Wed Dec 3rd Todays News

Enemy of the ADF

ALP is the enemy of the ADF. Badged as a friend of the ADF, Kim Beazley, former ALP leader foisted the Collins Class submarines which were so bad that no other nation wanted to buy from the class. The loss of funds from the blowout cost Australia defence capability. After the Howard administration raised funds available to the ADF, the following Rudd/Gillard administrations cut the ADF's funds to beneath pre WW2 levels. But also, the ALP set up a special unit designed to weaken and discredit the ADF. ADF special forces were subject to scrutiny inappropriate to their function. Lots of soldiers died from mismanagement. Issues of a sexual nature were placed in the public arena in an attack on defence culture so as to save bad ALP ministers from criticism. Jason Clare placed weakened body armour on active forces and soldiers died. Naval forces who wanted to go to the aid of sinking vessels in international waters were warned off by the ALP so that asylum seekers drowned. Now, the ALP want the government to waste money on substandard ship building so as to protect union labour. The Collins Class submarines had an edge from expertise that Australia had gained from former South Vietnamese forces who were left without a government in '75, but those good people have retired now. Meaning production talent has gone while the price remains high. 

Jacquie Lambie interrupted Phil Hughes' funeral to be herself. She has shrilly demanded the government pay ADF forces above inflation when all government services will be subject to the same cost. The previous ALP administration have damaged the economy with substantial debt that must be repaid now, or it will be a stone weighing down the prospects of our children. Lambie could pass cuts which would make her demand possible, but she refuses to do that. Her voting pattern in the senate closely matches the ALP, and that is a betrayal to every one of her constituents who did not vote for the ALP, and voted for her. She also betrayed those mourning for Hughes. The nation will need to move on from the death of Hughes, and celebrate his life. The funeral was not the right time to grandstand. 

Unreported issue discovered of death of migrants from ALP government. The ABC and SMH/Age have only just become aware that navy were 'suggested' not to save migrants on the high seas. Meanwhile ALP and Greens vote to keep some thirty thousand locked up by denying the legislation of temporary protection visas for those who survived the ALP's compassion. The ABC, in reporting the issue, substitute the policy which resulted in death from the ALP's to the current LNP's policy which is preventing it. Such a 'mistake' is a very nasty shot in the culture wars the ABC are engaged in. 

Culture wars

A ridiculous senate is being lauded for preventing good legislation. Mr Abbott is being blamed for the blockage. But the blockers are feeling pain too. The ALP has decided that it can behave badly in the lower house and get themselves booted temporarily, but they don't do that in the upper house where they maintain numbers to block legislation. The ALP are also blocking all legislation without having an alternative policy. They refer to money trees, as if it is ok that every man woman and child is happy to pay interest of over $6k a year just to stand still. And not every man, woman or child works .. so the burden of paying ALP debt falls on fewer people. Meanwhile PUP, which began as a block of four, are a block of two, voting the same as the ALP. Lambie has become a true independent, and is voting as the ALP all on her own. 

Climate alarmists sidestep the truth. They claim that plant food is bad. They claim that it is important to reduce national reliance on carbon dioxide production. But they refuse to accept in Australia that which works over seas, like nuclear power or coal seam gas. Instead, climate alarmists are demanding bird killing windmills and solar power stations that don't reduce base load. 

Jihadists report they are suffering in ISIL and want to go home. Their iPod is broken, or they are tired of toilet duty, or they don't like carrying dead mates out of the fighting. The left has made up numerous reasons for why jihadists do what they do. but apparently those excuses simply aren't motivating. And maybe they never were. Maybe Islamic peoples are not oppressed in the West. 

Pyne pronounced it right, but ABC's Sales horselaughs and gets it wrong on Wang. But, even when corrected, there is no apology. Palmer conspiracies continue, listed by Bolt. Attempt to sue Bolt over nothing fails, and abuser is fined half a million dollars. Sometimes the law works. 

Historical perspectives on this day

In 915, Pope John X was crowned Berengar I of Italy as Holy Roman Emperor. In 1799, War of the Second Coalition: Battle of Wiesloch – Austrian Lieutenant Field Marshal Anton Sztáray defeated the French at Wiesloch. In 1800, War of the Second Coalition: Battle of Hohenlinden – French General Moreau decisively defeated the Archduke John of Austria near Munich. Coupled with First Consul Napoleon Bonaparte's earlier victory at Marengo, this would force the Austrians to sign an armistice and end the war. In 1818, Illinois became the 21st U.S. state. In 1834, the Zollverein (German Customs Union) began the first regular census in Germany. In 1854, Battle of the Eureka Stockade: More than 20 gold miners at Ballarat, Victoria, were killed by state troopers in an uprising over mining licences. In 1898, the Duquesne Country and Athletic Club defeated an all-star collection of early football players 16-0, in what is considered to be the very first all-star game for professional American football.

In 1901, in a State of the Union message, U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt asked Congress to curb the power of trusts "within reasonable limits". In 1904, the Jovian moon Himalia was discovered by Charles Dillon Perrine at California's Lick Observatory. In 1910, modern neon lighting was first demonstrated by Georges Claude at the Paris Motor Show. In 1912, Bulgaria, Greece, Montenegro, and Serbia (the Balkan League) signed an armistice with the Ottoman Empire, temporarily halting the First Balkan War. (The armistice will expire on February 3, 1913, and hostilities would resume.) In 1919, after nearly 20 years of planning and construction, including two collapses causing 89 deaths, the Quebec Bridge opened to traffic. In 1925, World War I aftermath: The final Locarno Treaty was signed in London, establishing post-war territorial settlements. In 1927, Putting Pants on Philip, the first Laurel and Hardy film, was released. 1944, Greek Civil War: Fighting broke out in Athens between the ELAS and government forces supported by the British Army. In 1959, the current flag of Singapore was adopted, six months after Singapore became self-governing within the British Empire.

In 1960, the musical Camelot debuted at the Majestic Theatre on Broadway. It would become associated with the Kennedy administration. In 1964,  Free Speech Movement: Police arrest over 800 students at the University of California, Berkeley, following their takeover and sit-in at the administration building in protest of the UC Regents' decision to forbid protests on UC property. In 1967, at Groote Schuur Hospital in Cape Town, South Africa, a transplant team headed by Christiaan Barnard carried out the first heart transplant on a human (53-year-old Louis Washkansky). In 1971,  Indo-Pakistani War of 1971: Pakistan launched a pre-emptive strike against India and a full scale war began claiming hundreds of lives. In 1973, Pioneer program: Pioneer 10 sent back the first close-up images of Jupiter. In 1976, an assassination attempt was made on Bob Marley. He was shot twice, but would play a concert only two days later. In 1979, in Cincinnati, 11 fans were suffocated in a crush for seats on the concourse outside Riverfront Coliseum before a Who concert. Also, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini became the first Supreme Leader of Iran. In 1982, a soil sample is taken from Times Beach, Missouri, that would be found to contain 300 times the safe level of dioxin. In 1984,  Bhopal disaster: A methyl isocyanate leak from a Union Carbide pesticide plant in Bhopal, India, killed more than 3,800 people outright and injured 150,000–600,000 others (some 6,000 of whom would later die from their injuries) in one of the worst industrial disasters in history. In 1989,  Cold War: In a meeting off the coast of Malta, U.S. President George H. W. Bush and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev released statements indicating that the Cold War between NATO and the Soviet Union would be coming to an end.

In 1990, the 1990 Wayne County Airport runway collision killed seven passengers and one crew member. In 1992, UN Security Council Resolution 794 was unanimously passed, approving a coalition of United Nations peacekeepers led by the United States to form UNITAF, with the task of establishing peace and ensuring that humanitarian aid was distributed in Somalia. In 1992, the Greek oil tanker Aegean Sea, carrying 80,000 tonnes of crude oil, ran aground in a storm while approaching A Coruña, Spain, and spilled much of its cargo. Also, a test engineer for Sema Group used a personal computer to send the world's first text message via the Vodafone network to the phone of a colleague. In 1997, in Ottawa, Canada, representatives from 121 countries signed the Ottawa Treaty prohibiting manufacture and deployment of anti-personnel landmines. The United States, People's Republic of China, and Russia do not sign the treaty, however. In 1999, NASA lost radio contact with the Mars Polar Lander moments before the spacecraft entered the Martian atmosphere. Also, six firefighters were killed in the Worcester Cold Storage and Warehouse fire in Worcester, Massachusetts. In 2005, XCOR Aerospace made the first manned rocket aircraft delivery of U.S. Mail in Kern County, California. In 2007, winter storms caused the Chehalis River to flood many cities in Lewis County, Washington, and close a 20-mile portion of Interstate 5 for several days. At least eight deaths and billions of dollars in damages were blamed on the floods. In 2009, a suicide bombing in Mogadishu, Somalia, claimed the lives of 25 people, including three ministers of the Transitional Federal Government. In 2012, at least 475 people were killed after Typhoon Bopha, made landfall in the Philippines.

2013

Getting angry and pressing for a favoured agenda isn't effective. It is the curse of populist government. It boils down to a number game, where people spoil a situation until what they want happens, and they hope no one else spoils that. So that the ALP remove the Pacific Solution in order to put forward there own. It was an attempt at rebranding. Only the ALP failed, because the Pacific Solution was the best policy. It wasn't put in place to break the ALP, but to be effective in stopping the people trade where poor desperate people were exploited by pirates and often drowned. ALP opposition to effective policy means that the ALP does not stand for effective policy on illegal immigrants. Such branding policy has failed in many places, like education, fair work, health care, unions and marriage, to name a few. Thing is, effective policy is not always obvious. The Pacific Solution came about only after much tragedy. Education and health policy are hundreds of years old, fine tuned through ages of debate and compromise. Allowing an angry person to thoughtlessly pursue their own agenda without regard to history or effective need is dangerous. 

But the ALP have made Education their play thing and pursued a highly ineffective agenda. Modern education around the world began almost simultaneously in two separate places. The Madras System started in Madras circa 1792 when a headmaster (Dr Andrew Bell) of a school for orphans of British soldiers got a 12 year old boy, John Frisken, to teach the alphabet to much younger boys. Meanwhile Joseph Lancaster in England, began using older children to teach younger children. Both systems were adopted as models. One founded the British Foreign Service the other was adopted by the Catholic Church. In the 1870's, Britain began teacher training at university and dropped the Monitorial system. Teachers were supposed to model moral behaviour, as well as teach the basics. By early nineteenth century, kids were educated in Britain to year 8. After WW1, education in NSW was expected to be year 9, with university students being at school to year 11. Now there is discussion about a year 13. 

Now, teachers are highly specialised. Science teachers don't even understand Global Warming theory. English teachers don't know how to teach reading. History teachers don't know when the White Australia Policy ended, and have fantasy stories about a stolen generation. But they need more money to teach less. So as to raise the standard. When did the ALP begin bending education away from the core purpose of teaching? Whitlam did a lot of damage, but a lot of bad things pre existed him. But if a good idea is put forward, so many people will denounce it so as to roll the dice of change. 
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This column welcomes feedback and criticism. The column is not made up but based on the days events and articles which are then placed in the feed. So they may not have an apparent cohesion they would have had were they made up.
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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

Or the US President at
https://www.change.org/p/barack-obama-change-this-injustice#
or
https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/change-injustice-faced-david-daniel-ball-after-he-reported-bungled-pedophile-investigation-and/b8mxPWtJ or http://wh.gov/ilXYR

Douglas Sutherland-Bruce via David Daniel 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.net) which 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.
===

Happy birthday and many happy returns Sandra Flowers. Born on the same day, across the years

• 1368 – Charles VI of France (d. 1422)
• 1842 – Phoebe Hearst, American philanthropist and activist (d. 1919)
• 1857 – Joseph Conrad, Polish-English author (d. 1924)
• 1878 – Francis A. Nixon, American businessman, father of Richard Nixon (d. 1956)
• 1891 – Thomas Farrell, American general, Deputy Commanding General of the Manhattan Project (d. 1967)
• 1895 – Anna Freud, Austrian-English psychoanalyst (d. 1982)
• 1960 – Daryl Hannah, American actress
• 2005 – Prince Sverre Magnus of Norway

December 3: International Day of People with Disability

• 1800 – War of the Second Coalition: French forces under General Jean Moreau(pictured) defeated the Austrians and Bavarians under Archduke John in Hohenlinden, near Munich, forcing the Austrians to sign an armistice.
• 1834 – The German Customs Union instituted the first regular census in Germany.
• 1904 – Himalia, the largest irregular satellite of Jupiter, was discovered by astronomer Charles Dillon Perrine at the Lick Observatory in San Jose, California.
• 1984 – Methyl isocyanate and other toxic chemicals were accidentally released from the Union Carbide India Limited pesticide plant in Bhopal, India, causing the world's worst industrial disaster.
• 1992 – During extreme weather conditions, the oil tankerAegean Sea ran aground off the coast of Galicia, Spain, spilling 67,000 tonnes of light crude oil.

