I am reading a research article by Matthew C. MacWilliams , University of Massachusetts Amherst, a PhD student. The article was popular among #FakeNewsMedia. Matthew writes
"Second, the linkage between threat and authoritarianism has remained a central tenet of authoritarian studies for more than seven decades (Fromm 1941), as threat and fear have been theorized to play an important role in the activation of authoritarian behavior and the expression of authoritarian attitudes (Adorno et al. 1950; Altemeyer 1981b; Hetherington and Suhay 2011). Today, some scholars argue that authoritarianism is activated by normative threat (Feldman 2003; Stenner 2005). Hetherington et al. (2011; 2009) assert, as did Lipset (1959) and countless other students of authoritarianism, that physical threats are also driv- ers of authoritarian attitudes and behavior.Trump was not responsible for San Bernardino or Paris. But Hillary was quick to exploit each. But, as messages go, addressing Islamic extremism is more appealing to potential victims than describing the threat as inconsequential. It is apparent that Trump's extreme vetting of seven nations is a measured approach. Meanwhile many are calling for a total ban.
Authoritarian activation is, however, a contested question. To Stenner, authoritarianism is not always on. Authoritarian behav- ior is activated “when needed” in reaction to a particular threat (2005, 14). But Hetherington et al. contend that authoritarians are in a state of constant hypervigilance and hold authoritarian attitudes even when physical or normative threats are not extant. Thus, it is nonauthoritarians who become more authoritarian when a physical threat appears, since authoritarians are always activated and “have little place to travel in terms of their opinions” (Hetherington and Suhay 2011, 547).
With the terrorist incidents in Paris and San Bernardino driving media coverage of the threat posed by terrorism and, in early December 2015, the fear of terrorism rising to its highest point in the United States since 9/11, threat was posed to play an important role in shaping the Republican nominating process. And Donald Trump was positioned to be its main beneficiary."
In 2015, I wrote Turnbull should resign as he had nothing left to offer, except damaging Liberal governments. Today, Turnbull has proved me right. At the moment, Turnbull is being lauded by the partisan media for insulting Bill Shorten, the ALP leader. A real Liberal leader would not insult Shorten, but point to his failed policy record. Turnbull still has the support of Miranda Devine. But non partisan conservative commentators say that Abbott is the best alternative. Meanwhile, I am hostage to abysmal political leadership and hopeless journalists. My shopfront has opened on Facebook.
I am very good and don't deserve the abuse given me. I created a video raising awareness of anti police feeling among western communities. I chose the senseless killing of Nicola Cotton, a Louisiana policewoman who joined post Katrina, to highlight the issue. I did this in order to get an income after having been illegally blacklisted from work in NSW for being a whistleblower. I have not done anything wrong. Local council appointees refused to endorse my work, so I did it for free. Youtube's Adsence refused to allow me to profit from their marketing it.
Here is a video I made One Step Forward
Music by Patrick Poulou Lyrics and vocals by David Daniel Ball
Images include Video Blocks sourced images
http://conservativeweasel.blogspot.com.au/2012/08/one-step-forward-and-another-one-back.html
Oh father, do you love me?
Father, do you need me?
Father, can you hear me?
I'll walk to you
One step forward and another one back
Oh lord how many steps will I take this way?
How many steps will I have to stay?
Walking here and walking there
Praying this and wanting that
Give me hope, a straight path and your favor
You give grace and in the eyes of your people I see love
Don't close your eyes good people
Give me a straight path and your favor
Praying this and wanting that
Walking here and walking there
How many steps will I have to stay?
Oh Lord, how many steps will I take this way?
One step forward and another one back
I was raised as an Atheist. I learned, after reading the Bible, that God loves me, and you. This is his song for you too. He loves you, and wants to be with you.
All the elements are me and mine. ARIA ISRC number AUAWN1208118
=== from 2016 ===
Not written as I was working to secure accommodation.
Douglas survived, but the university cricketer lost both his legs, and fell into a depression in recovery. A good woman who was a nurse chatted with him, and tried to lift his spirits, but Douglas only remembered what he had been, and never would be again. He joked about dating her when he would take her to dances. But without legs, he wouldn't dance. But Douglas' heart was not that of a quitter. Many had lost limbs in WW1, and prosthetics were common. He got some tin prosthetic legs, and learned how to walk. And dance. He married that young woman nurse. He learned to walk so well, he didn't need a cane.
