Today is the birthday of Horace-Bénédict de Saussure. He worked in the Swiss Alps and created the basis of geology that underpinned Darwin's theory of Evolution. He also created an insulated glass box which captured sunlight, that underpinned todays AGW hysteria. Banjo Patterson was born on this day. He was one of Australia's greatest lyric poets. Young people might ask if he was greater than Michael Hutchence. He is. AB Devilliers celebrates a birthday today, illustrating great people can also be losers. Giordano Bruno was the inspiration for 2GB. Molière is inspiration for anyone that breathes or loves. Both passed on this day. For me, the day is significant for the 1963 birth of my brother.
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Happy birthday and many happy returns John Samuel Ball, Phath Caroline, Lina Ma, Michelle Do, Louis Pham and Christopher Jattan. Born on the same day, across the years, along with
- 624 – Wu Zetian, Chinese empress (d. 705)
- 1653 – Arcangelo Corelli, Italian violinist and composer (d. 1713)
- 1740 – Horace-Bénédict de Saussure, Swiss physicist (d. 1799)
- 1781 – René Laennec, French physician, invented the stethoscope (d. 1826)
- 1844 – Aaron Montgomery Ward, American businessman, founded Montgomery Ward (d. 1913)
- 1854 – Friedrich Alfred Krupp, German businessman, founded Krupp (d. 1902)
- 1862 – Mori Ōgai, Japanese author and poet (d. 1922)
- 1864 – Banjo Paterson, Australian poet (d. 1941)
- 1877 – André Maginot, French sergeant and politician (d. 1932)
- 1912 – Andre Norton, American author (d. 2005)
- 1920 – Curt Swan, American illustrator (d. 1996)
- 1939 – Mary Ann Mobley, American actress, Miss America 1959
- 1940 – Gene Pitney, American singer-songwriter (d. 2006)
- 1954 – Rene Russo, American actress
- 1955 – Mo Yan, Chinese author, Nobel Prize laureate
- 1957 – Loreena McKennitt, Canadian singer-songwriter and accordion player
- 1962 – Lou Diamond Phillips, American actor and director
- 1963 – Michael Jordan, American basketball player and actor
- 1963 - John Samuel Ball, inventor
- 1971 – Denise Richards, American model and actress
- 1980 – Jason Ritter, American actor
- 1981 – Paris Hilton, American model, actress, singer
- 1984 – AB de Villiers, South African cricketer
- 1984 – Jimmy Jacobs, American wrestler
- 1996 – Sasha Pieterse, South African-American actress
Matches
- 364 – Emperor Jovian dies after a reign of eight months. He is found dead in his tent at Tyana (Asia Minor) en route back to Constantinople in suspicious circumstances.
- 1600 – The philosopher Giordano Bruno is burned alive, for heresy, at Campo de' Fiori in Rome.
- 1621 – Myles Standish is appointed as first commander of Plymouth colony.
- 1801 – An electoral tie between Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr is resolved when Jefferson is elected President of the United States and Burr Vice President by the United States House of Representatives.
- 1838 – Weenen massacre: Hundreds of Voortrekkers along the Blaukraans River, Natal are killed by Zulus.
- 1863 – A group of citizens of Geneva founded an International Committee for Relief to the Wounded, which later became known as the International Committee of the Red Cross.
- 1864 – American Civil War: The H. L. Hunley becomes the first submarine to engage and sink a warship, the USS Housatonic.
- 1865 – American Civil War: Columbia, South Carolina, is burned as Confederate forces flee from advancing Union forces.
- 1871 – The victorious Prussian Army parades through Paris, France after the end of the Siege of Paris during the Franco-Prussian War.
- 1904 – Madama Butterfly receives its première at La Scala in Milan.
- 1933 – The Blaine Act ends Prohibition in the United States.
- 1965 – Project Ranger: The Ranger 8 probe launches on its mission to photograph the Mare Tranquillitatis region of the Moon in preparation for the manned Apollo missions.Mare Tranquillitatis or the "Sea of Tranquility" would become the site chosen for the Apollo 11 lunar landing.
- 1972 – Sales of the Volkswagen Beetle exceed those of the Ford Model-T.
- 1978 – The Troubles: The Provisional IRA detonates an incendiary bomb at the La Mon restaurant, near Belfast, killing 12 and seriously injuring 30.
- 1979 – The Sino-Vietnamese War begins.
- 1992 – Nagorno-Karabakh War: Azerbaijani troops massacre 70–90 Armenian civilians in the village of Qaradağlı
- 1996 – In Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, world champion Garry Kasparov beats the Deep Blue supercomputer in a chess match.
- 1996 – NASA's Discovery Program begins as the NEAR Shoemaker spacecraft lifts off on the first mission ever to orbit and land on an asteroid, 433 Eros.
- 2003 – The London Congestion Charge scheme begins.
Despatches
- 364 – Jovian, Roman emperor (b. 331)
- 440 – Mesrop Mashtots, Armenian monk, theologian, and linguist (b. 360)
- 661 – Finan, Irish monk and bishop
- 1600 – Giordano Bruno, Italian philosopher, mathematician, and astronomer (b. 1548)
- 1609 – Ferdinando I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany (b. 1549)
- 1673 – Molière, French playwright and actor (b. 1622)
Intervention was needed
Miranda Devine – Sunday, February 16, 2014 (11:49pm)
NSW Greens MP David Shoebridge is a disgrace. His spurious claim that welfare authorities are creating a new Stolen Generation has the potential to set back the cause of protecting Aboriginal children from an epidemic of sexual assault and abuse.
Last week, Shoebridge organised a protest with a group of Aboriginal women from Gunnedah complaining about grandchildren who have been removed, and brandishing placards: “Sorry means you don’t do it again”.
But anyone who knows the history of child protection in this country remembers the wilful reluctance of authorities to remove Aboriginal children from homes where they were neglected or physically and sexually abused. Once the Stolen Generation panic began, they were terrified of being accused of stealing children. So they condemned them to hell on earth. Indigenous children were left to endure situations no white child had to. Social workers were determined to keep “families” together — even if they were dysfunctional and substance-abusing homes.
The situation only began to change in NSW in recent years, under the Labor minister Linda Burney, who is Aboriginal.
Today, 6000 Aboriginal children are in out-of-home care. Tragically, through a generational cycle of welfare dependency, and the ready availability of drugs, alcohol and porn, there are indigenous communities so dysfunctional that every social norm has been trashed. In Bourke, the rate of child sexual assault is 10 times the NSW average.
While details of the case in Gunnedah that Shoebridge has recklessly inserted himself into cannot be divulged publicly, the eastern suburbs barrister should have known there were good reasons to remove not one, but four children from one mother, and not to place them with the grandmother.
But he never asked Community Services Minister Pru Goward for a briefing.
Instead, he staged a protest for the media, which, apart from the ABC and SBS, gave him short shrift.
Considering it costs as much as $950,000 per child to provide intensive foster care, it’s hardly something the government takes lightly. It is not done, as Shoebridge’s protesters suggest, because mum doesn’t have enough food in her cupboard.
As Goward put it, before we can stop removing Aboriginal children, “We also need to see rates of domestic violence, alcohol abuse and child sexual abuse in Aboriginal communities come down too, so we can be sure that Aboriginal children are safe.”
Instead the Left wants to perpetuate their misery.
Marijuana is not benign
WHAT can usefully be said about the devastating death of 11-year-old Luke Batty at the hands of his deranged father at cricket training last week?
WHAT can usefully be said about the devastating death of 11-year-old Luke Batty at the hands of his deranged father at cricket training last week?
Luke’s mother Rosie said it all, and her grace and forgiveness were humbling.
She said people would judge her, but no one does, except as a loving mother who tried to allow her boy limited contact with a troubled father.
But it is well worth noting that Greg Anderson had a marijuana habit, which
has been proven to cause psychosis in susceptible people.
has been proven to cause psychosis in susceptible people.
You can’t blame marijuana for this tragedy, but at the same time, it is not a benign drug.
It stands to reason that the less it is available, the fewer psychoses it will induce
It stands to reason that the less it is available, the fewer psychoses it will induce
THE ABBOTT EFFECT
Tim Blair – Sunday, February 16, 2014 (6:56pm)
Al Gore brings destructive cold whenever he talks about global warming. On the other hand, we have Australia’s Prime Minister:
Tony Abbott arrived in the NSW outback town of Bourke today to talk drought — but instead brought more rain with him than the district has seen for two years.As a thunderstorm pelted down on the shearing shed of 40,000-hectare Jandra station, the Prime Minister promised local farmers his government wanted to do more help them cope with the current drought …Jandra station owner Phillip Ridge welcomed Mr Abbott as a rainmaker.“If I had known what he would bring, I’d have asked him here months ago,” Mr Ridge said, as giant rain puddles, a sea of red mud and rows of bogged cars collected outside.
Hail the rainbringer!
