Sunday, August 02, 2015

Sun Aug 2nd Todays News

Andrew Bolt wanted Bronwyn Bishop gone and she has resigned. But the pressure of the unfair campaign against an ally of the PM won't disappear with this success. Selective reporting makes it look like the Speaker had done something wrong. She was a liability to government, it was said. The government could not sell its message with the Speaker being Bishop. A helicopter ride was (hide the grin) over the top. The sums being described, when added to her salary, was less that that paid to the ABC's CEO. Or even the salary of some of those ABC journalists criticising her. Travel expense accounts that were used on travel. That has to stop? Some have compared it to Peter Slipper's abuse of it and it doesn't compare. Bishop is a victim of noise. Those behind the noise are responsible for $600 billion of debt and missing money. Clive Palmer's 'Bye bye Bronny' was delivered on no basis but a sneering offer to use one of his private jets. To put it in perspective, One could deny expenses and salary to all parliamentarians and never approach $1 billion. But a good government like that of Mr Abbott with Bishop as speaker cut spending by tens of billions of dollars. ALP were promising to carry on their juvenile campaign against responsibility. What will they do now? 
=== from 2014 ===
Athens relied on Thebes to have their back. They fought together against the ambitious Macedonian King Phillip II and lost on this day in 338 BC. Phillip was ambitious, but probably not as ambitious as his son, Alexander, who inherited the war machine two years later after Phillip was assassinated by one of his bodyguards. As for my initial remark, Thebes is the setting of the first recorded story of pederasty. The world had changed a lot by 216 BC when, on this day, Hannibal defeated a Roman Army at Cannae. Rome was undefended, but Hannibal discovered prudence and failed to show Alexander's ambition. 

Majorian was Roman Emperor in 461, working to expand it to glory. But he did not have the support of the Senate, and was captured and killed on this day by a disloyal general accusing Majoran of being a puppet. But when it comes to pretexts for extraordinary behaviour, Jean De Clisson is the stronger example. Her husband, Olivier De Clisson was beheaded by the French King on this day in 1343. He had been accused of treason for suggesting the surrender of Nantes. So Jean sold the family castle and bought a fleet of ships to become a pirate. Many may have thought that Howard's government had brought significant riches to Australia and a different administration with Rudd as PM might have been affordable. They were wrong. Similarly, those that elected Hitler may have thought Hindenburg would keep him honest. But Hindenburg died in office and Hitler declared himself Fuhrer on this day in 1934. 

The NorthWest Passage promised great riches to any who might discover a sea trading route from England to China by sailing close to the arctic circle. Henry Hudson, a sea explorer and navigator sailed into Hudson Bay on this day, 1610, on board his ship, Discovery. It wasn't a north west passage. In 1790, the US had her first census, and finally the revolutionary successes began to count. In 1869 the Meiji Reforms in Japan abolished the class system. In 1870 the Tower Subway, the worlds first underground subway opened. In 1873, San Francisco's first cable cars began. The Ottoman Empire slaughtered more of her own people on this day in 1903. Italian Battleship Leonardo Da Vinci sank on this day, 1916. In 1923 Calvin Coolidge became President on the death of Warren Harding. In 1932, the Positron was discovered. In 1937 it became illegal to buy or sell Marijuana in the US. Two years later Einstein Urged FDR to build nuclear weapons, the link being purely temporal. Similarly, on the same day there was a failed uprising in Treblinka death camp in 1943, JFK survived his PT Boat 109 being rammed by a Japanese destroyer. In 1989, Indian Peace Keepers are accused of killing 64 Tamil Tigers. In 1990, Iraq invaded Kuwait. 
=== Publishing News ===
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
Douglas Sutherland-Bruce via David Daniel Ball
Mr Ball, I will not sign your petition as it will do no good, but I will share your message and ask as many of friends who read it, to share it also. Let us see if we cannot use the power of the internet to spread the word of these infamous killings. As a father and a former soldier, I cannot, could not, justify ignoring this appalling action by the perpetrators, whoever they may; I thank you Douglas. You are wrong about the petition. Signing it is as worthless and meaningless an act as voting. A stand up guy would know that. - ed

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

I have begun a bulletin board (http://theconservativevoice.freeforums.net) which will allow greater latitude for members to post and interact. It is not subject to FB policy and so greater range is allowed in posts. Also there are private members rooms in which nothing is censored, except abuse. All welcome, registration is free.
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Happy birthday and many happy returns Joe Hockey and Max Oh. Born on the same day, across the years, along with, John Tyndall (1820), Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi (1834), Jack Warner (1892), Peter O'Toole (1932), Wes Craven (1939), Mary-Louise Parker (1964), Susie O'Neill (1973) and Sam Worthington (1976). On your day, Day of the Republic in the Republic of Macedonia.
338 BC – A Macedonian army defeated the combined forces of Athens and Thebes at the Battle of Chaeronea, securing Macedonian hegemony over the majority of Ancient Greece.
1870 – Tower Subway, the world's first underground tube railway, opened beneath the River Thames in London.
1903 – The Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization started the Ilinden Uprising against the Ottoman Empire in Macedonia.
1923 – Calvin Coolidge became the 30th President of the United States after Warren G. Harding suffered a fatal heart attack.
1947 – A British South American Airways airliner crashed into Mount Tupungato in the Argentine Andes, the wreckage from which was not found until 1998.
1989 – Sri Lankan Civil War: The Indian Peace Keeping Force began killing 64 minority Sri Lankan Tamil civilians over a two-day period in Valvettithurai, Sri Lanka. Try to keep peace keeping peace loving .. and don't kill people. If you must crash, crash safely. You can be anything so try to be what you wish without others dying .. it is a challenge. A back can convert your ottoman to a lovely sofa or chair. The name 'Tower' in Tower Subway was ironic. Ancient victory does not mean tomorrows hegemony.
Matches
Hatches
Despatches
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Adam Goodes racism row:Beware the professional anti-racists, who want skin colour to define identity

Miranda Devine – Saturday, August 01, 2015 (11:56pm)

ARE we pleased now? Now that the Adam Goodes affair has engulfed the nation in division and rancour? 
Sure it’s been papered over, with shows of anti-racism ­yesterday and pious newspaper wraparounds exhorting #IStandWithAdam.

Icon Arrow Continue reading 'Adam Goodes racism row:Beware the professional anti-racists, who want skin colour to define identity'
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HE HAS LODGED A COMPLAINT

Tim Blair – Sunday, August 02, 2015 (1:36pm)

A grand announcement from crusader Ben Eltham: 
I have lodged a formal complaint with the Australian Press Council about Andrew Bolt’s blog post today. 
The ABC’s Paul Barry salivates: “This could be interesting.” It sure could, Paul, if Ben’s investigative skills are up to their usual standard. Andrew has already responded, but Eltham promises more: 
I’ll have more to say about Andrew Bolt and his dishonest denial of the Stolen Generations in an article in New Matilda this week. 
Wow. Ben and New Matilda. What a fact-checking dream team. This may become very interesting indeed.
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WHEN SYDNEY BOOED

Tim Blair – Sunday, August 02, 2015 (11:23am)

Back in 2001, promoting round three of that year’s AFL season, the Sydney Swans aggressively encouraged crowds to boo Sydney’s opponents: 
[Swans communications manager Stephen] Brassel said the “Boo a Roo” marketing slogan was necessary to entice Swans supporters to attend because the match was not part of the club’s membership package.
“It is not going to be the easiest gig we have ever managed because our members may have already decided to go away for the break; and the last thing we need is for the crowd to be in the low thousands,” he said.
“We are going to need all our marketing expertise to make this work, and what we are doing with the ‘Boo a Roo’ thing is capitalising on what has happened in the past. You only have to go back to last year when they (the Roos) played here (in Round 20). They were booed for the whole game.” 
And that was considered a positive thing. Adam Goodes, by the way, played in both the round 20, 2000 and round three, 2001 matches. At least one indigenous player, North Melbourne’s Byron Pickett, would have been the target of Sydney’s crowd.
(Via Catallaxy Files and Bill of End.)
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SHARING CARING