WW2 began, and the Battle of Britain. Douglas wanted to fly. But the war ministry would not let him because he didn't have legs which were needed to pilot the craft. Douglas modified a spitfire and the casualty rate was so high, the need so great, he got licensed. And he was good. He became an ace. He became recognised as possibly Britain's best pilot, and it was said it was because he had no legs, because in tight rolls, blood goes to the legs from the brain, and because that couldn't happen for Douglas, he could do tight rolls. In a mission over France in '41, and captured by the Nazis. His prosthetics were damaged, and British high command flew out a good pair for him. In custody, Douglas would not give up. He escaped, a number of times. So the Nazis placed him in Colditz. He escaped again, and they confiscated his legs.
At war's end, Douglas missed the adventure. He took up mountain climbing. And then became a member of parliament. In his heart was an indomitable spirit. The kind of spirit Australia will need to climb out of the debt hole the ALP have dug.
=== from 2015 ===
Queensland is resilient. A panicked ALP Premier was not able to suck the joy out of a sign worker Mark Cave. If Obama is ever wanting to wring his hands in Brisbane, this hand waver will make him understood. Or his telecaster. Meanwhile, press are keen to lie about Mr Abbott ordering troops into ISIL. And they lie about Mr Abbott and the two Bali prisoners facing execution. Don't journalists ever check their facts?
Australian jihadists are also welfare bludgers. Some 96% of jihadists leaving Australis for ISIL death cult are on the disability pension. Few things are more attractive to young Islamic women than a disabled jihadist. Meanwhile impotent Islamic leaders are struggling to say that jihadism, which brings Islam into disrepute, is wrong.
Sitcom writer dies of overdose. Parks and Recreation star, Harry Wittels, died at age 30 of a suspected drug overdose. Drugs may be legalised in some places, but they are never safe.
Athanasius was an important early Christian theologian based in Alexandria, preceding Hypatia and Cyril. He was exiled and returned on five occasions. On this day, in 362, he returned from the third exile which had been ordered by Emperor Constantius. Constantius favoured Arianism while Athanasius favoured Trinitarianism. So Constantius exiling Athanasius to the desert for the third exile, was deeply symbolic. It lasted six years. Later in the year, Emperor Julian would exile him again. In 1245, the first known Bishop of Finland, Thomas, was allowed to resign following a confession he had tortured a man to death and forged a Papal letter. In 1437, Scottish King James I was assassinated by a former follower. His wife survived and their son, James II was crowned king. In 1613, Mikhail I of Russia began the Romanov dynasty, having been unanimously elected by national assembly. In 1804, the first steam locomotive left its' iron works. In 1808, Russian troops took Finland from Sweden. Sweden had held Finland since shortly after Thomas had resigned. In 1828, the Cherokee Pheonix was first published using the syllabary of the great Sequoyah. Sequoyah had created his syllabary for Cherokee, the only time in recorded history a pre literate people created their own, resulting in his people becoming literate better and sooner than surrounding tribes. In 1842, the sewing machine was patented by John Greenough. In 1848, Marx and Engels published the Communist Manifesto which today provides for ALP policy. In 1878, New Haven Connecticut produced the first telephone directory. In 1937 the League of Nations moved to stop the ridiculous practice of international left wingers going to Spain to fight and die. In 1952, Winston Churchill abolished ID cards despite the adoring left liking them. In 1965 jihadists murdered Malcolm X for becoming Sunni. In 1972, Nixon visited China.
Australian jihadists are also welfare bludgers. Some 96% of jihadists leaving Australis for ISIL death cult are on the disability pension. Few things are more attractive to young Islamic women than a disabled jihadist. Meanwhile impotent Islamic leaders are struggling to say that jihadism, which brings Islam into disrepute, is wrong.
Sitcom writer dies of overdose. Parks and Recreation star, Harry Wittels, died at age 30 of a suspected drug overdose. Drugs may be legalised in some places, but they are never safe.
