Wednesday, August 27, 2014

Wed Aug 27th Todays News

A tenth Liberal Party member has stood aside after being fingered by the ICAC. The member denies the allegations which are not within three orders of magnitude of Eddie Obeid's property management which the ICAC passed without comment during the reign of Bob Carr and Iemma. It wasn't that the ALP corruption was hidden. One Liberal affiliated businessman was assassinated by ALP backers and it wasn't uncovered until a Liberal link was found. Earlier in the week the assassination of Donald Mackay was discussed with a previously dismissed alleged witness claiming to be ready to step forward. Thing is, the ALP are not clean over the issue, being too connected to drug crime and politically opposed to the victim. But the press are running with an allegation against Mr Abbott that he had claimed to have been late to a party function because he had to claim entitlements. ALP leader Shorten, who never notices if he has entitlements or other ALP do, said that it was telling someone within the Liberal Party was leaking to damage the Liberal Party. It is telling. It would never happen with the ALP, where gross corruption goes unreported and ignored. However, there appears to be no substance to the allegation against Mr Abbott. Even so, it would be nice for these allegations to be cleared regarding the Liberal Party. And it would be better to see them addressing extant issues, like the bizarre cover up of the death of Hamidur Rahman. 

Palmer can say *anything* to anyone and none of it can be considered reliable. This is illustrated by his recollection of a trip to China in 1962 and notes taken at the time. Girls are raped in a British village and the (approximately 1400) victims are ignored because of the race and religion of their abusers. Say 'no' for the proposed change to the Australian constitution to introduce race. Race is not needed for the state to function. ASIO is asking for special laws to protect Australians. There is good reason for extraordinary rules in extraordinary times, and if they have a sunset clause, they sound worthwhile. Paul Keating has released a book about himself, and he reminds the world he was another incompetent who protected other incompetents while he was in government, so that no one knows who was the most incompetent. 
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For twenty two years I have been responsibly addressing an issue, and I cannot carry on. I am petitioning the Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott to remedy my distress. I leave it up to him if he chooses to address the issue. Regardless of your opinion of conservative government, the issue is pressing. Please sign my petition at https://www.change.org/en-AU/petitions/tony-abbott-remedy-the-persecution-of-dd-ball

Mr Ball, I will not sign your petition as it will do no good, but I will share your message and ask as many of friends who read it, to share it also. Let us see if we cannot use the power of the internet to spread the word of these infamous killings. As a father and a former soldier, I cannot, could not, justify ignoring this appalling action by the perpetrators, whoever they may; I thank you Douglas. You are wrong about the petition. Signing it is as worthless and meaningless an act as voting. A stand up guy would know that. - ed

Lorraine Allen Hider I signed the petition ages ago David, with pleasure, nobody knows what it's like until they've been there. Keep heart David take care.

I have begun a bulletin board (http://theconservativevoice.freeforums.netwhich will allow greater latitude for members to post and interact. It is not subject to FB policy and so greater range is allowed in posts. Also there are private members rooms in which nothing is censored, except abuse. All welcome, registration is free.
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Happy birthday and many happy returns Geoff Bradley and Sultans Favorite. Born on the same day, across the years. Along with Ashikaga Yoshikazu (1407), Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770), Giuseppe Peano (1858), Charles Rolls (1877), C. S. Forester (1899), Donald Bradman (1908), Barbara Bach (1947), Gerhard Berger (1959) and Sarah Hecken (1993). On your day, 1859 – Edwin Drake successfully drilled for oil in Titusville, Pennsylvania, US, resulting in the Pennsylvania oil rush and the birth of the modern oil industry.
1896 – The United Kingdom and Zanzibar went to war, with Zanzibar surrendering less than an hour after the conflict broke out.
1922 – Turkish forces re-captured Afyon, the first victory of their counterattack during the Greco-Turkish War.
1991 – Dissolution of the Soviet Union: Moldova declared its independence during the aftermath of the failure of the Soviet coup d'état attempt.
2003 – The first round of six-party talks to find a peaceful resolution to the security concerns as a result of the North Korean nuclear weapons program opened. 
You have oil. Victory is quick. Greece is losing (geddit? Oil and grease?). But the most evil of modern empires has collapsed. Now we discuss peace. And party.
Matches
Hatches
Despatches
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Abbott has some rats in his ranks

Andrew Bolt August 27 2014 (9:56am)

The most significant thing about this disputed report about not much is that some Liberals - ones I’m guessing suffer from Thwarted Ambition Syndrome - are now happy to trash their leader and hurt their party to work off their spleen:
Prime Minister Tony Abbott told government MPs he had to schedule an early morning visit to a cancer research centre in Melbourne on Tuesday so that he could justify billing taxpayers to be in the city for a “private function” the night before.
Mr Abbott made the admission at the regular meeting of Liberal and Nationals MPs [in Canberra] after being taken to task by one his own senators for turning up an hour late.
Several MPs told Fairfax Media that the Prime Minister described the private function as a “fund-raiser” to the party room.
The issue came to a head when LNP senator Ian Macdonald, who has been a frequent critic of his own side since he was demoted from the frontbench after the election, told Mr Abbott his priority should have been the regular party room meeting, which is held every Tuesday morning when Parliament is sitting.
But Senator Macdonald was swiftly rebuked by colleagues including backbencher Ewen Jones, who said Senator Macdonald’s constant criticism of his own team had “overstepped the mark"…
Several government sources told Fairfax Media they were stunned to hear the Prime Minister respond to Senator Macdonald’s complaint by saying he had to schedule an official function on Tuesday morning so he could justify being in Melbourne for a fund-raiser the night before under entitlements.
Cabinet Minister Malcolm Turnbull told ABC Radio on Wednesday morning Mr Abbott was “upfront” about why he was in Melbourne on a parliamentary sitting day but said he “did not recall” the prime minister saying anything about entitlements. 
Memory lane:

Julia Gillard yesterday flew to northern NSW on a taxpayer funded VIP jet for a staffer’s wedding and several low key announcements. 

