Thursday, September 19, 2013

Thu Sept 19th Todays News

In France it is really chic to sport a beard, apparently. In Canada, it is not an essential skill to drive a train well? In the US it is outrageous to leave your gun before entering Starbucks. Apparently, gun restrictions aren't the preferred cup of tea for many. It is international speak like a Pirate day. 
Chief pirate Flannery has been dismasted. His acts of piracy answered by a reestablished rule of law. A rule which still hasn't reached the ABC. One act of piracy is pedophilia. It is outlawed, but some skirt those laws. 
The ALP is looking for a leader. Abbott is acting as a leader, but the ALP don't like Abbott. They are quite rude about him. It is funny that the ALP are attracting a large number of new members. It seems to happen during times the ALP are prone to branch stacking. It is een as a positive by those who approve of branch stacking. Howes wants to be involved by ditching the old Carr. North Korea is a bad place to be a free thinker. A bit like the ABC being a bad place to be a conservative, but worse. The sports drug issue is dying now that the impetus to get ALP reelected is gone. 
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Happy birthday and many happy returns Paul Sucharittanant. Born on the same day, across the years, as Antoninus Pius (86), Hartley Coleridge (1796), Ferdinand Anton Ernst Porsche (1909), Adam West (1928), Brian Epstein (1934), Cass Elliot (1941), Jeremy Irons (1948), Twiggy (1949), Kristopher & Jason Simmons (2002). On your day, Sukkot begins at sunset (Judaism, 2013); Mid-Autumn Festival (Chinese calendar, 2013); International Talk Like a Pirate Day
634 – Byzantine-Arab Wars: Rashidun Arabs under Khalid ibn al-Walid captured Damascus from the Byzantine Empire.
1863 – The Battle of Chickamauga began in northwestern Georgia and would end in the most significant Union defeat in the Western Theater of the American Civil War.
1970 – The first Glastonbury Festival, the largest greenfield festival in the world, was held at Michael Eavis's farm in Glastonbury, England.
1995 – The Manifesto of "Unabomber" Ted Kaczynski was published in The Washington Post and The New York Times, almost three months after it was submitted.
2006 – The Royal Thai Army overthrew the elected government of Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra while he was in New York City for a meeting of the United Nations General Assembly. 
It bein' international speak like a scurvy pirate day. Damascus be on th' road. Union won't win everythin'. Michael's farm be th' place. th' Manifesto was published. Thai Army made a royal mistake. Do well any ye gunna win a calculator .. fer th' sword fightin' academy.
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DEEP THOUGHTS FROM FRANCE

Tim Blair – Thursday, September 19, 2013 (10:16am)

• If tourists ever hear about it, this Paris place could really take off.
• I haven’t translated the health warning on my packet of French cigarettes, but I think it says: “We are here for but a short time. Please, go right ahead.”
• Due to an apparent city-wide razor shortage, many people in Paris look like Joe Hildebrand. Especially the men.
• France will never be taken seriously as a nation until its citizens work out that blue and black are the only acceptable colours for a pair of jeans.
• Insane homeless people behave the same the world over, but they sound much classier when screaming their tormented monologues in French.
• Like some Queenslanders, Paris residents pronounce the insult “retard” with an emphasis on the second syllable. So far, this is the only point of cultural overlap I’ve discovered between the two groups.
• When a waiter says “as you wish” following your request for a meal or your suggestion about how that meal might be prepared, it is important to gauge the deeper tonal meaning. This can vary from “you have a made a mistake” to “you have committed an error of such terrible consequence that it will be felt throughout your family for generations. Truly, the living will envy the dead.”
• If there’s a way to promote nightclubs without using illustrations of couples engaged in what appears to be extreme domestic violence, this city’s graphic designers have yet to find it.
• The best advice I was given prior to arrival: “Just walk around.” Paris does reward the observant walker.
• God bless the BBC for keeping me in touch with developments in Australia. Yesterday the BBC’s Sydney correspondent reported that Tony Abbott’s new government “has been criticised”, then – if I heard him correctly – mentioned that Labor’s Anthony Albanese faced a leadership challenge from non-challenger Chris Bowen.
• Although most Paris inhabitants speak excellent English, some conversations necessarily require a resort to gestures. It’s possible that the people we’ve always taken for mimes are actually non-French speakers simply trying to find out where to buy some climbing equipment.
• After staring at this sculpture in the Louvre for several minutes, my contemplation was interrupted by an Englishwoman. “Transfixing, isn’t it?” she asked. “Absolutely transfixing.”
“Er, yes,” I answered, hurrying away. I couldn’t admit that I’d been trying to work out who among the three would be awarded a free kick if they’d been competing for a mark in an AFL match. Probably Cybele, but it’s a close call.

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Flannery sacked

Andrew Bolt September 19 2013 (1:34pm)

This does not merely save us money. It closes a warmist propaganda unit that has spread so much baseless alarm:
PROFESSOR Tim Flannery has been sacked by the Abbott Government from his $180,000 a year part time Chief Climate Commissioner position with the agency he runs to be dismantled immediately.
Environment Minister Greg Hunt called Prof Flannery this morning to tell him a letter formally ending his employment was in the mail…
All other climate commissioners will also be sacked with the move to save more than $500,000 this financial year and $1.2 million next financial year.
The Coalition will now take advice on climate change from the Department of the Environment.
Do we dare hope the Environment Department is more rational about global warming than Flannery?
(Thanks to reader Mike.)
UPDATE
Highlights of Flannery’s CV:
Before he became Climate Commissioner, Flannery warned the Arctic could be ice free by 2013 (ice this year increased instead), “Australia is likely to lose its northern rainfall” (there’s actually been more rain) and “Perth will be the 21st century’s first ghost metropolis” (Perth is now headed for its wettest September in 40 years).
More seriously, Flannery in 2007 said global warming had hit Australia so hard that without desalination plants Adelaide, Sydney and Brisbane could be out of water by 2009.
“Even the rain that falls isn’t actually going to fill our dams and our river systems,” he warned.
Instead, floods filled dams in Sydney and Brisbane, and the expensive desalination plants hurriedly built in Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide are now all mothballed or scheduled to be.
Under Flannery, the Climate Commission similarly leaped on any sign that the planet might be warming, and played down evidence it wasn’t.
It blamed global warming for the Murray Darling Basin drought, despite admitting earlier there was no obvious link.
Last year, it even issued an alarmist report on “Australia’s Angry Summer”, hyping warm temperatures in Australia while ignoring low ones in the United States.
More in the Herald Sun and Advertiser tomorrow. 