You have feasted on Bavarian. And made it count. You have seen the moon. Avoid pesticides. Don't bathe in oil. Let's party. 
Matches

• 915 – Pope John X crowned Berengar I of Italy as Holy Roman Emperor.
• 1799 – War of the Second Coalition: Battle of Wiesloch – Austrian Lieutenant Field Marshal Anton Sztáraydefeats the French at Wiesloch.
• 1800 – War of the Second Coalition: Battle of Hohenlinden – French General Moreau decisively defeats the Archduke John of Austria near Munich. Coupled with First Consul Napoleon Bonaparte's earlier victory at Marengo, this will force the Austrians to sign an armistice and end the war.
• 1818 – Illinois becomes the 21st U.S. state.
• 1834 – The Zollverein (German Customs Union) begins the first regular census in Germany.
• 1854 – Battle of the Eureka Stockade: More than 20 gold miners at Ballarat, Victoria, are killed by state troopers in an uprising over mining licences.
• 1898 – The Duquesne Country and Athletic Club defeated an all-star collection of early football players 16-0, in what is considered to be the very first all-star game for professional American football.
• 1901 – In a State of the Union message, U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt asks Congress to curb the power of trusts "within reasonable limits".
• 1904 – The Jovian moon Himalia is discovered by Charles Dillon Perrine at California's Lick Observatory.
• 1910 – Modern neon lighting is first demonstrated by Georges Claude at the Paris Motor Show.
• 1912 – Bulgaria, Greece, Montenegro, and Serbia (the Balkan League) sign an armistice with the Ottoman Empire, temporarily halting the First Balkan War. (The armistice will expire on February 3, 1913, and hostilities will resume.)
• 1919 – After nearly 20 years of planning and construction, including two collapses causing 89 deaths, the Quebec Bridge opens to traffic.
• 1925 – World War I aftermath: The final Locarno Treaty is signed in London, establishing post-war territorial settlements.
• 1927 – Putting Pants on Philip, the first Laurel and Hardy film, is released.
• 1944 – Greek Civil War: Fighting breaks out in Athens between the ELAS and government forces supported by the British Army.
• 1959 – The current flag of Singapore is adopted, six months after Singapore became self-governing within the British Empire.
• 1960 – The musical Camelot debuts at the Majestic Theatre on Broadway. It will become associated with the Kennedy administration.
• 1964 – Free Speech Movement: Police arrest over 800 students at the University of California, Berkeley, following their takeover and sit-in at the administration building in protest of the UC Regents' decision to forbid protests on UC property.
• 1967 – At Groote Schuur Hospital in Cape Town, South Africa, a transplant team headed by Christiaan Barnard carries out the first heart transplant on a human (53-year-old Louis Washkansky).
• 1971 – Indo-Pakistani War of 1971: Pakistan launches a pre-emptive strike against India and a full scale war begins claiming hundreds of lives.
• 1973 – Pioneer program: Pioneer 10 sends back the first close-up images of Jupiter.
• 1976 – An assassination attempt is made on Bob Marley. He is shot twice, but will play a concert only two days later.
• 1979 – In Cincinnati, 11 fans are suffocated in a crush for seats on the concourse outside Riverfront Coliseum before a Who concert.
• 1979 – Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini becomes the first Supreme Leader of Iran.
• 1982 – A soil sample is taken from Times Beach, Missouri, that will be found to contain 300 times the safe level of dioxin.
• 1984 – Bhopal disaster: A methyl isocyanate leak from a Union Carbide pesticide plant in Bhopal, India, kills more than 3,800 people outright and injures 150,000–600,000 others (some 6,000 of whom would later die from their injuries) in one of the worst industrial disasters in history.
• 1989 – Cold War: In a meeting off the coast of Malta, U.S. President George H. W. Bush and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev release statements indicating that the Cold War between NATO and the Soviet Union may be coming to an end.
• 1990 – The 1990 Wayne County Airport runway collision kills seven passengers and one crew member.
• 1992 – UN Security Council Resolution 794 is unanimously passed, approving a coalition of United Nations peacekeepers led by the United States to form UNITAF, with the task of establishing peace and ensuring that humanitarian aid is distributed in Somalia.
• 1992 – The Greek oil tanker Aegean Sea, carrying 80,000 tonnes of crude oil, runs aground in a storm while approaching A Coruña, Spain, and spills much of its cargo.
• 1992 – A test engineer for Sema Group uses a personal computer to send the world's first text message via the Vodafone network to the phone of a colleague.
• 1997 – In Ottawa, Canada, representatives from 121 countries sign the Ottawa Treaty prohibiting manufacture and deployment of anti-personnel landmines. The United States, People's Republic of China, and Russia do not sign the treaty, however.
• 1999 – NASA loses radio contact with the Mars Polar Lander moments before the spacecraft enters the Martian atmosphere.
• 1999 – Six firefighters are killed in the Worcester Cold Storage and Warehouse fire in Worcester, Massachusetts.
• 2005 – XCOR Aerospace makes the first manned rocket aircraft delivery of U.S. Mail in Kern County, California.
• 2007 – Winter storms cause the Chehalis River to flood many cities in Lewis County, Washington, and close a 20-mile portion of Interstate 5for several days. At least eight deaths and billions of dollars in damages are blamed on the floods.
• 2009 – A suicide bombing in Mogadishu, Somalia, claims the lives of 25 people, including three ministers of the Transitional Federal Government.
• 2012 – At least 475 people are killed after Typhoon Bopha, makes landfall in the Philippines.