Tim Blair – Sunday, August 02, 2015 (2:31am)

My friend Ken Layne once observed that a subject ceases to be news from the moment papers attach a subject-themed logo.
In the online era, your logo equivalent is the celebrity concern video. 
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ALL-PURPOSE ELIXIR FOR WHATEVER AILS YOU

Tim Blair – Sunday, August 02, 2015 (2:25am)

Hotter weather, colder weather, less ice, more ice – global warming can do everything: 
People who insist that climate change isn’t happening often try to disprove it by pointing to what they see as contradictory phenomena. One example is the oft-repeated claim that there hasn’t been any global warming over the past 17 years, despite rising C02 levels. But one of their most visually compelling arguments has centered upon Antarctic sea ice, which expanded to reach record levels in 2014. If the planet really is warming, they ask, then shouldn’t the ice in the southern ocean be melting? 
The latest response to this from senior warmist James Hansen and his colleagues: 
They argue that the increase in Antarctic sea ice not only doesn’t refute climate change, but actually is caused by warming …
Hansen told the Washington Post that the Antarctic ice expansion trend will continue, along with ice sheet melt. But that acceleration actually will be a sign that climate change is worsening.
“It will be clearer, give us a few more years,” Hansen told the Post. 
Better make it quick, alarmy boy. Time’s a-wastin’.
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THANKS FOR THE MONEY, PEOPLE I HATE

Tim Blair – Sunday, August 02, 2015 (1:22am)

The ABC’s Jonathan Green is in one of his moods: 
You know Australia is better than a handful of rednecks and those raucous lickspittles of the nutbag right. Stand up and say it. 
Millionaire Green is talking about people who pay his wages. If Jonathan would prefer that his bank account not be tainted by the involuntary contributions of raucous lickspittles, he should stand up, say that he’s quitting the ABC and get a real job.
But it probably wouldn’t pay as much.
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TURBINE AWARENESS RAISED

Tim Blair – Sunday, August 02, 2015 (1:20am)

Commence Twitter fury! The avian version of Cecil the lion is killed by whitey: 
A young female golden eagle rescued by San Ramon Valley firefighters in March and rehabilitated by Lindsay Wildlife Hospital died hours after being struck by a wind turbine last Saturday. 
Just like Cecil, the unnamed eagle was even wearing a GPS tracker. Norma Bishop, executive director at Lindsay Wildlife Experience, apparently hopes that the anonymous bird’s death “will raise awareness about the scarce resources in the world and affect behavioral change in humans”.
Mission accomplished. I demand a wind turbine ban.
(Via Gavin Atkins.)
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FREEDOM BEFORE EQUALITY

Tim Blair – Sunday, August 02, 2015 (12:48am)

To commemorate Milton Friedman’s 103rd birthday, John Hawkins presents the great economist’s finest quotes, beginning with: 
A society that puts equality before freedom will get neither. A society that puts freedom before equality will get a high degree of both. 
Read on. And enjoy this 1979 television appearance.
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THE BIRMINGHAM THREE

Tim Blair – Sunday, August 02, 2015 (12:10am)

Experts predicted an Australian Third Test victory within three days.
They were half right. To be fair, however, this is the least predictable Ashes series in decades. Anyone forecasting the result of the Fourth Test, even taking into account England’s loss of James Anderson, is just guessing. It could be won by Bangladesh.
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IS THAT AN iPAD? MAYBE THIS IS AN iPAD

Tim Blair – Saturday, August 01, 2015 (2:32pm)

BBC presenters think everything is an iPad, including packages of paper and their own hands.
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Just go

Andrew Bolt August 02 2015 (6:33am)

Bronwyn Bishop will resign very soon. This cannot go on.
Bishop has now been shamed out of another jaunt:
Bronwyn Bishop has cancelled her next taxpayer-funded overseas trip…
Mrs Bishop had been planning to travel to the United States for an international summit of parliamentary speakers in New York at the end of August… but Mrs Bishop quietly withdrew her travel plans in the wake of public fury over her travel expenses at home and abroad.
But on the stories come. Sam Maiden:
Bronwyn ­Bishop spent $1071 on two chauffeur-driven car trips in Sydney on the same day she used freebie tickets to attend the opening of Yes, Prime Minister with two staffers.
The Speaker’s expenditure on taxpayer-funded luxury limousines and Comcars has been laid bare in parliamentary records that confirm costs of up to $1000 a day for the Liberal MP to be ferried around Sydney. Over the past five years, taxpayers have spent $260,237 on chauffeured cars, limousines and private-plated vehicles to drive Ms Bishop around Sydney, Melbourne, Canberra and other capital cities.
Her spokesman revealed she has often preferred Royale Limousines, that offers chauffeur-driven BMWs, because unlike Comcars they can drive in bus lanes allowing her to get around faster… It is not known if she had any official events on the day of the $1000 chauffeured car booking as her office is refusing to provide details of her official diary while the Finance Department probes Mrs Bishop’s expenses.
Simply laughable. To zip around faster in bus lanes? Spare me.
So no wonder:
SPEAKER Bronwyn Bishop must go, according to Tony Abbott’s own frontbench amid new revelations she is refusing to explain her taxpayer-funded flights to a $1 million Liberal Party fundraiser.
As a senior Liberal minister predicted it would be “resolved’’ over the weekend, other ministers complained they were in the dark about Mr Abbott’s strategy…
Foreign Minister Julie Bishop noted yesterday that the issue of the Speaker’s expenditure “came down to judgment.’’’
Sam Maiden again on trying to stem what’s best stemmed by a resignation:
LUCKY Liberal cabinet ministers were delighted to receive a personal text message from Tony Abbott this week only to learn the content included a prime ministerial instruction to stop talking about Bronwyn Bishop…
At the funeral of the late Western Australian Liberal parliamentarian Don Randall on Friday, there was no escape as colleagues ­directly confronted the PM, telling him she had to go.
Those urging action were said to include Queenslander Warren Entsch, who “loves Bronwyn’’ according to friends but believes the time for dithering is over.
(Thanks to reader Peter of Bellevue Hill.) 
===

On The Bolt Report today, August 2

Andrew Bolt August 02 2015 (6:03am)


image
On Channel 10 at 10am and 3pm:

My guests: gifted Aboriginal blogger Dallas Scott; Australian columnist Niki Savva; IPA boss John Roskam and Rowan Dean, editor of Spectator Australia and columnist for the Courier Mail and Financial Review. 
So much to talk about, including Adam Goodes, Bronwyn Bishop and Labor’s xenophonic campaign against free trade. 
The videos of the shows appear here.
UPDATE
Huge reaction to Dallas. He responds to you in comments below. 
===

A sinister attempt to gag debate on the “stolen generations”

Andrew Bolt August 02 2015 (5:00am)

