Happy birthday and many happy returns Tad Kaypek andThai Luong. Born on the same day, across the years. Remember, it is good to have a lot of birthdays. Healthy. For some reason, those without many, die young. My advice .. have another next year.
===
Today’s carbon tax day - a black one indeed for us all
Piers Akerman – Sunday, February 24, 2013 (12:56am)
TODAY, February 24, marks the second anniversary of Prime Minister Julia Gillard’s biggest public catastrophe - the announcement of her iniquitous carbon dioxide tax.
===
February 24: Purim ends at sundown (Judaism, 2013); Independence Day inEstonia (1918); Flag Day in Mexico; National Artist Day in Thailand
- 1711 – George Frideric Handel's Rinaldo, the first Italian language opera written specifically for the London stage, premiered.
- 1803 – The U.S. Supreme Court, in Marbury v. Madison, declared an act of Congress unconstitutional for the first time, forming the basis of judicial review in the U.S.
- 1868 – Andrew Johnson (pictured) became the first U.S. Presidentto be impeached.
- 1944 – World War II: The United States Army long-range penetration special operations unit known as Merrill's Marauders began a 1000-mile (1600 km) march over the Patkai region of the Himalayas and into the Burmese jungle behind Japanese lines.
- 2006 – Philippine President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo declared a state of emergency in an attempt to subdue a possible military coup.
===
Events
- 303 – Galerius publishes his edict that begins the persecution of Christians in his portion of the Roman Empire.
- 484 – King Huneric removes the Christian bishops from their offices and banished some to Corsica. A few are martyred, including former proconsul Victorian along with Frumentius and other merchants. They are killed at Hadrumetum after refusing to become Arians.
- 1303 – Battle of Roslin, of the First War of Scottish Independence.
- 1387 – King Charles III of Naples and Hungary is assassinated at Buda.
- 1525 – Spanish-Imperial army defeat French army at Battle of Pavia.
- 1538 – Treaty of Nagyvarad between Ferdinand I and John Zápolya.
- 1582 – Pope Gregory XIII announces the Gregorian calendar.
- 1607 – L'Orfeo by Claudio Monteverdi, one of the first works recognized as an opera, receives its première performance.
- 1711 – The London première of Rinaldo by George Frideric Handel, the first Italian opera written for the London stage.
- 1803 – In Marbury v. Madison, the Supreme Court of the United States establishes the principle of judicial review.
- 1809 – London's Drury Lane Theatre burns to the ground, leaving owner Richard Brinsley Sheridan destitute.
- 1822 – The 1st Swaminarayan temple in the world, Shri Swaminarayan Mandir, Ahmedabad, is inaugurated.
- 1826 – The signing of the Treaty of Yandaboo marks the end of the First Burmese War.
- 1831 – The Treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek, the first removal treaty in accordance with the Indian Removal Act, is proclaimed. The Choctaws in Mississippi cede land east of the river in exchange for payment and land in the West.
- 1848 – King Louis-Philippe of France abdicates the throne.
- 1863 – Arizona is organized as a United States territory.
- 1868 – Andrew Johnson becomes the first President of the United States to be impeached by the United States House of Representatives. He is later acquitted in the Senate.
- 1875 – The SS Gothenburg hits the Great Barrier Reef and sinks off the Australian east coast, killing approximately 100, including a number of high profile civil servants and dignitaries.
- 1881 – China and Russia sign the Sino-Russian Ili Treaty.
- 1895 – Revolution breaks out in Baire, a town near Santiago de Cuba, beginning the second war for Cuban independence, that ends with the Spanish-American War in 1898.
- 1917 – World War I: The U.S. ambassador to the United Kingdom is given the Zimmermann Telegram, in which Germany pledges to ensure the return of New Mexico, Texas, and Arizona toMexico if Mexico declares war on the United States.
- 1918 – Estonian Declaration of Independence.
- 1920 – The Nazi Party is founded.
- 1942 – The Battle of Los Angeles, one of the largest documented UFO sightings in history; the event lasted into the early hours of February 25, 1942.
- 1942 – An order-in-council passed under the Defence of Canada Regulations of the War Measures Act gives the Canadian federal government the power to intern all "persons of Japanese racial origin".
- 1944 – Merrill's Marauders: The Marauders begin their 1,000 mile journey through Japanese occupied Burma.
- 1945 – Egyptian Premier Ahmed Maher Pasha is killed in Parliament after reading a decree.
- 1968 – Vietnam War: The Tet Offensive is halted; South Vietnam recaptures Hué.
- 1971 – The All India Forward Bloc holds an emergency central committee meeting after its chairman, Hemantha Kumar Bose, is killed 3 days earlier. P.K. Mookiah Thevar is appointed as the new chairman.
- 1976 – Cuba: national Constitution is proclaimed.
- 1980 – The United States Olympic Hockey team completes their Miracle on Ice by defeating Finland 4-2 to win the gold medal.
- 1981 – An earthquake registering 6.7 on the Richter scale hits Athens, killing 16 people and destroying buildings in several towns west of the city.
- 1983 – A special commission of the U.S. Congress releases a report that condemns the practice of Japanese internment during World War II.
- 1989 – Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini offers a US$3 million bounty for the death of The Satanic Verses author Salman Rushdie.
- 1989 – United Airlines Flight 811, bound for New Zealand from Honolulu, Hawaii, rips open during flight, blowing 9 passengers out of the business-class section.
- 1996 – The last occurrence of February 24 as a leap day in the European Union and for the Roman Catholic Church.
- 1999 – The State of Arizona executes Karl LaGrand, a German national convicted of murder during a botched bank robbery, in spite of Germany's legal action to attempt to save him.
- 1999 – A China Southern Airlines Tupolev TU-154 airliner crashes on approach to Wenzhou airport in eastern the People's Republic of China, killing 61.
- 2006 – Philippine President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo declares Proclamation 1017 placing the country in a state of emergency in attempt to subdue a possible military coup.
- 2007 – Japan launches its fourth spy satellite, stepping up its ability to monitor potential threats such as North Korea.
- 2008 – Fidel Castro retires as the President of Cuba after nearly fifty years.
- 2010 – Sachin Tendulkar becomes the first Cricket player to score a Double hundred in One Day International format.
- 2011 – Final Launch of Space Shuttle Discovery (OV-103).