Athanasius was an important early Christian theologian based in Alexandria, preceding Hypatia and Cyril. He was exiled and returned on five occasions. On this day, in 362, he returned from the third exile which had been ordered by Emperor Constantius. Constantius favoured Arianism while Athanasius favoured Trinitarianism. So Constantius exiling Athanasius to the desert for the third exile, was deeply symbolic. It lasted six years. Later in the year, Emperor Julian would exile him again. In 1245, the first known Bishop of Finland, Thomas, was allowed to resign following a confession he had tortured a man to death and forged a Papal letter. In 1437, Scottish King James I was assassinated by a former follower. His wife survived and their son, James II was crowned king. In 1613, Mikhail I of Russia began the Romanov dynasty, having been unanimously elected by national assembly. In 1804, the first steam locomotive left its' iron works. In 1808, Russian troops took Finland from Sweden. Sweden had held Finland since shortly after Thomas had resigned. In 1828, the Cherokee Pheonix was first published using the syllabary of the great Sequoyah. Sequoyah had created his syllabary for Cherokee, the only time in recorded history a pre literate people created their own, resulting in his people becoming literate better and sooner than surrounding tribes. In 1842, the sewing machine was patented by John Greenough. In 1848, Marx and Engels published the Communist Manifesto which today provides for ALP policy. In 1878, New Haven Connecticut produced the first telephone directory. In 1937 the League of Nations moved to stop the ridiculous practice of international left wingers going to Spain to fight and die. In 1952, Winston Churchill abolished ID cards despite the adoring left liking them. In 1965 jihadists murdered Malcolm X for becoming Sunni. In 1972, Nixon visited China.
From 2014
One does not need religion to be graceful. Nor to be thankful. It isn't the religion that makes the heart. It takes tremendous grace, effort even, to be thankful when things go wrong. I think of this on the birthday of Douglas Bader (1910). 'Reach for the sky' is not some gangster call to those they point guns at. It was Douglas' title for his autobiography. He was a happy go lucky soul, and a touch irresponsible in his youth. He was born in the early days of powered flight. He wanted to reach for the sky, and he became an accomplished pilot who could do impressive tricks. His life changed in his early twenties (December, 1931) when he did one of those tricks. On take off, he attempted a difficult manoeuvre, but was too close to the ground, and crashed. In those days, the emergency response people took out a cup of strong spirits for survivors so they would not go into shock. The emergency response guy who found Douglas in the broken cockpit, with legs skew in a way that unbroken ones don't go, gulped down the spirits, thinking Douglas had not survived, and wanting to erase the memory of what he saw.
Douglas survived, but the university cricketer lost both his legs, and fell into a depression in recovery. A good woman who was a nurse chatted with him, and tried to lift his spirits, but Douglas only remembered what he had been, and never would be again. He joked about dating her when he would take her to dances. But without legs, he wouldn't dance. But Douglas' heart was not that of a quitter. Many had lost limbs in WW1, and prosthetics were common. He got some tin prosthetic legs, and learned how to walk. And dance. He married that young woman nurse. He learned to walk so well, he didn't need a cane.
WW2 began, and the Battle of Britain. Douglas wanted to fly. But the war ministry would not let him because he didn't have legs which were needed to pilot the craft. Douglas modified a spitfire and the casualty rate was so high, the need so great, he got licensed. And he was good. He became an ace. He became recognised as possibly Britain's best pilot, and it was said it was because he had no legs, because in tight rolls, blood goes to the legs from the brain, and because that couldn't happen for Douglas, he could do tight rolls. In a mission over France in '41, and captured by the Nazis. His prosthetics were damaged, and British high command flew out a good pair for him. In custody, Douglas would not give up. He escaped, a number of times. So the Nazis placed him in Colditz. He escaped again, and they confiscated his legs.
At war's end, Douglas missed the adventure. He took up mountain climbing. And then became a member of parliament. In his heart was an indomitable spirit. The kind of spirit Australia will need to climb out of the debt hole the ALP have dug.
Historical perspective on this day
In 362, Athanasius returned to Alexandria. 1245, Thomas, the first known Bishop of Finland, was granted resignation after confessing to torture and forgery. 1437, James I of Scotland was assassinated. 1440, the Prussian Confederation is formed. 1543, Battle of Wayna Daga – A combined army of Ethiopian and Portuguese troops defeated a Muslim army led by Ahmed Gragn. 1613, Mikhail I was unanimously elected Tsar by a national assembly, beginning the Romanov dynasty of Imperial Russia.
