Saturday, September 21, 2013

Sat Sep 21st Todays News

Germany is nearing election where the conservative leader is likely to win. Greens made a tactical mistake early pushing to legalise pedophilia. The only way the press can even the score is to make out another conservative government will have a policy of pepper spraying fare evaders. News come of the possibility of an accident nuking North Carolina early in JFK's reign. Too late to expect Jacky or Bobby to answer for their incompetence, but I'm uncomfortable with the justice they received. Apparently the safety measures put in place by Eisenhower worked, but that Republican President is dead so there is no need to thank him. 
In modern times, a dithering Obama has peacefully created a world where moderate Iranians make Iraqis execute former Saddam supporters. No news of Obama asking to hit Iran as he wanted to hit Syria. 
In sad election news, it looks like crank Palmer has managed to buy himself a seat in parliament, denying a serious candidate. The result is close, so there will be a recount. Already Palmer has discredited his win claiming the armed services are conspiring .. to let him win. Suggesting he won't improve parliament, but he may make it more watchable. 
The Pope has spoken sense, but his angry critics claim it is proof he endorses them. How would Islamics behave if their senior member said the same as Francis? I note one Islamist recently plotted to kill Prince Harry. What would Climate warming believers do if their scientists revealed the truth? We may never know. 
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Hatches

Happy birthday and many happy returns Valerie Alexandra Tarela. Born on the same day, across the years, as Bertha of Savoy (1051), Polyxena of Hesse-Rotenburg (1706), John Loudon McAdam (1756), H. G. Wells, (1866), Allen Lane (1902), Larry Hagman (1931), Leonard Cohen (1934), Jerry Bruckheimer (1945), Stephen King (1947), Faith Hill (1967), Nicole Richie (1981) and Christian Serratos (1990)
Matches




Despatches
19 BC – Virgil, Roman poet (b. 70 BC)
1327 – Edward II of England (b. 1284)
1798 – George Read, American lawyer and politician, signer of the United States Declaration of Independence (b. 1733)
1832 – Walter Scott, Scottish author, poet, and playwright (b. 1771)
1860 – Arthur Schopenhauer, German philosopher (b. 1788)
1998 – Florence Griffith-Joyner, American runner (b. 1959)
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Bolt Report tomorrow

Andrew Bolt September 21 2013 (4:45pm)

Note - a time change because of our sports coverage. The Bolt Report will be on Channel 10 on Sunday at 11.30am and 4pm.
Tomorrow: Tony Abbott’s excellent culture war.  Tim Flannery: the question isn’t why the Chief Climate Commissioner was sacked, but why he was hired. Plus some advice for ABC managing director Mark Scott.
Guests: Liberal MP Dr Dennis Jensen, Profesor Judith Sloan and Labor’s Kimberley Kitching.

The twitter feed.
The place the videos appear

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Palmer wins. Reason weeps

Andrew Bolt September 21 2013 (2:47pm)

Damn:
THE seat of Fairfax is headed for a recount after Clive Palmer finished just 36 votes ahead of his Liberal National Party opponent Ted O’Brien.

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A Muslim, you say?

Andrew Bolt September 21 2013 (2:43pm)

A member of a not-entirely-coincidental faith confesses:

A Muslim convert planned to disarm a royal bodyguard and use the gun to kill Prince Harry in an attack he had named Operation Regal.
Ashraf Islam, 31, formerly known as Mark Townley, confessed to police that he had ‘’advanced plans’’ to kill the Prince the day after he was arrested in May…
... he began to feel ‘’scared and nervous’’ and walked into Hounslow police station in west London, where he confessed to the plot.

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God returns. The people, too

Andrew Bolt September 21 2013 (11:43am)

Julia Gillard on September 14, 2010:

I, JULIA Eileen Gillard, do solemnly and sincerely affirm and declare that I will well and truly serve the Commonwealth of Australia in the office of prime minister.
Tony Abbott, September 18, 2013:

I, ANTHONY John Abbott, do swear that I will well and truly serve the people of Australia in the office of prime minister and that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, Queen of Australia. So help me God!

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Prime Hugger

Andrew Bolt September 21 2013 (11:35am)

Brian Loughnane, Coalition campaign director at the election, writes in the always excellent Spectator of his big night:
It is not commonly appreciated what a sensitive, tactile sort of guy Tony Abbott really is. For me, this manifests itself in his addiction to man hugs. Most of the men in his office and his senior male colleagues just go with the flow and are regular recipients of an affectionate bear hug. Early on, I cut a deal to be exempt until 10pm on election night. As it turned out, I was able to inform our new Prime Minister he had a majority in the House of Representatives at about 8.45pm. My resistance weakened and I was rewarded with a memorable Abbott bear hug.
The most moving hug of the night was between John Howard and Tony Abbott. It was an emotional moment for those watching, marking the passing of the torch.
Loughnane has a tip:

I’m not sure what odds the bookies are offering on Kevin Rudd leading Labor at the next election, but I’ve told my team not to archive the K. Rudd files.

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Age buries lead: world not warming as it claimed

Andrew Bolt September 21 2013 (10:45am)

The warmist Age frantically beats up the warming scare - and buries the real story:

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Only deep in the story does The Age grudgingly report the real news that makes its first paragraph a joke:

The draft report ...also says warming has slowed in the past 15 years to 0.05 degrees a decade - below the long-term average of 0.12 degrees since 1951...
That utterly trivial amount of warming suggests that the carbon dioxide emissions The Age warns about in its first paragraph may not be much to worry about, after all. All those extra emissions have produced almost none of the warming we were told to expect. Ergo: the global warming theory could be bust.
That’s the real story. So why didn’t The Age report it? Why the scary first paragraph instead? Why the freak-out Photoshopped image of a warming devastation that hasn’t occurred - and probably won’t?

UPDATE
From today’s letters page of The Age - proof that despite the lone efforts of cartoonist John Spooner, the paper has created a micro-bubble culture of fervent warmists and Abbott-haters, able to sustain rage but not circulation:

As an environmental scientist, I find Tony Abbott’s not-so-subtle climate denial so irresponsibly retrogressive that I wonder what hope Australia has of taking science seriously… David Morley, Minyirr, WA
Is closing the Climate Commission part of a deliberate strategy to dumb down the conversation by stopping the flow of informed scientific information? We are intelligent people, Mr Abbott, who need, and deserve, to be informed… Susan Pepper, Northcote
The mind boggles at the sea of ignorance in which our new government is swimming… From a nation of vision, leading the world towards a necessary low carbon-dioxide-emission future, to an insipid, selfish, follower-nation in three strokes… Jill Dumsday, Ashburton
Australia has experienced its hottest 12 months, its hottest summer, its hottest winter and hottest winter’s day on record. And Mr Abbott saves $1.2 million scrapping the Climate Commission that was delivering bad news about future disasters… Doug Steley, Heyfield

The axing of the Climate Commission has little to do with rationalising government. It is more a latter day form of book burning… Tim Mulligan, Warragul

Mr Abbott’s assertion that he will only tell us what he wants to is more worrying… Will we have to wait until a change of government to discover what is being done in our name and with our money? William Chandler, Surrey Hills
I work with a 17-year-old Hazara from Afghanistan seeking asylum… Under Mr Abbott’s new policies, if/when he is found to be a refugee, he will not be granted a permanent protection visa. Consequently, he will not have the right to bring his family to Australia… That we as a prosperous and secure country will do this to him is shameful and wrong. Amelia McDermott, West Brunswick
I guess the jury is out on Julie Bishop’s ability to be the best foreign minister… Such a belittling performance does not engender confidence in our representative on the global stage. Judy McKay, Maidstone
So many ‘’more qualified’’ male cabinet ministers in the Abbott government. I’d like some explanations as to what exclusive or official qualifications they are… Christine Hancock, Fitzroy
I’m tired of smug men and pandering women telling me and other women we have not earned leadership positions and it’s time we stepped up… What has been made clear is that this government does not adequately represent the women of this nation. Nhi Hoang, Richmond
The inability of women to advance politically and socially in Australia ...is, quite bluntly, related to an enduring and entrenched male sexism; and not just ‘’an informal boys’ club’’… Jon McMillan, Mt Eliza
Will the ABC commission a four-part comedy series to take viewers into the life of Prime Minister Tony Abbott?.. It would surely include early morning run drop-ins from Julie Bishop, phone calls from Archbishop Pell and a twitchy security detail. Robyn Sutherland, Ivanhoe
Add to those letters these, also from today’s Age:
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Also in today’s letters page: three further letters attacking the Liberal Victorian Government or its projects. On the entire page is just one letter criticising Labor, and then from someone sounding more like a disgruntled supporter.
The Age has become a Leftist monoculture. What an indictment of its management.   

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The more they scream, the better Abbott is doing

Andrew Bolt September 21 2013 (10:39am)

Politics - federal
Terry McCrann has an excellent metric for Tony Abbott’s success:

The more bleating we hear from Fairfax, the ABC, the Suzukis, Flannerys, Karolys and all the dreadful rest, the more we will know that Abbott is succeeding in the fine art of restoring rationality and even more basic sanity to government.