Hatches

• 1368 – Charles VI of France (d. 1422)
• 1560 – Jan Gruter, Dutch scholar and critic (d. 1627)
• 1596 – Nicola Amati, Italian violin maker (d. 1684)
• 1722 – Hryhorii Skovoroda, Ukrainian poet, composer, and philosopher (d. 1794)
• 1729 – Antonio Soler, Spanish composer and theorist (d. 1783)
• 1755 – Gilbert Stuart, American painter (d. 1828)
• 1766 – Barbara Fritchie, American Civil War Unionist (d. 1862)
• 1800 – France Prešeren, Slovenian poet and lawyer (d. 1849)
• 1826 – George B. McClellan, American general and politician, 24th Governor of New Jersey (d. 1885)
• 1833 – Carlos Finlay, Cuban physician (d. 1915)
• 1838 – Cleveland Abbe, American meteorologist (d. 1916)
• 1838 – Octavia Hill, English activist and author (d. 1912)
• 1842 – Phoebe Hearst, American philanthropist and activist (d. 1919)
• 1842 – Charles Alfred Pillsbury, American businessman, founded the Pillsbury Company (d. 1899)
• 1842 – Ellen Swallow Richards, American chemist, ecologist, and educator (d. 1911)
• 1857 – Joseph Conrad, Polish-English author (d. 1924)
• 1857 – Mathilde Kralik, Austrian composer (d. 1944)
• 1864 – Herman Heijermans, Dutch author and playwright (d. 1924)
• 1867 – William John Bowser, Canadian lawyer and politician, 17th Premier of British Columbia (d. 1933)
• 1872 – Arthur Charles Hardy, Canadian politician, Canadian Speaker of the Senate (d. 1962)
• 1872 – William Haselden, English cartoonist (d. 1953)
• 1875 – Émile Delchambre, French rower (d. 1958)
• 1875 – Max Meldrum, Scottish-Australian painter (d. 1955)
• 1878 – Francis A. Nixon, American businessman (d. 1956)
• 1879 – Albert Asher, New Zealand rugby player (d. 1965)
• 1879 – Charles Hutchison, American actor, director, and screenwriter (d. 1949)
• 1879 – Kafū Nagai, Japanese author and playwright (d. 1959)
• 1879 – Donald Matheson Sutherland, Canadian physician and politician, 5th Canadian Minister of National Defence (d. 1970)
• 1880 – Alexander Hall, Canadian soccer player (d. 1943)
• 1880 – Fedor von Bock, German field marshal (d. 1945)
• 1883 – Anton Webern, Austrian composer and conductor (d. 1945)
• 1884 – Rajendra Prasad, Indian lawyer and politician, 1st President of India (d. 1963)
• 1884 – Walther Stampfli, Swiss politician, 50th President of the Swiss Confederation (d. 1965)
• 1886 – Manne Siegbahn, Swedish physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1978)
• 1887 – Prince Naruhiko Higashikuni, Japanese general and politician, 43rd Prime Minister of Japan (d. 1990)
• 1888 – Yitzhak HaLevi Herzog, Polish-Irish rabbi (d. 1959)
• 1889 – Khudiram Bose, Indian revolutionary (d. 1908)
• 1889 – Cyrillus Kreek, Estonian trombonist and composer (d. 1962)
• 1891 – Thomas Farrell, American general (d. 1967)
• 1893 – Edmond Decottignies, French weightlifter (d. 1963)
• 1894 – Deiva Zivarattinam, Indian lawyer and politician (d. 1975)
• 1895 – Te Ata Fisher, Chickasaw-American actress (d. 1995)
• 1895 – Anna Freud, Austrian-English psychologist and psychoanalyst (d. 1982)
• 1899 – Hayato Ikeda, Japanese politician, 58th Prime Minister of Japan (d. 1965)
• 1900 – Ulrich Inderbinen, Swiss mountaineer (d. 2004)
• 1900 – Richard Kuhn, Austrian-German biochemist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1967)
• 1901 – Glenn Hartranft, American athlete (d. 1970)
• 1901 – Mildred Wiley, American high jumper (d. 2000)
• 1902 – Mitsuo Fuchida, Japanese captain and pilot (d. 1976)
• 1902 – Feliks Kibbermann, Estonian chess player and philologist (d. 1993)
• 1908 – Edward Underdown, English actor (d. 1989)
• 1911 – Nino Rota, Italian pianist, composer, conductor, and academic (d. 1979)
• 1914 – Irving Fine, American composer and academic (d. 1962)
• 1914 – Kaisa Parviainen, Finnish javelin thrower (d. 2002)
• 1918 – Abdul Haris Nasution, Indonesian general and politician (d. 2000)
• 1919 – Charles Lynch, Canadian journalist and author (d. 1994)
• 1921 – Phyllis Curtin, American soprano, actress, and academic
• 1921 – John Doar, American lawyer and activist (d. 2014)
• 1922 – Eli Mandel, Canadian poet, critic, and academic (d. 1992)
• 1922 – Sven Nykvist, Swedish director and cinematographer (d. 2006)
• 1923 – Dede Allen, American film editor (d. 2010)
• 1923 – Stjepan Bobek, Serbian footballer and manager (d. 2010)
• 1923 – Moyra Fraser, Australian-English actress, singer, and dancer (d. 2009)
• 1924 – Wiel Coerver, Dutch footballer and manager (d. 2011)
• 1924 – F. Sionil José, Filipino journalist and author
• 1924 – Roberto Mieres, Argentinian race car driver (d. 2012)
• 1924 – John Winter, Australian high jumper (d. 2007)
• 1925 – Kim Dae-jung, South Korean lieutenant and politician, 8th President of South Korea, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 2009)
• 1925 – Ferlin Husky, American singer and guitarist (d. 2011)
• 1927 – Andy Williams, American singer and actor (The Williams Brothers) (d. 2012)
• 1928 – Thomas M. Foglietta, American politician and diplomat, United States Ambassador to Italy (d. 2004)
• 1928 – Muhammad Habibur Rahman, Indian-Bangladeshi jurist and politician, Prime Minister of Bangladesh (d. 2014)
• 1929 – John S. Dunne, American priest and theologian (d. 2013)
• 1930 – Jean-Luc Godard, French-Swiss director and screenwriter
• 1930 – Raul M. Gonzalez, Filipino lawyer and politician, 42nd Filipino Secretary of Justice (d. 2014)
• 1930 – Yves Trudeau, Canadian sculptor
• 1931 – Franz Josef Degenhardt, German author and poet (d. 2011)
• 1931 – Jaye P. Morgan, American singer and actress
• 1932 – Corry Brokken, Dutch singer
• 1933 – Paul J. Crutzen, Dutch chemist and engineer, Nobel Prize laureate
• 1934 – Nicolas Coster, American actor and producer
• 1934 – Viktor Gorbatko, Russian general, pilot, and astronaut
• 1934 – Abimael Guzmán, Peruvian philosopher and academic
• 1935 – Eddie Bernice Johnson, American nurse and politician
• 1937 – Bobby Allison, American race car driver
• 1937 – Morgan Llywelyn, American-Irish author
• 1937 – Binod Bihari Verma, Indian physician and author (d. 2003)
• 1938 – Jean-Claude Malépart, Canadian lawyer and politician (d. 1989)
• 1939 – Don Calfa, American actor
• 1939 – John Paul, Sr., American race car driver
• 1940 – Jeffrey R. Holland, American academic and religious leader
• 1942 – Pedro Rocha, Uruguayan footballer and manager (d. 2013)
• 1942 – Alice Schwarzer, German journalist, founded EMMA magazine
• 1942 – David K. Shipler, American journalist and author
• 1943 – Pentti Kahma, Finnish discus thrower
• 1943 – J. Philippe Rushton, English-Canadian psychologist and academic (d. 2012)
• 1944 – Craig Raine, English poet, author, and playwright
• 1944 – Ralph McTell, English singer-songwriter and guitarist
• 1945 – Paul Nicholas, English actor and singer
• 1946 – Joop Zoetemelk, Dutch cyclist
• 1947 – Patricia Krenwinkel, American murderer
• 1948 – Jan Hrubý, Czech violinist and songwriter (Framus Five and Etc...)
• 1948 – Maxwell Hutchinson, English architect and television host
• 1948 – Ozzy Osbourne, English-American singer-songwriter and actor (Black Sabbath)
• 1949 – John Akii-Bua, Ugandan hurdler (d. 1997)
• 1949 – Heather Menzies, Canadian-American actress and singer
• 1949 – Mickey Thomas, American singer-songwriter (Jefferson Starship and Starship)
• 1950 – Alberto Juantorena, Cuban runner
• 1951 – Mike Bantom, American basketball player
• 1951 – Ray Candy, American wrestler (d. 1994)
• 1951 – Riki Chōshū, South Korean-Japanese wrestler
• 1951 – Rick Mears, American race car driver
• 1951 – Greg Rice, American actor
• 1951 – John Rice, American actor (d. 2005)
• 1951 – Nicky Stevens, Welsh singer (Brotherhood of Man)
• 1952 – Don Barnes, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (38 Special)
• 1952 – Christos Hatziskoulidis, Greek footballer (d. 2010)
• 1952 – Benny Hinn, American evangelist and author
• 1952 – Mel Smith, English comedian, actor, director, and producer (d. 2013)
• 1953 – Franz Klammer, Austrian skier
• 1953 – Lothar Schneider, German footballer
• 1954 – Grace Andreacchi, American-English author, poet, and playwright
• 1955 – Steven Culp, American actor
• 1955 – Warren Jeffs, American religious leader
• 1956 – Ewa Kopacz, Polish physician and politician, 15th Prime Minister of Poland
• 1957 – Maxim Korobov, Russian politician
• 1957 – Valérie Quennessen, French actress (d. 1989)
• 1959 – Eamonn Holmes, Irish-English journalist
• 1960 – Daryl Hannah, American actress and producer
• 1960 – Igor Larionov, Russian ice hockey player
• 1960 – Julianne Moore, American actress and author
• 1960 – Mike Ramsey, American ice hockey player and coach
• 1961 – Adal Ramones, Mexican comedian, actor, and producer
• 1962 – Richard Bacon, English banker, journalist, and politician
• 1962 – Nataliya Grygoryeva, Ukrainian hurdler
• 1963 – Joe Lally, American singer-songwriter and bass player (Fugazi and Ataxia)
• 1963 – Terri Schiavo, American medical patient (d. 2005)
• 1965 – Steve Harris, American actor
• 1965 – Andrew Stanton, American voice actor, director, producer, screenwriter
• 1965 – Katarina Witt, German figure skater and model
• 1966 – Monic Hendrickx, Dutch actress
• 1966 – Flemming Povlsen, Danish footballer and manager
• 1966 – Irina Zhuk, Russian figure skater and coach
• 1968 – Brendan Fraser, American actor and producer
• 1968 – Montell Jordan, American singer-songwriter and producer
• 1969 – Bill Steer, English guitarist and songwriter (Carcass, Firebird, Angel Witch, and Gentlemans Pistols)
• 1970 – Paul Byrd, American baseball player
• 1970 – Lindsey Hunter, American basketball player and coach
• 1970 – Christian Karembeu, French footballer
• 1970 – Lu Parker, American journalist, Miss USA 1994
• 1970 – Laura Schuler, Canadian ice hockey player and coach
• 1971 – Ola Rapace, Swedish actor
• 1971 – Frank Sinclair, English-Jamaican footballer and manager
• 1971 – Henk Timmer, Dutch footballer
• 1971 – Keegan Connor Tracy, Canadian actress
• 1971 – Vernon White, American mixed martial artist and wrestler
• 1972 – Danilo Goffi, Italian long-distance runner
• 1972 – Bucky Lasek, American skateboarder
• 1973 – Holly Marie Combs, American actress and producer
• 1973 – Super Crazy, Mexican-American wrestler
• 1973 – MC Frontalot, American rapper
• 1973 – Sammy Leung, Hong Kong singer and actor
• 1975 – Mickey Avalon, American rapper
• 1975 – Malinda Williams, American actress
• 1976 – Mark Boucher, South African cricketer
• 1976 – Silvia Fontana, American-Italian figure skater
• 1976 – Gary Glover, American baseball player
• 1976 – Cornelius Griffin, American football player
• 1976 – Byron Kelleher, New Zealand rugby player
• 1976 – Todd Smith, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (Dog Fashion Disco, Polkadot Cadaver, The Alter Boys, and Knives Out!)
• 1977 – Chad Durbin, American baseball player
• 1977 – Troy Evans, American football player
• 1977 – Adam Małysz, Polish ski jumper
• 1977 – Yelena Zadorozhnaya, Russian runner
• 1978 – Trina, American rapper
• 1978 – Daniel Alexandersson, Swedish footballer
• 1978 – Jiří Bicek, Slovak ice hockey player
• 1978 – Dan Snow, English-Canadian radio and television host
• 1978 – Bram Tankink, Dutch cyclist
• 1979 – Daniel Bedingfield, New Zealand-English singer-songwriter
• 1979 – Rock Cartwright, American football player
• 1979 – Rainbow Sun Francks, Canadian actor
• 1979 – Tiffany Haddish, American actress and dancer
• 1980 – Anna Chlumsky, American actress
• 1980 – Jenna Dewan, American actress and dancer
• 1980 – Zlata Filipović, Bosnian author
• 1980 – Jim Sorgi, American football player and sportscaster
• 1981 – Ioannis Amanatidis, Greek footballer
• 1981 – Brian Bonsall, American actor
• 1981 – Tyjuan Hagler, American football player
• 1981 – Liza Lapira, American actress
• 1981 – Louise Roe, English model and journalist
• 1981 – Edwin Valero, Venezuelan boxer (d. 2010)
• 1981 – David Villa, Spanish footballer
• 1982 – Jaycee Chan, Hong Kong actor and singer
• 1982 – Manny Corpas, Panamanian baseball player
• 1982 – Michael Essien, Ghanaian footballer
• 1982 – Lewis Marnell, Australian skateboarder (d. 2013)
• 1982 – Franco Sbaraglini, Argentinian-Italian rugby player
• 1983 – Stephen Donald, New Zealand rugby player
• 1983 – Sherri DuPree, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (Eisley)
• 1983 – Andy Grammer, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
• 1983 – James Ihedigbo, American football player
• 1983 – Kati Tolmoff, Estonian badminton player
• 1983 – Aleksey Drozdov, Russian decathlete
• 1984 – Hind Laroussi, Dutch singer
• 1984 – Avraam Papadopoulos, Greek footballer
• 1985 – László Cseh, Hungarian swimmer
• 1985 – Mike Randolph, American soccer player
• 1985 – Sıla Şahin, German model and actress
• 1985 – Mohit Sehgal, Indian actor
• 1985 – Amanda Seyfried, American actress and singer
• 1985 – Robert Swift, American basketball player
• 1985 – Marcus Williams, American basketball player
• 1986 – Frank Elegar, American basketball player
• 1986 – James Laurinaitis, American football player
• 1986 – Radek Smoleňák, Czech ice hockey player
• 1986 – Josh Vaughan, American football player
• 1987 – Michael Angarano, American actor
• 1987 – Brian Robiskie, American football player
• 1987 – Alicia Sacramone, American gymnast
• 1989 – Selçuk Alibaz, Turkish footballer
• 1990 – Sharon Fichman, Canadian-Israeli tennis player
• 1991 – Ekaterine Gorgodze, Georgian tennis player
• 1992 – Cristian Ceballos, Spanish footballer
• 1992 – Joseph McManners, English singer-songwriter and actor
• 1994 – Jake T. Austin, American actor
• 2005 – Prince Sverre Magnus of Norway

