Sunday, January 06, 2013

Sun 6th Jan Todays News

Happy birthday and many happy returns Carol P. Grilletto. Born on the same day as Harold Godwinson was crowned king of England in 1066. The last Saxon king. But not followed by Norman I. Remember, birthdays are good for you. The more you have, the longer you live.

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Fresco of Stephen Dečanski (Stephen Uroš III)

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Events

[edit]Births

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[edit]Holidays and observances


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Gillard’s offshore solution

Piers Akerman – Sunday, January 06, 2013 (12:12am)

DON’T look now, mum, but Labor is outsourcing the government. Just as Aussie jobs have been sent offshore, the Gillard Labor-Green-independent minority government has abdicated its decision-making responsibilities and is letting foreign green activists dictate policy.
Don’t call Canberra to speak to our policy-makers, dial 1-800-GREENMAIL instead and speak to the offshore extremists who really wield the power.
What started as a racket under the Hawke government when it passed World Heritage legislation in 1983 to enable it to hide behind a UN convention to block the building of Tasmania’s proposed Franklin dam is now a full-on enterprise.
The drive for Labor’s new nation-encircling marine reserves came from offshore, and so too have guidelines for anti-forestry legislation. The cattle industry is next in line.
Labor’s relentless drive to capture the green vote has seen it ignore local industry figures and embrace foreign pressure groups. Queensland Nationals Senator Ron Boswell, one of the few who have been blowing the whistle on the situation, has identified what he calls “big environment” (as opposed to “big business") as the source of much of the Gillard government’s new laws.
In a hard-hitting speech in November, Boswell slammed the environmental non-government organisations (ENGOs) and the government which has bent over backward to accommodate them.
Under its new Illegal Logging Prohibition Bill, the Labor minority government is permitting the radical green groups, including Greenpeace, the Wilderness Society, the Australian Conservation Foundation, Friends of the Earth, and World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and other environmental non-government organisations to determine the regulations governing imported timber products.
As Boswell said: “We see ENGO ‘sustainability certification’ bodies established or projected in a number of primary production areas for example, forestry, fishing, and now beef, and others.”
These bodies will be made up of green-friendly groups and, says Boswell, “raise issues of fundamental importance about how Australia will be governed in future certainly about how food, fibre and timber products will be harvested”.
“The growth of these certification bodies highlights an apparent abdication of responsibility by the current federal government for making important decisions about primary production,” he said.
“I believe it also represents a direct attack on science and the role of scientists in decision-making in primary production and other areas. It also belittles the role of experienced resource managers and potentially sidelines them.”
Forget the cuddly koala-suited image of these activist groups’ street collectors. Boswell says the new laws governing forestry and fisheries demonstrate the growing power of ENGOs, especially their financial power and their ability to exert influence over government decisions.
“We are all familiar with references to ‘big business’ as a general term for wealthy and influential business organisations. Now, in Australia, we are seeing the rise of ‘big environment’ : a large, wealthy network of environmental activists,” he said.
In 2009, The Canberra Times calculated that Australia’s four largest environmental groups had spent a total of $70 million that year, much of it for political lobbying.
“Under this Labor government, we have seen ‘big environment’ grow more and more powerful and influential to the point where environmental activists now seem to be orchestrating much of Labor’s policy on primary industries and natural resources,” Boswell said.
Green groups have demanded that forestry importers must get their certification through the group they control Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) and not the alternate body the Australian Forestry Standard Limited (AFS).
And, even though the AFS says it covers by far the majority of certified forests in Australia (more than 10 million hectares, certified under Australian Standard 4707: The Australian Standard for Sustainable Forest Management), businesses throughout the supply chain, from loggers right through to the final end-user, are already under pressure to use only the expensive services of the green-dominated FSC-certified timber.
Those that do not bow to the government-endorsed activists demands are targeted for greenmail.
One company, Ta Ann Tasmania, which uses timber sourced from regrowth and plantation timber harvested by others for woodchips, has been attacked by environmental activists, who have been contacting its customers and prejudicing jobs in the state with an unemployment rate about 2 per cent higher than the national average.
Before the London Olympics, a protest group called Markets for Change flew to London and convinced a local company buying plywood for a basketball court not to use Ta Ann product they had previously agreed to purchase.
A spokesman for the London contractor said: “The reason we’ve stopped or we’ve suspended purchasing from Ta Ann is mainly because of the controversy around the logging in Tasmanian forestry. The NGOs will have to be happy with any changes that they can make to enable the product to be purchased by us again.”
Customers for Ta Ann flooring products in Japan have been lobbied as well as the Harvey Norman chain.
“Harvey Norman is selling furniture made from sustainable Tasmanian timber but that’s not good enough for Markets for Change,” Senator Boswell said.
“Markets for Change website tells businesses, like Ta Ann and Harvey Norman, what they should do: ‘Give preference to plantation products with full Forest Stewardship Council certification.’ So, there we are: trying to force producers and buyers into using the Forest Stewardship Council,” he said.
The aims of the green activist ENGOs go far, far beyond just timber, the senator warns.
The WWF has been behind the organisation of the Forest Stewardship Council for timber products, the Marine Stewardship Council for wild-caught seafood, the Aquaculture Stewardship Council for farmed fish and now a so-called round table for beef production.
“Last year, WWF International stated it was focusing on commodities, including beef, bio-energy, cotton, dairy, farmed fish, palm oil, pulp and paper, soy, sugar cane, timber and wild-caught fish,” Senator Boswell said.
“It is by no means far-fetched to say that WWF and other ENGOs fully intend that all food and fibre products harvested in Australia will be forced to go through one of its cash-producing ‘sustainability certification’ schemes.”
Australia’s agricultural, forestry and fisheries industries have a gross value of production of some $50 billion. The green extremists aim to earn money from these industries or close them and Labor is doing nothing to stop these new multinationals destroying Australian jobs and the Australian economy.

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DRIVER UNKNOWN

Tim Blair – Sunday, January 06, 2013 (11:16am)

Someone is being nordy
Prime Minister Julia Gillard’s taxpayer-subsidised private car has been pinged eight times in six months for traffic offences – but her office is refusing to reveal who was behind the wheel at those times. 
Suspicion falls on an obvious target: 
Two years ago, Ms Gillard’s private-plated, taxpayer-funded car was snapped twice in six months by police. Ms Gillard said at the time that her partner Tim Mathieson had accepted responsibility for the infringements, which included speeding and going through a red light. 
Is the First Bloke a serial scofflaw? Perhaps not. Many others also have access to the Prime Ministerial vehicle. You decide: (poll at link)

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Actually Dennis, you were wrong. People did not fear and loathe you because they misunderstood you. They feared and loathed you because they understood you. - ed
Dennis Ferguson's last words: 'This will show them'===

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Team 9 lives
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Actually, it does mean that. But that is ok. - ed
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Mr. Cricket is unbeaten in his final innings as Australia complete a whitewash against his favourite opponent. Does it get better than that? Adios champ! http://es.pn/UOmgKU
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But Mr Abbott replied: "Well that's just bullshit. I believe it should be safe, legal and rare.">

Abbott was staffer's IVF confidant===

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