Tuesday, September 09, 2014

Tue Sep 9th Todays News

O'Farrell faces ICAC who smeared him but has no evidence of wrong doing presented to him. With an election due within a year, it would be good for the ICAC to give NSW an indication of what is wrong with the Liberal Party of NSW, if anything. It would also be good were they to investigate irregularities in the ALP which has long historical roots which have not been investigated. It is illustrative to contrast this with the testimony of a judge, Gillard's boss at Slaters and Gordon, later appointed judge by Gillard, claimed he knew Gillard was a lover of one company account but had not felt the need to ask her about it or deem it improper. It has been alleged Gillard corruptly misappropriated money from business designated for a union and used part of it on renovations for her home. If what the judge has said is true, it shows a strong reliance on the adage that a person who does nothing, does nothing wrong. More pertinently, it seems an abrogation of duty which has allowed corruption to fester in the highest office of the land. It is telling the reach of slush and unions, that such corruption has never been addressed.  Delay a windfall in Superannuation, many funds of which are managed by unions, and unions threaten strikes. A related slush fund attracting attention is the work income protection racket which unions are charging to their members. Surely the union fee covers that? It is ok for the ALP, they still have opinion poll majority and have announced their first policy since they ran out of our money. Shorten is promising to build submarines in Adelaide if he is elected in two years time. Assuming he won't be in jail for involvement with slush then, his ability to surpass a Collins class mistake can't be ignored. Meanwhile Obama thanks Mr Abbott for any of many reasons which Australian news media have missed, Abbott's strength as a leader and reliability as a friend.

We know some things are wrong. It is so obvious it seems absurd to have to explain them. An employee of a comics store has been sacked for publicly speaking out about a back room referred to as a rape room. She seems to have spoken to shop superiors before tweeting and then being fired. She apparently has not approached police with her concerns and doesn't seem to feel the room was a place where rape occurred. Had she approached authorities before publicly outing the room they may well have ignored her, but then she might not now be sacked. But it might still go well for her, news media are covering her story. They won't cover my issues .. I had approached authorities appropriately. Forcefully detaining people for sexual gratification is wrong. That is not what is happening with the Australian Federal Government's processing of boat people as asylum seekers. A recent rumour into the death of journalist Mungo McCallum has been met with glowing tributes. He is alive and well, but one wonders what he would do were he alive today.

Obama plans to heal Sunni/Shia divide .. will he reveal Mohammad's heir? Lol, as one wag observed re IS "The problem with Sharia is that it has never been tried. Not really." Obama could easily heal the schism between Sunni and Shia .. all he need do is reveal the heir of Mohammed. It might not go down well if he claims he is the heir. It also might not go down well if the heir is said to be Sunni. If the heir is Shia and not currently a leader, that won't be good either. Still, it would be poetic if Obama pointed to one of the beheaded journalists and said "It was him!" It is worth dreaming. It is reported many jihadi from the West are dreaming of life in a normal western home. The new sales pitch could be, 'Go to Syria and stay because you are dead.' Meanwhile a terrorist spokesperson in UK links it to Islam. Anjem Choudary is chairman of Britain's Society of Muslim Lawyers and he has taken a terrorist viewpoint on world affairs, bringing Islam into disrepute. It is interesting to contrast Choudary's comments with those of ALP Tony Burke who praises terrorists. Meanwhile an old debate in the UK (circa 2012, between journalist Penny and tv historian Starkey) illustrates how an empty meme can triumph in debate where substance contradicts it. In this case, Starkey had pointed out the ethnicity of Rotherham abusers, and been slapped down by Penny. Thing is Starkey was correct. Obama was similarly deemed to have won debates against Romney when the issue of Benghazi was raised. Another similar issue has been raised by the NYT Ross Douthat who points out that pedophiles are opportunists who will show up wherever they feel they will not be stopped. Interestingly, considering the ramifications of a constitutional change called for in Australia, Senator and idiot Lambie has claimed Aboriginal ancestry. Her right to claim it has been challenged. If she is successful in retaining her identity, she will have a special place reserved for her in the Australian constitution (should the amendments take place) that many other Australians won't have.

from 2013
A big fire is still raging in California, but the eyes of the world are focussed on a dithering Obama. He wants to bomb Syria but responsible people around the world are saying 'no.' But Obama really wants to. Some suggest bombing the Syrian bases of those who assaulted Bengahzi, but Obama doesn't want that. Assad has threatened Israel. Obama doesn't worry about that peace partner. Kerry wants to hit Syria too. He reckons the US must, although he argued the opposite in the Vietnam war. It balances, the Democrats started that war too. Assad says they were the chemical weapons he controls which killed the people his troops shot at. But Assad says he wasn't in control of those weapons at that time. Here then is the joke. Obama wants to hit Syria in a limited strike for killing children (note, not family planning is to be protected and secured by Obama Care). The chemical weapons used were Saddam's ones which Obama claimed never existed. Obama wants to hit Syria and put in power Al Qaeda. That will teach Assad a lesson in power he won't soon forget. Meanwhile, Christians around the world are praising Assad for not hurting them much. Meanwhile Israel is releasing terrorists who killed innocent peoples to facilitate Obama's peace plan in the Middle East. The Jewish new year just passed, and the Jewish peoples are not allowed to visit the wall of their old temple. 

Meanwhile in Australia, the election is over and predictably the LNP have to negotiate their policy through the senate. The senate is hostile as the Media said it was important that the LNP have a check on their power. Abbott is not yet calling himself PM .. Rudd still is. The change of government has not yet registered. But it will. 
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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 Eli Israel Goundar, Aurelian (214), Honorius (384), Cardinal Richelieu (1585), Luigi Galvani (1737), William Bligh (1754), Leo Tolstoy (1828), Fred Spofforth (1853), Herbert Henry Ball (1863), Colonel Sanders (1890), John Gorton (1911), Otis Redding (1941), Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (1949), Alexander Downer (1951), Hugh Grant (1960), Victoria Federica de Marichalar y Borbón (2000). On your day, Republic Day in North Korea (1948)
1141 – Yelü Dashi, the Liao Dynasty general who founded the Qara-Khitai, defeated the Seljuq and Kara-Khanid forces at the Battle of Qatwan near Samarkand, present-day Uzbekistan.
1513 – War of the League of Cambrai: James IV of Scotland was killed at the Battle of Flodden in Northumberland while leading an invasion of England.
1739 – The Stono Rebellion, at the time the largest slave rebellion in the Thirteen Colonies of British America, erupted near Charleston, South Carolina.
1969 – The Official Languages Act of Canada came into force, giving both French and English equal status throughout the Canadian national government.
2010 – A natural gas pipeline exploded in San Bruno, California, US, creating a "wall of fire more than 1,000 feet (300 m) high".
Value your freedom. Put battles behind you. Don't invade England. Put down the slave rebellion forever, by freeing the slaves and make them part of your family. French language has Je ne sais pas and entrepreneur. When it comes to gas, better out than in, my mother said. And now to party!
Matches
Hatches
Despatches
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2014
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CREAM PUFF BRIGADE