Indeed.
Some of those steps this week:
Week one of the new government was an excellent start…
The two big governing things he did were the changes in departmental heads and the moves to throw into the dustbin of history the Rudd-Gillard governments’ wasteful and punitive edifices of climate change main-chancing kleptocracy…
Our Rudd-Gillard targeted emissions cuts were going to make four-fifths of five-eighths of very little difference to global emissions, far less “the climate”, local and global…
The coming departure of Martin Parkinson from Treasury could be justified on his dark climate change past alone. And he must surely be followed—or preceded—by the head of Treasury’s macro-economic group, David Gruen.
Gruen presided over the most ludicrous nonsense to ever emerge from Treasury… This was the climate change policy modelling which purported to tell us that we could abandon cheap, carbon-based energy and our economy would hardly blink.
Those two streams beautifully merged in the most inane chart that has ever appeared in a government document, in the 2012 budget papers, which claimed that by 2050 we would be getting almost all our energy from windmills and solar panels. 

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It’s not racist to identify the rapists

Andrew Bolt September 21 2013 (10:36am)

It says something about the reluctance of the media class to speak frankly about ethnic crime that even a respected senior journalist of The Age must say beg-pardons before discussing a startling phenomenon:
Last week in this space, the most dedicated former head of clinical forensic medicine, David Wells, not so much blew the whistle as opened up with a trombone on a largely hidden scandal.

A group of taxi drivers are raping women and not much is being done about it. He identified 25 cases in three years, with many more going unreported…

If the emails that arrived here this week are any indication, there is a significant number of women so scarred by their experiences they are now frightened to catch taxis on their own.
First we need to address the elephant in the room.
Most (but not all) of the complaints we have received say the offending drivers were overseas-born students.
At this point the cravat-wearers will splutter on their croissants and declare this story racist. Too bad, we say. The issue is criminal not cultural.  

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Preach your own gospel, but don’t expect the Catholics to hand you their pulpit

Andrew Bolt September 21 2013 (10:30am)

Is it really so hard for Leftist priests (and journalists) to understand that their pulpit belongs to the church and is for the use of preaching church doctrine, not personal opinion?
Dissident priest Greg Reynolds has been both defrocked and excommunicated over his support for women priests and gays - the first person ever excommunicated in Melbourne, he believes…
‘’I’ve come to this position because I’ve followed my conscience on women’s ordination and gay marriage.’’…
Archbishop Hart said Father Reynolds was excommunicated because after his priestly faculties were withdrawn he continued to celebrate the Eucharist publicly and preach contrary to the teachings of the church.
So found your own church. 

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Don’t hide the boats

Andrew Bolt September 21 2013 (10:23am)

Boat people policy
Keeping such information from us seems an attempt to dodge accountability:

Immigration Minister Scott Morrison’s office has clamped down on information about asylum-seekers issued by his department and border protection agencies.
Previously, the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service has issued statements whenever an asylum-seeker boat arrived and the Immigration Department provided collated figures each month, which they made publicly available.
But inquiries to both the department and border protection service on boat arrivals are now being directed to the minister’s office. Mr Morrison’s spokesman is declining to provide any information.
This is not a good look. The Government may argue that reporting successful boat arrivals just encourages more, but not reporting them seems an attempt to stop us from holding the government to its promises. 

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People Abbott needs to promote one day

Andrew Bolt September 21 2013 (9:47am)

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Professor Judith Sloan loses her heart:
...there is a new man in my life.  Actually, I haven’t met him but he is the new Liberal member for Hume.  His name is Angus Taylor.
I say watch this space.  He is a country boy raised on a cattle station. He was a Rhodes Scholar and worked for Port Jackson Partners (one of the best consulting firms around) before returning to the country.
He looks like future PM material to me.
Sloan says the Coalition’s backbench makes the frontbench look a but humdrum, and ripe for renewal it the not-distant future. She names the future stars:
Kelly O’Dwyer (should have been Parliamentary Secretary – she was robbed)
Michaelia Cash
Josh Frydenberg
Paul Fletcher
Alan Tudge
Scott Ryan
Mitch Fifield
Tony Smith (again robbed)
Christian Porter
Arthur Sinodinos
Jamie Briggs
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A 2GB listener told me this week one other name should be on that list - Sussan Ley, Assistant Minister for Education:
Born in Nigeria to British parents, Sussan Ley spent her early childhood in the United Arab Emirates, before migrating to Australia at the age of 13 with her parents and older brother… [She has] a Bachelor of Economics, Master of Taxation Law and a Master of Accounting… [and] a Commercial Pilot’s License which she still holds. This interest also led to work as an air traffic controller with Sydney and Melbourne Airports, aerial stock-mustering in outback New South Wales and Queensland before life on the land as a shed hand / shearers’ cook through a large chunk of rural Australia.
During a livestock and dairy farming partnership (near Tallangatta in North East Victoria) of seventeen years, Sussan experienced the highs and lows that routinely test the resolve of farming families…
Still helping manage the farm Sussan took up a position with the Australian Taxation Office at Albury, graduating to the role of Director, Technical Training before seeking Liberal Party pre-selection for the Federal seat of Farrer in 2001…
Shadow portfolios for Housing and Women followed in 2007, Justice and Customs /Assistant Treasurer (2008 -2009) then Childcare, Early Childhood Learning & Employment Participation (2010-2013).

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How dumb is Colin Barnett?

Andrew Bolt September 21 2013 (8:35am)

Terry McCrann asks a very good question:

IS West Australian Premier Colin Barnett the stupidest man in Australia or merely the stupidest politician?
The reason for it:

New Prime Minister Tony Abbott built his entire political campaign over three long and bitterly contested years on holding Julia Gillard to account for her broken “there will be no carbon tax” promise from 2010.
He has staked not only his government’s entire credibility, and indeed its very ability to function, but also his own personal integrity on not repeating that fundamental breach of faith with voters…
So up pops the premier prat from the west to ask that he ... [abandon] his core promise not to change, and most certainly not to increase, the GST.
And why should the federal government increase the GST? To bail Barnett out from his self-created big-spending mess, which has seen WA state debt explode, culminating in the loss of its triple-A credit rating.
And why does Barnett need bailing out? More stupidity:

The old Aussie saying about someone not being able to organise a piss-up in a brewery now has a 21st-century equivalent. Barnett has shown himself to be a state leader who can’t balance the books while reaping the huge revenues from the biggest boom any state has ever experienced.
UPDATE
Professor Sinclair Davidson:

Colin Barnett is just another mendicant premier wanting Canberra and taxpayers to validate his irresponsible spending decisions. 

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On David Marr and the greatest failure of modern journalism

Andrew Bolt September 21 2013 (8:01am)

Global warming - general, Media
For years, most journalists in the mainstream media haven’t just failed to question the global warming fear campaign. They have refused to even listen to any evidence against it, and have howled down those who dared present it.
This has been the most shameful collective failure of journalism in the past 20 years. Journalists became propagandists, even witchhunters.
If you think I exaggerate just watch the clip above from my time on the ABC’s Insiders, which shows what happened when I mentioned the warming pause which had then lasted eight years. Note the scoffing of Annabel Crabb, now an ABC star in her own right. Note even more the rudeness and la-la-laa-not-listening routine of David Marr, the former ABC Media Watch host. The herd instinct at work. The true denialism.
Or here is another example - the strongly warmist Age running this picture to mock sceptic Christopher Monckton over a symptom of his illness in order to discredit him and any who dared meet him:

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But the warming pause kept going, and is now so undeniable and so contrary to global warming theory that it has blown up this stifling “consensus”.
Professor Judith Curry, chair of the school of earth and atmospheric sciences at the Georgia Institute of Technology, describes the IPCC’s desperate attempts in its latest summary to explain away a now 15-year pause in global warming:

Here is the relevant text from the leaked final draft of the AR5 summary for policymakers: “Models do not generally reproduce the observed reduction in surface warming trend over the last 10-15 years.
“The observed reduction in warming trend over the period 1998-2012 as compared to the period 1951-2012 is due in roughly equal measure to a cooling contribution from internal variability and a reduced trend in radiative forcing (medium confidence).
“The reduced trend in radiative forcing is primarily due to volcanic eruptions and the downward phase of the current solar cycle. However, there is low confidence in quantifying the role of changes in radiative forcing in causing this reduced warming trend. There is medium confidence that this difference between models and observations is to a substantial degree caused by unpredictable climate variability, with possible contributions from inadequacies in the solar, volcanic and aerosol forcings used by the models and, in some models, from too strong a response to increasing greenhouse-gas forcing.”
The IPCC acknowledges the pause and admits climate models do not reproduce the pause. I infer from these statements that the IPCC has failed to convincingly explain the pause in terms of external radiative forcing from greenhouse gases, aerosols, solar or volcanic forcing; this leaves natural internal variability as the predominant candidate to explain the pause.
Natural internal variability is associated with chaotic interactions between the atmosphere and ocean… The IPCC refers to this as “unpredictable climate variability” in its statement above.
My chain of reasoning leads me to conclude that the IPCC’s estimates of the sensitivity of climate to greenhouse gas forcing are too high, raising serious questions about the confidence we can place in the IPCC’s attribution of warming in the last quarter of the 20th century primarily to greenhouse gases, and also its projections of future warming. If the IPCC attributes the pause to natural internal variability, then this prompts the question as to what extent the warming between 1975 and 2000 can also be explained by natural internal variability.
Many journalists must asked themselves why they never questioned an apocalyptic faith that is now collapsing. Why they mocked or shunned those who did.  Such a sin against true journalism needs some explanation. 
UPDATE
Some newspapers are still actively promoting this obscene denialism. The Age, for instance, now has a scientist-in-residence, a warmist, who Age staff have been encouraged to consult when reporting on the release next week of the IPCC’s report.
What odds that any sceptical reporting will get through the Age filters?  