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Column - ABC dogs its responsibility

Andrew Bolt September 19 2013 (1:22pm)

Global warming - general, How the Left hates, Media
HERE’S a leadership tip for ABC boss Mark Scott, who just blames his audience when his ABC calls a conservative a “dog f---er”.
Mark, here’s how Kerry Packer stepped up when his TV station fell down. In 1992, Packer’s Channel 9 premiered Australia’s Naughtiest Home Videos, hosted by Doug Mulray.
It showed people losing their clothes, a man lifting a barbell with his penis, men running with flaming toilet paper hanging from their bared buttocks, a child grabbing a kangaroo’s scrotum and animals having sex.
The show was just a third of the way through before Packer jumped on the phone to the studio and ordered: “Get that sh-t off the air.”
The screen then froze and an announcer apologised for a “technical problem” before throwing to an old episode of Cheers.
Contrast that with the weaselling of the ABC under Scott.
(Read full article here.)
UPDATE

ABC types like Wil Anderson are so certain of their warming faith because they are so ignorant about the science.  Take last night’s Gruen Planet. Anderson simply advertised his own know-nothingness when he used his ABC show (from 22:30) to attack a climate sceptic by repeating a call “to change the current naming system for hurricanes and cyclones”:

The group wants wild weather events to be named after prominent people who deny climate change… We’re getting reports of a devastating storm front off the coast of Victoria, blowing hard and pissing on all of us. Residents say thousands if not millions of lives are threatened by Andrew Bolt.
We can now be absolutely sure Anderson is a global warming dupe with no mind of his own:

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Enough. End the New Racism before more get hurt

Andrew Bolt September 19 2013 (12:28pm)

Another (alleged) sign of the New Racism that makes debate so difficult - and Aboriginal children so vulnerable:

The royal commission into child abuse has been told a paedophile scout leader was not stood down because it would look bad to sack someone who was part Aboriginal
Former Scouts Australia group leader Armand Hoitink said scoutmaster Steven Larkins was left working with children, even though he was caught showering with them and putting love notes under their doors…
He said when he asked officials why Larkins had not been sacked, he was told it was because Larkins was part Aboriginal.
“They thought it would be bad publicity,” Mr Hoitink said.

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Abbott haters gotta hate

Andrew Bolt September 19 2013 (12:05pm)

How the Left hates
If Tim Dunlop, writing for the ABC, truly represents the rage, condescension and spite of the Left, Abbott will have nothing to fear. Abbott’s enemies will not understand those who voted for him and will only alienate, not persuade.
You see, the real aim of such a piece is to advertise the writer’s imagined moral superiority. Its real failing is to instead advertise to most readers the writer’s arrogance and nastiness:

[Abbott] simply cannot accept women as equals ... Abbott’s conservatism - a strain dominant in the western world at the moment - is far more reactionary than this. It is built on resentment, the resentment that comes from a perceived loss of prestige… Science comes under particular attack, because it is the great dethroner of religious power… Tony Abbott is one of their number. Their particular bugbears are evolution and the science of climate change… a deep unseriousness and immaturity at the centre of the Abbott Government… They would rather score points against the “feminazis” and “poofs” and “inner-city elites” and all the other figments of their arrested development than face up to the world as it actually exists.
This is absolutely nothing like the Tony Abbott I know.
(Thanks to reader Peter.) 

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The greatest hell on earth

Andrew Bolt September 19 2013 (12:02pm)

Michael Kirby must be praised for at least trying to bring attention to almost certainly the world’s most brutal regime - the Stalinist gulag of North Korea:

Testimony heard thus far points to widespread and serious violations in all areas [and the evidence had] given a face and voice to great human suffering.
The commission listened to political prison camp survivors who suffered through childhoods of starvation and unspeakable atrocities, as a product of the ‘guilt by association’ practice, punishing other generations for a family member’s perceived political views or affiliation.
Among the stark testimony was that from a man imprisoned from birth, who lived on rodents, lizards and grass, and witnessed the public execution of his mother and brother… a woman who saw a fellow inmate forced to drown her own baby in a bucket, and [testimony] from a man obliged to burn the corpses of starved inmates and scatter their ashes on fields… torture and sexual violence, detention for watching foreign soap operas or having religious beliefs, kidnapping citizens of South Korea and Japan, massive malnutrition, and the total control by the regime’s propaganda apparatus.
Just another legacy of Marxism.
(Thanks to reader Graham. UPDATE: Link fixed.) 

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Howes call

Andrew Bolt September 19 2013 (11:18am)

AWU secretary Paul Howes rules out taking over Bob Carr’s Senate seat, if Carr steps down.
He said he’s had a lot of support, but if he went for the job it would be a “negative” and “destructive” fight.
He believed he would have had majority support in the party to run for the Senate vacancy, but it would have been a “pretty ugly and messy fight”.
“Ultimately I made this decision because I don’t want to be a wrecker and I don’t want to divide,” Mr Howes said.
“I don’t want to have the branch of the party here in NSW and our movement rip itself apart over me personally.”

That doesn’t bode well for Howe’s future in the party. Says a lot about the bitter divisions, too, made worse by Howes’ role in the Gillard coup. 