[edit]Births
- 1103 – Emperor Toba of Japan (d. 1156)
- 1304 – Ibn Battuta, Arabian explorer (d. c.1368)
- 1463 – Giovanni Pico della Mirandola, Italian humanist (d. 1494)
- 1500 – Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor (d. 1558)
- 1545 – Don John of Austria, Spanish military leader (d. 1578)
- 1557 – Matthias, Holy Roman Emperor (d. 1619)
- 1595 – Maciej Kazimierz Sarbiewski, Polish author and Latin Poet (d. 1640)
- 1597 – Vincent Voiture, French poet (d. 1648)
- 1619 – Charles Le Brun, French artist (d. 1690)
- 1622 – Johannes Clauberg, German theologian and philosopher (d. 1665)
- 1684 – Matthias Braun, Czech sculptor (d. 1738)
- 1693 – James Quin, English actor (d. 1766)
- 1709 – Jacques de Vaucanson, French inventor (d. 1782)
- 1723 – John Burgoyne, British general (d. 1792)
- 1767 – Buddha Loetla Nabhalai, King of Siam (d. 1824)
- 1774 – Prince Adolphus, 1st Duke of Cambridge (d. 1850)
- 1786 – Martin W. Bates. U.S. Senator from Delaware (d. 1869)
- 1786 – Wilhelm Grimm, German philologist and folklorist (d. 1859)
- 1810 – Matías Ramos Mejía, Argentine colonel (d. 1885)
- 1831 – Leo von Caprivi, Chancellor of Germany (d. 1899)
- 1836 – Winslow Homer, American artist (d. 1910)
- 1842 – Arrigo Boito, Italian composer (d. 1918)
- 1846 – Luigi Denza, Italian composer (d. 1922)
- 1848 – Andrew Inglis Clark, Tasmanian politician (d. 1907)
- 1852 – George A. Moore, Irish writer (d. 1933)
- 1866 – Pyotr Nikolaevich Lebedev, Russian physicist (d. 1912)
- 1866 – Hubert Van Innis, Belgian archer (d. 1961)
- 1868 – Édouard Alphonse James de Rothschild, French financier and polo player (d. 1949)
- 1872 – John Arthur Jarvis, British swimmer (d. 1933)
- 1872 – Gustave Sandras, French gymnast (d. 1951)
- 1874 – Honus Wagner, American baseball player (d. 1955)
- 1877 – Rudolph Ganz, Swiss pianist, conductor and composer (d. 1972)
- 1877 – Ettie Rout, New Zealand activist (d. 1936)
- 1885 – Charles Daniels, American swimmer (d. 1973)
- 1885 – Chester Nimitz, U.S. admiral (d. 1966)
- 1885 – Stanisław Ignacy Witkiewicz, Polish writer and painter (d. 1939)
- 1890 – Marjorie Main, American actress (d. 1975)
- 1896 – Richard Thorpe, American film director (d. 1991)
- 1898 – Kurt Tank, German aeronautical engineer and test pilot (d. 1983)
- 1903 – Vladimir Bartol, Slovene writer (d. 1967)
- 1908 – Telford Taylor, American lawyer (Nuremberg Trials) (d. 1998)
- 1909 – August Derleth, American writer (d. 1971)
- 1909 – Riccardo Freda, Italian film director (d. 1999)
- 1911 – Eduardo Vañó Pastor, Spanish cartoonist (d. 1993)
- 1912 – Jiří Trnka, Czech puppet maker, illustrator, motion-picture animator and film director (d. 1969)
- 1914 – Ralph Erskine, British architect (Byker Wall) (d. 2005)
- 1914 – Weldon Kees, American poet, musician, painter (d. 1955)
- 1914 – Zachary Scott, American actor (d. 1965)
- 1919 – Árpád Bogsch, Hungarian turned American international civil servant (d. 2004)
- 1919 – Betty Marsden, English comedy actress (d. 1998)
- 1920 – Ernst Reiss, Swiss mountaineer (d. 2010)
- 1921 – Gaston Reiff, Belgian athlete (d. 1992)
- 1921 – Abe Vigoda, American actor
- 1921 – Douglass Watson, American actor (d. 1989)
- 1922 – Richard Hamilton, English painter (d. 2011)
- 1922 – Steven Hill, American actor
- 1923 – David Soyer, American cellist (d. 2010)
- 1924 – Erik Nielsen, Canadian politician (d. 2008)
- 1926 – Jean Alexander, English actress
- 1926 – John Gunther Dean, American diplomat
- 1926 – Balys Gajauskas, Lithuanian politician
- 1927 – Emmanuelle Riva, French actress
- 1928 – Barbara Lawrence, American actress
- 1931 – Dominic Chianese, American actor
- 1932 – Michel Legrand, French composer
- 1932 – John Vernon, Canadian actor (d. 2005)
- 1933 – Judah Folkman, American cancer researcher (d. 2008)
- 1933 – David "Fathead" Newman, American jazz saxophonist (d. 2009)
- 1934 – Bettino Craxi, Prime Minister of Italy (d. 2000)
- 1934 – Linda Cristal, Argentina-born actress
- 1934 – Renata Scotto, Italian soprano
- 1938 – James Farentino, American actor (d. 2012)
- 1938 – Phil Knight, American sportswear manufacturer
- 1938 – Kathleen Margaret Richardson, Baroness Richardson of Calow, British Baroness and Methodist reverend
- 1939 – Joy Mukherjee, Indian actor and director (d. 2012)
- 1940 – Pete Duel, American actor (d. 1971)
- 1940 – Denis Law, Scottish footballer
- 1941 – Joanie Sommers, American singer and actress
- 1942 – Colin Bond, Australian racing driver
- 1942 – Paul Jones, English singer (Manfred Mann and The Manfreds)
- 1942 – Joe Lieberman, American politician
- 1943 – Kent Haruf, American novelist
- 1943 – Pablo Milanés, Cuban singer-songwriter and guitarist
- 1943 – Hristo Prodanov, Bulgarian mountaineer (d. 1984)
- 1943 – Terry Semel, American business executive
- 1944 – Nicky Hopkins, British musician (d. 1994)
- 1945 – Barry Bostwick, American actor
- 1946 – Grigory Margulis, Russian mathematician
- 1946 – John Stapleton, English television presenter
- 1947 – Mike Fratello, American basketball head coach
- 1947 – Rupert Holmes, English singer-songwriter and composer
- 1947 – Edward James Olmos, American actor
- 1948 – J. Jayalalithaa, Indian actress and politician
- 1948 – François Lacombe, Canadian ice hockey player
- 1948 – Walter Smith, Scottish football manager
- 1948 – Tim Staffell, English singer (Smile)
- 1948 – Dennis Waterman, British actor
- 1950 – George Thorogood, American singer and guitarist
- 1950 – Steve McCurry, American photojournalist
- 1951 – Tony Holiday, German singer (d. 1990)
- 1951 – Debra Jo Rupp, American actress
- 1951 – Helen Shaver, Canadian actress
- 1954 – Ann Bell, American Teacher, Entrepreneur and Children's Book Author
- 1954 – Plastic Bertrand, Belgian singer and songwriter
- 1954 – Sid Meier, Canadian-American game designer and programmer, known for his work with Civilization series
- 1955 – Steve Jobs, American computer pioneer (d. 2011)
- 1955 – Eddie L. Johnson, retired American professional basketball player and sex offender
- 1955 – Alain Prost, French race car driver, a four-time World Formula One Drivers' Champion (1985; 1986; 1989 & 1993)
- 1956 – Judith Butler, American philosopher