Despatches

• 311 – Diocletian, Roman emperor (b. 244)
• 649 – Birinus, French-English bishop and saint (b. 600)
• 1154 – Pope Anastasius IV (b. 1073)
• 1265 – Odofredus, Italian jurist
• 1533 – Vasili III of Russia (b. 1479)
• 1552 – Francis Xavier, Spanish missionary and saint (b. 1506)
• 1610 – Honda Tadakatsu, Japanese general and daimyo (b. 1548)
• 1706 – Countess Emilie Juliane of Barby-Mühlingen (b. 1637)
• 1765 – Lord John Sackville, English cricketer (b. 1713)
• 1789 – Claude Joseph Vernet, French painter (b. 1714)
• 1815 – John Carroll, American archbishop (b. 1735)
• 1845 – Gregor MacGregor, Scottish soldier and explorer (b. 1786)
• 1882 – Archibald Tait, Scottish-English archbishop (b. 1811)
• 1888 – Carl Zeiss, German physicist and lens maker, created the optical instrument (b. 1816)
• 1890 – Billy Midwinter, English-Australian cricketer (b. 1851)
• 1892 – Afanasy Fet, Russian author and poet (b. 1820)
• 1894 – Robert Louis Stevenson, Scottish author and poet (b. 1850)
• 1902 – Robert Lawson, New Zealand architect, designed the Otago Boys' High School and Knox Church (b. 1833)
• 1904 – David Bratton, American water polo player (b. 1869)
• 1910 – Mary Baker Eddy, American religious leader and author, founded Christian Science (b. 1821)
• 1912 – Prudente de Morais, Brazilian politician, 3rd President of Brazil (b. 1841)
• 1917 – Harold Garnett, English-French cricketer (b. 1879)
• 1919 – Pierre-Auguste Renoir, French painter (b. 1841)
• 1928 – Ezra Meeker, American farmer and politician (b. 1830)
• 1928 – Johan Olin, Finnish wrestler (b. 1883)
• 1934 – Charles James O'Donnell, Irish politician (b. 1849)
• 1935 – Princess Victoria of the United Kingdom (b. 1868)
• 1939 – Princess Louise, Duchess of Argyll (b. 1848)
• 1941 – Pavel Filonov, Russian painter and poet (b. 1883)
• 1949 – Maria Ouspenskaya, Russian-American actress and educator (b. 1876)
• 1952 – Rudolf Margolius, Czech politician (b. 1913)
• 1955 – Cow Cow Davenport, American singer and pianist (b. 1894)
• 1956 – Manik Bandopadhyay, Indian author (b. 1908)
• 1956 – Alexander Rodchenko, Russian sculptor, photographer, and graphic designer (b. 1891)
• 1967 – Harry Wismer, American sportscaster (b. 1913)
• 1969 – Mathias Wieman, German-Swiss actor (b. 1902)
• 1972 – William Manuel Johnson, American bassist (b. 1872)
• 1973 – Emile Christian, American trombonist, cornet player, and composer (b. 1895)
• 1979 – Dhyan Chand, Indian field hockey player and coach (b. 1905)
• 1980 – Oswald Mosley, English lieutenant and politician, Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (b. 1896)
• 1981 – Walter Knott, American farmer, founded Knott's Berry Farm (b. 1889)
• 1984 – Vladimir Abramovich Rokhlin, Azerbaijani-Russian mathematician and academic (b. 1919)
• 1988 – Panos Gavalas, Greek singer (b. 1926)
• 1989 – Fernando Martín Espina, Spanish basketball player (b. 1962)
• 1989 – Connie B. Gay, American businessman, founded the Country Music Association (b. 1914)
• 1993 – Lewis Thomas, American physician, etymologist, and academic (b. 1913)
• 1994 – Michael Dacher, German mountaineer (b. 1933)
• 1994 – Elizabeth Glaser, American activist (b. 1947)
• 1995 – Jimmy Jewel, English actor (b. 1909)
• 1995 – Gerard John Schaefer, American serial killer (b. 1946)
• 1996 – Georges Duby, French historian and author (b. 1919)
• 1998 – Pierre Hétu, Canadian pianist and conductor (b. 1936)
• 1999 – Scatman John, American singer-songwriter and pianist (b. 1942)
• 1999 – Madeline Kahn, American actress and singer (b. 1942)
• 1999 – Jarl Wahlström, Finnish 12th General of The Salvation Army (b. 1918)
• 2000 – Gwendolyn Brooks, American poet and academic (b. 1917)
• 2000 – Hoyt Curtin, American composer and producer (b. 1922)
• 2002 – Adrienne Adams, American illustrator (b. 1906)
• 2002 – Glenn Quinn, Irish-American actor (b. 1970)
• 2003 – David Hemmings, English actor, director, and producer (b. 1941)
• 2004 – Shiing-Shen Chern, Chinese-American mathematician and academic (b. 1911)
• 2005 – Frederick Ashworth, American admiral (b. 1912)
• 2005 – Herb Moford, American baseball player (b. 1928)
• 2006 – Logan Whitehurst, American drummer (The Velvet Teen) (b. 1977)
• 2007 – James Kemsley, Australian cartoonist and actor (b. 1948)
• 2008 – Robert Zajonc, Polish-American psychologist and author (b. 1923)
• 2009 – Leila Lopes, Brazilian actress and journalist (b. 1959)
• 2009 – Richard Todd, Irish-English soldier and actor (b. 1919)
• 2010 – Abdumalik Bahori, Azerbaijani poet and author (b. 1927)
• 2011 – Dev Anand, Indian actor, director, and producer (b. 1923)
• 2012 – Jules Mikhael Al-Jamil, Iraqi-Lebanese archbishop (b. 1938)
• 2012 – Tommy Berggren, Swedish footballer (b. 1950)
• 2012 – Kuntal Chandra, Bangladeshi cricketer (b. 1984)
• 2012 – Fyodor Khitruk, Russian animator, director, and screenwriter (b. 1917)
• 2012 – M. Mahroof, Sri Lankan politician (b. 1950)
• 2012 – Diego Mendieta, Paraguayan footballer (b. 1980)
• 2012 – Eileen Moran, American visual effects producer (b. 1952)
• 2012 – Geoffrey Shakerley, English photographer (b. 1932)
• 2012 – Janet Shaw, Australian cyclist and author (b. 1966)
• 2012 – Jeroen Willems, Dutch actor and singer (b. 1962)
• 2013 – John Albery, English chemist and academic (b. 1936)
• 2013 – Fernando Argenta, Spanish journalist (b. 1945)
• 2013 – Paul Aussaresses, French general (b. 1918)
• 2013 – Ronald Hunter, American actor (b. 1943)
• 2013 – Reda Mahmoud Hafez Mohamed, Egyptian air marshal (b. 1952)
• 2013 – Ahmed Fouad Negm, Egyptian poet (b. 1929)
• 2013 – Ida Pollock, English author and painter (b. 1908)
• 2013 – Sefi Rivlin, Israeli actor (b. 1947)
• 2013 – Sacha Sosno, French sculptor and painter (b. 1937)

===
2014

• Advocate's Day (India)
• Christian feast day:
  • Birinus
  • Francis Xavier (Roman Catholic Church and Anglicanism)
  • December 3 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics)

• International Day of People with Disability (International)
• International Day of the Basque Language (Basque Country and Diaspora)

===

Labor is the real enemy of the ADF

Miranda Devine – Wednesday, December 03, 2014 (12:53am)

IT was nauseating to hear Bill Shorten championing pay rises for defence personnel this week.

 Continue reading 'Labor is the real enemy of the ADF'

===

Climate alarmists sidestepping the truth

Miranda Devine – Wednesday, December 03, 2014 (12:52am)

HIGH-PROFILE climate alarmists such as Wallaby flanker David Pocock and IPCC author Professor Colin Butler are the useful idiots of green hypocrisy.

 Continue reading 'Climate alarmists sidestepping the truth'

===

IPOD BROKEN

Tim Blair – Wednesday, December 03, 2014 (1:13pm)

Holy war is hell for dainty French jihadists in Syria: 

In a series of letters seen by Le Figaro newspaper, some of the 376 French currently fighting in Syria have begged for advice on how to return. Others have complained that, rather than participating in a noble battle, they have been acting as jihadi dogsbodies.

“I’ve basically done nothing except hand out clothes and food,” wrote one, who wants to return from Aleppo. “I also help clean weapons and transport dead bodies from the front. Winter’s arrived here. It’s begun to get really hard.”

Another writes: “I’m fed up. They make me do the washing up.”

One Frenchman whinged that he wanted to come home because he was missing the comforts of life in France.

“I’m fed up. My iPod doesn’t work any more here. I have to come back.”

A third wrote fearfully: “They want to send me to the front, but I don’t know how to fight.” 

(Via Brat)

===

LITTLE-KNOWN GOVERNMENT CAUSED DEATH, DESPAIR

Tim Blair – Wednesday, December 03, 2014 (3:18am)

More than a year after the last federal election, and long after the Abbott government ended the deadly people-smuggling trade into Australia, the ABC discovers one or two problems with the previous government’s asylum seeker policies: 

‘Fiona’ is a serving Navy officer, so the ABC must obscure her identity. She worked at the Northern Command in Darwin, which directed the Navy ships intercepting asylum seeker boats …

Fiona said she was also aware of the level of indirect political pressure applied to border protection operations.

She said the captains of naval ships were told not to board asylum seeker vessels until they were in Australian waters, and the crews and passengers were then subject to Australian migration law.

She claims that on at least one occasion, an asylum seeker vessel sank as a result.

“In the incident that I’ve described where the boat overturned and people died, that pressure came from Canberra,” she said. 

Interesting. The ABC also found Navy officer “Michael”: 

Another serving Navy officer, ‘Michael’, also said he witnessed occasions in which unseaworthy asylum seeker vessels were not boarded because of decisions made in Canberra.

He said this pressure took the form of “suggestions” relayed to the captains of boats, rather than direct orders.

“Our vessel was delayed 15 hours for a boarding on one occasion and we got reports in from surveillance aircraft that that vessel had sunk 13 hours ago,” he said.

“All we found was probably a line about 70 miles long of bodies. We fished them out for as long as we could, ‘til we were full. And that wasn’t uncommon.” 

Mentioned only once in this piece: 

All of the personnel the ABC spoke to served on Operation Resolute during the Rudd/Gillard Labor governments. 

Again, interesting. The ABC’s 7.30 at least mentioned Labor more than once, but the online copy contains this puzzling paragraph: 

Men and women who served on Operation Resolute – the Navy’s contribution to Operation Sovereign Borders – have spoken publicly for the first time about what they have witnessed while boarding and intercepting asylum seeker vessels off Australia’s northern coast. 

Operation Sovereign Borders was introduced by the Abbott government in 2013. It stopped the deaths and trauma referred to in this report. The ABC is more than a year late and a fact short.

UPDATE. Further from the ABC: 

For the first time, we hear from some of the one in three Australian Defence Force members involved in Operation Sovereign Borders who have reported being deeply traumatised by what they’ve seen ... 

Every individual interviewed in that piece describes events that took place under the Labor and prior to Operation Sovereign Borders.

(Via MiltonG)

UPDATE II. The ABC slyly removes that Operation Sovereign Borders reference: 

For the first time, we hear from some of the one in three Australian Defence Force members involved in border protection operations who have reported being deeply traumatised by what they’ve seen … 

(Via J.F. Beck)

===

ABC trawls for a government critic

Andrew Bolt December 03 2014 (7:44pm)

The ABC’s 7.30 makes the Abbott Government’s higher education bill - rejected by the Senate last night - seem a dog sold by a clown It interviews at length a vice-chancellor of a minor university who is damning of the reforms:

STEPHEN PARKER, UNI. OF CANBERRA VICE-CHANCELLOR: Definitely, there are things that need to be looked at. But what we had was a surprise announcement on Budget night which contradicts assurances from what is now the Government two days before the election with the threat of a loss of research funding if we don’t agree. That is not the way for an honourable government or for a statesman with the best interests of higher education at heart to effect reforms. So if the gun is removed and we can have a proper conversation, then I’d be very happy to join them at the table…
SABRA LANE: Stephen Parker’s the Vice-Chancellor of Canberra University. He’s critical of the universities’ peak lobby group, Universities Australia, for supporting the Government’s changes, saying it’s tantamount to a suicide pact.
STEPHEN PARKER: I think they’ve sold their soul, they’ve sold out students and someone needs to say so clearly… I think [the Government needs] to withdraw their proposals and stop trying last-minute compromises, tacky things like $400 million for Tasmania, and then do what the Commission of Audit actually recommended, which was a 12-month debate about fee deregulation. We could possibly have pilot schemes, we could look at certain kinds of courses having fees deregulated first, we can model the impact on different kinds of students. This has been done far too fast and in a rushed way, which has just sapped confidence that the Government knows what it’s going with these reforms.

Education Minister Christopher Pyne is then interviewed by 7.30’s Leigh Sales and calls her out:

Well, surprisingly, Leigh, you’ve found the one vice chancellor who is publically opposed to these reforms out of 41. But the other 40 are in favour.

If Parker was the one warming sceptic among 41 climate scientists the ABC would spurn him. But the one Abbott Government critic among 41 vice chancellors?
If Labor votes down a reform backed by 40 out of 41 university vice chancellors, isn’t the real story the bloody-mindedness of Labor, not the unfairness of the Coalition? 

===

Labor, Greens vote to reward boat people yet again

Andrew Bolt December 03 2014 (1:50pm)

Make no mistake. Labor back in office will once more lure in the boats:

The government faces another possible Senate defeat with Labor, the Greens, the Palmer United party and other crossbench senators insisting that 30,000 asylum seekers living in limbo in Australia receive the possibility of a permanent visa.
The immigration minister, Scott Morrison, sought to sway senators as debate on the new bill began, announcing he had agreed to increase the humanitarian intake from 13,750 to 18,750 in two years’ time, and to 20,000 in the following year. He also said he would allow people on temporary protection visas to leave the country for compassionate reasons, for example to visit a dying relative, if they did not travel to the country where they claimed they had been persecuted.

Note, too, how Jacqui Lambie will vote against good policy again and again, regardless of the facts of the matter.

The newly independent Jacqui Lambie continued to say she would vote against all government legislation until it agreed to improve its offer for defence force pay. 