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ABC rules: an Indonesian critic is serious only when he attacks Abbott

Andrew Bolt September 19 2013 (10:35am)

The ABC’s Lateline last night gave a big introduction to Indonesian MP Tantowi Yahya, who duly attacked Tony Abbott:
TONY JONES, PRESENTER:  ... Indonesian MP Tantowi Yahya is a prominent member of his parliament’s Foreign Affairs Commission… Are there any circumstances under which Indonesia will agree to the new Australian government’s policy of turning back boats full of asylum seekers to Indonesia?
TANTOWI YAHYA, INDONESIAN FOREIGN AFFAIRS COMMISSION: No, we don’t agree with that… It becomes our concerns because first, it might potentially jeopardise our already good relationships in the past, and second, the policy which is going to be implemented by Mr Abbott clearly - what do you call it? - annoys our sovereignty as independent country.
But the ABC’s AM gave a very different introduction to Tantowi Yahya last year when he criticised the Gillard Government:
MATT BROWN: Tantowi Yahya is a former host of Indonesia’s version of Who Wants to be a Millionaire, and he has a populist’s eye for how this will play out in Jakarta.
TANTOWI YAHYA: ... That’s the way we see it. Australian Government is not consistent with the spirit of eliminating all the practice of smuggling people from Indonesia.
The ABC seems keen to whip up a story about Abbott being rejected by Indonesia. Let’s see what his discussions with the Indonesian President actually produce, shall we?
(Thanks to reader Token.) 

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Holden first in line with hand out

Andrew Bolt September 19 2013 (9:54am)

It’s a shakedown of a government that Holden would bet doesn’t want to start on a bad note:

General Motors Holden needs a ­commitment from the Abbott government on financial subsidies within two months or it is likely to announce it will cease making cars in Australia.
If Holden is so hard up for a handout, I suspect a handout won’t save it.
(Thanks to reader Peter of Bellevue Hill.)  

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Abbott’s revolt against the Age of Seeming

Andrew Bolt September 19 2013 (9:27am)

Culture wars, Politics - federal
THE media calls them Tony Abbott’s first two “mistakes”. They are in fact his first shots in a war on our Age of Seeming.
This is the start of a conservative revolution.
Our new Prime Minister wants to end this era of poseurs and preachers. He is saying no to Seeming, yes to Doing. The joke was that he’s an action man. Well, yes, he is.
So never mind if only five of his ministers are women - the great media scandal of the week.
(Read full article here.) 

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Why did it take five years to sack them?

Andrew Bolt September 19 2013 (8:41am)

How many more such boards and quangos could the Abbott Government scrap, saving money without inconveniencing a single member of the public?

The Social Inclusion Board is scrapped.
What did this board actually do in its five years? Well, not much, even by its own account last June:
The Minister reflected on achievements of the Australian Social Inclusion Board and the social inclusion agenda to date and the Board’s impact on Government policy and the
broader societal conversation. The Minister noted that since its establishment in 2008, the Board has: 

- supported whole-of-Government approaches to social inclusion policy and measurement
- recognised and advocated the crucial importance of social and intermediate outcomes of government programs
- developed the How Australia is faring research reports, which provide vital information on the state of social inclusion in Australia, and
- advocated for strengths-based approaches to service delivery.
Yes, it wrote some reports and cheered the government. That’s about it.
Goodbye. 

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ABC gives pulpit to Suzuki as warming church burns

Andrew Bolt September 19 2013 (8:29am)

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The biggest story in global warming today is the lack of it. There has now been 15 years of no warming of our atmosphere, yet the ABC’s Q&A, hosted by global warming spruiker Tony Jones, devotes next Monday’s entire show to just one panelist - visiting eco-extremist David Suzuki, here to preach his message of doom.
How credible is he? Here’s just some fact-checking:
David Suzuki, The Age, yesterday: 
...Half the coral on the Great Barrier Reef has disappeared in the past 27 years and its size could halve again in the next decade with degradation of the environment and the increasing frequency of cyclones.
Frequency of cyclones? Australian Bureau of Meteorology:

TRENDs in tropical cyclone activity in the Australian region ... show that the total number of cyclones has decreased in recent decades ... Two (recent studies) suggest that there will be no significant change in tropical cyclone numbers ... The third study, based on the CSIRO simulations, shows a significant decrease in tropical cyclone numbers for the Australian region ...
Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority:

CORAL reefs can cope with natural disturbances like floods and cyclones ...
And what exactly is damaging the reef? Brian Handwerk in National Geographic, June 8:

TERRY Hughes, who heads the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies headquartered at James Cook University ... (said) ... “Coastal reefs have been obliterated by run-off of sediment, dredging, and pollution.”
David Suzuki, The Age, yesterday:

FOR more than 20 years the insurance industry has been telling us we have all been paying more for changes in the climate. Why aren’t we listening to the insurers, the hardest business heads of all?
Roger Pielke Jr, December 10, 2012:

...After adjusting for patterns of development, over the long term there is no climate change signal ... of increasing damage from extreme events either globally or in particular regions.
More here.
Or treat yourself to Ezra Levant’s talk on David Suzuki’s views on immigration and human “maggots”

UPDATE
Reader Baden:

I have little time for David Suzuki since I first encountered him on a plane in the early days of his crusading career. He caused a fuss and inconvenienced the crew by insisting they serve him his liquid refreshment in the tin cup he had hanging around his neck on a string. He also made sure all we nearby passengers were made aware of his virtuous stand for the environment.
A beautiful image. Suzuki with his planet-saving tin cup hanging from his neck while seated in a carbon dioxide-belching airplane.
UPDATE
A brilliant fisking by Roger Franklin of David Suzuki’s ludicrously alarmist column yesterday in the warmist Age. Read it all. But it was particularly interested in Franklin’s takedown of Suzuki’s exhibit A in his gallery of warmist devastation:

Unfortunately, especially for Fairfax’s circulation managers and shareholders, the media company’s legions of environment writers and Gaia-loving editors then retail to a much larger audience the sort of industrial-grade fertiliser that is Suzuki’s stock in trade, as The Age has done… If Fairfax retained even a shred of journalistic integrity, Suzuki’s screed would have been fact-checked, spiked and his submission returned with editors comments, just to let him know that a pronounced sense of moral superiority doesn’t grant permission to make stuff up – or leave inconvenient stuff out.
Here is what that annotated response might have looked like. Suzuki’s column is reproduced in the bold chunks…

In British Columbia, where I live, a warming climate has allowed insects the size of grains of rice to destroy $65 billion worth of pine trees in just a bit over a decade. For millennia the mountain pine beetle, a native of Canada, has been kept in check by our winter temperatures which reach minus 35 degrees for several days.
Geez, Dave, you’re a bugger for cherry-picking! You want us to publish the claim that climate change is killing lodgepole pines, but you’ve admitted elsewhere that poor forestry practices, monocultures and the suppression of fire, not just warmer weather, created an overabundance of the older trees those beetles love to eat, hence the population explosion. You can’t just leave out inconvenient facts, otherwise our readers would be misled.

Not anymore. The British Columbia Ministry of Forests says that, thanks to global warming, we have not had one of these widespread weather events in the British Columbia interior since the winter of 1995-96.
Yeah, you’re right. It does say that, but shouldn’t you also mention this bit from the same report? Again, it has got to do with fire and monoculture…

“…During the last century, British Columbia’s fire suppression program protected billions of young pine trees from wildfire, allowing them to grow to maturity far faster than the rate of their commercial harvest and natural mortality.
Prior to this sort of effective fire suppression, approximately 400 million cubic metres of mature pine was estimated to be growing in the Interior. When the current epidemic started, the Interior was estimated to hold approximately 1.34 billion cubic metres of mature pine suitable for breeding mountain pine beetle."…

And anyway, according to Scientific American, the plague is running out of steam, with the last two years seeing dramatic decreases in infestations. As the US Forest Service’s deputy chief of research puts it, “We expect the beetle population numbers to drop dramatically over time.” Dave, if you want to be a climate-change authority, you just have to keep up with the literature!

This unprecedented event is unlike anything recorded in North American history, but it’s not been enough to galvanise our government to get serious about acting on climate change.
Unprecedented? What about the blight that killed all the North American chestnuts in just a few decades, starting around the turn of the last century?

And this is the man welcomed as an oracle onto the set of Q&A. As former ABC chairman Maurice Newman correctly observed:

The ABC is not being frank and open about the way global warming is portrayed on its various platforms, although the sense of imbalance is becoming more overt, I feel…
I retain a deep affection for the ABC. But, like the BBC, there are signs that a small but powerful group has captured the corporation, at least on climate change.
(Thanks to reader Carmen.) 

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The Age cries for warming alarmists it should hold to account

Andrew Bolt September 19 2013 (8:05am)

The deceptively titled “carbon economy editor” of The Age asks three warming alarmists to explain how terrible the Abbott Government is to scrap the Climate Commission, their publicly-funded pulpit.
First, Will Steffen:

“It’s really important that the Australian public have access to authoritative, independent, accurate information on climate change, and that’s exactly what the Climate Commission did,’’ said Will Steffen, a professor at the ANU and a Climate Commissioner.
‘’Unfortunately, the science has been sucked into this vortex of a highly politicised approach to climate change....’’
Authoritative? Accurate? Not politicised? The Age fails to mention the Climate Commission’s cherry-picking reports with alarmist titles such as ”The Angry Summer”. It fails to note the commission’s disgraceful hyping of fear over one hot Australian summer without noting there’s been no global warming for 15 years. It fails to note how the Climate Commission savaged critics who pointed out its errors. It fails to point out that Steffen blamed global warming for the Murray Darling Basin drought despite earlier conceding there was no real link.  It fails to note Steffen helped blow up a conversation about kangaroo culling into a death threat by a sceptic against climate scientists.
Second, Tim Flannery:

‘’Given the highly contested and political nature of this stuff, you need a body that’s trustworthy,’’ Dr Flannery said.
Trustworthy? The Age fails to mention Flannery’s 2007 dud prediction that ”even the rain that falls isn’t actually going to fill our dams and our river systems”. It fails to note his 2007 warning that without desalination plants (now mothballed, or about to be), Adelaide, Sydney and Brisbane could be out of water by 2009. It fails to mention Flannery’s 2008 false warning that the Arctic could be ice free this year. It fails to mention Flannery’s bizarre Gaian theories.
Third, David Karoly:

Professor David Karoly, a member of the Climate Change Authority who also serves on the science advisory panel of the Climate Commission, ...  noted comments by Maurice Neuman [sic], expected to chair the Abbott government’s Business Advisory Council, attacking the CSIRO and the Bureau of Meteorology for propagating the ‘’myth of anthropological climate change’’. ‘’He’s obviously an important adviser to the government and he’s misinformed about climate change,’’ he said.
Misinformed? The Age fails to mention Karoly’s co-authored paper claiming unprecedented warming in Australasia had to be withdrawn after sceptics pointed out its flaws. It fails to mention Karoly in 2003 blamed our drought on global warming, but in 2011 blamed our floods on warming as well, when the Climate Commission in 2011 admitted there was no clear evidence man-made warming was responsible for either.
The Age does not report on global warming. It propagandises. And so do the warmist bodies now being defunded.
(Thanks to readers Wes and John.) 