- 1956 – Eddie Murray, American baseball player
- 1956 – Peter Pagel, German footballer (d. 2010)
- 1956 – Paula Zahn, American journalist
- 1958 – Sammy Kershaw, American musician
- 1958 – Mark Moses, American actor
- 1959 – Beth Broderick, American actress
- 1959 – Owen Gleiberman, American film critic
- 1960 – Nick Esasky, American baseball player
- 1962 – Outi Mäenpää, Finnish actress
- 1962 – Michelle Shocked, American musician
- 1962 – Teri Weigel, American pornographic actress
- 1963 – Line Beauchamp, Canadian politician
- 1963 – Prince Carlo, Duke of Castro
- 1963 – Dirk Greiser, German footballer
- 1963 – Mike Vernon, Canadian ice hockey player
- 1964 – Andy Crane, British children's television presenter
- 1964 – Todd Field, American actor and film director
- 1964 – Russell Ingall, Australian racing driver
- 1965 – Kristin Davis, American actress
- 1965 – Lloyd McGrath, former English footballer
- 1965 – Jane Swift, American politician
- 1966 – René Arocha, Cuban baseball player
- 1966 – Ben Miller, English comedian, director and actor
- 1966 – Billy Zane, American actor
- 1967 – Brian Schmidt, Australian astrophysicist, Nobel Laureate
- 1968 – Mitch Hedberg, American comedian (d. 2005)
- 1970 – Jeff Garcia, American football player
- 1970 – Kienast quintuplets, American quintuplets
- 1970 – Jonathan Ward, American television and movie actor
- 1971 – Josh Bernstein, American explorer and television host
- 1971 – Thomas Franck, German footballer
- 1971 – Pedro de la Rosa, Spanish Formula One driver
- 1971 – Brian Savage, Canadian ice hockey player
- 1972 – Manon Rhéaume, Canadian ice hockey player
- 1973 – Richard Clapp, Canadian baseball player
- 1973 – Chris Fehn, American percussionist (Slipknot and Will Haven)
- 1973 – Yordan Yovchev, Bulgarian gymnast
- 1973 – Alexei Kovalev, Russian ice hockey player
- 1973 – Christína Papadáki, Greek tennis player
- 1974 – Chad Hugo, American musician (N*E*R*D) and producer (The Neptunes)
- 1974 – Mike Lowell, Puerto Rican baseball player
- 1974 – Bonnie Somerville, American actress and singer
- 1975 – Maurizio Giuliano, writer and traveller
- 1975 – Ashley MacIsaac, Canadian fiddler
- 1976 – Marco Campos, Brazilian racing driver (d. 1995)
- 1976 – Crista Flanagan, American comedian
- 1976 – Eric Griffin, American rock guitarist (Murderdolls and Wednesday 13)
- 1976 – Zach Johnson, American golfer
- 1976 – Bradley McGee, Australian cyclist
- 1976 – Matt Skiba, American musician (Alkaline Trio and Heavens)
- 1976 – Alistair Brownlie, Australian Man of Many Talents
- 1977 – Jason Akermanis, Australian footballer
- 1977 – Bronson Arroyo, American baseball player
- 1977 – Jay Kenneth Johnson, American actor
- 1977 – Floyd Mayweather Jr, American boxer
- 1978 – John Nolan, American musician (Straylight Run and Taking Back Sunday)
- 1978 – Shinya, Japanese musician (Dir en grey)
- 1978 – DeWayne Wise, American baseball player
- 1979 – Jesse Billauer, American surfer
- 1979 – Claire Cooper, English actress
- 1979 – Vitor Ribeiro, Brazilian mixed martial artist
- 1980 – Anton Maiden, Swedish Internet celebrity (d. 2003)
- 1980 – Shinsuke Nakamura, Japanese professional wrestler
- 1980 – Roman Sloudnov, Russian swimmer
- 1981 – Lleyton Hewitt, Australian tennis player
- 1981 – Mauro Rosales, Argentinian footballer
- 1981 – Mohammad Sami, Pakistani cricketer
- 1982 – Nick Blackburn, American baseball player
- 1982 – Fala Chen, Chinese-American actress and beauty pageant titleholder
- 1982 – Kevin O'Neill, New Zealand rugby player
- 1982 – Emanuel Villa, Argentine footballer
- 1982 – Klára Zakopalová, Czech tennis player
- 1983 – Matt McGinley, American musician (Gym Class Heroes and Kill The Front Man)
- 1984 – Sterling James Keenan, American professional wrestler
- 1984 – Clivio Piccione, Monegasque racing driver
- 1984 – Pieter Dirkx, Belgian film director
- 1985 – Britney Stevens, American pornographic actress
- 1986 – Wojtek Wolski, Polish/Canadian ice hockey player
- 1987 – Mayuko Iwasa, Japanese entertainer and model
- 1987 – Kim Kyu Jong, Korean singer (SS501)
- 1987 – Chieko Kawabe, Japanese singer, model and actress
- 1988 – Emma Hayman, New Zealand tennis player
- 1989 – Trace Cyrus, American musician (Metro Station)
- 1989 – Gabriella Fox, American pornographic actress
- 1989 – Kosta Koufos, American basketball player
- 1990 – Stefan Müller, German footballer
- 1991 – Madison Hubbell, American ice dancer
- 1994 – Earl Sweatshirt, American rapper part of the collective (OFWGKTA)
[edit]Deaths
- 616 – King Ethelbert of Kent
- 1386 – King Charles III of Naples (b. 1345)
- 1525 – Guillaume Gouffier, seigneur de Bonnivet, French soldier
- 1563 – Francis, Duke of Guise, French soldier and politician (b. 1519)
- 1588 – Johann Weyer, Dutch physician and occultist
- 1666 – Nicholas Lanier, English composer (b. 1588)
- 1674 – Matthias Weckmann, German composer (b. 1616)
- 1685 – Charles Howard, 1st Earl of Carlisle, English politician and military leader (b. 1629)
- 1704 – Marc-Antoine Charpentier, French composer (b. 1643)
- 1714 – Edmund Andros, English governor in North America (b. 1637)
- 1721 – John Sheffield, 1st Duke of Buckingham and Normanby, English statesman and poet (b. 1648)
- 1732 – Colonel Francis Charteris, known as "The Rape-Master General". (b. 1675)
- 1777 – King Joseph I of Portugal (b. 1714)
- 1779 – Paul Daniel Longolius, German encyclopedist (b. 1704)
- 1781 – Edward Capell, English critic (b. 1713)
- 1799 – Georg Christoph Lichtenberg, German physicist (b. 1742)
- 1810 – Henry Cavendish, English scientist (b. 1731)
- 1812 – Étienne-Louis Malus, French physicist and mathematician (b. 1775)
- 1815 – Robert Fulton, American inventor (b. 1765)
- 1824 – Sir Albemarle Bertie, 1st Baronet, Royal Navy admiral (b. 1755)
- 1825 – Thomas Bowdler, English physician and editor (b. 1754)
- 1856 – Nikolai Ivanovich Lobachevsky, Russian mathematician (b. 1792)
- 1876 – Joseph Jenkins Roberts, 1st President of Liberia (b. 1809)
- 1879 – Shiranui Kōemon, Japanese sumo wrestler, the 11th Yokozuna (b. 1825)
- 1914 – Eugène Balme, French shooter (b. 1874)