===

ABC 7.30 knocks Pyne for pronouncing “Wang” correctly

Andrew Bolt December 03 2014 (1:09pm)

The ABC’s Leigh Sales tells Education Minister Christopher Pyne he’s wrong to pronounce PUP Senator Dio Wang’s surname “Wong”.
Other journalists immediately assume Pyne made a fool of himself:

Education Minister Christopher Pyne tried to give ABC 7.30 host Leigh Sales a lesson in Mandarin last night during an interview about the defeat of his education reform bill in the Senate.
In an interview during which Pyne defended himself and his relationships with crossbench senators the minister pronounced Palmer United Senator Dio Wang’s name as “Dio Wong”.
“I have a great relationship with Glenn Lazarus and Clive Palmer and Dio Wong,” Mr Pyne said before being corrected by the host.
“I think it’s Dio Wang, actually,” Sales said.
“Well, some people pronounce it ‘Wang’, some people pronounce it ‘Wong’.
“It depends on where you are in the spectrum,” Mr Pyne contended before suggesting it was a “very small thing” for the host to pick him up on.

In fact, Pyne is right and his mockers the fools.
Nine seconds into this interview with singer and actor Wang Leehom, you’ll hear how Wang is pronounced in Mandarin - and it’s “Wong”.
The president of the Senate introduces Dio Wang for his maiden speech. It’s “Wong”.
Frances Kai-Hwa Wang, editor of IMDiversity.com Asian American Village, says her name is pronounced “Wong”:

My surname is spelled “Wang,” but it is pronounced \wong\. When I was little, some people would get mad and scold that I was the one who was spelling or pronouncing my own name wrong. (Or “Wong.” Ha ha. Not funny.) The “a” in Wang is pronounced like “wander” or “want” or “wand.”

Will Sales apologise to Pyne? (UPDATE - SEE END OF POST) By the way, Wang’s maiden speech was very good - wonderfully humble and moving in the dedication to Wang’s daughter, whose reaction is a delight. Wang’s family story is so very telling, and his anger at Tony Abbott’s unfortunate description of the “honourable” conduct of Japanese troops entirely understandable when he tells the history of the city of his birth. I rate Wang highly, despite the political company he unfortunately keeps:

UPDATE
Reader PeterB corrects me:

Andrew, I just want to pull you up on your last paragraph - Abbott’s remarks were about the Japanese submariners that attacked Sydney Harbour in 1942, not about Japanese troops in general. It was the leftists and their media that blew up Abbott’s comments in to something that they were not. You are perpetuating the myth by saying the same.

UPDATE
More ignorant gloating as a journalist who is wrong mocks a man who is right:

Three errors in those headlines. Will the Daily Mail retract and apologise?
UPDATE
Credit to Leigh Sales for posting this admission after asking Dio Wang himself how to pronounce his name:
I suspect Sales will acknowledge this on tonight’s show.
But the whole episode - with Twitter savaging Pyne and journalists on ninesm and Daily Mail horselaughing - shows the power of confirmation bias.
And fours hours on, the Daily Mail still hasn’t corrected its false headlines.
(Thanks to reader Jason Fong.) 

===

Jacqui Lambie hijacks Phillip Hughes’ tribute for a political stunt

Andrew Bolt December 03 2014 (12:21pm)

Contemptible. With Lambie it really is all about Lambie:

OUTSPOKEN senator Jacqui Lambie has interrupted Senate tributes for cricketer Phillip Hughes in a bid to force a rushed debate on her private bill to raise defence force pay. 

In an attempt to hijack the government’s agenda in the final days of the parliamentary year, Senator Lambie cut short a move to honour the young cricketer who died last week.
Her move also coincided with preparations for a funeral in his hometown of Macksville.
After a few moments of confusion, the Senate agreed to finalise its tributes to Hughes with a minute’s silence.
Senator Lambie then moved to suspend all other business so that senators could debate her bill.
The move was supported by Labor but was defeated 34-33.

Look at Labor’s response… How dare it reward this vile behaviour?
UPDATE
Lambie makes political capital from crashing the Hughes’ tributes:

Glenn Lazarus shows the principle missing from Labor and the Greens:

===

Palmer adds to his bizarre conspiracy theories

Andrew Bolt December 03 2014 (10:26am)

Clive Palmer really believes his mad conspiracy theories. This is freaky:

“I’m monitored, my phones are tapped every day,” Mr Palmer said.
“We know that if we go back to inquiries in ASIO in the late ‘80s in the Senate that ASIO constantly monitors the top hundred wealthiest Australians...”

Clive’s conspiracies:

The CIA funds the Greens.
Rupert Murdoch’s then wife Wendy Deng “is a Chinese spy”.
Rupert Murdoch gives orders to journalist Hedley Thomas via Skype to get Palmer.
Murdoch’s papers are in a conspiracy to bring down Palmer.
Palmer’s Chinese partners are part of a conspiracy by Chinese “mongrels” to take over our ports and steal our natural resources.
Palmer is being bugged by ASIO.
A network of former soldiers is working for the Australian Electoral Commission, fiddling results.
Some major political party planted Jacqui Lambie in his own party and got her to act irrationally

===

Implacable in purpose, better in delivery

Andrew Bolt December 03 2014 (10:02am)

Good advice from John Ruddick, a former candidate for the federal presidency of the Liberal party:

Bad polling in the early stages of a government is an antidote to hubris. It toughens up the government for the long haul and the eventual recovery earns the respect of the nation. The key is to hold the line. As Margaret Thatcher said in the depths of her polling woes just over a year into her first term, “we shall not be diverted from our course. To those waiting with bated breath for that favourite media catchphrase, the ‘U-turn’, I have only one thing to say: ‘You turn if you want to. The lady’s not for turning.’?”
Today’s pundits look back on the Howard era as one long success story, but John Howard had acute political headaches in his first and second terms. Polling in year one was solid, but collapsed so badly in years two and three there were fears the government would be a one-term wonder. One Nation attracted many voters and gun ownership restrictions drove away others. Spending cuts, the waterfront dispute and changes to industrial relations and the GST were all unpopular. Seven ministers and Howard’s chief of staff resigned because of the code of ministerial conduct.
Labor hit the lead in year two of Howard’s first term with polls blowing out to 57-43 two-party preferred. Labor remained in front until election day. The second term was worse. A few months out from the 2001 election bookmakers offered $4 on Howard v $1.20 for Kim Beazley. From there polling firmed up until Howard could lose only to a Labor leader promising to be like him.
Pundits remember the Thatcher government and Reagan administration as a golden age of widespread support but, although those governments were popular for most of their time in office, initially their polling was dire. Eighteen months into Thatcher’s first term three cabinet ministers knocked on her door and suggested she resign. The Conservatives went on to win three more elections and convince British Labour to accept much of Thatcher’s agenda.
Ronald Reagan’s approval near the first term halfway mark was 35 per cent with a disapproval of 56 per cent. Reagan remained in the polling doldrums for 18 months but made history in the 1984 US election by winning 49 out of 50 states ....

I’d differ in Ruddick only in this (or maybe he’d even agree) - to recall the great maxim from The Leopard, that for things to stay as they are, everything must change. In other words, the Government must stick to its firm purpose, but change everything about the way it delivers and sells. Same purpose, better means.
UPDATE
Federal Liberal frontbencher Josh Frydenberg lists the 10 lessons of the Victorian Liberals’ defeat:

One: Develop a clear narrative consistent with Liberal philosophy. Since its inception 70 years ago, the party has stood for smaller and more efficient government, the power of the individual and his or her entrepreneurship, opportunity and choice in health and education, and a safety net for those who can’t help themselves....
Two: Communication is key.... Studies show that the average person reaches for their mobile device more than 100 times a day. Advertising via Facebook and Google is often more likely to connect with the swinging voter.
Three: Challenge the right of partisan unionists to openly campaign in uniform against the sitting government. It was outrageous to see hundreds of unionists stand on the booths and doorknock homes in their firefighting, paramedic and nursing uniforms. It was a clear breach of a century-old practice of public sector neutrality…
Four: Never let the public forget the failures of your political predecessors. The Brumby/Bracks years left Victorians with the myki, desalination plant and north-south pipeline fiascos. But those white elephants were such a distant memory that Victorians felt comfortable electing Labor again after such a short period of time.
Five: Disunity is death. Geoff Shaw got headlines for the wrong reasons and a great opportunity to govern with a majority in both Houses was missed…
Six: Avoid the fringe and play to the middle… Parties should always be conscious of the ground upon which elections will be decided…
Seven: Incumbency is providing a diminishing return. 
Eight: Don’t leave election announcements too late because more people vote early. More than 1.1 million voters out of a base of 3.8 million voted before Saturday…
Nine: Regroup, renew. When the state Liberal Party reconvenes, it will select its new leader. That provides an opportunity to select a revitalised team with some new names..
Ten: There is always a silver lining. The rise of the Greens, and the strength of their challenge in the seat of Melbourne, will cause heartache for Labor. That is an opportunity for the Coalition, because there will be occasion where Labor will look to the Coalition for support against the Greens, knowing that the enemy of my enemy is my friend.

Actually, that last point presents the Liberals with a dilemma. As Bill Shorten is proving, you can actually wreck everything you can and the Government still gets the blame. Why help the Government do the right thing when chaos is so rewarded?  

===

Too hot, too cold - an unworkable Senate

Andrew Bolt December 03 2014 (9:50am)

How could any government win against a Senate like this?

While Liberal Democratic Party senator David Leyonhjelm rebuked ministers for not consulting him enough, Palmer United Party senator Glenn Lazarus complained of being contacted too often to discuss the government’s university reforms.

How can Ministers negotiate with crossbenchers who refuse to even talk?

Senator Lazarus never agreed to meet [Education Minister Christopher] Pyne....

===

Liberals demand more talk before action

Andrew Bolt December 03 2014 (9:45am)

It is a good sign that Liberal MPs want more debate within the party before the Government hares off on another attack:

FRUSTRATED backbench MPs have blocked an attempt to fast-track the Abbott government’s $20 billion medical research ­future fund in a show of strength amid growing despair at the way their leaders are communicating their economic strategy. 

The Coalition’s economics committee refused to approve a draft bill to set up the controversial fund in a blunt signal to ministers that it would not “rubber-stamp” fresh ideas after seeing the government struggle to argue for its existing reforms.

It is better to thrash out problems with policies before they are released, not after.
Related:

West Australian MP Ken Wyatt stood at one point and rebuked the “arrogance” of ministerial staff members, which some took as a coded reference to the centralisation of power in the ministerial wing. “The criticism that they’ve put barriers up around the Prime Minister is absolutely true,” an MP said. “They’ve put walls around him for their own benefit and that’s a big mistake.”
Another said the Prime Minister’s office should be consulting MPs about how to improve policies and political tactics. “There is a degree of paranoia there that is totally unwarranted and unnecessary because there’s no threat to Tony.”

===

It costs $500,000 to show you’re innocent

Andrew Bolt December 03 2014 (9:33am)

A win:

A DISENDORSED Family First candidate’s attempts to sue columnist Andrew Bolt over an email sent to two people has backfired with a judge ordering him to pay $500,000 in legal costs…
“The defamatory imputations were trivial and obviously made under qualified privilege. If the claim was the first salvo in Mr Barrow’s threatened ‘innovative stormwave of defamation claims’ against Mr Bolt, then it has failed conspicuously,” Justice Forrest wrote in his judgment. 

The list of cases this man has run. 

===

Why did the ABC protect Labor from the blame for these horrors?

Andrew Bolt December 03 2014 (7:21am)

A scandal is denounced by the ABC:

Men and women who served on Operation Resolute - the Navy’s contribution to Operation Sovereign Borders - have spoken publicly for the first time about what they have witnessed while boarding and intercepting asylum seeker vessels off Australia’s northern coast.
In a series of interviews with the ABC, they described the horrendous task of retrieving the bodies of dead asylum seekers and of coping with sick and distressed children in squalid conditions.

Wait a minute. Operation Sovereign Borders? Bodies? Didn’t the Abbott Government’s Operation Sovereign Borders actually stop the boats and the drownings?

They also alleged decisions made in Canberra directly led to the deaths of asylum seekers.

Deaths? Under this Government?

All of the personnel the ABC spoke to served on Operation Resolute during the Rudd/Gillard Labor governments.

