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The ALP have not acknowledged it but they spent recklessly in government and have blocked mindlessly in opposition. Now they have a problem regarding voter perception. The ALP are confident in their contempt for the voter, and don't feel it matters they have damaged the economy and threatened the welfare of all Australian children and those not yet born. However, they won't want to do that immediately before election because some supporters might notice. Now the ALP's problem is that they do not know if this is a pre election budget or not. The government won't want to go right away. The ALP will want to block everything regardless of merit. But, if it is a pre election budget then the ALP need to pass something to suggest they are responsible. Bill Shorten is clearly upset that the media aren't telling him which way to jump. Laura Tingle had an opportunity when asking Treasurer Hockey a question at lunch with the media today. Instead she proudly told the Canberra Press Gallery she had not understood the issue of paid parental leave. She blamed Mr Abbott, but forgot to point a direction to Shorten. For the record, Mr Abbott's policy he took to election was blocked by Mr Shorten who felt that because he had the numbers, then the Australian people voted for him to block the legislation. Showing once again ALP hates families.
Nepal has another earthquake, a 7.3 magnitude aftershock. At last count another fifty were killed and more than a thousand injured. Nepal needs prayer and other practical support.
Kevin Pieterson told he won't play for England again. He had been told he might, so he gave up a lucrative contract in the IPL and hit a triple century in English domestic. But now he has been told he never stood a chance. England would need to play worse than they are now, and that may not be possible.
On this day in 1373, Julian of Norwich had visions which were later transcribed in her Revelations of Divine Love. 1515, Mary Tudor, Queen of France and Charles Brandon, 1st Duke of Suffolk were officially married at Greenwich. 1568, Battle of Langside: The forces of Mary, Queen of Scots, were defeated by a confederacy of Scottish Protestants under James Stewart, Earl of Moray, her half-brother. 1619, Dutch statesman Johan van Oldenbarnevelt was executed in The Hague after being convicted of treason. 1648, construction of the Red Fort at Delhi was completed. 1779, War of Bavarian Succession: Russian and French mediators at the Congress of Teschen negotiated an end to the war. In the agreement Austria received the part of its territory that was taken from it (the Innviertel). 1780, the Cumberland Compact was signed by leaders of the settlers in early Tennessee. 1787, Captain Arthur Phillip left Portsmouth, England, with eleven ships full of convicts (the "First Fleet") to establish a penal colony in Australia.
In 1804, forces sent by Yusuf Karamanli of Tripoli to retake Derna from the Americansattacked the city. 1830, Ecuador gained its independence from Gran Colombia. 1846, Mexican–American War: The United States declared war on Mexico. 1848, first performance of Finland's national anthem. 1861, American Civil War: Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom issued a "proclamation of neutrality" which recognised the breakaway states as having belligerent rights. Also 1861, the Great Comet of 1861 was discovered by John Tebbutt of Windsor, New South Wales, Australia. Also 1861, Pakistan's (then a part of British India) first railway line opened, from Karachi to Kotri. 1862, the USS Planter, a steamer and gunship, stole through Confederate lines and was passed to the Union, by a southern slave, Robert Smalls, who later was officially appointed as captain, becoming the first black man to command a United States ship. 1864, American Civil War: Battle of Resaca: The battle began with Union General Sherman fighting toward Atlanta, Georgia. 1865, American Civil War: Battle of Palmito Ranch: In far south Texas, more than a month after Confederate General Robert E. Lee's surrender, the last land battle of the Civil War ended with a Confederate victory. 1880, in Menlo Park, New Jersey, Thomas Edisonperformed the first test of his electric railway. 1888, with the passage of the Lei Áurea ("Golden Law"), Brazil abolished slavery.
In 1909, the first Giro d'Italia started from Milan. Italian cyclist Luigi Ganna would be the winner. 1912, the Royal Flying Corps, the forerunner of the Royal Air Force, was established in the United Kingdom. 1917, three children report the first apparition of Our Lady of Fátimain Fátima, Portugal. 1923, Robert Bellarmine, a Doctor of the Catholic Church, was beatified. 1939, the first commercial FM radio station in the United States was launched in Bloomfield, Connecticut. The station later became WDRC-FM. 1940, World War II: Germany's conquest of France began as the German army crossed the Meuse. Winston Churchill made his "blood, toil, tears, and sweat" speech to the House of Commons. Also 1940, Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands fled her country to Great Britain after the German invasion. Princess Juliana took her children to Canada for their safety. 1941, World War II: Yugoslavroyal colonel Dragoljub Mihailović started fighting with German occupation troops, beginning the Serbian resistance. 1943, World War II: German Afrika Korps and Italian troops in North Africa surrendered to Allied forces. 1948, 1948 Arab-Israeli War: The Kfar Etzion massacre was committed by Arab irregulars, the day before the declaration of independence of the state of Israel on May 14.
In 1950, the first round of the Formula One World Championship was held at Silverstone. 1951, the 400th anniversary of the founding of the National University of San Marcos was commemorated by the opening of the first large-capacity stadium in Peru. 1952, the Rajya Sabha, the upper house of the Parliament of India, held its first sitting. 1954, the anti-National Service Riots, by Chinese Middle School students in Singapore, took place. Also 1954, the original Broadway production of The Pajama Game opened and ran for another 1,063 performances. Later received three Tony Awards for Best Musical, Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Musical, and Best Choreography. 1958, during a visit to Caracas, Venezuela, Vice President Richard Nixon's car was attacked by anti-American demonstrators. Also 1958, the trademark Velcro was registered. Also 1958, May 1958 crisis: A group of French military officers led a coup in Algiers demanding that a government of national unity be formed with Charles de Gaulle at its head in order to defend French control of Algeria. Also 1958, Ben Carlin became the first (and only) person to circumnavigate the world by amphibious vehicle, having travelled over 17,000 kilometres (11,000 mi) by sea and 62,000 kilometres (39,000 mi) by land during a ten-year journey.
In 1960, hundreds of University of California, Berkeley students congregated for the first day of protest against a visit by the House Committee on Un-American Activities. Thirty-one students were arrested, and the Free Speech Movement was born. 1963, the U.S. Supreme Court case Brady v. Maryland was decided. 1967, Dr. Zakir Hussain became the third President of India. He was the first Muslim President of the Indian Union. He held this position until August 24, 1969. 1969, Race riots, later known as the May 13 Incident, took place in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. 1972, Faulty electrical wiring ignited a fire underneath the Playtown Cabaret in Osaka, Japan. Blocked exits and non-functional elevators led to 118 fatalities, with many victims leaping to their deaths. Also 1972, The Troubles: A car bombing outside a crowded pub in Belfast sparked a two-day gun battle involving the Provisional IRA, Ulster Volunteer Force and British Army. Seven people were killed and over 66 injured.
In 1980, an F3 tornado hit Kalamazoo County, Michigan. President Jimmy Carter declared it a federal disaster area. 1981, Mehmet Ali Ağca attempted to assassinate Pope John Paul IIin St. Peter's Square in Rome. The Pope was rushed to the Agostino Gemelli University Polyclinic to undergo emergency surgery and survived. 1985, police release a bomb on MOVE headquarters in Philadelphia to end a stand-off, killing 11 MOVE members and destroying the homes of 250 city residents. 1989, large groups of students occupied Tiananmen Square and began a hunger strike. 1992, Li Hongzhi gave the first public lecture on Falun Gong in Changchun, People's Republic of China. 1994, Johnny Carson made his last television appearance on Late Show with David Letterman. 1995, Alison Hargreaves, a 33-year-old British mother, became the first woman to conquer Everest without oxygen or the help of sherpas. 1996, severe thunderstorms and a tornado in Bangladesh killed 600 people. 1998, Race riots broke out in Jakarta, Indonesia, where shops owned by Indonesians of Chinese descent were looted and women raped. Also 1998, India carried out two nuclear tests at Pokhran, following the three conducted on May 11. The United States and Japan imposed economic sanctions on India.
In 2000, in Enschede, the Netherlands, a fireworks factory exploded, killing 22 people, wounding 950, and resulting in approximately €450 million in damage. 2005, the Andijan Massacre occurred in Uzbekistan. Also 2005, the Bính Bridge opened to traffic in Hai Phong, Vietnam. 2006, São Paulo violence: A major rebellion occurred in several prisons in Brazil. 2008, the Jaipur bombings in Rajasthan, India resulted in dozens of deaths. 2011, Two bombs exploded in the Charsadda District of Pakistan killing 98 people and wounding 140 others. 2014, an explosion at an underground coal mine in south-western Turkey killed 301 miners. Also 2014, Major floods in Southeast Europe killed at least 47 people.
2014
It is a joke that religious people see things and may be inspired by adversity, or nothing. But on this day in 1373, an unknown woman had a vision which defines, and illustrates, what we know today of what religious thought was then. She is called Julian of Norwich because her writings were found in an anchoress's cell which was built onto the wall of the church of St Julian in Norwich. From her visions she wrote "Revelations of Divine Love." She wrote in English, and so it is the earliest text we have written in English. She said she was unlettered, which may mean she was not literate in Latin. Some say she was a universalist, believing that all will be saved, but she did not write that, she merely wrote she hoped for that. And so arguments arise over diminutions that say more about the readers than the writer. I focus on this today because it is the National Budget being brought before parliament and, for a long time, people have inferred and argued over what has not been said, but which they assume. The truth is, although spinners aren't admitting it, that previous ALP government was shockingly bad and has left the economy in need of exceptional government. From a position of substantial surplus to substantial debt, defenders of the previous corrupt government claim the economy is not that badly off, and there are many governments worse off. That misleading truth obscures the fact that cuts need to be made for Australia to stand still. We had lots of cash, now we owe it. And we have nothing to show for it. And our children are slated to suffer for it.
The ALP are very keen that the poorest suffer while they are in opposition. They have a policy of opposing the ending of a Carbon Dioxide tax even though when they were last in government they ran a policy claiming they had ended it. The government needs to cut spending, but the ridiculous tax aimed at limiting plant food does not even do that. All it does is make business more difficult, meaning fewer jobs and a weaker economy. It is difficult to see a single policy pursued by the ALP which provides for the poor, or struggling workers. The ALP aimed for unemployment to be higher than it now is. They see things happening that others do not. My bet is they will never author a text as acutely important or beneficial as "Revelations of Divine Love."
The ALP are very keen that the poorest suffer while they are in opposition. They have a policy of opposing the ending of a Carbon Dioxide tax even though when they were last in government they ran a policy claiming they had ended it. The government needs to cut spending, but the ridiculous tax aimed at limiting plant food does not even do that. All it does is make business more difficult, meaning fewer jobs and a weaker economy. It is difficult to see a single policy pursued by the ALP which provides for the poor, or struggling workers. The ALP aimed for unemployment to be higher than it now is. They see things happening that others do not. My bet is they will never author a text as acutely important or beneficial as "Revelations of Divine Love."
Historical perspectives on this day
In 1373, Julian of Norwich had visions which were later transcribed in her Revelations of Divine Love. 1515, Mary Tudor, Queen of France and Charles Brandon, 1st Duke of Suffolk were officially married at Greenwich. 1568, Battle of Langside: The forces of Mary, Queen of Scots, were defeated by a confederacy of Scottish Protestants under James Stewart, Earl of Moray, her half-brother. 1619, Dutch statesman Johan van Oldenbarnevelt was executed in The Hague after being convicted of treason. 1648, construction of the Red Fort at Delhi was completed. 1779, War of Bavarian Succession: Russian and French mediators at the Congress of Teschen negotiated an end to the war. In the agreement Austria received the part of its territory that was taken from it (the Innviertel). 1780, the Cumberland Compact was signed by leaders of the settlers in early Tennessee. 1787, Captain Arthur Phillip left Portsmouth, England, with eleven ships full of convicts (the "First Fleet") to establish a penal colony in Australia.
In 1804, forces sent by Yusuf Karamanli of Tripoli to retake Derna from the Americans attacked the city. 1830, Ecuador gained its independence from Gran Colombia. 1846, Mexican–American War: The United States declared war on Mexico. 1848, first performance of Finland's national anthem. 1861, American Civil War: Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom issued a "proclamation of neutrality" which recognised the breakaway states as having belligerent rights. Also 1861, the Great Comet of 1861 was discovered by John Tebbutt of Windsor, New South Wales, Australia. Also 1861, Pakistan's (then a part of British India) first railway line opened, from Karachi to Kotri. 1862, the USS Planter, a steamer and gunship, stole through Confederate lines and was passed to the Union, by a southern slave, Robert Smalls, who later was officially appointed as captain, becoming the first black man to command a United States ship. 1864, American Civil War: Battle of Resaca: The battle began with Union General Sherman fighting toward Atlanta, Georgia. 1865, American Civil War: Battle of Palmito Ranch: In far south Texas, more than a month after Confederate General Robert E. Lee's surrender, the last land battle of the Civil War ended with a Confederate victory. 1880, in Menlo Park, New Jersey, Thomas Edison performed the first test of his electric railway. 1888, with the passage of the Lei Áurea ("Golden Law"), Brazil abolished slavery.