Absolutely incredible. Sinister.
What I said yesterday:
It is now a sin - even a crime against high art - to mention that despite all the apologies, all the teaching, all the ceremonies and all the newspaper stories, no one to this day has been able to name even 10 of the children allegedly stolen by officials just for being Aborigines. Even the courts cannot find them, for all the activists now appointed to the judiciary. Yet I predict that questioning the “stolen generations” myth will soon be ruled unlawful.
What I read today:
A Melbourne-based journalist encouraged his Twitter followers to make a complaint to the Australian Press Council after a blog post by commentator Andrew Bolt that branded the Stolen Generations a “myth” before lodging his own....
...journalist Ben Eltham ... branded the blog “utterly false” and called for editors and news broadcasters to force Bolt to “put up evidence for racist claims”.
Eltham, the National Affairs Correspondent for New Matilda, urged his followers to make a complaint to the Australian Press Council before making one of his own on Saturday evening and posting it on Twitter.
For many years now I have made my case in print, on air and in public debates with “stolen generations” activists, including one at the Melbourne Writers Festival with Robert Manne. I have quoted court findings, every one of them against the “stolen generations” narrative, particularly in Western Australia, South Australia and the Northern Territory. I have presented the findings of the Aboriginal-led Stolen Generations Taskforce which concluded that in Victoria, too: ”there was no formal policy for removing children”. I have probed the real stories behind the “stolen generations” cases that were compensated in Tasmania.  I have checked the histories presented by a royal commission, the courts, the media, and activists such as Robert Manne, who three times tried and failed to present even 10 cases of children stolen as he once described - children allegedly stolen to rescue them “not from harm ... but from their Aboriginality” to ”keep white Australia pure”.  I have interviewed Lowitja O’Donohue, then co-chair of the National Sorry Day Committee, presenting her with evidence that had her concede she had not actually been stolen from her parents but given to a children’s home by her father. I have debated on radio with Phillip Noyce, director of the Rabbit Proof Fence, and given the evidence to show his film distorts the histories of the children he described. I have presented the evidence of Aborigines who themselves challenge the “stolen generations” narrative.
I have on countless occasions made my arguments, and never once been given what I have asked for: a list of 10 children stolen by officials just because they were Aborigines and not because they were in danger, abandoned, neglected or sent for an education.
I have also put the moral case for questioning the stolen generations: not just that the truth always matters, but that the “stolen generations” myth is killing Aboriginal children by leaving some in dangers from which they’d be removed were they white. I’ve cited utterly tragic examples.
I have done all this, and documented it at virtual book length on this blog. See the material here and here. Yet Eltham, who has done none of that and has not even read my evidence or sought to debate me in the marketplace of ideas, now tries instead to shut up this debate with the cry of “racist!” and the summoning of the speech police.
What a betrayal of free speech, free inquiry and the truth. And how incredibly lazy.
Dangerous days.
Protest. Complain to the Press Council here against Eltham’s crime against free speech, and his attempt to use the council as a weapon against what it should protect.
UPDATE
Eltham has sent me the following material which he’s lifted from a Robert Manne article - one I’ve actually responded to long ago, showing why he has still not presented the 10 names (for instance, a Federal Court test case has already found “the evidence does not support a finding that there was any policy of removal of part-Aboriginal children such as that alleged by the applicants” in the Northern Territory):

Icon Arrow Continue reading 'A sinister attempt to gag debate on the “stolen generations”'
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Pen portrait of Florence Fuller, 1897
Florence Fuller (1867–1946) was a South African-born Australian artist. Originally from Port Elizabeth, Fuller migrated as a child to Melbourne with her family. There she trained with her uncle Robert Hawker Dowling and teacher Jane Sutherland and took classes at the National Gallery of Victoria Art School, becoming a professional artist in the late 1880s. In 1892 she left Australia, travelling first to South Africa, where she met and painted for Cecil Rhodes, and then on to Europe. Between 1895 and 1904 her works were exhibited at the Paris Salonand London's Royal Academy. In 1904, Fuller returned to Australia to live in Perth. She became active in the Theosophical Society and painted some of her best-known works. From 1908, Fuller travelled extensively, living in India and England before ultimately settling in Sydney where she was the inaugural teacher of life drawing at a women's art school. Highly regarded in her lifetime as a portrait and landscape painter, by 1914 Fuller was represented in four public galleries—three in Australia and one in South Africa—a record for an Australian female painter at that time. She subsequently suffered mental illness and sank into obscurity. (Full article...)
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NEWS OF THE MATILDA

Tim Blair – Saturday, August 02, 2014 (5:13pm)

An earlier hacking scandal led to multiple inquiries, police charges and even the closure of a newspaper. Now a new hacking scandal has already claimed two jobs, with possibly more to follow: 
NSW police are close to completing a criminal investigation into computer hacking that led to confidential student records about a $60,000 scholarship granted to Tony Abbott’s daughter being leaked to the left-leaning, online magazine New Matilda.
Wendy Bacon, the prominent journalism teacher and contributing editor of New Matilda, has claimed the leaked information — which also involved a hacker allegedly gaining illegal access to the files of more than 500 other students — was justified in the public interest …
The computer-hacking incident has since become a criminal investigation that is nearing completion, following a complaint to police from management of the Whitehouse Institute about a major security breach involving the alleged illegal accessing and distribution of confidential student records.
So far, two former staff from the Whitehouse Institute have resigned, and Sydney police are understood to have followed the trail of how confidential student information ended up in the hands of Graham and Ms Bacon. 
In 2011, Bacon wrote that the News of the World hacking disgrace involved “the ”active participation of senior executives.” Keep that in mind: 
The Weekend Australian has obtained emails sent on May 20 that start with a then part-time teacher at the Whitehouse Institute, Mellitios Kyriakidis, asking fellow staffer Freya Newman: “Did you get it!!” Ms Newman replies 24 minutes later, saying she is on “edupoint right now and there’s very little on here but just trying to generate a report”.
She adds: “There’s a bit about Francis (sic) meeting with Leanne on Feb 21 2011 and then receiving a managng (sic) director scholarship for 2011 three days later . . that’s all I’ve found for the moment.”
In a further email to Mr Kyriakidis sent 23 minutes later at 6.43pm, Ms Newman, says: “got em. Might go meet Chris now to talk tactics. see you tomorrow.”
New Matilda published its first article on the issue the next day … 
“Chris” may be New Matilda owner and editor Chris Graham. Wendy Bacon is credited with additional reporting in that first article.
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FRIGHTBATS SING

Tim Blair – Saturday, August 02, 2014 (3:18pm)

The Concerned Ladies’ Off-Key Whiner Choir belts out a rousing anti-coal seam gas anthem:



Add this instant classic to previous songs of the doomed.
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BUH-BYE

Tim Blair – Saturday, August 02, 2014 (3:11am)

Remember that bunch of Tamil illegals whose arrival in Australia so excited our leftist friends? Well, they’re gone: 
The 157 Tamil asylum seekers brought to the Australian mainland last week after a month at sea have been flown to Nauru in a secret overnight operation, after all refused offers to return to India …
It is believed three aircraft, leaving at one-hour intervals from 9.30pm last night, were commissioned by the government after a final offer for their safe return to India was rejected by the boat people. 
Good work.
UPDATE. Guardian readers are sad. So is SMH Saturday editor Josephine Tovey, whose paper was 11 hours late to this story: 
Sickening … 
It sure is, Jo. Don’t you have anyone monitoring rival sites? The SMH eventually pulled this together, with the help of AAP. Great quote: 
Lawyer George Newhouse said he thought they were still in Australia before learning of the move from media.
“I found out from News Corp just like everyone else,” he said. 
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BUT THIS IS AN ARTIST!