Ms Gillard, along with Treasurer Wayne Swan and Finance Minister Penny Wong, will today attend the Byron Bay wedding of her press secretary Laura Anderson and Mr Swan’s chief-of-staff Jim Chalmers.
Her office confirmed the PM flew to northern NSW on a RAAF VIP Challenger aircraft. MPs are only entitled to use the RAAF special purpose flights for “commitments associated with their official responsibilities and other purposes including parliamentary business"…
Yesterday, Ms Gillard and local MP Justine Elliot - a Kevin Rudd loyalist - held a press conference at Titenbar at the side of a new stage of the Pacific Highway duplication, which started in October and is not due to be completed until the end of next year. 
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Clive Palmer’s excellent Chinese adventure, even more lurid than his father recalled

Andrew Bolt August 27 2014 (9:32am)

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Three years after visiting Mao’s China Clive Palmer’s father talked to the Australian Women’s Weekly of that remarkable visit.
He recalls:
- the trip was on a freighter which “visited Red Chinese ports for two months”.
- the Palmer family did manage to visit the Great Wall and a Catholic church, where daughter Jean allegedly “bravely asked the guard: ‘Is the fence there to keep God in our out?’.
- but there is no mention of meeting Mao himself, or Premier Chou En-lai. No mention, either, of seeing any former Emperor working as a gardener.
Now hear Clive Palmer, four decades later, add many florid details:

I think so, but I went up to China in 1962 with my father and mother and my sister who was nine years older than me and we stayed in China for around about six to nine months, I think it was somewhere in that order. I’ve still got a lot of movies of me on the Great Wall and in Beijing and stuff like that and it was an interesting time to be in China. I remember sitting on Chairman Mao’s knee. We were up there, he said something in Chinese, I didn’t know what it was, but everyone laughed. Many years later when my father died I looked at his diary and he said “Which imperialist capitalist country is this boy from?” And someone said “Australia” and then it’s in the diary that he said “Australians are the running dogs of the American imperialists.”
The trip to the church gets even wilder, the way Clive now tells it:
In earlier tellings of his China tale - in which he met the legendary premier Chou En-lai and saw the former emperor Pu Yi working in the gardens of the Forbidden City in Beijing - Palmer said his recollections were aided by reading his father’s diaries as an adult. So now ... I ask what he remembers of China himself, without recourse to the diaries. He doesn’t hesitate.

“I remember going to Beijing and seeing the machine-gun nest on top of the Catholic church. I remember a guard in the church with a bayonet. I remember going in the church and seeing a priest there with a little light on the side of the altar. I remember my [late] sister [Jean, then 18] talking in French with the priest. I remember them [earlier] going next door to get the priest, and him being bayoneted on the way over to see us ...”
He saw that?
“I saw it,” says Palmer. “He was bayoneted in the leg. And I remember my father asking the guy that bayoneted him, through an interpreter, why there were guards on the church, and whether they were there to keep the people from practising their religion. I thought my father was a very courageous guy to do that. And I remember the answer that he got. The guy said that a priest in China was a pretty busy guy, and if you want to see him you have to make an appointment. Then I remember my sister stepping forward and asking was the guard there to protect the priest or to stop people getting in. And the guard said the people of the People’s Republic of China hated God so much that the guard was there to protect God.”
Speaking only for myself, I would not believe a word Palmer said about anything unless I had independent verification.

(Thanks to reader Nathan.) 
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Girls left to be raped to protect multicultural ‘harmony’

Andrew Bolt August 27 2014 (8:53am)

Culture wars, Immigration

An incredible report by an independent inquiry that details depravity and social disintegration in Britain’s Rotherham:
No one knows the true scale of child sexual exploitation (CSE) in Rotherham over the years. Our conservative estimate is that approximately 1400 children were sexually exploited over the full Inquiry period, from 1997 to 2013.
In just over a third of cases, children affected by sexual exploitation were previously known to services because of child protection and neglect. It is hard to describe the appalling nature of the abuse that child victims suffered. They were raped by multiple perpetrators, trafficked to other towns and cities in the north of England, abducted, beaten, and intimidated. There were examples of children who had been doused in petrol and threatened with being set alight, threatened with guns, made to witness brutally violent rapes and threatened they would be next if they told anyone. Girls as young as 11 were raped by large numbers of male perpetrators.
This abuse is not confined to the past but continues to this day. In May 2014, the caseload of the specialist child sexual exploitation team was 51.
The report also details a great cowardice:
By far the majority of perpetrators were described as ‘Asian’ by victims, yet throughout the entire period, councillors did not engage directly with the Pakistani-heritage community to discuss how best they could jointly address the issue. Some councillors seemed to think it was a one-off problem, which they hoped would go away. Several staff described their nervousness about identifying the ethnic origins of perpetrators for fear of being thought racist; others remembered clear direction from their managers not to do so.
Multiculturalism at its very worst, tolerating an us-against-them that weakens a sense of duty to all, stifling criticism of values hostile to the host community’s and bolstering reactionary traditions and structures in the immigrant communities:

There was too much reliance by agencies on traditional community leaders such as elected members and imams as being the primary conduit of communication with the Pakistani-heritage community. The Inquiry spoke to several Pakistani-heritage women who felt disenfranchised by this and thought it was a barrier to people coming forward to talk about CSE…
Census information from 2011 showed that Rotherham had nearly 8000 people with Pakistani or Kashmiri ethnicity, or 3.1% of the Borough population, an increase from 2% in the previous census. 77% of this population lived in one of three central wards of Rotherham. There are eight mosques in Rotherham. There were few references in any minutes to ethnic minorities or migrant families until 2006, when concern was raised at the Safeguarding Board about the living conditions of migrant families. Young people were thought to be at risk of physical or sexual abuse for a variety of reasons. Some had been separated from their own families. There were also issues of poverty, forced marriage and child abduction. In the early months of 2005, twelve cases of forced marriage had been dealt with in Rotherham - the highest in the South Yorkshire Police area. Of particular concern was the young age of many of the girls involved…
Dr Heal, in her 2003 report, stated that ‘In Rotherham the local Asian community are reported to rarely speak about them [the perpetrators].’ The subject was taboo and local people were probably equally frightened of the violent tendencies of the perpetrators as the young women they were abusing. In her 2006 report she described how the appeal of organised sexual exploitation for Asian gangs had changed. In the past, it had been for their personal gratification, whereas now it offered ‘career and financial opportunities to young Asian men who got involved’. She also noted that Iraqi Kurds and Kosovan men were participating in organised activities against young women.
The new anti-racism now betrays the very people it pretends to shield:
Dr Heal, in her ... 2006 report, ... stated that ‘it is believed by a number of workers that one of the difficulties that prevent this issue [CSE] being dealt with effectively is the ethnicity of the main perpetrators’.
She also reported in 2006 that young people in Rotherham believed at that time that the Police dared not act against Asian youths for fear of allegations of racism. This perception was echoed at the present time by some young people we met during the Inquiry, but was not supported by specific examples.
Several people interviewed expressed the general view that ethnic considerations had influenced the policy response of the Council and the Police, rather than in individual cases. One example was given by the Risky Business project Manager (1997- 2012) who reported that she was told not to refer to the ethnic origins of perpetrators when carrying out training. Other staff in children’s social care said that when writing reports on CSE cases, they were advised by their managers to be cautious about referring to the ethnicity of the perpetrators…
The issue of race, regardless of ethnic group, should be tackled as an absolute priority if it is known to be a significant factor in the criminal activity of organised abuse in any local community. There was little evidence of such action being taken in Rotherham in the earlier years. Councillors can play an effective role in this, especially those representing the communities in question, but only if they act as facilitators of communication rather than barriers to it. One senior officer suggested that some influential Pakistani-heritage councillors in Rotherham had acted as barriers.
Several councillors interviewed believed that by opening up these issues they could be ‘giving oxygen’ to racist perspectives that might in turn attract extremist political groups and threaten community cohesion.
So the fact that dozens of girls were being raped by Pakistani gangs was hushed up so that people wouldn’t think badly of, er, Pakistani gangs.
(Thanks to reader the Evil ABC.) 
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Recognise what?

Andrew Bolt August 27 2014 (8:36am)

I don’t believe the principle should even be conceded. We are Australians together, not to be divided by “race”, and the Constitution is not to be treated as a history lesson, either. But Gary Johns and Wesley Aird are at least trying to minimise the damage:
FORMER Labor minister Gary Johns will campaign against changing the Constitution to recognise indigenous Australians and demand funding for a No case unless three conditions are included in a minimalist Yes proposal. 

Mr Johns, who is cautious about any change, said a Yes case must have three elements. Firstly, he says the recognition must sit in a preamble with an express statement that: “The preamble to this Constitution has no legal force and shall not be considered in interpreting this Constitution or the law in force in the commonwealth or any part of the commonwealth.’’

Secondly, he says, it must contain the words: “The parliament, on behalf of the people of Australia, recognises that the continent and the islands now known as Australia were first occupied by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.’’
Thirdly, it must not mention any characteristics of a people, such as “culture’’. “If these three conditions for a Yes case were not met, I would back a No case and demand government funding for it,’’ he said.
Mr Johns has joined forces with conservative indigenous adviser Wesley Aird to start Recognise What?, an organisation aimed at warning voters of the “dangers of many forms” of constitutional recognition of indigenous people.
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So does Palmer think the Reds are coming or not?

Andrew Bolt August 27 2014 (8:28am)

Clive Palmer apologised for calling the Chinese “mongrels”, but his feral offsider is too proud to admit she was just as big an idiot:

Mr Palmer has apologised to the “Chinese people everywhere” for last week describing China’s government as “mongrels” and “bastards” who shoot their own people.
[Palmer United Party Senator Jacqui] Lambie said the PUP leader had little choice because “people are still quite irate about his comments”.
However, she would not offer a similar apology for her China invasion warning, in which she said Australia needed to double the size of it military to “stop our grandchildren from becoming slaves to an aggressive, anti-democratic totalitarian foreign power"…
“I don’t see why I would offer an apology when I’m actually speaking about the Chinese communist regime and not the Chinese people,” she told ABC Radio. 
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Scrap this expensive energy target. It is an insult to our reason

Andrew Bolt August 27 2014 (8:24am)

Why are we being forced to use more expensive green power when it makes no difference to a global warming that’s actually paused for 16 years anyway? It simply makes no sense, and to compromise like this is to compromise with unreason - and green carpetbaggers:
SUBSIDIES on renewable-energy power generation would be frozen at current levels until overall electricity demand recovered, under a plan the Abbott government is considering to ease pressure from the Renewable ­Energy Target on power prices. 

