Wednesday, May 22, 2013

Wed May 22nd Todays News


Happy birthday and many happy returns Daniel Bogo and Bob Scheer. Born on the same day, across the years. The same day, when in 1826, HMS Beagle sailed and the world made discoveries billions of years in the making. You have sailed from Plymouth, and now you can own your future.
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Their ABC

Miranda Devine – Wednesday, May 22, 2013 (12:15am)

IF a Martian were to land in Sydney and start watching the ABC, she would soon figure out the taxpayer-funded broadcaster is biased to the left.
Whether it’s a show like Q&A, which consistently stacks its panel with one lone conservative plus a Coalition politician (who may or may not be conservative) against four left-wingers. Or Insiders, which struggles to put one conservative on its couch each Sunday or MediaWatch, which just announced a new presenter, but did not extend the genepool past Paul Barry, who is not much of a leftie, but who has already done the job.
The leftist bias is patently obvious to everyone, and denials from within the ABC are laughable, even to themselves.
Now that bias has been quantified, in a survey into journalists’ political leanings by the University of the Sunshine Coast. It showed that all journalists lean left - no surprise.
But ABC journalists are extremists. They vote 41% Greens, 34% ALP and 16% Coalition - just about the exact opposite of the community.
The latest Newspoll shows the community favours 9% Greens, 31% ALP and 46% Coalition.
So will the ABC launch an affirmative action program to hire conservatives as a matter of urgency?
What assurances can the ABC provide that coverage of climate change is impartial and accurate when so many of its staffers are green zealots?
Does the ABC think its role is to balance against the perceived right-wing bias of News Limited and other commercial media?
If so, then it should say so honestly and allow the proposition to be tested. The truth is that News Limited journalists also lean left, just not so far as the ABC, with 19.8% voting for the Greens, 46.5% for Labor, and 26.7% for the Coalition, as reported by The Conversation website.
Yes, senior editors are more conservative than their staff, but they are still left of the public, voting 11.4% Greens, 34.1% Labor and 43.2% Coalition. ‘
And, as anyone who has worked in a newsroom knows, it’s the frontline journalists who create the culture, not their bosses.
So how can the ABC continue to pretend it provides balance when its staff are so out of kilter with the taxpayer? It’s why the ABC is known on twitter as #theirabc.

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Magistrate’s strength in weak legal system

Miranda Devine – Tuesday, May 21, 2013 (8:02pm)

PEOPLE have been quick to condemn magistrate Jacqueline Milledge over the refusal of a Muslim defendant to stand when she entered the court this week. But look a bit deeper and you’ll find they’re flogging the wrong horse.

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KYLE AND JULIA G

Tim Blair – Wednesday, May 22, 2013 (5:10pm)

The Prime Minister with her new best friend, this time minus the rabbit outfit:



Gillard’s previous alliances seem almost acceptable by comparison.
UPDATE. “Business deals in parking lots …” A Midnight Oil lyric comes to life for our PM.

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BOB’S OPTIONS

Tim Blair – Wednesday, May 22, 2013 (1:41pm)

Labor folk hero Bob Ellis is considering two courses of action in his strange feud with Fairfax columnist and dental expert John Birmingham. Let’s help Bob by putting those options – plus a third – to a fair, democratic and legally binding vote:
Thank you for voting!
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Total Votes: 1,063



UPDATE. With 1000 votes submitted, readers strongly endorse love. Marriage leads death and legal action by a massive margin.

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THE SCIENCE IS SETTLED

Tim Blair – Wednesday, May 22, 2013 (11:49am)

Back in 1975, tornadoes were said to be caused by global cooling. Now they’re caused by global warming – or conservatives.

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LEAF SENTENCE

Tim Blair – Wednesday, May 22, 2013 (11:47am)

A leaf is imprisoned in an upstairs window sill. Updates to follow:

image

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WE’RE ALL BAD

Tim Blair – Wednesday, May 22, 2013 (11:04am)

“If you find this amusing,” emails David Thompson, “you’re a very bad person.”

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CHECKER APPOINTED

Tim Blair – Wednesday, May 22, 2013 (10:59am)

Our spy deep within the ABC’s Ultimo compound forwards this memo: 
I’m pleased to announce the appointment of a new and foundation Editor for the ABC Fact Check unit.
Russell Skelton has vast experience as both a media executive and writer. He is a highly regarded reporter and Contributing Editor to The Age newspaper and Fairfax Media. A former deputy editor, business editor, foreign editor and North Asia correspondent for The Age, Russell has worked in top positions at Fairfax and News Limited. He has been business editor of the Melbourne Herald.
Russell also worked for the ABC as Executive Producer for 7.30 Victoria.
He is the winner of numerous awards including a Walkley and the George Munster award for independent journalism.
The ABC News Division is delighted to attract to this position a journalist with Russell’s reputation for accuracy and integrity.
Bruce Belsham
Head Current Affairs
 
Skelton is the husband of ABC presenter Virginia Trioli.