Ah. Now it becomes clear. This was a problem under Labor, not this government at all.
Strange, though. In this long story that remains the only mention of Labor, Rudd or Gillard. No mention is made of the Abbott Government actually stopping these horrors. The casual reader would probably assume from the report they are continuing.
Let’s now check the ABC 7.30 report of this alleged scandal:

LEIGH SALES, PRESENTER: ... Australian Defence Force members routinely witness large-scale human degradation and misery.
Tonight, for the first time, some of those Australian men and women speak publicly about the traumatic experience of dealing with the surge of asylum seeker boats that reached its peak under the former Labor government.

This is misleading. All the allegations that follow - other than a complaint that the Liberals turned back boats - seem to date from Labor’s period.  No sailors now “routinely witness” the ghastly things the ABC then describes. The boats have been stopped. This problem didn’t merely reach “its peak” under Labor. It occurred under Labor - until the Liberals ended the dying and this “large-scale human degradation and misery”:

They describe how they’ve suffered, their mistreatment by Defence and the political calculations that can determine who lives and who dies at sea.

Deaths at sea under Labor? More than 1200. Under the Liberals: none.

TROY NORRIS: ... You’re just trying to do the best you can to get as many people out of the water as quickly as possible. There’s so many people on the water…
DAN OAKES: Often Troy Norris faced a different horror: retrieving the dead, including children.
TROY NORRIS: They become quite bloated, very unrecognisable and there’s only one way to pull them in and that’s to grab ‘em and, you know, try and chuck ‘em in the boat. And sometimes you’d go to pull these people in the boat and all you’d end up with is a handful of flesh. They’re just stripped to the bone…
‘GREG’, FORMER NAVY OFFICER: ... You jump on and you can smell three days’ worth of human faeces, you can smell vomit. There are children screaming, there are people crying, there are people - desperation, I would say. You know, I’d say maybe one in five has someone who’s deceased. There are other search and rescues where they haven’t been found in time and everyone’s dead when you get on there. Everyone, and, you know, they’ve been in the sun for a few days as well.

All of this happened under Labor, which lured over the boats by weakening our border laws. All of it was stopped by the Abbott Government.
So how does the ABC deal with a central fact in this story - that the “cruel” Abbott Government actually stopped the horror unleashed by the “kind” Labor Government?

DAN OAKES: Under the Labor governments of Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard, the number of asylum seekers dramatically increased. In 2007, 148 people arrived by boat. By 2012, the figure was 17,000.

Only half the story told.
No mention of this scandalous event occurring under the Gillard Labor Government, either:

‘GREG’: It was a very hot day. It was up to 45 degrees. We conducted this boarding, steamed the vessel to a buoy off Christmas Island, which it was secured to while we waited for someone to make a decision. But it was determined that, firstly, it wasn’t a good look to have a SIEV arriving on Australia Day [last year]. Secondly, there was no-one in the office to talk to who had the ability to make the decision without worrying about having to cover their own backside. So as a result, we sat on that boat with 90 - upwards of 90 men, women and children in 45-degree heat.... And we sat on that boat for six and a half hours to wait for darkness to fall so we were then able to unload the people without creating a stir. Without the media being able to know all the details of it.

No mention that this occurred under Labor, too:

DAN OAKES: ‘Michael’ is a serving Navy member who ... says that people have died because of delays caused by Canberra. He describes an occasion when he was told to wait to board a vessel with disastrous consequences.
‘MICHAEL’, FORMER NAVY OFFICER: Our vessel was delayed 15 hours for a boarding on one occasion and we got reports in from surveillance aircraft that that vessel had sunk 13 hours ago and all we found was probably a line about 70 miles long of bodies....
DAN OAKES: He says decisions made by captains he served under was sometimes a result of indirect political influence. Sometimes, the results were fatal.
‘MICHAEL’: I can remember ...where a struggling boat of Rohingyas halfway to Christmas Island did all they could to comply with the boarding commander’s instructions, then we left them alone, 150 nautical miles from anywhere in a poorly-repaired boat.
DAN OAKES: According to ‘Michael’, the captain of the ship said the instruction to leave the first boat came from Canberra, with tragic consequences.
‘MICHAEL’: After we rendered the second boat assistance, we went back to where the previous boat was, 150 miles down. There was no sign of it.

Only near the very end of the show is Labor accused by name:

‘FIONA’, NAVY OFFICER (Actor’s voice): There were times when we had crews that conducted boardings and saw the state of the vessel, which was largely overcrowded, and they would have concerns for the welfare of the people onboard. But they were told they were only to conduct a boarding to deliver necessary equipment, then they had to disembark and monitor. On one occasion at least, a vessel overturned and people died.
DAN OAKES: According to ‘Fiona’, the Labor government wanted the boats to enter Australian waters before being boarded so the crew and passengers would be subject to Australian migration law.
‘FIONA’ (Actor’s voice): That pressure came from Canberra. It was at a time of heightened political pressure leading up to the election and they didn’t want to conduct yet another boarding outside of waters where they would not get a conviction. So, there was pressure, certainly, from within the operations room at the headquarters that we were told the minister himself was standing in Border Protection Command and he did not want that boat to be boarded.

Which minister? The ABC won’t say:

DAN OAKES: Former Labor government ministers contacted by 7.30 categorically denied any such interference.

And even then, the Abbott Government is not thanked for ending this horror but criticised:

After Labor was ousted by the Coalition in September, 2013, according to ‘Fiona’, the new turnback policy deterred asylum seekers from risking their lives, but it simultaneously imperilled those who did try to reach Australia and were caught.
‘FIONA’ (Actor’s voice): Those boats are generally unseaworthy and overcrowded. To simply turn them back for the sake of policy and put them on those not-purpose-built lifeboats is putting women and children in danger and we could have taken them onboard.

Actually those lifeboats are unsinkable.
To repeat. Deaths at sea under Labor: more than 1200. Deaths at sea under the Abbott Government: zero.
Why did the ABC go out of its way not to say so? 

===

===

Post by Matt Granz.

===

Post by Matt Granz.

===

Post by Diamond Imports.

===

Katz drink to forget ..
===

Post by Neil Cavuto.

===

Post by Matt Granz.

===

Post by Sarah Palin.

Yes he can
===

https://t.co/56Vw9NJPCe Collins class failure
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) December 3, 2014

===

Refugee allegations malicious: Morrison http://t.co/WFLnM3pcWw via @newscomauHQ
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) December 3, 2014

===

Will he apologise re MH17? .. Ukraine's Poroshenko to visit Australia http://t.co/Q6K9MIw0kL via @newscomauHQ
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) December 3, 2014

===

selfish and inappropriate .. Lambie interrupts Senate tributes to Phillip Hughes to talk http://t.co/pwC8yRJYjD via @newscomauHQ
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) December 3, 2014

===

Great picture opportunity .. Warning: Bad storms on the way http://t.co/39lfm4vQCw via @newscomauHQ
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) December 3, 2014

===

The mourning will end, but the celebration of life must continue. http://t.co/vywFF79M78
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) December 3, 2014

===

Photo: .. the better man is humble. An indisputable truth. However .. how is that truth applied to reason? http://t.co/v7hq2AXByb
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) December 3, 2014

===

Good guy wins .. Andrew Bolt defamation case: Man who tried to sue ordered to pay $500,000 in legal costs http://t.co/Ql0hWgQojN
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) December 3, 2014

===

Gillard .. do you see misogyny? Mental Health Minister Jack Snelling under fire http://t.co/2gPPwAxn5h
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) December 3, 2014

===

Photo: Always for ..  http://t.co/r5YOTfZc29
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) December 3, 2014

===

Whle we didn't win, we don't lose, either https://t.co/tBVNXEtoKy
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) December 3, 2014

===

Carrot Clarinet – Linsey Pollak http://t.co/yjQrBIVDCt
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) December 2, 2014

===

John Howard backs GP co-payment http://t.co/TtxUNzHlc3 via @SkyNewsAust
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) December 2, 2014

=== Posts from last year ===

THE PRESS, THE PRESIDENT AND THE PLASTIC TURKEY

Tim Blair – Tuesday, December 03, 2013 (3:59am)

The recent 50th anniversary of John F. Kennedy’s assassination gave us all reason to again consider one of modern history’s great tragedies. But, aside from the inadvisability of travelling in an open car while there are communists in nearby buildings, there are few lessons to be learned from that dreadful day in Dallas.

Another anniversary, however, is loaded with helpful learning moments, especially for the media.

 Continue reading 'THE PRESS, THE PRESIDENT AND THE PLASTIC TURKEY'

===

NO TO MO

Tim Blair – Tuesday, December 03, 2013 (3:56am)

A bunch of guys grow moustaches. The left responds: 

Movember is divisive, gender normative, racist and ineffective against some very real health issues. 

Probably better if they just killed themselves.

===

WAR ON SHRUGS

Tim Blair – Tuesday, December 03, 2013 (3:49am)

Anti-sarc rules loom in the west: 

Negative body language including shrugging shoulders, rolling eyes, deep sighing and finger-pointing is to be prohibited at a Perth council under new guidelines on behavior …

According to the document, raising one’s voice, taunting or trying to undermine others’ arguments, or attacking a suggestion as “that’s a dumb idea” or “that won’t work” is in breach of the code.

As are backbiting and complaining about others behind their backs, criticism of an individual or group and asking excessive or inappropriate questions. 

If this legislation catches on, every household with children is headed to court.

(Via J.F. Beck)

===

ALL COST, NO BENEFIT

Tim Blair – Tuesday, December 03, 2013 (3:08am)

We’re living in an age of madness: 

Climate-change policies are expected to cost Britain more than £80 billion by the end of the decade, as critics warn that the global-warming industry is spiralling out of control …

Vast sums are being spent on initiatives ranging from climate-change officers in local councils to the funding of “low carbon” agriculture in Colombia at a cost of £15 million alone. Billions of pounds are also being added to fuel bills to pay for green policies. 

On a positive note, at least the latest leftist belief system isn’t actively killing people.

===

What’s fair about Fair Work?

Andrew Bolt December 03 2013 (8:18am)

Judith Sloan on the outrageous stacking of the Fair Work Commission - not least by Bill Shorten as Workplace Relations Minister:

Of the 27 appointments made by the Labor government, 18 were either union officials or Labor affiliates. And of these appointments, nearly one-third were at the presidential level. The FWC is now a ridiculously top-heavy organisation, with half of all the members at the presidential level. 
And just take a look at the salaries. The total annual remuneration of a vice-president is $534,000 and of a deputy president, it is $435,000. Even the more junior commissioners earn $358,000…
There is, of course, the possibility the appointees to the FWC will act in a detached and even-handed way. But, alas, it has not been the case. One member of the tribunal is so inclined to hand down lop-sided and prejudiced decisions that many of them are appealed… The Australian Mines and Minerals Association, the resources industry employer group, has outlined a number of areas of significant inconsistency. These include: whether employers have the right to test for drug and alcohol use by workers; whether accessing pornographic material is the basis for justified dismissal; whether assaulting a fellow worker is the basis for justified dismissal; whether annual leave can be cashed out; and whether individual flexibility agreements must actually deliver on their promise.

Let us pray that Employment Minister Eric Abetz can unpick the lock on the box in which the government has put him. 

===

Boats slowing, but now Labor dismantles what’s working

Andrew Bolt December 03 2013 (8:08am)

Boat people policy

Utterly bizarre. Has Labor learned nothing from the humanitarian, financial and security disaster it unleashed by scrapping such tough measures in 2008?
Now, with boats down to one a week, Labor tries to dismantle some of the policies which are clearly working:

THE Senate has scuttled the Coalition government’s reintroduction of temporary protection visas.
Labor and the Greens teamed up on Monday night to pass a disallowance motion in the Senate, 36 votes to 26, to quash the controversial visas.
The coalition government reintroduced temporary protection visas via regulation in October as a key plank of its hardline Operation Sovereign Borders policy aimed at discouraging asylum-seeker boat journeys. It must now wait for six months to reintroduce regulation of the same substance. 

So stupid. 