Tim Blair – Tuesday, September 09, 2014 (3:37pm)

Several of our homesick jihadi friends are now Islamic State prisoners
Five British ISIS fighters have been locked up in a Syria torture camp after pleading to be allowed to return home because they had become disillusioned with the self-proclaimed Islamic State.
The Express reports that the men have been nicknamed the “cream puff brigade” after being branded as “traitors” and sent to a detention centre in the city of Raqqa – the de facto ISIS capital. They are now reportedly being “mistreated on a daily basis”.
The volunteers, who are believed to have become sick of the brutality shown by some of their fellow fighters, are now “considered traitors who deserve death”, according to German magazine Focus. 
This is working out better than anyone could have expected – although there is a precedent
It is not the first time Westernised “jihadists” have become disillusioned.
German intelligence sources revealed in 2010 how one gang had become the laughing stock of the Taliban because they missed their mums while training at a terror camp in Pakistan. 
(Via Old Fellah)
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THOSE MOST LIKELY

Tim Blair – Tuesday, September 09, 2014 (3:31pm)

The NYT’s Ross Douthat
Show me what a culture values, prizes, puts on a pedestal, and I’ll tell you who is likely to get away with rape.
In Catholic Boston or Catholic Ireland, that meant men robed in the vestments of the church.
In Joe Paterno’s pigskin-mad Happy Valley, it meant a beloved football coach.
In status-conscious, education-obsessed Manhattan, it meant charismatic teachers at an elite private school.
In Hollywood and the wider culture industry — still the great undiscovered country of sexual exploitation, I suspect — it has often meant the famous and talented, from Roman Polanski to the BBC’s Jimmy Savile, robed in the authority of their celebrity and art.
And in Rotherham, it meant men whose ethnic and religious background made them seem politically untouchable, and whose victims belonged to a class that both liberal and conservative elements in British society regard with condescension or contempt. 
(Via Instapundit. See also this excellent piece by Rita Panahi.)
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NO RETURN TICKET

Tim Blair – Tuesday, September 09, 2014 (11:59am)

From the US State Department:



If you can’t access the video, click here.
UPDATE. “The folks at Foggy Bottom seem to have missed the whole point about groups like ISIS,” emails A.R.M. Jones. “Their adherents like to butcher people, and they don’t really care who. A better approach, for my money, is to show them what awaits (if Obama ever gets his finger out). Show them brave wannabe martyrs running for their livesin vain when an Apache shows up.”
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How to destroy someone in a debate

Andrew Bolt September 09 2014 (12:55pm)

A classic failure of the Left is to put seeming above doing.
That becomes a real problem when the doing is exposed - and makes the seeming look sick.
This video dates from 2012 but I have only just seen it. What’s more, it involves someone of the Left - radical blogger and journalist Laurie Penny - initially attacking TV historian David Starkey for seeming a racist for raising an issue that has since blown up into a national scandal:
[The] contretemps ... occurred after the historian had talked about the values of the Asian men from Rochdale who were convicted of grooming young white girls for sex as being “entrenched in the foothills of the Punjab or wherever it is”, and how the men needed to be “inculcated in the British ways of doing things”.
Penny accused Starkey of “playing xenophobia and national prejudice for laughs” and asked him in a leading question whether he had a home in America, implying that Starkey might have tax questions to answer, a strong innuendo in the current climate of zero-tolerance.
The video shows Starkey bouncing out of his seat in response to this perceived smear, taking to the lectern to “share a little story” ....
It is a very good one, too.
End of debate.
(Thanks to reader Allan.) 
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Judge questioned about AWU slush fund

Andrew Bolt September 09 2014 (11:38am)

The royal commission gets closer to the heart of the Gillard matter today:

A FEDERAL Court judge will face questioning at the royal commission into union corruption today about Julia Gillard’s claims that as her manager at a law firm, he did not give any advice about a union slush fund she helped set up for their client, her union boss ­boyfriend [Bruce Wilson].
Bernard Murphy, a former ­equity partner of Slater & Gordon law firm ... oversaw Ms Gillard’s work in the industrial unit in the 1990s…
Justice Murphy, the head of Melbourne-based firm Maurice Blackburn until being elevated to the Federal Court by the Gillard government in 2011, has not been questioned about the slush fund or Mr Wilson, or whether Ms Gillard talked to him about helping set up the slush fund…
Justice Murphy has been named in new evidence from confessed union fraudster Ralph Blewitt, who has claimed Mr Murphy was at a meeting in Melbourne when requirements for the slush fund were discussed. But Mr Wilson said while Mr Murphy was involved in the union’s legal work, there was no Melbourne meeting, and only Ms Gillard from the law firm was involved in the work at the time of their personal relationship.
UPDATE
Michael Smith covers Justice Murphy’s evidence here.
Summary: Murphy says he didn’t know about the slush fund (Gillard did it alone), Gillard should have opened a file on the work she did and he’d taken her denials of impropiety at face vale. He says he knew Gillard was having an affair with her client, AWU official Bruce Wilson, but did not counsel her about it and did not think it improper.
According to Michael, there was also this:
Murphy says the AWU WRA (slush fund) incorporation was a surprise to him, as was concerns expressed by partners in the firm about Gillard acting in the Kerr Street conveyance as was concerns among the partners about payments from the AWU WRA for renovations to Gillard’s house.
Stoljar, “What were the concerns about the conveyance?
Murphy, “That Julia Gillard had created an Association which might have been set up corruptly and might have involved corrupt monies and might have involved in the firm in the conveyance with that corrupt money”.
Murphy seems to have been extremely incurious at the time: not asking Gillard about the affair, about her failure to open a file, or about details of the slush fund.
(Thanks to reader Peter of Bellevue Hill.) 
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All-wise Obama to solve the Sunni-Shia divide

Andrew Bolt September 09 2014 (9:55am)