In 1909, the first Giro d'Italia started from Milan. Italian cyclist Luigi Ganna would be the winner. 1912, the Royal Flying Corps, the forerunner of the Royal Air Force, was established in the United Kingdom. 1917, three children report the first apparition of Our Lady of Fátima in Fátima, Portugal. 1923, Robert Bellarmine, a Doctor of the Catholic Church, was beatified. 1939, the first commercial FM radio station in the United States was launched in Bloomfield, Connecticut. The station later became WDRC-FM. 1940, World War II: Germany's conquest of France began as the German army crossed the Meuse. Winston Churchill made his "blood, toil, tears, and sweat" speech to the House of Commons. Also 1940, Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands fled her country to Great Britain after the German invasion. Princess Juliana took her children to Canada for their safety. 1941, World War II: Yugoslav royal colonel Dragoljub Mihailović started fighting with German occupation troops, beginning the Serbian resistance. 1943, World War II: German Afrika Korps and Italian troops in North Africa surrendered to Allied forces. 1948, 1948 Arab-Israeli War: The Kfar Etzion massacre was committed by Arab irregulars, the day before the declaration of independence of the state of Israel on May 14.
In 1950, the first round of the Formula One World Championship was held at Silverstone. 1951, the 400th anniversary of the founding of the National University of San Marcos was commemorated by the opening of the first large-capacity stadium in Peru. 1952, the Rajya Sabha, the upper house of the Parliament of India, held its first sitting. 1954, the anti-National Service Riots, by Chinese Middle School students in Singapore, took place. Also 1954, the original Broadway production of The Pajama Game opened and ran for another 1,063 performances. Later received three Tony Awards for Best Musical, Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Musical, and Best Choreography. 1958, during a visit to Caracas, Venezuela, Vice President Richard Nixon's car was attacked by anti-American demonstrators. Also 1958, the trademark Velcro was registered. Also 1958, May 1958 crisis: A group of French military officers led a coup in Algiers demanding that a government of national unity be formed with Charles de Gaulle at its head in order to defend French control of Algeria. Also 1958, Ben Carlin became the first (and only) person to circumnavigate the world by amphibious vehicle, having travelled over 17,000 kilometres (11,000 mi) by sea and 62,000 kilometres (39,000 mi) by land during a ten-year journey.
In 1960, hundreds of University of California, Berkeley students congregated for the first day of protest against a visit by the House Committee on Un-American Activities. Thirty-one students were arrested, and the Free Speech Movement was born. 1963, the U.S. Supreme Court case Brady v. Maryland was decided. 1967, Dr. Zakir Hussain became the third President of India. He was the first Muslim President of the Indian Union. He held this position until August 24, 1969. 1969, Race riots, later known as the May 13 Incident, took place in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. 1972, Faulty electrical wiring ignited a fire underneath the Playtown Cabaret in Osaka, Japan. Blocked exits and non-functional elevators led to 118 fatalities, with many victims leaping to their deaths. Also 1972, The Troubles: A car bombing outside a crowded pub in Belfast sparked a two-day gun battle involving the Provisional IRA, Ulster Volunteer Force and British Army. Seven people were killed and over 66 injured.
In 1980, an F3 tornado hit Kalamazoo County, Michigan. President Jimmy Carter declared it a federal disaster area. 1981, Mehmet Ali Ağca attempted to assassinate Pope John Paul II in St. Peter's Square in Rome. The Pope was rushed to the Agostino Gemelli University Polyclinic to undergo emergency surgery and survived. 1985, police release a bomb on MOVE headquarters in Philadelphia to end a stand-off, killing 11 MOVE members and destroying the homes of 250 city residents. 1989, large groups of students occupied Tiananmen Square and began a hunger strike. 1992, Li Hongzhi gave the first public lecture on Falun Gong in Changchun, People's Republic of China. 1994, Johnny Carson made his last television appearance on Late Show with David Letterman. 1995, Alison Hargreaves, a 33-year-old British mother, became the first woman to conquer Everest without oxygen or the help of sherpas. 1996, severe thunderstorms and a tornado in Bangladesh killed 600 people. 1998, Race riots broke out in Jakarta, Indonesia, where shops owned by Indonesians of Chinese descent were looted and women raped. Also 1998, India carried out two nuclear tests at Pokhran, following the three conducted on May 11. The United States and Japan imposed economic sanctions on India.
In 2000, in Enschede, the Netherlands, a fireworks factory exploded, killing 22 people, wounding 950, and resulting in approximately €450 million in damage. 2005, the Andijan Massacre occurred in Uzbekistan. Also 2005, the Bính Bridge opened to traffic in Hai Phong, Vietnam. 2006, São Paulo violence: A major rebellion occurred in several prisons in Brazil. 2008, the Jaipur bombings in Rajasthan, India resulted in dozens of deaths. 2011, Two bombs exploded in the Charsadda District of Pakistan killing 98 people and wounding 140 others. 2014, an explosion at an underground coal mine in south-western Turkey killed 301 miners. Also 2014, Major floods in Southeast Europe killed at least 47 people.
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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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Editorials will appear in the "History in a Year by the Conservative Voice" series, starting with August https://www.createspace.com/4124406, September https://www.createspace.com/5106914, October https://www.createspace.com/5106951, or at Amazon http://www.amazon.com/dp/1482020262/ref=cm_sw_r_tw_dp_dVHPub0MQKDZ4 The kindle version is cheaper, but the soft back version allows the purchase of a kindle version for just $3.99 more.
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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
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.
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
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.
Happy birthday and many happy returns Steve Wolf and Emily Wong. Born on the same day, across the years. The same day which in 1888 saw Princess Isabel of the Empire of Brazil formally abolishing slavery. Also the same day three children had their first Our Lady of Fatima visions. A lot to live up to. You can do it.
- 1024 – Hugh of Cluny, French saint (d. 1109)
- 1588 – Ole Worm, Danish physician (d. 1654)
- 1713 – Alexis Clairaut, French mathematician, astronomer, and geophysicist (d. 1765)
- 1717 – Maria Theresa, Austrian wife of Francis I, Holy Roman Emperor (d. 1780)
- 1735 – Horace Coignet, French composer (d. 1821)
- 1753 – Lazare Carnot, French general, mathematician, and politician (d. 1823)
- 1795 – Gérard Paul Deshayes, French geologist and conchologist (d. 1875)
- 1830 – Zebulon Baird Vance, American colonel, lawyer, and politician, 37th Governor of North Carolina (d. 1894)
- 1842 – Arthur Sullivan, English composer (d. 1900)
- 1883 – Georgios Papanikolaou, Greek-American pathologist, invented the pap smear (d. 1962)
- 1912 – Judah Nadich, American rabbi (d. 2007)
- 1914 – Joe Louis, American boxer (d. 1981)
- 1914 – Johnnie Wright, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (Johnnie & Jack) (d. 2011)
- 1931 – Jim Jones, American cult leader, founded the Peoples Temple (d. 1978)
- 1937 – Trevor Baylis, English inventor, invented the wind-up radio
- 1939 – Harvey Keitel, American actor and producer
- 1941 – Ritchie Valens, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (d. 1959)
- 1945 – Magic Dick, American harmonica player (The J. Geils Band)
- 1950 – Stevie Wonder, American singer-songwriter, pianist, and producer
- 1957 – Alan Ball, American screenwriter, producer, and director
- 1961 – Dennis Rodman, American basketball player, wrestler, and actor
- 1987 – Carrie Prejean, American model and author, Miss California USA 2009
- 1993 – Debby Ryan, American actress and singer
- 1993 – Bang Minah, South Korean idol singer (Girl's Day)
Deaths
- 1176 – Matthias I, Duke of Lorraine (b. 1119)
- 1884 – Cyrus McCormick, American businessman, co-founded the International Harvester Company (b. 1809)
- 1961 – Gary Cooper, American actor and singer (b. 1901)
- 2002 – Ruth Cracknell, Australian actress (b. 1925)
- 1638 – Construction began in Delhion the Red Fort (Lahori Gate pictured), the residence of the Mughal emperors, now an iconic symbol of India.
- 1888 – Princess Isabel of the Empire of Brazil signed the Lei Áurea into law, formally abolishing slavery in Brazil.
- 1917 – Ten-year-old Lúcia Santos and her cousins Francisco and Jacinta Marto reportedly began experiencing a Marian apparition near Fátima, Portugal, now known as Our Lady of Fátima.
- 1985 – Eleven members of the American black liberation group MOVE were killed when a Philadelphia police helicopter dropped a bomb on their house during a raid.
- 2005 – Uzbek Interior Ministry and National Security Service troops fired into a crowd of protesters in Andijan, Uzbekistan, killing anywhere from 187, the official count of the government, to a reported 1,500 people.
We built it. No more slavery. Our lady saw to it. We moved it. They were fired. Let's party.
Matches
- 1373 – Julian of Norwich has visions which are later transcribed in her Revelations of Divine Love.
- 1515 – Mary Tudor, Queen of France and Charles Brandon, 1st Duke of Suffolk are officially married at Greenwich.
- 1568 – Battle of Langside: The forces of Mary, Queen of Scots, are defeated by a confederacy of Scottish Protestants under James Stewart, Earl of Moray, her half-brother.
- 1619 – Dutch statesman Johan van Oldenbarnevelt is executed in The Hague after being convicted of treason.
- 1648 – Construction of the Red Fort at Delhi is completed.
- 1779 – War of Bavarian Succession: Russian and French mediators at the Congress of Teschennegotiate an end to the war. In the agreement Austria receives the part of its territory that was taken from it (the Innviertel).
- 1780 – The Cumberland Compact is signed by leaders of the settlers in early Tennessee.
- 1787 – Captain Arthur Phillip leaves Portsmouth, England, with eleven ships full of convicts (the "First Fleet") to establish a penal colony in Australia.
- 1804 – Forces sent by Yusuf Karamanli of Tripoli to retake Derna from the Americans attack the city.
- 1830 – Ecuador gains its independence from Gran Colombia.
- 1846 – Mexican–American War: The United States declares war on Mexico.
- 1848 – First performance of Finland's national anthem.
- 1861 – American Civil War: Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom issues a "proclamation of neutrality" which recognizes the breakaway states as having belligerent rights.
- 1861 – The Great Comet of 1861 is discovered by John Tebbutt of Windsor, New South Wales, Australia.
- 1861 – Pakistan's (then a part of British India) first railway line opens, from Karachi to Kotri.
- 1862 – The USS Planter, a steamer and gunship, steals through Confederate lines and is passed to the Union, by a southern slave, Robert Smalls, who later was officially appointed as captain, becoming the first black man to command a United States ship.
- 1864 – American Civil War: Battle of Resaca: The battle begins with Union General Sherman fighting toward Atlanta, Georgia.
- 1865 – American Civil War: Battle of Palmito Ranch: In far south Texas, more than a month after Confederate General Robert E. Lee's surrender, the last land battle of the Civil War ends with a Confederate victory.
- 1880 – In Menlo Park, New Jersey, Thomas Edison performs the first test of his electric railway.
- 1888 – With the passage of the Lei Áurea ("Golden Law"), Brazil abolishes slavery.
- 1909 – The first Giro d'Italia starts from Milan. Italian cyclist Luigi Ganna will be the winner.
- 1912 – The Royal Flying Corps, the forerunner of the Royal Air Force, is established in the United Kingdom.
- 1917 – Three children report the first apparition of Our Lady of Fátima in Fátima, Portugal.
- 1923 – Robert Bellarmine, a Doctor of the Catholic Church, is beatified.
- 1939 – The first commercial FM radio station in the United States is launched in Bloomfield, Connecticut. The station later becomes WDRC-FM.
- 1940 – World War II: Germany's conquest of France begins as the German army crosses the Meuse. Winston Churchill makes his "blood, toil, tears, and sweat" speech to the House of Commons.
- 1940 – Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands flees her country to Great Britain after the German invasion. Princess Juliana takes her children to Canada for their safety.
- 1941 – World War II: Yugoslav royal colonel Dragoljub Mihailović starts fighting with German occupation troops, beginning the Serbian resistance.
- 1943 – World War II: German Afrika Korps and Italian troops in North Africa surrender to Allied forces.
- 1948 – 1948 Arab-Israeli War: The Kfar Etzion massacre is committed by Arab irregulars, the day before the declaration of independence of the state of Israel on May 14.
- 1950 – The first round of the Formula One World Championship is held at Silverstone.
- 1951 – The 400th anniversary of the founding of the National University of San Marcos is commemorated by the opening of the first large-capacity stadium in Peru.
- 1952 – The Rajya Sabha, the upper house of the Parliament of India, holds its first sitting.
- 1954 – The anti-National Service Riots, by Chinese Middle School students in Singapore, take place.
- 1954 – The original Broadway production of The Pajama Game opens and runs for another 1,063 performances. Later received three Tony Awards for Best Musical, Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Musical, and Best Choreography.
- 1958 – During a visit to Caracas, Venezuela, Vice President Richard Nixon's car is attacked by anti-American demonstrators.
- 1958 – The trademark Velcro is registered.
- 1958 – May 1958 crisis: A group of French military officers lead a coup in Algiers demanding that a government of national unity be formed with Charles de Gaulle at its head in order to defend French control of Algeria.
- 1958 – Ben Carlin becomes the first (and only) person to circumnavigate the world by amphibious vehicle, having travelled over 17,000 kilometres (11,000 mi) by sea and 62,000 kilometres (39,000 mi) by land during a ten-year journey.
- 1960 – Hundreds of University of California, Berkeley students congregate for the first day of protest against a visit by the House Committee on Un-American Activities. Thirty-one students are arrested, and the Free Speech Movement is born.
- 1963 – The U.S. Supreme Court case Brady v. Maryland is decided.
- 1967 – Dr. Zakir Hussain becomes the third President of India. He is the first Muslim President of the Indian Union. He holds this position until August 24, 1969.