===

Turnbull rebukes ABC, but only for helping the Guardian sell itself

Andrew Bolt December 03 2013 (7:59am)

Interesting, and more stinging coming from Malcolm Turnbull - although he’s confined his criticism to the ABC getting into bed with a commercial entity:

COMMUNICATIONS Minister Malcolm Turnbull has told ABC managing director Mark Scott it was an error of judgment for the national broadcaster to join The Guardian to publish claims Australia tapped the phones of Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and his wife… 
Mr Turnbull ... defended the legitimacy of the story. However, he said it was The Guardian’s story, not the ABC’s.
“They were going to publish it and they just basically wanted a partner to help them amplify their publication,” Mr Turnbull said…
Mr Turnbull suggested The Guardian, which launched its Australian web edition earlier this year, would have proposed the partnership with commercial considerations in mind… Mr Turnbull first raised his concerns with Mr Scott in a phone call he initiated last Monday.

===

A band you may well like

Andrew Bolt December 03 2013 (7:52am)

 Reader Gary:

About a year ago you shared my band’s video clip on your blog. The band is called Faith & Gasoline and the song, ”Reality Hurts”, dealt with freedom of speech and your recent trial. Thanks to your blog, we received over 100,000 views in under a fortnight and connected with listeners/readers from across Australia, as well as a few readers from Europe and the USA. We also met some interesting characters as we toured Vic, SA and NSW, who had recognised us from your blog! We have now released our second record, “Better Left Unsaid”, as well as a video clip for the title track. The video can be viewed here. And the CD can be purchased in our online store.

===

How to win $1000 from a Liberal Lord Mayor and make Melbourne a “city of literature”

Andrew Bolt December 03 2013 (7:09am)

This is cartoonist David Blumenstein with Melbourne Lord Mayor Robert Doyle, a Liberal, who has just given him a $1000 prize as an “emerging writer” who will ”strengthen Melbourne’s status as a UNESCO City of Literature”:

The criteria for Blumenstein’s award for a graphic short story in the Lord Mayor’s Creative Writing Awards:

General criteria (across all categories) 

Literary merit and overall quality of authorship 
Originality of concept 
Stylistic excellence 
Readability 
Clarity of purpose 
Editorial excellence 
Intent of work met by author 
Professional presentation

Graphic short story
All of the general criteria apply but also 

Artistic merit 

The prize was for a story in Blumenstein’s cartoon book:

It contains personal stories of people who shit me off — many of them politicians. One of the stories is a thing about Andrew Bolt which won a Lord Mayor’s Creative Writing prize the other day. 

The prize-winning story was presented as the work of Blumenstein’s much younger brother:

Presenting this as the work of a not-so-bright year 10 student excused Blumenstein the crudity of language and thought of a playground:

All right, so the drawings aren’t great, the writing adolescent - but the politics are right on. And so a former Victorian Liberal leader rewards the sentiments of this “emerging writer” with $1000 taken from ratepayers.
The Left may have conquered the institutions, but it took the acquiescence of conservatives too eager to seem broadminded. 

===

A conservative government should laugh such critics to scorn

Andrew Bolt December 03 2013 (7:03am)

Gerard Henderson has typically sound advice: 

The tenor of intensity with which many journalists dislike the Prime Minister and his colleagues is evident in the note which accompanies the current edition of The Monthly magazine. Editor John van Tiggelen quotes “one of the magazine’s most popular contributors” as declaring: “I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a cabinet of creeps; I can’t bear to take them seriously yet."… 
So much is the dislike of Abbott that it appears some commentators want his policies to fail even if this is damaging to Australia’s national interest. This is evident in the reporting of the documents stolen by Edward Snowden… It’s possible the overwhelmingly negative coverage may affect the Coalition at the next election. Or that the media’s apparent obsessions have little traction in the electorate. Despite promising starts, Howard only narrowly won his first election as prime minister in 1998 and Rudd did not even lead Labor to the 2010 campaign. Even so, the Coalition may need to consider whether its apparent tactic of low-profile engagement deserves reassessment.

A tip: George Brandis could play a significant role in the culture war this government must fight. Malcolm Turnbull has all the firepower, too, but whose side would he actually join?
(Thanks to reader Peter of Bellevue Hill.) 

===

The warming religion will collapse from its sheer cost

Andrew Bolt December 03 2013 (6:46am)

How many billions of dollars have been squandered on pretending to do something about the weather? On placating the great Climate God?
Richard Lindzen, Professor of Atmospheric Sciences emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology:

Global climate alarmism has been costly to society, and it has the potential to be vastly more costly.  It also has been damaging to science, as scientists adjust both data and even theory to accommodate politically correct positions… 
There are past examples.  In the U.S. in the early 20th century, the eugenics movement had coopted the science of human genetics and was driving a political agenda.  The movement achieved the Immigration Restriction Act of 1923, as well as forced sterilization laws in several states.  The movement became discredited by Nazi atrocities, but the American consequences survived well into the 1960s.
In the Soviet Union, Trofim Denisovich Lysenko (1898-1976) promoted the Lamarckian view of the inheritance of acquired characteristics.  It fit with Stalin’s megalomaniacal insistence on the ability of society to remold nature….
Global warming differs from the previous two affairs.  Global warming has become a religion.  A surprisingly large number of people seem to have concluded that all that gives meaning to their lives is the belief that they are saving the planet by paying attention to their carbon footprint… In contrast to Lysenkoism, Global Warming has a global constituency, and has successfully coopted almost all of institutional science.  However, the cracks in the scientific claims for catastrophic warming are, I think, becoming much harder for the supporters to defend. 

For example:

In fact:

“‘Real Risk of a Maunder Minimum ‘Little Ice Age’ announced the BBC this week, in reporting startling findings by Professor Mike Lockwood of Reading University.  ‘Professor Lockwood believes solar activity is now falling more rapidly than at any time in the last 10,000 years [raising the risk of a new Little Ice Age]…, explained Paul Hudson, the BBC’s climate correspondent.  If Earth is spared a new Little Ice Age, a severe cooling as ‘occurred in the early 1800s, which also had its fair share of cold winters and cold summers is, according to him, ‘more likely than not to happen.”

How much more waste before the cost becomes so crippling that it forces politicians to admit voters have been conned - and fleeced?

Climate-change policies are expected to cost Britain more than £80 billion by the end of the decade, as critics warn that the global-warming industry is spiralling out of control … 
Vast sums are being spent on initiatives ranging from climate-change officers in local councils to the funding of “low carbon” agriculture in Colombia at a cost of £15 million alone. Billions of pounds are also being added to fuel bills to pay for green policies. 

(Thanks to reader fulchrum.) 

===

Memo to the ABC: Edward Snowden is as much a “whistleblower” as Kim Philby

Andrew Bolt December 03 2013 (6:26am)

The ABC has decided on another adjective to describe the traitor Edwin Snowden:

The Guardian Australia has published secret documents from 2008, leaked by the US whistleblower Edward Snowden,...

Here is how Whistleblowers Australia defines the term:

Whistleblowers Australia Inc. is an association for those who have exposed corruption or any form of malpractice...

Here is how the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority defines it:

A ‘whistleblower’ is a person who exposes or brings to public attention an irregularity or a crime, especially from within an organisation.

So the ABC is informing its audience as a matter of fact, not opinion, that Snowden, now granted asylum in Russia, has exposed corruption, crime or some malpractice in his country’s national security organisations. In the ABC’s language, Snowden is a hero.
But what crime? What corruption? What malpractice? And look at the damage done to the national security of his own country and that of its allies.
The ABC’s description of Snowden is loaded, inaccurate and informed by hostility to the security interests of the West and its citizens. Snowden is about as much a whistleblower as Kim Philby or Wilfred Burchett.
The ABC is out of control. 

===

Round up these ma and pa throwbacks

Andrew Bolt December 03 2013 (4:49am)

What’s more worrying? That AWU boss Paul Howes thinks farming really is just a primitive “ma and pa” operation, or that a way of life “needs” to stop?

It essentially means the day of ma and pa farming in Australia needs to end.

A phone call is made:

Senator Bill Heffernan ... said he made a “courtesy” phone call to express his views direct to Mr Howes late Sunday evening, which was met with blunt objection. 
“He (Mr Howes) hung up actually because he was a bit upset that I’d called him on a Sunday night which was extraordinary,” he said.
“But I thought it was an extraordinary circumstance that he would demean the great institution of Australian family farmers with the comment that ma and pa farmers should get out.
“He obviously doesn’t understand farming and hasn’t had a real job ever in his life as a trade union person and doesn’t understand the issues or details around the ADM issue."…
He said farmers had made great advances over many decades in the uptake of on-farm technology and science to improve their operations.
“The bulk of family farmers are viable farmers and besides corporate farming in this country has had a history of going broke,” he said. “Farmers don’t pay themselves overtime like the ma and pa trade unions do.”

===

Abbott’s big pitch: why is Shorten standing between you and $550?

Andrew Bolt December 03 2013 (12:01am)

 I’m not sure why Tony Abbott wasn’t given an auto-cue or better lighting, but the message is very effective.
And the point isn’t just that Labor is ignoring the clear wish of most Australians to scrap the carbon tax and save Australians an average of $550 a year. There is also this, as Paul Murray pointed out on Sky last night:  Abbott in the space of a week realised he was making a mistake on school funding and changed course. Labor made a terrible mistake on the carbon tax and in three years still hasn’t been able to change. 

===

Time this Government showed it can also do tough

Andrew Bolt December 03 2013 (8:30am)

Each individual decision taken by the Abbott Government might just be defensible, but the pattern is a worry:

One of the most senior figures of the Howard government and a leading ­figure of the Liberal Party’s conservative wing, Peter Reith, has accused Prime Minister Tony Abbott of orchestrating the veto of a $3.4 billion US bid for GrainCorp, which he described as the latest of several botched decisions. 
Mr Reith called on the new government to show more leadership and resist the push for government subsidies and assistance for business, and raised concerns that the GrainCorp decision, which was supposed to have been made by Treasurer Joe Hockey, makes a bailout of Qantas Airways more likely.
“Hockey says it should be the subject of a national debate. Australia does not need a debate; we need a government that makes it clear it will not be wasting any more taxpayer money with sub­sidies for business and that its priority, as promised, is to return the budget to surplus ASAP,” he said.
“I never thought that the Abbott government would be the first Australian government to knock back an application to Foreign Investment Review Board from the business community of our close ally the United States."… Former treasurer Peter Costello criticised the decision on Sunday. On Monday, former Victorian Premier Jeff Kennett said it had condemned Australia to be a “10th-order country” and “we are still back in the 18th century”.

So this is more heartening:

Prime Minister Tony Abbott has sought to dampen expectations that the government will offer financial help to Qantas to preserve its investment-grade credit rating, saying the airline has yet to tell politicians exactly what it wants… 
‘’Maybe it wants to see the restrictions on ownership lifted,’’ he said on Brisbane radio. ‘’I’m not sure they really want to see a new government shareholding. And the trouble with providing a government loan guarantee is where does it stop?’’

===

Children diagnose discrimination in workplaces they’ve never seen

Andrew Bolt December 03 2013 (8:24am)

Children aged from 15 to 19 who’ve never had full-time jobs know exactly what’s wrong with the workplace:

When [the survey of 15,000 youths is] carved up on gender lines, for [the] first time ever young women ranked equity and discrimination as the top issue facing the country, with female respondents indicating concerns about workplace discrimination, racism and gender inequality.

Reader Jilly:

These girls have not yet experienced workplace situations, are not yet at Uni, live in a decade when women held every one of our highest public offices and are represented in the top level of success in private business of every kind - so where did they get this notion from?  

Good question. I have some strong suspicions. 

===

Abbott finally unleashes

Andrew Bolt December 03 2013 (2:04pm)

A turn for the better in the Abbott Government’s communications strategy:

- A keeping of the education funding promise (or close enough).
- A far stronger performance - in fact, a good one - from Christopher Pyne on 7.30 last night.
- A good, aggressive performance from Tony Abbott in Question Time yesterday, without crossing that line into stridency that prime ministers must avoid.
- A press conference from Abbott today from a prime minister who at first held few.
- Some red meat in the press conference for Liberal voters, not least on the ABC.