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A government that feels the proper weight of tradition

Andrew Bolt September 19 2013 (7:44am)

image
Scott Ryan set the record for the biggest Bible at yesterday’s swearing in of the Abbott Ministry.
It’s actually a family Bible from the 1880s, carried at the request of his 94-year-old grandmother, and was the biggest of many signs yesterday that we have now a government that respects traditions.
Here was another:

Josh Frydenberg used a Torah given to him by Sir Zelman Cowan, who carried it when he was sworn in as governor-general in 1977.
Another, from the new Prime Minister:

We are conscious of the ideals of duty and service, exemplified by our Queen, whom you (Ms Bryce) have so graciously represented here in Australia.

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Why was James Hird suspended for what Essendon doctor was let off?

Andrew Bolt September 19 2013 (7:08am)

Mark Robinson on the curious decision of the AFL to drop all charges against Essendon’s doctor, rather than be tested in court:

On Wednesday, the final pillar of the Essendon’s drugs scandal came tumbling down ... by the hand of a 68-year-old doctor called Bruce Reid who had the courage and fortitude to stand up for justice.
The day before Reid was due back in the Supreme Court, the AFL dropped all 38 charges against him for his role in the supplements scandal…
Without an explanation from the AFL, we can only assume they didn’t want to be in court. You know, all those testimonies about tip offs would be aired and witnesses would be called…
Scandal ... might not be the right word.
For how can it be a scandal when the person who approved the use of AOD-9604, which is banned by the world anti-doping body, and allowed it to be administered, among other exotic drugs, to players who were to receive 1500 injections, is given a pardon by the AFL?
By exonerating Reid, they’re saying his conduct, as chief medical officer of the club found guilty of the biggest crime in the game’s history, is not worthy of punishment…
Meanwhile, the coach James Hird, who never saw one player injected, head of football Danny Corcoran, who wasn’t there for three months because his wife died, and assistant coach Mark Thompson, who tried to the stop the injection program, were hung from the nearest tree.
How could those three know more about what was going on than the Doc?…
If only Essendon has as much courage as its wily doctor… The two-day ‘’hearing’’ leading up to the charges being laid on August 27 was not a hearing at all. It was two-day assignment to get Essendon to agree to the penalties.
Hird succumbed in the end because his chairman Paul Little asked him to for the good of the club. Only five days earlier, the other 17 club presidents asked Little to do the same for the good of the competition…
For God’s sake, the AFL suspended the coach for 12 months and the doctor got off. Hello?

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Is Albanese running dead in a contest of no ideas?

Andrew Bolt September 19 2013 (6:52am)

Labor’s leadership ballot of members is turning into a farce. Both candidates said they were in a ”contest of ideas” - implying that members could now choose Labor’s direction.
But Anthony Albanese and Bill Shorten have presented no choice of policies, no contest of ideas:
However, a senior Labor MP has told The Australian there are very few differences between the policies of Mr Albanese and his opponent, Bill Shorten, with the contest being more about the Right trying to re-establish its power base through Mr Shorten.
You won’t see them disagreeing on policy,” a senior MP said. “The leadership is about the factions; the Right is trying to assert authority.”
Albanese has built his pitch around his biography - son of a single mum in a housing commission flat. Shorten has meanwhile just got the faction bosses behind him.
Labor members should feel ripped off. This is a fix. And Albanese, whose campaign speech yesterday was a content-free ramble, could well lose unless he starts putting up a compelling case for Labor choosing a genuinely new way under him.  Or is his real game to gift the election to Shorten by offering no real contest, while preserving the fiction of giving members a say? 

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Make yourself at home

Andrew Bolt September 18 2013 (8:40pm)

Importing the strife we were saving them from:
Crown prosecutor David O’Doherty said Yak and the two [Sudanese] men left the house in Chapman Street, Swan Hill, in the early hours of January 21 after a 21-year-old co-accused had made repeated references about wanting to knock out a white boy, drag him inside the house, cut his throat and kill him.
Mr O’Doherty said the group were walking along Chapman Street when the 22-year-old victim was seen walking towards them.
The prosecutor said the 21-year-old male commented “let’s bash him up” before he confronted the victim and said to his co-accused in his native Sudanese language that he wanted to “cut the white boy’s head off”.
He said another 21-year-old co-accused male – Chol Monydhot – told his co-accused male associate to leave the victim alone and the trio began to walk away.
However, the court was told the aggressor ran from Yak and Monydhot towards the victim and after a brief chase, punched him to the face.
The victim lost consciousness and fell heavily to the bitumen road before the co-accused punched him twice more to the head and twice kicked him to the head “with great force”.

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September is #HungerAction month -- Join me and Feeding America! #TogetherWeCan#SolveHunger http://on.fb.me/14cdo44
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He has. You may. Hallelujah! ed
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A spring day in Sydney - ed
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Government funded climate scientist report glossary:
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New data from the U.S. Census Bureau's annual survey released this week reveal that the gap between the wages paid to women and men in this country has not improved in the last 11 years. This is a bitter pill for the nation's women and families, and a painful reminder that lawmakers' failure to act is causing grave harm to women, their families and our economy.
The wage gap must not continue to go unchecked. There is much more that Congress, the Obama administration and employers can and should be doing to help.
According to the new survey data, women with full-time, year-round jobs are paid just 77 cents for every dollar paid to men who hold full-time, year-round jobs. The gap amounts to more than $11,500 in lost income annually, which affects the short- and long-term financial security of women, their families and our economy. With women serving as essentialbreadwinners for their families, losing income that could go toward basic necessities can have devastating consequences.
For women of color, the wage gap is even more appalling and made worse by racial discrimination. African American women are paid 69 cents for every dollar paid to all men, and 64 cents for every dollar paid to white, non-Hispanic men. Latinas are paid just 58 cents for every dollar paid to all men, and a mere 54 cents for every dollar paid to white, non-Hispanic men. The effects of losses of this magnitude are appalling.