The Australian has confirmed that one scenario in businessman Dick Warburton’s RET review, which has been handed to the government, would freeze the scheme at near its current level until electricity demand stops falling. But the option would provide an opportunity for the amount of renewable energy to be increased if electricity demand started to rise before 2020.
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If it stops a Khaled Sharrouf from walking our streets it can’t be all bad

Andrew Bolt August 27 2014 (8:14am)

Why not wait to see the draft laws first before dismissing the kind of power ASIO says it needs to protect us?
As three-quarters of Australians endorse the proposed crackdown on foreign fighters, crossbenchers have joined Labor and the Greens to voice concerns about handing the government a blank cheque with its sweeping changes.
One of the sticking points is the proposal to erode the presumption of innocence by making it an offence to travel to a designated area — such as Iraq or Syria — without a valid reason…
MPs are yet to see legislation but Family First senator Bob Day has backed the concerns of crossbench colleague David Leyonhjelm, who yesterday warned against “moral panic’’ and said powers curbing liberties and freedoms of all Australians would mean “the terrorists win essentially if we lose our rights’’.
The Greens warned against being “panicked into changes that undermine our legal protections’’ and Labor’s legal affairs spokesman Mark Dreyfus said the opposition had concerns about “reversing the presumption of innocence’’…
ASIO director-general David Irvine will today outline the need to empower security agencies to combat an evolving threat in a rare address to the National Press Club. He is expected to say: ... “The draw of foreign fighters to Syria and Iraq is significant and includes more Australians than all other previous extremist conflicts put together. The number of Australians of potential security concern to ASIO has increased substantially.’’ 
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No riots if the dead man is white

Andrew Bolt August 27 2014 (8:07am)

One fits the agenda of the media Left, and the other doesn’t:
On the surface, the cases appear nearly identical: Michael Brown and Dillon Taylor, two young, unarmed men with sketchy criminal pasts shot to death by police officers two days apart.
But while the world knows of the highly publicized situation involving 18-year-old Mr. Brown, whose Aug. 9 death in Ferguson, Missouri touched off violence, protests and an angry national debate, most people outside Utah have never heard of 20-year-old Mr. Taylor.

Critics say there’s a reason for the discrepancy in media coverage: race. Mr. Brown was black and the officer who shot him was white. Mr. Taylor wasn’t black — he’s been described as white and Hispanic — and the officer who shot him Aug. 11 outside a 7-Eleven in South Salt Lake wasn’t white.
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Another Labor lie conceded

Andrew Bolt August 27 2014 (7:34am)

Kevin Rudd lies in 2009:
The Australian Prime Minister has rejected Opposition claims that a group of asylum seekers aboard the Australian customs ship Oceanic Viking is being given special treatment…
The Government has offered the Sri Lankans quick re-settlement in Australia or other developed countries if they agree to spend a short time in an Indonesian detention centre…

“The Indonesian Government and the Australian Government have agreed to a set of arrangements regarding the time frame for the processing for the group in Indonesia consistent with an international practice and settlement procedures,” Mr Rudd said in Parliament.
“That among other things, contained in a letter that I’m about to table, clearly articulates from the perspective of the Secretary of the Department of Immigration that these are not preferential arrangements.”
Julia Gillard admits in 2014, according to Paul Kelly’s new book:
The Sri Lankans won a preferential deal based on a much faster than usual resettlement timetable. Rudd denied point-blank to the media they won any preferential treatment. He made the same denial in parliament. His statements were false.
Rudd’s office asked Metcalfe to write a letter covering the terms of the agreement. Under attack in parliament, Rudd tabled the letter, claiming it showed that “these are not preferential arrangements”. The letter did not verify Rudd’s claims. Metcalfe was prudent enough to alter the draft.
Gillard says: “I wasn’t involved in this personally but it is obvious to anybody who looks at it, as a government we did a deal to get them off the boat. They got a favourable deal.”
Brazen liars. 
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Rudd’s dream, your billions lost

Andrew Bolt August 27 2014 (7:17am)

It is astonishing that we get this analysis only years after Kevin Rudd decided to splash billions on his grandiose dream. It’s amazing that Labor for years justified its waste with bogus claims about the benefits to health services and education:
THE former Labor government’s decision to pursue a fibre-to-the-home, super-fast, broadband network would have a net cost to taxpayers of $22.2 billion, but the Coalition’s model still leaves them paying billions to deliver access to the bush and urban fringes, a landmark cost-benefit analysis reveals.
The Coalition-commissioned analysis finds the expense of providing high-speed internet access to people who live in uncommercial rural and regional areas, as well as urban fringes, would cost nearly $5bn but the benefits are only a fraction of that.