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NEW CHARGES FOR THOMMO

Tim Blair – Wednesday, May 22, 2013 (10:31am)

The member for Embattled faces additional charges: 
Embattled MP Craig Thomson is now facing 19 new charges in relation to allegations he misused thousands of dollar in union funds.
The Melbourne Magistrates’ Court heard this morning Mr Thomson would now face 173 fraud related charges – including 19 new charges …
Court documents, tendered at that hearing, alleged Mr Thomson misused $42,800, allegedly using union credit cards to pay for prostitutes, R-rated movies and ATM cash withdrawals. 
Thomson maintains his innocence. No comments.

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Damn. Mr Trioli beats me to another ABC job

Andrew Bolt May 22 2013 (5:14pm)

Of course, the ABC isn’t biased. It’s just that conservatives can’t be trusted to deliver news and views.
Thus the ABC’s head of current affairs announces a new appointment, just a couple of weeks after Media Watch gained its eighth straight presenter of the Left:

I’m pleased to announce the appointment of a new and foundation Editor for the ABC Fact Check unit.
Russell Skelton has vast experience as both a media executive and writer. He is a highly regarded reporter and Contributing Editor to The Age newspaper and Fairfax Media. A former deputy editor, business editor, foreign editor and North Asia correspondent for The Age, Russell has worked in top positions at Fairfax and News Limited. He has been business editor of the Melbourne Herald.
Russell also worked for the ABC as Executive Producer for 7.30 Victoria.
To cut to the chase, Skelton is the husband of Virginia Trioli.
Which you click that last link, you might suspect Skelton will feel a strong temptation to make me an early subject of an ABC audit. 

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Turning dead children in Oklahoma into a joke

Andrew Bolt May 22 2013 (9:48am)

Ah, the Left. So sure of its greater compassion:
She thought she was making a topical political joke, but a co-creator of ‘The Daily Show’ managed to enrage many of her followers after tweeting joke about the Oklahoma tornado’s political motivations.
This tornado is in Oklahoma so clearly it has been ordered to only target conservatives,’ wrote comedian Lizz Winstead, in a tweet, around 3:30 Monday afternoon.
The Daily Show is one that ABC managing director Mark Scott is looking to for inspiration.  

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Would journalists tell you if there really were a bust-up?

Andrew Bolt May 22 2013 (9:19am)

Would it be a big story if Tony Abbott was getting divorced? I suspect the answer would be yes, yes and yes.
In fact, Abbott’s marriage is as sound as a bell.
I’m just trying to establish the ground rules here, now that 3AW has referred to a rumor widely shared by journalists - but not with the public. 
(From 36:50) 

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I’ll what?

Andrew Bolt May 22 2013 (9:05am)


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No one in Treasury fired for a $20 billion blue

Andrew Bolt May 22 2013 (8:48am)

Terry McCrann agrees there was no conspiracy. I just want to know why no one was fired for the mistake:
THE Treasury Department did not fiddle its forecasts to help the Government cook the Budget books - the easy, conspiratorial, explanation for why a predicted $1 billion surplus ended up as a $19.4 billion deficit.
Nor did Treasury provide the Government with a range of forecasts, to enable it to pick and choose the one that best suited its own political purposes.
Treasury head Martin Parkinson gave a vigorous, even aggressive, defence of his department and its role in the Budget forecasting process, in the traditional post-Budget speech yesterday… Essentially it came down to this: we got it wrong.
In the process, he once again proved the truth of the maxim: if you have to choose between a conspiracy and a stuff-up, go for the stuff-up every time.

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Sick pensioner finds Wayne Swan needs his $22,000 life savings

Andrew Bolt May 22 2013 (8:42am)

This isn’t a good look:
A QUEENSLAND pensioner emerged from a quintuple heart bypass only to find his bank had emptied his account, handing more than $22,000 to the Federal Government.
Legislative changes rushed through Parliament late last year mean money can now be identified as “unclaimed” after an account has been inactive for more than three years, instead of seven years.... ASIC says the money can be claimed “at any time by the rightful owner”, but banks have pointed out the process can take as long as six weeks.
Toowong resident Adrian Duffy is now looking at a lengthy battle to have his savings restored.
The 75-year-old spent 21 days in hospital following quintuple heart bypass surgery and a second operation in April.
When he and his wife, 57-year-old Mary-Jane, went to check their Suncorp account, they discovered their balance had plummeted from $22,616 to zero. A note on the May 1 entry read: “Closing WDL Govt unclaimed monies.”
The couple had saved for 14 years in preparation for major health-related costs…
Mr and Mrs Duffy are adamant they received no warnings of the closure of the account.
“I called it stealing,” Mr Duffy said.

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Robbing stay-at-home mums to pay for the child-care rich

Andrew Bolt May 22 2013 (8:34am)


Janet Albrechtsen, a critic of the baby bonus, concedes what we discussed on Sunday - that removing it, but boosting paid parental leave, privileges working women above stay-at-home mothers:

Howard’s policy had one great virtue. It was an equitable way to acknowledge the social value of women bearing and caring for children. As Howard explains in his biography, he was opposed to taxpayer-funded paid parental leave because he wanted fair treatment of both stay-at-home and workforce-bound parents. This led to the Baby Bonus, set at $3000 in 2004, rising to $5000 in 2008 - the rough equivalent of 12 or 13 weeks of paid leave at the then federal minimum wage level…
It put an end to the mummy wars.
However, with the abolition of the Baby Bonus and the introduction of paid parental leave, equity is gone. Now, even more middle-class welfare is skewed towards working parents. Even before the Baby Bonus was axed, the Gillard government boasted that working women will be $2000 better off receiving PPL than if they opt for the baby bonus. The opposition’s even more generous PPL policy is even more objectionable now that the Baby Bonus has been axed. Working women on incomes up to $150,000 can extract $75,000 from taxpayers to fund their maternity leave. 