Token politics doesn't deal effectively with the issue. I'm glad a woman was PM. I just wish she had been competent. I'm glad a woman is foreign minister .. Julie Bishop is very good. It was an interesting exercise to parallel Gillard with Thatcher. But it is unfair .. Thatcher was great. - ed
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Looking towards Kirribilli House at the Australian Prime Minister's official Sydney residence overlooking Sydney Harbour towards the Sydney Opera House. — with Kirsten Katz and Luke Lukasz at Bennelong Point Sydney New South Wales.
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"Readers now have more choices than ever, and talented authors are no longer falling through the cracks."

Author Andrew Kaufman describes his indie journey → http://amzn.to/19bzg2n
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Over the last few years Fairfield City Council has invested a lot of money into improving cycling infrastructure within the municipality. This ranges from connected off-road cycle paths, signage, and bicycle parking facilities nearby train stations. But the growth in numbers of cyclists in the south-western suburbs isn't as great as it could be, particularly considering the extensive off-road infrastructure available.

There is where Fairfield Bike Shorts (FBS) comes in. FBS is a series of film making workshops which will culminate in the premier screening of films in Fairfield in October 2013. There may be opportunities for the films to then be showcased in the 2013 Sydney Rides Festival (TBC) and the films will be submitted to the 2014 Bicycle Film Festival for worldwide screening consideration. With these films we hope to engage the local community to get them thinking about and reconnecting with the act of cycling.

At the conclusion of the workshops we aim to have FIVE short films in post-production. These include a fictional narrative, an animation, a music video, a documentary and a behind-the-scenes documentary of the project.
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Oops - mandatory calorie counts in fast food restaurant have the exact opposite effect than intended! http://t.co/GqqaoBNCje
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“You’re wondering why she is connecting with strangers on the Internet? She’s doing this because she’s got a need that’s being filled by those people.” http://bit.ly/DRP091813 #DrPhil
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Madu Odiokwu Pastorvin'
Please magnify the Lord with me and praise the name of Abba. Lord, I will continually be thankful for everything You let me do and for the people I reached with Your Gospel.Amen.

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Madu Odiokwu Pastorvin'
Your word, LORD, is eternal; it stands firm in the heavens.(Psalm 119:89, NIV)
As you meditate on His Word day in and day out, you’re breaking out past the limitations set by others. People may have spoken negative things over you, but the good news is that people don’t determine your destiny. You are not who people say you are. You are who God says you are. Don’t be defined by the limits of others. Believe God’s Word and see His victory all the days of your life.
Pray.
Father, I choose today to believe Your Word over the words of others. You are the one who defines my life. Search my heart; search my mind. I choose to trust, I choose to believe, and I choose to follow Your Word which is life to my soul. Show me any areas where I need to be renewed to Your Word in Jesus’ name. Amen.

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Listening to the awesome Malín Alegría.
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Breaking News: Abducted 14-year-old Georgia girl found alive, police say. Two suspects are in custody and investigators are "looking at" other suspects as well. http://tinyurl.com/q8lqybr
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S.C. School District Responds to Blaze Report onTextbook With Flawed 2nd Amendment Definition

The South Carolina school district currently utilizing a U.S. history textbook with a disputed interpretation of the Second and Third Amendments responded to TheBlaze’s exclusive report in great detail on Wednesday.
In an emailed statement, a spokesman for Greenville County Schools confirmed that Hillcrest High School in Simpsonville, S.C., has received “several emails and phone calls” expressing concern over how the textbook, “The Americans,” defines the Second Amendment.
Oby G. Lyles, Sr., the director of communications at Greenville County Schools, told TheBlaze that the district has “looked into the matter and found that page 149 of the state-adopted textbook does not accurately present the Second Amendment.”
“It states that citizens have the right to bear arms as members of a militia of citizen-soldiers,” he added. “This is not accurate.  We will inform our high school social studies teachers that they should refer to page 166 of the textbook which accurately presents the Amendment (as originally ratified).”

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'The Day of the Doctor' is well on the way, with surprises emerging all of the time.

Plus: classic Doctors team up for an historic cover shoot.

Check out Anglophenia’s weekly #DoctorWhoroundup: http://bit.ly/1dmfmo6
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The end of the day approaches and the sky turns wickedly unstable down by Paul's Valley, Oklahoma. The day was one of trying not to be eaten alive by the violence of the storms passing overhead. Woodward had been demolished earlier in the day and the size and scope of everything was enormous to say the least. My job on this day turned from trying to chase wicked storms, to that of trying to keep out of severe hail cores and unpredictable turbulence. — at Paul's Valley, OK.
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Holly Sarah Nguyen
doTERRA EO is 100% pure, organic, safe to use as it has no added chemicals or anything artificial or synthetic that may cause any side effects it comes from the life blood of the plants and so it has a number of medicinal benefits which can be used over a period of time and as it is a natural remedy, it is obviously harmless to the body so i highly recommend it to everyone why not give it a try.
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Hopscotch

Young hopscotch aficionados could become unwitting criminals under proposed new anti-graffiti laws in New South Wales.
The legislation, which has been introduced to the NSW Parliament, makes it an offence to intentionally mark any premises or other property without the permission of the owner.
Greens MP David Shoebridge says there is no requirement in the legislation for a mark to be permanent or difficult to remove.
He says that means it will technically outlaw things like chalk hopscotch squares or handball courts drawn on footpaths or bitumen.
"Unless the kids get the consent of the local council they're committing an offence," Mr Shoebridge said.
"This Government is going to be putting on the statute books laws that make it an offence not just for kids to chalk a hopscotch court on the footpath, but for Mr Stace to have chalked 'Eternity', or for a street artist to put a rainbow crossing on the road.
"This will now all become criminal activity. If children get caught by police they'll be facing a $440 fine. Now that's just nonsense."
Attorney-General Greg Smith has downplayed the impact of the new legislation while apparently acknowledging that drawing in chalk will technically be an offence.
He says police always have discretion about whether to lay charges and he considers it unlikely they would charge children for chalking up hopscotch squares.