CARPETBAG COLLISION
Tim Blair – Sunday, February 16, 2014 (6:51pm)
A rare moment of disagreement with Peter Phelps and agreement with the ABC’s Mark Colvin. At issue is the magnificence of the carpetbag steak.
Abbott asks sceptic to review useless green energy target. Will he ask the tough question?
Andrew Bolt February 17 2014 (2:34pm)
The Abbott Government
today announced a review into the renewable energy target, which
requires electricity companies to get 20 per cent of our power from
renewable sources by 2020.
Environment Minister Greg Hunt today said the cost to consumers of the scheme - which forces us to use expensive wind and solar power to save the planet from overheating - was “minor”. We’ll see. Let’s add also the price of subsidising this green power.
The good news? The review will be led by rationalist Dick Warburton, the distinguished businessman and former Reserve Bank board member.
Warburton was one of the few business leaders with the guts three years ago to warn that Labor’s carbon tax was a folly:
How much difference does the Renewable Energy Target actually make to the world’s temperature? Is it 0.0001 degrees or much less? Is the gain really worth the pain?
It is astonishing - a fraud against taxpayers - that even modelling of the effects of the RET done for the Climate Change Authority failed to answer that question. It is as if the warmist bureaucrats and politicians do not want you to know the RET is actually useless. All symbol, no action.
All the other questions - whether this is the best way to achieve our emissions target, are we overshooting that target anyway - are just fiddling until this most fundamental question is answered first.
Does the Renewable Energy Target make a blind bit of difference to our climate, and, if not, why on earth do we have it?
UPDATE
Reader Jack puts it more colloquially:
===Environment Minister Greg Hunt today said the cost to consumers of the scheme - which forces us to use expensive wind and solar power to save the planet from overheating - was “minor”. We’ll see. Let’s add also the price of subsidising this green power.
The good news? The review will be led by rationalist Dick Warburton, the distinguished businessman and former Reserve Bank board member.
Warburton was one of the few business leaders with the guts three years ago to warn that Labor’s carbon tax was a folly:
“It seems quite wrong to be going ahead with this when the rest of the world are actually pulling out of carbon taxes and (emissions trading schemes),” Mr Warburton told ABC Radio.Five years ago, when global warming hysteria had cowed almost every doubter into silence, Warburton warned:
“As long as there is going to be a tax of this nature on manufacturing, which is not comparable to any other countries in which manufacturing is carried out, that has to be a disadvantage.
“It is a disadvantage that gradually would lead to probable loss of jobs and plant closures.”
I believe there’s been an appalling lack of debate on the two key issues in this whole area. One issue is being the cause, what is the cause of the climate change? There’s no doubt there is climate change. To say that there’s not you’d be living in fool’s paradise.But here is the bad news. In announcing the review, neither Hunt nor Industry Minister Ian McFarlane suggested it would answer the most basic question of all.
On the cause there’s huge debate about whether carbon dioxide is the main cause.... [T]he science is not settled...
How much difference does the Renewable Energy Target actually make to the world’s temperature? Is it 0.0001 degrees or much less? Is the gain really worth the pain?
It is astonishing - a fraud against taxpayers - that even modelling of the effects of the RET done for the Climate Change Authority failed to answer that question. It is as if the warmist bureaucrats and politicians do not want you to know the RET is actually useless. All symbol, no action.
All the other questions - whether this is the best way to achieve our emissions target, are we overshooting that target anyway - are just fiddling until this most fundamental question is answered first.
Does the Renewable Energy Target make a blind bit of difference to our climate, and, if not, why on earth do we have it?
UPDATE
Reader Jack puts it more colloquially:
Free country. If you want your renewable energy you can have it. But why should I pay for your fantasy?
ABC obsessed with boat policies only now they work
Andrew Bolt February 17 2014 (8:08am)
It is June 22, 2012.
About 60 boat people a day are arriving illegally, and dozens more have
just drowned at sea, lured to their deaths by Labor’s weak laws.
Here are the questions asked by the ABC of Jason Clare, the Labor Minister presiding over this disaster:
It is June 10, 2013. Nearly 90 boat people are now landing every day, and dozens more have just drowned. lured to their deaths by Labor’s weak laws. ABC PM raises the issue of the day:
It is February 16, 2014. No boat has arrived for more than eight weeks. No one has drowned. The new Abbott Government’s policies to stop the boats, stop the drownings and gradually empty the detention centres are clearly working.
Here are the questions the ABC’s Insiders asks of Scott Morrison, the Minister presiding over this success:
It is impossible not to see a bias here. The ABC seemed indifferent about Labor policies which brought in more than 50,000 illegal immigrants, lured more than 1100 to their deaths, filled detention centres to overcrowding and cost Australians perhaps $10 billion. It seemed very unwilling to hold Labor responsible for the terrible consequences of its policies.
Yet the ABC seems obsessed with - and hostile to - the Coalition’s successful policies, which have stopped the boats and the drownings. It seems to take offence on Indonesia’s behalf and gives massive coverage to any grievance or claim of cruelty.
===Here are the questions asked by the ABC of Jason Clare, the Labor Minister presiding over this disaster:
SABRA LANE: Mr Clare, good morning and welcome to AM. What is the latest? What can you tell us about the rescue operation for these people?Note the ABC’s almost complete lack of interest in Labor’s responsibility for luring yet more people to their deaths. Note the ABC’s failure to ask a single question about the inhumanity of Labor’s laws, given these consequences. Note the absence of any sign of hostility to the Minister presiding over these catastrophic policies.
SABRA LANE: You’ve got two navy vessels there now. You’ve got a number of merchant ships there as well. You’re expecting more boats to join the location this morning?
SABRA LANE: And the weather prospects there, is that good for these people who are in the water?
SABRA LANE: You’ve just given a chronology of when Australia first learnt that this boat was in distress, it appears it called Australian authorities 10pm Tuesday night, but that there was no location and Australia told Indonesia that there was a boat in distress. It appears that Wednesday morning very early, 1.30 in the morning, that you were alerted to its location. What happened then?
SABRA LANE: A surveillance aircraft saw it on Wednesday afternoon and it appeared to be not in distress at that point. But you’ve said that you received more calls yesterday morning which alerted you to the fact that this boat was in trouble. What were the nature of those calls?
SABRA LANE: There are reports that Indonesian authorities say that they were first alerted to this on Sunday and that they were quite confused, saying that they received a number of telegrams from Australia and that they believed that there were two boats out there in distress.
SABRA LANE: Minister, the Australian Christian lobby says it’s time for both major political parties to put aside their differences on this issue, to stop playing politics and to sit down and devise a bipartisan solution.
SABRA LANE: Minister, thanks for joining us this morning.
It is June 10, 2013. Nearly 90 boat people are now landing every day, and dozens more have just drowned. lured to their deaths by Labor’s weak laws. ABC PM raises the issue of the day:
ASHLEY HALL: The Customs and Border Protection Service has intercepted another suspected asylum seeker boat carrying 30 people off Christmas Island. It follows the decision to call off the search for survivors of another boat that sunk off the island at the weekend.Notice the ABC’s complete lack of anger at Labor’s catastrophic laws. Note the complete lack of anger at the ghastly consequences - a death toll now above 1000.
Customs also decided not to try to recover bodies from that boat, to allow it to respond to others that may need help. One expert on the law of the sea says there is no obligation under international law to recover the dead from the water.
It is February 16, 2014. No boat has arrived for more than eight weeks. No one has drowned. The new Abbott Government’s policies to stop the boats, stop the drownings and gradually empty the detention centres are clearly working.
Here are the questions the ABC’s Insiders asks of Scott Morrison, the Minister presiding over this success:
BARRIE CASSIDY: How many Australian naval ships entered Indonesian territorial waters in December and January?On ABC AM and Radio National Breakfast this morning there is more extensive questioning of the Abbott Government’s successful policies - how they are offending Indonesia, how there are reported escapes from the Manus Island detention centre, how it’s mean to have people in detention there, how we need to resettle them, how PNG won’t accept any boat people as permanent residents, how we are sending unaccompanied children to Nauru.
BARRIE CASSIDY: Do you know the answer to the question?
BARRIE CASSIDY: Why can’t you tell us now?
BARRIE CASSIDY: But why would that piece of information be in any way, why would it compromise the Government’s position?
BARRIE CASSIDY: How much of that report then will be released?
BARRIE CASSIDY: Will it explain how it happened and why it happened?
BARRIE CASSIDY: And it will explain how it happened?
BARRIE CASSIDY: Will the unclassified section of that report explain to the Australian people how this happened, why it happened and why it won’t happen again?
BARRIE CASSIDY: And then we can back that judgment. The Indonesian Navy report argued the incursions may have been intentional, said in this era, navigation equipment is very sophisticated.
BARRIE CASSIDY: What’s false about that?
BARRIE CASSIDY: And what satisfied you of that?
