptian singer
1967 – Nick Clegg, British Liberal Democrat Leader
1967 – Guy Hebert, American ice hockey player
1967 – Mark Lamarr, British comedian and broadcaster
1969 – David Yost, American actor
1970 – Todd Day, American basketball player
1970 – Doug E. Doug, American actor
1970 – Joao Ricardo, Angolan footballer
1971 – C.W. Anderson, American professional wrestler
1971 – Tina Anderson, American comic book writer
1971 – Jeremy Renner, American actor
1972 – Donald Brashear, American ice hockey player
1973 – Baiba Broka, Latvian actress
1973 – Jonna Tervomaa, Finnish singer
1974 – Alenka Bikar, Slovenian athlete
1974 – John Rich, American musician (Big & Rich)
1975 – Tift Merritt, American singer songwriter (The Two Dollar Pistols with Tift Merritt)
1975 – Hossein Derakhshan, Iranian dissident blogger
1976 – Éric Gagné, Canadian baseball player
1976 – Alfonso Soriano, Dominican baseball player
1977 – Michelle Behennah, British model
1977 – Marco Storari, Italian footballer
1977 – Dustin Diamond, American actor
1977 – John Gidding, American architect and TV host
1978 – Jean Charles de Menezes, Brazilian shooting victim (d. 2005)
1978 – Kevin Mench, American baseball player
1978 – Emilio Palma, first person born on the Antarctic continent
1979 – Bipasha Basu, Indian model and actress
1979 – Ricardo Maurício, Brazilian racing driver
1979 – Mariangel Ruiz, Venezuelan actress and model
1980 – Campbell Johnstone, New Zealand rugby player
1980 – Zöe Salmon, Irish television presenter
1981 – Jinxx, American guitarist (Black Veil Brides, The Dreaming, and Amen)
1981 – Alex Auld, Canadian ice hockey player
1981 – Marquis Daniels, American basketball player
1982 – Francisco Rodriguez, Venezuelan baseball player
1982 – Hannah Stockbauer, German swimmer
1982 – Ianina Zanazzi, Argentine racing driver
1983 – Edwin Encarnación, Dominican baseball player
1983 – Natalie Gulbis, American golfer
1983 – Robert Ri'chard, American actor
1983 – Liesbeth Mouha, Belgian beach volleyball player
1984 – Diego Balbinot, Italian footballer
1984 – Jon Lester, American baseball player
1984 – Antonino Saviano, Italian footballer
1985 – Lewis Hamilton, English F1 racing driver
1985 – Wayne Routledge, English footballer
1986 – Grant Leadbitter, English footballer
1987 – Lyndsy Fonseca, American actress
1987 – Stefan Babović, Serbian footballer
1987 – Jimmy Smith, English footballer
1988 – Haley Bennett, American singer and actress
1988 – Scott Pendlebury, Australian rules footballer
1988 – Robert Sheehan, Irish actor
1989 – Emiliano Insúa, Argentine footballer
1990 – Liam Aiken, American actor
1990 – Elene Gedevanishvili, Georgian figure skater
1990 – Camryn Grimes, American actress
1990 – Gregor Schlierenzauer, Austrian ski jumper
1991 – Eden Hazard, Belgian footballer
1991 – Max Morrow, Canadian actor
1997 – Ayumi Ishida, Japanese singer (Morning Musume)