In 1804, the first self-propelling steam locomotive made its outing at the Pen-y-Darren Ironworks in Wales. 1808, without a previous declaration of war, Russian troops crossed the border to Sweden at Abborfors in eastern Finland, thus beginning the Finnish war, in which Sweden would lose the eastern half of the country (i.e. Finland) to Russia. 1828, initial issue of the Cherokee Phoenix is the first periodical to use the Cherokee syllabary invented by Sequoyah. 1842, John Greenough was granted the first U.S. patent for the sewing machine. 1848, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels published The Communist Manifesto. 1862, American Civil War: Battle of Valverde was fought near Fort Craig in New Mexico Territory. 1874, the Oakland Daily Tribune published its first edition. 1878, the first telephone book was issued in New Haven, Connecticut. 1885, the newly completed Washington Monument was dedicated.
In 1913, Ioannina was incorporated into the Greek state after the Balkan Wars. 1916, World War I: In France, the Battle of Verdun began. 1918, the last Carolina Parakeet died in captivity at the Cincinnati Zoo. 1919, German socialist Kurt Eisner was assassinated. His death resulted in the establishment of the Bavarian Soviet Republic and parliament and government fleeing Munich, Germany. 1921, Constituent Assembly of the Democratic Republic of Georgiaadopted the country's first constitution. Also 1921, Rezā Shāh took control of Tehran during a successful coup 1925, the New Yorker published its first issue.
In 1937, the League of Nations banned foreign national "volunteers" in the Spanish Civil War. 1945, World War II: Japanese Kamikaze planes sank the escort carrier USS Bismarck Sea and damaged the USS Saratoga. 1947, in New York City, Edwin Land demonstrated the first "instant camera", the Polaroid Land Camera, to a meeting of the Optical Society of America. 1948, NASCAR was incorporated. 1952, the British government, under Winston Churchill, abolished identity cards in the UK to "set the people free". Also 1952, the Bengali Language Movement protests occurred at the University of Dhaka in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh). 1958, the peace symbol, commissioned by Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament in protest against the Atomic Weapons Research Establishment, is designed and completed by Gerald Holtom.
In 1965, Malcolm X was assassinated at the Audubon Ballroom in New York City by members of the Nation of Islam. 1971, the Convention on Psychotropic Substances was signed at Vienna. 1972, President Richard Nixon visited the People's Republic of China to normalise Sino-American relations. Also 1972, the Soviet unmanned spaceship Luna 20 landed on the Moon. 1973, over the Sinai Desert, Israeli fighter aircraft shot down Libyan Arab Airlines Flight 114 jet killing 108. 1974, the last Israeli soldiers left the west bank of the Suez Canal pursuant to a truce with Egypt. 1975, Watergate scandal: Former United States Attorney General John N. Mitchell and former White House aides H. R. Haldeman and John Ehrlichman were sentenced to prison. 1986, The Legend of Zelda, the first game of The Legend of Zelda series, was released in Japan on the Famicom Disk System. 1995, Steve Fossett landed in Leader, Saskatchewan, Canada becoming the first person to make a solo flight across the Pacific Ocean in a balloon.
In 1804, the first self-propelling steam locomotive made its outing at the Pen-y-Darren Ironworks in Wales. 1808, without a previous declaration of war, Russian troops crossed the border to Sweden at Abborfors in eastern Finland, thus beginning the Finnish war, in which Sweden would lose the eastern half of the country (i.e. Finland) to Russia. 1828, initial issue of the Cherokee Phoenix is the first periodical to use the Cherokee syllabary invented by Sequoyah. 1842, John Greenough was granted the first U.S. patent for the sewing machine. 1848, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels published The Communist Manifesto. 1862, American Civil War: Battle of Valverde was fought near Fort Craig in New Mexico Territory. 1874, the Oakland Daily Tribune published its first edition. 1878, the first telephone book was issued in New Haven, Connecticut. 1885, the newly completed Washington Monument was dedicated.
In 1913, Ioannina was incorporated into the Greek state after the Balkan Wars. 1916, World War I: In France, the Battle of Verdun began. 1918, the last Carolina Parakeet died in captivity at the Cincinnati Zoo. 1919, German socialist Kurt Eisner was assassinated. His death resulted in the establishment of the Bavarian Soviet Republic and parliament and government fleeing Munich, Germany. 1921, Constituent Assembly of the Democratic Republic of Georgiaadopted the country's first constitution. Also 1921, Rezā Shāh took control of Tehran during a successful coup 1925, the New Yorker published its first issue.