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Beats Miley for cuteness
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Archaeologist and explorer Harrison Ford plummed the mysteries of the past in the 1981 film, "Raiders of the Lost Ark." Many intriguing archaeology puzzles remain unsolved.
Source: Lucasfilm Ltd.


Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/science/slideshow/2013/09/20/history-mysteries-archaeology-mysteries-from-past/?intcmp=features#slide=1#ixzz2fWBEeSsJ

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A passenger on a train in Germany was stung with capsicum spray and then beaten for allegedly not having a ticket, mobile phone footage has revealed.
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Catholics around the world may be especially tuned in during Sunday's homilies, following Pope Francis' bombshell interview in which he urged the church to take a softer line on the hot-button issues that have become increasingly polarizing in recent years.
“We cannot insist only on issues related to abortion, gay marriage and the use of contraceptive methods," Francis said in a 12,000-word article published Thursday in Jesuit journals in 16 countries. "We have to find a new balance; otherwise even the moral edifice of the church is likely to fall like a house of cards, losing the freshness and fragrance of the Gospel."


Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/world/2013/09/20/religious-figures-overjoyed-by-pope-francis-comments-marking-new-dawn-in/#ixzz2fWBkdZsI

Clearly the Pope worships God .. do any of his critics who campaign on issues? - ed
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Initially, it was a massacre that much of the world greeted with silence.
While controversy raged about chemical weapons in Syria, in neighboring Iraq 52 Iranians living in an exile camp were killed.  Relatives of the victims say Iraqi-backed forces committed the Sep.1 slaughter. Iraq denies the allegation.
Among the dead was Amir Emadi’s 56 year old father. He says the Iraqis “were there to execute.” 
 Emadi, a U.S. citizen living in San Diego, claims they “were not just there to scare people off. They had targets and they shot every single one of my friends and my father’s friends and my father in the head.”


Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/world/2013/09/20/massacre-52-iranians-at-exile-camp-in-iraq-draws-international-attention/#ixzz2fWC6bEnZ

Will Obama want to hit Iran too? - ed
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"I'm not your friend. I'm your mother,'' she writes.
"And I am here to give you the boundaries that you need to become a functional responsible adult.
"You may hate me now...But I don't care. Its my job to raise a responsible adult...not nurture bad habits in my teenage child.''


Read more: http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/breaking-news/angry-mum-launches-internet-tirade-against-her-8216lippy8217-teenage-one-direction-fan-daughter/story-e6frfkp9-1226724321675#ixzz2fViQmacq

오사렘 The apple doesn't fall far from the tree?? Sounds like this woman let her daughter walk over her too many times in the past, why is she even angry her daughter pulled such a stunt? You can't let them have it easy for so long & get away with deceit & disresepect & then suddenly get angry when they don't give you the respect that you desire. I would never have to do such an extreme thing to my daughters, they know from the get go what is expected from them. Trying to clean up the mess after the fact its a little too late.
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In the 1980s, some members of Germany's Green Party advocated the legalization of sex with minors. Now the party wants to come to terms with this dark chapter via an independent review of internal documents -- some of which show that the influence of pedophiles on the young party was much stronger than previously thought.
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A BOARDING school education, gifts at Christmas and birthdays … Charlotte Colquhoun may have been illegitimate, but her baronet father ensured she enjoyed at least some of the privileges of an aristocratic background.
Now the eldest child of Sir Malcolm Colquhoun is quite literally trading on her heritage - by selling herself for sex.
Miss Colquhoun, 37, alludes to her blue blood on explicit websites where she advertises herself as a $250-an-hour 'escort' under the name Charlie Foxtrot - claiming her public school education makes her even more desirable.
And the mother-of two has posted photographs of her Old Etonian father, her titled grandfather, the family crest - even her birth certificate - on her Facebook page, alongside intimate photographs of herself semi-naked.
Confronted about her work, Miss Colquhoun told the Daily Mail: 'I'm sure my father would have a fit if he found out.'
Sir Malcolm, 65, who owns two private schools in London and a 40,000-acre country estate, fathered Miss Colquhoun when he was 28, after a fling with interior designer Susan Armstrong.
He went on to marry twice - first to an American in 1978, while his current wife Katharine is Australian - but kept in touch with his first child and funded her schooling, even after producing an heir, Patrick, now 32.

it doesn't matter, it is all a joke .. right? - ed
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A COUPLE didn't report that their 10-year-old daughter had been shot for more than five hours because they thought she was menstruating, police have revealed.
The girl was sleeping in her Hayward home in California around 2am on Thursday when a stray bullet from drive-by shooting wounded her in the buttocks, Sergeant Mark Ormsby said on Friday.
When the girl woke up in pain and had blood in her underwear, her parents thought she had started her period, police said.
They also found no indication she had been shot when they took her to the bathroom.
Ormsby said when she woke up for school and was still in pain, her parents inspected her bed and saw bullet holes.
The girl's doctor told investigators the bullet's entry wound was small and could have been easily overlooked if the family thought she was menstruating.
The girl remained hospitalised in a stable condition on Friday, Lieutenant Mark Stuart said.
Police don't have a motive for the shooting and no arrest has been made.


Read more: http://www.news.com.au/world-news/couple-thought-shot-girl-had-period-after-10yearold-hit-in-driveby-shooting/story-fndir2ev-1226724385210#ixzz2fWNKqDeX