Seriously? Barack Obama really thinks he can end a bloody Middle Eastern schism going back centuries?
We’re going to have to train the military there more capably. We’ve got to do more effective diplomatic work to eliminate the schism between Sunni and Shia that has been fueling so much of the violence in Syria, in Iraq. And so we put together a plan that is compatible with the kind of work that we’re doing now.
Is this man really so colossally vain?
UPDATE
Obama should start his grand mission of uniting Muslims in Gaza - before Hamas becomes the moderate option:
Abu Hafs al-Maqdisi is leader of Jaish al-Oumah — the Army of the Nation — one of nine Salafist groups in Gaza that believe Hamas is not pushing sharia quickly enough

They are: Jaish al Oumah (Army of the Nation); Jaljalat (Rolling Thunder); Jaish al-Islam (Army of Islam); Ansar al-Sunnah (Loyal Followers of Sunnah); Jund Ansar Allah (Soldiers of Followers of Allah); the Al Tawheed Brigades (The One God Brigades); the Al Haman Mohamed Bin Maslamah Brigades; the Mujahideen Shoura Council (the Defenders of God Council); and Ahrar al-Watan (the Free of the Homeland).
All are Sunni, all want sharia law immediately and some endorse kidnappings…
The rivalry has spilled into gunfights. In 2009 Jund Ansar Allah declared the south of Gaza a caliphate. Hamas surrounded the group’s mosque and opened fire, with 28 members killed…

Added to this lethal cocktail is Islamic Jihad, a formidable rival to Hamas. While Hamas has aligned itself with Sunni powers — particularly Qatar — Islamic Jihad has aligned itself with Iran, leader of the Shia world.
One Western intelligence source who specialises in arms movements in the Middle East tells The Australian that in the recent war with Israel Islamic Jihad had more lethal weapons than Hamas, because theirs had been supplied by Iran, while many of Hamas’s were made in Gaza.  
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Labor still has handy lead

Andrew Bolt September 09 2014 (8:55am)

Coalition support - as measured by Newspoll - is a bit lower than I’d have expected after the past month:
The latest Newspoll, conducted exclusively for The Australian, reveals support for the Coalition is significantly below the level of its thumping election victory, while Labor is marginally higher but leads in two-party-preferred terms by 52 to 48 per cent.
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Lambie’s Aboriginal ancestry disputed

Andrew Bolt September 09 2014 (8:36am)

Our obsession with “race” is made to seem even more farcical by Jacqui Lambie - whose claims to Aboriginal ancestry have angered Tasmanian Aboriginal leaders:

The outspoken Senate newcomer claimed in her maiden speech last week that she was related to, if not descended from, a prominent Aboriginal resistance leader of north-eastern Tasmania.
“I acknowledge and pay my respects to Australia’s Aboriginal traditional owners. I share their blood, culture and history through my mother’s, Sue Lambie’s, family,” Senator Lambie said.
“We trace our history over six generations to celebrated Aboriginal chieftain of the Tasmania east coast, Mannalargenna.”
Clyde Mansell, a community elder and acknowledged direct descendant of Mannalargenna, said it was news to him…
Mr Mansell, who is also chair of the Aboriginal Land Council of Tasmania, branded Senator Lambie’s claims as “… totally unfounded...”
“She had no idea what she was saying and couldn’t even pronounce the name [Mannalargenna] properly.”
Senator Lambie provided some documents to Australian Story on Monday afternoon. 
A family tree indicates a lineage from one of Mannalargenna’s granddaughters, Margaret (also known as Mary), who was the offspring of Mannalargenna’s daughter Worretermoeteyenner and a sealer, George Briggs, who had abducted her… This key ancestor in Senator Lambie’s family tree, Margaret Briggs, is said to have married a Thomas Hite, with the rest of the family emanating from them. 
But there is no trace of a Thomas Hite in the Tasmanian archival records. 
And the Tasmanian Pioneer Index shows that Margaret Briggs died in 1839, aged 22, with no mention of a spouse or offspring, all of which is consistent with a detailed Briggs family genealogy…

The documents provided to Australian Story include the findings of a 2002 Administrative Appeals Tribunal dispute relating to rights to participate in an ATSIC election. 
Know that if Lambie can prove this tenuous and disputed link that she will have different legal status to non-Aboriginal Australians on the grounds of her different “race”, should the proposed changes to change the constitution to acknowledge Aborigines succeed.
(Thanks to readers a happy little debunker, RightWingNuclearArmedDeathRabbit and others.)  
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How unions and their employer mates make millions from the workers

Andrew Bolt September 09 2014 (8:27am)

A very lucrative union rort exposed:
REQUIRING employers to pay into income-protection schemes that generate massive fees for unions should be outlawed through changes to federal workplace laws, the royal commission into union governance has been told.
The Australian Industry Group said it was “inappropriate” for unions to gain multi-million-dollar revenue streams from ­employers funding income-protection and redundancy schemes…
The commission was told last Friday that the Electrical Trades Union in Victoria received a $4.5 million bonanza in “management fees” and other payments in just 12 months by pushing employers across the state into preferred supplier deals negotiated by its then leader, Dean Mighell. The arrangement meant the ETU pocketed a 20 per cent commission on the premiums paid by employers to cover their workers for income-protection insurance in the 2013 financial year.
The employer group representing firms in the industry, the National Electrical and Communications Association, also benefited, receiving almost $330,000 in directors’ fees and other ­income in the same period…
Grace Collier on snouts in the trough:
IN 2011 a tip-off came from an ­insider. An employer group, the National Electrical and Communications Association, had just done a dirty deal with a construction union…
In the 2012-13 year, the association received ­secret commissions of almost $330,000 for pushing its members — business owners — into a union enterprise bargaining agreement…
Yesterday I spoke to one of the association’s members, who employs 30 electricians. The EBA makes him pay $95 a week per employee ($150,000 a year) into a union fund called Protect. From this fund, secret commissions are paid to the union and the association gets a 25 per cent cut of those.
The business owner hates his EBA — it is basically sending him bankrupt. No union forced him into it; he has never even seen a union person. Instead, a person from the association visited him and told him he should sign it.
(Thanks to reader Peter of Bellevue Hill.) 
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Tony Burke praises the “bravery” of Palestinians “engaging in politics in different ways”

Andrew Bolt September 09 2014 (8:02am)

Labor frontbencher Tony Burke savages Israel and praises Palestinians fighting it:
You don’t need to be of any particular religious faith to be opposed to the bombing of children....
[T]he Friends of Palestine group ... brought me photographs of what had happened to the water supply for the people who lived downstream from one of the [Jewish] settlements… [W]hen you see people who have had their drinking water trashed by a settlement upstream, you get a sense very quickly of proportion…
[W]hen settlements are being built between Bethlehem and Ramallah, all the way south of Jericho, that’s about preventing a two state solution. It cannot be about anything else…
When Bob Carr was Foreign Minister, for the first time, Australia stopped automatically lining up with whatever the voting pattern of the United States and Israel was on resolutions of the United Nations. For the first time, we refused to line up when it came to whether or not there’d be improved recognition in the General Assembly for the Palestinian people…
If you are serious about justice, then we need to acknowledge and acknowledge the truth, that all Israeli settlements on Palestinian land are illegal. If we’re serious about speaking the truth then we must unequivocally be able to say that East Jerusalem is occupied.
And then this astonishing statement:

For those who are political advocates within Palestine itself, I will never know the bravery that comes with putting your life on the line and at risk, in engaging in politics in different ways.
What the hell does Burke mean with “engaging in politics in different ways”? I know how it would have sounded to Muslims in favour of jihad.
Note that in Burke’s speech there is not a single reference to what Israel is actually up against - a terrorist-led government in Gaza, pledged to its destruction and preaching the most vicious Jew-hatred.
Here is one of the latest examples, from the Al-Aqsa TV that Hamas controls in Gaza.  Palestinian preacher Bahsir Al-’Ashi is being interviewed:

The people occupying Palestine are the enemies of Mankind. The Jews are not the enemies of the Palestinians alone. If I could, I would say this in English, so that the people of the whole world would understand that the Jews are their enemies.

The Jews are the enemies of the Christians worldwide. They are the enemies of the Americans and of all the nations, not just of Palestine and of the Arab and Islamic nation. The Jews are prepared to sow corruption in the world, and to ignite strife and wars between the nations…
All the nations need to understand that the most important thing for the Jews and their leaders is to appeal to the sentiment of their people by quenching their thirst for sucking the blood of others. This is what happened [in the war].
The killing of children brings joy to the Jews. The killing of children brings joy to the Jews. The Jewish people rejoice at the killing of children, women, and the elderly, at the uprooting of trees, the plundering of money, and the burning of lands. This is true of all of the Jews, of the entire Jewish people.
All the nations of the world should know that sucking the blood of non-Jews and killing them is in the very nature of the Jews. After all, they are the slayers of the prophets. It is a war of Truth against Falsehood, and both sides have supporters.

What the hell is Burke playing at? I know that 20 per cent of the voters in his seat are Muslim, but can that excuse his reckless stoking of resentments?
UPDATE
How former Foreign Minister Bob Carr is spending September 11, the anniversary of Islamist terror attacks which killed nearly 3000 people, including 10 Australians:
image
Carr will be speaking about the Middle East at a Lebanese restaurant in Bankstown for Sydney University’s far-Left Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies, a supporter of boycotts on Israel, with proceeds going to “funds for scholarships for Palestinian students”.
Can the choice of date be an accident?
(Thanks to reader Daniel.) 
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Choudary: terrorism is “part of Islam”

Andrew Bolt September 09 2014 (7:26am)

Anjem Choudary was chairman of Britain’s Society of Muslim Lawyers:

An acolyte of the extremist cleric Omar Bakri Muhammed, who fled the UK for Lebanon, the 47-year-old former lawyer was a founding member of Al-Muhajiroun, which celebrated the 9/11 attacks, and was proscribed along with several other groups that Choudary has fronted, including Islam4UK… Because of his large claims and small following, Choudary has often been derided, not least by fellow Muslims, as a joke figure of no significance. Yet he is known to have had links with a number of people convicted under anti-terrorism laws, as well as the killer of Lee Rigby, Michael Adebolajo.
No significance? I doubt that is true. And we must pray it isn’t after his interview with Russian television.
In the interview Choudary says terrorism is authorised by the Koran, no distinction should be made between civilians and soldiers and the Islamic State’s terrorism is “pro-life”.
From his interview, an insight into the kind of Islam preached in parts of Britain…
Britain and the US are the true terrorists:
Well if you look in the Oxford dictionary in fact, the word terrorism is the use of violence against a community or a section of the community for political purposes. So I would say to you that the ordinary English meaning is precisely what the Americans and the British are doing in Afghanistan, and what they did before in Iraq, to establish their own military and economic interests no matter what the cost is to the life and wealth of the people… I think there is something called state terrorism, which in fact the Americans are in fact engaging in quite regularly.
The Islamic State’s terrorism is “pro-life”:
I think that there is terrorism which is pro-life, and there is terrorism which is against life. You know, you could terrorise the enemy in order to make sure that the war ends quickly. And I think this is what the Islamic State in fact are trying to do, to scare off the Americans and their own allies in Syria and Iraq. And then there is terrorism which is against life, which is like carpet bombing, dropping nuclear weapons, the shock and awe that we saw in Iraq before.
Terrorism is “part of Islam” and killing civilians is legitimate:
Allah mentions in the Quran in fact, if you look in Chapter eight, verse 60, he said “Prepare as much as you can steeds of war to terrorise the enemy.” So terrorising the enemy is in fact part of Islam, I mean this is something that we must embrace and understand, as far as the jurisprudence of jihad is concerned. Secondly, I think that think that people need to appreciate is that in war, the Muslims are not distinguishing in general between civilians and military. Because those very civilians are those that put the people in charge, and those people in charge – Barack Obama and others – are sending their troops to Muslim countries. So they’re not making that distinction, let alone between people who are journalists, who are considered to be the right hand in fact, and the propaganda machine of the Obama administration.
James Foley and other journalists are seen as the enemy:

I don’t know the details of Mr James Foley… But what I can definitely tell you is that journalists in general from the West, the civilians from places like America, at the current time are in a position where there is no sanctity for them in Muslim countries. There is no one to give them that sanctity. We are uprising against our own regimes, and they are seen as enemies of the Usama Muslims.
Taking hostages is what Mohammed did, too, and all non-Muslims in Muslim lands are targets:
...the Prophet himself took hostages from a tribe which had an alliance with another tribe, who had actually taken the Muslims hostage....  But what I can say to you definitely is that at the current time, in Muslim countries, there is no sanctity for non-Muslims who are citizens of those regimes who are fighting against Muslims. So my advice to you, which is good advice, is to withdraw completely your own civilians, and your own journalists, and your own armies from Muslims countries.
Everyone’s against the Muslims, who are the victims and entitled to hit back at these criminals:
You know, the killing of James Foley is not going to make a difference to the heinous, very barbaric, criminal nature of the American regime and the history of atrocities against Muslims… You can see that what happened with the Taliban, and what’s happening with the Islamic State, and what’s happening to the Americans and their own allies in the area, is a direct result of their own policy over the last decade… China occupies and tortures people in the Xinjiang. The Russians do it in Chechnya. The Burmese do it to the Muslims in Burma. The Indians do it in Kashmir. We are the only ones defending ourselves, we are rising up. You know, when people rise up, of course there will be casualties.
Never mind the atrocities we see from the Islamic State:
It is never justified to kill women and children, as a general rule… Many of the images that you see are from other battlefields, from the Nusayris [Alawites] for example in Syria, from Hizbullah in Iran, who have killed women and children, and then they’re blaming the Muslims…
OB: (crosstalk) But Mr Choudary, we can also see images of people being executed, soldiers, Syrian soldiers being executed en mass and being put into mass graves. I mean, those images exist.
AC: Remember, we’re talking about people who are criminals. The soldiers of the Syrian regime committed horrendous crimes. Remember, the Nusayris [Alawites] in Syria are people who consider the Sunnis to be like animals, even the children and women are animals. They slaughter them the way they would a dog or a cat.
Shariah is coming to the West, which must submit:
I believe that one day the Sharia will be implemented in Russia and in China and America. There is no, if you like, permanent treaty between the Islamic State and any nation which is implementing non-Islamic law. There could be a temporary ceasefire with those people who are not enemies to the Muslims. But definitely, because of the aggression of the Americans, and the British and others, there will never be a treaty with these people. I think eventually they will be conquered… Now we see the re-emergence of the Khilafah [Caliphate], we can see a new world order. Finally, we have a state where the Muslims are implementing Sharia, and it is expanding once more, and inshallah all the world will be governed by the Sharia.
If Choudary does indeed represent Islam then Islam is without question an enemy of the West, its faiths and its freedoms.
(Thanks to reader Charles.) 
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Twitter kills Mungo

Andrew Bolt September 09 2014 (7:17am)

I know only too well the quality of Anne Summers’ “journalism”:
“Vale Mungo Macallum. Journalist and gentleman. His words and wit will outlive him.” – Feminist author Anne Summers farewells veteran political journalist Macallum on Twitter – without confirming that MacCallum is in fact dead. Twitter subsequently goes into meltdown.
Read on. What follows is particularly telling because of this:
“Twitter has the highest proportion of journalists to humans of anywhere outside the Aurora and no one checked whether Mungo was actually dead.” – Writer Elle Hardy. 
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Why millions of Australians are refugees, too

Andrew Bolt September 09 2014 (6:45am)

A truly astonishing lack of perspective from a friend of Labor:
image
Or put it this way: if Syria is just like Australia, what’s the problem?
(Thanks to reader Anthony,) 
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=== Posts from last year ===
4 her, so she can see how I see her

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The new span of the Oakland Bay Bridge lighting up at night next to the old Cantilever workhorse that carried me from one side of the bay to the other for most all of my life. I salute the old and say farewell as the crews start the dismantling process and welcome the new elegant span with this picture showing them side by side. In three years, only the new bridge will be seen here. Good times with my Aperture Academy partner Jean Day shooting this last night! — with Jean Day atOakland/Bay Bridge.
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Yaakov Sandler
This is by far the best explanation of the Muslim terrorist situation I have ever read.

The author's references to past history are accurate and clear. It's not a lengthy read, it's easy to understand, and it's well worth the read.

The author of this message is Dr. Emanuel Tanya, a well-known and well-respected psychiatrist.

A man, whose family was German aristocracy prior to World War II, owned a number of large industries and estates. When he was asked how many German people were true Nazis, the answer he gave can guide our attitude toward fanaticism.

'Very few people were true Nazis,' he said, 'but many enjoyed the return of German pride, and many more were too busy to care. I was one of those who just thought the Nazis were a bunch of fools.

So, the majority just sat back and let it all happen. Then, before we knew it, they owned us, and we had lost control, and the end of the world had come. My family lost everything. I ended up in a concentration camp and the Allies destroyed my factories.'

We are told again and again by 'experts' and 'talking heads' that Islam is the religion of peace and that the vast majority of Muslims just want to live in peace.


Although this unqualified assertion may be true, it is entirely irrelevant. It is meaningless fluff, meant to make us feel better, and meant to somehow diminish the spectre of fanatics rampaging across the globe in the name of Islam. 

The fact is that the fanatics rule Islam at this moment in history.

It is the fanatics who march.

It is the fanatics who wage any one of 50 shooting wars worldwide.

It is the fanatics who systematically slaughter Christian or tribal groups throughout Africa and are gradually taking over the entire continent in an Islamic wave.

It is the fanatics who bomb, behead, murder, or honour-kill. It is the fanatics who take over mosque after mosque.

It is the fanatics who zealously spread the stoning and hanging of rape victims and homosexuals.

It is the fanatics who teach their young to kill and to become suicide bombers.

The hard, quantifiable fact is that the peaceful majority, the 'silent majority,' is cowed and extraneous.

Communist Russia was comprised of Russians who just wanted to live in peace, yet the Russian Communists were responsible for the murder of about 20 million people. The peaceful majority were irrelevant.

China 's huge population was peaceful as well, but Chinese Communists managed to kill a staggering 70 million people..

The average Japanese individual prior to World War II was not a warmongering sadist. Yet, Japan murdered and slaughtered its way across South East Asia in an orgy of killing that included the systematic murder of 12 million Chinese civilians; most killed by sword, shovel and bayonet.

And who can forget Rwanda, which collapsed into butchery. Could it not be said that the majority of Rwandans were 'peace loving'?

History lessons are often incredibly simple and blunt, yet for all our powers of reason, we often miss the most basic and uncomplicated of points:

Peace-loving Muslims have been made irrelevant by their silence.

Peace-loving Muslims will become our enemy if they don't speak up, because like my friend from Germany, they will awaken one day and find that the fanatics own them, and the end of their world will have begun.

Peace-loving Germans, Japanese, Chinese, Russians, Rwandans, Serbs, Afghans, Iraqis, Palestinians, Somalis, Nigerians, Algerians, and many others have died because the peaceful majority did not speak up until it was too late.

Now Islamic prayers have been introduced into Toronto and other public schools in Ontario , and, yes, in Ottawa too while the Lord's Prayer was removed (due to being so offensive?). The Islamic way may be peaceful for the time being in our country until the fanatics move in.

In Australia, and indeed in many countries around the world, many of the most commonly consumed food items have the halal emblem on them.

Just look at the back of some of the most popular chocolate bars, and at other food items in your local supermarket.

Food on aircraft have the halal emblem, just to appease the privileged minority who are now rapidly expanding within the nation’s shores.

In the U.K, the Muslim communities refuse to integrate and there are now dozens of “no-go” zones within major cities across the country that the police force dare not intrude upon.

Sharia law prevails there, because the Muslim community in those areas refuse to acknowledge British law.