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Not a “cut to the bone” but a scratch

Andrew Bolt May 22 2013 (8:12am)

Labor’s latest focus-group-tested catch-phrase to attack Tony Abbott:

These are just the start of the cuts to the bone that the Leader of the Opposition has planned ...
“Cuts to the bone”? I wish.
No one has yet challenged Prime Minister Julia Gillard, Treasurer Wayne Swan or Finance Minister Penny Wong on their use of this ludicrous meme.
The bare facts expose the lie.
The extra savings Tony Abbott announced last week - a net $1 billion a year:
Aiming his pre-election Budget reply speech directly at the family wallet, the Opposition Leader last night pledged to lower the cost of living with a $4 billion tax and cash splash to households…
To pay for it all, however, Mr Abbott said he would take an axe to government spending and other handouts - with $5 billion in extra savings..
Government spending: $391 billion next year.
Deficit next year: $18 billion.
A $1 billion a year cut in $391 billion outlays when we are running a deficit of $18 billion is not a “cut to the bone” but the lightest scratch.
UPDATE
Jack Waterford, like many on the Left, dramatically underestimates Abbott, but there is a kernel of truth to this attack:

But it cannot be said that cuts or changes of the order being promised will make a huge difference to the scale of government, or cause lasting damage to the economy. In any event Labor has been cutting at much the same rate…
Labor could be better to ask whether Abbott is more timid than bold, more timorous than decisive
Can Abbott lead a government that does things, drives things and changes things? Can he win arguments about the rationing of public resources… Many of his senior colleagues are quite serious about economic restraint and simply do not trust Abbott to knuckle down to financial discipline.   

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Gonski a fight over false figures and never-never funding

Andrew Bolt May 22 2013 (8:03am)

The Gillard Government just makes up another number - as it did with the ”10,000” rorted 457 visas - to flog a scare:
Labor’s central claim that Abbott’s opposition to Gonski’s changes will cost schools $16.2 billion over six years is based on the extrapolation of a hypothetical and is still not justified or explained.
School Education Minister Peter Garrett has confused the education funding debate by arbitrarily announcing funding growth to be 3 per cent for the next six years, airily claiming this is standard budgetary practice.
What’s more, his claim the budget papers “clearly show” this fall to 3 per cent is plain wrong - they say “had” they fallen to this level, a hypothetical.
Paul Kelly is right to warn Abbott about the poor politics of picking a fight over school funding with not just Gillard but a Liberal premier:
Abbott visited NSW Premier Barry O’Farrell and tried to persuade him not to sign up. O’Farrell, backed by his cabinet, rebuffed Abbott.
O’Farrell told Sky News’ Australian Agenda on Sunday “the existing funding formula is broken” and “unfair”. A direct repudiation of Abbott.
But Abbott cannot slide into office just promising to do Labor things, but better. Spending is out of control. He cannot sign up to spend as much as Labor.
But Kelly says he shouldn’t worry - the real spending hit only comes in his second term:

The budget boasted an extra $9.8 billion from the national government for schools across six years. But only $2.9bn falls in the next four years of forward estimates. The bulk comes in 2017-18 and 2018-19, well into the second term of any theoretical Abbott government. Yet these ballpark numbers grossly exaggerate the new funding.
Across the forward estimates Labor is redirecting to Gonski funds a series of five national funding plans worth $2.1bn. So the extra Gonski money is more like $800 million across four years. That’s no revolution. The Gonski funds come very slowly.
Yet they do come. 

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The ABC is killing Fairfax and betraying its charter. Answer: sell it

Andrew Bolt May 22 2013 (7:52am)

The arguments are sound, the politics difficult:
Tony Abbott is facing internal pressure from Victorian Liberals to privatise the ABC and SBS if he wins the September 14 election amid claims both organisations are struggling to comply with their charters…
The Victorian Liberal Party’s state conference this weekend will vote on a motion urging the federal Coalition to make a full-scale ‘’operational review’’ of the ABC and SBS to ‘’look at the feasibility of partial or full privatisation of both’’.
The motion says ...  both broadcasters ‘’aggressively compete’’ with private media outlets in a ‘’high-velocity public information environment’’…
Institute of Public Affairs executive director John Roskam said it was becoming ‘’more apparent by the day’’ that concerns about public ownership and bias would need to be addressed if the Coalition won the September 14 election.
Abbott does not want this debate before the election. But conservatives - and Fairfax shareholders and journalists - must quickly address the vast expansion of the ABC into on-line publishing. We are getting a state newspaper (electronic version) that is actually a propaganda sheet for the Left and is cannibalising the traditional audience of Fairfax mastheads, which must sell what the ABC is giving away.
UPDATE
Professor James Allan:

DOES it really matter if every host of the ABC’s Media Watch since its inception has left-of-centre sympathies?
Or if all the ABC political programs, not least Insiders, show an unmistakable tilt towards having more left-of-centre participants than right-of-centre ones, sometimes by a factor of 3:1?
... let’s consider a couple of analogies…
Does anyone doubt that if, say, the Labor Party got to pick every top judge that we would end up with a different set of rulings about how to read our Constitution and our federal statutes than if about half of these judges were chosen by Labor and half by the Coalition?
Of course we would. Because all of us bring to the table certain core beliefs that influence how we see and decide the borderline cases…
So the way the ABC selects its top hosts and participants for its big-ticket current affairs shows, choosing them overwhelmingly from one side of the political spectrum, means that we end up with less balance than if they were picked the way top judges are, with both sides of politics getting about even input…
Personally, I think there is real bias at the ABC. But let’s say I’m wrong. Why not at least improve the awful appearances and pick, say, at least one conservative host of Media Watch (ever) or make sure that exactly half of those who appear on Insiders have a lineage on each side of politics?
But I believe the ABC, certainly under Scott, has made it clear it has not the slightest intention of fixing its bias. To plead for balance at the ABC is to whistle in the wind.
Treat that hope as vain - even naive. So the next step is to conclude that what cannot be reformed must be sold. 

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That 97 per cent claim: four problems with Cook and Obama

Andrew Bolt May 22 2013 (7:13am)

Global warming - propaganda
John Cook’s claim got wide coverage:

Today, the most comprehensive analysis of peer-reviewed climate research to date was published in the journal Environmental Research Letters. Our analysis found that among papers expressing a position on human-caused global warming, over 97% endorsed the consensus position that humans are causing global warming. Overwhelming agreement among scientists had already formed in the early 1990s. And the consensus is getting stronger.
It was always odd that Cook, a Queensland University Climate Communication Research Fellow (what is that, exactly?), could find strong certainty about global warming science at the very time the failure of the world to warm as predicted was causing warmist scientists to rejig figures and think up new excuses.
Even the ABC this week conceded:

A recent slowdown in global warming means the harshest climate change predictions are less likely in the immediate decades, say an international team of scientists. Others argue the conclusions need to be taken with a ‘large grain of salt’.
But four key things are now emerging about Cook’s claim, which was swallowed whole by the usual media suspects, and was even tweeted by President Barack Obama.
First, the papers which explicity endorsed the standard global warming theory were outnumbered by those which explicitly denied it:

The guidelines for rating these abstracts [of papers on global warming] show only the highest rating value blames the majority of global warming on humans. No other rating says how much humans contribute to global warming. The only time an abstract is rated as saying how much humans contribute to global warming is if it mentions: 
that human activity is a dominant influence or has caused most of recent climate change (>50%).
If we use the system’s search feature for abstracts that meet this requirement, we get 65 results. That is 65, out of the 12,000+ examined abstracts. Not only is that value incredibly small, it is smaller than another value listed in the paper:

Reject AGW 0.7% (78)
Remembering AGW stands for anthropogenic global warming, or global warming caused by humans, take a minute to let that sink in.  This study done by John Cook and others, praised by the President of the United States, found more scientific publications whose abstracts reject global warming than say humans are primarily to blame for it…
This study found ~4,000 abstracts that say humans cause some amount of global warming. Only 143 of those indicate how much warming humans are responsible for. Of those, 65 say its a lot, 78 say it isn’t much.
Second, a theory is not proved by the number of scientists who believe it. And however popular, it can be disproved by a single fact.
Third, Cook’s study missed key papers by sceptical scientists.

Fourth, some of the papers Cook claims endorse global warming theory do not.
Says who? Say the scientists who wrote them:
I emailed a sample of scientists who’s papers were used in the study and asked them if the categorization by Cook et al. (2013) is an accurate representation of their paper. Their responses are eye opening and evidence that the Cook et al. (2013) team falsely classified scientists’ papers as “endorsing AGW"…

Craig D. Idso, Ph.D. Geography; Chairman, Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change

Dr. Idso, your paper ‘Ultra-enhanced spring branch growth in CO2-enriched trees: can it alter the phase of the atmosphere’s seasonal CO2 cycle?’ is categorized by Cook et al. (2013) as; “Implicitly endorsing AGW without minimizing it”.
Is this an accurate representation of your paper?
Idso: “That is not an accurate representation of my paper. The papers examined how the rise in atmospheric CO2 could be inducing a phase advance in the spring portion of the atmosphere’s seasonal CO2 cycle. Other literature had previously claimed a measured advance was due to rising temperatures, but we showed that it was quite likely the rise in atmospheric CO2 itself was responsible for the lion’s share of the change. It would be incorrect to claim that our paper was an endorsement of CO2-induced global warming.”
Nicola Scafetta, Ph.D. Physics; Research Scientist, ACRIM Science Team
Dr. Scafetta, your paper ‘Phenomenological solar contribution to the 1900–2000 global surface warming’ is categorized by Cook et al. (2013) as; “Explicitly endorses and quantifies AGW as 50+%”
Is this an accurate representation of your paper?