What a waste the Labor plan was:
The Abbott government’s pared-back broadband plan is three times more cost effective than Labor’s ambitious scheme and would leave Australians $16 billion better off, according to the first independent cost-benefit analysis of the national broadband network…
The much-anticipated report finds households and businesses will benefit from quicker downloads but the much-vaunted societal benefits of fast broadband – such as improvements to health and education services – will probably be extremely limited.
The cost benefit analysis panel, led by former Victorian Treasury head Michael Vertigan, ... finds the [Government’s] multi-technology mix model outperforms a fibre to the premises plan in net economic benefits in 98 per cent of scenarios.
A multi-technology mix NBN would cost $24.9 billion to launch from 2015 compared with $35.3 billion for fibre to the premises (FTTP), the report finds.
A multi-technology mix would deliver download and upload speeds of 20-100 megabits a second, while FTTP would deliver speeds above 100Mbps.
The report finds the most cost-effective option would be an unsubsidised launch in which the free market delivers high-speed broadband to 93 per cent of homes. This would have a net economic benefit of $24 billion, but would leave 7 per cent of premises in regional and rural areas without fast broadband.
Providing fast broadband to the bush through wireless and satellite services – as envisaged under both Labor and the Coalition’s plans – will cost nearly $5 billion but produce only $600 million in economic benefits.
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No riots if the dead man is white

Andrew Bolt August 27 2014 (8:07am)

One fits the agenda of the media Left, and the other doesn’t:
On the surface, the cases appear nearly identical: Michael Brown and Dillon Taylor, two young, unarmed men with sketchy criminal pasts shot to death by police officers two days apart.
But while the world knows of the highly publicized situation involving 18-year-old Mr. Brown, whose Aug. 9 death in Ferguson, Missouri touched off violence, protests and an angry national debate, most people outside Utah have never heard of 20-year-old Mr. Taylor.

Critics say there’s a reason for the discrepancy in media coverage: race. Mr. Brown was black and the officer who shot him was white. Mr. Taylor wasn’t black — he’s been described as white and Hispanic — and the officer who shot him Aug. 11 outside a 7-Eleven in South Salt Lake wasn’t white.
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Another Labor lie conceded

Andrew Bolt August 27 2014 (7:34am)

Kevin Rudd lies in 2009:
The Australian Prime Minister has rejected Opposition claims that a group of asylum seekers aboard the Australian customs ship Oceanic Viking is being given special treatment…
The Government has offered the Sri Lankans quick re-settlement in Australia or other developed countries if they agree to spend a short time in an Indonesian detention centre…

“The Indonesian Government and the Australian Government have agreed to a set of arrangements regarding the time frame for the processing for the group in Indonesia consistent with an international practice and settlement procedures,” Mr Rudd said in Parliament.
“That among other things, contained in a letter that I’m about to table, clearly articulates from the perspective of the Secretary of the Department of Immigration that these are not preferential arrangements.”
Julia Gillard admits in 2014, according to Paul Kelly’s new book:
The Sri Lankans won a preferential deal based on a much faster than usual resettlement timetable. Rudd denied point-blank to the media they won any preferential treatment. He made the same denial in parliament. His statements were false.
Rudd’s office asked Metcalfe to write a letter covering the terms of the agreement. Under attack in parliament, Rudd tabled the letter, claiming it showed that “these are not preferential arrangements”. The letter did not verify Rudd’s claims. Metcalfe was prudent enough to alter the draft.
Gillard says: “I wasn’t involved in this personally but it is obvious to anybody who looks at it, as a government we did a deal to get them off the boat. They got a favourable deal.”
Brazen liars. 
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Rudd’s dream, your billions lost

Andrew Bolt August 27 2014 (7:17am)

It is astonishing that we get this analysis only years after Kevin Rudd decided to splash billions on his grandiose dream. It’s amazing that Labor for years justified its waste with bogus claims about the benefits to health services and education:
THE former Labor government’s decision to pursue a fibre-to-the-home, super-fast, broadband network would have a net cost to taxpayers of $22.2 billion, but the Coalition’s model still leaves them paying billions to deliver access to the bush and urban fringes, a landmark cost-benefit analysis reveals.
The Coalition-commissioned analysis finds the expense of providing high-speed internet access to people who live in uncommercial rural and regional areas, as well as urban fringes, would cost nearly $5bn but the benefits are only a fraction of that.

What a waste the Labor plan was:
The Abbott government’s pared-back broadband plan is three times more cost effective than Labor’s ambitious scheme and would leave Australians $16 billion better off, according to the first independent cost-benefit analysis of the national broadband network…
The much-anticipated report finds households and businesses will benefit from quicker downloads but the much-vaunted societal benefits of fast broadband – such as improvements to health and education services – will probably be extremely limited.
The cost benefit analysis panel, led by former Victorian Treasury head Michael Vertigan, ... finds the [Government’s] multi-technology mix model outperforms a fibre to the premises plan in net economic benefits in 98 per cent of scenarios.
A multi-technology mix NBN would cost $24.9 billion to launch from 2015 compared with $35.3 billion for fibre to the premises (FTTP), the report finds.
A multi-technology mix would deliver download and upload speeds of 20-100 megabits a second, while FTTP would deliver speeds above 100Mbps.
The report finds the most cost-effective option would be an unsubsidised launch in which the free market delivers high-speed broadband to 93 per cent of homes. This would have a net economic benefit of $24 billion, but would leave 7 per cent of premises in regional and rural areas without fast broadband.
Providing fast broadband to the bush through wireless and satellite services – as envisaged under both Labor and the Coalition’s plans – will cost nearly $5 billion but produce only $600 million in economic benefits.
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Scrap this expensive energy target. It is an insult to our reason

Andrew Bolt August 27 2014 (6:24am)

Why are we being forced to use more expensive green power when it makes no difference to a global warming that’s actually paused for 16 years anyway? It simply makes no sense, and to compromise like this is to compromise with unreason - and green carpetbaggers:
SUBSIDIES on renewable-energy power generation would be frozen at current levels until overall electricity demand recovered, under a plan the Abbott government is considering to ease pressure from the Renewable ­Energy Target on power prices. 