It is a Green announcement .. as believable as the world ending yesterday. But, if they must, Greens can go quake in their boots. - ed
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A good discussion point. I dislike how Greenies have stolen moral high ground with lies. But I support the initiative to be responsible and connected to community. - ed
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Liberal Premier Barry O'Farrell and the NSW Liberal National Government deliver on another key election promise to begin construction of a eleven and a half billion dollar super-motorway that will connect the M4 and M5 through Sydney.
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A historic conference in support of the Jewish settlemententerprise in Judea and Samaria took place Tuesday inside one of the bastions of opposition to the Jewish presence in the region – the European Parliament.
The conference was organized by the Deputy Chairman of the European Parliament's Foreign Affairs Committee, Dr. Fiorello Provera of Italy, who became a supporter of the Jewish communities after touring Samaria (Shomron), and by senior MEP Bastiaan Belder of Holland, who has also become a friend of Samaria in recent years.
The Israeli delegation included Samaria (Shomron) Regional Council Head Gershon Mesika, Acting Council Head Yossi Dagan, and the Director of Shomron Foreign Department, Shay Atias. MK Ayelet Shaked (Bayit Yehudi) was also a part of the delegation.
David Walzer, Israel's Ambassador to the EU, delivered an address at theconference – the first time he has done so alongside the Samaria representatives.
In the two days that preceded the conference, members of the Israeli delegation met with influential MEPs including Germany's Elmar Brok, Chairman of the EU's Committee on Foreign Affairs, and Alejo Vidal Quadras, Vice-President of the European Parliament.
About 20 MEPs took part in the historic conference, in the Foreign Affairs Committee hall, and many media representatives attended it as well.

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<As Israeli and Palestinian negotiators pursue their latest round of talks, hate speech remains one of many daunting obstacles to long-term peace. It is one thing for a government to tolerate private hate speech, but quite a different and more serious matter for it to actually produce, disseminate, or subsidize such speech. Put another way, it is illogical and ill-advised for the United States to proclaim its absolute opposition to terrorism while looking the other way when Palestinian officials and institutions elevate terrorists as heroes and role models>
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Caricature drawn by Carlos Latuff for Belgian educational website.

A Belgian Education Ministry website compared Israel and Nazi Germany, a Jewish newspaper reported.
The comparisons were made on the KlasCement.be website, a major teaching resource offered by the Education Ministry of the Flemish Region, one of three entities that make up the federal Belgian state, the Jewish monthly Joods Actueelreported Monday.

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oslo 521
Twenty years ago today, Israel’s so-called peace process with the PLO was officially ushered in at the White House Rose Garden.

A year or so later, when the death toll of Israeli victims of the massive terror offensive that the PLO organized shortly afterwards reached what then seemed unbearable heights, a popular call went out to “Put the Oslo Criminals on Trial.”

Needless to say, with Shimon Peres, the architect and godfather of the so-called peace process now serving as the president of Israel, nothing ever came of the call.

The demand for an accounting was not unprecedented. There was no reason, on the face of things, for those who made it to be perceived as anything other than reasonably enraged, and as responsible citizens insisting that those responsible for the largest, most destructive strategic error Israel has ever made pay a personal price for their actions.

Twenty years before that ceremony at the White House, Israel suffered the worst military defeat in its history.

Israel did win the Yom Kippur War, in the end.

It was a sloppy, painful, tragic and costly win.
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I just got an email from an online (and hardcopy) non-profit magazine that wants to use my Mount Diablo images that went viral a week or so ago, but they do not want to pay. That puts me in a strange position. I originally shared them with the news service and all for free, but generally treat articles using my images different than my generally releasing things to the social media. They aren't even offering name cred or links to my various selling websites... thinking this one out...
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Made in 1854 for princess Matilde Bonaparte by Theodore Fester. Later property of Mrs. Cornelius Vanderbilt
4 her
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Yellow and white diamond ring by Yael Designs
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Aprille Love
#tbt #throwback #morning #thursday
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Sukkot, Dry Bones cartoon, doobie, shuldig, jews, jewish, continuity, huts, booths,
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This past weekend, Kay and I did our first public interview since Matthew's death, and God was definitely at work!
September 18, 2013
View this email in your browser
The Most Important Interview
I've Ever Done
Rick and Kay Interviewed by Piers MorganAfter teaching How to Get Through What You’re Going Through” for the past eight weeks, Kay and I felt it was time to grant the first media interview since Matthew’s death. We chose CNN’s Piers Morgan Live because it offered a full-hour for us to share our thoughts, rather than just short sound bites.
In kindness, the CNN team came to us, taping the interview at our Acts of Mercy family foundation office. In our conversation, we discussed:
  • What it was like to parent a child who battled mental illness all his life.
  • What it has been like to grieve our son’s suicide as public figures.
  • Mental illness, depression, guns, grief, and God.
  • What needs to change in our culture, including removing the stigma from mental illness.
  • How to support the mentally ill and the families who care for them.
  • How our faith has been tested and has grown stronger.
  • How we get our sins forgiven, purpose for living, and home in heaven through Jesus.
  • The overwhelming love we’ve received from our church family and others. How God gives us HOPE in our darkest days.
The interview was raw and real. The CNN crew and our staff watched almost breathlessly. For an entire hour, you could’ve heard a pin drop, everyone was so riveted by what God was doing through the conversation.
I wanted to take an opportunity to pass along some of the most significant things we were privileged to say, and I would welcome your feedback on the interview.
  
10 Values to Communicate for a
Stronger Church Staff
By Brandon Cox
ValuesRecently I began reflecting on where our church’s staff needs to go as a team and it occurred to me that while our church, as a whole, understands who we are because of our Code, our staff may not have a strong identity as a team because I’ve never clearly and succinctly articulated my own values for those who join our ministry in a leadership role.
  