In 1937, the League of Nations banned foreign national "volunteers" in the Spanish Civil War. 1945, World War II: Japanese Kamikaze planes sank the escort carrier USS Bismarck Sea and damaged the USS Saratoga. 1947, in New York City, Edwin Land demonstrated the first "instant camera", the Polaroid Land Camera, to a meeting of the Optical Society of America. 1948, NASCAR was incorporated. 1952, the British government, under Winston Churchill, abolished identity cards in the UK to "set the people free". Also 1952, the Bengali Language Movement protests occurred at the University of Dhaka in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh). 1958, the peace symbol, commissioned by Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament in protest against the Atomic Weapons Research Establishment, is designed and completed by Gerald Holtom.
In 1965, Malcolm X was assassinated at the Audubon Ballroom in New York City by members of the Nation of Islam. 1971, the Convention on Psychotropic Substances was signed at Vienna. 1972, President Richard Nixon visited the People's Republic of China to normalise Sino-American relations. Also 1972, the Soviet unmanned spaceship Luna 20 landed on the Moon. 1973, over the Sinai Desert, Israeli fighter aircraft shot down Libyan Arab Airlines Flight 114 jet killing 108. 1974, the last Israeli soldiers left the west bank of the Suez Canal pursuant to a truce with Egypt. 1975, Watergate scandal: Former United States Attorney General John N. Mitchell and former White House aides H. R. Haldeman and John Ehrlichman were sentenced to prison. 1986, The Legend of Zelda, the first game of The Legend of Zelda series, was released in Japan on the Famicom Disk System. 1995, Steve Fossett landed in Leader, Saskatchewan, Canada becoming the first person to make a solo flight across the Pacific Ocean in a balloon.
=== 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.
===
I am publishing a book called Bread of Life: January.
Bread of Life is a daily bible quote with a layman's understanding of the meaning. I give one quote for each day, and also a series of personal stories illustrating key concepts eg Who is God? What is a miracle? Why is there tragedy?
January is the first of the anticipated year-long work of thirteen books. One for each month and the whole year. It costs to publish. It (Kindle version) should retail at about $2US online, but the paperback version would cost more, according to production cost.If you have a heart for giving, I fundraise at gofund.me/27tkwuc
Bread of Life is a daily bible quote with a layman's understanding of the meaning. I give one quote for each day, and also a series of personal stories illustrating key concepts eg Who is God? What is a miracle? Why is there tragedy?
January is the first of the anticipated year-long work of thirteen books. One for each month and the whole year. It costs to publish. It (Kindle version) should retail at about $2US online, but the paperback version would cost more, according to production cost.If you have a heart for giving, I fundraise at gofund.me/27tkwuc
===
Editorials will appear in the "History in a Year by the Conservative Voice" series, starting with August, September, October, 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 a free kindle version.
List of available items at Create Space
The Amazon Author Page for David Ball
UK .. http://www.amazon.co.uk/-/e/B01683ZOWGFrench .. http://www.amazon.fr/-/e/B01683ZOWG
Japan .. http://www.amazon.co.jp/-/e/B01683ZOWG
German .. http://www.amazon.de/-/e/B01683ZOWG
Happy birthday and many happy returns Dean Hamstead, Kaffee Yaboualy and Peter Mac Lovin. Born on the same day, across the years, along with
- 1484 – Joachim I Nestor, Elector of Brandenburg (d. 1535)
- 1556 – Sethus Calvisius, German astronomer, composer, and theorist (d. 1615)
- 1621 – Rebecca Nurse, English-American victim of the Salem witch trials (d. 1692)
- 1821 – Charles Scribner I, American publisher, founded Charles Scribner's Sons (d. 1871)
- 1865 – John Haden Badley, English educator and author, founded the Bedales School (d. 1967)
- 1903 – Scrapper Blackwell, American guitarist and singer (d. 1962)
- 1903 – Anaïs Nin, French-American author (d. 1977)
- 1907 – W. H. Auden, English-American poet (d. 1973)
- 1910 – Douglas Bader, English pilot (d. 1982)
- 1925 – Sam Peckinpah, American director and screenwriter (d. 1984)
- 1927 – Hubert de Givenchy, French fashion designer, founded Givenchy
- 1933 – Nina Simone, American singer-songwriter and pianist (d. 2003)
- 1946 – Alan Rickman, English actor
- 1951 – Vince Welnick, American keyboard player (The Grateful Dead, The Tubes, and Missing Man Formation) (d. 2006)
- 1955 – Kelsey Grammer, American actor, singer, director, and producer
- 1958 – Mary Chapin Carpenter, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
- 1979 – Jennifer Love Hewitt, American actress, singer, and producer
- 2001 – Isabella Acres, American actress
February 21: Language Movement Day in Bangladesh
- 1437 – King James I of Scotland was murdered at Perth in a failed coup by his uncle and former ally Walter Stewart, Earl of Atholl.