- 1969 – Race riots, later known as the May 13 Incident, take place in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
- 1972 – Faulty electrical wiring ignites a fire underneath the Playtown Cabaret in Osaka, Japan. Blocked exits and non-functional elevators lead to 118 fatalities, with many victims leaping to their deaths.
- 1972 – The Troubles: A car bombing outside a crowded pub in Belfast sparks a two-day gun battle involving the Provisional IRA, Ulster Volunteer Force and British Army. Seven people are killed and over 66 injured.
- 1980 – An F3 tornado hits Kalamazoo County, Michigan. President Jimmy Carter declares it a federal disaster area.
- 1981 – Mehmet Ali Ağca attempts to assassinate Pope John Paul II in St. Peter's Square in Rome. The Pope is rushed to the Agostino Gemelli University Polyclinic to undergo emergency surgery and survives.
- 1985 – Police release a bomb on MOVE headquarters in Philadelphia to end a stand-off, killing 11 MOVE members and destroying the homes of 250 city residents.
- 1989 – Large groups of students occupy Tiananmen Square and begin a hunger strike.
- 1992 – Li Hongzhi gives the first public lecture on Falun Gong in Changchun, People's Republic of China.
- 1994 – Johnny Carson makes his last television appearance on Late Show with David Letterman.
- 1995 – Alison Hargreaves, a 33-year-old British mother, became the first woman to conquer Everest without oxygen or the help of sherpas.
- 1996 – Severe thunderstorms and a tornado in Bangladesh kill 600 people.
- 1998 – Race riots break out in Jakarta, Indonesia, where shops owned by Indonesians of Chinese descent are looted and women raped.
- 1998 – India carries out two nuclear tests at Pokhran, following the three conducted on May 11. The United States and Japan impose economic sanctions on India.
- 2000 – In Enschede, the Netherlands, a fireworks factory explodes, killing 22 people, wounding 950, and resulting in approximately €450 million in damage.
- 2005 – The Andijan Massacre occurs in Uzbekistan.
- 2005 – The Bính Bridge opens to traffic in Hai Phong, Vietnam.
- 2006 – São Paulo violence: A major rebellion occurs in several prisons in Brazil.
- 2008 – The Jaipur bombings in Rajasthan, India results in dozens of deaths.
- 2011 – Two bombs explode in the Charsadda District of Pakistan killing 98 people and wounding 140 others.
- 2014 – An explosion at an underground coal mine in south-western Turkey kills 301 miners.
- 2014 – Major floods in Southeast Europe kill at least 47 people.
Hatches
- 1024 – Hugh of Cluny, French saint (d. 1109)
- 1254 – Marie of Brabant, Queen of France (d. 1321)
- 1588 – Ole Worm, Danish physician (d. 1654)
- 1638 – Richard Simon, French priest (d. 1712)
- 1655 – Pope Innocent XIII (d. 1724)
- 1699 – Sebastião José de Carvalho e Melo, 1st Marquis of Pombal, Portuguese politician, Prime Minister of Portugal (d. 1782)
- 1712 – Count Johann Hartwig Ernst von Bernstorff, Danish politician (d. 1772)
- 1713 – Alexis Clairaut, French mathematician, astronomer, and geophysicist (d. 1765)
- 1717 – Maria Theresa, Austrian wife of Francis I, Holy Roman Emperor (d. 1780)
- 1730 – Charles Watson-Wentworth, 2nd Marquess of Rockingham, English politician, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (d. 1782)
- 1735 – Horace Coignet, French violinist and composer (d. 1821)
- 1742 – Maria Christina, Duchess of Teschen (d. 1798)
- 1753 – Lazare Carnot, French general, mathematician, and politician (d. 1823)
- 1759 – Elizabeth Cavendish, Duchess of Devonshire (d. 1824)
- 1792 – Pope Pius IX (d. 1878)
- 1794 – Louis Léopold Robert, French painter (d. 1835)
- 1795 – Gérard Paul Deshayes, French geologist and chronologist (d. 1875)
- 1822 – Francis, Duke of Cádiz (d. 1902)
- 1830 – Zebulon Baird Vance, American colonel, lawyer, and politician, 37th Governor of North Carolina (d. 1894)
- 1832 – Juris Alunāns, Latvian philologist (d. 1864)
- 1840 – Alphonse Daudet, French author (d. 1897)
- 1842 – Arthur Sullivan, English composer (d. 1900)
- 1856 – Tom O'Rourke, American boxer and manager (d. 1938)
- 1857 – Ronald Ross, Indian-English physician, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1932)
- 1868 – Sumner Paine, American target shooter (d. 1904)
- 1881 – Lima Barreto, Brazilian journalist and author (d. 1922)
- 1881 – Joe Forshaw, American runner (d. 1964)
- 1882 – Georges Braque, French painter and sculptor (d. 1963)
- 1883 – Georgios Papanikolaou, Greek-American pathologist, invented the pap smear (d. 1962)
- 1885 – Mikiel Gonzi, Maltese archbishop (d. 1984)
- 1894 – Ásgeir Ásgeirsson, Icelandic politician, 2nd President of Iceland (d. 1972)
- 1895 – Nandor Fodor, Hungarian-American psychologist, parapsychologist, and author (d. 1964)
- 1898 – Justin Tuveri, Italian-French soldier (d. 2007)
- 1901 – Murilo Mendes, Brazilian poet (d. 1975)
- 1904 – Louis Duffus, Australian-South African cricketer and journalist (d. 1984)
- 1904 – Chishū Ryū, Japanese actor (d. 1993)
- 1905 – Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed, Indian lawyer and politician, 5th President of India (d. 1977)
- 1907 – Daphne du Maurier, English author and playwright (d. 1989)
- 1908 – Eugen Kapp, Estonian composer and educator (d. 1996)
- 1909 – Ken Darby, American composer and conductor (d. 1992)
- 1911 – Robert Middleton, American actor (d. 1977)
- 1911 – Maxine Sullivan, American singer and actress (d. 1987)
- 1912 – Gil Evans, Canadian-American pianist, composer, and bandleader (d. 1988)
- 1912 – Judah Nadich, American rabbi (d. 2007)
- 1913 – Robert Dorning, English musician, ballet dancer and actor (d. 1989)
- 1913 – William R. Tolbert, Jr., Liberian politician, 20th President of Liberia (d. 1980)
- 1914 – Joe Louis, American boxer (d. 1981)
- 1914 – Johnnie Wright, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (Johnnie & Jack) (d. 2011)
- 1918 – Balasaraswati, Indian dancer (d. 1984)
- 1918 – Gwyn Howells, Australian public servant (d. 1997)
- 1920 – Gareth Morris, English flute player (d. 2007)
- 1922 – Michael Ainsworth, English cricketer (d. 1978)
- 1922 – Otl Aicher, German graphic designer and typographer (d. 1991)
- 1922 – Bea Arthur, American actress and singer (d. 2009)
- 1923 – Red Garland, American pianist (Miles Davis Quintet) (d.1984)
- 1924 – Theodore Mann, American director and producer (d. 2012)
- 1924 – Harry Schwarz, German-South African lawyer, politician, and diplomat, 13th South African Ambassador to the United States (d. 2010)
- 1924 – Conrad Swan, Canadian academic
- 1927 – Archie Scott Brown, Scottish race car driver (d. 1958)
- 1927 – Herbert Ross, American actor, director, and producer (d. 2001)
- 1928 – Enrique Bolaños, Nicaraguan politician, President of Nicaragua
- 1928 – Édouard Molinaro, French actor, director, producer, and screenwriter (d. 2013)
- 1928 – Theo Saat, Dutch sprinter
- 1928 – Jim Shoulders, American rodeo rider (d. 2007)
- 1928 – Augie Rodriguez, American dancer (d. 2014)
- 1930 – Mike Gravel, American lieutenant and politician
- 1930 – José Jiménez Lozano, Spanish journalist and author
- 1930 – Vernon Shaw, Dominican politician, 5th President of Dominica
- 1931 – Jim Jones, American cult leader, founder of the Peoples Temple (d. 1978)
- 1931 – Sydney Lipworth, South African businessman
- 1933 – John Roseboro, American baseball player and coach (d. 2002)
- 1934 – Ehud Netzer, Israeli archaeologist (d. 2010)
- 1934 – Leon Wagner, American baseball player and actor (d. 2004)
- 1935 – Dominic Cossa, American opera singer
- 1935 – Teddy Randazzo, American singer-songwriter and accordion player (The Three Chuckles) (d. 2003)
- 1935 – Jan Saudek, Czech art photographer and painter
- 1936 – Bill Rompkey, Canadian educator and politician
- 1937 – Trevor Baylis, English inventor, invented the wind-up radio
- 1937 – Roch Carrier, Canadian author
- 1937 – John Cope, Baron Cope of Berkeley, English politician
- 1937 – Zohra Lampert, American actress
- 1937 – Roger Zelazny, American author and poet (d. 1995)
- 1938 – Giuliano Amato, Italian politician, 48th Prime Minister of Italy
- 1938 – Laurent Beaudoin, Canadian businessman
- 1938 – Milton Johns, English actor
- 1938 – Francine Pascal, American author
- 1939 – Hildrun Claus, German long jumper
- 1939 – Peter Frenkel, German race walker
- 1939 – Harvey Keitel, American actor and producer
- 1940 – Bruce Chatwin, English author (d. 1989)
- 1940 – Kōkichi Tsuburaya, Japanese runner (d. 1968)
- 1941 – Senta Berger, Austrian actress, producer, and author
- 1941 – Joe Brown, English singer-songwriter, guitarist, and game show host
- 1941 – Jody Conradt, American basketball player and coach
- 1941 – Ritchie Valens, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (d. 1959)
- 1942 – Leighton Gage, American author (d. 2013)
- 1942 – Roger Young, American director, producer, and screenwriter
- 1943 – Anthony Clarke, Baron Clarke of Stone-cum-Ebony, English lawyer and judge
- 1943 – Kurt Trampedach, Danish painter and sculptor
- 1943 – Mary Wells, American singer-songwriter (d. 1992)
- 1944 – Sir Crispin Agnew, 11th Baronet, Scottish judge and explorer
- 1944 – Carolyn Franklin, American singer-songwriter (d. 1988)
- 1944 – Armistead Maupin, American author, screenwriter, and actor
- 1945 – Sam Anderson, American actor
- 1945 – Lasse Berghagen, Swedish singer-songwriter, guitarist, and actor
- 1945 – Magic Dick, American harmonica player (The J. Geils Band)
- 1945 – Lou Marini, American saxophonist and composer (The Blues Brothers)
- 1946 – Waneta Hoyt, American murderer (d. 1998)
- 1946 – Tim Pigott-Smith, English actor
- 1946 – Jean Rondeau, French race car driver and constructor (d. 1985)
- 1946 – Marv Wolfman, American author
- 1947 – Edgar Burcksen, Dutch-American film editor
- 1948 – Sheila Jeffreys, Australian political scientist
- 1948 – Dean Meminger, American basketball player and coach (d. 2013)
- 1949 – Jane Glover, English conductor and scholar
- 1949 – Zoë Wanamaker, American-English actress
- 1950 – Danny Kirwan, English singer-songwriter and guitarist (Fleetwood Mac)
- 1950 – Manning Marable, American author and academic (d. 2011)
- 1950 – Bobby Valentine, American baseball player and manager
- 1950 – Stevie Wonder, American singer-songwriter, pianist, and producer
- 1951 – Rosie Boycott, English journalist
- 1951 – Sharon Sayles Belton, American politician, 45th Mayor of Minneapolis
- 1951 – Anand Modak, Indian composer (d. 2014)
- 1951 – Herman Philipse, Dutch philosopher and academic
- 1951 – Selina Scott, English journalist, producer, and author
- 1951 – Paul Thompson, English drummer (Roxy Music, Concrete Blonde, and Angelic Upstarts)
- 1951 – James Whale, English radio and television host
- 1952 – John Kasich, American talk show host and politician, 69th Governor of Ohio
- 1952 – Mary Walsh, Canadian actress
- 1953 – Gerry Sutcliffe, English politician
- 1953 – David Voelker, American businessman and philanthropist (d. 2013)
- 1953 – Harm Wiersma, Dutch draughts player
- 1954 – Johnny Logan, Australian-Irish singer-songwriter and guitarist
- 1956 – Steve Blackwood, American actor
- 1956 – Richard Madeley, English journalist
- 1957 – Alan Ball, American director, producer, and screenwriter
- 1957 – David Hill, English organist and conductor
- 1957 – Andrea Klump, German terrorist
- 1957 – Mar Roxas, Filipino economist and politician
- 1957 – Koji Suzuki, Japanese author
- 1958 – Frances Barber, English actress
- 1959 – Jerry Butler, American porn actor
- 1961 – Dennis Rodman, American basketball player, wrestler, and actor
- 1962 – Paul Burstow, English politician
- 1962 – Nick Hurd, English politician
- 1962 – Kathleen Jamie, Scottish poet and academic
- 1962 – Paul McDermott, Australian comedian, actor, and singer (Doug Anthony All Stars)
- 1962 – Sean McDonough, American sportscaster
- 1962 – Eduardo Palomo, Mexican actor (d. 2003)
- 1963 – Andrea Leadsom, English politician
- 1963 – Wally Masur, Australian tennis player, coach, and sportscaster
- 1964 – Stephen Colbert, American comedian, actor, and talk show host
- 1964 – Ronnie Coleman, American bodybuilder