She lives .. but society and culture are dying .. ed
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"If Europe thinks Jews will return to the days where we were forced to mark our products, you can forget it. Delegitimization of parts of Israel by Europe is the new anti-Semitism. The old anti-Semitism led to the destruction of our people in gas chambers. We will not allow the new anti-Semitism to hurt us." — Ayelet Shaked, Member of Knesset
A group of former European leaders have called on the European Union not to ease or delay the implementation of new rules that would prohibit the EU from funding Israeli institutions based or operating anywhere beyond theGreen Line, including eastern Jerusalem.
In a September 16 letter addressed to the foreign ministers of the 28 EU member states and to EU foreign relations chief Catherine Ashton, 15 members of the so-called European Eminent Persons Group expressed "great concern" at attempts to "delay, modify or even suspend the European Commission guidelines on funding of Israeli entities in the territories occupied by Israel since June 1967."
The letter -- signed by longtime Israel critics including former EU foreign policy chief and NATO secretary-general Javier Solana, former French foreign minister Hubert Védrine, and former Spanish foreign minister Miguel Ángel Moratinos -- argues that the "strict application" of the guidelines "serves to reiterate that the EU does not recognize and will not support settlements and other illegal facts on the ground."
The "guidelines" refer to a new directive -- the long title is "Guidelines on the Eligibility of Israeli Entities and their Activities in the Territories Occupied by Israel since June 1967 for Grants, Prizes and Financial Instruments funded by the EU from 2014 Onwards" -- that forbids EU organizations and institutions from funding or cooperating with any Israeli entities based in Judea and Samaria, eastern Jerusalem or the Golan Heights.
The directive -- which was published on July 19, 2013 and will take effect on January 1, 2014 -- includes a requirement that all future agreements between the EU and Israel include a clause in which Israel accepts the EU position that none of the territory beyond the Green Line belongs to Israel.
Needless to say, Israeli officials have rejected the directive out of hand and are refusing to sign any new agreements with the EU which include such a clause.
The issue came to a head after Israel threatened to cancel its participation in Horizon 2020, an €80 billion ($110 billion) scientific cooperation program sponsored by the European Union.
The EU and Israel both stand to benefit from Israel's involvement in the lucrative program, which begins on January 1, 2014 and will run for a period of seven years.
Israel -- the only non-EU country that has been invited to join Horizon 2020 -- is expected to invest €600 million in the program and receive €900 million in inbound research grants and other investments. For its part, the EU will benefit from Israeli research and technology, which is widely believed to surpass the capabilities of many EU member states.
Officials from the EU and Israel met in Jerusalem on September 10 and in Brussels on September 12 in talks aimed at hashing out an agreement that would modify the EU guidelines in such a way that Israel would be able to participate in the project.
Although the talks in Brussels continued for seven hours and included nearly a dozen participants from each side, EU negotiators refused to budge. Israel Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is now expected to raise the issue directly with Catherine Aston, the EU foreign policy chief.
Any agreement over Israel's participation in Horizon 2020 would have to be signed by the middle of November, and negotiations are expected to continue up until then.
Thus the apparent purpose of the September 16 letter issued by the European Eminent Persons Group is to provide Ashton with political cover for maintaining her hardline stance vis-à-vis Israel.
Indeed, the letter is vehement that the new EU guidelines be enforced with regard to Horizon 2020. The letter states: "We urge you to uphold this commitment by supporting the guidelines and their full application by EU institutions, notably in regard to the ongoing negotiations about Israel's participation in Horizon 2020... If the EU were to delay or suspend the guidelines, or not fully apply them to the agreement with Israel on Horizon 2020, this could further undermine the Palestinians' trust in the negotiation process and their ability to continue the talks. In other words, delaying or suspending the guidelines is likely to undermine negotiations, which we want to see succeed, not help them."
The letter also comes in response to U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, who has urged the EU to suspend implementation of the ban in order to show the Israeli public the benefit of pursuing a peace agreement with the Palestinians.
On September 7, Kerry asked for the suspension in a closed-door meeting of EU foreign ministers in Vilnius, Lithuania, where he also discussed the current status of the talks, which resumed on July 30 after a nearly three-year hiatus.
A senior US State Department official who was at the talks in Vilnius said, "There was strong support for his efforts and an openness to considering his requests." But Ashton has been characteristically unapologetic, saying only that the EU would send a team to Israel to make sure the implementation of the new guidelines was done sensitively.
Ashton has support from other quarters as well. On September 11, a group of nearly 500 European academics sent a letter to Ashton urging her not to water down the new guidelines. The letter states: "Reports in the media that you are thinking of softening or postponing the implementation of the EU Guidelines on Israeli Settlements have shocked academic opinion across Europe and beyond. We, and the nearly five hundred European academics who have signed the attached petition in the last 48 hours, applaud your Guidelines, and urge you not to weaken or abandon them at the first sign that Israel, or the United States, takes objection to them. Principles are principles. Please stick to yours."
Not to be outdone, a group of far-left Israeli intellectuals, academics and artists also sent a petition to Ashton in support of the EU guidelines on funding of Israeli entities. The document states: "Our government has threatened to end its participation in the EU's research program -- a move that would be, in the first place, to Israel's own great detriment. We urge the EU not to be misled by this tactical maneuver, and to insist on full application of the guidelines when negotiating Israel's participation in that program."
Meanwhile, the European Jewish Congress (EJC), a Paris-based umbrella group for Jewish communities in Europe, criticized the former EU officials for sending the letter, calling it a "danger to peace as it hands one side a political victory without having to compromise and deepens the Palestinian feeling that they can gain more outside of negotiations than in them."
In a full-page advertisement published by the London-based Financial Times on September 16, EJC President Moshe Kantor described the EU guidelines as "discriminatory" and a reflection of "the desire for the EU to score political points." Kantor continued:
From the well over one hundred territorial disputes in the world, the European Union has mandated the creation of a clause in every agreement denying European funding to, and cooperation with, institutions from only one nation involved in a territorial dispute: Israel. It has not placed similar criteria on Turkey, Morocco, China, or any other nation involved in a territorial dispute.
...
What makes the situation far worse is that the European Union is abrogating agreements that it signed and witnessed. The Oslo Accords, the basis for the peace negotiations, specifically stipulated that the current status of the territories, and its residents, will not be changed or harmed ahead of final status negotiations, to which the parties have recently returned.
In an interview with the Jerusalem Post, the Greek ambassador to Israel, Spiros Lampridis, said he understood Israel's objections to signing the territorial clause because it is so "explicit."
"If I put myself in the Israeli shoes I can see why they are not able to sign it," he said. "Therefore our task as European states is to find alternatives to make this thing workable for both sides. We are not here to fight, we are here to cooperate, and if Israel cannot cooperate with the EU, and vice versa, then that means that the EU is not really understanding the importance of Israel in the framework of the Western family."
Other Europeans have also shown themselves sympathetic to the Israeli position. On September 17, the Vice Chairman of the European Parliament's Committee on Foreign Affairs, Italian politician Fiorello Provera, organized what has been described as an "historic" conference to help MEPs better understand the harmful impact of EU policies in Judea and Samaria (aka the West Bank).
The conference -- entitled "EU-Israel Relations: Impact of the New EU Guidelines on Israel and Their Effects on the EU, Israeli and Palestinian Economies" -- was held at the Foreign Affairs Committee hall inside the European Parliament.
The event was attended by 20 MEPs, representatives of Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria, the Israeli ambassador to the EU, David Walzer, and a wide array of journalists.
Member of the Knesset for the Jewish Home Party, Ayelet Shaked, told the European politicians attending the conference that she feared the evacuation of West Bank settlements and the creation of a Palestinian state would only lead to increased missile attacks against Israel:
Europe's forcing us to cede land, in order to achieve the type of agreement it sees fit for the Middle East, will only mean that these missiles will continue to rain down on Israel not only from Gaza, but from Qalqilya and Ramallah [Palestinian cities in the West Bank] as well.
If Europe thinks Jews will return to the days where we were forced to mark our products, you can forget it. Delegitimization of parts of Israel by Europe is the new anti-Semitism. The old anti-Semitism led to the destruction of our people in gas chambers. We will not allow the new anti-Semitism to hurt us.
Such conduct creates a sense among Israelis that Europe is lost, that it is occupied by the forces of radical Islam. If that is the message you have been trying to send, you are doing a good job in getting it across. I want you to understand that you are important to us. We hold your support in high regard, but you cannot push us to commit suicide.
Shaked also called for a change in the terminology employed within the context of the Arab-Israeli conflict. "It is time to say the truth: Judea and Samaria are not occupied territory, but disputed territory. That is the truth as far as international law is concerned."
Provera summed up the conference, saying that "MEPs in this house [the European Parliament] are not familiar with the facts. Did you know that Jews and Arabs work side by side in the factories of Samaria? The idea of putting pressure on Israel and slapping sanctions on it is unacceptable. It will not bring peace, but may only bring unemployment to the Palestinians, as a result of which they might turn to terror."
Soeren Kern is a Senior Fellow at the New York-based Gatestone Institute. He is also Senior Fellow for European Politics at the Madrid-based Grupo de Estudios Estratégicos / Strategic Studies Group. Follow him on Facebook.

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north-korean-nuclear-weapons.jpg

Did US President Barack Obama score a great victory for the United States by concluding a deal with Russia on Syria's chemical weapons or has he caused irreparable harm to the US's reputation and international position? By what standard can we judge his actions when the results will only be known next year? To summarize where things now stand, last Saturday US Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov concluded an agreement regarding Syria's chemical weapons arsenal. The agreement requires Syria to provide full details on the size and locations of all of its chemical weapons by this Saturday. It requires international inspectors to go to Syria beginning in November, and to destroy or remove Syria's chemical weapons from the country by June 2014.

Obama and Kerry have trumpeted the agreement as a great accomplishment. They say it could never have been concluded had the US not threatened to carry out "unbelievably small" punitive military strikes against the Syrian regime in response to its use of Sarin gas to massacre 1,400 civilians in the suburbs of Damascus on August 21.

And then there is the perception of an "Iran dividend" from the US-Russian deal. Just two days after last Saturday's agreement, speculation mounted about a possible breakthrough in the six party negotiations with Iran regarding its illicit nuclear weapons program.

According to Der Spiegel, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani may consider closing down Iran's illicit uranium enrichment facility at Fordo under IAEA supervision in exchange for the removal or weakening of economic sanctions against Iran's oil exports and its central bank.

The White House has not ruled out the possibility that Obama and Rouhani may meet at the UN General Assembly meeting later this month. These moves could pave the way for a reinstatement of full diplomatic relations between the US and Iran. Those relations were cut off after the regime-supported takeover of the US embassy in Teheran in 1979.

Obama's supporters in the US media and Congress have hailed these developments as foreign policy victories for the United States. Thanks to Obama's brilliant maneuvering, Syria has agreed to disarm from its chemical weapons without the US having had to fire a shot. The Iranians' increased willingness to be forthcoming on their nuclear program is similarly a consequence of Obama's tough and smart diplomacy regarding Syria, and his clever utilization of Russia as a long arm of US foreign policy.

For their part, critics have lined up to condemn Obama's decision to cut a deal with Russia regarding Syria.

They warn that his actions in that regard have destroyed the credibility of his threat to use force to prevent Iran from developing or deploying nuclear weapons.

To determine which side is right in this debate, we need to look no further than North Korea.

In April 1992 the IAEA concluded that North Korea was hiding information on its nuclear program from the UN and declared it in breach of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty it signed in 1985. In March 1993 North Korea announced its intention to vacate its signature from the NPT. Later that year, it later offered to begin negotiations related to its illicit nuclear program with the US.

Those negotiations began in early 1994, after the US canceled planned joint military exercises with South Korea as a goodwill gesture to the North. The talks led to the Agreed-Framework Agreement concluded later that year under which North Korea agreed to shutter its nuclear installation at Yongbyon where it was suspected of developing plutonium based nuclear weapons. In exchange the US and its allies agreed to build light water nuclear reactors in North Korea, and to provide North Korea with oil for energy production until the reactors were up and running.

In November 2002 the North Koreans acknowledged that they were engaging in illicit uranium enrichment activities. In January 2003 Pyongyang announced it was withdrawing from the NPT.

In February 2005 it announced it possessed a nuclear arsenal. And on October 9, 2006, North Korea launched its first test of a nuclear bomb.

The US suspended its talks with North Korea in 2003. It responded to the nuclear test by renewing those negotiations just weeks after it took place. And in February 2007 the US and North Korea reached an agreement under which Pyongyang agreed to close down Yongbyon in exchange for a resumption of shipments of free oil.

In September 2007, against the strenuous opposition of then secretary of state Condoleezza Rice, who was the architect of the US's renewed push to cut a deal with North Korea, Israel destroyed a North Korean built nuclear reactor almost identical to the Yongbyon nuclear reactor in the Syrian desert. Had it become operational, Syria would likely have developed a nuclear arsenal by now.

In June 2008, the North Koreans demolished Yongbyon's cooling tower.

Amidst fears that North Korea had reopened the reactor in the fall of 2008, the US removed North Korea from the State Department's list of state sponsors of terrorism.