- 1848 – Communist theorists Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels published The Communist Manifesto, which became one of the world's most influential political tracts.
- 1921 – Rezā Khan seized Tehran to make himself the most powerful person in Iran, which eventually led to the establishment of the Pahlavi dynasty.
- 1965 – Black nationalist Malcolm X (pictured) was assassinated while giving a speech in New York City's Audubon Ballroom.
- 1971 – The Convention on Psychotropic Substances, a United Nations treaty designed to control psychoactive drugs, was signed at a conference of plenipotentiaries in Vienna.
Andrew Bolt
ALLAHU CENTRELINK
Tim Blair – Saturday, February 21, 2015 (3:09pm)
Almost all of Australia’s Islamic State Mo muppets were previously members of the bludjahideen:
A federal investigation into the welfare status of Australian foreign fighters, prompted last year by revelations in The Telegraph, shows 96 per cent had been on welfare benefits when they fled to the Middle East.Most had continued to collect payments from Australian taxpayers while training with Islamic State to become terrorists intent on wanting to kill Australians.
One of those idiots, who is now attempting to return home after six months in Syria, recently described his pathetic cause:
After more than seven months gaining his trust, CBS News correspondent Clarissa Ward convinced Ibrahim, believed to be in his early 30s, to sit down for an interview and provide a window into the workings of the murderous group …“Some of the policies, like I said, with the beheadings of non-combatants. Some of those things I don’t agree with.”What he did agree with though was the barbaric killings that took place in the name of Sharia law.Ibrahim said he had witnessed a number of executions while in Syria, including a crucifixion and the stoning of a couple who were accused by local officials of adultery.“It’s harsh. It’s real. But it’s Sharia,” he said.“It was done publicly, there were many hundreds of people there. Seeing someone die is not something anyone probably would want to see, but having the actual Sharia established is what many Muslims look forward to.”
Not that this is anything to do with Islam, of course.
===
CAVE ART
Tim Blair – Saturday, February 21, 2015 (2:41pm)
Sign language sensation Mark Cave is a hit in cyclone-savaged Queensland:
As one commenter noted, Cave was momentarily lost for signs when Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk mentioned the need to follow hourly radio bulletins - which, obviously, are not a major issue for the deaf. No problem; Cave edited the remark on the fly, simply using the more general term “hourly updates”.
As one commenter noted, Cave was momentarily lost for signs when Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk mentioned the need to follow hourly radio bulletins - which, obviously, are not a major issue for the deaf. No problem; Cave edited the remark on the fly, simply using the more general term “hourly updates”.
===
HARRIS WITTELS
Tim Blair – Saturday, February 21, 2015 (2:30pm)
Parks and Recreation is one of the best-scripted sitcoms of the last 30 years. One of the reasons for the show’s sharpness was writer Harris Wittels, who has died at just 30 following a suspected drug overdose.
===
STOP AT KABOOM
Tim Blair – Saturday, February 21, 2015 (1:22pm)
Former champion NZ batsman Martin Crowe addresses the big bat issue, previously examined by Gideon Haigh and me. In other cricket news, play is still considered a possibility in Brisbane (won’t happen) and England is hopeless.
UPDATE. Chasing the West Indies’ 310, Pakistan were quickly reduced to 4/1 – the worst start in one-day cricket history.
===
WHAT’S BAHASA FOR “AIR HELLAIR”?
Tim Blair – Saturday, February 21, 2015 (12:57pm)
Did you know that multi-lingual Mike Carlton speaks Indonesian? He’s very shy about it, but occasionally hints at this astonishing ability.
===
I’m calling bullshit on Lyon’s Abbott story. The dates don’t fit
Andrew Bolt February 21 2015 (11:46am)
This anti-Abbott story, discussed also in the post below, has one huge factual mistake that destroys it completely:
It is that there’s no way that Abbott on November 25 could have suggested “a unilateral invasion of Iraq ... without any US or NATO cover”. Why? Because Barack Obama had two weeks ago already said 1500 US troops were going in.
From November 4, 2014:
Lyons’ story is bullshit.
(Thanks to reader Alan RM Jones.)