Heartening.
Now, if Speaker Bronwyn Bishop could seem less scared of the Oppositionn and demand less heckling and shouting, even better. It is a poor show when the Prime Minister and others need to remind her of standing orders or need to pause to make the point that the uproar is simply unacceptable. The Member for Parramatta in particular needs a few outings in the sin bin, and Tanya Plibersek’s shouting is surely too much.
Bishop, a classic conservative, thinks setting a good example in civility will impress the uncivil. Actually, a swish of the cane impresses the uncouth even more.
UPDATE
Better. A noisy Labor MP is thrown out.
Worse: Now Julie Bishop has to ask a “rude member” let her finish an answer. Where was Bronwyn Bishop?
UPDATE
Pyne then points out to the Speaker how rude a Labor MP just was to her. (Labor is treating Bishop with a labored patronisation.) She takes no action. 

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Boats slowing, but now Labor dismantles what’s working

Andrew Bolt December 03 2013 (12:08pm)

Boat people policy

Utterly bizarre. Has Labor learned nothing from the humanitarian, financial and security disaster it unleashed by scrapping such tough measures in 2008?
Now, with boats down to one a week, Labor tries to dismantle some of the policies which are clearly working:

THE Senate has scuttled the Coalition government’s reintroduction of temporary protection visas.
Labor and the Greens teamed up on Monday night to pass a disallowance motion in the Senate, 36 votes to 26, to quash the controversial visas.
The coalition government reintroduced temporary protection visas via regulation in October as a key plank of its hardline Operation Sovereign Borders policy aimed at discouraging asylum-seeker boat journeys. It must now wait for six months to reintroduce regulation of the same substance. 

So stupid.
UPDATE
So the Abbott Government brought back temporary protection visas. Labor last night sided with the Greens in the Senate to scrap them. This is how an ABC reporter then grills the Immigration Minister, Scott Morrison:

JANE NORMAN: Bringing back temporary protection visas was one of the Coalition’s key election commitments, the key plank of your border protection policy. So is this now a broken promise? 

(Thanks to reader F, as well as to reader Andrew for the graphic.) 

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How a Melbourne academic slimes us in Indonesia

Andrew Bolt December 03 2013 (11:51am

Indonesia’s elite are reacting with disproportionate hostility to Australia over the spying controversy, seemingly forgetful of so much help we have offered.
Now Melbourne University academic Professor Thomas Reuter eggs them on, with this virulently anti-Australian poison published in the Jakarta Post:

After the Japanese surrender in August 1945, Indonesia’s founding president Sukarno declared independence… Dutch prisoners of war, released by Indonesia, were armed and sent back on rampages against Indonesian civilians and police. Australian troops participated in the occupation of the outer islands, including Bali, and were involved in massacres.

Australian troops massacred Indonesians in Bali? This is news to me. The evidence for this incendiary claim?
Australian troops were in Indonesia as a consequence of liberating Indonesia from the Japanese. Australia was actually a strong supporter of Indonesian independence from Dutch rule.

The British have since apologized for this cruel attempt to stifle the young nation’s struggle for freedom and sovereignty. Australia has not.

How can we apologise for something for which no credible evidence seems to exist? Who, other than Reuter, has ever demanded we do apologise?
And if we are to get outraged by massacres in Bali, we should first be cross about mass killings of Indonesians by Indonesians in 1965, and of Australians by Indonesians in 2002. Have apologies been issued for either?

An undeclared war (the “Confrontation") began, and Australian troops participated. Covert operations into Indonesian Kalimantan began in 1964 under the code name Operation Claret. Attempts to assassinate Sukarno failed.

Australians tried to assassinate Sukarno? Where’s the evidence? The most famous attempts to kill him came from an Indonesian air force officer and Islamist radicals. You could even blame Suharto for Sukarno’s death. But Australia?
As for intervening in the Konfrontasi, it was only to protect Malaysia from Indonesian aggression, thanks to Sukarno. Why is that not mentioned?

In 1965, Indonesia witnessed one of the greatest genocides of the 20th century, as army general Soeharto led a military coup against the left-leaning but essentially nationalist and non-aligned Sukarno government. 
Up to one million innocent Indonesian civilians were butchered over the following year at a rate of 1,500 people per day, to the applause of western powers including Australia.

Applause? Where in Australia was there “applause”?  Australian politicians should perhaps have protested more, and they certainly favored the pro-West Suharto to the far-Left Sukarno. But cheering on the massacres?

The deep involvement of British and American intelligence in staging this bloody military coup, similar to the Pinochet takeover of Chile, is beyond reasonable doubt.

In every bloody coup, blame the CIA. The true hallmark of the far-Left.  The responsibility for the massacres remain with Indonesians themselves, with Suharto leading a coup against the erratic and dictatorial Sukarno, so economically incompetent that his country was plagued by famines and his people were advised to eat rats..

The lack of an apology for such consistent un-neighborly behavior may seem astonishing in the context of the “Asian Century” and needs to be understood as a direct consequence of the ongoing nature of these operations.

“On going” involvements in assassination plots, coups and massacres? Is this academic serious? We are “un-neighbourly”?  Australia? Which backed Indonesian independence, gives $500 million a year in aid, bailed out Indonesia in the Asian financial crisis and donated $1 billion after the terrible tsunami? Why was none of the good we do mentioned in a piece which reads like a hate-stirring slander sheet?

Reuter’s research is handsomely funded by the Australian Research Council.  Is such funding in our national interest? I resent every dollar of my taxes taken from me and given to him, when he’s spreading calumnies about Australia in a country where resentments can be lethal.
UPDATE
Reader Leo G says Reuter has form. In 2002 he suggested to a Parliamentary committee  the Bali bombing might be the work not of al Qaeda or Jemaah Islamiyah, which would suit the wicked US. No, the Indonesian military might have done it:

Media reports, citing US and Australian government soms, quickly pointed the finger of blame at the international terrorist network Al-Qaeda and ‘its local operatives. Little attention was given to the national let alone local socio-political context in which the attack had taken place. It was not sufficiently noted that attacks of a similar kind, if not scope, have occurred with increasing frequency since the collapse of Suharto’s military dictatorship in 1998. As a consequence, the tragedy of October 12 was co-opted prematurely and uncritically into the global political agenda and rhetoric of the United States government’s “War on Terror."… 
The problem in allocating blame for the Bali blast is that radical Islamic groups like Jemaah Islamiyah are not the only groups in Indonesia today who may be willing and capable of committing or supporting acts of terrorism, such as the recent attacks in Bali… Different groups even within the government’s own security forces have been fighting turf wars, with clashes between police and army forces reported from Java, Sumatra and Flores in recent months. A string of violent incidents bears testimony to increasing lawlessness and an expanding culture of political and economic violence, cutting across all sectors of society. This diffusion makes it difficult to pinpoint a single person or group as the likely perpetrators in any particular case.

(Thanks to reader Mick.) 

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“In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom also he made the universe.” Hebrews 1:1-2 NIV

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Morning and Evening by Charles Spurgeon

"Thou art all fair, my love."
Song of Solomon 4:7

The Lord's admiration of his Church is very wonderful, and his description of her beauty is very glowing. She is not merely fair, but "all fair." He views her in himself, washed in his sin-atoning blood and clothed in his meritorious righteousness, and he considers her to be full of comeliness and beauty. No wonder that such is the case, since it is but his own perfect excellency that he admires; for the holiness, glory, and perfection of his Church are his own glorious garments on the back of his own well-beloved spouse. She is not simply pure, or well-proportioned; she is positively lovely and fair! She has actual merit! Her deformities of sin are removed; but more, she has through her Lord obtained a meritorious righteousness by which an actual beauty is conferred upon her. Believers have a positive righteousness given to them when they become "accepted in the beloved" (Eph. 1:6). Nor is the Church barely lovely, she is superlatively so. Her Lord styles her "Thou fairest among women." She has a real worth and excellence which cannot be rivalled by all the nobility and royalty of the world. If Jesus could exchange his elect bride for all the queens and empresses of earth, or even for the angels in heaven, he would not, for he puts her first and foremost--"fairest among women." Like the moon she far outshines the stars. Nor is this an opinion which he is ashamed of, for he invites all men to hear it. He sets a "behold" before it, a special note of exclamation, inviting and arresting attention. "Behold, thou art fair, my love; behold, thou art fair" (Song of Sol. 4:1). His opinion he publishes abroad even now, and one day from the throne of his glory he will avow the truth of it before the assembled universe. "Come, ye blessed of my Father" (Matt. 25:34), will be his solemn affirmation of the loveliness of his elect.

Evening

"Behold, all is vanity."
Ecclesiastes 1:14

Nothing can satisfy the entire man but the Lord's love and the Lord's own self. Saints have tried to anchor in other roadsteads, but they have been driven out of such fatal refuges. Solomon, the wisest of men, was permitted to make experiments for us all, and to do for us what we must not dare to do for ourselves. Here is his testimony in his own words: "So I was great, and increased more than all that were before me in Jerusalem: also my wisdom remained with me. And whatsoever mine eyes desired I kept not from them, I withheld not my heart from any joy; for my heart rejoiced in all my labour: and this was my portion of all my labour. Then I looked on all the works that my hands had wrought, and on the labour that I had laboured to do: and, behold, all was vanity and vexation of spirit, and there was no profit under the sun." "Vanity of vanities, all is vanity." What! the whole of it vanity? O favoured monarch, is there nothing in all thy wealth? Nothing in that wide dominion reaching from the river even to the sea? Nothing in Palmyra's glorious palaces? Nothing in the house of the forest of Lebanon? In all thy music and dancing, and wine and luxury, is there nothing? "Nothing," he says, "but weariness of spirit." This was his verdict when he had trodden the whole round of pleasure. To embrace our Lord Jesus, to dwell in his love, and be fully assured of union with him--this is all in all. Dear reader, you need not try other forms of life in order to see whether they are better than the Christian's: if you roam the world around, you will see no sights like a sight of the Saviour's face; if you could have all the comforts of life, if you lost your Saviour, you would be wretched; but if you win Christ, then should you rot in a dungeon, you would find it a paradise; should you live in obscurity, or die with famine, you will yet be satisfied with favour and full of the goodness of the Lord.

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Today's reading: Ezekiel 42-44, 1 John 1 (NIV)

View today's reading on Bible Gateway

Today's Old Testament reading: Ezekiel 42-44

The Rooms for the Priests

¹ Then the man led me northward into the outer court and brought me to the rooms opposite the temple courtyard and opposite the outer wall on the north side. ² The building whose door faced north was a hundred cubits long and fifty cubits wide. ³ Both in the section twenty cubits from the inner court and in the section opposite the pavement of the outer court, gallery faced gallery at the three levels. ⁴ In front of the rooms was an inner passageway ten cubits wide and a hundred cubits long. Their doors were on the north. ⁵ Now the upper rooms were narrower, for the galleries took more space from them than from the rooms on the lower and middle floors of the building. ⁶ The rooms on the top floor had no pillars, as the courts had; so they were smaller in floor space than those on the lower and middle floors. ⁷ There was an outer wall parallel to the rooms and the outer court; it extended in front of the rooms for fifty cubits. ⁸ While the row of rooms on the side next to the outer court was fifty cubits long, the row on the side nearest the sanctuary was a hundred cubits long. ⁹The lower rooms had an entrance on the east side as one enters them from the outer court....

...read the rest on Bible Gateway

Today's New Testament reading: 1 John 1

The Incarnation of the Word of Life

¹ That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of life. ² The life appeared; we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us. ³ We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. ⁴ We write this to make our joy complete.

Light and Darkness, Sin and Forgiveness

⁵ This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. ⁶ If we claim to have fellowship with him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live out the truth. ⁷ But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin.

⁸ If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. ⁹ If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. ¹⁰ If we claim we have not sinned, we make him out to be a liar and his word is not in us.

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Amasa [Ăm'asă]—burden-bearer.

1. The son of David’s half-sister Abigail whom Absalom made captain of his rebel army (2 Sam. 17:25; 19:13; 20 ). Amasa was completely defeated by his cousin Joab in the forest of Ephraim (2 Sam. 18:6-8). David not only forgave Amasa but gave him Joab’s place (2 Sam. 19:13). Joab treacherously slew him (2 Sam. 20:9-12).
2. The name of an Ephraimite who with others resisted the bringing into Samaria the Jews Ahaz had made prisoners ( 2 Chron. 28:12).

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