Scafetta: “Cook et al. (2013) is based on a strawman argument because it does not correctly define the IPCC AGW theory, which is NOT that human emissions have contributed 50%+ of the global warming since 1900 but that almost 90-100% of the observed global warming was induced by human emission.
What my papers say is that the IPCC view is erroneous because about 40-70% of the global warming observed from 1900 to 2000 was induced by the sun....
Please note that it is very important to clarify that the AGW advocated by the IPCC has always claimed that 90-100% of the warming observed since 1900 is due to anthropogenic emissions. While critics like me have always claimed that the data would approximately indicate a 50-50 natural-anthropogenic contribution at most...”
Nir J. Shaviv, Ph.D. Astrophysics; Associate Professor, Racah Institute of Physics, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel
Dr. Shaviv, your paper ‘On climate response to changes in the cosmic ray flux and radiative budget’ is categorized by Cook et al. (2013) as; “Explicitly endorses but does not quantify or minimise”
Is this an accurate representation of your paper?

Shaviv: “Nope… it is not an accurate representation. The paper shows that if cosmic rays are included in empirical climate sensitivity analyses, then one finds that different time scales consistently give a low climate sensitiviity. i.e., it supports the idea that cosmic rays affect the climate and that climate sensitivity is low. This means that part of the 20th century should be attributed to the increased solar activity and that 21st century warming under a business as usual scenario should be low (about 1°C)…
Science is not a democracy, even if the majority of scientists think one thing (and it translates to more papers saying so), they aren’t necessarily correct. Moreover, as you can see from the above example, the analysis itself is faulty, namely, it doesn’t even quantify correctly the number of scientists or the number of papers which endorse or diminish the importance of AGW.” 

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Stand up for our rule of law

Andrew Bolt May 22 2013 (6:54am)

Miranda Devine defends the magistrate who dealt with the Muslim man who refused to stand for her in court.
Devine blames the legal culture for making it difficult to punish such contempt. But the culture cannot change until one individual starts to push. I want that individual to be the magistrate, not the defendant.  

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Abbott prays for fair coverage

Andrew Bolt May 22 2013 (12:08am)

What Tony Abbott actually said:

I thank God every day for the privilege of leading this great party and I pray to God every day that my colleagues and I can give this great country the better government that it deserves
How the Sydney Morning Herald cast that in its first paragraph:

Opposition Leader Tony Abbott says he prays every day for an election victory.

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The night Mike Carlton showed us what he’s got. Dear God…

Andrew Bolt May 22 2013 (12:06am)

Tim Blair, in his update on the latest inanities of three writers of the Left, notes the verdict of Twitter on the performance of the boor Mike Carlton on the ABC’s Q&A:
...failed to impress on Q & A last night ...
Intrigued, and keen to check prejudice against evidence, I checked the transcript to see if this harsh judgment from a normally sympathetic medium was fair.
Here are all Carlton’s contributions to what the ABC fondly likes to imagine is an intellectually heavyweight show.
Note the reflex “blame America”, which leads Carlton to forget even the Cambodian genocide. Note the reflex hate-the-rich mockery, and the reflex resentment when another country snaffles what the business he expects our rich to have signed up. And note about all the schoolboy humor and, er, insights.
[UPDATE: Cut&Paste has edited excerpts, plus fact checks and screams of horror at his mumblings over oral sex.]
But judge for yourself: 

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#GreatGatsby Premiere #TobyMaguire #Spiderman #FoxStudios #should #be #interesting.
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LIMITED EDITION TRUE BLOOD HEART ICE CREAM AT MESSINA
Click here to read more:www.urbansociety.com.au/limited-edition-true-blood-heart-messina
This devil's food ice cream cake has been sprayed with red velvet chocolate and is filled with fruit syrup so it looks like it's bleeding when you take a bite. It's also giving us some kind of dessert panic attack…
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Helen Keller’s Letter to Nazi Germany

In 1933, she attacked book-burning German students
Slate’s new history blog recently posted a piece on a semi-obscure letter from Helen Keller to German university students in the wake of a decision to burn books that were deemed “un-German.” Among the books was Keller’s, whose political leanings were chronicled in How I Became a Socialist. As Rebecca Onion points out, Keller’s letter contained a prescient excoriation for Germany’s treatment of its Jewish citizens.
To the student body of Germany:
History has taught you nothing if you think you can kill ideas. Tyrants have tried to do that often before, and the ideas have risen up in their might and destroyed them.
You can burn my books and the books of the best minds in Europe, but the ideas in them have seeped through a million channels and will continue to quicken other minds. I gave all the royalties of my books for all time to the German soldiers blinded in the World War with no thought in my heart but love and compassion for the German people.
I acknowledge the grievous complications that have led to your intolerance; all the more do I deplore the injustice and unwisdom of passing on to unborn generations the stigma of your deeds.
Do not imagine that your barbarities to the Jews are unknown here. God sleepeth not, and He will visit His judgment upon you. Better were it for you to have a mill-stone hung around your neck and sink into the sea than to be hated and despised of all men.