- 1964 – Chris Maitland, English drummer (Porcupine Tree and Nosound)
- 1964 – Tom Verica, American actor and director
- 1965 – José Antonio Delgado, Venezuelan mountaineer (d. 2006)
- 1965 – Tasmin Little, English violinist
- 1965 – János Marozsán, Hungarian footballer
- 1965 – Hikari Ōta, Japanese comedian and actor
- 1965 – Lari White, American singer-songwriter, producer, and actress
- 1966 – Alison Goldfrapp, English singer-songwriter and producer (Goldfrapp)
- 1966 – Darius Rucker, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (Hootie & the Blowfish)
- 1966 – Kamen Vodenicharov, Bulgarian actor and singer
- 1967 – Chuck Schuldiner, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (Death, Control Denied, Slaughter, and Voodoocult) (d. 2001)
- 1967 – Melanie Thornton, American-German singer (La Bouche) (d. 2001)
- 1968 – PMD, American rapper (EPMD)
- 1968 – Miguel Ángel Blanco, Spanish politician (d. 1997)
- 1968 – Susan Floyd, American actress
- 1968 – Dmitriy Shevchenko, Russian discus thrower
- 1968 – Sonja Zietlow, German television host
- 1969 – Buckethead, American guitarist and songwriter (Guns N' Roses, Colonel Claypool's Bucket of Bernie Brains, Praxis, and Deli Creeps)
- 1969 – Nikos Aliagas, French-Greek journalist and television host
- 1970 – Doug Evans, American football player
- 1970 – Robert Maćkowiak, Polish sprinter
- 1971 – Imogen Boorman, English actress and martial artist
- 1971 – Rob Fredrickson, American football player
- 1971 – Espen Lind, Norwegian singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer (Espionage)
- 1971 – Fana Mokoena, South African actor
- 1971 – Tom Nalen, American football player
- 1972 – Stefaan Maene, Belgian swimmer
- 1972 – Darryl Sydor, Canadian ice hockey player and coach
- 1972 – Pieta van Dishoeck, Dutch rower
- 1973 – Eric Lewis, American pianist
- 1973 – Bridgett Riley, American boxer and stuntwoman
- 1975 – Jamie Allison, Canadian ice hockey player
- 1975 – Cristian Bezzi, Italian rugby player and coach
- 1975 – Itatí Cantoral, Mexican actress and singer
- 1975 – Brian Geraghty, American actor
- 1975 – Evelin Samuel, Estonian singer and actress
- 1976 – Mark Delaney, Welsh footballer and manager
- 1976 – Trajan Langdon, American basketball player
- 1976 – Ana Popović, Serbian-American singer-songwriter and guitarist
- 1976 – Magdalena Walach, Polish actress
- 1977 – Ilse DeLange, Dutch singer-songwriter (The Common Linnets)
- 1977 – Anthony Q. Farrell, Canadian-American actor and screenwriter
- 1977 – Robby Hammock, American baseball player and coach
- 1977 – Neil Hopkins, American actor
- 1977 – Samantha Morton, English actress and director
- 1977 – Christopher Ralph, Canadian actor
- 1977 – Brian Thomas Smith, American actor and producer
- 1978 – Brooke Anderson, American journalist
- 1978 – Mike Bibby, American basketball player
- 1978 – Ryan Bukvich, American baseball player
- 1978 – Germán Magariños, Argentinian actor, director, producer, and screenwriter
- 1978 – Dilshan Vitharana, Sri Lankan cricketer
- 1978 – Barry Zito, American baseball player
- 1979 – Prince Carl Philip, Duke of Värmland
- 1979 – Mickey Madden, American bass player (Maroon 5 and Kara's Flowers)
- 1979 – Steve Mildenhall, English footballer
- 1979 – Lauren Phoenix, Canadian porn actress
- 1979 – Vyacheslav Shevchuk, Ukrainian footballer
- 1979 – Jenny Winkler, German actress
- 1980 – Waka Inoue, Japanese model and actress
- 1980 – Mau Marcelo, Filipino singer
- 1980 – L. J. Smith, American football player
- 1981 – Luciana Berger, English politician
- 1981 – Nicolas Jeanjean, French rugby player
- 1981 – Sunny Leone, Indo-Canadian and American Bollywood actress, businesswoman, model, Penthouse Pet of the Year 2003
- 1981 – Rebecka Liljeberg, Swedish actress
- 1981 – Shaun Phillips, American football player
- 1981 – James Yun, American wrestler and actor
- 1982 – Albert Crusat, Spanish footballer
- 1982 – Yoko Kumada, Japanese model and singer
- 1982 – Oguchi Onyewu, American soccer player
- 1982 – Larry Fonacier, Filipino basketball player
- 1983 – Natalie Cassidy, English actress
- 1983 – Anita Görbicz, Hungarian handball player
- 1983 – Johnny Hoogerland, Dutch cyclist
- 1983 – Grégory Lemarchal, French singer (d. 2007)
- 1983 – Jacob Reynolds, American actor
- 1983 – Yaya Touré, Ivorian footballer
- 1984 – J. B. Cox, American baseball player
- 1984 – Benny Dayal, Indian singer (S5)
- 1984 – Dawn Harper, American hurdler
- 1984 – Ginger Orsi, American actress and singer
- 1984 – Caroline Rotich, Kenyan runner
- 1985 – Javier Balboa, Spanish-Equatoguinean footballer
- 1985 – Jaroslav Halák, Slovak ice hockey player
- 1985 – Iwan Rheon, Welsh actor and singer
- 1985 – Travis Zajac, Canadian ice hockey player
- 1986 – Lena Dunham, American actress, director, and screenwriter
- 1986 – David Hernandez, American baseball player
- 1986 – Eun-Hee Ji, South Korean golfer
- 1986 – Giuliana Marino, German model
- 1986 – Robert Pattinson, English actor, singer, and producer
- 1986 – Alexander Rybak, Belarusian-Norwegian singer-songwriter, violinist, and actor
- 1986 – Scott Sutter, English footballer
- 1986 – Kris Versteeg, Canadian ice hockey player
- 1987 – Candice Accola, American singer-songwriter and actress
- 1987 – Antonio Adán, Spanish footballer
- 1987 – Matt Doyle, American actor and singer
- 1987 – Laura Izibor, Irish singer-songwriter, pianist, and producer
- 1987 – Mei Kurokawa, Japanese actress and singer
- 1987 – Hunter Parrish, American actor and singer
- 1987 – Carrie Prejean, American model and author, Miss California USA 2009
- 1987 – Marianne Vos, Dutch cyclist
- 1988 – Paulo Avelino, Filipino actor and singer
- 1988 – Casey Donovan, Australian singer-songwriter
- 1989 – P. K. Subban, Canadian ice hockey player
- 1991 – Francisco Lachowski, Brazilian model
- 1992 – Egert Heintare, Estonian footballer
- 1993 – Romelu Lukaku, Belgian footballer
- 1993 – Bang Minah, South Korean singer and dancer (Girl's Day)
- 1993 – Debby Ryan, American actress and singer
- 1993 – Siim-Tanel Sammelselg, Estonian ski jumper
Despatches
- 1176 – Matthias I, Duke of Lorraine (b. 1119)
- 1312 – Theobald II, Duke of Lorraine (b. 1263)
- 1573 – Takeda Shingen, Japanese daimyo (b. 1521)
- 1619 – Johan van Oldenbarnevelt, Dutch politician (b. 1547)
- 1704 – Louis Bourdaloue, French preacher (b. 1632)
- 1782 – Daniel Solander, Swedish botanist (b. 1736)
- 1807 – Eliphalet Dyer, American colonel,lawyer, and politician (b. 1721)
- 1809 – Beilby Porteus, English bishop (b. 1731)
- 1832 – Georges Cuvier, French zoologist (b. 1769)
- 1835 – John Nash, English architect, designed the Royal Pavilion (b. 1752)
- 1866 – Nikolai Brashman, Czech-Russian mathematician and academic (b. 1796)
- 1878 – Joseph Henry, American physicist (b. 1797)
- 1884 – Cyrus McCormick, American businessman, co-founded the International Harvester Company (b. 1809)
- 1885 – Friedrich Gustav Jakob Henle, German physician, pathologist, and anatomist (b. 1809)
- 1903 – Apolinario Mabini, Filipino lawyer and politician, 1st Prime Minister of the Philippines (b. 1864)
- 1916 – Sholem Aleichem, Ukrainian-American author and playwright (b. 1859)
- 1921 – Jean Aicard, French author, poet, and playwright (b. 1848)
- 1926 – Libert H. Boeynaems, Belgian-American bishop (b. 1857)
- 1930 – Fridtjof Nansen, Norwegian scientist, explorer, and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1861)
- 1938 – Charles Édouard Guillaume, Swiss-French physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1861)
- 1941 – Frederick Christian, English cricketer (b. 1877)
- 1941 – Ōnishiki Uichirō, Japanese sumo wrestler, the 26th Yokozuna (b. 1891)
- 1945 – Tubby Hall, American drummer (b. 1895)
- 1947 – Sukanta Bhattacharya, Indian poet and playwright (b. 1926)
- 1948 – Kathleen Cavendish, Marchioness of Hartington (b. 1920)
- 1957 – Michael Fekete, Hungarian-Israeli mathematician (b. 1886)
- 1961 – Gary Cooper, American actor and singer (b. 1901)
- 1962 – Henry Trendley Dean, American dentist (b. 1893)
- 1962 – Franz Kline, American painter (b. 1910)
- 1963 – Alois Hudal, Austrian-Italian bishop (b. 1885)
- 1972 – Dan Blocker, American actor (b. 1928)
- 1974 – Jaime Torres Bodet, Mexican diplomat (b. 1902)
- 1974 – Arthur J. Burks, American colonel and author (b. 1898)
- 1975 – Bob Wills, American singer-songwriter and actor (Light Crust Doughboys) (b. 1905)
- 1977 – Mickey Spillane, American mobster (b. 1934)
- 1985 – Leatrice Joy, American actress (b. 1893)
- 1988 – Chet Baker, American singer and trumpet player (b. 1929)
- 1992 – F. E. McWilliam, Irish sculptor (b. 1909)
- 1994 – Duncan Hamilton, Irish-English race car driver (b. 1920)
- 1999 – Abd al-Aziz ibn Baz, Saudi Arabian scholar (b. 1910)
- 1999 – Gene Sarazen, American golfer (b. 1902)
- 2000 – Paul Bartel, American actor, director, and screenwriter (b. 1938)
- 2000 – Jumbo Tsuruta, Japanese wrestler (b. 1951)
- 2001 – Jason Miller, American actor and playwright (b. 1939)
- 2001 – R. K. Narayan, Indian author (b. 1906)
- 2002 – Ruth Cracknell, Australian actress (b. 1925)
- 2002 – Valeriy Lobanovskyi, Ukrainian footballer and manager (b. 1939)
- 2005 – Eddie Barclay, French record producer, founded Barclay Records (b. 1921)
- 2005 – George Dantzig, American mathematician and academic (b. 1914)
- 2005 – Michael Bruce Ross, American serial killer (b. 1959)
- 2006 – Jaroslav Pelikan, American historian and scholar (b. 1923)
- 2006 – Johnnie Wilder, Jr., American singer (Heatwave) (b. 1949)
- 2008 – Saad Al-Abdullah Al-Salim Al-Sabah, Kuwaiti ruler, Emir of Kuwait (b. 1930)
- 2008 – Ron Stone, American journalist (b. 1936)
- 2009 – Frank Aletter, American actor (b. 1926)
- 2009 – Meir Brandsdorfer, Belgian rabbi (b. 1934)
- 2009 – Achille Compagnoni, Italian skier and mountaineer (b. 1914)
- 2011 – Derek Boogaard, Canadian ice hockey player (b. 1982)
- 2011 – Stephen De Staebler, American sculptor (b. 1933)
- 2011 – Wallace McCain, Canadian businessman, co-founded McCain Foods (b. 1930)
- 2011 – Bruce Ricker, American director and producer (b. 1942)
- 2011 – Alain Voss, Brazilian-French illustrator (b. 1946)
- 2012 – Arsala Rahmani Daulat, Afghan politician (b. 1937)
- 2012 – Donald "Duck" Dunn, American bass player, songwriter, and producer (Booker T. & the M.G.'s, The Blues Brothers, and The Mar-Keys) (b. 1941)
- 2012 – Ada Maria Isasi-Diaz, Cuban-American theologian, author, and academic (b. 1943)
- 2012 – Lee Richardson, English motorcycle racer (b. 1979)
- 2012 – Don Ritchie, Australian humanitarian (b. 1925)
- 2012 – Nguyễn Văn Thiện, Vietnamese bishop (b. 1906)
- 2013 – Joyce Brothers, American psychologist, author, and actress (b. 1927)
- 2013 – Otto Herrigel, Namibian lawyer and politician (b. 1937)
- 2013 – Luciano Lutring, Italian criminal (b. 1937)
- 2013 – Jagdish Mali, Indian photographer (b. 1954)
- 2013 – Chuck Muncie, American football player (b. 1953)
- 2013 – Fyodor Tuvin, Russian footballer (b. 1973)
- 2013 – Lynne Woolstencroft, Canadian politician (b. 1943)
- 2014 – David Malet Armstrong, Australian philosopher and author (b. 1926)
- 2014 – Malik Bendjelloul, Swedish director and producer (b. 1977)
- 2014 – J. F. Coleman, American soldier and pilot (b. 1918)
- 2014 – Ron Stevens, Canadian lawyer and politician (b. 1949)
- 2014 – Ivan Wingreen, South African cricketer (b. 1961)
- 2014 – Morning Glory Zell-Ravenheart, American occultist and author (b. 1948)
2015
- Abbotsbury Garland Day (Dorset, England)
- Christian Feast Day:
- One of the three feast days of the Lemuralia, observed in ancient Rome
- Rotuma Day (Rotuma)
COMMUNITY DISMAYED
Tim Blair – Wednesday, May 13, 2015 (11:57am)
This is hilarious:
Australia’s arts industry is in shock after a dramatic intervention by Minister George Brandis in tonight’s budget.$104.8 million over four years has been ripped out of the Australia Council’s budget to create a new slush fund, apparently to be decided at the discretion of the Arts Minister of the day …As news of the radical shake-up filtered out, dismay and confusion spread throughout Australia’s tight-knit arts community.