As for us who watch it all unfold, we must pay attention to the only group that counts - the fanatics who threaten our way of life.

Lastly, anyone who doubts that the issue is serious and just deletes this email without sending it on, is contributing to the passiveness that allows the problems to expand.

So, extend yourself a bit and send this on and on and on! Let us hope that thousands, world-wide, read this and think about it, and they also continue to send it on - before it's too late.

And we are silenced .......
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Via Allyson Christy
Arab Spring: Death to humanity - Arab News

"The Arab and Western media welcomed the changes, but apparently, many analysts don’t know the complexity of the Arab world.

When you talk to a Syrian from Damascus and a Syrian from Aleppo, it is like talking to two people from two different planets.

A Libyan from Benghazi is completely different to a Libyan from Tripoli. An Egyptian from Cairo would not be welcome in Egypt’s Sinai.

A Yemeni from Sanaa considers a Yemini from Aden his sworn enemy.

The simple fact is that these countries are already divided beyond imagination.

Ironically, it was those ousted dictators who held these countries together. Yes, dictatorship is inexcusable, but this is the reality of the Arab world." - Abdulateef Al-Mulhim

.................................................................................
Suffice it to say that the Middle East, at the demise of the Ottoman Empire, was divided and maps re-drawn by European powers at the time, who had little idea of cultural dynamics in doing so.

However, it is worth reiterating this point; the end of the Ottoman Empire resulted in modern created Arab states and one Jewish state.

Today we have 22 Arab states on the map and one, tiny Jewish state. - Allyson
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The reason why electronic voting is not yet in widespread use is twofold 1: the principle of a secret ballot has to be removed as there is always an electronic signature. That is not insurmountable, but idiot privacy advocates block it. 2: computer fraud is possible if the first point is implemented badly, so that votes are diverted. - ed
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Under what circumstance would it be right to shoot someone jumping out of a closet? Someone is paranoid .. ed

Premila Lal, 18, shot dead after jumping out of closet to surprise friend
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David Daniel Ball 5pm the exclamation point should be outside the radical sign 
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I just got back home from checking out the fire on our little fake mountain named Diablo... it's quite the blaze. I'll have some more pics posted soon.— at Kirker Pass.
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More Diablo Conflagration...
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The Queensland Government is now seeking applications for a chairperson and six board members for the new Queensland Building and Construction Commission (QBCC).
The QBCC will replace the controversial BSA by the beginning of 2014. 
Appointees will require previous senior management or board experience at a significant organisation and bring a broad range of relevant building and construction industry experience to the position. 
For more information about the board roles, visit:http://www.hpw.qld.gov.au/construction/QBSA-Review

Campbell Newman
Good men and women wanted in Queensland.

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<This is brilliant stuff from Rita Panahi on the Abbott-hating loony Left and why for me, the battle against them must still continue.>
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Democrat stronghold .. the low class of a classless society .. ed
Toni Christina Jenkins says the couple was 'extremely rude'. Picture: Facebook

A WAITRESS at a family restaurant has described her shock at receiving a receipt from her customers with racist language written on the tipping line.
Toni Christina Jenkins, 19, posted this picture to her Facebook page after claiming to pick up the bill from customers at a Red Lobster franchise in the American deep south.
Ms Jenkins says a couple left the insulting receipt with the words "None, Ni**er" after failing to leave a tip when they visited the restaurant in Tennesse on Saturday afternoon.
Ms Jenkins published the photo with the caption: : "This is what I got as a tip last night...so happy to live in the proud southern states. God Bless America, land of the free and home of the low class racists of Tennessee."
Some online commenters have speculated as to the authenticity of Ms Jenkins' claims, some even suggesting she faked the racist receipt as an affront to be short-changed on a tip.
But in an interview with the Daily Mail , Ms Jenkins say she is simply reporting what really happened and taking a stance against bigotry.
"I don't get tips all the time. I really don't care cause God is my provider I don't worry about tips," she said.
"They were extremely rude, but I introduced myself to them and they didn't respond. When I came to take their order they simply told me they wanted their food and to put everything in a to-go box. I offered them dessert but they told me abruptly that they just wanted the check.
"When I went back to the table they had gone and left the receipt and had written the comments."

Read more: http://www.news.com.au/world-news/none-nier8217-racist-receipt-shocks-waitress-at-red-lobster/story-fndir2ev-1226715275065#ixzz2eOhqthhz

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As the United States debates what, if anything, should be done in response to allegations that the Syrian government used chemical weapons on its own people, there’s a theological debate brewing, too.
Bible experts aren’t just sparring over whether the U.S. military should attack; they’re also going back-and-forth over theories surrounding the End Times (events surrounding Jesus Christ’s return).
Earlier this summer, TheBlaze began dissecting the subject, speaking with experts about what role, if any, they believe Syria will play in this theoretical occurrence. Numerous outlets have jumped into the fray, noting that many faithful are wondering just how important Damascus and Syria might be in this debate.
For starters, there’s one particular Bible passage that’s rekindling the entire discussion of how Syria fits into End Times theology: Isaiah 17:1-3.
The verse reads, “’See, Damascus will no longer be a city but will become a heap of ruins. The cities of Aroer will be deserted and left to flocks, which will lie down, with no one to make them afraidThe fortified city will disappear from Ephraim, and royal power from Damascus; the remnant of Aram will be ike the glory of the Israelites,’ declares the Lord Almighty.”
The first portion about a “heap of ruins” has some wondering if the present Syria crisis was prophesied in the Bible. But as The Huffington Post recently noted, some scholars believe that Damascus was already destroyed and that this particular Scripture refers to an attack by the Assyrians that unfolded in 732 B.C.

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I met a nice couple while out and about shooting the fire... we wound up walking down this closed off road together and got a unique vantage of the blaze.
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I am a former teacher .. I loved the musical when I first saw it .. I adore this take .. adore .. tears of laughter .. thank you ed
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Dr. Phil

Working on a show: Should children have a choice in deciding which parent they want to live with? http://www.drphil.com/shows/page/ChildCustodyPoll/

Your comments and photo may be used by Dr. Phil and Peteski Productions, including being published on the Web or on television.
Yes. I wasn't given the choice. Australian courts in the 1970's were not enlightened. I needed to say what was happening from my pov, but no one was listening. As an adult, I was estranged from my father until he died. I am estranged from my mother since I left home at 20. I had been put in her care, and she betrayed me .. many times .. ed
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David Daniel Ball I have had to tell high school kids how to spell my last name 
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Tuesday, in a Dr. Phil exclusive and Season 12 premiere, the mother of The Bachelor star Gia Allemand opens up. http://bit.ly/Drp0910 
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Dr. Phil
You can’t change what you don’t acknowledge.
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Iowa is giving people who are blind permits that will allow them to purchase guns or to carry firearms in public. Critics believe the move could pose a risk to public safety. Read more and weigh in:http://tinyurl.com/pxh9zor
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Interesting how Tony Abbott's office is issuing statements as MHR and not PM Elect Tony Abbott. When Kevin Rudd and Anthony Albanese rolled Julia Gillard and Wayne Swan they called a media conf as PM and DPM before they were sworn in.
Latika M Bourke
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Fire and Ice...