BARRIE CASSIDY: There is a suspicion clearly in Indonesia that it was intentional. How will you disabuse them of that notion?
BARRIE CASSIDY: And do you think based on what you already know they will be satisfied with what you have to say, that without question, it was not intentional?
BARRIE CASSIDY: The Indonesian Navy report that I referred to had a photograph of burn wounds on a hand and it said, and this is the quote, “Resulting from being forced to hold onto the ship’s engine by the Australian Navy.” Does it concern you that an official Indonesian Navy report would make such an assertion?
BARRIE CASSIDY: Can you though dismiss just as lightly a report from the Indonesian Navy as you can a report from an asylum seeker?
BARRIE CASSIDY: How again will you disabuse the Indonesian Navy of their notion?
BARRIE CASSIDY: And you’ve established the facts, of course, without speaking to the person who made the allegations?
BARRIE CASSIDY: But you describe it as a normal process, wouldn’t a normal process, as part of that wouldn’t you talk to the person making the allegations?
BARRIE CASSIDY: What are the factors at work there? Clearly it’s the monsoon season, that’s one factor. How much credit would you give to the previous Government over its PNG (Papua New Guinea) solution?
BARRIE CASSIDY: But the PNG solution wasn’t in place this time last year.
BARRIE CASSIDY: The Indonesian Foreign Minister has, talking about the turn-back strategy, quote, “It threatens the negotiation of a code of conduct designed to repair the relationship.” Clearly he’s offended by the policy.
BARRIE CASSIDY: You are being true to yourself and true to your policy, as you say, but nevertheless it does seem to be offending the Indonesians, to the point where they’re now going to raise this issue with the US Secretary of State, John Kerry.
BARRIE CASSIDY: What do you think John Kerry would do about it anyway, even if he does regard it as a global issue?
BARRIE CASSIDY: And the other issue that they seem to displease them is the lifeboats issue and they say that that’s more severe than towing back boats; “We strongly protest.”
BARRIE CASSIDY: So you will go on utilising these lifeboats?
BARRIE CASSIDY: Well we’ve seen a video of those lifeboats.
BARRIE CASSIDY: Three days ago an Indian student took his own life at a detention centre in Melbourne. He was in that centre because he overstayed his visa. Could that have been avoided?
BARRIE CASSIDY: Is there a better way to deal with a student who overstays his visa?
BARRIE CASSIDY: So you’re saying there are factors at work here that go beyond the sort of conditions and stresses that come with being in a detention centre?
BARRIE CASSIDY: OK. Now on Friday at a Senate hearing there were 16 denominations, churches, who talked about the Government’s position on the migration act. You want to change it to give you more discretionary powers. Now they said, they say that would allow you to play God.
BARRIE CASSIDY: A former minister though, Chris Evans, said that it gave him too much power, the workload was too great and the churches are saying the taskforce, that if the minister gets it wrong there could be dire consequences for the individual.
BARRIE CASSIDY: Now just finally a report in The Australian yesterday, the Government is considering spending $3 billion to buy giant unmanned drones to patrol the borders that would be used, at least in part, to track asylum seekers and illegal fishermen. Is that under consideration?
BARRIE CASSIDY: If you were to invest that sort of money though in unmanned drones that would suggest you’d think this problem is going to be around for a long time yet?
It is impossible not to see a bias here. The ABC seemed indifferent about Labor policies which brought in more than 50,000 illegal immigrants, lured more than 1100 to their deaths, filled detention centres to overcrowding and cost Australians perhaps $10 billion. It seemed very unwilling to hold Labor responsible for the terrible consequences of its policies.
Yet the ABC seems obsessed with - and hostile to - the Coalition’s successful policies, which have stopped the boats and the drownings. It seems to take offence on Indonesia’s behalf and gives massive coverage to any grievance or claim of cruelty.
How to destroy a hypocrite in two minutes
Andrew Bolt February 17 2014 (8:03am)
Wow. And all done in just two minutes:
===Karl Rove demolished former Ohio Governor Ted Strickland on Fox News Sunday this morning in the course of responding to Strickland’s critique of Governor Christie and Bridgegate. Rove precisely demonstrated Strickland to be a critically flawed messenger of the Democratic Party talking points on Christie. Though it’s rare to find a Democrat shamed into silence — they have so much margin for error provided by their media enablers — I would be surprised if Strickland undertakes this particular mission again.
No, Gillard did not get tough on crooked unions
Andrew Bolt February 17 2014 (7:32am)
Henry Ergas doesn’t believe Julia Gillard’s latest claims of having been tough on union corruption:
===Gillard’s contention is simply this: that she bears no responsibility for the industrial lawlessness which flourished under Labor.
As regards the building industry laws, she merely implemented changes retired judge Murray Wilcox had recommended. Far from doing “virtually nothing to police (the unions’) internal governance”, as I had written, she not only retained the relevant provisions of Work Choices in the Fair Work Act, but strengthened them in 2012. And rather than trample on freedom of association, her legislation provides “more effective remedies in relation to breaches (of that freedom) than ever before”.
Each of these assertions is incorrect, misses the point or both. I accept that the Wilcox review recommended that the Howard government’s building industry laws be modified. But even the review concluded that significant lawlessness remained and that strong powers were required to prevent it persisting.
Faced with that finding, a government which genuinely believed that (as Gillard had said) the industry needed “hard-edged compliance (with) no tolerance at all for lawlessness” would have monitored those changes to ensure they did not, in Wilcox’s words, “impede investigations of significant contraventions”.
Instead, as the lawlessness spread, Gillard made further changes, not recommended by Wilcox, preventing the regulator pursuing matters once the parties to a dispute had reached an agreement, regardless of the tactics by which that agreement had been secured.
The consequences were entirely predictable: the thuggery escalated dramatically, as extracting an agreement, even by extreme means, now provided far-reaching protection from the law.
With Labor then standing by as the building union was found guilty of 30 counts of contempt in the Grocon dispute alone, Gillard’s protestations of innocence can hardly be taken seriously. Gillard’s claims with respect to policing unions’ governance are no more convincing.
Yes, the Fair Work Act kept the relevant provisions of Work Choices; but Gillard’s appointments to the Fair Work Commission, and the way the commission was then managed, guaranteed they would never be effectively enforced, as the Health Services Union scandal shows.
University is the last refuge of the Marxist
Andrew Bolt February 17 2014 (7:24am)
MARXISTS murdered millions and wrecked every country they’ve led. Yet 25
years after the Berlin Wall’s fall, they still cling to power in
Australia’s universities.
Amazing. Yes, our universities are the last refuge of the Marxist — of people such as Victoria University politics lecturer Max Lane, recently on the executive council of the Revolutionary Socialist Party.
Lane is now with the Socialist Alternative, which urges “the smashing of the capitalist state apparatus”, including the “dismantling” of “parliaments, courts, the armed forces and police”.
Its followers “reject Australian patriotism” and “oppose all immigration controls”, and Lane last week dutifully sent a letter to the Jakarta Post to warn its Indonesian readers our immigration minister is actually a pirate who kills innocent people.
(Read full article here.)
===Amazing. Yes, our universities are the last refuge of the Marxist — of people such as Victoria University politics lecturer Max Lane, recently on the executive council of the Revolutionary Socialist Party.
Lane is now with the Socialist Alternative, which urges “the smashing of the capitalist state apparatus”, including the “dismantling” of “parliaments, courts, the armed forces and police”.
Its followers “reject Australian patriotism” and “oppose all immigration controls”, and Lane last week dutifully sent a letter to the Jakarta Post to warn its Indonesian readers our immigration minister is actually a pirate who kills innocent people.
(Read full article here.)
The lesson of beautiful New Zealand
Andrew Bolt February 17 2014 (7:19am)
I COULD live here, I thought last month, as I drove through one of the world’s most beautiful countries. One day, I had a beach of seals to my left and snowy mountains to my right. Another, a ferry took me through a deep sound as glorious as any in Norway.
But I can’t live in lovely New Zealand, for much the same reason an astonishing 650,000 New Zealanders live here instead, leaving just 4.4 million back home.
See, a country that can’t give its young a future has no future itself. And having also just inspected the dead canary called Tasmania, I’m desperate we learn that lesson.
Sure, New Zealand isn’t a basket case. It’s growing, and its unemployment rate is only a bit over ours. It’s bigger problem is that it is small and remote, and without two pieces of luck that saved us — coal and iron ore.
But the point remains. New Zealand, with wages and houses smaller than ours, is Australia if we don’t change our culture.
(Read full article here.)
Shorten falls so far that Labor will listen for a splash
Andrew Bolt February 17 2014 (5:55am)
The public has picked Bill Shorten for a union hack:
This will only get worse. The royal commission into union corruption will look hard at Shorten’s old union. Shorten was not in charge at the time the AWU scandal involving Julia Gillard took place, but did he do enough later to expose the truth? Did he block attempts to bring the guilty to account? (Shorten denies the allegation. Gillard insists she did nothing wrong.) Then there are serious questions about links between Labor and unions that could have encouraged Labor governments to go soft on union lawlessness, not least by scrapping the Australian Building and Construction Commission two years ago. Police meanwhile are expected to announce whether they will charge anyone as a result of their own inquiries into the AWU scandal.