- 1914 – Joshua Chamberlain, Civil War hero for the Union on Little Round Top at the Battle of Gettysburg (b. 1828)
- 1925 – Hjalmar Branting, Prime Minister of Sweden, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (b. 1860)
- 1927 – Sir Edward Marshall Hall, English barrister (b. 1858)
- 1927 – Frank MacKey, American polo player (b. 1852)
- 1929 – André Messager, French composer and conductor (b. 1853)
- 1953 – Gerd von Rundstedt, German field marshal (b. 1875)
- 1970 – Conrad Nagel, American actor (b. 1897)
- 1975 – Nikolai Bulganin, Premier of the Soviet Union (b. 1895)
- 1982 – Virginia Bruce, American actress and singer (b. 1910)
- 1984 – Helmut Schelsky, German sociologist (b. 1912)
- 1986 – Tommy Douglas, Canadian politician (b. 1904)
- 1987 – Jim Connors, American radio personality (b. 1940)
- 1989 – Sparky Adams, American baseball player (b. 1894)
- 1990 – Tony Conigliaro, American baseball player (b. 1945)
- 1990 – Malcolm Forbes, American publisher (b. 1917)
- 1990 – Sandro Pertini, Italian politician (b. 1896)
- 1990 – Johnnie Ray, American singer (b. 1927)
- 1991 – John Charles Daly, American news broadcaster and game show host (b. 1914)
- 1991 – George Gobel, American comedian (b. 1919)
- 1991 – Webb Pierce, American music singer (b. 1921)
- 1993 – Danny Gallivan, Canadian radio and television sportscaster (b. 1917)
- 1993 – Bobby Moore, English footballer (b. 1941)
- 1994 – Jean Sablon, French singer (b. 1906)
- 1994 – Dinah Shore, American actress and singer (b. 1916)
- 1998 – Clara Fraser, American feminist and activist (b. 1923)
- 1998 – Antonio Prohías, Cuban-born cartoonist (b. 1921)
- 1998 – Henny Youngman, English-born American comedian (b. 1906)
- 1999 – Andre Dubus, American writer (b. 1936)
- 1999 – David Eccles, 1st Viscount Eccles, British politician and peer (b. 1904)
- 1999 – Frank Leslie Walcott, Barbadian labour leader (b. 1916)
- 2001 – Theodore Marier, KCSG, American composer, founder of the Boston Archdiocesan Choir School (b. 1912)
- 2001 – Claude E. Shannon, American information theorist (b. 1916)
- 2002 – Arthur Lyman, American jazz vibraphone and marimba player (b. 1932)
- 2002 – Leo Ornstein, Russian-born composer and pianist (b. 1912)
- 2003 – John Edward Christopher Hill, English historian (b. 1912)
- 2003 – Bernard Loiseau, French chef (b. 1951)
- 2004 – John Randolph, American actor (b. 1915)
- 2005 – Dan McIvor, Canadian aviation pioneer (b. 1911)
- 2006 – Octavia Butler, American author and MacArthur Foundation Fellow (b. 1947)
- 2006 – Don Knotts, American actor (b. 1924)
- 2006 – John Martin, Canadian broadcaster (b. 1947)
- 2006 – Denis Twitchett, Cambridge scholar, and Chinese historian (b. 1925)
- 2006 – Dennis Weaver, American actor (b. 1924)
- 2007 – Bruce Bennett, American actor (b. 1906)
- 2007 – Leroy Jenkins, American composer and violinist (b. 1932)
- 2007 – Lamar Lundy, American football player (b. 1935)
- 2007 – Damien Nash, American football player (b. 1982)
- 2008 – Larry Norman, American musician, singer, songwriter and producer (b. 1947)
- 2009 – C. R. Johnson, American freestyle skier (b. 1983)
- 2011 – Anant Pai, Indian educationalist and creator of comics (b. 1929)
- 2012 – Jan Berenstain, author of The Berenstain Bears, a children's book series with about 260 million copies of about 300 titles (b. 1923)
[edit]Holidays and observances
- Christian Feast Day:
- Dragobete (Romania)
- Flag Day (Mexico)
- Independence Day, celebrates the independence of Estonia from Russian Empire in 1918; the Soviet period is considered illegal annexation.
- National Artist Day (Thailand)
- Regifugium (Ancient Rome)
===
Off to the high dungeon with union mates
Miranda Devine – Sunday, February 24, 2013 (11:40am)
IS there a more preposterous figure in Australian political life than Paul Howes?
His performance at the Australian Workers Union conference on the Gold Coast last week was quite something to behold.
In his final triumphant speech, the 31-year-old AWU leader accused anonymous Labor MPS of “underminding [sic] our Prime Minister, underminding [sic] the leadership of our movement and this country. What a bunch of gutless pr*cks they are.”
Apart from the fruity language, he has coined a new word: “underminding”. He said it twice, just in case you didn’t get it the first time.
Maybe it means not minding too much when the prime minister goofs up, as long as she takes care of her union mates.
If he meant “undermining”, however, Howes and his AWU masters have done a pretty good job of that all by themselves, taking credit for unseating the democratically elected Labor Prime Minister Kevin Rudd in the first place, and unashamedly displaying an unhealthy proprietorial claim over their hand-picked replacement Julia Gillard, who just happens to be caught up in an AWU scandal from her days as a union lawyer.
Howes looked so pleased with himself as he ushered Gillard into the conference dinner, in front of the cameras, as if she were a trophy.
He “had her back” he declared, and supports her 110 percent. Just what she needs, especially when union membership has sunk to 18 percent of the workforce.
The union collectively rubbed its hands with glee. Look how powerful we are, right at the heart of power! There was Howes’ mentor Bill Ludwig out from the shadows to grab the PM’s manicured hand in his gnarled paw and hold it aloft.
What an image. The Prime Minister paraded by Howes and Ludwig as if she were a wholly owned subsidiary of the AWU, in the week that polls show Labor’s primary vote has collapsed.
With friends like Howes who needs an Opposition?
It’s not hyper-bowl to say that if anyone appears to be “underminding” Labor it’s Howes and his beloved moo-ment.
His performance at the Australian Workers Union conference on the Gold Coast last week was quite something to behold.
In his final triumphant speech, the 31-year-old AWU leader accused anonymous Labor MPS of “underminding [sic] our Prime Minister, underminding [sic] the leadership of our movement and this country. What a bunch of gutless pr*cks they are.”
Apart from the fruity language, he has coined a new word: “underminding”. He said it twice, just in case you didn’t get it the first time.