Good. Although it would have been better if the $104.8 million was removed entirely.
UPDATE. The Australia Council is a political organisation that occasionally dabbles in creative ventures.
OUT OF HIS BLIND (CORRECTED)
Tim Blair – Wednesday, May 13, 2015 (11:02am)
Bill Shorten invents a new word:
“I am not going to make the same mistake Tony Abbott made in opposition and blindlessly oppose everything,” Mr Shorten told Sky News.
Not bad, but he’s still some distance behind Julia Gillard.
UPDATE/CORRECTION. On reviewing the Sky News interview, Shorten did not say “blindlessly”. He stumbled very slightly but clearly said “mindlessly”. Apologies to the Labor leader.
FROM CRITICISM TO COPYING
Tim Blair – Wednesday, May 13, 2015 (10:24am)
2014:
Indonesia’s previous foreign minister, Marty Natalegawa, was blunt in his criticism of Australia’s policy of turning back asylum seekers attempting to leave Indonesia for Australian waters.
2015:
On Tuesday, Indonesia turned back one boat believed to be carrying around 400 mainly Rohingya Muslims, after giving them fuel, food and water.
Australia previously showed Europe the way. Now Indonesia is learning.
(Via J.F. Beck)
Foreign Minister Julie Bishop has confirmed “numerous requests” have been made by European officials to discuss Australia’s border protection policies, as the continent grapples with large numbers of refugees drowning in the Mediterranean Sea …Her confirmation comes after The Australian revealed last week that a meeting took place in Sydney in which European immigration officials specifically asked to be given a briefing on the program.
St Peter denied three times. Bill Shorten 13
Andrew Bolt May 13 2015 (3:12pm)
Oh dear. Bill Shorten has yet another nightmare at 3AW:
Or just read and weep:
===Opposition Leader Bill Shorten refused to accept Labor bears responsibility for leaving the budget in deficit 13 times in an excruciating interview that left talkback callers confessing to yelling at their radios…Listen to the car crash here.
Or just read and weep:
NEIL MITCHELL:
Do you as Labor Leader accept any responsibility for the problems with the deficit?
BILL SHORTEN:
I believe that Labor does have a role to put forward positive alternatives…
NEIL MITCHELL:
No, no, no, no in the size of the deficit that you delivered to this Government?
BILL SHORTEN:
No, the Government is in charge. They are the ones…
NEIL MITCHELL:
Yeah, but did you impose part of the problem on them?
BILL SHORTEN:
Oh, when the Government proposes to introduce a GP tax and we say no, and then the Government blames us for not legislating unfairness. When the Government, did you know, all of last year…
NEIL MITCHELL:
What deficit did they inherit when they won power?
BILL SHORTEN:
Oh, 16-17 billion dollars.
NEIL MITCHELL:
So, do you wear responsibility for that?
BILL SHORTEN:
Well, first of all, you’ve asked two questions in a row and I’m determined to answer your first one first. When you talk about responsibility, how is it, and for a whole year, you know, you have Liberal Ministers on your show saying we’re not cutting the pension. I know they were lying, pensioners knew they were lying. Now, they have dropped their cuts to the pension, there is not any atonement, it’s as if these guys…
NEIL MITCHELL:
That’s not answering my question.
BILL SHORTEN:
Well, you know, answering your first question, I don’t accept responsibility for stupid ideas put forward by a Government which are unfair and broken promises. Now, we accept…
NEIL MITCHELL:
But that wasn’t the question, the question was whether you accepted some responsibility for the size of the deficit that this Government inherited and continues to be a problem?
BILL SHORTEN:
We accept that we have a role to play to get the Budget in the medium term, back to trajectory.
NEIL MITCHELL:
No, that’s not the question either.
BILL SHORTEN:
Well, no, judge us not by our words but by our actions.
NEIL MITCHELL:
I’m judging you by your actions in the size of the deficit you delivered to this Government when they took over and that deficit continues to be a problem. Is that partly the responsibility of the Labor Party?
BILL SHORTEN:
The responsibility that I accept is to tackle the deficit. I’m the Leader of the Opposition now. So, what I’ve done is we’ve ripped up the political rule book, we put forward two major costed policies. One, to get foreign multinationals to pay their fair share of tax in Australia and it’s proposed, under our measures, which do fit up with best practice tax guidelines worldwide. We propose to save $7 billion extra off these multinationals. We’ve also proposed, on superannuation and this is where the Government are very, very cheeky and mischievous. They say that because we want to lower the tax concession that a multimillionaire receives on millions of dollars of super from a 45c concession to a 30c concession…
NEIL MITCHELL:
Mr Shorten, this goes to your credibility, because you know that the perception Labor runs up big deficits, conservative governments try to address it. Now, you can debate that or not, the point is, is there any responsibility sitting in the hands of the Labor Party for the problems we now have with deficits?
BILL SHORTEN:
We accept the responsibility of reducing the deficit, we’re here to work.
NEIL MITCHELL:
You’re not answering the question.
BILL SHORTEN:
Well, you’re asking what responsibility…
NEIL MITCHELL:
No, I’m asking what responsibility you have in the size of the deficit that exists now that was inherited by this Government.
BILL SHORTEN:
I accept the responsibility of reducing the deficit. I accept the responsibility of coming up with costed policies. Neil, I can, you know, you say, well, you know, that’s not the answer you want to hear but…
NEIL MITCHELL:
No, it’s not answering the question, it’s avoiding it.
BILL SHORTEN:
Well the answer is, I’ll tell you what Australians want to hear, they want to hear what’s your plan to do something, politics isn’t as complicated…
NEIL MITCHELL:
I think they want to hear a bit of straight talk and they want to hear if there is any responsibility on your hands for the size of the deficit we now face.
BILL SHORTEN:
I’m up for the task of reducing the deficit. I take that responsibility.
I’d trust George “Medici” Brandis above this Council
Andrew Bolt May 13 2015 (12:48pm)
The Sydney Morning Herald had praise when Labor’s Paul Keating took control of arts funding:
And what exactly have we been getting for all those millions in grants?
As I said last year:
Brandis had his own reasons for wondering about who was handing grants to whom:
Continue reading 'I’d trust George “Medici” Brandis above this Council'
===The “Keatings” paid $11.7 million to 65 artists between 1989 and 1996. A decade later the work produced for that investment is almost complete, though more time is needed to judge its real value, and the long-term career boost is immeasurable.But the Sydney Morning Herald and Labor are squealing now that the Liberals are taking control of arts funding:
“They were people at the top of their game but with no means of income,” says [former Prime Minister Paul] Keating now....
It’s easy to argue six figures is too much for taxpayers to spend on any artwork. But a dozen interviewees say they couldn’t have done their ambitious works for less…
The fellowships were authorised by cabinet but administered by the Australia Council… Keating wanted to keep control of the money away from the Australia Council, which he described as “a form of peer group pass-the-parcel”.
The Australia Council says the Abbott Government’s decision to strip almost $105 million from its funding to establish a new grants program run by the federal Arts Ministry will have a significant impact on the peak cultural funding and advisory body…Lovers of art should actually welcome this move. There’s reason to wonder at the way the Australia Council has spent our arts funding. There’s reason to wonder whether Leftists on the council are freezing out conservative artists and publications, or giving too many grants to the same old faces or families. Is there not a danger that the Australia Council gets dominated by Leftists who reward other Leftists in a tight little group? For instance:
The measures announced by federal Arts Minister George Brandis contained in the budget include the creation of a National Programme for Excellence in the Arts, with funding diverted from the Australia Council to the minister’s office…
The move has been described as an “audacious grab” by the Abbott Government for “personal control” of cultural funding and “a devastating move” for the small to medium arts sector.
Shadow Arts Minister Mark Dreyfus said the changes would undermine the arms-length, peer-review process for grants undertaken by the Australia Council.
Sophie Cunningham, chairman of the Australia Council’s literature panel, attends parties of fellow Leftists such as Jonathan Green (now an ABC presenter) where guests are known to have bashed a pinata of John Howard.That wasn’t all, either. Read on.
Benjamin Law is another Leftist with a liking for rhetorical violence against conservatives. Of me he wrote: “Some of us are huge and muscled, built like brick sh*thouses and could demolish Andrew Bolt’s face if we wanted to, and that is definitely fine by me too.” Of Tony Abbott he tweeted:
Now to the action…
Last March Cunningham - to repeat, the chairman of the Literature Panel - had a dream:
Hmm. A month later Benjamin’s sister - who describes Cunningham as ”my mentor” - gets an Australia Council award:
And now the man himself gets that grant of which Cunningham once dreamed:
And what exactly have we been getting for all those millions in grants?
As I said last year:
Arts funding needs reform. It is meant to promote excellence and open minds. I fear it is instead promoting a political tribe and stifling debate.UPDATE
Here is an urgent job for Arts Minister George Brandis.
Brandis had his own reasons for wondering about who was handing grants to whom:
Senator Brandis has shown little love for the Australia Council board in its current form. Speaking after the appointment of the current board by former Labour Arts Minister Tony Burke in 2013, the then shadow arts spokesman described its makeup as a “bitter disappointment” to arts lovers living outside Melbourne and Sydney, in particular taking aim at appointees including filmmaker Khoa Do and writer and broadcaster Waleed Aly (also a Fairfax Media columnist).The ideological credentials, however, cannot be questioned.
Senator Brandis said in a 2013 media release that while some of the new board members were “undoubtedly distinguished leaders”, others, such as Mr Aly and Mr Do, had “far from obvious” credentials in the arts.
Continue reading 'I’d trust George “Medici” Brandis above this Council'Here come Tony’s tradies
Andrew Bolt May 13 2015 (9:35am)
David Speers and Tony Abbott workshop a phrase that Abbott will love - and which he hopes will trend and define the Budget:
===“We had Howard’s battlers, are these going to be Abbott’s tradies?” Sky news journalist David Speers asked Mr Abbott. The Prime Minister quickly volunteered a better term would be ”Tony’s tradies”.
News no Abbott-hater will read or remember
Andrew Bolt May 13 2015 (7:52am)
Fairfax writers please note. A strange thing for a misogynist to do, wouldn’t you say?
===LEIGH SALES, PRESENTER: Four years ago, David Morrison was appointed Chief of the Australian Army. He couldn’t possibly have guessed that in that time he’d become an international poster boy for women’s rights. Lieutenant General Morrison had a transformative experience three years ago when he personally met women who’d been abused in the Army. It changed his life and his attitude, and the following year, when a group of male soldiers known as the Jedi Council were exposed for filming lewd and explicit images of female soldiers without their knowledge and sharing them around, the Army Chief spoke by video link to the military, telling people to get out if they couldn’t accept the Army’s values....(Thanks to reader Mervyn.)
DAVID MORRISON: Look, I think it’s got to carry on and I think it will. When the Prime Minister sat with me in his office a year ago and asked me if I would stay on for an additional year as the Chief of Army to conclude a four-year term, the predominant reason he said he wanted me to stay was because of the work that we were doing with our culture and our treatment of women. Now I thought that that was an extraordinary thing for a prime minister to say to a chief of army.
Essential poll: government up slightly, Abbott a lot
Andrew Bolt May 13 2015 (7:47am)
Inch by inch, Tony Abbott is recovering in the polls, although the Government is still behind.
Essential Media, in a pre-Budget poll, has the Government improve slightly to 48 per cent to Labor’s 52.
But then there’s this: 35 per cent of voters (up 3 per cent since April) now think Tony Abbott would make the better Prime Minister and 32 per cent (down 3) prefer Bill Shorten.
This is the first month Abbott has been preferred over Shorten since November last year.
===Essential Media, in a pre-Budget poll, has the Government improve slightly to 48 per cent to Labor’s 52.
But then there’s this: 35 per cent of voters (up 3 per cent since April) now think Tony Abbott would make the better Prime Minister and 32 per cent (down 3) prefer Bill Shorten.
This is the first month Abbott has been preferred over Shorten since November last year.
ABC journalists star in new media game: yelling at Liberal MPs
Andrew Bolt May 13 2015 (6:42am)
Left-wing journalists
now think it’s news when fellow Left-wing journalists are rude to
Liberal MPs. That could also explain what seems to be a competition to
be abusive.
So it’s news when Laurie Oakes needles Joe Hockey:
But the ABC had not finished yet in this game of bash-the-Liberal-and-make-yourself-a-headline.
News.com.au - the far-Left outpost of the Murdoch empire - now spruiks another journalist who made themselves the hero of their own interview by heckling, awarding her the ”interview of the evening”:
Liberal MPs should be aware of this new game, where they are cast as punching bags by journalists seeking to impress the pack. They need to call out the bias, as Hockey and Cormann both did - and then some.
As for the ABC, it is now clear that it has declared war on the Abbott Government. This cannot stand.
The public, meanwhile, should note how much some journalists think they are the real story.