Shorten could shake off this tag of union hack if he’d shown policy courage and imagination. Instead, he’s shown a cheap populism and defended stale policies. He’s still defending the carbon tax, for heaven’s sake. He’s attacking every spending cut, including ones Labor in government itself proposed, when even the drinkers in the John Curtin Hotel know in their hearts the belt needs tightening. This rank opportunism marries only too well with Shorten’s inability to communicate sincerity, and an apparently patronising verbal tic that has this husband of a former governor-general’s daughter pronounced “with” as “wiv” as though he came from Sunshine High rather than Xavier College.
The Government is now convinced it has Shorten’s measure. He’s got rattier at the despatch box in Parliament, and was even desperate enough last week to hint Tony Abbott wasn’t sincere in his obvious commitment to Aboriginal advancement.
That said, the Government also has challenges. It has made tough decisions on corporate handouts and has an even tougher budget to come. The economy is very sluggish. The Senate is a log-jam now, and the new Senate in July will be tricky to deal with. The ABC is on the attack.
But Abbott, after a slow start, seems to have found his voice and his message, and will increasingly seem Prime Ministerial. Commentators have forgotten how much John Howard improved as a leader over his first term, and I suspect Abbott, always a quick study, will do no less.
===The Abbott government has regained the lead in the latest Fairfax-Nielsen opinion poll for the first time in two months, helped by a sharp drop in support for Bill Shorten’s performance and a Labor primary vote lurching back into the low 30s…Shorten is in deep strife. He is being seen for the public for exactly what he’s been so far - a creature of unions which many voters now suspect of abusing power. He is a former union boss known to have helped depose the last two Labor prime ministers. He himself became Labor leader only because the union-influenced party machine convinced enough Labor MPs to back him over Anthony Albanese, the choice of 60 per cent of Labor’s members. In government, Shorten changed the law to favour union power. As leader, he now opposes a royal commission to examine the excesses of union power, including corruption.
Labor’s share of the primary vote has also fallen by 4 points to be just 33 per cent… On a two-party-preferred basis, the Coalition now leads the ALP by four percentage points - 52 per cent to 48
After several weeks in which the Coalition government has successfully linked industrial relations reform, union power, and corruption allegations in the building industry in national debate, Mr Shorten’s personal approval has slumped by an unusually decisive 11 points…
Mr Shorten, who favours the more focused use of existing law enforcement authorities to address union corruption, strongly opposed the royal commission [into union corruption], prompting Mr Abbott to accuse him of ‘’running a protection racket for a protection racket’’....
As the incumbent prime minister, Mr Abbott enjoys a 10 point lead over the Opposition Leader as preferred prime minister, 49 per cent to 39 per cent…
The number of people approving of [Shorten’s] performance fell from 51 per cent in the Fairfax-Nielsen poll of November 21-23, to be just 40 per cent now ...
This will only get worse. The royal commission into union corruption will look hard at Shorten’s old union. Shorten was not in charge at the time the AWU scandal involving Julia Gillard took place, but did he do enough later to expose the truth? Did he block attempts to bring the guilty to account? (Shorten denies the allegation. Gillard insists she did nothing wrong.) Then there are serious questions about links between Labor and unions that could have encouraged Labor governments to go soft on union lawlessness, not least by scrapping the Australian Building and Construction Commission two years ago. Police meanwhile are expected to announce whether they will charge anyone as a result of their own inquiries into the AWU scandal.
Shorten could shake off this tag of union hack if he’d shown policy courage and imagination. Instead, he’s shown a cheap populism and defended stale policies. He’s still defending the carbon tax, for heaven’s sake. He’s attacking every spending cut, including ones Labor in government itself proposed, when even the drinkers in the John Curtin Hotel know in their hearts the belt needs tightening. This rank opportunism marries only too well with Shorten’s inability to communicate sincerity, and an apparently patronising verbal tic that has this husband of a former governor-general’s daughter pronounced “with” as “wiv” as though he came from Sunshine High rather than Xavier College.
The Government is now convinced it has Shorten’s measure. He’s got rattier at the despatch box in Parliament, and was even desperate enough last week to hint Tony Abbott wasn’t sincere in his obvious commitment to Aboriginal advancement.
That said, the Government also has challenges. It has made tough decisions on corporate handouts and has an even tougher budget to come. The economy is very sluggish. The Senate is a log-jam now, and the new Senate in July will be tricky to deal with. The ABC is on the attack.
But Abbott, after a slow start, seems to have found his voice and his message, and will increasingly seem Prime Ministerial. Commentators have forgotten how much John Howard improved as a leader over his first term, and I suspect Abbott, always a quick study, will do no less.
Danger: The Exploding Chocolate Shot. Deliciousness high risk area!
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MADU Odiokwu Pastorvin
YOUR EXPECTATION FOR THIS WEEK SHALL NOT BE CUT OFF!
No matter where you are in life, no matter what’s happening around you, start looking for more of God’s favor. Don’t settle where you are. Don’t settle for just barely getting by. Believe that God is good, and He wants to do more in and through you. Remember, what you seek, you will find. So seek Him first, and He will pour out His supernatural favor upon you.
Heavenly Father, I come to You today, giving You all that I am. I trust that You have a plan for my good. I trust that You are opening doors that no one can shut. Thank You for filling me with You today. In Jesus’ Name. Amen.
No matter where you are in life, no matter what’s happening around you, start looking for more of God’s favor. Don’t settle where you are. Don’t settle for just barely getting by. Believe that God is good, and He wants to do more in and through you. Remember, what you seek, you will find. So seek Him first, and He will pour out His supernatural favor upon you.
Heavenly Father, I come to You today, giving You all that I am. I trust that You have a plan for my good. I trust that You are opening doors that no one can shut. Thank You for filling me with You today. In Jesus’ Name. Amen.
=
PLEASE MEDITATE ON THIS!
The most important decision a person can make is where you will spend eternity. Will you go to Heaven and spend eternity with God? OR will you go to Hell and spend eternity separated from God?
When you ask the average person that question they will usually say Heaven. You ask them why they believe that and you will get many answers? I am good person, or I go to Church, or I give to charity, or I have been baptised, or many others. If you ask God who will go to Heaven, He tells us through His Word (The Bible) that only those who are born again will go to Heaven when they die. Only those who's sins are forgiven will get to go to Heaven. The Bible is also very clear that the only payment that is acceptable to God is that blood of his son Jesus-Christ. Your good works are not good enough. Your righteousness is as filthy rags according to the scriptures.
The good news is that God loves you so much that He wrapped His love in flesh and blood and paid a price that you could not pay. In Christ there is forgiveness of sin, a home in Heaven, and communion with the Father. My prayer for you is that you see your need for a savior and turn to Him. Through prayer ask for forgiveness of your sin and receive Him as your Lord and Saviour.God bless you.
===The most important decision a person can make is where you will spend eternity. Will you go to Heaven and spend eternity with God? OR will you go to Hell and spend eternity separated from God?
When you ask the average person that question they will usually say Heaven. You ask them why they believe that and you will get many answers? I am good person, or I go to Church, or I give to charity, or I have been baptised, or many others. If you ask God who will go to Heaven, He tells us through His Word (The Bible) that only those who are born again will go to Heaven when they die. Only those who's sins are forgiven will get to go to Heaven. The Bible is also very clear that the only payment that is acceptable to God is that blood of his son Jesus-Christ. Your good works are not good enough. Your righteousness is as filthy rags according to the scriptures.
The good news is that God loves you so much that He wrapped His love in flesh and blood and paid a price that you could not pay. In Christ there is forgiveness of sin, a home in Heaven, and communion with the Father. My prayer for you is that you see your need for a savior and turn to Him. Through prayer ask for forgiveness of your sin and receive Him as your Lord and Saviour.God bless you.
Pastor Rick Warren
"The night is about over, dawn is about to break. Be up and awake to what God is doing!" Rom. 13:12
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JOIN ME ONLINE NOW! This week I discuss how to deal with how you feel. Join us athttp://t.co/oD7mO.zzz6p
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I'm speaking now on how to deal with how you feel. JOIN ME LIVE ONLINE NOW http://t.co/oD7mOzzz6p
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February 17: Family Day in various regions of Canada (2014);Independence Day in Kosovo (2008); Washington's Birthday/Presidents' Day in the United States (2014)
- 1400 – Having died in Pontefract Castle after he was deposed, the body of Richard II was put on display in London's Old St Paul's Cathedral.
- 1621 – Myles Standish was elected as the first commander of the Plymouth Colony militia, a position he would hold for the rest of his life.