Maybe it means not minding too much when the prime minister goofs up, as long as she takes care of her union mates.
If he meant “undermining”, however, Howes and his AWU masters have done a pretty good job of that all by themselves, taking credit for unseating the democratically elected Labor Prime Minister Kevin Rudd in the first place, and unashamedly displaying an unhealthy proprietorial claim over their hand-picked replacement Julia Gillard, who just happens to be caught up in an AWU scandal from her days as a union lawyer.
Howes looked so pleased with himself as he ushered Gillard into the conference dinner, in front of the cameras, as if she were a trophy.
He “had her back” he declared, and supports her 110 percent. Just what she needs, especially when union membership has sunk to 18 percent of the workforce.
The union collectively rubbed its hands with glee. Look how powerful we are, right at the heart of power! There was Howes’ mentor Bill Ludwig out from the shadows to grab the PM’s manicured hand in his gnarled paw and hold it aloft.
What an image. The Prime Minister paraded by Howes and Ludwig as if she were a wholly owned subsidiary of the AWU, in the week that polls show Labor’s primary vote has collapsed.
With friends like Howes who needs an Opposition?
It’s not hyper-bowl to say that if anyone appears to be “underminding” Labor it’s Howes and his beloved moo-ment.
To the high dungeon with him.
===
Free speech stoned to death
Miranda Devine – Saturday, February 23, 2013 (6:26pm)
IF you needed proof that free speech in Australia is on the run, look at what happened when Dutch anti-Islam MP Geert Wilders came to town.
With 10 per cent of the vote in Holland, Wilders, 49, is a mainstream politician, leading the third largest political party in one of the most tolerant liberal democracies in the world. Yet in Australia he is treated like a pariah, denied a visa for weeks, and unable to secure a venue at all for his speaking tour in Perth.
Instead of a “welcome to country” before he spoke to audiences in Sydney and Melbourne last week, organisers had to read aloud a statement of Victoria’s racial and religious tolerant act.
As much as anything, this curious legal requirement explains why Australians are open to his message of creeping Islamisation.
That and the enormous security needed to guard him from assassins 24-hours-a-day.
It is shameful that of all the Western democracies Geert Wilders has visited it turns out, Australia is the most repressive.
Not only did more than 30 venues refuse to host him or cancel at the last minute, politicians denounced him and in Melbourne protesters tried to block the entrance of the function hall where he was speaking and pushed at least one attendee to the ground in violent clashes.
This of course is great publicity for Wilders.
When you meet him in person, he is much more normal than his image would suggest. The shock of hair isn’t quite so yellow and he presents as a tall, well-dressed, quietly spoken, man with perfect English.
“I have no problem with Muslims,” he said on a balcony in an undisclosed location on Sydney harbour, with yachts clinking nearby, and an armed bodyguard even nearer.
“The majority of them are not extremist. But there is no such thing as moderate Islam.”
As proof he spoke of of gays being beaten up by Muslims in Amsterdam “once the most tolerant city in Europe”, of high crime statistics for Moroccan youth in Holland, the over-representation of Somalis on welfare, of suburbs looking like Mecca. In Europe he says “it is almost too late, but Australia can learn from the mistakes.”
He says although he is not religious, he feels a sense of “mission” which he loves, although he has had to sacrifice his freedom, living with his Hungarian-born wife Krisztina for nine years like a prisoner, surrounded by bodyguards, moving from safe house to safe house.
He is strongest on his attacks on cultural relativism which he calls “the biggest political disease which says that all cultures are equal.
“They are not. I’m proud to say our Judeo Christian humanist culture is much better than the barbaric Islamic culture.”
It was a message that struck a chord in Sydney, on Friday night, at speeches hosted by the Q society, which is named after the Melbourne suburb of Kew where its first meeting was held, and is dedicated to “preserving western values and making the discussion of Islam a respectable topic of debate,” says member Marshall Ahern, a Lidcombe businessman. Unlike in Melbourne, the unionists and student socialist groups protesting outside the Liverpool function hall on Friday night were fairly quiet.
“I don’t think he should be able to come here and say disgusting racist ideas,” said Amy Thomas, 26, a UTS arts student.
Inside, Wilders said he just wants the right to state his views without being killed or put on trial as he was in Holland. The threat of an assassin is real. Two weeks ago his friend, Lars Hedegaard, a 70-year-old Danish journalist and a critic of Islam, was shot at.
Wilders invited the audience to “make up your own mind on who I am and what I really stand for.”
Then he claimed Sydney was the Australian city “where Islamisation has progressed the worst.
“This city needs to hear the truth about the dangerous ideology of Islam .”
He complained that he had to wait five weeks for a visa to Australia.
But a radical sheik who calls Jews “rats, apes and monkeys or the scum of the human race” and will be visiting Sydney in a few weeks, “gets a visa within a day”.
He said he wanted to warn Australia about Islam which he claims is “predominantly a totalitarian ideology striving for world dominance.
“I believe Islam and freedom are incompatible.
“The more Islamic a society becomes the less free and tolerant it will be even when the majority of Muslims are tolerant.”
He cited suburbs in Holland, France and in Europe which have become no go zones for non-Muslims, where gays are attacked, alcohol confiscated, non-Muslim women forced to cover up, polygamy and female genital mutilation practised and the police dare not enter. Do you want all this to happen in Australia,” he asked.
“No” shouted the audience.
He claimed Australia is heading down the same path.
“Your country too is facing stealth Jihad, and Islamic attempts to introduce Sharia law bit by bit.”
He pointed to a proposed “Muslim enclave in Riverstone” , a Sydney sheik “who performs female genital mutilation, women walk around in hijabs, banks offer financial services compliant with Sharia law, separate segregated swimming hours for Muslim women, universities cater to Sharia demands for students but at the same time refuse to allow me to speak at their premises.”
There was applause when he explained his platform: “No Sharia ... No more mosques. No more immigration from Islamic countries.” But he received his loudest applause when he slammed as “most dangerous of all are the attempts of governments all over our Western societies to draft bills that restrict our freedom of speech under the pretext of discrimination or hate speech.
“I say we have to let the law protect us against Islam instead of selling us out to it.”
The second loudest applause came when he praised Israel.
Much of what he says about the difficulties of Muslim integration in Europe is true.
But I couldn’t help but wonder how it would feel for the decent law-abiding Australian Muslims I know to sit in that room.
What is wrong with a Muslim women wearing a headscarf?
What is wrong with painting an arrow on the floor of a jail cell pointing to Mecca?
What is wrong with Muslims building a mosque to pray in?
And why keep calling Muhammed a paedophile?
Some of what Wilders says is calculated to cause offence, and so if he is snubbed, he can blame himself.
But you don’t have to agree with everything he says to acknowledge that he has the right to say it.
And as one audience member on Friday night said: “If he’s a far right extremist, he’s the first one I’ve heard who supports Jews and gays.”