TONY Abbott suggested a unilateral invasion of Iraq, with 3500 Australian ground troops to confront the Islamic State terrorist group.The mistake? It’s not just that Finance Minister Mathias Cormann denies any such suggestion was made.
Flanked by his chief of staff, Peta Credlin, in a meeting in Canberra on November 25, the Prime Minister said the move would help halt the surge of Islamic State in northern Iraq.
After receiving no resistance from Ms Credlin or his other staff in the room, Mr Abbott then raised the idea with Australia’s leading military planners. The military officials were stunned, telling Mr Abbott that sending 3500 Australian soldiers without any US or NATO cover would be disastrous for the Australians. They argued that even the US was not prepared to put ground troops into Iraq and it would make Australia the only Western country with troops on the ground.
It is that there’s no way that Abbott on November 25 could have suggested “a unilateral invasion of Iraq ... without any US or NATO cover”. Why? Because Barack Obama had two weeks ago already said 1500 US troops were going in.
From November 4, 2014:
President Barack Obama has approved sending up to 1,500 more troops to Iraq, roughly doubling the number of U.S. forces on the ground to advise and retrain Iraqis in their battle against the militant group Islamic State, U.S. officials said on Friday.And even earlier, on September 4:
Obama’s decision greatly expands the scope of the U.S. campaign and the geographic distribution of American forces, some of whom will head into Iraq’s fiercely contested western Anbar province for the first time to act as advisors.
Canada’s next contribution to the fight against ISIS in Iraq will be “several dozen” members of the Armed Forces, Prime Minister Stephen Harper announced today — and CBC News has learned that includes special operations forces. The contingent of special operations forces will work closely with U.S. forces ...Earlier again:
Elite US soldiers were today masterminding a mission to rescue thousands of people facing death at the hands of the Islamic State in Iraq. Barack Obama ordered 130 marines and special operations troops to join an operation to save refugees from the minority Yezidi community who are trapped on the barren Sinjar Mountains in northern Iraq.
Lyons’ story is bullshit.
(Thanks to reader Alan RM Jones.)
===
See no evil, resist no evil
Andrew Bolt February 21 2015 (11:04am)
Brendan O’Neill, typically brilliant - about an undeserved self-loathing that’s leaving us defenceless:
MARTIN Amis, who loves nothing better than riling respectable society, once asked an audience of arty types at the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London to put their hands up if they thought they were morally superior to the Taliban…
“About 30 per cent,” Amis said in his trademark laconic, scathing drone, in the process passing judgment not only on those gathered to hear him speak but on the relativistic, self-loathing liberal elite more broadly.
That was 2007. Fast forward eight years and now there’s a group that makes the Taliban look like the Girl Guides in comparison: Islamic State, crucifer of apostates, executor of queers, immolator of prisoners, and all-round medieval nutjobs who look and sound like they wandered out of the swirling recesses of Dante’s brain.
Yet if Amis repeated his experiment with reference to this mob, ... I reckon the result would be same. “About 30 per cent” would say yes. The rest? Shuffle, dodge the question, move on…
The cult of relativism, the nonsense notion that all cultures are equally valid, now has the West in such a vice-like grip that it seems some of us can’t even bring ourselves to say: “Yes, those people who throw gays off buildings and who whip women who don’t wear black sackcloths are uncomplicatedly bad."…
President Barack Obama himself ... delighted the mob of moral relativists when he said at a National Prayer Breakfast that we Westerners should think twice before treating Islamist acts of violence as especially nutty.
“Lest we get on our high horse and think this is unique to some other place, remember that during the Crusades and the Inquisition, people committed terrible deeds in the name of Christ,” he said…
The Atlantic, conscience of liberal America, ... praised Obama putting the high horse out to pasture and said that “a certainty about which ‘side’ is always good and which ‘side’ is forever evil doesn’t really exist”.
The Economist said, of course, we shouldn’t be too judgmental of Them because “If you think your side is too virtuous to sin, it probably will sin”.
Meanwhile, New Matilda, key portal of Aussie miserabilism, bellowed: “Yes, ISIS Burned A Man Alive; White Americans Did The Same Thing To Black People By The Thousands"… Of course, it’s true our history is peppered with awful events. And these should be studied. But to the new breed of Enlightenment-eschewing observers, history is not simply something to be analysed — rather, it has become a rich resource of ugly episodes that the self-loathers can dig into whenever they want to hate themselves a bit more and do what that Amis audience did: avoid like the plague making moral judgments against any group or idea.