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Senator Barbara Boxer blamed global warming for deadly tornadoes and advocated for her carbon tax.

Would a carbon tax have prevented this tragedy?

Details at CFACT's Climate Depot http://www.climatedepot.com/.
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A grassy knoll?
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STRETCHING TIPS: Always focus on your breath and relax as much as possible, if we don't focus on proper breathing during stretching then we deprive the muscles of oxygen and the energy needed to effectively achieve a good stretch. Proper breathing is deep, slow and long, to ensure the body is getting enough oxygen whilst also getting rid of toxins. Now that you know all this don't forget it and keep researching to find different ways to constantly help you improve! #team9lives #9livesparkour
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Walk by faith, not by sight. We are all scared of the unknown and what we can't see. But we have a God who does see and is faithful. We need to trust in His direction for our life. Eventually he will make it seen to us.
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☆•♥• Pepperoni & Mozzarella Pull Apart Bread Recipe! •♥•☆
http://www.inthekitchenwithkp.com/recipe/pepperoni-mozzarella-pull-apart-for-a-tasty-tailgate-sundaysupper
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The struggle of the spirit against the mindlessness: the composer, lyricist and music writer Richard Wagner in conversation nmz


Richard Wagner, Fotografie von Pierre-Louis Pierson, Aufnahmedatum: zwischen 28. Oktober und 4. November 1867, Abzug im Format carte-de-visite. Sammlung Gunther Braam, München
(Schott) - 
Before Richard Wagner This year there's no escape: Hardly a theater game plan comes in the anniversary year without him, no festival can do without the tension of the ubiquitous Tonsetzers, feature articles and magazines above are reflected in wordy appraisals, valuations and dedications. Everywhere will be talking about Richard Wagner, the new musikzeitung, however, has tried to talk to him. To the conversation, Juan Martin Koch tried.


new musikzeitung: Mr. Wagner, two years ago we spoke with your father Franz Liszt among other things, the "desire for change" in the musical and cultural life of our time (Schott 9/2011). What has done since then, in your view? 
Richard Wagner: The struggle of man against the existing society has begun. This struggle, he is the most sacred, the most sublime that has ever been fought, for he is the struggle of consciousness against the coincidence of the Spirit against the inanity, morality and evil, the force against the weak: it is the struggle for our determination, our right to our happiness. The status quo, it has great power over the people. Our current society has a terrible power over us because they deliberately inhibited the growth of our power. The power of this holy struggle we can only arise from the knowledge of the depravity of our society. If we are well aware of how our existing society of their task contradicts how violent and often intentionally keeps us, our determination, our right to get our happiness, we have also gained the strength to fight them, to defeat them. Our first, most important task is therefore: on all sides to examine the nature and work of our existing society, and to grasp more clearly, it is once detected, then it is also judged! (1) However, we have this modern world to shed light necessary in order for us to find out that nothing was to be hoped from it? You will always be hostile and under every form, such requests as we have for the care of a noble art, because they just what we want, do not want. (2)

The bloody heavy work of education

Schott: Where do you get the motivation to compose in such a hostile environment? 
Wagner: Only with true desperation, I always take back the Art on: happen Diess, and I must renounce the reality again - I have to throw myself back into the waves of the artistic imagination to satisfy me in an imaginary world, it must at least also helped my imagination, my imagination must be supported.Then I can not live like a dog, I can not embed on straw and refresh myself in booze: my very irritated, fine, immensely covetous, but extremely delicate and tender sensuality, must somehow be flattered if my mind the bloody heavy work of formation of a unvorhandenen world is to succeed. (3)
Schott: Which brings us indirectly reached even at the cultural education ... 
Wagner: The daily perceived and bitterly lamented gap between the so-called education and ignorance is so vast, a connecting link between the two so unthinkable, a reconciliation so impossible to admit at some sincerity, founded on those unnatural formation of modern art at its deepest shame is would, as a life elements owe their existence, which in turn can support its existence only to the deepest ignorance of the actual mass of humanity. The only thing that should be able to modern art in this their assigned position and assets in honest hearts aims, namely to spread education, they can not do, simply for the reason that because the art in order to somehow act in life can even the flower of a natural, that is grown out from below, education must be, can never be capable however, formation pour down from above. At best, therefore, resembles the person seeking in a foreign language a people communicate to themselves, which does not know this our culture art: Anything, and especially also the spirit richest person what he produces can only lead to the most ridiculous confusions and misunderstandings. (4)

"We have the whole press against us"