===
Fact-checking how the ABC pushes Labor’s NBN
Andrew BoltFEBRUARY242013(11:13am)
Grahame Lynch of CommsDay.com fact-checks an ABC spruiker of Labor’s $36 billion NBN gamble - and the results are ugly:
Nick Ross has established a reputation as Australia’s highest profile media advocate of the NBN. There’s nothing wrong with supporting the NBN…But Nick is a special case. He is the technology and games editor for ABC Online, the website of the national broadcaster and one of the most highly read sources of Australian news and analysis on the web. He is subject to a code that governs how he exercises his duties – specifically in terms of the need for balance and standards.However, Nick has used the web platform he edits to publish article after article expressing highly personal views that advocate the ALP Government’s NBN policy and totally disparage the Opposition’s…This week Nick attended a tech media conference in Queensland and challenged speaker Malcolm Turnbull to an extended argument over the NBN (basically over what Nick saw as the superiority of the ALP’s Fibre To The Home network over the Coalition’s proposed Fibre To The Node alternative). His actions were unpopular with other attendees who thought him both rude to Malcolm ... and others who were denied the opportunity to ask their own questions. Malcolm implored Nick to undertake more balanced journalistic inquiry on the NBN and, voila, several days later, Nick has published a several thousand word opus which purports to compare the ALP and Coalition policies, and, inevitably, finds almost complete fault with the Opposition’s…But in reading this opus last night, I was struck by Nick’s loose construction of research, argument and expression. Not only is the piece unbecoming of acceptable editorial standards regarding bias, but also those of accuracy and logic.
Lynch then gives nearly 50 examples, drawn from this single ABC article by the ABC’s technology and games editor. For instance:
“Over 80 per cent of the nation’s copper network is over 30-years old and copper expires after 30 years” - if the copper has truly expired how can it still be operational? Telstra reports fault-free performance of over 99% after all…“Fibre also offers revolution to television with every household being able to access the bulk of the developed world’s TV channels” - right now using a DSL connection, I can watch many channels using third-party Justin.TV-style portals or original websites of the broadcasters.... I can also quite easily watch many of the developed world’s TV channels using a satellite dish or other pay TV service.“For instance, if people could communicate with CentreLink by talking to their TVs instead of spending time travelling to offices, hardly any offices would be required – everything could be outsourced to a low-cost regional location. There are over 900 offices in Australia” - The very nature of social welfare suggests that the people most likely to be in need of CentreLink services are the ones most likely to not have an high speed NBN connection, either because of expense, their lack of permanent residence or their socio-economic or socio-educational level…“The ‘telehealth’ opportunities afforded by fibre are so dramatic that the savings to the vast $120bn (and rising) annual health budget will pay for the entire rollout on their own, while simultaneously revolutionising healthcare for all Australians, particularly the elderly and those living in rural areas” - One big problem with this, the government has just abolished Medicare rebates for telehealth consultations in metro areas, the ones slated to get fibre. Sorry Nick, but your revolution is dead in the starting gates.http://www.medicalobserver.com.au/news/rebates-slashed-rural-gps-forced-to-cut-telehealth“National emergencies, whether fire or flooding, are becoming a part of Australian life. Consequently, the benefits of a fibre-based NBN are becoming increasingly important” – Despite Nick’s belief that fibre is water proof, the NBN didn’t hold up too well in the recent Queensland floods. Like other tech platforms, it is a touch vulnerable itself to natural disaster. As always, wireless techs prove best in these situations. http://www.zdnet.com/au/nbn-co-telcos-continue-to-combat-qld-flood-outages-7000010466/…“The net cost is zero and it will pay for itself in at least four different ways” – The net cost is not zero! The NBN is not forecast to recover its costs for between twenty years and twenty seven years, depending on the scenario. Fibre networks are commonly depreciated after 25 years!…“This money ultimately comes back to the government with a seven per cent profit” - That is a projection, not a guarantee. Many business plans fail to come true…
Read the full list. Lynch concludes:
I have just provided nearly 50 examples from one article published by our national broadcaster that arguably fail to meet basic standards of fact, accuracy and logic… It’s s a serious enough issue that it deserves more than this tawdry analysis from the national broadcaster for something that remains Australia’s most ambitious infrastructure project – ever.
===
How can a Water Minister know so little about dams?
Andrew BoltFEBRUARY242013(10:05am)
Water Minister Tony Burke thought he was being so clever two weeks ago when he mocked a Coalition discussion paper raising the need for more dams:
I will congratulate whomever wrote this document for breathtaking logic.Because what they proposed in that document and what government policy absolutely rejects is that you can use your dams in this magical way that they will provide against drought, provide against flood and provide renewable energy. If you’re managing a dam to avoid drought, your dam has to be constantly full, if you’re managing your dam to avoid floods, you need to keep your dam empty and if you’re managing your dam to be able to provide hydroelectricity, you need to keep your dam flowing.Only the Opposition could come up with a dams policy where they have dams that will be always full, always empty and always flowing.
The complete foolishness of Burke’s answer is exposed by this item yesterday about Wivenhoe, a dam that both collects drinking water and protects Brisbane from flooding:
WATER management authorities are considering releasing even more water from Wivenhoe Dam as Queensland’s southeast corner prepares for another drenching next week.In a statement on Saturday afternoon, a spokeswoman for Seqwater, which controls the water in the southern corner of the state, said Wivanhoe Dam was sitting at 91 per cent and there were low levels being released from it.She said the releases were intended to bring the dam back to temporary full supply level of 88 per cent.
Its primary function is to provide a safe and reliable water supply to the south-east Queensland region… Wivenhoe Dam houses a pumped-storage, hydro-electric generating facility… During a flood situation, Wivenhoe Dam is designed to hold back a further 1.45 million megalitres...
How could a Water Minister not know this?
(Thanks to reader Ken.)
===
Gillard’s “achievements” crash Labor’s website
Andrew BoltFEBRUARY242013(9:49am)
On the Labor Party’s website is this promising invitation to learn about the Gillard Government’s achievements:
Eager to discover one Gillard achievement, I clicked on the icon and found this:
(Thanks to reader Baldrick.)
===
Is Australia better off with 7000 more from Balochistan?
Andrew BoltFEBRUARY242013(9:11am)
Pardon? We’re recruiting more asylum seekers - and from the very country from which thousands of boat people are already coming?
The Australian government has offered asylum to over 2,500 Hazara families of Balochistan and urged the United Nations refugee agency in Pakistan to facilitate migration of the community facing sectarian violence, Australian embassy sources said.Jim O’Callaghan, assistant secretary of the humanitarian branch of the Department of Immigration and Citizenship Australia, had held a meeting with UNHCR officials last week and discussed the asylum offer with them, First Secretary Australian High Commission Sherief Andrawos told Dawn on Wednesday.The UNHCR was informed that Australia was willing to accommodate 2,500 families or 7,000 individuals of the Hazara community, keeping in view attacks on them.“Yes we have started work on facilitating members of Shia minority and other people prone to sectarian violence for giving them refuge in Australia. The Australian government wants our assistance in this regard,” Maya Ameratunga, deputy representative of United Nations High Commission for Refugees in Pakistan, confirmed to Dawn.