- 1904 – Italian composer Giacomo Puccini's Madama Butterfly(Geraldine Farrar in the title role pictured) premiered at La Scala in Milan, generating negative reviews that forced him to rewrite the opera.
- 1949 – Chaim Weizmann began his term as the first President of Israel.
- 1964 – Gabonese military officers overthrew President Léon M'ba, but France, honoring a 1960 treaty, forcibly reinstated M'ba the next day.
Events[edit]
- 364 – Emperor Jovian dies after a reign of eight months. He is found dead in his tent at Tyana (Asia Minor) en route back to Constantinople in suspicious circumstances.
- 1370 – Northern Crusades: Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Teutonic Knights meet in the Battle of Rudau.
- 1411 – Following successful campaigns during the Ottoman Interregnum, Musa Çelebi, one of the sons of Bayezid I, becomes Sultan with the support of Mircea I of Wallachia.
- 1500 – Duke Friedrich and Duke Johann attempt to subdue the peasantry of Dithmarschen, Denmark, in the Battle of Hemmingstedt.
- 1600 – The philosopher Giordano Bruno is burned alive, for heresy, at Campo de' Fiori in Rome.
- 1621 – Myles Standish is appointed as first commander of Plymouth colony.
- 1753 – In Sweden February 17 is followed by March 1 as the country moves from the Julian calendar to the Gregorian calendar.
- 1801 – An electoral tie between Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr is resolved when Jefferson is elected President of the United States and Burr Vice President by the United States House of Representatives.
- 1814 – War of the Sixth Coalition: The Battle of Mormans.
- 1819 – The United States House of Representatives passes the Missouri Compromise for the first time.
- 1838 – Weenen massacre: Hundreds of Voortrekkers along the Blaukraans River, Natal are killed by Zulus.
- 1854 – The United Kingdom recognizes the independence of the Orange Free State.
- 1863 – A group of citizens of Geneva founded an International Committee for Relief to the Wounded, which later became known as the International Committee of the Red Cross.
- 1864 – American Civil War: The H. L. Hunley becomes the first submarine to engage and sink a warship, the USS Housatonic.
- 1865 – American Civil War: Columbia, South Carolina, is burned as Confederate forces flee from advancing Union forces.
- 1871 – The victorious Prussian Army parades through Paris, France after the end of the Siege of Paris during the Franco-Prussian War.
- 1904 – Madama Butterfly receives its première at La Scala in Milan.
- 1913 – The Armory Show opens in New York City, displaying works of artists who are to become some of the most influential painters of the early 20th century.
- 1933 – The Blaine Act ends Prohibition in the United States.
- 1944 – World War II: The Battle of Eniwetok Atoll begins. The battle ends in an American victory on February 22.
- 1944 – World War II: Operation Hailstone begins. U.S. naval air, surface, and submarine attack against Truk Lagoon, Japan's main base in the central Pacific, in support of theEniwetok invasion.
- 1949 – Chaim Weizmann begins his term as the first President of Israel.
- 1959 – Project Vanguard: Vanguard 2 – The first weather satellite is launched to measure cloud-cover distribution.
- 1964 – In Wesberry v. Sanders the Supreme Court of the United States rules that congressional districts have to be approximately equal in population.
- 1964 – Gabonese president Leon M'ba is toppled by a coup and his rival, Jean-Hilaire Aubame, is installed in his place.
- 1965 – Project Ranger: The Ranger 8 probe launches on its mission to photograph the Mare Tranquillitatis region of the Moon in preparation for the manned Apollo missions.Mare Tranquillitatis or the "Sea of Tranquility" would become the site chosen for the Apollo 11 lunar landing.
- 1968 – In Springfield, Massachusetts, the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame opens.
- 1972 – Sales of the Volkswagen Beetle exceed those of the Ford Model-T.
- 1974 – Robert K. Preston, a disgruntled U.S. Army private, buzzes the White House in a stolen helicopter.
- 1978 – The Troubles: The Provisional IRA detonates an incendiary bomb at the La Mon restaurant, near Belfast, killing 12 and seriously injuring 30.
- 1979 – The Sino-Vietnamese War begins.
- 1980 – Mount Everest, 1st Winter Ascent by Krzysztof Wielicki and Leszek Cichy.
- 1992 – Nagorno-Karabakh War: Armenian troops massacre more than 20 Azerbaijani civilians in the village of Qaradağlı
- 1995 – The Cenepa War between Peru and Ecuador ends on a cease-fire brokered by the UN.
- 1996 – In Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, world champion Garry Kasparov beats the Deep Blue supercomputer in a chess match.
- 1996 – NASA's Discovery Program begins as the NEAR Shoemaker spacecraft lifts off on the first mission ever to orbit and land on an asteroid, 433 Eros.
- 2003 – The London Congestion Charge scheme begins.
- 2006 – A massive mudslide occurs in Southern Leyte, Philippines; the official death toll is set at 1,126.
- 2008 – Kosovo declares independence.
- 2011 – Libyan protests begin. In Bahrain, security forces launched a deadly pre-dawn raid on protesters in Pearl Roundabout in Manama, the day is locally known as Bloody Thursday.
Births[edit]
- 624 – Wu Zetian, Chinese empress (d. 705)
- 1490 – Charles III, Duke of Bourbon (d. 1527)
- 1519 – Francis, Duke of Guise (d. 1563)
- 1524 – Charles, Cardinal of Lorraine (d. 1574)
- 1581 – Fausto Poli, Italian cardinal (d. 1653)
- 1646 – Pierre Le Pesant, sieur de Boisguilbert, French economist (d. 1714)
- 1653 – Arcangelo Corelli, Italian violinist and composer (d. 1713)
- 1718 – Matthew Tilghman, American politician (d. 1790)
- 1723 – Tobias Mayer, German astronomer (d. 1762)
- 1740 – Horace-Bénédict de Saussure, Swiss physicist (d. 1799)
- 1752 – Friedrich Maximilian Klinger, German author and playwright (d. 1831)
- 1754 – Nicolas Baudin, French cartographer and explorer (d. 1803)
- 1781 – René Laennec, French physician, invented the stethoscope (d. 1826)
- 1796 – Philipp Franz von Siebold, German physician (d. 1866)
- 1816 – Haller Nutt, American planter (d. 1864)
- 1817 – Édouard Thilges, Luxembourgian politician, 7th Prime Minister of Luxembourg (d. 1904)
- 1820 – Elzéar-Alexandre Taschereau, Canadian cardinal (d. 1898)
- 1820 – Henri Vieuxtemps, Belgian violinist and composer (d. 1881)
- 1821 – Lola Montez, Irish actress and dancer (d. 1861)
- 1836 – Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer, Spanish poet (d. 1870)
- 1844 – Aaron Montgomery Ward, American businessman, founded Montgomery Ward (d. 1913)
- 1848 – Albert Gustaf Dahlman, Swedish executioner (d. 1920)
- 1848 – Louisa Lawson, Australian poet and publisher (d. 1920)
- 1854 – Friedrich Alfred Krupp, German businessman, founded Krupp (d. 1902)
- 1860 – Tom Seeberg, Norwegian target shooter (d. 1938)
- 1861 – Princess Helena of Waldeck and Pyrmont (d. 1922)
- 1862 – Mori Ōgai, Japanese author and poet (d. 1922)
- 1862 – Eugen Schmidt, Danish tug of war competitor (d. 1931)
- 1863 – Fyodor Sologub, Russian author and poet (d. 1927)
- 1864 – Jozef Murgaš, Slovak priest and inventor (d. 1929)
- 1864 – Banjo Paterson, Australian poet (d. 1941)
- 1874 – Thomas J. Watson, American businessman (d. 1956)
- 1877 – Isabelle Eberhardt, Swiss explorer and author (d. 1904)
- 1877 – André Maginot, French sergeant and politician (d. 1932)
- 1877 – Isidora Sekulić, Serbian author (d. 1958)
- 1880 – Ernest Linton, Scottish-Canadian soccer player (d. 1957)
- 1883 – George Edwin Cooke, American soccer player (d. 1969)
- 1885 – Steve Evans, American baseball player (d. 1943)
- 1887 – Leevi Madetoja, Finnish composer (d. 1947)
- 1887 – Joseph Bech, Luxembourgish politician, 15th Prime Minister of Luxembourg (d. 1975)
- 1888 – Otto Stern, German physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1969)
- 1890 – Ronald Fisher, English statistician, biologist, and geneticist (d. 1962)
- 1891 – Abraham Fraenkel, German-Israeli mathematician (d. 1965)
- 1892 – Marjorie Fielding, British stage and film actress (d. 1956)
- 1893 – Wally Pipp, American baseball player (d. 1965)
- 1900 – Ruth Clifford, American actress (d. 1998)
- 1903 – Sadegh Hedayat, Iranian author (d. 1951)
- 1904 – Hans Morgenthau, German philosopher (d. 1980)