Schott: I wonder what lies at our school system, with its emphasis on the natural sciences. 
Wagner might if our science, the idol of the modern world, our state constitutions found so much out sense that they would be able, for example, figure out a cure for starving unemployed citizens, we should take them at the end of the substitutions for the impotent become ecclesiastical religion then . But they can not do anything. And the state is using its social "order" in the face of extended circles there like a lost child, and has only one concern to prevent that it would otherwise about. To this end, he pulls himself together, gives laws and increased the armies: the bravery is formed disciplinary action, which then in cases occurring injustice is protected against Übele consequences. (5)
Schott: What role do the media in this context? 
Wagner: We have the whole press against us, which is very natural: for she is the only who they interested by material for themselves. All the rulers of this world, from the highest to the lowest powers, have their advocates, their organs in the press. Conviction is nothing here that interests all. (6)
Schott: Do you see a way out? 
Wagner: We need to set ourselves an organ in the daily press. Even in my report on the music school I have shown the necessity of starting a specifischen press organ for the same. Diess must now be placed immediately into the work, without any loss of time. (7)
Schott: Interesting, because we would have to bring one or the other suggestion ... 
Wagner: I wish that this sheet of 1 January of the next year to appear. I have already counseled me about it. The cost of such weekly Journales are not important: I have made for me by experts to calculate, after which with 3000 florins to justify this magazine and to be maintained to the point where they must entertain through their own sales themselves. In the cheap requirement that my Creirung would be entrusted to the music school, I had already ordered the redaction of this Journales considered.(8)

The drama illuminated by artistic creation

Schott: We'll closely monitor ... Again back to the position of art and music: As an important means for their anchoring in society puts so for some time placement in the center. Are they right? 
Wagner: Every art form divides naturally only in the degree of, as the core, the drama zureist in it, which can stimulate and justify the work of art only by its relation to man or in his derivation of it.Allverständlich, fully understood and justified, each art work in proportion as it rises in the drama, the drama is illuminated. (9)
Schott: The now refers primarily to your own work. Can your conception of the musical drama because claim universal validity? 
Wagner: Who has understood me as it would have been me to do it, set up an arbitrary erdachtes system, henceforth musicians and poets should work after that did not want to understand me. But who also wants to believe the new, what I said about, based on absolute acceptance and is not identical with the experience and the nature of the developed object that is can not understand me, even if he wanted to. The new thing that I said about, is nothing else than me become aware of the unconscious in the nature of things, as I became aware of the THINKING artist, because I sensed that its connection to what has so far been taken only separated by artists. I have therefore invented nothing new, but just found that connection. (10)
Schott: Hmm ... Do not you have the impression that your opinion has now become established? 
Wagner: The utter immaturity of the theater-going public of our provincial cities in terms of a for precipitating first sentence of a new, it occurring Art phenomenon - because it's only used already outwardly judged of and demonstrated to see accreditirte works - brought me to the decision , at any price to bring in smaller theaters a larger work for the first performance. (11)

Neglected area of ​​public art

Schott: That seems to me a blanket judgment too ... 
Wagner: The perfect Styllosigkeit of German opera, and the almost grotesque incorrectness of their services, the hope is corporate to meet in a home theater for higher task practiced art means not to grasp: the author, in this neglected public art areas, a seriously intentioned, intends to make greater task applies to its support of anything, as the real talent of individual singers who taught in any school, guided by no style for the presentation, here and there, rarely - because this is the talent of the Germans on the whole low - and leave completely themselves, occur. Therefore it can not provide a single theater, would be able, happy case, only an association airborne forces, which would be called together for a certain time on a certain point. (12)
Schott: What role do the structural conditions of the theater? 
Wagner: The role of the theater building for the future must be considered by no means our modern theater building as solved: in them are conventional assumptions and laws giving maaß who with the requirements of pure art nothing in common. Where acquisition speculation act determines on the one hand, and with her luxurious ostentation on the other hand, the absolute interest of art must be affected to the most sensitive, and so not a builder of the world is as it is able, that by the separation of our audience in under most diverse objects and citizenship categories offered layering and fragmentation of the auditoriums on legislation to raise the beauty. If we are in the theater of the future of the common rooms, we see without difficulty that to a rich field of the invention is open to him. (13)
Schott: What do you say about the state of the orchestra, whose existence threatened repeatedly appears. What function does it perform today? 
Wagner: The orchestra has an undeniable power of speech, and the creations of our modern instrumental music have revealed to us Diess. We have the symphonies of Beethoven Diess seen develop language skills to a level from which it felt forced, even to say what exactly it but can not speak to his nature. Now that we have just supplied in the Wortversmelodie him what he could not pronounce, and zuwiesen him as the carrier of this kindred melody, the effectiveness of it - totally easy - just only that should not say what it is by its nature can only speak, - we call this ability to speak clearly to the orchestra as meaning that it is the manifestation of the power of the ineffable. (14)