Six months later, in April 2009, Pyongyang resumed its reprocessing of spent fuel rods for the production of plutonium. And the next month it conducted another nuclear test.

In 2010, North Korean scientists at Yongbyon told Siegfried Hecker, a former director of the Los Alamos National Laboratory that the plutonium reactor had been shuttered.

Later in 2010, the North Koreans began open enrichment of uranium at Yongbyon.

Enrichment activities have doubled in scale since 2010. US experts now assess that with 4,000 centrifuges operating, North Korea produces enough enriched uranium to build three uranium based nuclear bombs every year. On February 12, 2013 North Korea conducted a third nuclear test. Experts were unclear whether the tested bomb a plutoniumbased or uranium-based nuclear weapon.

On September 11, the media reported that the latest satellite imagery indicates the North Koreans have resumed their plutonium production activities at Yongbyon.

Although the media claim that this represents an abrogation of the 2007 deal, it is unclear why that deal was considered in place given that North Korea began its reprocessing activities in April 2009 and tested another nuclear weapon the next month.

Although it issued a strong statement condemning the reopening of the plutonium operation at Yongbyon, the Obama administration remains committed to the sixparty talks with North Korea.

When viewed as a model for general US-non-proliferation policy, rather than one specific to North Korea, the North Korean model involves a rogue state using the Chinese and Russians to block effective UN Security Council action against its illicit development and proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.

Faced with a dead end at the UN, the US is forced to decide between acting on its own to compel a cessation of the illicit behavior, or to try to cut a deal with the regime, either through bilateral or multilateral negotiations.

Not wishing to enter into an unwanted confrontation or suffer domestic and international condemnations of American unilateralism, the US opts for diplomacy. The decision is controversial in Washington. And to justify their decision, the champions of negotiating deals with rogue proliferators stake their personal reputations on the success of that policy.

In the case of Rice, her decision to open negotiations with North Korea following its nuclear test was staunchly opposed by vice president Dick Cheney. And once the policy was exposed as a failure first by the intelligence reports proving that North Korea was proliferating its nuclear technologies and know-how to Syria, and then with its early suspension of its agreement to the 2007 agreement, rather than acknowledge her mistake, she doubled down. And as a consequence, under the nose of the US, and with Washington pledged to a framework deal to which North Korea stood in continuous breach, North Korea carried out two more nuclear tests, massively expanded its uranium enrichment activities, and reinstated its plutonium production activities.

Just as importantly, once the US accepted the notion of talks with North Korea, it necessarily accepted the regime's legitimacy. And as a consequence, both the Clinton and Bush administrations abandoned any thought of toppling the regime. Once Washington ensnared itself in negotiations that strengthened its enemy at America's expense, it became the effective guarantor of the regime's survival. After all, if the regime is credible enough to be trusted to keep its word, then it is legitimate no matter how many innocents it has enslaved and slaughtered.

With the US's experience with North Korea clearly in mind, it is possible to assess US actions with regards to Syria and Iran. The first thing that becomes clear is that the Obama administration is implementing the North Korean model in its dealings with Syria and Iran.

With regards to Syria, there is no conceivable way to peacefully enforce the US Russian agreement on the ground. Technically it is almost impossible to safely dispose of chemical weapons under the best of circumstances.

Given that Syria is in the midst of a brutal civil war, the notion that it is possible for UN inspectors to remove or destroy the regime's chemical weapons is patently absurd.

Moreover, since the agreement itself requires non-compliance complaints to be discussed first at the UN Security Council, and it is clear that Russia is willing to do anything to protect the Syrian regime, no action will be taken to punish non-compliance.

Finally, like his predecessors with regard to Pyongyang, Obama has effectively accepted the continued legitimacy of the regime of Bashar Assad, despite the fact that he is an acknowledged war criminal.

As was the case with Pyongyang and its nuclear brinkmanship and weapons tests, Assad won his legitimacy and removed the US threat to remove him from power by using weapons of mass destruction.

As for Iran, Rouhani's talk of closing Fordo needs to be viewed against the precedents set at Yongbyon by the North Koreans. In other words, even if the installation is shuttered, there is every reason to believe that the shutdown will be temporary. On the other hand, just as North Korea remains off the State Department's list of state sponsors of terrorism despite the fact that since its removal it carried out two more nuclear tests, it is hard to imagine that sanctions on Iran's oil exports and central bank removed in exchange for an Iranian pledge to close Fordo, would be restored after Fordo is reopened.

Like North Korea, Iran will negotiate until it is ready to vacate its signature on the NPT and test its first nuclear weapon.

The critics are correct. And the danger posed by Obama's decision to seek a false compromise rather than accept an unwanted confrontation following Syria's use of chemical weapons will only be removed when the US recognizes the folly of seeking to wish away the dangers of weapons of mass destruction through negotiations. Those talks lead only to the diminishment of US power and the endangerment of US national security as more US enemies develop and deploy weapons of mass destruction with the sure knowledge that the US would rather negotiate fecklessly than contend responsibly with the dangers they pose.

Originally published in The Jerusalem Post. 

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4 her
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Sunny and beautiful today in Lucky Bay, Western Australia... Perfect day to take the little joey out to the beach. (Photo: lileepod/flickr)
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TO: All the Better National Reporters
FROM:  The Coach.
SUBJECT: The Appearance of Credibility.
Listen people, you’re doing great work. Our guy’s holding up very well considering how rough the economy is. No jobs, sky high dependency. Best part: people don’t blame him. They think he’s an innocent bystander rather than president for the last five years. We’re getting it done!

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Mr. President, please give America justification before you spend blood and treasure to intervene. Start with: who are you rooting for in this?
Sarah Palin
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Sarah Palin
Thanks to my Aunt Billie in Texas for sending me her friend's clever caption.
===

And here I am doing my Annie Oakley thing.
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/359114/freedom-destroys-itself-sarah-palin
===

Pastor Rick Warren'
Laws never change hearts. Love does.

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EVERY PARENT NEEDS TO WATCH THIS NOW: “Parents, you need to question these people!:” Shock video of dad ARRESTED at school meeting after challenging Common Core/Fed Ed scheme==> 

http://michellemalkin.com/2013/09/20/parents-you-need-to-question-these-people-shock-video-of-dad-arrested-at-school-meeting-after-challenging-common-core/
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One author explains why sometimes less is more when it comes to book marketing → http://bit.ly/19ktwTX

Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing

===

Pastor Rick Warren
CNN will REPEAT the #WarrensOnCNN interview multiple times TONIGHT and SATURDAY at 6 pm, 9 pm and 12:00 am. 
THIS IS UNPRECEDENTED! 

Never before in CNN’s history have they given 3 days to a Piers Morgan Interview. One network executive called it “a Pulitzer Prize worthy interview.” Glory to God!

“I want you to know, dear brothers and sisters, that everything that has happened to us has helped to spread the Good News!” Philippians 1:12

Set your DVR. Please use your social media to tell everyone right now. Use the Twitter hashtag #WarrensOnCNN, and PRAY that the pain we’ve experienced will be used to turn many hearts to Christ!

I’d love to hear your feedback on the interview here if you’ve already watched it. You “share in the partnership of the gospel” (Phil. 1:5) when you pass on this news.

===

Madu Odiokwu Pastorvin
You shall go out with joy, and be led forth with peace.(Isaiah 55:12, NKJV)
When you get up in the morning excited about your future, recognizing that day is a gift and go out with a spring in your step, pursuing your goals, passionate about life, then God will breathe in your direction. Studies tell us that people who are enthusiastic get better breaks. They’re promoted more often. That’s not a coincidence. When you’re full of passion, you have the favor of God.

Remember that God didn’t breathe His life into us to drag through the day. He didn’t create us in His image, crown us with His favor, equip us with His power to just go through the motions of life. You may have had some setbacks, the wind may have been taken out of your sail, but this is a new day. God wants to breathe new life back into you. If you’ll get your fire and passion back, the wind will start blowing once again. When you’re in agreement with God, He can cause the winds of favor to shift in your direction.God bless you.

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4 her
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Green River, Utah
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Artwork depicting the incident.

A MID-AIR disaster was avoided by seconds over Adelaide yesterday when two Qantas pilots ignored traffic-control directions that put them on a collision path.
The passenger jets came within about 200m of a mid-air disaster just 19km west of the city about lunch time.
The planes flew into the recognised danger zone in clear skies over Gulf St Vincent after a traffic-control blunder resulted in one plane being given permission to fly directly towards the other.
The pilots reacted to on-board warning systems and changed the positions to avert a mid-air catastrophe.


Read more: http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/national-news/south-australia/qantas-pilots-praised-for-averting-midair-crash-over-adelaide-following-airtraffic-control-blunder/story-fnii5yv4-1226724017862#ixzz2fWXUqVmW

This is not an auto pilot lesson or remote pilot. This is an air traffic control problem. ed
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A new study that claims to present evidence of alien life is being met with a healthy dose of skepticism in the scientific community.
On July 31, a team of British researchers sent a balloon into the stratosphere over England, where it collected samples at an altitude range of 14 miles to 17 miles (22 to 27 kilometers). The balloon's scientific payload returned to Earth toting the cell wall, or frustule, of a type of microscopic algae called a diatom, the scientists report in the Journal of Cosmology.
While bacteria and other tiny lifeforms have been found high above the planet before — storm clouds are teeming with microbes, for example — the new discovery is potentially of monumental importance, study team members say. [5 Bold Claims of Alien Life ]

If alien life is pervasive in space, it will be pervasive on Mars. ed
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THE slayer of Jill Meagher had discussed what it would be like to kill before he raped and murdered her in a crime that shocked Melbourne.
A former workmate and friend of Adrian Bayley told police last year that he had had conversations with Bayley about having sex with drunken girls, and about how it would feel to kill someone.
The pair allegedly discussed the Claremont serial killer in Perth, who abducted and killed three women in 1996 and 1997 and has never been caught.