Tim Blair – Saturday, August 02, 2014 (2:23am)

Same big crate at a much lower rate: 
A Western Sydney company has offered to build Lord Mayor Clover Moore’s giant upside-down milk crate artwork for a fifth of the $2.5 million set aside to pay for it …
But such a practical, no-nonsense approach to the project was greeted with horror at the City of Sydney. When presented with a $2 million saving for producing exactly the same thing, a flabbergasted press officer stammered: “But this is an artist who is going to build an artwork!” 
The council is run by idiots. Meanwhile, here’s another artist.
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The Bolt Report tomorrow

Andrew Bolt August 02 2014 (11:15am)


imageimageimageimage
On Channel 10 at 10am and 4pm…
Editorial: Gaza and the rise of the Jew haters
My guest:  Environment Minister Greg Hunt on defying the greens trying to stop the biggest coal mine in the country
The panel: Tim Wilson and Kimberley Kitching.
NewsWatch:  The Daily Telegraph’s Miranda Devine.  Taking on some ABC spin and a particularly foul SMH cartoon.
Plus the genocide the media ignores. And Ricky Muir can’t even run his office.
The videos of the shows appear here.
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How the ABC maintains group discipline

Andrew Bolt August 02 2014 (11:03am)

The ABC really is far too incestuous. Gerard Henderson, in another Media Watch Dogcrammed with goodies, details a particularly startling example of how group-think discipline is maintained:
Last Monday on the ABC 1 News Breakfast program, co-presenter Virginia Trioli praised the ABC Fact Check. Not for the first time. And – not for the first time – La Trioli neglected to point out that the head of the Fact Check is none other than Mr Trioli – aka Russell Skelton. 
And so it came to pass that John Barron was given time – along with a soft-interview by La Trioli – to tell us all about the ABC Fact Check’s most recent initiative. Namely, the Promise Tracker – by which the likes of Messrs Skelton and Barron will tell us whether or not Prime Minister Tony Abbott is keeping his pre-election promises. According to their opinion, of course. After all, Mr Skelton is on the record as expressing his contempt for conservatives – only describing them in The Age (of course) as “pesky possums”.
First up, La Trioli congratulated John Barron on “a great achievement”. Then, in winding up the interview, La Trioli described the Promise Tracker as “a great thing to see” and, once again, extended her “congratulations to you and the team”. As in – “Well done, Darling”.

And, of course, Henderson supplies more evidence of the ABC’s anti-Israel bias. Hit the link. 
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If Ricky Muir cannot even lead his staff, what hope the nation?

Andrew Bolt August 02 2014 (10:57am)

The nation’s affairs in their hands:
The office of Ricky Muir has spectacularly imploded, with allegations of racism, sexism, bullying - and even personal threats against the rookie senator - at the heart of a dispute that led to the sacking of his most senior aide, Glenn Druery… 
Mr Druery has laid the blame for his shock dismissal with Australian Motoring Enthusiast Party founder Keith Littler who he accused on Friday of plotting to take Senator Muir’s seat in Parliament…
Fairfax Media has obtained an incident report to the Parliament dated July 18, raising serious questions about Mr Littler’s conduct since July 1.
The email, sent by Peter Breen, a policy adviser in Senator Muir’s office, outlines ‘’numerous clashes’’ between Mr Druery and Mr Littler and states that ‘’at least one Senator’’ has complained about Mr Littler.
‘’Mr Littler and Mr Druery had numerous clashes about Mr Littler’s presence in the office, his volatile temper, aggression, offensive language, inappropriate remarks about Aboriginal people, Asians and women and his disagreeable demeanour more generally when confronted by people or issues that did not comply with his world view,’’ the letter states… ‘’It should also be said that Mr Druery has had a difficult relationship with Mr Littler ever since he, Mr Littler, made personal threats against Senator Muir prior to the Senator taking office over the appropriate pay-grade at which Mr Littler and his wife should be employed.’’ 
UPDATE
Clive Palmer could be the winner: 
While Clive Palmer is understood to have had nothing to do with Druery’s sacking, The Australian has been told that Mr Palmer was upset that Mr Druery had been helping Senator Muir become his own person.Mr Druery’s departure is expected to solidify Senator Muir’s alliance with PUP.
But one small ray of hope for the Abbott Government that not all PUPs bark the same:
PALMER United Party senator Jacqui Lambie has found at least one part of the Abbott government budget on which she is willing to move, telling Joe Hockey yesterday she would consider a means test on the $1.3 billion Schoolkids Bonus if it can be retained for the very poor. 
It’s the first sign of concession from anyone in the new party as the federal government continues its hearts and minds mission to convince crossbench senators of the virtue of tough economic management… Abolishing the bonus would save the budget about $4.5 billion over the forward estimates.
(Thanks to reader Peter of Bellevue Hill.) 
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Can we trust Labor with national security when it panders to ethnic votes?

Andrew Bolt August 02 2014 (10:51am)

Labor is so in hock to Muslim voters in key marginal seats that I question whether it can be trusted with our national security:
THE risk of terror attacks on Australian soil, including on public transport networks in capital cities, is significantly ­increased because the Gillard government downplayed a report on the dangers posed by returning home-grown jihadists. 
The blunt assessment was ­issued yesterday by Anthony Whealy QC, the former judge who chaired a 2013 counter-­terrorism review and who sentenced Australian terrorist Khaled Sharrouf to five years’ jail…
Mr Whealy, who chaired the Council of Australian Governments committee’s review of counter-terrorism legislation, said that when the report warning of serious attacks in Australia was presented to the Gillard government in March last year, it was held for two months and then quietly tabled on budget night in May…
Mr Whealy’s 2013 report made it clear there was “a real risk that Australian citizens presently undergoing training overseas with extremist groups might return to Australia with extremist convictions or terrorist capability, posing a threat that those persons or their associates may consider carrying out some form of serious terrorist activity”.
He said current attempts to revisit the legislation could have begun earlier had the review been given more immediate attention. “The response from the previous government you would have to say was slow,’’ Mr Whealy said. “The present government is attempting to act very rapidly to meet the threat of extremism coming back into this country… I’m pleased that they’re moving now.”
So what are these changes to legislation Whealy refers to and how is Labor responding?
Tony Abbott has confirmed his government will bring forward legislation to deal with its current problems prosecuting Australian fighters participating in bloody sectarian conflicts overseas. 
A month ago the attorney general, George Brandis flagged a radical overhaul of the law that would see Australians visiting Syria or northern Iraq or other conflict zones presumed to be in the country for “no good purpose” – rather than assumed to be innocent… Such a change would mean any returnees from these regions would have to prove they were not involved in the insurgencies, rather than the conventional practice of people being presumed innocent until proven guilty…
The opposition leader, Bill Shorten, said the government needed to maintain a “balanced approach” to strengthening national security legislation.
“Not everyone who goes to the Middle East is a bad person. I think we have to be very careful in this complex situation about demonising Australians of Middle-Eastern backgrounds,” Shorten said on Friday… “… we just need to make sure we’re doing all of this national security, keeping a weather eye on civil rights.” 
UPDATE
 Can you trust Democrats, either? Bill Clinton said - one day before September 11 - he could have killed Osama bin Laden:
An audio tape of Bill Clinton released on Wednesday confirmed longstanding reports that he ‘could have killed’ Osama bin Laden but decided not to because he was concerned about civilian casualties in Kandahar, Afghanistan. 
The audio recording, made with Clinton’s permission by former president of Australia’s Liberal Party Michael Kroger and released to Sky News by Kroger, reveals Clinton telling the former Australian politician and more than two dozen Australian businessman about the missed opportunity during a visit to Australia several months after the end of his presidency. The conversation eerily took place the day before the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks masterminded by bin Laden.
(Thanks to reader Gab.) 
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Police investigating the smearing of Abbott’s daughter

Andrew Bolt August 02 2014 (10:42am)