Horny modern opera, music, and other excesses

Schott: Beethoven - well and good, but the "modern instrumental music" is even now but already a bit further. How do you assess the current composers scene? 
Wagner: Only the incompetent, weak, knows no nothwendigstes, strongest soul desire in himself: in him outweighs any moment the random, occasionally excited by external desires that he, precisely because it is only a longing for it can never be silent, and therefore, arbitrarily thrown from one to the other back and forth, never even get to the real enjoyment. Did this Bedürfnißlose but the power to pursue the satisfaction random cravings persistent, so just created the hideous, unnatural phenomena in life and in art, which we as outgrowths insane selfish and bustle, as murderous lust of the despot, or as a horny modern opera, comply with such unspeakable disgust. (15)
Schott: Who do you specifically have in mind with this diagnosis, and why maybe we can discuss some other time. In our context, however, would be interesting to see which treatment you suggest. 
Wagner: The outrageous Dani Eder chairs our present domestic German composer initially made ​​me aware of what is to take now: (16) Complete you, you unfortunate people, a healthy digestion, and suddenly living in a very different shape to yourself, when you could seen it from the abdomen Plage out!Truly, all of our politics, diplomacy, ambition, fainting and science, and - unfortunately - our whole modern art, in which one has the palate to spoilage of the stomach so long only satisfied, irritated, and again tried to flatter, until finally insensibly only one body was still galvanisirt, - verily, all these Schmarotzergewüchse of our life today have no other reason and soil from which they grow, as - ruined our abdomen! Oh! wanted and everyone could understand me, I Diess - almost ridiculous-sounding - and yet so terribly shouts true word! - But now I realize that I am the hundredth to the thousandth gerathe: I will finally close then! (17)
Schott: In fact, even the space is limited in our monthly ... 
Wagner: Above all, however, I must also have money: (18) Could you give me at once, but in a few days or 100 dollars to any percentage ... (19)
Schott: ... here we have to cancel, unfortunately, Mr. Wagner. Thank you for this interview!

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Bit of quick fire fun for you – can you spot the 5 differences in this pic from 'Nightmare in Silver'?

You can get two more spot-the-differences (and the answers to this one) on the BBC Doctor Who website: http://bbc.in/1a0PoDh
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One more for my contention that I would REALLY be okay with chasing for more than two days each year.
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Another View from this morning's storm over Oklahoma.
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José Guadalupe Posada 1852-1913
El Jarabe en Ultratumba (A Jig Beyond the Grave) c.1910
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20 Pearls of Wisdom From The Book of Job

If you're enduring a season of hardship, be encouraged and use this time to build your faith. God is still on the throne and He's in control. Let these 20 pearls of wisdom from the book of Job remind us that God always has the last say in our lives....

READ MORE ►http://r.beliefnet.com/JobILJO
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I'm with Kate Wilkinson MP and the Opus team which is working on the $2m Kaiapoi Riverbanks development, funded by The Christchurch Earthquake Appeal
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JEWISH COMMUNITY REACHES OUT TO OKLAHOMA TORNADO VICTIMS

As emergency crews sort through the wreckage of yesterday’s Oklahoma tornado, which has killed at least 51 people, the Jewish community is reaching out to offer support. Israeli Prime MinisterBenjamin Netanyahu - בנימין נתניהו contacted President Barack Obama early this morning, expressing his condolences and prayers. Meanwhile, the Chabad Community Center of Southern Oklahoma is organizing a supply drive for victims, many of whom saw their homes flattened during the Monday storm.

Read full article: http://www.jspace.com/news/articles/jewish-community-reaches-out-to-oklahoma-tornado-victims/14074

Follow Jewish news at Jspace.com.
 — ‎with ‎דורית קוסטיקה‎.‎
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L’Oreal Professional Hair rehab, exclusive in- salon treatments.
These highly concentrated, long lasting prescriptive treatments will leave your locks feeling supple and looking well tressed. 
With winter here and our moods dwindling come in for the ultimate pick me up. 
For a limited time we are offering an after colour blow dry and treatment for $40.00.
If you would like to take advantage of this fabulous offer with your next colour please inform Rose at Reception.
Colin Moxey Hairdressing
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Incredible footage of Jerusalem from the year 1896!
http://www.israelvideonetwork.com/jerusalem-in-1896-jews-muslims-christians-living-under-the-ottomans
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HISTORY IN THE HEADLINES: An international team of scientists has finally solved one of history’s greatest mysteries: What caused the devastating Irish potato famine of 1845?http://histv.co/10jpo56
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Retired U.S. Army Sgt. Troy Gamble shares the powerful story behind this American flag he put up amid tornado debris --http://tinyurl.com/mwynxxz
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I have a poster in my window and also a couple of small ones on my car of my local Liberal candidate Emanuele Cicchiello. When I went out to my car this morning, I discovered that it had been 'egged'! You know when the oposition can't beat you with reasoned debate, but...
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I was leaving the OKC area today when I saw some dark clouds on my left. I decided to take a closer look and found a beautiful dark blue shelf structure filling up the entire sky, slowly churning down the road... it was also producing baseball sized hail, so I avoided that nice teal colored hail shaft.
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If you try to serve people, it impresses them. If you try to impress people it irritates them.

Pastor Rick Warren'

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Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sent a letter of condolences to the President and people of the United States, following the tragic tornado in Oklahoma.

The Prime Minister wrote:
On behalf of the Government and people of Israel, I offer our heartfelt condolences to you and to the people of the United States on the massive tornado that struck in Oklahoma and exacted such a horrific toll in human life.

Our thoughts and prayers are with the victims of this tragedy and their families at this difficult time.

In friendship,
Benjamin Netanyahu

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Mini lion
Gillette the best a cat can get
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JensenSutta-Malkin-2
Photo credit: www.jensensutta.com
Hi everyone! Here's the MichelleMalkin.com newsletter for May 21st. Enjoy!

From the Blog

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Michelle's Top Tweets

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And ... Our Hate Tweet of the Day

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*Sigh*

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HMS Beagle

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