Read more: http://www.heraldsun.com.au/national-news/victoria/adrian-bayley8217s-evil-fantasy-revealed-on-the-anniversary-of-jill-meagher8217s-death/story-fnii5sms-1226724013541#ixzz2fWYH1L00

The idea "it is better to allow a hundred guilty people to be free than to let an innocent man serve time" .. it doesn't mean that it is good that guilty people are freed. - ed
===
Tunisia Rally

TUNISIAN women have travelled to Syria to wage 'sex jihad' by comforting Islamist fighters battling the regime there, Interior Minister Lotfi ben Jeddou has told MPs.
'They have sexual relations with 20, 30, 100' militants, the minister told members of the National Constituent Assembly yesterday.
'After the sexual liaisons they have there in the name of 'jihad al-nikah' - (sexual holy war in Arabic) - they come home pregnant,' Ben Jeddou told the MPs.
He did not elaborate on how many Tunisian women had returned to the country pregnant with the children of jihadist fighters.
Jihad al-nikah, permitting extramarital sexual relations with multiple partners, is considered by some hardline Sunni Muslim Salafists as a legitimate form of holy war.
The minister also did not say how many Tunisian women were thought to have gone to Syria for such a purpose, although media reports have said hundreds have done so.
Hundreds of Tunisian men have also gone to join the ranks of the jihadists fighting to bring down the regime of President Bashar al-Assad.
However, Ben Jeddou also said that since he assumed office in March, 'six thousand of our young people have been prevented from going there' to Syria.
He has said in the past that border controls have been boosted to intercept young Tunisians seeking to travel to Syria.
Media reports say thousands of Tunisians have, over the past 15 years, joined jihadists across the world in Afghanistan Iraq and Syria, mainly travelling via Turkey or Libya.


Read more: http://www.news.com.au/world-news/tunisian-women-waging-sex-jihad-in-syria/story-fndir2ev-1226724083566#ixzz2fWYaZFaC

They are prostitutes that are selective. The religion would not accept the excuse "I thought he was a jihadist" or "He told me he was waging holy war" in many places .. ed
===

Current Gallery on all Photographs

Please click on below link:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/307958525882739/photos/
...See more
Current Gallery on all Photographs

Please click on below link:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/307958525882739/photos/

Jewellery & Gemstone Gallery

Colour your world with gemstones !

A Gallery of Jewellery, Diamond News,Gems & Gemology promoted bywww.diamondimports.com.au


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The Pigeon Point Lighthouse on a moonlit night.
Seven minute exposure
ISO 100
f/16
13mm with a Tokina 12-16mm Lens
Nikon D7000
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Allen West
Quote of the week comes from President Obama at the Business Roundtable, “raising the debt limit does not increase our debt.” Imagine what those business leaders were thinking: Not so fast, my friend. Look at it this way, what if Lee Corso on ESPN's College Gameday said, “scoring more touchdowns does not get you more points.” So America, when the credit card collectors call on you, just use President Obama’s logic. After all, going from $10.6T in debt in Jan 2009 to $16.9T now, well, it’s just a grand illusion as the rock band Styx would say...and our President is singing the same tune.

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4 her
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OK this one the Kids will absolutely love!!!!
Ingredients::
•2 packs (3 oz) Raspberry jello
•1 pkg unflavored gelatin (for extra firmness)
•3/4 cup whipping cream
•3 cups boiling water
•15 drops green food coloring
•100 flexible straws (or enough to fill your container)
•Tall container (1 quart or 1 liter carton of milk)

Directions::
1.Combine gelatin in bowl and add boiling water.
2.Let it cool to lukewarm and then add the whipping cream and 15 drops green food coloring.
3.Gather your straws (don’t forget to flex them out) and put them in the container. It’s important that the straws have a tight fit so the jello stays in the straws. For this reason, a 1 liter carton may be better; you will probably get longer worms since there is a tighter fit. If you have a bigger container, a rubber band around the straws is helpful. Or you could just add more straws to fill the container.
4.Add the gelatin mixture to the straw-filled container and let it set until firm.
5.There are multiple ways you can remove the worms from the straws. You can roll a rolling pin over the straws and squeeze them out or you can hold the straws over warm water. The worms will slip right out.

===

A Dept store Sweden introduced these normal-size mannequins. Instead of size 00, these gals are a size 12 and 16. Some are saying they "condone obesity." Pfft, the average woman is a size 14. "LIKE" and "SHARE" this picture if you think mannequins should look like this in store.
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Jorge Armando Rueda Estupiñan | Flinders Island, TAS

Paradise!
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Phillip Jensen

Who are your leaders, those who spoke the word of God to you?
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Tower after a snow storm
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Larry Pickering
INDONS WILL TOE THE LINE WITH TONY

If you watched the ABC you would believe Abbott had no hope of stopping the boats. The Left would like you to believe that, but the truth is a long way from it. 

Abbott will stop the boats and with the assistance of the Indonesians, simply because it’s the Indonesians themselves who have kept the trade going. And now the game is up.

Rudd and Gillard were treated with sniggering contempt but Abbott has them standing to attention with little beads of sweat on their slanty foreheads. And he hasn’t even arrived there yet.

The Indonesians know their weak excuses won’t cut it with this administration and they are about to co-operate to safeguard their little yearly aid gift of $600 million.

They need to top up their Swiss bank accounts and refurbish a few weekend palaces.

Jakarta Airport customs agents know full well who arrives from Iraq and Afghanistan etc, with valid passports, and they know their intentions.

These well-off arrivals are not in Jakarta for the hookers or for a rub of Buddha’s tummy.

The boats can stop with Jakarta customs agents, it’s just a matter of compensation for bribes lost.

Forget the white-noise nonsense of turning back or buying boats. Forget “regional solutions” and TPVs... our broken border problems start and end in Indonesia’s corrupt Immigration Department.

A little more payola and that problem is fixed. Except it’s not called payola, it will be called, “Illegal Entrants Repatriation Fund” or the like.

And the cost will be minimal when compared the $14 billion cost of Rudd’s open border policy so far.

The ABC used the old sordid tactic of trawling for a maverick to iterate its own view. Pathetic! In no way could that little germ represent the Indonesian Government.

More likely he was on the take and could see his corrupt income dissipating.

But that’s our ABC... (in its current form).

Within weeks boats will not be leaving from Indonesian shores. If they do, it will be because Tony Abbott doesn’t understand how third world countries work.

I don’t believe that’s the case.

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Edu-Kingdom Bankstown
In English yesterday, Year 6's wrote a letter to their future selves. The letters are kept in a time capsule and will be returned to each individual before their HSC. I like how one student marked the word 'Yolo' on the front of her envelope. Very inspirational! 
===
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Madison Project
Dear Fellow Patriot,
Tea Party hero Ted Cruz has launched a last-ditch effort to defund Obamacare in next year's budget, but Mitch McConnell and the Republican establishment are standing in his way!
Republican "leader" Mitch McConnell is actually pressuring Republican Senators to throw their lot in with Barack Obama and continue funding this disastrous big-government program!
These aren't the actions of a leader. They're the actions of a weak-kneed compromiser who has been in Washington for far too long.
Mitch McConnell is the leader of the Senate Republicans. Dozens of his fellow Senators are going to follow his lead on this vote.
If he doesn't give in to our demands, Obamacare won't be defunded this year.It's as simple as that.
Ted Cruz is ready to stand up to this RINO to defund Obamacare, but there's only so much he can do on his own.
He needs the help of the conservative grassroots, and he needs it right now.
We MUST turn up the heat, my friend. Frankly, we're running out of options.
You see, just this week, the Madison Project launched an aggressive TV ad against Mitch McConnell. It's airing all across his home state of Kentucky as we speak.
We have already endorsed his conservative primary challenger, Matt Bevin, and sent the maximum legal financial contribution to his campaign.
But these efforts have fallen on deaf ears. Mitch hasn't budged. It's going to take more than TV ads and a conservative primary challenger to get under his skin.
And that's why I just had to write you this email today. We're down to our final push in this fight, and it won't go anywhere without your help!
This is truly our last chance to push Mitch in the right direction. We MUST rally the conservative grassroots from coast to coast right away!
Obamacare has never been more hated than it is right now. 57 percent of independent voters support defunding this nightmare - and that doesn't even include the vast majority of Republicans!
The American people know that Obamacare will kill jobs, cause premiums to skyrocket, decrease the quality of care for all Americans, and give agencies like the IRS unlimited access to their personal information.
And yet, Mitch McConnell, a self-described "conservative," is activelypressuring his fellow Republicans to continue funding this disaster!
Enough's enough. We need to flood Mitch's office with petitions. We need to remind him that if he votes to fund Obamacare, he'll own it lock, stock, and barrel!
We need to stand with Ted Cruz and his Tea Party allies against the destructive compromising of Mitch McConnell and the GOP establishment.
The Madison Project was the first PAC in the nation to endorse Ted Cruz in 2011. We stood by him through the vicious attacks of the Republican "ruling class." And in the end, we helped him achieve victory.
It's time to do it again.
Thank you so much for your help!
For Freedom,

Congressman Jim Ryun (Retired) 

Chairman
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Hi everyone! Here's the MichelleMalkin.com newsletter for September 20th. Enjoy!