Two pictures I took of Mount Diablo in two extremes. The first image was from about four years ago, and the other is from tonight.
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Its South Australia's turn to go to the poll in 6 months. The Labor brand is in damage control http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/south-australia/jay-weatherill-won8217t-cooperate-with-new-school-sex-abuse-inquiry-likely-to-report-just-before-the-next-state-election/story-fni6uo1m-1226715186908
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Hey guys Committed Action Group runs on mondays and wednesday at 7pm in Fairfield Heights coleraine st X avisford scout hall. Great thing about fitness is that there is no secret. Just come. Gold coin donation for the scouts. Not long to go guys. Lets work out car pooling

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Despite its anti-war image, the Democratic Party has a long history of supporting war.

Here is some evidence for you Democrats out there that may disagree...
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Allyson Christy.

"Special article by Dr. Rafi Ofek – will Iran purchase nuclear reactors from Argentina, or provide Argentina with uranium enriching technologies, in return for Argentina's consent to allow Iran to take part in the investigation into the AMIA bombing, in which senior Iranians were allegedly involved?"
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The data obtained this way reportedly includes contacts, call lists, SMS traffic, notes and location information. .. it doesn't really worry me .. ed
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.. glue won't fix that .. ed
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Last night, Judge Jeanine Pirro challenged President Obama on his push for military action in Syria.

"Mr. President, can you understand why Americans are so dead set against this? We look at wars in the Middle East through the prism of Iraq, and the lies and false narrative of Benghazi. 

You want us to trust you, but you're not credible, clear or concise. Why should Americans take it on faith that what you're saying is true? There's no end game. And we can't afford, and we don't want World War III."

Watch her full remarks: http://tinyurl.com/o58brhs
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Ichiro scores on a wild pitch to give the Yankees the walk-off win over the Red Sox, 4-3. RECAP:http://atmlb.com/1auLZ5s
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Redeemed Four
holidays are coming up very soon, and that means more videos will be uploaded by R4. stay tuned, stay blessed. and SHARE <33 span="">

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Very interesting, a "grandiose narcissist" . Libs used psychiatric assessment of Rudd to plan election tactics and strategy. 



The document was not shown to Abbott, but rather remained within the strategy group as an informal check-list, often as a tool for comparison after Rudd had already behaved in ways that the Liberal strategists believed could be leveraged to their advantage. The Liberal war room had reached its own conclusions about Rudd long ago, based on his public behaviour and the damning revelations of his colleagues.

Describing grandiose narcissism as less a psychiatric disease and more a destructive character defect, the document suggested Rudd was held together by one key strut: an absolute conviction of intellectual superiority over everyone else. “Kick out that strut and he will collapse".

Rudd, the document went on, was vulnerable to any challenge to his self-belief that he was more widely-read, smarter and more knowledgeable than anyone else “on the planet”. Such a condition of grandiose narcissism would make Rudd obsessively paranoid, excessively vindictive – “prepared to wait years to get revenge”.

Rudd would be threatened by a rival in any of his fields and would be obsessively paranoid and ready to retaliate to real or perceived threats; he would suffer from excessive suspicion. This could be tactically exploited, the document suggested, by promoting the idea that Rudd was merely a caretaker prime minister, to be terminated by colleagues once the election was won.

The document – simple in its construct and in many ways echoing a view clearly held inside Labor itself where many of Rudd’s colleagues had described him as dysfunctional – raised a riddle no one could answer; if the symptoms were all so obvious and the character flaws so marked, how was it that Labor had chosen Rudd not once, but twice to lead the country?>

http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/federal-election-2013/grandiose-narcissist-the-secret-diagnosis-that-helped-bring-down-kevin-rudd-20130909-2tfum.html

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How Kevin Rudd’s campaign unravelled

The unelectable man walked across the stage of a hotel ballroom. Against a backdrop of iridescent blue with four Australian flags, he claimed the prime ministership with a mandate the likes of which had not been won by Conservatives for 17 years.
As Tony Abbott’s supporters screamed the room down at Sydney’s Four Season’s Hotel they also buried the last vestige of a terrible three year-experiment on the other side – a saga which had seen a Labor government destroy two of its own prime ministers before flaming out itself.
“Tony, Tony, Tony,” the Liberal crowd shouted. Typically, some wept. “I can inform you that the government of Australia has changed,” Abbott began, with the rest of his words drowned out. A one-time journalist and a man who had won his party’s leadership in 2009 by one vote, Abbott had defied the calculated demonisation by three previous Labor prime ministers – Kevin Rudd, Julia Gillard and then Kevin Rudd again – to march improbably to victory.
In the hours before arriving on stage, Abbott had closeted himself in a suite on the 34th floor of the hotel with the Liberal’s federal director Brian Loughnane, the pollster and strategist Mark Textor, Abbott’s chief of staff and the wife of Loughnane, Peta Credlin, and, for a period, the party’s former leader and prime minister of almost 12 years, John Howard as they counted in the vote.
Abbott had had, for the previous five weeks, a political campaign machine which ran with the unblinking focus of a hungry man on the last mile. They had built a strategy around fighting Gillard, but anticipated always a return to Rudd. They had shifted their sights from one to the next. Liberal campaign experts had sometimes joked to each other that public antipathy to Gillard meant they needed only to hang her photo on walls around the country and then sit back; but when it came to Rudd, they believed his messianic self-belief and micro-managing style would soon emerge to remind voters of why they too had lost faith in him the first time around.
The ruthless manner in which Rudd had been despatched by his own side in 2010 had laid the seeds. His successor Gillard had never explained why Rudd had been destroyed. Had she done so – invoking the tale of dysfunctional management which seeped out in any case – then Gillard might have at least partially headed off the public traction which Rudd was able to invoke later as a victim, and a prime ministerial victim moreover, unjustly dealt with.