The Australian has confirmed that one scenario in businessman Dick Warburton’s RET review, which has been handed to the government, would freeze the scheme at near its current level until electricity demand stops falling. But the option would provide an opportunity for the amount of renewable energy to be increased if electricity demand started to rise before 2020.
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So does Palmer think the Reds are coming or not?

Andrew Bolt August 27 2014 (12:28am)

Clive Palmer apologised for calling the Chinese “mongrels”, but his feral offsider is too proud to admit she was just as big an idiot:

Mr Palmer has apologised to the “Chinese people everywhere” for last week describing China’s government as “mongrels” and “bastards” who shoot their own people.
[Palmer United Party Senator Jacqui] Lambie said the PUP leader had little choice because “people are still quite irate about his comments”.
However, she would not offer a similar apology for her China invasion warning, in which she said Australia needed to double the size of it military to “stop our grandchildren from becoming slaves to an aggressive, anti-democratic totalitarian foreign power"…
“I don’t see why I would offer an apology when I’m actually speaking about the Chinese communist regime and not the Chinese people,” she told ABC Radio. 
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=== Posts from last year ===
4 her, so she can see how I see her 

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J.John

If you remove“Christ” from Christian,you are left with “Ian” and Ian just isn’t going to help you!” I wonder who first said that!
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THE Greens continue to be tied in knots by their stance on Israel, with NSW senator-elect Lee Rhiannon forced to admit she marched in protest with Taj Din al-Hilali after initially denying any association with the controversial Islamic cleric.
Photographic evidence shows Ms Rhiannon and her former NSW upper house Greens colleague Sylvia Hale marching with Sheik Hilali at a protest in Sydney on June 5 last year, holding a banner that reads, "End the siege of Gaza -- break ties with Israel".
Press reports of another rally four days earlier, including reports in Green Left Weekly, list Sheik Hilali and Ms Rhiannon among the speakers, with Sheik Hilali denouncing Israel as a "terrorist state" and Ms Rhiannon condemning the Israeli attack on an aid flotilla to Gaza as "a crime against humanity".
Sheik Hilali provoked outrage in 2006 when he compared scantily clad women to "uncovered cat meat".
When asked by The Australian if she had spoken alongside Sheik Hilali at the first rally, Ms Rhiannon said: "I did not appear with Sheik Hilali as you state.
"I did not see him or hear him speak. I was not aware that he was at the rally. I reject The Australian's attempt to associate me with controversial views held by Sheik Hilali. I condemn Sheik Hilali's comment comparing women in casual clothing to cat meat. I oppose all forms of racism, bigotry and sexism."
But shown the media reports, Ms Rhiannon clarified her movements on June 1, saying parliament had been sitting on the evening in question. "We jumped in a taxi to go down there and as soon as we got there, we were put on to speak," Ms Rhiannon said. "I did not see Sheik Hilali."
Shown the photograph taken on June 5, in which she is marching about 2m from the Sheik, Ms Rhiannon did not deny her presence. "I was not alongside Hilali and the photo shows I am not alongside Sheik Hilali," she said. "The rally was about Gaza and that's why I went along."
Ms Rhiannon's difficulties in distancing herself from Sheik Hilali follow criticism of the NSW Greens during the recent state election for their support of a boycott of Israel. The issue contributed to the defeat of the Greens candidate in Marrickville, Fiona Byrne, after Ms Byrne made contrary comments on whether she planned to introduce the boycott into state parliament, if elected.
Ms Rhiannon later claimed the Greens needed to explain the policy more forcefully and was carpeted by federal Greens leader Bob Brown, who called the policy a "mistake".
Ms Rhiannon last night denied there was any conflict between her alleged speaking engagement with Sheik Hilali and her referral of Cardinal George Pell to the NSW parliamentary privileges committee, for contempt, in 2007. The move occurred after Cardinal Pell warned Catholic state MPs who voted in favour of stem-cell research to consider their place in the life of the church. "Cardinal Pell's comments were attempting to influence a vote in parliament," Ms Rhiannon said. "The sheik's comment (on Israel as a terrorist state), which I oppose, was not linked to legislation before the NSW parliament."
Federal opposition foreign affairs spokeswoman Julie Bishop last night described Ms Rhiannon's comments regarding Israel as "extreme, highly prejudicial and deeply troubling".
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  • Best Father, Best Friend, Best Counselor, Best Healer, Best Helper, and Best Retirement Planner Ever Unless you got something better, I'm stickin' with the Lord...
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Monochromatic Monday Monsoon Madness! (say that ten times really fast). 

I'm kicking off this page with a black and white image of a desert storm just east of Picacho. The monsoon clouds were slowly building and soon there would be a lightning storm overtaking this area. I liked the cactus that covers the ground... very different than a Californian landscape!

Prints can be found at:http://mattgranz.zenfolio.com/p429424258/h635546df#h635546df

#Desert #Storm #Arizona

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Taken on Mount Lemmon, Arizona at sunrise. The stars were still shining brightly in the pre-dawn sky and the hoodoos were starting to catch some ambient glow.

Please feel free to share, and see in a better viewing environment at this location: http://mattgranz.zenfolio.com/p751617211/h6812667b#h6812667b
 — at Mount Lemmon.
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Do you like getting free stuff? If you like being social, you've got an advantage! Check out the blog to see how you can receive a free 5" x 7" mini album with the images from your portrait session!