From the Blog

Jeb Bush’s latest Common Core snit fit

This is priceless...

Economy wars: Barack Obama vs. Hillary Clinton

President Obama made this claim last weekend...

Obama: People mistakenly think raising the debt ceiling means the US is racking up more debt

In April, President Obama proclaimed it to be the month when we “teach young people how to budget responsibly”...

More From the Right Side of the Web

Michelle's Top Tweets

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And ... Our Hate Tweet of the Day

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Drinky!

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No Kum-Sok

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Events[edit source | editbeta]

Births[edit source | editbeta]

Deaths[edit source | editbeta]

Holidays and observances[edit source | editbeta]


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“Be glad, people of Zion, rejoice in the LORD your God, for he has given you the autumn rains because he is faithful. He sends you abundant showers, both autumn and spring rains, as before.” Joel 2:23 NIV
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Charles Spurgeon's Morning and Evening

Morning

"The sword of the Lord, and of Gideon."
Judges 7:20
Gideon ordered his men to do two things: covering up a torch in an earthen pitcher, he bade them, at an appointed signal, break the pitcher and let the light shine, and then sound with the trumpet, crying, "The sword of the Lord, and of Gideon! the sword of the Lord, and of Gideon!" This is precisely what all Christians must do. First, you must shine; break the pitcher which conceals your light; throw aside the bushel which has been hiding your candle, and shine. Let your light shine before men; let your good works be such, that when men look upon you, they shall know that you have been with Jesus. Then there must be the sound, the blowing of the trumpet. There must be active exertions for the ingathering of sinners by proclaiming Christ crucified. Take the gospel to them; carry it to their door; put it in their way; do not suffer them to escape it; blow the trumpet right against their ears. Remember that the true war-cry of the Church is Gideon's watchword, "The sword of the Lord, and of Gideon!" God must do it, it is his own work. But we are not to be idle; instrumentality is to be used--"The sword of the Lord, and of Gideon!" If we only cry, "The sword of the Lord!" we shall be guilty of an idle presumption; and if we shout, "The sword of Gideon!" alone, we shall manifest idolatrous reliance on an arm of flesh: we must blend the two in practical harmony, "The sword of the Lord, and of Gideon!" We can do nothing of ourselves, but we can do everything by the help of our God; let us, therefore, in his name determine to go out personally and serve with our flaming torch of holy example, and with our trumpet tones of earnest declaration and testimony, and God shall be with us, and Midian shall be put to confusion, and the Lord of hosts shall reign forever and ever.

Evening

"In the evening withhold not thy hand."
Ecclesiastes 11:6
In the evening of the day opportunities are plentiful: men return from their labour, and the zealous soul-winner finds time to tell abroad the love of Jesus. Have I no evening work for Jesus? If I have not, let me no longer withhold my hand from a service which requires abundant labour. Sinners are perishing for lack of knowledge; he who loiters may find his skirts crimson with the blood of souls. Jesus gave both his hands to the nails, how can I keep back one of mine from his blessed work? Night and day he toiled and prayed for me, how can I give a single hour to the pampering of my flesh with luxurious ease? Up, idle heart; stretch out thy hand to work, or uplift it to pray; heaven and hell are in earnest, let me be so, and this evening sow good seed for the Lord my God.
The evening of life has also its calls. Life is so short that a morning of manhood's vigour, and an evening of decay, make the whole of it. To some it seems long, but a four-pence is a great sum of money to a poor man. Life is so brief that no man can afford to lose a day. It has been well said that if a great king should bring us a great heap of gold, and bid us take as much as we could count in a day, we should make a long day of it; we should begin early in the morning, and in the evening we should not withhold our hand; but to win souls is far nobler work, how is it that we so soon withdraw from it? Some are spared to a long evening of green old age; if such be my case, let me use such talents as I still retain, and to the last hour serve my blessed and faithful Lord. By his grace I will die in harness, and lay down my charge only when I lay down my body. Age may instruct the young, cheer the faint, and encourage the desponding; if eventide has less of vigorous heat, it should have more of calm wisdom, therefore in the evening I will not withhold my hand.
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Today's reading: Ecclesiastes 4-6, 2 Corinthians 12 (NIV)

View today's reading on Bible Gateway

Today's Old Testament reading: Ecclesiastes 4-6

Oppression, Toil, Friendlessness
1 Again I looked and saw all the oppression that was taking place under the sun:
I saw the tears of the oppressed—
and they have no comforter;
power was on the side of their oppressors—
and they have no comforter.
2 And I declared that the dead,
who had already died,
are happier than the living,
who are still alive.
3 But better than both
is the one who has never been born,
who has not seen the evil
that is done under the sun.
4 And I saw that all toil and all achievement spring from one person’s envy of another. This too is meaningless, a chasing after the wind....

Today's New Testament reading: 2 Corinthians 12

Paul’s Vision and His Thorn
1 I must go on boasting. Although there is nothing to be gained, I will go on to visions and revelations from the Lord. 2 I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven. Whether it was in the body or out of the body I do not know—God knows. 3 And I know that this man—whether in the body or apart from the body I do not know, but God knows— 4 was caught up to paradise and heard inexpressible things, things that no one is permitted to tell. 5 I will boast about a man like that, but I will not boast about myself, except about my weaknesses. 6 Even if I should choose to boast, I would not be a fool, because I would be speaking the truth. But I refrain, so no one will think more of me than is warranted by what I do or say, 7 or because of these surpassingly great revelations. Therefore, in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. 8 Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. 9 But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. 10 That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong....
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Jephthah, Jephthae

[Jĕph'thah,Jĕph'tha ē] - he doth openor set freeA Gileadite, illegitimate child expelled by his brother from the paternal abode. He became a Judge in Israel and delivered the people from the Ammonites. He judged Israel for six years (Judg. 11; Heb. 11:32).