What depths some people sink to in order to attack the Prime Minister and smear his daughter:
NSW police are close to completing a criminal investigation into computer hacking that led to confidential student records about a $60,000 scholarship granted to Tony Abbott’s daughter being leaked to the left-leaning, online magazine New Matilda. 
Wendy Bacon, the prominent journalism teacher and contributing editor of New Matilda, has claimed the leaked information — which also involved a hacker allegedly gaining illegal access to the files of more than 500 other students — was justified in the public interest.
Ms Bacon, who co-wrote the New Matilda article with the publication’s editor, Chris Graham, has tweeted multiple times since it appeared on May 21, declaring that the documents showed a scholarship awarded to Frances Abbott by the Sydney-based Whitehouse Institute of Design was not based on merit…
Mr Abbott has dismissed the suggestion he was required to declare a scholarship for his daughter, and the Whitehouse Institute claims it was awarded on merit.
The computer-hacking incident has since become a criminal investigation that is nearing completion, following a complaint to police from management of the Whitehouse Institute about a major security breach involving the alleged illegal accessing and distribution of confidential student records.
So far, two former staff from the Whitehouse Institute have resigned, and Sydney police are understood to have followed the trail of how confidential student information ended up in the hands of Graham and Ms Bacon.
The Weekend Australian has obtained emails sent on May 20 that start with a then part-time teacher at the Whitehouse Institute, Mellitios Kyriakidis, asking fellow staffer Freya Newman: “Did you get it!!” Ms Newman replies 24 minutes later, saying she is on “edupoint right now and there’s very little on here but just trying to generate a report”.
She adds: “There’s a bit about Francis (sic) meeting with Leanne on Feb 21 2011 and then receiving a managng (sic) director scholarship for 2011 three days later . . that’s all I’ve found for the moment.”
In a further email to Mr Kyriakidis sent 23 minutes later at 6.43pm, Ms Newman, says: “got em. Might go meet Chris now to talk tactics. see you tomorrow.”
New Matilda published its first article on the issue the next day… Ms Bacon did not reply to ­ questions last night about whether she would have concerns if material from Ms Abbott’s student records, and those of others, were inappropriately and possibly illegally obtained.
Like another rabid Abbott-hater, Jenna Price, Bacon is a journalism academic at the University of Technology, Sydney. Exactly what does that university have to offer journalism students not of the far Left? Exactly what hatreds is its journalism faculty preaching? What vendettas is it pursuing against conservatives? And how sloppy is it?
(Thanks to reader Peter of Bellevue Hill.) 
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Palmer vs Abbott: judge by the MH17 search results

Andrew Bolt August 02 2014 (10:00am)

image
If it were up to Clive Palmer:
The Palmer United leader, who has not had a security briefing, said recovering the bodies [from the MH17] was not worth the risk to personnel taking part in the mission. 
“I just don’t think it’s realistic to have a lot of people who are alive worrying about recovering remains that’s going to put anyone’s life in danger, to be honest with you, I just can’t see the point of it,’’ he said. 
But it’s up to Prime Minister Tony Abbott:
A FULL team of 60 international investigators — including 40 Australian Federal Police — has begun searching for human remains after forging a treacherous path through a war zone to reach the Malaysia Airlines crash site.
Persistence is now paying off for the investigators, who paused for a minute’s silence at the area ... By the end of the day the Dutch Ministry of Security confirmed remains had been found. “We can pleased that we can ensure these remains are now transported to the Netherlands,” it said in a statement. “We hope this will be a consolation for the bereaved.” 
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Not a war about nothing

Andrew Bolt August 02 2014 (9:34am)

Paul Kelly attacks the myth that World War I was just a colossal mistake by the leaders of every Great Power - a mere war of choice:
Over time, as British historian Margaret MacMillan says, the idea arose that the Great War “was nobody’s fault or everybody’s (fault)”. From the 1960s, such delusion became a sign of sensibility and sophistication from the educated class. In the end, the story of World War I was carried by the legacy of poets and anti-war cultural practitioners. 
The mythology created by the writers and filmmakers becomes its own reality: the war was a terrible blunder, nobody’s fault, a shocking accident that saw millions sacrificed in vain, a case of the common people betrayed by their failed leaders and smug generals. The brilliant Australian film Gallipoli, by David Williamson and Peter Weir, was a modest local version of the genre…
And the conventional answer [on why the world went to war] was pervasive: because of its flawed societies, corrupt empires, imperialist greed, militarist obsessions and self-serving racist and class-ridden elitism. There is a viciou­s sub-text: one empire was as bad as another.
The war, however, was not an accident…
It is a fact that France, Russia and Britain had no pre-war designs on Germany or plans to instig­ate action against Germany…
In his classic account, historian David Stevenson said: “At the root of everything that followed was Germany’s decision to march two million men westward across industrial and rural landscapes that had known decades of peace. The shock it caused to other countries was scarcely less than such an event might cause today."…
Their objective on the Western Front was a German-dominated Western Europe extending to the Channel. Their objective in the East was a diminished Russia, crippled long-term against a more formidable German position.
At the outset, German forces, angry that Belgium had decided to fight the invaders, torched and sacked the ancient town of Louvain, burnt its historic library, killed hundreds of civilians and transported 1500 civilians back to Germany…
Britain went to war because strategically it would not allow Germany to liquidate France as a great power. Prime minister Herbert Asquith wrote that Britain “cannot allow Germany to use the channel as a hostile base”. Beyond that, Britain had obligations to Belgium’s neutrality…
The… British Empire had compelling reasons for war. This was widely seen at the time by governments and peoples. And not just at the time — the commitment of allied armies and home fronts for four years reflected a basic truth: they believed they were fighting a just cause for principles of freedom. France and Belgium were fighting to save their nations intact. Long before the war’s end, Germany was a de facto military dictatorship. As time advances, the two world wars will increasingly be seen as different chapters in the same bigger event: a prolonged 30-year struggle over the aspirations of Germany, easily the most powerful nation on the continent, to satisfy its ambitions for power, territory and recognition. 
One of the worst distortions of this history - and one of the most culturally influential - was the Marxism-inspired hit Oh What a Lovely War, with so many great tunes:
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Hamas breaks the fourth ceasefire, too. It wants this war

Andrew Bolt August 02 2014 (9:11am)

Hamas wants this war. It broke every one of the first three cease-fires, and now breaks the fourth:

Israel declared a Gaza ceasefire over on Friday, saying Hamas militants breached the truce soon after it took effect and apparently captured an Israeli officer while killing two other soldiers. 
Renewed Israeli shelling killed more than 70 Palestinians and wounded some 220, hospital officials said....
The Israeli military said that 90 minutes into the truce, militants attacked soldiers searching for tunnels in the southern Gaza Strip used to infiltrate fighters into Israel. “Out of a tunnel access point or several, terrorists came out of the ground. At least one was a suicide terrorist who detonated himself. There was an exchange of fire,” said Lieutenant-Colonel Peter Lerner, a military spokesman. Two of the soldiers were killed… He said Israeli forces were mounting an “extensive effort” to locate the officer, Second-Lieutenant Hadar Goldin, 23. 
UN boss Ban Ki Moon attacks Hamas:
“The Secretary-General condemns in the strongest terms, the reported violation by Hamas of the mutually agreed humanitarian ceasefire which commenced this morning. He is shocked and profoundly disappointed by these developments,” Ban’s spokesman said in a statement. 
UPDATE
Channel 10’s The Project last night, with Waleed Aly as co-host, said Israel broke the ceasefire.
UPDATE
Bottom line:
If Hamas stops shooting, the war is over.
If Israel stops shooting, the war continues.
UPDATE
Readers say I haven’t expressed the issue crisply enough.
Reader bush accountant:
Simpler still.  If Hamas lay down their weapons, there will be no more war. 
If Israel lay down their weapons, there will be no more Israel.
Reader The Realist:
Bottom line: If Hamas stops shooting, the war is over. If Israel stops shooting, the war continues. 
Wrong conclusion. If Israel stops shooting, Israel is over
UPDATE
In which case, writes Piers Akerman...:
THE real message coming from the Gazan conflict is give war a chance… The only way for peace in Gaza is for Israel to win a clear victory, not another no-win, no-lose settlement that gives succour to terrorism… Defeating terrorism in Gaza would be a severe setback to the Islamist extremists who are at war with each other in Syria, Libya, Iraq, Afghanistan, Africa and elsewhere.
UPDATE
The ABC, running a vehemently anti-Israel line, does it again. Reader Kukuru reports:
Yesterday ABC Breaking news: “Breaking news – Gaza cease-fire: Gaza officials says Israeli tank fire kills at least four Palestinians nearly 2 hours into ceasefire.” 
No mention that it was again in a response to a Hamas attack.
That lasted for about 15 minutes. Then – “Israel claims it was response to a Hamas attack.” But very quickly it disappeared from the screen. And again: “Gaza officials says Israeli tank fire kills at least four Palestinians nearly 2 hours into ceasefire.” Immediately this was quoted on twitter and retweeted through the network.
I haven’t confirmed this account for myself. I’d appreciate being sent further evidence such as screenshots. 
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The world has heard the US border is open