UPDATE
And Liberal voters listening to ABC Melbourne host Jon Faine’s Budget coverage today, and his asides throughout the morning, will be further incensed that the ABC is using taxpayer’s money for one long sledge at conservatives. Faine is no fool, but where on Melbourne ABC is a conservative to balance him? Should Liberal MPs think all this too hard, listen to the carefully cultivated audience Faine now has, and the sheer hatred of Liberals that comes through talkback.
UPDATE
Another example, from just this morning, in the Sydney Morning Herald:
===So it’s news when Laurie Oakes needles Joe Hockey:
It’s news when Lisa Wilkinson flies at Scott Morrison:
And it’s simply delightful news to The Age that the ABC’s Leigh Sales was astonishingly rude last night to Joe Hockey, frantically and breathlessly interrupting him 14 times in just seven minutes, even when he was directly answering the very question she’d put a nanosecond before:
You really need to see the interview to fully understand just how obviously and manically Sales was searching for a gotcha, rather than for information:
The contrast with Sales’ genial interview with Labor’s Chris Bowen moments later was remarkable.
But the ABC had not finished yet in this game of bash-the-Liberal-and-make-yourself-a-headline.
News.com.au - the far-Left outpost of the Murdoch empire - now spruiks another journalist who made themselves the hero of their own interview by heckling, awarding her the ”interview of the evening”:
If you think Sales was rude, check out Emma Alberici treating Finance Minister Mathias Cormann with undeserved contempt, interrupting him 12 times, refusing to let him criticise Labor and claiming his figures were “made up”.
Liberal MPs should be aware of this new game, where they are cast as punching bags by journalists seeking to impress the pack. They need to call out the bias, as Hockey and Cormann both did - and then some.
As for the ABC, it is now clear that it has declared war on the Abbott Government. This cannot stand.
The public, meanwhile, should note how much some journalists think they are the real story.
UPDATE
And Liberal voters listening to ABC Melbourne host Jon Faine’s Budget coverage today, and his asides throughout the morning, will be further incensed that the ABC is using taxpayer’s money for one long sledge at conservatives. Faine is no fool, but where on Melbourne ABC is a conservative to balance him? Should Liberal MPs think all this too hard, listen to the carefully cultivated audience Faine now has, and the sheer hatred of Liberals that comes through talkback.
UPDATE
Another example, from just this morning, in the Sydney Morning Herald:
Budget too soft, but no option with Labor and Greens such wreckers
Andrew Bolt May 13 2015 (12:44am)
WE are in trouble. No one in Parliament will tell the truth about this Budget — that it is too soft to save us.
Yes, it is “fair” and politically smarter than last year’s, and should help the Government win the next election.
But this Budget still buries us in more debt, with years more deficits still to come, even if you believe the Budget’s happy claim that we’ll be back to 3.5 per cent growth in two years.
Worse, Labor and the Greens decided even before they studied it that even this Budget is too tough and key spending cuts may again be blocked in the Senate.
Yet the bottom line, as Treasurer Joe Hockey yesterday revealed, is that despite all the Abbott Government’s alleged meanness, it will still spend $96 million a day more than it is earning.
(Read the full article here.)
===Yes, it is “fair” and politically smarter than last year’s, and should help the Government win the next election.
But this Budget still buries us in more debt, with years more deficits still to come, even if you believe the Budget’s happy claim that we’ll be back to 3.5 per cent growth in two years.
Worse, Labor and the Greens decided even before they studied it that even this Budget is too tough and key spending cuts may again be blocked in the Senate.
Yet the bottom line, as Treasurer Joe Hockey yesterday revealed, is that despite all the Abbott Government’s alleged meanness, it will still spend $96 million a day more than it is earning.
(Read the full article here.)
Yes, dear Greens and Herald journalists: there really is a “death cult”
Andrew Bolt May 13 2015 (12:10am)
Yesterday the Sydney Morning Herald - in an astonishingly trite, sneering and inaccurate article - mocked Tony Abbott for calling the Islamic State a “death cult”.
The Greens foolishly took up the theme in the Senate, and were treated to this withering reply.
The Sydney Morning Herald quoted two “experts” who took astonishing exception to describing the Islamic State as a “death cult”:
In fact, Mr Seyit, what creates that perception that these people are “violent psychopaths” are not Abbott’s words but the Islamic State’s deeds (CAUTION: extreme violence):
And dear Ms Grossman, the truth is exactly the reverse. In fact, what is too easy for cultural relativists and post-modernist academics to overlook is the sheer evil and inhumanity that underpin the IS narrative of building a new world and a new order, promising action, power and engagement.
Let me give you analogy. Remember the countless people who admired Hitler’s autobahns without questioning the nature of the state that built them?
===The Greens foolishly took up the theme in the Senate, and were treated to this withering reply.
The Sydney Morning Herald quoted two “experts” who took astonishing exception to describing the Islamic State as a “death cult”:
Kuranda Seyit, a Muslim youth worker and secretary of the Islamic Council of Victoria… [said:] “For mainstream Australians it creates a perception that these people are violent psychopaths...”I am utterly flabbergasted.
Professor Michele Grossman, a cultural diversity researcher from Victoria University, said it was dangerous to use a term that only reflected one small part of the reality of Islamic State.
“It’s too easy to overlook the elements of the IS narrative that focus on building a new world and a new order, promising action, power and engagement,” she said.
In fact, Mr Seyit, what creates that perception that these people are “violent psychopaths” are not Abbott’s words but the Islamic State’s deeds (CAUTION: extreme violence):
And dear Ms Grossman, the truth is exactly the reverse. In fact, what is too easy for cultural relativists and post-modernist academics to overlook is the sheer evil and inhumanity that underpin the IS narrative of building a new world and a new order, promising action, power and engagement.
Let me give you analogy. Remember the countless people who admired Hitler’s autobahns without questioning the nature of the state that built them?
Budget reactions - too soft, but sweeter
Andrew Bolt May 13 2015 (12:07am)
Here is Joe Hockey’s Budget speech.
Terry McCrann:
David Koch:
===Terry McCrann:
SORRY, Joe, for the life of me I can’t see a “credible path back to surplus”.Dennis Shanahan:
I do see a bloody great fiscal vacuum hose sucking up billions of ever-increasing dollars from the wallets and purses of every Australian. The central fact of Joe Hockey’s second ("Hell, let’s forget about debt and deficits and focus on me keeping my job and Tony Abbott his’’) Budget is the way it rides a $110 billion leap in annual revenues to get — to hopefully get — the deficit down close to balance by 2018-19.
Joe Hockey has redeemed the political failures of the last year in his 2015 Budget by reversing unpopular measures and clawing back some savings…Simon Benson:
Left with nowhere to go politically after the 2014 debacle, Hockey and Tony Abbott had to cop billions in lost savings from measures that were listed as a “reversal” in the Budget documents.
Chopping and changing on pension indexation and entitlements, and child care and pharmaceuticals improved the Coalition’s political deficit but did little to help the Budget deficit.
In the long run, Hockey’s “better-than-expected” Budget deficit outcomes — down to just $6.9 billion in 2018-19 and a surplus the following year — is built on some modest savings reforms, bracket creep and optimistic forecasts.
TREASURER Joe Hockey has banked Australia’s economic recovery on the most ambitious small business and jobs stimulus package in the nation’s history.Ross Gittins:
With national gross debt set to soar to more than half a trillion by 2018, and deficits of almost of $100 billion still on the horizon, the Abbott Government has turned to the 2 million small businesses to get the nation back to work.
This is the budget of a badly rattled government that has put self-preservation ahead of economic responsibility. It will do much to restore Tony Abbott’s political fortunes, but next to nothing to return the budget to surplus or hasten the economy’s return to strong growth.UPDATE
David Koch:
This is a boss’ budget. It is arguably the best Federal Budget in a generation for small business (with revenue under $2 million a year). A 1.5 per cent company tax cut (and 5 per cent tax discount for unincorporated businesses) plus the ability to immediately deduct any purchase worth less than $20,000 is an absolute bonanza. Bosses should be happy and more inclined to invest, grow and hire more staff.Paul Kelly:
This budget aims to revive the Abbott government’s political fortunes, entrench the Coalition base vote with small business, families and farmers and give priority to growth and jobs over budget repair…On Budget day, Labor frontbencher Gary Gray pays tribute to his father-in-law, the late Peter Walsh, a very fine man:
Hockey has staked his career on faster growth, falling jobless and small business as the engine- room of innovation and investment. The second big gamble is postponing for the future the tougher spending decisions necessary to fix the budget and return to surplus. The risk is that these estimates are too optimistic, that fiscal repair remains in limbo and that without reform the economy drifts downwards.
It was as finance minister for six years that Peter made his mark bringing an unprecedented level of discipline and rigour in public finance. Significant expenditure cuts were required from 1986 in order to weather collapsing terms of trade. The government adopted a simple trilogy: not to raise taxes as a share of GDP; not to raise outlays as a share of GDP; and to reduce outlays in real terms. For four years, using IMF expenditure definitions, Peter fulfilled that trilogy. He produced four budgets, which reduced outlays in real terms; something that no other government or finance minister has done more than once. Peter remains the gold standard ... Australia was made stronger and fairer for Peter’s public service.Michael Gordon, The Age:
Like Houdini, Hockey and Abbott have staged a great escape.
Posted by Spirit Science on Sunday, 10 May 2015
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You CAN spend quality time with your travel companions this vacation and still progress in your writing: http://bit.ly/1J7WGKp
Posted by Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing on Tuesday, 12 May 2015
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Posted by Samuel Alexander Betz on Monday, 11 May 2015
Take me home
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If you believe, TYPE AMEN.
Posted by Herty Borngreat Music on Saturday, 28 February 2015
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No travel plans this summer? A staycation might be just what you need to get some writing done: http://bit.ly/1J7XleI
Posted by Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing on Tuesday, 12 May 2015
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Morning Light Storm clouds were lingering as our workshop lined up to get a shot of the mountain lighting up in spots. A hypnotizing experience watching the morning light dance.
Posted by Matt Granz on Tuesday, 12 May 2015
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best thug life video ever? lollike us: Delirious & Alex K Mikhaël Pageau
Posted by Delirious & Alex K on Wednesday, 25 February 2015
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What this kid did is pretty amazing http://t.co/MmtA0Zdw0j via @newscomauHQ
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) May 13, 2015
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Still not convenient. Where is luggage? Is this the real-life Tony Stark? http://t.co/Aub1KiI8S9 via @newscomauHQ
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) May 13, 2015
===
$90 million search for MH370 discovers debris field http://t.co/bHTCl0NTyF via @newscomauHQ
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) May 13, 2015
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Domestic Violence and gross stupidity Vic girlfriend killer not guilty of murder http://t.co/ZkmGVbcgoN via @newscomauHQ
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) May 13, 2015
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Shorten evades, lies, misrepresents http://t.co/qJZrMi4rl0
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) May 13, 2015
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England will never play badly enough to recall KP but they will come close http://t.co/SDSQnDLgoN via @newscomauHQ
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) May 13, 2015
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Magnitude 7.4 earthquake rocks Nepal http://t.co/gSwwQzJWLG via @newscomauHQ
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) May 13, 2015
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Steve Easton had a blocked nose for 44 years before a sneezing fit blew out sucker of a dart gun http://t.co/TjynyVPEZS via @newscomauHQ
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) May 13, 2015
===
Was Aussie to blame for deadly fire? http://t.co/32lxcEhEcD via @newscomauHQ
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) May 13, 2015
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Black Miss Japan faces backlash http://t.co/ZLCwjGkUZc via @newscomauHQ
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) May 13, 2015
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Her choice. Cate Blanchett candidly reveals she’s had ‘many’ past lesbian relationships http://t.co/pBBIyhs7ff via @newscomauHQ
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) May 13, 2015
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Where it cuts spending, all Australia is the winner http://t.co/uUsfsoxke9 via @newscomauHQ
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) May 13, 2015
===
Indonesia insisted on cut http://t.co/W35mtnOLux via @newscomauHQ
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) May 13, 2015
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Partisan ABC interview fails to hurt, but heckles Finance Minister http://t.co/ICDhlBpTJm via @newscomauHQ
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) May 13, 2015
===
TV reporter Shauna Hunt’s takedown of filth http://t.co/W6MzBPfpEN via @newscomauHQ
— David Daniel Ball (@DaOddBall67) May 13, 2015
=== Posts from last year ===
MUNGO BINGO
Tim Blair – Tuesday, May 13, 2014 (2:16am)
Some pre-war history from Mungo MacCallum, writing for the unbiased ABC:
Allowing politicians whose ambition and arrogance greatly outweigh their abilities and character to acquire their own private armies is seldom a good idea.To take just one obvious example: when Adolf Hitler gave his mate Heinrich Himmler control of the SS in 1929, the organisation was a single battalion of 290. Within a year Himmler had raised its ranks to 3,000 and by the time Hitler gained supreme power in 1933 the SS numbered 52,000. And so it went.
Where is Mungo headed with all of this old-timey Nazi talk? You’ll never guess:
Scott Morrison has already done great damage to Australia’s reputation and to our foreign policy. And something warns me that we ain’t seen nothing yet.
WORLD’S OLDEST HUMANS FACE DIGNITY LOSS
Tim Blair – Tuesday, May 13, 2014 (2:13am)
New Zealand rejects climate refugee claims. Morgan Godfery is upset:
No refugees please, we’re New Zealanders. That’s the message from New Zealand’s court of appeal. In a decision released last week the court endorsed earlier rulings that Ioana Teitiota – a Kiribati national – is not a climate change refugee. Teitiota, his wife and their children will be deported to Kiribati, where the court believes they can “resume their prior subsistence life with dignity”.Even if the Teitiota’s can reclaim some dignity, climate change will take it from them. The IPCC projects that the Pacific ocean will swallow most Kiribati by the end of this century.