- 1905 – Osvald Käpp, Estonian wrestler (d. 1995)
- 1907 – Yevgeniy Abalakov, Soviet mountaineer (d. 1948)
- 1908 – Red Barber, American sportscaster (d. 1992)
- 1908 – Ants Eskola, Estonian actor and singer (d. 1989)
- 1908 – Bo Yibo, Chinese politician, Vice Premier of the People's Republic of China (d. 2007)
- 1910 – Arthur Hunnicutt, American actor (d. 1979)
- 1911 – Oskar Seidlin, German-American author, poet, and scholar (d. 1984)
- 1911 – Orrin Tucker, American saxophonist and bandleader (d. 2011)
- 1912 – Andre Norton, American author (d. 2005)
- 1912 – Virginia Sorensen, American author (d. 1991)
- 1913 – Jean Le Moyne, Canadian journalist and politician (d. 1996)
- 1913 – Russel B. Nye, American author (d. 1993)
- 1914 – Arthur Kennedy, American actor (d. 1990)
- 1914 – Wayne Morris, American actor (d. 1959)
- 1916 – Alexander Obolensky, Russian rugby player (d. 1940)
- 1916 – Raf Vallone, Italian footballer and actor (d. 2002)
- 1917 – Abdel Rahman Badawi, Egyptian philosopher and poet (d. 2002)
- 1917 – Guillermo González Camarena, Mexican engineer (d. 1965)
- 1918 – William Bronk, American poet (d. 1999)
- 1918 – Volodymyr Shcherbytsky, Ukrainian politician (d. 1990)
- 1919 – J. M. S. Careless, Canadian historian (d. 2009)
- 1919 – Kathleen Freeman, American actress (d. 2001)
- 1920 – Ivo Caprino, Norwegian director and screenwriter (d. 2001)
- 1920 – Curt Swan, American illustrator (d. 1996)
- 1921 – Duane Gish, American biochemist (d. 2013)
- 1922 – Enrico Banducci, American businessman (d. 2007)
- 1922 – Tommy Edwards, American singer-songwriter (d. 1969)
- 1922 – Valentino Mazzia, American physician (d. 1999)
- 1923 – John M. Allegro, English archaeologist and scholar (d. 1988)
- 1923 – Alden W. Clausen, American banker (d. 2013)
- 1923 – Buddy DeFranco, American jazz clarinettist
- 1924 – Margaret Truman, American author (d. 2008)
- 1925 – Ron Goodwin, English composer and conductor (d. 2003)
- 1925 – Hal Holbrook, American actor
- 1928 – Marta Romero, Puerto Rican actress and singer
- 1929 – Paul Meger, Canadian ice hockey player
- 1929 – Chaim Potok, American author (d. 2002)
- 1929 – Nicholas Ridley, Baron Ridley of Liddesdale, English politician (d. 1993)
- 1929 – Patricia Routledge, English actress and singer
- 1930 – Roger Craig, American baseball player, coach, and manager
- 1930 – Benjamin Fain, Ukrainian-Israeli physicist (d. 2013)
- 1930 – Doug Hoyle, British politician
- 1930 – Ruth Rendell, English author
- 1933 – Bobby Lewis, American singer
- 1931 – Jiřina Jirásková, Czech actress (d. 2013)
- 1933 – Larry Jennings, American magician and author (d. 1997)
- 1933 – Craig L. Thomas, American politician (d. 2007)
- 1934 – Alan Bates, English actor (d. 2003)
- 1934 – Barry Humphries, Australian comedian, actor, and author
- 1935 – Christina Pickles, English-American actress
- 1936 – Jim Brown, American football player and actor
- 1938 – Buck Trent, American banjo player
- 1938 – Martha Henry, American-Canadian actress
- 1938 – Yvonne Romain, English actress
- 1939 – John Leyton, English actor and singer
- 1939 – Mary Ann Mobley, American actress, Miss America 1959
- 1939 – Clément Richard, Canadian businessman and politician
- 1940 – Gene Pitney, American singer-songwriter (d. 2006)
- 1941 – Julia McKenzie, English actress, singer, and director
- 1942 – Huey P. Newton, American activist, co-founded the Black Panther Party (d. 1989)
- 1943 – Costas Azariadis, Greek economist
- 1943 – Claire Malis, American actress (d. 2012)
- 1944 – Bruce Fogle, Canadian veterinarian and author
- 1944 – Nick Hewer, English public relations consultant, television personality and presenter
- 1944 – Karl Jenkins, Welsh saxophonist, keyboard player, and composer (Soft Machine)
- 1945 – Zina Bethune, American actress, dancer, and choreographer (d. 2012)
- 1945 – Brenda Fricker, Irish actress
- 1945 – Linda Kitson, English artist
- 1946 – Dodie Stevens, American singer
- 1946 – Shahrnush Parsipur, Iranian author
- 1948 – José José, Mexican singer-songwriter, producer, and actor
- 1948 – Rick Majerus, American basketball player and coach (d. 2012)
- 1948 – Don Scardino, American actor and director
- 1949 – Fred Frith, English guitarist and composer (Henry Cow, Art Bears, Massacre and Skeleton Crew)
- 1950 – Rickey Medlocke, American musician (Blackfoot and Lynyrd Skynyrd)
- 1950 – Graham Stringer, English politician
- 1951 – Rashid Minhas, Pakistani pilot (d. 1971)
- 1952 – Karin Janz, German gymnast
- 1952 – Vladimír Padrůněk, Czech bass player (Energit and Etc...) (d. 1991)
- 1953 – Norman Pace, English actor
- 1954 – Rene Russo, American actress
- 1954 – Miki Berkovich, Israeli basketball player
- 1955 – Mo Yan, Chinese author, Nobel Prize laureate
- 1956 – Richard Karn, American actor
- 1957 – Loreena McKennitt, Canadian singer-songwriter, harpist and pianist
- 1958 – Steve Fox, English footballer (d. 2012)
- 1958 – Alan Wiggins, American baseball player (d. 1991)
- 1959 – Aryeh Deri, Moroccan-Israeli rabbi and politician
- 1959 – Rowdy Gaines, American swimmer
- 1959 – Neil Lomax, American football player
- 1960 – Shunji Kosugi, Japanese wrestler
- 1961 – Christopher Ashford-Smith, American wrestler
- 1961 – Angela Eagle, English politician
- 1961 – Maria Eagle, English politician
- 1962 – David McComb, Australian singer-songwriter and guitarist (The Triffids and The Blackeyed Susans) (d. 1999)
- 1962 – Lou Diamond Phillips, American actor and director
- 1962 – Sarah Wollaston, English politician
- 1963 – Larry the Cable Guy, American comedian and actor
- 1963 – Alison Hargreaves, English mountaineer (d. 1995)
- 1963 – Jen-Hsun Huang, Taiwanese-American businessman, co-founded Nvidia
- 1963 – Michael Jordan, American basketball player and actor
- 1963 – Rene Syler, American journalist
- 1964 – Buster Olney, American journalist
- 1965 – Michael Bay, American director and producer
- 1965 – Samuel Bayer, American director and cinematographer
- 1966 – Quorthon, Swedish guitarist and songwriter (Bathory) (d. 2004)
- 1966 – Michael Lepond, American bass player (Symphony X and Seven Witches)
- 1966 – Robert Reid, Scottish rally co-driver
- 1966 – Luc Robitaille, Canadian ice hockey player
- 1967 – Chanté Moore, American singer-songwriter
- 1968 – Wu'er Kaixi, Chinese Dissident, Tienanmen Student Leader
- 1968 – Bryan Cox, American football player
- 1969 – David Douillet, French martial artist and politician
- 1969 – Tuesday Knight, American actress and singer
- 1969 – Willi Kronhardt, German footballer
- 1970 – Tommy Moe, American skier
- 1970 – Dominic Purcell, English-Australian actor
- 1971 – Martyn Bennett, Canadian-Scottish composer (d. 2005)
- 1971 – Jeremy Edwards, English actor
- 1971 – SaRenna Lee, American porn actress
- 1971 – Denise Richards, American model and actress
- 1971 – Cynthia Caylor, English actress
- 1972 – Yuki, Japanese singer-songwriter (Mean Machine, Judy and Mary, and NiNa)
- 1972 – Billie Joe Armstrong, American singer-songwriter, guitarist, actor, and producer (Green Day, Pinhead Gunpowder, The Network, and Foxboro Hot Tubs)
- 1972 – Philippe Candeloro, French figure skater
- 1972 – Taylor Hawkins, American singer-songwriter and drummer (Foo Fighters and Taylor Hawkins and the Coattail Riders)
- 1972 – Ralphie May, American comedian and actor
- 1972 – Valeria Mazza, Argentinian model
- 1972 – Lars Göran Petrov, Swedish singer and drummer (Entombed and Morbid)
- 1973 – Drew Barry, American basketball player
- 1973 – Raphaël Ibañez, French rugby player
- 1974 – Kaoru, Japanese guitarist, songwriter, and producer (Dir en grey)
- 1974 – Jerry O'Connell, American actor
- 1974 – Bryan White, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
- 1975 – Harisu, South Korean singer and actress
- 1975 – Kaspars Astašenko, Latvian ice hockey player (d. 2012)
- 1975 – Todd Harvey, Canadian ice hockey player
- 1975 – Vaclav Prospal, Czech ice hockey player
- 1976 – Kelly Carlson, American actress
- 1976 – Lefteris Fafalis, Greek skier
- 1976 – William Roussel, French singer-songwriter and guitarist (Mütiilation)
- 1976 – Scott Williamson, American baseball player
- 1977 – Wong Choong Hann, Malaysian badminton player
- 1978 – Jacob Wetterling, American kidnapping victim
- 1979 – Josh Willingham, American baseball player
- 1980 – Aya Endō, Japanese voice actress