Andrew Bolt August 02 2014 (8:34am)

image
News that the US border with Mexico is open has spread around the world - just as it did when Labor weakened our own border laws with similarly deadly effect:

The dead bodies of illegal immigrants are turning up in south Texas as Central Americans pour across the U.S.-Mexico border, and a veterinarian who ranches cattle 70 miles from ground zero has the photos to prove it. 
Dr. Mike ‘Doc’ Vickers of Brooks County, Texas showed some of the grisly images… Vickers, 64, told MailOnline on Wednesday that since 2012 his organization, the Texas Border Volunteers, has counted 259 dead bodies in his native Brooks County alone, including those of children.... ‘We found a dead 12-year-old boy on my neighbor’s property.’..
Burgard also saw an Urdu-to-English dictionary that Vickers picked up near his ranch, dropped by ‘a coyote leading a group of Middle Easterners into our country.’ And Chinese immigrants, paying up to $50,000 each to be smuggled into Ecuador and then into the United States, are now numerous enough that the federal government has added Mandarin translations to signs at emergency stations dotting the Texas border region. 
This week:
A single group of illegal aliens entering Texas from Mexico over the weekend included foreign nationals from Bangladesh, Nepal, and Sri Lanka, according to the National Border Patrol Council...
A month ago:
Border Patrol union officials in the Rio Grande Valley Sector tell National Review Online that they’ve noticed a recent uptick in the number of Chinese border crossers…  
“[Traffic of Chinese-born persons] seemed to have dried up for awhile, but then maybe within the last month or so it seemed to have increased,” says Albert Spratte, the sergeant-at-arms of the National Border Patrol Council Local 3307 in the Rio Grande Valley. “You see them in threes or fours, and it’s always, ‘Oh, the one-child policy, the one-child policy, don’t want to go back.’...” Spratte says a few Chinese nationals crossed the river into Texas via jet skis near Anzalduas Park in Mission, Texas, last week. 
And:
The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime [in 2012] released a report, “Transnational Organized Crime in Central America and the Caribbean,” that identifies both Mexican cartels and street gangs as conduits for individuals from Africa and Asia entering the U.S illegally… [It] states: 

Central Americans are not the only ones being smuggled through Mexico to the United States. Irregular migrants from the Horn of Africa (Eritrea, Somalia, and Ethiopia), as well as South Asia (Bangladesh, Nepal, India), China, and other African and Asian states are being smuggled through Central America.
Parents have heard the US won’t send back children, and so:
image 
Some 57,000 unaccompanied children have crossed the border since October, more than double the number last year.
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Boat people fraud exposed: Tamils refuse Indian offer of asylum

Andrew Bolt August 02 2014 (7:48am)

Sri Lankans turn down an offer of asylum - again - from India, proving they are not genuine refugees looking only for safety:
ALL the 157 people, including 50 children, who left India almost six weeks ago on a people-smuggler’s boat will arrive at the Nauru ­asylum-seeker camp today from the Curtin detention centre in Western Australia after refusing to see Indian consular officials. 
The Abbott government decided to send all those from the boat late yesterday to the Pacific nation’s detention centre because they decided not to meet Indian government officials after re­ceiving advice from refugee ­advocates. 
The “refugee” advocates also demonstrate that they are not looking simply to find a safe place for refugees.
Consider:
These Tamils would almost certainly have been safe in Sri Lanka, to where more than 11,000 refugees have been returned already with UN help.
They would have certainly been safe in India, where most have been living for years.
This is a gigantic fraud against Australian taxpayers. 
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Pastor Rick Warren
The sign that a church is personality-driven NOT purpose-driven is that the pastor is always tired. I can teach you a better way.
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Pastor Rick Warren
Your illness isn't your identity.Your sickness isn't your soul. Many have strong character and weak chemistry. 
http://bit.ly/HnE6ib
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Pastor Rick Warren
They are inviting .. but I have to convey that better - ed
Is your ministry blocking your family from getting to Jesus? "Jesus' mother and brothers couldn't get to him because of the crowds." Luke 8:19
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Much prayer,much power. Little prayer,little power. No prayer,no power.
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Pastor Rick Warren
Why this Rabbi Went To Church Last Sunday" really moved me. Please read and share it: http://huff.to/15z8iRP
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Pastor Rick Warren
The most comforting notes that I've received since my son died have been from the people that Matthew led to Jesus. 
In God's garden of Grace,even broken trees bear fruit.
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J.John
Thanksgiving is good but thanks-living is better. Matthew Henry
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Did Obama just save Hamas?
If Obama had a son...

The national debt has been stuck on $16,699,396,000,000.00 — for 70 straight days. Nevertheless, the Treasury has sold at least $53.267 billion in debt, while somehow remaining $25 million under the debt ceiling.
But the president has decided to circumvent Congress yet again…
With a stroke of his pen,
Dictator President Barack Obama paved the way for more aid to the Palestinian Authority on Friday, waiving congressional restrictions on funding to the organization — again.
Citing the United States’ “national security interests,” the president signed an executive order providing $148 million to the Palestinian Authority. That is in addition to the $500 million Obama authorized just four months ago, also in apparent violation of congressional authority. At that time, Secretary of State John Kerry said he would like to see an additional $200 million go to the Palestinian group, according to The Washington Times.
“Some lawmakers oppose the aid, both because of sequestration budget cuts and the Palestinian Authority’s ties to the terrorist organization Hamas,” the Times reported.
A group of U.S. citizens filed a lawsuit in a Manhattan federal district court on Nov. 25, 2012, seeking an end to Palestinian Authority aid. The action challenges congressional restrictions on providing direct aid to the group.
Section 3 of the Palestinian Accountability Act provides in part, “No funds available to any United States Government department or agency to carry out the provisions of chapter 4 of part II of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 for any fiscal year may be obligated or expended with respect to providing funds to the Palestinian Authority.”
An administration official referred to the $148 million in aid as, “the most immediate and efficient means of helping the PA maintain and build the foundations of a viable, peaceful Palestinian state.”
Think of that $148 million as Obama’s personal Ramadan gift to the Palestinian Authority.
Obama has been handing out Ramadan gifts aplenty this week including the release of 5 Taliban and 2 Algerians from Gitmo.
Congress is incompetent or corrupt or both.
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The CIA is polygraphing its operatives on a regular basis in an “unprecedented” effort to prevent Benghazi secrets from leaking out, CNN’s Drew Griffin is reporting, citing unnamed inside sources.
“Since January, some CIA operatives involved in the agency’s missions in Libya, have been subjected to frequent, even monthly polygraph examinations, according to a source with deep inside knowledge of the agency’s workings,” the bombshell report reveals. “The goal of the questioning, according to sources, is to find out if anyone is talking to the media or Congress.”
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Allyson Christy
"Mr. Obama may well consider Snowden a flaky slacker, but he is a hero to much of the world, and his flight from justice is a global cause célèbre. From the perspective of the global community being targeted by the NSA, Moscow is seizing the moral high ground. 

Mr. Obama’s lack of response makes him look weaker by the day, and his studied indifference to the case only magnifies his impotence.