Astonishing. Will our recruiters spread out next to northern Africa, Tibet, central Africa and Burma?
This strategy is based on the wishful belief that if we bring over “asylum seekers” by plane, they won’t come by boat.
I suspect it will have the opposite effect, promoting ultimately illegal immigration to Australia with the advice and assistance of tens of thousands already here.
And this overlooks a fairly basic question deemed too sensitive for public debate: precisely how well will 7000 more Muslims from this violent and tribal part of the world settle in Australia? How much is it in Australia’s interest to sponsor thousands of villagers from Balochistan?
UPDATE
The Australian Embassy denies the report, saying people Australia takes must be genuine refugees:
The Australian Embassy denies the report, saying people Australia takes must be genuine refugees:
Australia on Thursday clarified that it was not introducing any programme to resettle Hazara community out of Pakistan. The Australian High Commission in a statement dismissed a news report titled ‘2,500 Hazara families offered asylum’ published in a national daily on February 21."While Australia’s offshore Humanitarian Program has been increased in 2012-2013, there are no new arrangements for particular ethnicities or people from a particular part of any country,” the statement added.The statement stressed that Australia was sympathetic to communities affected by sectarian violence and acts of terrorism…“Refugees including Afghan Hazaras, wanting to be resettled in Australia must be recognized by UNHCR as meeting the criteria for refugee status,” according to the statement.
But the Embassy’s response - “no new arrangements for particular ethnicities or people from a particular part of any country” - seems to directly contradict what then Immigration Minister Chris Bown said last year in announcing an increase of the refugee intake to 20,000 to help stop the boats:
Key groups that will figure in the 20,000 are Afghans, whether they be in Pakistan, Iran or Indonesia; Iraqi minorities including Assyrians, Chaldeans and Mandaeans in Syria, Jordan, Turkey and Lebanon. Of course Sri Lankan refugees will continue to figure...”
The mixed messages seem the result of the Gillard Government’s changes to the refugee program, made in line with a recommendation it adopted from the Houston committee of “experts”:
(Thanks to reader Wiley.)
===
When will Flannery finally admit error
Andrew BoltFEBRUARY242013(9:03am)
I’ll keep highlighting this 2007 prediction while warming alarmist Tim Flannery remains the Chief Climate Commissioner:
So even the rain that falls isn’t actually going to fill our dams and our river systems, and that’s a real worry for the people in the bush.
Torrential downpours and gale-force winds last night meant more than 19,000 people were told to evacuate flood-stricken towns across NSW.
===
Will Labor ban Gillard from the federal campaign, too?
Andrew BoltFEBRUARY242013(8:55am)
Labor must wonder how it can campaign under a leader who is such poison that she’s told by colleagues to say away from campaigns:
An exclusive Galaxy poll, published today by Perth’s Sunday Times, puts support for the Labor Party in WA ahead of the state election at just 35 per cent.On the orders of campaign chiefs, she has declined to set foot in WA since late last year.“We rang everyone in December and said, ‘Please, don’t come,’ “ a Labor strategist said…Defence Minister Stephen Smith has been “fantastic” in enforcing the ban, according to ALP sources. A former WA state secretary for Labor, Mr Smith has ensured his colleagues do not cross the border unless it is unavoidable.
Gillard was allowed make just a single appearance in Queensland’s state election and none in Victoria’s and the Northern Territory’s.
Can she really be kept from the voters come the federal election?
===
Monckton to ABC: enough of Caldicott’s wild abuse
Andrew BoltFEBRUARY242013(7:57am)
Dr Helen Caldicott should be the last to accuse others of being charlatans, peddling false claims, scares and exaggerations.
And what’s a nuclear holocaust story without Helen Caldicott, actually a paediatrician and anti-nuke hysteric? So there she was, too, on 3AW, warning that if the [Fukushima] reactor blew up, “hundreds of thousands of Japanese will be dying within two weeks of acute radiation illness”, with countless more later suffering an “epidemic” of cancers.
“And over time, nuclear waste will induce epidemics of cancer, leukemia and genetic disease, and random compulsory genetic engineering."…[But] Professor Gerry Thomas...: “Absolutely no evidence for this whatsoever – we live in a radioactive world, we are superbly adapted to it. There are areas of the world that are exposed to natural background radiation 10+ times higher than the average (same maximal dose as radiation workers receive). These populations do not show an increase in cancer.”
Biggest achievementHelping to end the Cold War - although Bill Clinton’s legacy is that it still goes on… And helping to stop uranium mining [for five years from 1976]. And the third thing is getting the French nuclear tests to go underground...
Caldicott: You know what occurred to me the other day as I was pondering this whole thing, Antony? What if some of the, uh, [Wikileaks] cables start revealing, uh, the truth about government thinking about 9/11?… I mean, if 9/11 documents were released that would put the cat amongst the pigeons so to speak. I mean, there’s a huge amount that we don’t know.Loewenstein: Absolutely.Caldicott: And that was covered up and could have huge political ramifications in the United States.
Now this same Caldicott - unaccountably given the run of the ABC studio of Waleed Aly - makes another string of wild and also offensive claims, and this time Lord Monckton has quite rightly had enough.