Ioana Teitiota is 37. By the end of the century, when Teitiota’s dignity will be stolen by climate change, he’ll be 123. His youngest child will be 85 or so. At that point, climate change might be the least of their problems.
SHOOTER IDENTIFIED
Tim Blair – Tuesday, May 13, 2014 (2:10am)
Andrew Marlton’s draughtsmanship sure has improved since he joined the Guardian. No, wait – these are drawings byillegal immigrant children, gathered by Australian Human Rights Commission medical consultants Sarah Mares and Karen Zwi:
Along with three other colleagues, we interviewed 230 families. While we talked, we provided paper and pens and invited children to draw pictures that would tell us something about their lives.
Apparently their lives involve being murdered by the Prime Minister:
According to the Guardian: “This drawing by a child includes a smiling Tony Abbott holding a gun.” No. It clearly shows Abbott firing a gun at a seven-year-old, while dead or dying children bleed on the ground. Why would any parent bring a child to a country ruled by such a murderous tyrant? Best they be resettled somewhere safer, like Iran.
According to the Guardian: “This drawing by a child includes a smiling Tony Abbott holding a gun.” No. It clearly shows Abbott firing a gun at a seven-year-old, while dead or dying children bleed on the ground. Why would any parent bring a child to a country ruled by such a murderous tyrant? Best they be resettled somewhere safer, like Iran.
EERIE DISCONNECT
Tim Blair – Tuesday, May 13, 2014 (1:01am)
Former Fairfax functionary Margo Kingston approaches her next nervous breakdown:
When she’s coming up with lines like “riot police smash”, you know Margo is close to the edge. And check out this spectacular Margo haiku:
When she’s coming up with lines like “riot police smash”, you know Margo is close to the edge. And check out this spectacular Margo haiku:
TOM HAFEY
Tim Blair – Monday, May 12, 2014 (11:49pm)
===Can unions be trusted to help run giant super funds?
Andrew Bolt May 13 2014 (11:55am)
The power unions have over super funds is not healthy:
===The Australian Privacy Commissioner is investigating superannuation giant Cbus over another leak of personal details to the construction union.(Thanks to reader Peter of Bellevue Hill.)
Privacy commissioner Timothy Pilgrim began an investigation this year into claims Cbus employee co-ordinator Steve Gaske leaked information about more than 300 employees of a company subject to a construction union industrial campaign.
Mr Gaske is honourary president of the Queensland branch of the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union. Cbus files reveal an internal inquiry by the fund found Mr Gaske inappropriately sent personal details of the workers to a third party “without consent” and underwent “remedial training” as a result.
On Monday, Fairfax Media reported that NSW CFMEU state secretary Brian Parker allegedly conspired with a Cbus employee to get personal details of 400 workers, including their addresses and financial details, to help an industrial campaign… News of a second privacy breach involving the CFMEU will further pressure the Cbus board, which includes Australian Council of Trade Unions president Ged Kearney, CFMEU national secretary Dave Noonan, NSW CFMEU president Rita Mallia and is chaired by former Victorian premier Steve Bracks. There is no suggestion the Cbus board knew of the leaking of the members’ details.
Great research. ABC finds ABC staffer’s mum to bag the Liberals
Andrew Bolt May 13 2014 (9:58am)
The ABC looks for someone to bag the Abbott Government’s Budget. It finds an ABC reporter’s mum.
(Thanks to reader whatthe? and via Michael Smith. Plus thanks to many other readers.)
UPDATE
Son Mark is happy, though.
===(Thanks to reader whatthe? and via Michael Smith. Plus thanks to many other readers.)
UPDATE
Son Mark is happy, though.
Warmist defects
Andrew Bolt May 13 2014 (8:57am)
James Delingpole says one the world’s most eminent warmist scientists has become a sceptic:
===Lennart Bengtsson - a Swedish climatologist, meteorologist, former director of the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology in Hamburg and winner, in 2006, of the 51st IMO Prize of the World Meteorological Organization for his pioneering work in numerical weather prediction - is by some margin the most distinguished scientist to change sides.
For most of his career, he has been a prominent member of the warmist establishment, subscribing to all its articles of faith - up to and including the belief that Michael Mann’s Hockey Stick was a scientifically plausible assessment of the relationship between CO2 emissions and global mean temperature.
But this week, he [agreed] to join the advisory council of Britain’s Global Warming Policy Foundation (GWPF), the think tank created by the arch-sceptical former Chancellor Lord Lawson.
Though Bengtsson is trying to play down the significance of his shift - “I have always been a sceptic and I think that is what most scientists really are” he recently told Germany’s Spiegel Online, denying that he had ever been an “alarmist” - his move to the GWPF is a calculated snub to the climate alarmist establishment…“I have used most of my career to develop models for predicting the weather. I have learned the importance of forecasting validation, i.e. the verification of predictions with respect to what has really happened. So I am a friend of climate forecasts. But the review of model results is important in order to ensure their credibility. It is frustrating that climate science is not able to validate their simulations correctly. The warming of the Earth has been much weaker since the end of the 20th century compared to what climate models show.”Bengtsson went on to reject another pillar of the warmist faith - the existence of a “consensus.”“I have great respect for the scientific work that goes into the IPCC reports. But I see no need for the endeavour of the IPCC to achieve a consensus. I think it is essential that there are areas of society where a consensus cannot be enforced. Especially in an area like the climate system, which is incompletely understood, a consensus is meaningless.”
(Thanks to reader Penny.)
Gosnell movie to be made
Andrew Bolt May 13 2014 (8:55am)
Readers of this blog have answered an appeal and helped ensure an important movie gets made:
===THE CONTROVERSIAL movie about abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell has reached its funding target on the crowdfunding website Indiegogo - smashing a series of records on the way to its $2.1m goal.You have still got a few hours to add even $1 to ensure you’re part of it.
Gosnell is now by a huge margin, the most successful film project ever to be on Indiegogo, even beating projects from Hollywood celebrities such as James Franco.
It is also by far the most successful non-celebrity crowdfunded film on ANY crowdfunding platform.
Gosnell has so far raised $2.1m from over 23,000 contributors. The project closes to contributors at midnight Monday May 12th.
Boko Haram says its agenda is Islam. Will the Left finally say so, too?
Andrew Bolt May 13 2014 (8:14am)
It just got harder for the Left to avoid mentioning Boko Haram’s Islamist agenda:
===A new video issued by Boko Haram claims to show some of the nearly 300 schoolgirls missing in Nigeria, who the Islamist group’s leader says have converted to Islam.
Abubakar Shekau reportedly said the girls would not be released until his fighters being held in prison are freed…
In the video, the militant chief speaks for 17 minutes before showing what he says are about 130 of the girls, wearing full-length hijabs, reciting the first chapter of the Koran and praying in an undisclosed rural location…
Holding a pad of paper in his hand, Shekau tells the camera: “These girls, these girls you occupy yourselves with their affair we have indeed ‘liberated’ them. We have indeed ‘liberated’ them. “Do you know ‘we have liberated them’? These girls have become Muslims. They are Muslims.”
McCrann: why Abbott is not breaking a tax promise
Andrew Bolt May 13 2014 (7:43am)
These are some of the things Tony Abbott said before the election:
===2012: What you’ll get under us are tax cuts without new taxes.But Terry McCrann says those are not promises Tony Abbott will break in today’s Budget - something I’d like to believe, even if it means saying I was wrong:
August, 2013: The only party which is going to increase taxes after the election is the Labor Party.
In his always punchy The Bolt Report on the Ten Network on Sunday, Bolt showed two clips to “prove” Abbott had broken his promise “not to raise taxes”.
The first was from March 2012. Setting aside what Abbott actually said, which proved no such thing, something said in the everyday rough and tumble of political debate 18 months before an election simply does not qualify as an “election promise” in any rational universe…
Bolt’s second clip was from the 2013 election campaign. It had Abbott saying: “The only party that will raise taxes after the election is the Labor Party.”
That simply does not equate with Julia Gillard’s “There will be no carbon tax.....” It is common political rhetoric of the sort we’ve had since time immemorial; the assertion of the nasties the other side will deliver. It is not a promise of what his side will or will not do…
Abbott had to specifically rule out any tax increases under his government, for his assertion, his political rhetoric, to be converted into a promise…
We are apparently getting two tax increases today — a temporary increase in the top marginal personal tax rate, and perhaps the very top end of the second top rate; and a return to indexing the fuel excise.
They are not new taxes, they are increases in existing taxes. Abbott has not broken the alleged promise not to have new taxes…
And he committed to getting the Budget back to balance by cutting spending — with the objective to be able as a consequence, to long term deliver lower taxes. None of this amounts to what would have been an absurd promise to not raise any tax, ever, even marginally, and far less temporarily.
ABC smears another conservative: Now Scott Morrison is another Heinrich Himmler
Andrew Bolt May 13 2014 (7:22am)
The ABC is not merely biased but a disgraceful peddler of character assassination of conservatives. It’s already portrayed Chris Kenny as a “dog-f..ker” and me as a racist, and only grudgingly apologised.
Now it gives a platform to Mungo MacCallum to liken Immigration Minister Scott Morrison to Heinrich Himmler and a military-led border operation to the SS:
Can Scott also explain why the ABC reserves its slops bucket for conservatives?
The ABC is out of control.
===Now it gives a platform to Mungo MacCallum to liken Immigration Minister Scott Morrison to Heinrich Himmler and a military-led border operation to the SS:
Operation Sovereign Borders is out of control and running amok.... Morrison ... is definitely a minister on the make; he has revelled in speculation that he could one day take the top job himself. Which should make the thoughtful very nervous. Allowing politicians whose ambition and arrogance greatly outweigh their abilities and character to acquire their own private armies is seldom a good idea.Why are taxpayers dollars being used to publish this vicious calumny? Mark Scott should apologise for the ABC’s latest savaging of a conservative and order The Drum editor Chip Rolley to take it down.
To take just one obvious example: when Adolf Hitler gave his mate Heinrich Himmler control of the SS in 1929, the organisation was a single battalion of 290. Within a year Himmler had raised its ranks to 3,000 and by the time Hitler gained supreme power in 1933 the SS numbered 52,000. And so it went.
Can Scott also explain why the ABC reserves its slops bucket for conservatives?
The ABC is out of control.
Blewitt, Gillard and the house
Andrew Bolt May 13 2014 (7:18am)
Ralph Blewitt’s evidence yesterday included a nugget of information that suggests questions for Julia Gillard later:
===AMONG the hundreds of documents placed before Ralph Blewitt, the first witness at the national royal commission into union corruption yesterday, was one recovered from 1993.Gillard has elsewhere insisted she witnessed legal documents correctly.
[It was an] advertisement for a Fitzroy, Melbourne, terrace house that was to be auctioned ...
The commission heard that while Blewitt [became] its owner, he ...did not see it before it was bought nor go to the auction. He did not live in it…
He claims the house was purchased for his boss in the AWU, Bruce Wilson, who was accompanied to the auction by his then girlfriend and solicitor, Julia Gillard. Blewitt’s function was to be the fall guy who lent his name to the transaction and provided the cash for the deposit and the balance of the mortgage, which was organised by Slater & Gordon, Gillard’s employer.
Blewitt said he did as he was told. He pulled the necessary cash out of the account of the AWU Workplace Reform Association Inc, the secret slush fund registered in Western Australia on Gillard’s legal advice ...
Expenses reimbursement records placing Blewitt at a “Slater & Gordon dinner” at the Patee Thai restaurant in Fitzroy on February 3, 1993, for which he claimed $80 from the AWU, were accompanied by other records indicating he returned to Perth the next morning. This evidence could become more important because of his earlier claims that a February 4 power-of-attorney document was falsely witnessed by the Melbourne-based Gillard.
Never mind the facts, feel that passionate sinking feeling for Kiribati
Andrew Bolt May 13 2014 (6:41am)
A brilliant example of how many on the Left deal in dreams and feelings, not reality and evidence - particularly when discussing global warming:
But how dare we question a man with such qualifications?
===Message from the Court of Appeal! Morgan Godfery, The Guardian, yesterday:More facts about Kiribati and Pacific islands not drowning but growing here.NO refugees please, we’re New Zealanders. That’s the message from New Zealand’s Court of Appeal.Message from Immigration. New Zealand Refugee Quota 2013-14 to 2015-16:REFUGEE Quota Programme remains at 750 annually.Kiribati is sinking! Godfery, The Guardian, yesterday:BEFORE Kiribati sinks beneath the sea, ocean creep will make the islands uninhabitable … Tarawa, the main atoll, is a tiny sandstrip some six square miles in size. There is, quite literally, no escaping the misery climate change will cause.Kiribati is growing. Naomi Biribo, Colin D. Woodroffe, Sustainability Science, July last year:REEF islands (around Tarawa in Kiribati) have substantially increased in size, gaining about 450 hectares, driven largely by reclamations on urban South Tarawa.Science is telling us to revolt! Godfery, The Guardian, yesterday:SCIENCE, as Naomi Klein argues, “is telling us to revolt”. Ordinary people need to put pressure on their governments to deal with climate change displacement …Science is telling us to adapt. Biribo, Woodroffe, Sustainability Science, July last year:WIDESPREAD erosion ... is primarily due to human activities … Appropriate adaptation measures … are required, including prohibiting beach mining ... near settlements.