He claims he “shouldn’t have to” get involved in resolving the situation, but there is a growing belief that the real reason he isn’t trying to resolve it is because he can’t." - James S Robbins

obama_putin_thumb
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Netanyahu then approached the podium and said, “I did not plan to speak, but I heard Member of Knesset Zahalka’s statement. You said, ‘We were here before you and we’ll be here after you’re gone.’ The first part is not true and the second part will never happen.”
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Holly Sarah Nguyen
"knows that true joy does not come from being self centered, spouse centered, work centered or money centered, it only comes from being Christ centered."
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Recently the IDF was widely condemned after left-wing Israeli groups publicized a video clip showing Israeli soldiers allegedly arresting a sobbing Arab child in the city of Hevron. The child was taken into custody after hurling rocks at Israelis who were driving past.
Now IDF legal experts have spoken out to explain why the child was detained – and why the detention was for his own good.
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By Walid Shoebat and Ben Barrack

The half-brother of the President of the United States is the Executive Secretary of an organization that was founded by an Sudanese Islamic terrorist – Hassan al-Turabi – who was extremely close with the masterminds behind each World Trade Center attack (2/26/93 and 9/11/01). As the Executive Secretary of the Islamic Da’wa Organization (IDO), Malik Obama is connected to Sudan’s genocidal President Omar al-Bashir, through the IDO. Consider that Turabi was proven to be connected to the “blind Sheikh”, who was the mastermind of the first World Trade Center attack (bombing) in 1993. In 1994, the Clinton administration’s Secretary of State – Warren Christopher – “placed Sudan on the list of state sponsors of terrorism” and it’s been there ever since.

In our May 28th report, we showed photos of al-Bashir, Suar Al Dahab (Malik’s boss), and Malik himself at the 23rd IDO Conference in Khartoum in 2010. Al Dahab has hobnobbed with both the Prime Minister of Hamas – Ismail Haniyeh – and the Spiritual head of the Muslim Brotherhood – Sheikh Yusuf Al-Qaradawi.
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<Imagine what else archaeologists and historians would have found had the Muslim authorities not systematically destroyed artifacts and historical discoveries in what Natan Sharansky has called the largest archeological catastrophe in history.

Obviously there is a savage movement afoot that doesn't want to know; nor do they want anyone else to, either.

MK Aryeh Eldad has brought to the floor of the Knesset the unsupervised digging carried out by the Muslim authorities (the "Wakf") on the Temple Mount by means of heavy machinery. "I received a series of photographs of digs on the Temple Mount near the Dome of the Rock," the parliamentary question read. "The police are present on the scene but there is no supervision by the Department of Antiquities regarding finds taken out of the digs, and there is a serious concern that they could be destroyed by the Wakf. What will be done in the short term to stop the destruction of the remains of the Temple?"

Here we see the systematic destruction, maybe the biggest destruction in the history of geology/archaeology: the destruction of the most important artifacts for Christianity and Judaism. And the world knows nothing of this and does nothing about this. Nobody is permitted to go and see and watch what's happening. Excavators are working there. They are taking thousands and thousands of pounds and thousands of artifacts and simply throwing them out.>

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hing to do is to stop feeding the beast and stop believing there's more than one hound. It's all one animal. And it hates us. And it will go on hating us. And it will go on biting us as long as we let it. We are no longer bidding for the Muslim world as an ally. We are bidding to prevent it from being our enemy. But the very people we are bidding for, already see us as the enemy. We are not going to change that with free weapons and speeches praising their enlightenment. By competing for their favor, we are only bidding against ourselves, and paying out to our enemies. By competing for their favor, we are only undercutting ourselves.> - See more at: http://sultanknish.blogspot.com.au/2013/07/playing-for-islam-against-ourselves.html#sthash.G5vjJERC.dpuf
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Pro-abortion protestors gathered outside of one Republican Governor's house after he signed a pro-life bill.

You won't believe the kind gesture he performed that made them pack up and leave...
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I walked into Tripodi's office asking for help .. and felt my life was threatened for it. I was stunned at the power Tripodi apparently had among the media. Apparently, he is losing friends. - ed
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<Another whining wet-behind-the-ears pinko former Labor lawyer who will still probably prop up Labor indirectly by preferential voting. But he takes a good swipe at Rudd's hypocrisy on boats so it's worth a read.>
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Leó Szilárd
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Events[edit]

Births[edit]

Deaths[edit]

Holidays and observances[edit]

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“You are my refuge and my shield; I have put my hope in your word.” Psalm 119:114 NIV
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Charles Spurgeon's Morning and Evening

Morning

"Let me now go to the field, and glean ears of corn."
Ruth 2:2
Downcast and troubled Christian, come and glean today in the broad field of promise. Here are abundance of precious promises, which exactly meet thy wants. Take this one: "He will not break the bruised reed, nor quench the smoking flax." Doth not that suit thy case? A reed, helpless, insignificant, and weak, a bruised reed, out of which no music can come; weaker than weakness itself; a reed, and that reed bruised, yet, he will not break thee; but on the contrary, will restore and strengthen thee. Thou art like the smoking flax: no light, no warmth, can come from thee; but he will not quench thee; he will blow with his sweet breath of mercy till he fans thee to a flame. Wouldst thou glean another ear? "Come unto me all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." What soft words! Thy heart is tender, and the Master knows it, and therefore he speaketh so gently to thee. Wilt thou not obey him, and come to him even now? Take another ear of corn: "Fear not, thou worm Jacob, I will help thee, saith the Lord and thy Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel." How canst thou fear with such a wonderful assurance as this? Thou mayest gather ten thousand such golden ears as these! "I have blotted out thy sins like a cloud, and like a thick cloud thy transgressions." Or this, "Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool." Or this, "The Spirit and the Bride say, Come, and let him that is athirst come, and whosoever will let him take the water of life freely." Our Master's field is very rich; behold the handfuls. See, there they lie before thee, poor timid believer! Gather them up, make them thine own, for Jesus bids thee take them. Be not afraid, only believe! Grasp these sweet promises, thresh them out by meditation and feed on them with joy.

Evening

"Thou crownest the year with thy goodness."
Psalm 65:11
All the year round, every hour of every day, God is richly blessing us; both when we sleep and when we wake his mercy waits upon us. The sun may leave us a legacy of darkness, but our God never ceases to shine upon his children with beams of love. Like a river, his lovingkindness is always flowing, with a fulness inexhaustible as his own nature. Like the atmosphere which constantly surrounds the earth, and is always ready to support the life of man, the benevolence of God surrounds all his creatures; in it, as in their element, they live, and move, and have their being. Yet as the sun on summer days gladdens us with beams more warm and bright than at other times, and as rivers are at certain seasons swollen by the rain, and as the atmosphere itself is sometimes fraught with more fresh, more bracing, or more balmy influences than heretofore, so is it with the mercy of God; it hath its golden hours; its days of overflow, when the Lord magnifieth his grace before the sons of men. Amongst the blessings of the nether springs, the joyous days of harvest are a special season of excessive favour. It is the glory of autumn that the ripe gifts of providence are then abundantly bestowed; it is the mellow season of realization, whereas all before was but hope and expectation. Great is the joy of harvest. Happy are the reapers who fill their arms with the liberality of heaven. The Psalmist tells us that the harvest is the crowning of the year. Surely these crowning mercies call for crowning thanksgiving! Let us render it by the inward emotions of gratitude. Let our hearts be warmed; let our spirits remember, meditate, and think upon this goodness of the Lord. Then let us praise him with our lips, and laud and magnify his name from whose bounty all this goodness flows. Let us glorify God by yielding our gifts to his cause. A practical proof of our gratitude is a special thank-offering to the Lord of the harvest.
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Today's reading: Psalm 57-59, Romans 4 (NIV)

View today's reading on Bible Gateway

Today's Old Testament reading: Psalm 57-59

For the director of music. To the tune of "Do Not Destroy." Of David. A miktam. When he had fled from Saul into the cave.
1 Have mercy on me, my God, have mercy on me,
for in you I take refuge.
I will take refuge in the shadow of your wings
until the disaster has passed.
2 I cry out to God Most High,
to God, who vindicates me.
3 He sends from heaven and saves me,
rebuking those who hotly pursue me-
God sends forth his love and his faithfulness.