[edit]Deaths

1285 – King Charles I of Naples (b. 1226)
1325 – King Dinis of Portugal (b. 1261)
1400 – Thomas Holland, 1st Duke of Surrey, English politician (b. 1374)
1451 – Count Amadeus VIII of Svoy (b. 1383)
1536 – Catherine of Aragon, consort of Henry VIII of England (b. 1485)
1566 – Louis de Blois, Flemish mystic (b. 1506)
1619 – Nicholas Hilliard, English painter (b. c.1547)
1625 – Ruggiero Giovannelli, Italian composer (b. c.1560)
1655 – Pope Innocent X (b. 1574)
1658 – Theophilus Eaton, American colonist (b. 1590)
1694 – Charles Gerard, 1st Earl of Macclesfield, English general (b. c.1618)
1700 – Raffaello Fabretti, Italian antiquarian (b. 1618)
1715 – François Fénelon, French-Catholic theologian and writer (b. 1651)
1758 – Allan Ramsay, Scottish poet (b. 1686)
1767 – Thomas Clap, 1st president of Yale University (b. 1703)
1770 – Carl Gustaf Tessin, Swedish politician (b. 1695)
1783 – William Tans'ur, English hymnist (b. 1700)
1786 – Jean-Étienne Guettard, French physician and scientist (b. 1715)
1812 – Joseph Dennie, American writer (b. 1768)
1830 – Thomas Lawrence, English painter (b. 1769)
1830 – John Campbell, Australian public servant and politician (b. 1770)
1864 – Caleb Blood Smith, 6th U.S. Secretary of the Interior (b. 1808)
1876 – Juste Olivier, Swiss poet (b. 1807)
1878 – François-Vincent Raspail, French chemist (b. 1794)
1892 – Tewfik Pasha, Khedive of Egypt (b. 1852)
1893 – Jožef Stefan, Slovenian physicist and mathematician (b. 1835)
1904 – Emmanuel Rhoides, Greek writer and journalist (b. 1836)
1913 – Jack Boyle, American baseball player (b. 1866)
1919 – Henry Ware Eliot American industrialist and philanthropist (b. 1843)
1920 – Sir Edmund Barton, 1st Prime Minister of Australia (b. 1849)
1927 – Nikolaos Kalogeropoulos, Greek politician (b. 1851)
1932 – André Maginot, French eponym of the Maginot Line (b. 1877)
1936 – Guy d'Hardelot, French composer, best known for Because (b. 1858)
1943 – Nikola Tesla, Serbian-born inventor and electrical engineer (b. 1856)
1944 – Lou Hoover, U.S. First Lady (b. 1874)
1944 – Napoleon Lapathiotis, Greek poet (b. 1888)
1946 – Adamo Didur, Polish tenor (b. 1874)
1951 – René Guénon, French-Egyptian author (b. 1886)
1953 – Osa Johnson, American explorer (b. 1894)
1960 – Dorothea Douglass Chambers (aka Katharine Lambert Chambers), UK tennis player (b. 1878)
1963 – Arthur Moore, Premier of Queensland (b. 1876)
1964 – Cyril Davies, English musician (b. 1932)
1966 – Allan Chapman, Scottish politician (b. 1897)
1967 – David Goodis, American writer (b. 1917)
1967 – Carl Schuricht, German conductor (b. 1880)
1968 – Prof. James Smith, South African ichthyologist (b. 1897)
1968 – Gholamreza Takhti, Iranian wrestler (b. 1930)
1972 – John Berryman, American poet (b. 1914)
1972 – Eftichia Papagianopoulos, Greek lyricist (b. 1893)
1980 – Larry Williams, American singer and songwriter (b. 1935)
1981 – Alvar Lidell, UK radio broadcaster (b. 1908)
1981 – Eric Robinson, Australian politician (b. 1926)
1984 – Alfred Kastler, French physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1902)
1985 – Mary Hardy, Australian radio and television presenter (b. 1931)
1986 – P. D. Eastman, American children's book writer and illustrator (b. 1909)
1986 – Juan Rulfo, Mexican novelist (b. 1917)
1988 – Michel Auclair, French actor (b. 1922)
1988 – Trevor Howard, English actor (b. 1913)
1989 – Hirohito, Emperor of Japan (b. 1901)
1990 – Bronko Nagurski, American football player (b. 1908)
1990 – Horace Stoneham, American baseball executive (b. 1903)
1992 – Richard Hunt, American puppeteer (The Muppets) (b. 1951)
1995 – Murray Rothbard, American economist (b. 1926)
1996 – Károly Grósz, Hungarian politician (b. 1930)
1996 – Tarō Okamoto, Japanese avant-garde artist (b. 1911)
1998 – Owen Bradley, American record producer (b. 1915)
1998 – Vladimir Prelog, Croatian chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1906)
2000 – Gary Albright, American professional wrestler (b. 1963)
2001 – James Carr, American Rhythm & Blues and soul musician (b. 1942)
2002 – Jon Lee, Welsh musician (Feeder) (b. 1968)
2002 – Avery Schreiber, American actor (b. 1935)
2004 – Ingrid Thulin, Swedish actress (b. 1926)
2005 – Pierre Daninos, French novelist (b. 1913)
2005 – Eileen Desmond, Irish politician (b. 1932)
2006 – Heinrich Harrer, Austrian mountaineer (b. 1912)
2007 – Bobby Hamilton, NASCAR team owner (b. 1957)
2007 – Magnús Magnússon, Icelandic-born television presenter (b. 1929)
2008 – Alwyn Schlebusch, South African vice state president (b. 1917)
2009 – Maria Dimitriadi, Greek singer (b. 1950)
2010 – Willie Mitchell, American soul singer (b. 1928)
2011 – Derek Gardner, British Formula 1 car designer (b. 1931)