- 1980 – Al Harrington, American basketball player
- 1980 – Jason Ritter, American actor
- 1980 – Klemi Saban, Israeli footballer
- 1981 – Joseph Gordon-Levitt, American actor, director, and producer
- 1981 – Paris Hilton, American model, actress, singer
- 1981 – Andrew Stephenson, English politician
- 1982 – Brian Bruney, American baseball player
- 1982 – Daniel Merriweather, Australian singer-songwriter and producer
- 1982 – Deyvid Oprja, Estonian alpine skier
- 1982 – Adriano Leite Ribeiro, Brazilian footballer
- 1983 – Gérald Cid, French footballer
- 1983 – Marios Kaperonis, Greek boxer
- 1983 – Nguyen Tien Minh, Vietnamese badminton player
- 1983 – Kevin Rudolf, American singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer
- 1984 – Sadha, Indian actress
- 1984 – AB de Villiers, South African cricketer
- 1984 – Jimmy Jacobs, American wrestler
- 1984 – Stefan Jarosch, German footballer
- 1984 – Kenta Kamakari, Japanese actor and singer
- 1984 – Drew Miller, American ice hockey player
- 1985 – Sivakarthikeyan,Tamil Film Actor
- 1985 – Anne Curtis, Australian-Filipino actress and singer
- 1985 – Anders Jacobsen, Norwegian ski jumper
- 1986 – Joey O'Brien, Irish footballer
- 1986 – Ricardo Rodriguez, American wrestler and ring announcer
- 1987 – Thomas Ayasse, French footballer
- 1987 – Aseem Trivedi, Indian cartoonist and activist
- 1987 – Danny Farquhar, American baseball player
- 1987 – Tiquan Underwood, American football player
- 1988 – Natascha Kampusch, Austrian kidnapping victim
- 1989 – Rebecca Adlington, English swimmer
- 1989 – Ina Demireva, Bulgarian ice dancer
- 1989 – Stacey McClean, English singer and actress (S Club 8)
- 1989 – Chord Overstreet, American actor and singer
- 1990 – Marianne St-Gelais, Canadian speed skater
- 1991 – Sam Oldham, English artistic gymnast
- 1991 – Ed Sheeran, English singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer
- 1991 – Bonnie Wright, English actress
- 1992 – Meaghan Jette Martin, American actress and singer
- 1993 – Nicola Leali, Italian footballer
- 1993 – Marc Márquez, Spanish motorcycle racer
- 1993 – AJ Perez, Filipino actor (d. 2011)
- 1993 – Philip Wiegratz, German actor
- 1994 – Angie Miller, American singer
- 1996 – Sasha Pieterse, South African-American actress
Deaths[edit]
- 364 – Jovian, Roman emperor (b. 331)
- 440 – Mesrop Mashtots, Armenian monk, theologian, and linguist (b. 360)
- 661 – Finan, Irish monk and bishop
- 1339 – Otto, Duke of Austria (b. 1301)
- 1371 – Ivan Alexander of Bulgaria
- 1596 – Friedrich Sylburg, German scholar (b. 1536)
- 1600 – Giordano Bruno, Italian philosopher, mathematician, and astronomer (b. 1548)
- 1609 – Ferdinando I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany (b. 1549)
- 1624 – Juan de Mariana, Spanish priest and historian (b. 1536)
- 1652 – Gregorio Allegri, Italian composer (b. 1582)
- 1659 – Abel Servien, French diplomat (b. 1593)
- 1673 – Molière, French playwright and actor (b. 1622)
- 1680 – Denzil Holles, 1st Baron Holles, English politician (b. 1599)
- 1680 – Jan Swammerdam, Dutch biologist (b. 1637)
- 1715 – Antoine Galland, French archaeologist (b. 1646)
- 1732 – Louis Marchand, French organist and composer (b. 1669)
- 1768 – Arthur Onslow, English politician (b. 1691)
- 1780 – Andreas Felix von Oefele, German historian and librarian (b. 1706)
- 1841 – Ferdinando Carulli, Italian guitarist and composer (b. 1770)
- 1854 – John Martin, English painter (b. 1789)
- 1856 – Heinrich Heine, German journalist and poet (b. 1797)
- 1874 – Adolphe Quetelet, Belgian astronomer, mathematician, and sociologist (b. 1796)
- 1883 – Vasudev Balwant Phadke, Indian activist (b. 1845)
- 1890 – Christopher Latham Sholes, American publisher, politician, and inventor (b. 1819)
- 1905 – William Bickerton, English-American religious leader, leader in the Latter Day Saint movement (b. 1815)
- 1909 – Geronimo, American tribal leader (b. 1829)
- 1912 – Edgar Evans, Welsh navy officer and explorer (b. 1876)
- 1918 – Milan Neralić, Croatian fencer (b. 1875)
- 1919 – Wilfrid Laurier, Canadian politician, 7th Prime Minister of Canada (b. 1841)
- 1934 – Albert I of Belgium (b. 1875)
- 1934 – Siegbert Tarrasch, German chess player (b. 1862)
- 1939 – Willy Hess, German violinist (b. 1859)
- 1943 – Konstantin Bogaevsky, Russian painter (b. 1872)
- 1943 – Armand J. Piron, American violinist and composer (b. 1888)
- 1946 – Dorothy Gibson, American actress and singer (b. 1889)
- 1950 – William Dickey, American diver (b. 1883)
- 1958 – Hugh McCrae, Australian author (b. 1876)
- 1961 – Nita Naldi, American actress (b. 1897)
- 1962 – Joseph Kearns, American actor (b. 1907)
- 1962 – Bruno Walter, German-American conductor (b. 1876)
- 1968 – Marquard Schwarz, American swimmer (b. 1887)
- 1970 – Shmuel Yosef Agnon, Ukrainian-Israeli author, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1888)
- 1970 – Alfred Newman, American composer and conductor (b. 1900)
- 1976 – Jean Servais, Belgian actor (b. 1910)
- 1977 – Janani Luwum, Ugandan archbishop (b. 1922)
- 1979 – K. Alvapillai, Ceylon Tamil civil servant (b. 1905)
- 1982 – Nestor Chylak, American baseball umpire (b. 1922)
- 1982 – Thelonious Monk, American pianist and composer (b. 1917)
- 1982 – Lee Strasberg, Austrian-American actor and director (b. 1901)
- 1986 – Jiddu Krishnamurti, Indian-American philosopher and author (b. 1895)
- 1988 – John M. Allegro, English archaeologist and scholar (b. 1923)
- 1989 – Lefty Gomez, American baseball player (b. 1908)
- 1990 – Jean-Marc Boivin, French mountaineer (b. 1951)
- 1990 – Hap Day, Canadian ice hockey player and manager (b. 1901)
- 1990 – Erik Rhodes, American actor and singer (b. 1906)
- 1990 – Volodymyr Shcherbytsky, Ukrainian politician (b. 1917)
- 1994 – Randy Shilts, American author and journalist (b. 1951)
- 1996 – Hervé Bazin, French author (b. 1911)
- 1997 – Joe Kieyoomia, American soldier (b. 1919)
- 1998 – Ernst Jünger, German author (b. 1895)
- 1998 – Bob Merrill, American composer and songwriter (b. 1921)
- 1999 – Sunshine Parker, American actor (b. 1927)
- 2001 – Barry Burman, English painter (b. 1943)
- 2001 – Bob Geary, Canadian football player and manager (b. 1933)
- 2001 – Khalid Abdul Muhammad, American activist (b. 1948)
- 2003 – Steve Bechler, American baseball player (b. 1979)
- 2004 – José López Portillo, Mexican politician, 51st President of Mexico (b. 1920)
- 2005 – Dan O'Herlihy, Irish actor (b. 1919)
- 2005 – Omar Sívori, Argentinian footballer and manager (b. 1935)
- 2006 – Ray Barretto, American drummer (b. 1929)
- 2006 – Bill Cowsill, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (The Cowsills) (b. 1948)
- 2007 – Mike Awesome, American wrestler (b. 1965)
- 2007 – Jurga Ivanauskaitė, Lithuanian author (b. 1961)
- 2007 – Dermot O'Reilly, Irish-Canadian singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer (Ryan's Fancy) (b. 1943)
- 2007 – Maurice Papon, French civil servant (b. 1910)
- 2008 – Brian Harris, English footballer (b. 1935)
- 2009 – Conchita Cintrón, Chilean bullfighter (b. 1922)
- 2009 – Gazanfer Özcan, Turkish actor (b. 1931)
- 2009 – Mike Whitmarsh, American volleyball player (b. 1962)
- 2010 – Kathryn Grayson, American actress and singer (b. 1922)
- 2012 – Ulric Neisser, German-American psychologist (b. 1928)
- 2013 – Derek Batey, English game show host (b. 1928)
- 2013 – Claudette Boyer, Canadian politician (b. 1938)
- 2013 – Richard Briers, English actor (b. 1934)
- 2013 – Manoranjan Das, Indian playwright (b. 1923)
- 2013 – Debbie Ford, American author (b. 1955)
- 2013 – André Gingras, Canadian dancer and choreographer (b. 1966)
- 2013 – Phil Henderson, American basketball player (b. 1968)
- 2013 – Shmulik Kraus, Israeli singer-songwriter and actor (The High Windows) (b. 1935)
- 2013 – Sophie Kurys, American baseball player (b. 1925)
- 2013 – Mindy McCready, American singer-songwriter (b. 1975)
- 2013 – Seán Óg Ó Ceallacháin, Irish sportscaster and author (b. 1923)
- 2013 – Maretta Taylor, American politician (b. 1935)
- 2013 – Mike Westhues, American-Finnish singer-songwriter and guitarist (b. 1949)
- 2013 – David Whitehouse, English archaeologist (b. 1941)
Holidays and observances[edit]
- Christian Feast Day:
- Independence Day, celebrates the independence declaration of Kosovo in 2008, still under dispute.