The Man Who Made a Vow

While Jephthah is described as a "mighty man of valour" and one upon whom "the Spirit of the Lord" descended, he is conspicuous as a man who in all sincerity made a rash vow. He vowed a vow to be fulfilled if the Lord would deliver the Ammonites to him. As a thanksgiving to God, he said he would offer up whatever came out of his house at his return from battle. Jephthah defeated the Ammonites, and on his return, his daughter, an only child, came out to meet him. He told her of his vow and declared he could not go back upon his word. The daughter begged for two months'respite in order to go away and bewail her virginity. On her return, her father fulfilled the vow.
In those twilight, uncivilized times there was the practice of the sacrifice of human beings at times of special stress, but whether Jephthah offered up his daughter as a human sacrifice or surrendered her to perpetual virginity in fulfillment of his vow may be debatable. We do know that it was the custom for the daughters of Israel to lament the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite for four days every year. And we can imagine how they would return softened, sobered and sanctified as the result of their act of remembrance.
For the preacher these aspects can be developed: Jephthah was an outcast (Judg. 11:1, 2 ); rose to leadership (Judg. 11:4-10); was moved by the Spirit (Judg. 11:29); made a rash vow (Judg. 11:30, 31); saved Israel from his foes (Judg. 11:33); kept his vow (Judg. 11:39).
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September 20, 2011
Battered and Bruised
Today's Truth
"But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us" (2 Corinthians 4:7NIV).
Friend to Friend
The speaker came out onto the stage. He pulled out a one-hundred dollar bill.
"Who would like this one-hundred dollar bill?" he asked.
Hands shot up all around the room.
Then he crumpled the paper, threw it on the floor and ground the dirt into it with his foot. Holding up the dirty, crumpled and tattered money, he then asked, "Now, who wants this one-hundred dollar bill?"
The same hands went into the air.
"And that is why God still wants you," he continued. "You may be battered and bruised. You may be tattered and torn. You may be crumpled and creased. But that does not change your value to God any more than what I have done changes the value of this one-hundred dollar bill. You are still precious and valuable to the God who chose you, redeemed you, and loves you as His own."
"He knows how we are formed; he remembers that we are dust" (Psalm 103:14). God understands that we are fatally flawed creatures, yet deems us immeasurably valuable no matter how crumpled and soiled we are.
Paul wrote to the Corinthians, "But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us" (2 Corinthians 4:7). In Paul's day, it was customary to store treasure in clay jars. The common container disguised its contents and didn't draw attention to the treasure within. You and I might not look like much on the outside. We may appear as common as jars of clay, but inside are hidden incredible treasures. Inside these old cracked pots reside the most incredible treasure of all...Jesus Christ. And that makes us valuable.
In Louisa May Alcott's book, Little Women, she includes a conversation from Mrs. March to her three girls, Meg, Jo, and Amy. "I only care what you think of yourself. If you feel your value lies in being merely decorative, I fear that someday you might find yourself believing that's all you really are. Time erodes all such beauty. But what it cannot diminish is the wonderful workings of your mind - your humor, your kindness, and your moral courage. These are things I so cherish in you."
Our culture places an ungodly amount of significance on a woman's appearance. Outward trappings of appearance are simply that...trappings. But God sees us as simple jars of clay containing valuable treasure...and that makes us beautiful to Him.
Let's Pray
Dear Lord, even though I am battered and bruised, I know that I am still valuable to You. Thank You for loving me so much that You sent Your Son, Jesus, to die for my sins. Thank You for making a way for me to have eternal life through Jesus' sacrifice. Thank You for seeing me as Your priceless treasure.
In Jesus' name,
Amen.
Now It's Your Turn
Don't you love the teacher's illustration of the crumpled dollar bill? Today, consider using that illustration with a friend or a child who feels knocked down by life.
Did the illustration touch you in a particular way? If so, I'd love to hear about it. You can share your thoughts on my Facebook page at www.facebook.com/sharonjaynes.
More from the Girlfriends
Today's devotion was taken from Sharon's book, I'm Not Good Enough and Other Lies Women Tell Themselves. If you feel battered and bruised by life, if you have been believing lies that you are worthless, then join Sharon in learning to see yourself as God sees you - a valuable treasure -as a chosen, dearly loved child of the King.
Seeking God?
Click here to find out more about
how to have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.
Girlfriends in God
P.O. Box 725
Matthews, NC 28106
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P31Header
Marybeth Whalen
September 20, 2011
Back to Fishing
Marybeth Whalen
"'I'm going out to fish,' Simon Peter told them, and they said, 'We'll go with you.' So they went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing." John 21:3 (NIV)
Have you ever found yourself in a place where all your hopes and dreams have fallen apart? What did you do?
Jesus' disciple Peter had betrayed his Lord, and watched Him die. Now Jesus was gone. So what did he do? In John 21, we see Peter going back to what he was doing before he met Him. I sometimes wonder what he must've been thinking as he sat aboard the fishing boat and scanned the horizon.
Did he wonder if it was all just a dream? Did he worry about the future? He had been at a spiritual pinnacle-walking with Jesus, hearing from Jesus, planning for a future that included Jesus. But in the blink of an eye, he and his comrades were back to their old pursuits as though nothing had happened at all.
God was still at work, but during this time He let Peter and the other disciples go back to fishing. He let them have those days of wondering and worrying. He allowed them to scan the horizon looking for Him-and find nothing. For a time He allowed them to feel alone and even forsaken.
When we feel that way, we tend to go back to what we knew before. We might go back to old habits or old friends who weren't necessarily the best for us. We might go back to old pursuits or old crutches that once propped us up. We might be like Peter and find ourselves sitting in a place we never thought we'd see again.
And yet, this time, something is different. This time there is that glimmer of hope that-while we might have gone back-we don't have to stay back.
I love that this story ends with Jesus on the beach waiting for Peter and his friends to stop fishing and come to Him. And, when Peter saw Jesus, he jumped out of the boat to get to Him.
Perhaps you've walked away from your own dreams and returned to what is familiar. Maybe disappointment or failure has left you wondering where God is. I hope you will cling to this story today. I hope that as you scan your horizon, you will see God waiting for you to return to Him. And when you do, you will run towards Him as fast as you can.
He may have let you go through an alone time. He may have allowed you to wonder if He was still there. But in that time, I pray that the flicker of hope did not die out for you. You may have gone back to "fishing," but He doesn't want you to stay there. He's got so much more for you to do. He is still at work. His plans involve going forward, not going back.
Dear Lord, I have felt alone and forgotten. I have wondered if any of my spiritual experiences were real. I've gone back to what's familiar because it was all I knew to do. But I know You don't want to leave me there. I want to see You when I scan the horizon. And when I do, help me to have the courage to run toward You as fast as I can. I trust that You still have a plan for me. And that plan involves going forward, not going back. In Jesus' Name, Amen.
Related Resources:
Do You Know Him?
The Reason We Speak General Editor Marybeth Whalen
She Makes It Look Easy by Marybeth Whalen
Visit Marybeth's blog or click here for more resources from Marybeth.
When you purchase resources through Proverbs 31 Ministries, you touch eternity because your purchase supports the many areas of hope-giving ministry we provide at no cost. We wish we could, but we simply can't compete with prices offered by huge online warehouses. Therefore, we are extremely grateful for each and every purchase you make with us. Thank you!
Application Steps:Read John 21 today and write down some of the verses that speak to you directly. Spend some time journaling what this passage has made you think about.
Reflections:Am I in the boat like Peter was? Am I looking for Jesus to appear? Will I be ready to swim for Him when He does?
Power Verses:John 21:4, "Early in the morning, Jesus stood on the shore, but the disciples did not realize that it was Jesus." (NIV)
Luke 5:11, "So they pulled their boats up on shore, left everything and followed him." (NIV)
© 2011 by Marybeth Whalen. All rights reserved.
Proverbs 31 Ministries
616-G Matthews-Mint Hill Road
Matthews, NC 28105
www.Proverbs31.org
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Everything New - A Weeekly Devotional

WHAT FREQUENCY ARE YOU TUNED INTO?

Revelation is God himself speaking loudly and clearly about who he is and how he views the world; it is our responsibility to listen clearly. He speaks because he wants to be known. Imagine that–God wants to be known! A god who is just an energy force in the universe has no such desire–in fact, has no desire at all; an impersonal deity is uninteresting in the extreme because it is uninterested. If there were many gods, maybe a million or more, there’s not much of a chance one god would have the desire to be known by the human race. And even if he or she or it did, would we really care?
But a personal and infinite God knows and relates, and so God speaks–and he speaks clearly. We need to make sure we are listening, not as astronomers do with the massive radio telescope dishes that sweep the sky listening for a faint pulse in the universe. If those scientists did hear the faintest sign that there was some intelligent life out in space, it would be revolutionary. Even finding a fossil on Mars, with no intelligence, no knowledge, and no voice, would generate massive enthusiasm. It would be deemed another Copernican revolution. So when believers appear to be stunned with delight that a message has come from the greatest being in the universe–not one message, but thousands of messages–nobody should be surprised that they become fanatically spiritual. What else is the appropriate reaction to beholding what God himself slowly and deliberately uncovers?
Skeptics think that if there is a God, then he must be deaf and mute, because God is not broadcasting on the frequency they are tuned into. But who should determine the frequency, the greater being or the lesser? Should we really make the main issue why God chose one frequency over another, instead of just responding awestruck by the fact that messages from the Creator are coming through? Because of who God is, and because God knows who we are, he chooses the methods by which he speaks to us.
The biblical view is that God has spoken through chosen representatives, prophets and apostles, and preeminently, in his Son, Jesus Christ. These are God’s chosen frequencies for broadcasting his truth. This is revelation, and it is a different manner of speaking than any we are used to.
We’d love to have you join us on Facebook or follow on Twitter.

Resources

About The Author - Mel Lawrenz serves as minister at large for Elmbrook Church and leads The Brook Network. Having been in pastoral ministry for thirty years, the last decade as senior pastor of Elmbrook, Mel seeks to help Christian leaders engage with each other. Mel is the author of eleven books, the most recent for church leaders, Whole Church: Leading from Fragmentation to Engagement.
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Change a Life, Give a Bible - Muslim Converts Plead for Bibles
Hello,
When a Muslim comes to faith in Jesus Christ, the one thing they plead for is a Bible.
And now we have been offered a $10,000 Challenge Grant to provide these desperately needed Bibles! But we needyour help to meet this challenge!
Sadly, Bibles are scarce in most Islamic countries where it's illegal to be a Christian. Which is why we have set a goal to deliver at least 4,000 Bibles to our suffering brothers and sisters in these countries over the next four months.
And now... if we meet this $10,000 Challenge Grant... we can meet this goal! But we need your help... which is why I'm asking you to give an online gift to Open Doors today.
Through your gift, you'll not only help meet the challenge... but help deliver Bibles to Muslim converts who risk their lives every day to follow Christ. You'll be giving strength, hope, and encouragement to those who so desperately need it!
So thank you for your gift. And thank you for standing with those who are suffering the most for their faith.
Carl A. Moeller Signature

ECFA A higher standard. A higher purpose.
Picture of girlJust $5 will send one desperately needed Bible
to a Muslim convert.
Send a Bible!
"Fifty years of serving and strengthening persecuted Christians worldwide - that is the legacy of Open Doors.
An important part of that legacy has beenOpen Doors' passion for motivating, mobilizing, and educating the
body of Christ in the West to reach out to our suffering brothers and sisters."
- Rick Warren, Author of
"The Purpose Driven Life"
Open Doors Serving persecuted Christians Worldwide Click here to give Bibles.


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Why do details sometimes differ from one Gospel account to another?

This week's reading: Mark 1:12-13
Mark omits many details that Matthew and Luke include in their accounts of Jesus' temptation. Just as various witnesses have individual perspectives on an event, the Gospel writers draw on their own backgrounds and write from their own viewpoints for their particular audience.
Of greater concern than the amount of coverage are the apparent discrepancies in the accounts themselves. For instance, Matthew and Luke seem to rearrange the sequence of these events. Matthew says Jesus was tempted: (1) to turn stones into bread; (2) to leap from the temple; and (3) to worship the devil so all the kingdoms of the world would be given to him. Luke changes the order of the second and third temptation.
Ancient cultures did not feel compelled to relate events in chronological sequence. Some think Matthew may have listed the temptations in chronological order while Luke listed them in order of significance. Though the details vary according to individual Gospel writers, the essence of the information is consistent. There is no real contradiction between these accounts.
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Today's reading is from theNIV Quest Study Bible
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