But how dare we question a man with such qualifications?
The difference between arguing for a side and a principle
Andrew Bolt May 13 2014 (6:32am)
Remember how the media Left was near-unanimous in cheering Labor’s worst mistakes - scrapping tough border laws, introducing a carbon tax, calling a vindictive media inquiry, unleashing over-the-top spending during the financial crisis, rolling out an uncosted mega-billion national broadband network, promising huge new spending of borrowed billions on education and more. Remember how the media Left was for years not just totally incurious about the AWU slush fund scandal but at times determined to excuse Julia Gillard’s involvement?
See how this cheering led Labor to electoral disaster and the country to massive debts? See how the squalid truth is now leaking out?
Now note the absence of such group think among conservative commentators under a conservative government:
===See how this cheering led Labor to electoral disaster and the country to massive debts? See how the squalid truth is now leaking out?
Now note the absence of such group think among conservative commentators under a conservative government:
Given the past six years of tortured federal leadership and the attempt to shunt blame on to an imagined media vendetta, it is instructive to look at the criticism being meted out to the Abbott government. Staunch News Corp critics of Mr Rudd and Julia Gillard — such as Andrew Bolt, Miranda Devine and Chris Kenny — have been earliest and strongest in their condemnation of Tony Abbott’s broken election promises. This shows the dispassionate consistency we need to see in a national debate, as do cogent arguments from News Corp writers such as Terry McCrann and Greg Sheridan arguing virtually the opposite point of view. For the past six years, on the liberal-Left side of the media and political divide, we have seen a blancmange of groupthink and a delusional denial of obvious failings, presumably in an attempt to buttress a government whose ideals were cherished. This absence of scepticism and debate does not bolster government but weakens it; doesn’t repair weaknesses but exacerbates them; and doesn’t prevent the eventual reckoning but rather allows it to gather momentum.
Greens back Liberals’ plan to raise a tax
Andrew Bolt May 13 2014 (6:12am)
The only sure thing in the Abbott Government’s Budget to get through the Senate so far is a tax rise - thanks to the Greens:
The Australian puts it well:
Nick Cater says the worth of a Budget – or a government - isn’t measured by promises kept or broken:
===The fuel tax increase was cemented last night when the Greens agreed to support the budget plan to index the excise to inflation, sparing the government from needing votes from Labor and minor parties.The Greens just expose themselves as tax addicts:
Greens leader Christine Milne rejected the government’s claims of a “budget crisis” and said there should be permanent action on tax, such as a lift in the tax rate for the wealthy, rather than an "ideological hit on the poor” by withdrawing benefits. “We’ve got a carbon price — let’s keep it. We’ve got a mining tax — let’s keep it,” Senator Milne said. The Greens will vote for the increase in the petrol excise but want the revenue to go to public transport rather than roads, she said.The Government claims it’s keeping its fundamental promise on taxes, but its calculations rely on scrapping the carbon tax - which is still there and can’t possibly get through the Senate until new Senators take over in July:
Mr Abbott promised “tax cuts without new taxes” when in opposition. Putting a contentious new claim at the heart of the budget, the government will rely on Treasury analysis to promise a $5.7bn cut in the “overall tax burden” next year to offset the new revenue measures.UPDATE
The tax reduction contrasts with a $107.3bn Treasury estimate for the cost of Labor tax increases over the past six years, including the carbon tax.
The Australian puts it well:
Today’s budget must deliver a plausible fiscal plan. If promises are broken, they will deserve attention but not a Twitter-led frenzy. The real test will be whether the national interest is served — costs curtailed, structural reforms delivered and a blueprint to maximise growth revealed.UPDATE
Nick Cater says the worth of a Budget – or a government - isn’t measured by promises kept or broken:
ON the eve of the 1983 election, Bob Hawke ... told a willing crowd at his campaign launch ... he would maintain controls on mortgage interest rates, continue assistance for the footwear, clothing and textile industries, fund a separate ABC rural network, construct the National Museum, introduce a national Bill of Rights and fixed four-year terms and wipe out (yes, wipe out) the tax evasion and avoidance industry.
Which goes to prove that a tally of promises kept and those supposedly broken is a hopeless measure of a government’s worth.
There was barely a hint in Hawke’s campaign speech of the reforms by which he came to be judged as one of Australia’s most successful prime ministers. The Hawke government’s fiscal conservatism did not emerge until his first budget…
Moments like this call for the advice from older and wiser heads, and former Howard government minister David Kemp’s Alfred Deakin lecture last week on the nature of good government was particularly well timed. Kemp took issue with the current political orthodoxy that “good government is simply doing after the election what the party promised before … almost regardless of what it has a mandate to do.”
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=== Posts from last year ===
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A mother's relentless love and unwavering prayers has saved more lives and done more good on earth than any other human activity.
===“The hand that rocks the cradle rules the world”—a phrase so simple, yet so profound in its expression of a mother’s importance. Mothers have been entrusted with the responsibility of raising life’s most precious resource—our children.
I appreciate my mom and the example of love and grace she has been throughout the years. Thank you, Mom!
Todd and I also appreciate the honor of being the parents of five wonderful kids and two amazing little grandkids who have enriched our life together in more ways than I could have ever imagined. Track, Bristol, Willow, Piper, and Trig are my life, and being joined now by Tripp Easton and Kyla Grace, I know that no matter what is going on in the world around me, they are the ones who keep me grounded. They are my daily reminders of what really matters.
Even as we celebrate Mother’s Day with family today, please stop to think of the many mothers who are separated from loved ones serving in the military and keeping us safe. I've been there, and especially today my heart goes out to those Blue Star moms who are missing their sons and daughters, while being so very proud. More than ever my heart extends to the precious Gold Star moms who are spending today holding on to memories of a child who paid the ultimate price. Whether it's been far away in specified combat zones, or attacks globally throughout the ongoing battle to defend our republic, or nearer home as the result of terrorist acts like Ft. Hood, the sacrifice of our military personnel and their families has not been in vain, and we will never forget.
Moms, whatever your plans today, know that you are appreciated year-round. One day is not enough to capture the essence of who you are, what you do, and the difference you make.
Driving in our truck this morning up towards Mt. McKinley, hauling kids and trailering snowmachines to launch on a trek to look for bear before the spring snow melts, I wish you a Happy Mother’s Day, and God bless you!
- Sarah Palin
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Give the ones you love wings to fly, roots to come back and reasons to stay.
That is beautiful .. but I love a human woman .. I suspect I make her toe nails dig into the dirt, rage which gives her wings and reasons to argue more .. ed
She is also in my head .. and she told me I love lots of people. Everyone. And I probably do make them feel that way at times. But I am grateful for the love God has given me. - ed
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Mother's Day....if raised too alone: A Beautiful Poem for you
If
your mother
was caustic,
toxic,
abusive,
vindictive,
twisted,
dangerous:
If she was irresistibly drawn
to making much too clear
that her unhappiness—
her pain,
her dysfunction,
her drama—
was more precious to her
than you could ever be,
so that as a child
you
had to live your life
frightfully and desperately
scrounging
for whatever
fundamentally unacceptable
version of love
you could squeeze from her,
then this Mother’s Day,
while others
(as you imagine; as we all imagine)
are basking in the warmth
of their exemplary mothers,
you close your eyes,
and say a prayer
for two mothers:
the one you never had,
and the one she never had.
And then say a loving prayer
for yourself,
for the child
raised too alone.
And then open your eyes—
and there is the world,
beautiful again.
you are still here,
and you are not done yet.
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- 1638 – Construction began in Delhi on the Red Fort(Lahori Gate pictured), the residence of the Mughal emperors, now an iconic symbol of India.
- 1779 – Russian and French mediators negotiated the Treaty of Teschen to end the War of the Bavarian Succession.
- 1913 – Russian American Igor Sikorsky flew the world's first multi-engine fixed-wing aircraft, the Russky Vityaz, which he designed himself.
- 1948 – Fifteen Jewish residents of Kibbutz Kfar Etzion were massacred following their surrender after a two-day battle with theArab Legion and Arab settlers.
- 1985 – Eleven members of the American black liberation groupMOVE were killed when a Philadelphia police helicopter dropped a bomb on their house during a raid.
“A wife of noble character who can find? She is worth far more than rubies. She watches over the affairs of her household and does not eat the bread of idleness. Her children arise and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praises her:” - Proverbs 31:10, 27-28
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Morning and Evening by Charles Spurgeon
Morning
"And will manifest myself to him."
John 14:21
John 14:21
The Lord Jesus gives special revelations of himself to his people. Even if Scripture did not declare this, there are many of the children of God who could testify the truth of it from their own experience. They have had manifestations of their Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ in a peculiar manner, such as no mere reading or hearing could afford. In the biographies of eminent saints, you will find many instances recorded in which Jesus has been pleased, in a very special manner to speak to their souls, and to unfold the wonders of his person; yea, so have their souls been steeped in happiness that they have thought themselves to be in heaven, whereas they were not there, though they were well nigh on the threshold of it--for when Jesus manifests himself to his people, it is heaven on earth; it is paradise in embryo; it is bliss begun. Especial manifestations of Christ exercise a holy influence on the believer's heart. One effect will be humility. If a man says, "I have had such-and-such spiritual communications, I am a great man," he has never had any communion with Jesus at all; for "God hath respect unto the lowly: but the proud he knoweth afar off." He does not need to come near them to know them, and will never give them any visits of love. Another effect will be happiness; for in God's presence there are pleasures for evermore. Holiness will be sure to follow. A man who has no holiness has never had this manifestation. Some men profess a great deal; but we must not believe any one unless we see that his deeds answer to what he says. "Be not deceived; God is not mocked." He will not bestow his favours upon the wicked: for while he will not cast away a perfect man, neither will he respect an evil doer. Thus there will be three effects of nearness to Jesus--humility, happiness, and holiness. May God give them to thee, Christian!
Evening
"Fear not to go down into Egypt; for I will there make of thee a great nation: I will go down with thee into Egypt; and I will also surely bring thee up again."
Genesis 46:3-4
Genesis 46:3-4
Jacob must have shuddered at the thought of leaving the land of his father's sojourning, and dwelling among heathen strangers. It was a new scene, and likely to be a trying one: who shall venture among couriers of a foreign monarch without anxiety? Yet the way was evidently appointed for him, and therefore he resolved to go. This is frequently the position of believers now--they are called to perils and temptations altogether untried: at such seasons let them imitate Jacob's example by offering sacrifices of prayer unto God, and seeking his direction; let them not take a step until they have waited upon the Lord for his blessing: then they will have Jacob's companion to be their friend and helper. How blessed to feel assured that the Lord is with us in all our ways, and condescends to go down into our humiliations and banishments with us! Even beyond the ocean our Father's love beams like the sun in its strength. We cannot hesitate to go where Jehovah promises his presence; even the valley of deathshade grows bright with the radiance of this assurance. Marching onwards with faith in their God, believers shall have Jacob's promise. They shall be brought up again, whether it be from the troubles of life or the chambers of death. Jacob's seed came out of Egypt in due time, and so shall all the faithful pass unscathed through the tribulation of life, and the terror of death. Let us exercise Jacob's confidence. "Fear not," is the Lord's command and his divine encouragement to those who at his bidding are launching upon new seas; the divine presence and preservation forbid so much as one unbelieving fear. Without our God we should fear to move; but when he bids us to, it would be dangerous to tarry. Reader, go forward, and fear not.
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Theophilus
[Thēŏph'ĭlŭs] - loved by god, lover of god, or friend of god. A Christian of high rank for whose use Luke wrote his gospel and the Acts of the Apostles (Luke 1:3; Acts 1:1). The term "most excellent," used also of Felix and Festus (Acts 23:26; 24:3; 26:25 ), indicates that Theophilus was a Roman official to whom Luke paid due deference, even though he was on intimate terms with him. It has been suggested "Theophilus" was the name this Gentile nobleman chose at his conversion to Christianity. Evidently Luke had fully instructed him in the cardinal truths of the Gospel (Luke 1:3).
[Thēŏph'ĭlŭs] - loved by god, lover of god, or friend of god. A Christian of high rank for whose use Luke wrote his gospel and the Acts of the Apostles (Luke 1:3; Acts 1:1). The term "most excellent," used also of Felix and Festus (Acts 23:26; 24:3; 26:25 ), indicates that Theophilus was a Roman official to whom Luke paid due deference, even though he was on intimate terms with him. It has been suggested "Theophilus" was the name this Gentile nobleman chose at his conversion to Christianity. Evidently Luke had fully instructed him in the cardinal truths of the Gospel (Luke 1:3).
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Today's reading: 2 Kings 15-16, John 3:1-18 (NIV)
View today's reading on Bible GatewayToday's Old Testament reading: 2 Kings 15-16
Azariah King of Judah
1 In the twenty-seventh year of Jeroboam king of Israel, Azariah son of Amaziah king of Judah began to reign. 2 He was sixteen years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem fifty-two years. His mother's name was Jekoliah; she was from Jerusalem. 3 He did what was right in the eyes of the LORD, just as his father Amaziah had done. 4 The high places, however, were not removed; the people continued to offer sacrifices and burn incense there.
Today's New Testament reading: John 3:1-18
Jesus Teaches Nicodemus
1 Now there was a Pharisee, a man named Nicodemus who was a member of the Jewish ruling council. 2 He came to Jesus at night and said, "Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the signs you are doing if God were not with him."
3 Jesus replied, "Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again."
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