Monckton writes to the ABC about this latest vilification:
I should be grateful if the ABC would investigate and respond to each of the following grounds of complaint against it for broadcasting factually inaccurate, biased, inappropriate, offensive and unfair remarks about me on its Radio National programme “The Drawing Room “ on Wednesday, 20 February 2013 at 7.40 pm.During the programme a Dr. Helen Caldicott said: “The other thing is, you know, that they say they have to give equal time to global warming, and they have people like this awful – what’s his name? – Monck? Lord Monckton, who’s got thyrotoxicosis and bilateral exophthalmos, but apart from that he’s not a lord and apart from that he doesn’t know any science. This is so important. And it’s imperative to have people who understand science and medicine to be discussing this, and not have these global deniers often who are funded by the oil companies like Exxon in America who spent hundreds of millions in a propaganda campaign to convince people that global warming isn’t a fact. I don’t think the media quite gets it that it’s like medicine: you know, you don’t have a charlatan debating with the doctor about the treatment of a patient, you have to, you know, practise the very best medicine you can or the patient might die.”Ground 1: Dr. Caldicott incorrectly stated that I suffer from thryotoxicosis, which is in fact now cured, and correctly but grossly inappropriately stated that I suffer from one of the sequelae of that disease, bilateral exophthalmos. I am entitled to privacy in my medical history, and it is certainly inappropriate that Dr. Caldicott should discuss my health on the air, particularly in a fashion that was, in part, factually inaccurate.Ground 2: Dr. Caldicott inaccurately stated that I am not a Lord. However, my passport states that I am “The Right Honourable Christopher Walter, Viscount Monckton of Brenchley”. A Viscount is a Lord. When the Clerk of the Parliaments once wrote to say I should not call myself “a member of the House of Lords”, I consulted a barrister expert in peerage law, whose written Opinion concludes that I am indeed a member of the House, albeit without the right to sit and vote, and that I am, in his words, “fully entitled to say so”.Ground 3: Dr. Caldicott inaccurately stated that I do not know any science. However, I have a degree in Classical Architecture from the University of Cambridge, and the degree course included instruction in mathematics. I was last year’s Nerenberg Lecturer in Mathematics at the University of Western Ontario. I have contributed several papers to the learned journals on climate science and economics, have lectured on climate science at universities on three continents at faculty as well as undergraduate level, and am an expert reviewer for the forthcoming Fifth Assessment Report of the UN’s climate panel, the IPCC. I have testified four times before the U.S. Congress on climate science and economics.Ground 4: Dr. Caldicott describes me, offensively, as a “global denier”, with overtones calculated to bracket me with holocaust deniers.Ground 5: Dr. Caldicott inaccurately implies that I am “funded by the oil companies like Exxon in America.” I am not, and have never been, funded by any oil company. My current tour in Australia, like my first tour here, is entirely funded by the contributions of those who attend my speaker meetings.Ground 6: Dr. Caldicott unfairly and without adducing any evidence describes me as a “charlatan”, inferentially on the sole ground that she disagrees with me. I do not know whether she has any scientific or mathematical knowledge relevant to the climate debate: if not, then it was doubly inappropriate for her to mischaracterize me as a “charlatan”.Ground 7: The presenter did nothing to prevent Dr. Caldicott from saying what she said, and did nothing to remedy the situation by indicating to the audience that her remarks – which on their face appear malicious – might not be well founded in fact and were certainly inappropriate.I am also lodging complaints with the medical registration authorities in Australia, since Dr. Caldicott’s discussion of my health problems on the air is a flagrant breach of the confidentiality to which patients are entitled. I shall be requesting that Dr. Caldicott be removed from all medical registers in Australia and debarred from practising medicine ever again, on the ground that she is not a fit and proper person to respect the confidentiality of patients.Christopher MoncktonThe Viscount Monckton of Brenchley
As for Aly, what on earth makes him think an informative debate on the alleged “tipping point” of global warming is to be had with a panel like this?
GuestsHelen Caldicott
Editor of Loving This Planet: Leading Thinkers Talk About How To Make A Better World
Nick Feik
Chief Executive of The Monthly’s SlowTV
(Thanks to reader Rocky.)
===
Dozed this afternoon .. wanted to hear cricket updates .. but comedian presenter James Laughlin was on. He wanted to know if the estimated carbon tax on heating bills broke election laws for political advertising, and his guest speaker gushingly assured him it could. But the NSW legislation/regulation putting the price on the bill predates the election announcement. A good complaint could be made about media bias on the ABC .. - ed
===
===
Why so serious? - ed
===
Karen McNamara - Candidate for Dobell - Caught up with Matt yesterday at Chittaway. Matt was there to pay an electricity bill on behalf of the Berkeley Vale Boy Scouts. Now this not for profit group who give so much to their local community have to rely on additional fundraising to pay the increase in their electricity bill.
===
PLEASE READ. WILL NOT HURT TO AND FORWARD.
Kids are putting Drano, tin foil, and a little water in plastic drink bottles
and capping it up - leaving it on lawns, in mail boxes, in gardens, on
driveways etc. just waiting for you to pick it up intending to put it in the
rubbish, but you'll never make it!!!
If the bottle is picked up, and the bottle is shaken even just a little - in
about 30 seconds or less it builds up enough gas which then explodes with
enough force to remove some your extremities. The liquid that comes out is
boiling hot as well.
Don't pick up any plastic bottles that may be lying in your yards or in the
gutter, etc.
Pay attention to this. A plastic bottle with a cap. A little Drano. A little
water. A small piece of foil.
Disturb it by moving it; and BOOM!!
No fingers left and other serious effects to your face, eyes, etc.
Please ensure that everyone that may not have email access are also informed
of this.
===
I'm starting to dread the chocolate season that is creeping upon us. I think I might make these as gifts with warm soup as a family meal for friends! Bunny rolls, quite cute I think!
===
Fast food is a stereotypical way of life for many Americans, but new findings suggest that Americans may be starting to cut back on the fast food diet. http://oak.ctx.ly/r/2joe
===
===
Siva Samoa - Jesus Family Center Cabramatta
Ain't no rain was gonna stop us! LOL' Multicultural Food & Entertainment Festival - Cabramatta! #JFC 'All For The Glory Of God
===
===
4 TMN
===
A parody response video to Jimmy Fallon and Michelle Obama's "Evolution of Mom Dancing." Which dance is your favorite? http://youtu.be/
===
"Your harvest is hidden in the seed. Just as the apple tree is hidden in the apple seed, whatever you are believing God for is hidden in your seed. God desires to meet your needs through the seed you plant in fertile soil." - Roma Downey
===
Princess jasmin Aprille
===
What old school madness we got up to yesterday!— with Adrian Chino Castro,
===
This screenshot from "Wings of Eagles" is one of the most meaningful because it captures Maureen's fondness for Duke not only in the role she's playing, but off screen as well. They were loyal friends for so many years and one of the most influential in her life.
===
Proverbs 14:22 Do not those who plot evil go astray? But those who plan what is good find love and faithfulness. (NIV)
===
===
===
NASA reported in January that we may be on the verge of another Maunder Minimum (a period with an unusually low number of sunspots, leading to colder temperatures):
Much has been made of the probable connection between the Maunder Minimum, a 70-year deficit of sunspots in the late 17th-early 18th century, and the coldest part of the Little Ice Age, during which Europe and North America were subjected to bitterly cold winters. The mechanism for that regional cooling could have been a drop in the sun’s EUV output; this is, however, speculative.
The sun could be on the threshold of a mini-Maunder event right now. Ongoing Solar Cycle 24 is the weakest in more than 50 years. Moreover, there is (controversial) evidence of a long-term weakening trend in the magnetic field strength of sunspots. Matt Penn and William Livingston of the National Solar Observatory predict that by the time Solar Cycle 25 arrives, magnetic fields on the sun will be so weak that few if any sunspots will be formed. Independent lines of research involving helioseismology and surface polar fields tend to support their conclusion.
NASA explains that interactions between the sun, sources of cosmic radiation and the Earth are very complicated, and it takes an interdisciplinary team of heliophysicists, chemists and others to quantify what is really going on. And the Earth’s climate is also affected by cosmic radiation.
So – even if NASA’s prediction of a period of an unusually low amount of sun spots is proven correct – it is hard to know whether that will lead to a large or small reduction in temperature trends.
Diagram from : Decrease of the Total Solar Irradiance Leads to Unbalanced Thermal Budget of the Earth
Habibullo I. Abdussamatov, Pulkovo Observatory of the RAS
No comments:
Post a Comment