[edit]Holidays and observances

Christian Feast Day:
Christmas (Eastern Orthodox Churches and Oriental Orthodox Churches using the Julian Calendar)
Distaff Day (medieval Europe)
Festival of Seven Herbs or Nanakusa no sekku (Japan)
Pioneer's Day (Liberia (controversial))
Synaxis of John the Forerunner & Baptist (Julian Calendar)
Tricolour day or Festa del Tricolore (Italy)
Victory from Genocide Day (Cambodia)

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GET ON THE BANDTWAGON

Tim Blair – Monday, January 07, 2013 (6:33pm)

Are you on the dole? Have you been unemployed for years? Do you struggle to get work because employers demand “experience” and “qualifications”?

What you need is a boss who is sympathetic to the unemployed and wants to help you begin a rewarding career. Apply here.

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SLIPPER SUMMONSED

Tim Blair – Monday, January 07, 2013 (4:32pm)

An announcement from the Australian Federal Police:

The AFP has today (7 January 2013) served the legal representative of Mr Peter Slipper MP with a summons in relation to three offences of Dishonestly Causing a Risk of a Loss to the Commonwealth pursuant to section 135.1(5) Criminal Code Act 1995 (Cth).

Mr Slipper MP has been summonsed to appear in the Canberra Magistrates Court on 15 February 2013.

No comments.

UPDATE. Section 135.1(5) of the Criminal Code Act 1995:

A person is guilty of an offence if:
(a) the person dishonestly causes a loss, or dishonestly causes a risk of loss, to another person; and
(b) the first-mentioned person knows or believes that the loss will occur or that there is a substantial risk of the loss occurring; and
(c) the other person is a Commonwealth entity.

Penalty: Imprisonment for 5 years.

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ABOVE THE PROLES

Tim Blair – Monday, January 07, 2013 (2:40pm)

The Sydney Morning Herald‘s Catherine Armitage recently wondered how Australia might look in 2050. With some help from Phil O’Neill, foundation director of the Urban Research Centre at the University of Western Sydney, Armitage came up with a vision of five-star facilities at the Badgerys Creek aerotropolis, “jewel of Sydney’s west”. But this splendid aerotropolis won’t be available to just any common folk, as Armitage and O’Neill explained:

“Air travel draws together ‘some of the most elite citizens on the planet, highly educated, highly paid, highly mobile people’, he says, especially when flying reverts to a premium-priced luxury in the low-carbon economy.”

In other words, welcome back to the tyranny of distance, when Australians of limited means were unable to afford air travel. Instead, we’ll have an airborne aristocracy insulated by wealth from low-carbon privations. London, Paris and New York will still be open to the elite, but it’s Mildura for the rest of you.

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FULL DISCLOSURE

Tim Blair – Monday, January 07, 2013 (2:15pm)

It’s our money, so we have a right to know:

The ABC could be forced to disclose details of the pay packets of its top broadcasters and producers at programs such as Media Watch, Four Corners and Mornings with Jon Faine after it lost two appeals to block access to the information.

The national broadcaster received $1 billion in government funding in the last financial year and spent $486 million on wages and superannuation.

This could be hilarious. What might Holiday Holmes be earning?

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EARN TOP DOLLARS

Tim Blair – Monday, January 07, 2013 (12:31pm)

Not for the first time, Adam Bandt misses the point. The Greens deputy leader has responded to Families Minister Jenny Macklin’s claim that she can survive on the $35-per-day dole by vowing tolive on that amount for a week.

Bandt will be joined in his quest for headlines by fellow Green Rachel Siewert. ‘’At least by trying to survive for a week, it gives me a feel what people are living day in, day out,” said the empathetic Greens senator.

So we’ll soon have a couple of Greens briefly imitating their broad support base by doing nothing and living on benefits. We might reasonably predict that at the end of their ordeal both will demand an increase in the dole to something approximating a “living wage”.