- Quirinalia, in honor of Quirinus (Roman Empire)
“For this is the message you heard from the beginning: We should love one another.” - 1 John 3:11
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Morning and Evening by Charles Spurgeon
February 16: Morning
"I have learned, in whatever state I am, therewith to be content." - Philippians 4:11
These words show us that contentment is not a natural propensity of man. "Ill weeds grow apace." Covetousness, discontent, and murmuring are as natural to man as thorns are to the soil. We need not sow thistles and brambles; they come up naturally enough, because they are indigenous to earth: and so, we need not teach men to complain; they complain fast enough without any education. But the precious things of the earth must be cultivated. If we would have wheat, we must plough and sow; if we want flowers, there must be the garden, and all the gardener's care. Now, contentment is one of the flowers of heaven, and if we would have it, it must be cultivated; it will not grow in us by nature; it is the new nature alone that can produce it, and even then we must be specially careful and watchful that we maintain and cultivate the grace which God has sown in us. Paul says, "I have learned ... to be content;" as much as to say, he did not know how at one time. It cost him some pains to attain to the mystery of that great truth. No doubt he sometimes thought he had learned, and then broke down. And when at last he had attained unto it, and could say, "I have learned in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content," he was an old, grey-headed man, upon the borders of the grave--a poor prisoner shut up in Nero's dungeon at Rome. We might well be willing to endure Paul's infirmities, and share the cold dungeon with him, if we too might by any means attain unto his good degree. Do not indulge the notion that you can be contented without learning, or learn without discipline. It is not a power that may be exercised naturally, but a science to be acquired gradually. We know this from experience. Brother, hush that murmur, natural though it be, and continue a diligent pupil in the College of Content.
Evening
"Thy good Spirit." - Nehemiah 9:20
Common, too common is the sin of forgetting the Holy Spirit. This is folly and ingratitude. He deserves well at our hands, for he is good, supremely good. As God, he is good essentially. He shares in the threefold ascription of Holy, holy, holy, which ascends to the Triune Jehovah. Unmixed purity and truth, and grace is he. He is good benevolently, tenderly bearing with our waywardness, striving with our rebellious wills; quickening us from our death in sin, and then training us for the skies as a loving nurse fosters her child. How generous, forgiving, and tender is this patient Spirit of God. He is good operatively. All his works are good in the most eminent degree: he suggests good thoughts, prompts good actions, reveals good truths, applies good promises, assists in good attainments, and leads to good results. There is no spiritual good in all the world of which he is not the author and sustainer, and heaven itself will owe the perfect character of its redeemed inhabitants to his work. He is good officially; whether as Comforter, Instructor, Guide, Sanctifier, Quickener, or Intercessor, he fulfils his office well, and each work is fraught with the highest good to the church of God. They who yield to his influences become good, they who obey his impulses do good, they who live under his power receive good. Let us then act towards so good a person according to the dictates of gratitude. Let us revere his person, and adore him as God over all, blessed forever; let us own his power, and our need of him by waiting upon him in all our holy enterprises; let us hourly seek his aid, and never grieve him; and let us speak to his praise whenever occasion occurs. The church will never prosper until more reverently it believes in the Holy Ghost. He is so good and kind, that it is sad indeed that he should be grieved by slights and negligences.
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Lot
[Lŏt] - concealed or myrrh.
The son of Haran, Abraham's brother, who accompanied Abraham from Mesopotamia to Canaan (Gen. 11:27, 31; 12:4; 13:1).
The Man with a Worldly Mind
We deem it necessary to spend a little time with this character because we believe Lot to be a representative man. Perhaps there is no Bible figure who represents so many men of today as Lot of Sodom. Where you can find one Abraham, one Daniel or one Joshua you will find a thousand Lots.
Lot started out well. But he acquired riches and with his wealth came trouble. He and his uncle, Abraham, came out of Egypt with great possessions. Then came the strife among the herdsmen of both men. Lot could not pick a quarrel with his uncle, so he separated from him and made the greatest mistake of his life in doing so. If determined to have the well-watered plain, Lot should have asked Abraham to choose for him. But no, when he lifted up his eyes and saw the fruitful land, his decision was made.
The moments of solemn, decisive choice reveal the character of the two men involved. Lot's choice was a bad and selfish one, ending in disaster. Abraham's choice was lofty, unworldly, superior to all petty consideration. Although, as elder of the two, he had the undisputable right to precedence in the choice, Abraham behaved like the high-minded, noble-hearted gentleman he was and so left the choice to Lot. The meanness of Lot is seen in that he took the best. The crisis of that moment was decided by the tenor of Lot's life. In spite of his general righteousness, Lot must have had a vein of great selfishness within.
In one of his unique speeches - The Subject of Salaries - Benjamin Franklin said, "There are two passions which have a powerful influence in the affairs of men. These are Ambition and Avarice: the love of power and the love of money. Separately, each of these has great force in prompting man to action; but when united in view of the same object they have in many minds the most violent effects." It was thus that Lot became "a bad lot." In his choice ambition and avarice became one. Points to ponder are:
I. His wealth (Gen. 13:5). Lot had a house - Abraham was content with a tent (Gen. 18:1; 19:3). Lot was no pilgrim (Heb. 11:13).
II. His choice (Gen. 13:10, 11). Lot was guided by selfishness, and pitching his tent toward Sodom was soon living in it (Gen. 14:12).
III. His righteous soul (2 Pet. 2:8). Lot did many things that were inconsistent with his true character and that were dishonoring to God. He sat down with the ungodly. Yet he showed some good qualities. He entertained the angels - believed their message - endeavored to restrain the wicked Sodomites. His good, however, was mixed with evil.
IV. His loss (Gen. 19:17-28). Lot narrowly escaped judgment. He lost everything, his wife was turned into a pillar of salt, he lost his wealth, he sacrificed his influence, for the people of Sodom despised him, his relatives mocked him, his two daughters shamed him. Lot offered no prayer for Sodom and manifested no desire for the salvation of its people. His only concern was for his own safety, and angels delivered him.
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Today's reading: Leviticus 19-20, Matthew 27:51-66 (NIV)
View today's reading on Bible GatewayToday's Old Testament reading: Leviticus 19-20
Various Laws
1 The LORD said to Moses, 2 "Speak to the entire assembly of Israel and say to them: 'Be holy because I, the LORD your God, am holy.
3 "'Each of you must respect your mother and father, and you must observe my Sabbaths. I am the LORD your God.
4 "'Do not turn to idols or make metal gods for yourselves. I am the LORD your God.
Today's New Testament reading: Matthew 27:51-66
51 At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook, the rocks split 52 and the tombs broke open. The bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life. 53 They came out of the tombs after Jesus' resurrection and went into the holy city and appeared to many people.
54 When the centurion and those with him who were guarding Jesus saw the earthquake and all that had happened, they were terrified, and exclaimed, "Surely he was the Son of God!"
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