Get to sharing peeps!

http://marycagalitanblog.blogspot.com.au/2013/08/perks-for-being-social-end-of-winter.html
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Thanks to Kevin Rudd and Labor everything from electricity, gas, education, and medical services has gone up.

Calculate exactly how much Labor is costing you by clicking the link below:http://apps.facebook.com/costoflabor/
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New Collection coming along nicely!#textiledesign #fabricdesign #design#surfacedesign #interiordesign #printdesign#pattern #textiledesigner #katzdesignertextiles#kirstenkatz #botanical #floral #australian
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Food for today! #organic #glutenfree #wheatfree#almondspread #vitaminc #organicchocolate#healthy
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another cruel blow to leftie hopes of demonising Tony Abbott
, The Age reports he saved lives during the Bali Bombing. I expect a litany of furious letters from Northcote to the editor now about the "right-wing" bias of the Fairfax press.>===
<Dot connections continue amid a whirlwind of confused ethics, gross hypocrisies, who supports whom, ignorance, convoluted and hidden agendas, and of course, egos intent on elevating statuses quite beyond otherwise, well-deserved criticism and exposed scandals...Dots increasingly muffle the the chessboard.>
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If anyone had any doubts about what Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas meant when he met last weekwith members of the Israeli leftist party Meretz, an officialstatement from his Fatah party on Sunday made things clear.
After Thursday’s meeting, members of Meretz said that Abbas had reassured them that if a peace agreement is reached with Israel, it would bring an end to his people’s demands of the Jewish state.
"I know your concerns, but guarantee that at the conclusion of successful negotiations, we undertake to end all the demands. We will not ask to return to Yafo, Akko and Tzfat,” he reportedly said.
Members of Meretz said that Abbas told them a “fair agreement” will end the conflict with Israel and that a “peace agreement with Israel will be final and binding." He did not, however, specify what is meant by a fair peace agreement and did not commit to the fact that the PA would give up its demand for the “right of return”, which would see millions of Arabs who fled Israel in 1948 and their descendants flood Israel.
On Sunday, Abbas chaired a meeting of the Central Committee of the Fatah movement, at the conclusion of which Fatah spokesman Nabil Abu Rudeineh said in a statement that "the main goal of the negotiations with Israel is to establish an independent Palestinian state within the [pre-]1967 borders with its capital Al-Quds (Jerusalem -ed.), and the return of refugees in accordance with resolutions by international legitimate institutions and the Arab Peace Initiative.”
Abu Rudeineh stressed that "all issues related to the permanent status agreement are on the negotiating table, within the time frame of the nine months that was agreed upon with the U.S. government."
He added that the settlement enterprise in Judea and Samaria “is an obstacle to reaching a just peace based on the rights of the Palestinian people that cannot be canceled.”
The meeting between Abbas and the Meretz members took place several days after the latest meeting between Israeli and PA negotiators, as part of the current round of peace talks.
So far, details of the discussions between the sides have not been revealed, apparently consistent with a request from Washington last week for a strict news blackout.
At the same time, the PA’s chief negotiator Saeb Erekat  revealed, in aninterview with the Nazareth-based Arabic language A-Shams radio station on Tuesday, that the PA would not have returned to the negotiating table with Israel had it not received a letter of assurances from the United States, guaranteeing its main negotiating preconditions.
Meanwhile, not all PA factions are on board the peace talks. On Friday, hundreds of people in Gaza protested against Israeli-PA peace talks, in marches organized by the Hamas and Islamic Jihad terror groups.
Marchers set off from mosques across the coastal strip before converging on a square in the middle of Gaza City, with protesters brandishing signs saying "No to negotiations" and slamming Abbas's "political failure."

there are no moderates from Palestinian/Jordanian side? ed
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Journalists protest security crackdown in Ramallah, August 25, 2013 (photo credit: Issam Rimawi/Flash90)
The Palestinian journalists’ syndicate has decided to boycott coverage of the activities of the Palestinian Authority’s security apparatus in the West Bank to protest the security crackdown on journalists during a recent demonstration.
Way too often journalists participate and don't report ed
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I replied .. having watched Media Watch last night I yearned for an unbiased media .. ABC and Fairfax favor ALP while news limited is balanced .. it isn't fair on conservatives. I note it suits conservatives in the electoral cycle as it occasionally works for them .. but as in '07 it is also a cancer which eats at the fabric of society .. ed
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In response to the multi million dollar Federal Government ad campaign aimed at frightening middle class Australians, a group of tax-paying, voting (middle class) Australians installed 3m posters on Sydney's busiest street. The very low budget ad campaign aims to tell a different story and point out the hypocrisy, and mean-spirited asylum seeker policy.

Please tag and share away #auspol
 Near Commonwealth Bank, George Street Sydney .
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ISRAEL – CENTER OF THIS STORM , From Iran to Syria, Hamas to Hezbollah and more. 
Asymmetrical Rocket Warfare and State sponsors of terrorism. Such states do not have to declare war upon their opponent, fight through a proxy and can strike where, when and how at their own choosing. In the age of Asymmetrical Rocket Warfare, the tiny state of Israel is in the center of this storm. This chapter facilitates a more thorough insight towards understanding the magnitude of the deadly threat of these weapons and CBRN. This is a primer for understanding SCUD missiles, Kassam Rockets, cruise missiles, UAVs, solid-fueled, liquid-fueled, hyper-sonic, subsonic, and stealth capabilities.”
http://iranthreatassessmentcbrn.com/downloads/chapter-6-the-basics-for-understanding-qassams-scud-missiles-to-cruise-missiles-drones-to-uavs-cbrn-warfare/