Men: What Do We Need that Jesus Can Bring?

By Kenny Luck
5 GroupLife Dots You May Not Be Connecting

By Mark Howell
"When walking thru the Valley of the Shadow of Death, turn your back to the shadow and focus on The Light!"#WarrensOnCNN

Via @RickWarren on Twitter
How to Find Your
Social Media Voice

By Phil Cooke
Books:
God of the Underdogs

By Matt Keller
8 Ways You May Be Losing People In Your Sermons
By Brandon Hilgemann
Why We Multiply Everything, Including Campuses
By Ed Stetzer
Copyright © 2013 Saddleback Church, All rights reserved.
Thanks for opting into Rick Warren's Pastor's Toolbox at pastors.com.

Our mailing address is:
Saddleback Church
1 Saddleback Pkwy
Lake ForestCA 92630

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Hi everyone! Here's the MichelleMalkin.com newsletter for September 18th. Enjoy!

From the Blog

More From the Right Side of the Web

Featured Video

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Heritage is taking the Obamacare debate to Times Square. Check out this video to see what people think about it! You might be surprised.

Michelle's Top Tweets

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And ... Our Hate Tweet of the Day

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The Left has so much to teach us about respect for women.

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FBI's sketch of the Unabomber

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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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“Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.” Philippians 2:3-4 NIV
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Morning and Evening by Charles Spurgeon

Morning

"If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit."
Galatians 5:25
The two most important things in our holy religion are the life of faith and the walk of faith. He who shall rightly understand these is not far from being a master in experimental theology, for they are vital points to a Christian. You will never find true faith unattended by true godliness; on the other hand, you will never discover a truly holy life which has not for its root a living faith upon the righteousness of Christ. Woe unto those who seek after the one without the other! There are some who cultivate faith and forget holiness; these may be very high in orthodoxy, but they shall be very deep in condemnation, for they hold the truth in unrighteousness; and there are others who have strained after holiness of life, but have denied the faith, like the Pharisees of old, of whom the Master said, they were "whitewashed sepulchres." We must have faith, for this is the foundation; we must have holiness of life, for this is the superstructure. Of what service is the mere foundation of a building to a man in the day of tempest? Can he hide himself therein? He wants a house to cover him, as well as a foundation for that house. Even so we need the superstructure of spiritual life if we would have comfort in the day of doubt. But seek not a holy life without faith, for that would be to erect a house which can afford no permanent shelter, because it has no foundation on a rock. Let faith and life be put together, and, like the two abutments of an arch, they will make our piety enduring. Like light and heat streaming from the same sun, they are alike full of blessing. Like the two pillars of the temple, they are for glory and for beauty. They are two streams from the fountain of grace; two lamps lit with holy fire; two olive trees watered by heavenly care. O Lord, give us this day life within, and it will reveal itself without to thy glory.

Evening

"And they follow me."
John 10:27
We should follow our Lord as unhesitatingly as sheep follow their shepherd, for he has a right to lead us wherever he pleases. We are not our own, we are bought with a price--let us recognize the rights of the redeeming blood. The soldier follows his captain, the servant obeys his master, much more must we follow our Redeemer, to whom we are a purchased possession. We are not true to our profession of being Christians, if we question the bidding of our Leader and Commander. Submission is our duty, cavilling is our folly. Often might our Lord say to us as to Peter, "What is that to thee? Follow thou me." Wherever Jesus may lead us, he goes before us. If we know not where we go, we know with whom we go. With such a companion, who will dread the perils of the road? The journey may be long, but his everlasting arms will carry us to the end. The presence of Jesus is the assurance of eternal salvation, because he lives, we shall live also. We should follow Christ in simplicity and faith, because the paths in which he leads us all end in glory and immortality. It is true they may not be smooth paths--they may be covered with sharp flinty trials, but they lead to the "city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God." "All the paths of the Lord are mercy and truth unto such as keep his covenant." Let us put full trust in our Leader, since we know that, come prosperity or adversity, sickness or health, popularity or contempt, his purpose shall be worked out, and that purpose shall be pure, unmingled good to every heir of mercy. We shall find it sweet to go up the bleak side of the hill with Christ; and when rain and snow blow into our faces, his dear love will make us far more blest than those who sit at home and warm their hands at the world's fire. To the top of Amana, to the dens of lions, or to the hills of leopards, we will follow our Beloved. Precious Jesus, draw us, and we will run after thee.
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Today's reading: Proverbs 30-31, 2 Corinthians 11:1-15 (NIV)

View today's reading on Bible Gateway

Today's Old Testament reading: Proverbs 30-31

Sayings of Agur
1 The sayings of Agur son of Jakeh—an inspired utterance.
This man’s utterance to Ithiel:
“I am weary, God,
but I can prevail.
2 Surely I am only a brute, not a man;
I do not have human understanding.
3 I have not learned wisdom,
nor have I attained to the knowledge of the Holy One.
4 Who has gone up to heaven and come down?
Whose hands have gathered up the wind?
Who has wrapped up the waters in a cloak?
Who has established all the ends of the earth?
What is his name, and what is the name of his son?
Surely you know!

Today's New Testament reading: 2 Corinthians 11:1-15

Paul and the False Apostles
1 I hope you will put up with me in a little foolishness. Yes, please put up with me! 2 I am jealous for you with a godly jealousy. I promised you to one husband, to Christ, so that I might present you as a pure virgin to him. 3 But I am afraid that just as Eve was deceived by the serpent’s cunning, your minds may somehow be led astray from your sincere and pure devotion to Christ. 4 For if someone comes to you and preaches a Jesus other than the Jesus we preached, or if you receive a different spirit from the Spirit you received, or a different gospel from the one you accepted, you put up with it easily enough....
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