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Israel has nothing to do with Obama hitting Syria - ed
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Madu Odiokwu Pastorvin

Possess Your Promised Land
The Lord your God will thrust them out from before you and drive them out of your sight, and you shall possess their land, as the Lord your God promised you.
(Joshua 23:5, AMP)

We all have giants or obstacles that try to keep us from possessing what God has promised, especially in our dreams. We have two choices: we can quit and live in mediocrity, or we can fight and take hold of the victory.
PRAY.
Father, today I come to You believing that You have given me the victory. I will not focus on the obstacles before me; instead, I will focus on You. Help me to stand strong and keep my heart and mind focused on the victory You have in store for me in Jesus’ name. Amen.
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By Madu Odiokwu Pastorvin
Note That Love Drives Out Fear
There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear.(1 John 4:18, NIV)
Scripture tells us that God is love. He is perfect, and His love is perfect. There is nothing you can do to make God love you more and nothing you can do to make Him love you any less. His love toward you is steadfast; it’s unchanging. His arms are always stretched out toward you, and He is always ready for you to come to Him.

Acts 2:38 (NIV) Peter replied, “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
Father,I thank You for loving me perfectly. I want to know You more, and I want to have Your love. I receive it by faith today and ask that You show me Your ways and fill me with Your peace as I keep my heart and mind stayed on You in Jesus’ name. Amen.

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Matt Granz
This will be my last Diablo fire post for this early, early morning. I better get to bed! This was shot from a semi secret location that Mike Oria and I found a while back. I was lucky enough to catch a car traveling down the dark lonely road.
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Colin Wong'

If robbers ever broke into my house and searched for money, I'd just laugh and search with them.......
.. you could get into trouble for paying your robbers less than minimum wage .. Fair Work works for YOU. ed
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I get the anger, but a good politician is worth much more (cf Costello) and were you to have paid Penny Wong nothing she would still have lost $107 billion more than she cost .. ed
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Dubai Metro train
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“Teach me to do your will, for you are my God; may your good Spirit lead me on level ground.” Psalm 143:10 NIV
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Morning and Evening by Charles Spurgeon

Morning

"From me is thy fruit found."
Hosea 14:8
Our fruit is found from our God as to union. The fruit of the branch is directly traceable to the root. Sever the connection, the branch dies, and no fruit is produced. By virtue of our union with Christ we bring forth fruit. Every bunch of grapes has been first in the root, it has passed through the stem, and flowed through the sap vessels, and fashioned itself externally into fruit, but it was first in the stem; so also every good work was first in Christ, and then is brought forth in us. O Christian, prize this precious union to Christ; for it must be the source of all the fruitfulness which thou canst hope to know. If thou wert not joined to Jesus Christ, thou wouldst be a barren bough indeed.
Our fruit comes from God as to spiritual providence. When the dew-drops fall from heaven, when the cloud looks down from on high, and is about to distil its liquid treasure, when the bright sun swells the berries of the cluster, each heavenly boon may whisper to the tree and say, "From me is thy fruit found." The fruit owes much to the root--that is essential to fruitfulness--but it owes very much also to external influences. How much we owe to God's grace-providence! in which he provides us constantly with quickening, teaching, consolation, strength, or whatever else we want. To this we owe our all of usefulness or virtue.
Our fruit comes from God as to wise husbandry. The gardener's sharp-edged knife promotes the fruitfulness of the tree, by thinning the clusters, and by cutting off superfluous shoots. So is it, Christian, with that pruning which the Lord gives to thee. "My Father is the husbandman. Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away; and every branch that beareth fruit he purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit." Since our God is the author of our spiritual graces, let us give to him all the glory of our salvation.

Evening

"The exceeding greatness of his power to us-ward who believe according to the working of his mighty power, which he wrought in Christ, when he raised him from the dead."
Ephesians 1:19-20
In the resurrection of Christ, as in our salvation, there was put forth nothing short of a divine power. What shall we say of those who think that conversion is wrought by the free will of man, and is due to his own betterness of disposition? When we shall see the dead rise from the grave by their own power, then may we expect to see ungodly sinners of their own free will turning to Christ. It is not the word preached, nor the word read in itself; all quickening power proceeds from the Holy Ghost. This power was irresistible. All the soldiers and the high priests could not keep the body of Christ in the tomb; Death himself could not hold Jesus in his bonds: even thus irresistible is the power put forth in the believer when he is raised to newness of life. No sin, no corruption, no devils in hell nor sinners upon earth, can stay the hand of God's grace when it intends to convert a man. If God omnipotently says, "Thou shalt," man shall not say, "I will not." Observe that the power which raised Christ from the dead was glorious. It reflected honour upon God and wrought dismay in the hosts of evil. So there is great glory to God in the conversion of every sinner. It was everlasting power. "Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more; death hath no more dominion over him." So we, being raised from the dead, go not back to our dead works nor to our old corruptions, but we live unto God. "Because he lives we live also." "For we are dead, and our life is hid with Christ in God." "Like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life." Lastly, in the text mark the union of the new life to Jesus. The same power which raised the Head works life in the members. What a blessing to be quickened together with Christ!
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Today's reading: Proverbs 3-5, 2 Corinthians 1 (NIV)

View today's reading on Bible Gateway

Today's Old Testament reading: Proverbs 3-5

Wisdom Bestows Well-Being
1 My son, do not forget my teaching,
but keep my commands in your heart,
2 for they will prolong your life many years
and bring you peace and prosperity.
3 Let love and faithfulness never leave you;
bind them around your neck,
write them on the tablet of your heart.
4 Then you will win favor and a good name
in the sight of God and man.
Trust in the LORD with all your heart
and lean not on your own understanding;
6 in all your ways submit to him,
and he will make your paths straight....

Today's New Testament reading: 2 Corinthians 1

1 Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother,
To the church of God in Corinth, together with all his holy people throughout Achaia:
2 Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Praise to the God of All Comfort
3 Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, 4 who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God. 5For just as we share abundantly in the sufferings of Christ, so also our comfort abounds through Christ. 6 If we are distressed, it is for your comfort and salvation; if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which produces in you patient endurance of the same sufferings we suffer. 7 And our hope for you is firm, because we know that just as you share in our sufferings, so also you share in our comfort....
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Jedaiah

[Jēdā'iah] - jehovah is praise orjehovah knoweth.
  1. A descendant of Simeon (1 Chron. 4:37).
  2. A man of Harumaph who repaired the part of the wall near his own house (Neh. 3:10).
  3. A descendant of Aaron whose family came up from Jerusalem (1 Chron. 9:10; 24:7; Ezra 2:36; Neh. 7:39).
  4. A chief of the priests who returned with Zerubbabel (Neh. 11:10; 12:6, 19; Zech. 6:10, 14).
  5. Another priest with the same history (Neh. 12:7, 21).
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