They’re Greens, so this type of sorrow-mongering, ego-driven pointlessness comes as little surprise. What they should do is to spend a week on the dole as the system is intended. Instead of trying to merely live for a week on $35 per day, they should try to get a job while living on $35 per day.

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BIG GRAB

Tim Blair – Monday, January 07, 2013 (11:40am)

Big Bash League players Shane Warne and Marlon Samuels face charges following this incident(language warning). Background to Warne’s outburst may be found near the end of this clip:

Naturally, some are quick to accuse Warne of racism, which is absurd. The fight may have been idiotic, but it had no racial element. I’ve seen worse confrontations at sub-district level. Meanwhile, a top-edged bouncer from Lasith Malinga leaves Samuels with more serious problems:

Samuels was last night taken to hospital after a later separate incident in which he was struck by a bouncer and suffered what is believed to be a fractured eye socket.

The hearing date is yet to be announced.

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WHERE THE ELITE MEET TO BEAT THE HEAT

Tim Blair – Monday, January 07, 2013 (3:59am)

Ten top locations for avoiding Sydney’s searing summer:

• Establishment 218, 29 O’Riordan Street, Alexandria. This brilliant butcher shop features a walk-through industrial chiller filled with prime cuts of meat – and one or two people who just need a heat break.

• Penrith Ice Palace, 7 Pattys Place, Jamisontown. Just $20 buys an adult session ticket. Be quick getting your skates on, however. The carbon tax is set to push prices higher.

• Kemeny’s Food & Liquor Store,137 Bondi Road, Bondi. The big beer fridge is an arctic delight, with the added bonus of selling beer.

• Event Cinemas, 159-175 Church Street, Parramatta. All cinemas are a good bet when the heat is on, but this mega movie house also offers three gold class sections for added cool.

• Sydney Fish Market, Bank Street, Pyrmont. So much ice! So many oysters! You can’t go wrong.

• Liverpool Catholic Club Sports Complex, 424-458 Hoxton Park Road, Liverpool West. Home base of the Sydney Ice Dogs. Watch in chilly comfort as the Dogs compete in the Australian Ice Hockey League.

• Porsche Centre Sydney South, 470 Gardeners Road, Alexandria. Take a very slow test drive in a Porsche 911, reputed to have the best air conditioning (including ventilated seats) of any modern car.

• Snowglobes.com.au. Sells Australia’s largest range of snowglobes. Feel your temperature drop as you scroll down each globe-filled page.

• Mr Iceman, 37-47 Borec Road, Penrith. Supplies industrial quantities of ice and dry ice throughout Sydney. Drop in and buy a 6kg block.

• The United States, western hemisphere. Nearly 70 per cent of the US was covered by snow on January 1. It’s an expensive option, but currently guarantees impressive heat relief.

UPDATE. Another option:

Temperatures in China have plunged to their lowest in almost three decades, cold enough to freeze coastal waters and trap 1,000 ships in ice, official media said at the weekend.

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LIVES SAVED

Tim Blair – Monday, January 07, 2013 (3:26am)

Georgia’s Donnie Herman: “My wife is a hero. She protected her kids. She did what she was supposed to do as [a] responsible, prepared gun owner. Her life is saved, and her kids’ life is saved, and that’s all I’d like to say.” Meanwhile, the gun debate has lost some heat.

UPDATE. Meanwhile, in gun-controlled Sydney:

A gang of young thieves have attacked people in their beds with machetes during a string of violent home invasions in Sydney’s west, leaving some with horrific and disfiguring injuries.

Police say the group, believed to be aged in their teens and early 20s, could also be involved in a number of armed robberies on businesses in the area.

They are hunting for up to six youths who stormed six different homes in Auburn between September and November last year.

The young offenders stole only mobile phones, laptops and cash.

Six people were injured, one in each robbery, including a man who was left missing a large chunk of his forehead after being hit with an axe.

Another man suffered horrific injuries to his face and skull after being attacked with a machete.

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UNIVERSAL TRUTH

Tim Blair – Monday, January 07, 2013 (3:13am)

Further on Jon Henley’s Guardian piece defending paedophilia:

The problem was less with content than with tone. Henley tried to bring “objectivity” to an issue – the potential or literal abuse of children – about which there is no reason to be objective …

Not only has a space been open for debate about something that hardly needs debating, but it’s also injected the misleading discourse of “reason” vs “hysteria” in to it. The constant call for “reason” can become a way of blinding us to certainly universal truths that don’t require reason to resonate.

Quite so.

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