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Left wing humor. It is offensive. ed
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Mandarin Ducks
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General William Howe
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“For just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ we, though many, form one body, and each member belongs to all the others.” Romans 12:4-5 NIV
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Morning and Evening by Charles Spurgeon

Morning

"He hath commanded his covenant forever."
Psalms 111:9
The Lord's people delight in the covenant itself. It is an unfailing source of consolation to them so often as the Holy Spirit leads them into its banqueting house and waves its banner of love. They delight to contemplate the antiquity of that covenant, remembering that before the day-star knew its place, or planets ran their round, the interests of the saints were made secure in Christ Jesus. It is peculiarly pleasing to them to remember the sureness of the covenant, while meditating upon "the sure mercies of David." They delight to celebrate it as "signed, and sealed, and ratified, in all things ordered well." It often makes their hearts dilate with joy to think of its immutability, as a covenant which neither time nor eternity, life nor death, shall ever be able to violate--a covenant as old as eternity and as everlasting as the Rock of ages. They rejoice also to feast upon the fulness of this covenant, for they see in it all things provided for them. God is their portion, Christ their companion, the Spirit their Comforter, earth their lodge, and heaven their home. They see in it an inheritance reserved and entailed to every soul possessing an interest in its ancient and eternal deed of gift. Their eyes sparkled when they saw it as a treasure-trove in the Bible; but oh! how their souls were gladdened when they saw in the last will and testament of their divine kinsman, that it was bequeathed to them! More especially it is the pleasure of God's people to contemplate the graciousness of this covenant. They see that the law was made void because it was a covenant of works and depended upon merit, but this they perceive to be enduring because grace is the basis, grace the condition, grace the strain, grace the bulwark, grace the foundation, grace the topstone. The covenant is a treasury of wealth, a granary of food, a fountain of life, a store-house of salvation, a charter of peace, and a haven of joy.

Evening

"The people, when they beheld him, were greatly amazed, and running to him saluted him."
Mark 9:15
How great the difference between Moses and Jesus! When the prophet of Horeb had been forty days upon the mountain, he underwent a kind of transfiguration, so that his countenance shone with exceeding brightness, and he put a veil over his face, for the people could not endure to look upon his glory. Not so our Saviour. He had been transfigured with a greater glory than that of Moses, and yet, it is not written that the people were blinded by the blaze of his countenance, but rather they were amazed, and running to him they saluted him. The glory of the law repels, but the greater glory of Jesus attracts. Though Jesus is holy and just, yet blended with his purity there is so much of truth and grace, that sinners run to him amazed at his goodness, fascinated by his love; they salute him, become his disciples, and take him to be their Lord and Master. Reader, it may be that just now you are blinded by the dazzling brightness of the law of God. You feel its claims on your conscience, but you cannot keep it in your life. Not that you find fault with the law, on the contrary, it commands your profoundest esteem, still you are in nowise drawn by it to God; you are rather hardened in heart, and are verging towards desperation. Ah, poor heart! turn thine eye from Moses, with all his repelling splendour, and look to Jesus, resplendent with milder glories. Behold his flowing wounds and thorn-crowned head! He is the Son of God, and therein he is greater than Moses, but he is the Lord of love, and therein more tender than the lawgiver. He bore the wrath of God, and in his death revealed more of God's justice than Sinai on a blaze, but that justice is now vindicated, and henceforth it is the guardian of believers in Jesus. Look, sinner, to the bleeding Saviour, and as thou feelest the attraction of his love, fly to his arms, and thou shalt be saved.
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Today's reading: Psalm 119:89-176, 1 Corinthians 8 (NIV)

View today's reading on Bible Gateway

Today's Old Testament reading: Psalm 119:89-176

89 Your word, LORD, is eternal;
it stands firm in the heavens.
90 Your faithfulness continues through all generations;
you established the earth, and it endures.
91 Your laws endure to this day,
for all things serve you.
92 If your law had not been my delight,
I would have perished in my affliction.
93 I will never forget your precepts,
for by them you have preserved my life.
94 Save me, for I am yours;
I have sought out your precepts.
95 The wicked are waiting to destroy me,
but I will ponder your statutes.
96 To all perfection I see a limit,
but your commands are boundless....

Today's New Testament reading: 1 Corinthians 8

Concerning Food Sacrificed to Idols
Now about food sacrificed to idols: We know that "We all possess knowledge." But knowledge puffs up while love builds up. 2 Those who think they know something do not yet know as they ought to know. 3 But whoever loves God is known by God.
4 So then, about eating food sacrificed to idols: We know that "An idol is nothing at all in the world" and that "There is no God but one." 5 For even if there are so-called gods, whether in heaven or on earth (as indeed there are many "gods" and many "lords"), 6 yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live.
7 But not everyone possesses this knowledge. Some people are still so accustomed to idols that when they eat sacrificial food they think of it as having been sacrificed to a god, and since their conscience is weak, it is defiled. 8 But food does not bring us near to God; we are no worse if we do not eat, and no better if we do....
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Japheth

[Jā'pheth] - beauty, let him enlarge orhe that persuadesThe second son of Noah, born in the patriach's five hundredth year, and founder of those who spread over the north and west regions of the earth (Gen. 5:32; 6:10; 7:13). The Medians, Greeks, Romans, Russian and Gauls are referred to as descendants of Japheth. Most of the nations springing from him reappear in the endtime period under Gog (Ezek. 3839). For Greece seeZechariah 9:13.
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