Today's New Testament reading: Romans 4

Abraham Justified by Faith
1 What then shall we say that Abraham, our forefather according to the flesh, discovered in this matter? 2 If, in fact, Abraham was justified by works, he had something to boast about-but not before God. 3 What does Scripture say? "Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness."
4 Now to the one who works, wages are not credited as a gift but as an obligation. 5 However, to the one who does not work but trusts God who justifies the ungodly, their faith is credited as righteousness. 6 David says the same thing when he speaks of the blessedness of the one to whom God credits righteousness apart from works:
7 "Blessed are those
whose transgressions are forgiven,
whose sins are covered.
8 Blessed is the one
whose sin the Lord will never count against them."
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Lydia

Anna

The Woman Who Became the First Christian Missionary
Scripture Reference - Luke 2:36-38
Name Meaning - Favor, or Grace. Anna is the same with Hannah of the Old Testament, and was the Phoenician name used by Virgil for the sister of Dido, queen of Carthage.
Family Connection - Anna was the daughter of Phanuel, a name identical with Penuel, and meaning, "The face, or appearance of God." The name of her husband who died young is not given. Like Anna, he, too, doubtlessly waited for the salvation of God. Her father was of the tribe of Asher - one of the so-called "lost tribes." This is all we know of the ancestry of Anna, who, although her biography is one of the briefest in Bible history, lived a life that is still fragrant. Her name is a popular one for girls. Elsdon C. Smith in The Story of Our Names says that there are over half-a-million girls and women in America alone who have the name of Anna.
In our exposition of this most renowned of Bible widows we deem it best to take her record as given by the beloved physician, Luke, who says of her that -
She Was a Prophetess
Jezebel, the self-styled and false prophetess is the only other one in the New Testament (Revelation 2:20) to bear this designation. Philip's four daughters also prophesied (Acts 21:9). The narrative does not tell us why she was known as a prophetess. It may be that her long departed husband had been a prophet, or because under divine inspiration she herself told future events, or spent her time celebrating the praises of God (1 Samuel 10:5; 1 Chronicles 25:1-3). To prophesy simply means to proclaim a divine message, and Anna was one to whom it was given to know events before and after, and one through whom God spoke to others. Anna must be included in that continuous line of prophets and prophetesses who had heralded the coming of the Messiah through succeeding generations. As she gazed upon the face of the Babe of Bethlehem Anna knew that the past predictions of Him were fulfilled. Through her long, godly life her mind had become saturated with Old Testament prophecies concerning the coming of the seed of the woman to bruise the serpent's head. Waiting unceasingly for Christ she believed, along with Simeon, that Mary's first-born Son was indeed the rod out of the stem of Jesse (Isaiah 11:1; Micah 5:2).
She Was of a Great Age
Anna was married for only seven years, and remained a widow for eighty-four years. All of this means that she must have been over one hundred years old when her failing eyes beheld the Saviour she had longingly expected. She had grown old in the service of the sanctuary, and having seen, with Simeon, God's Salvation, was ready to depart in peace. How encouraging it is to meet those who through a long life have remained true to the Lord and whose gray hairs are honorable because of a life lived in the divine will, and who, when they pass away, are ready for glory.
She Was a Widow
Paul exhorted young Timothy to "honour widows who are widows indeed," and Anna, a worthy widow, all should certainly honor. In fact, we wonder if the Apostle had the aged Anna before his mind's eye when he gave Timothy this thought -
She that is a widow indeed, and desolate, trusteth in God, and continueth in supplication and prayers night and day (1 Timothy 5:3, 5).
Anna was desolate, that is, alone, or solitary. A widow can know what it is to face a long, lonely and cheerless life, and a solitude made more acute because of the remembrance of happier days. But it was not so with Anna. When as a young, motherless wife, God withdrew from her the earthly love she rejoiced in, she did not bury her hope in a grave. In the place of what God took, He gave her more of Himself, and she became devoted to Him who had promised to be as a Husband to the widow, and through her long widowhood was unwearying in devotion to Him. She "trusted in God," and her hoary head was a crown of glory ( Proverbs 16:31). Repose of soul was hers for eighty-five years because the one thing she desired was to have God's house as her dwelling place all the days of her life.
She Departed Not From the Temple
When death ravaged her own home, Anna turned from all legitimate concerns to join the band of holy women who devoted themselves to continual attendance at the "night and day services of the Temple." She was no occasional attender or dead member, but a constant, devout worshiper. Her seat in the Temple was always occupied. What an inspiration worshipers of this sort are to a faithful pastor who feels he can minister more freely when they are present because of their prayer support! When their seat is empty in the church, he knows there must be something unusual accounting for their absence.
She Served God With Fastings and Prayers
Without doubt, Anna was one of God's own elect, which cry day and night unto Him, and who was heard in that she feared. It was not in some retired nook of the Temple she prayed, or in a corner where females only supplicated God. She would join with others openly in the presence of the congregation and pour out her soul audibly in the Temple. The One to whose birth she witnessed was to say that praying and fasting are necessary requisites in a God-used life, and Anna not only prayed but also fasted. She was willing to miss a meal in order to spend more time before God. Hers was a life of godly self-control. She had learned how to crucify the flesh in order to serve God more acceptably.
She Gave Thanks Likewise Unto the Lord
Anna's prayers were paired with praises. How arrestive is the phrase, "she coming in that instant." This was no mere coincidence. Through her long pilgrimage, day after day, she went to the Temple to pray for the coming of the Messiah, and although He seemed to tarry she waited for Him, believing that He would come. Then one day the miracle happened, for as she entered the Temple she heard sounds of exultation and joy proceeding from the inner court, and then from the lips of the venerable Simeon she heard the words, "Now, Lord, lettest Thou Thy servant depart in peace, for mine eyes have seen Thy salvation." Gazing upon the Holy Child who was none other than her long-looked-for Messiah, Anna, too, was ready to depart in peace and be joined with her husband above.
She Spake of Him to All
Anna not only prayed and praised, but went out to proclaim the glad tidings to those who had shared her hope and faith. Note, again, the glimpse we have of Anna in her brief record. We see her, first of all, as -
A Daughter of Phanuel of the tribe of Asher - a somewhat interesting fact seeing that she is the only one of note mentioned in the Bible of the tribe of Asher, even though the name means blessedness.
A Widow of a great age.
A Devout Worshiper of the living God.
A Prophetess proclaiming the prophetic word.
Now she assumes another role. Old though she is, she goes forth to become -
A Missionary . Anna was one of the godly remnant in Israel who, through centuries, even in the darkest days before Christ came, looked for the Dayspring from on high. Thus, as she heard Simeon's praise for prophecy fulfilled, she went out to her godly intimates to declare the glad tidings. Faith, through her long years of waiting, was rewarded and she became the first female herald of the Incarnation to all who looked for the Redeemer in Jerusalem. In Anna we have "a sample of an aged female's waiting faith, as Simeon is of an aged man's." Blessed are all those who patiently and prayerfully await Christ's second appearance ( Hebrews 9:28).
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Hophni

 [Hŏph'nī] - strong. A son of Eli, the high priest and judge who proved unworthy of his sacred offices (1 Sam. 1:3; 2:34; 4:4, 11, 17). Hophni is always associated with his brother Phinehas. The two were partners in evil practices and brought a twice-pronounced curse upon their heads (1 Sam. 2:34; 3 ). Both were slain at the battle of Aphek, and this coupled with the loss of the Ark, caused the death of Eli. Both sons disgraced their priestly office in a twofold way:

I. In claiming and appropriating more than their due of the sacrifices (1 Sam. 2:13-17).
II. In their immoral actions in the Tabernacle (2:22; Amos 2:7, 8).
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