===
Crisis point: Mufti attacks Abbott, whitewashes Hizb ut-Tahrir
Andrew Bolt February 21 2015 (9:07am)
We are in a very, very dangerous place, and with not much time left before it becomes too dangerous to speak up.
And now we have the Mufti essentially urging Muslims through his example to reject the Prime Minister as an enemy of Muslims, with his attack on Abbott appearing in a video titled: “Muslim Community Confronts Abbott.”
Then there’s this taunt of Abbott by the Mufti: “Perhaps you are annoyed with Hizb ut-Tahrir because they criticise you.”
True. the Mufti says he opposes Hizb ut-Tahrir (but without saying why in this video). But he is grossly irresponsible and misleading to suggest Hizb ut-Tahrir’s sin is merely to criticise the Government like, he suggests, some Noam Chomsky or Robert Fisk.
False. Utterly false.
Why is the true reason the Government is worried about Hizb ut-Tahrir?
Because, yes, although it says it opposes terrorism, Hizaby ut-Tahrir publicly demonises and threatens Jews , claiming “Wherever the Jews thrive, corruption abounds”, and asking: “Who will set the world free from the Israelites, so that the world will be able to say that it has rid itself of that hidden evil?”.
Because, yes, although it says it opposes terrorism, Hizb ut-Tahrir attacks Australia as Muslim-hating and sinful, warning ominously: ”Even if a thousand bombs went off in this country, all that it will prove is that the Muslims are angry, and they have every reason to be angry.”
Because, yes, although it says it opposes terrorism, Hizb ut-Tahrir issues veiled warnings - that “Prime Minister Tony Abbott has been leading the way in demonising Islam and Muslims”, for instance, and that if he … goes again into Iraq (to attack the Islamic State) “his government and those who support such a move alone will be responsible for the repercussions that ensue”.
Because, yes, although it says it opposes terrorism, Hizb ut-Tahrir refuses to criticise even the Islamic State, criticising instead the Islamic State’s critics and offering the excuse that “ISIS or al-Qaeda don’t exist in a vacuum. They exist as a reaction to Western interference in the Islamic lands”.
Because, yes, although it says it opposes terrorism, Hizb ut-Tahrir defends Australians who fight for the Islamic State, complaining that “Muslims in the west who make the sacrifice of going abroad to fight tyranny and assist the oppressed are characteristed as ‘extremists’ and ‘terrorists’”
Because, yes, although it says it opposes terrorism, Hizb ut-Tahrir tells followers that Australia is “at war with Muslims”, and “the world has seen no greater terrorists than western states who have laid entire nations to waste through decade-long invasions and war”.
Because, yes, although it says it opposes terrorism, Hizb ut-Tahrir says Muslims are “forced to react” against our “Western violence”: that “the real problem, the root problem, is western violence, which eclipses the violence of any individual or group many times over and is in fact the cause of the oppression to which people are forced to react”.
Because, yes, although it says it opposes terrorism, Hizb ut Tahrir held a protest seeming to justify the slaughter by Islamists of Charlie Hebdo journalists, declaring “Je suis Muslims”, promising to protect Muhammad from insults and warning: “We need to defend him. Should we turn the other cheek?”
And because, yes, although it says it opposes violence, Hizb ut-Tahrir gives cover to wife killers, agreeing to give a talk titled “Honor killings are morally justified”.
For the Mufti to insist in the interview above that his response to such radicalism has been “more than adequate”, and at the very same time whitewash Hizb ut-Tahrir as opposed to violence and guilty of no more than criticing the government, is simply frightening.
And for the Mufti to insist I have no right to criticise him or other leaders of the Muslim community - “what right does he have to meddle in its internal affairs” - is not simply evading his duty as an Australian citizen but putting me at personal risk for pointing this out.
As it happens, I actually have concerns of my own about government plans to take away Hizb ut Tahrir’s free speech. But one can defend free speech without defending those who use it to threaten us and incite potentially lethal hatreds when so many have already died.
UPDATE
The Mufti is not alone, unfortunately, in giving Hizb ut Tahrir cover and attacking its critics. In suggesting that too many Muslim leaders have a “touch-one-touch-all” defence to criticism even of extremists in their ranks.
Dozens of Muslim groups, Muslim academics and Muslim clerics have actually joined with Hizb ut Tahrir in signing a joint letter damning the Abbott Government, claiming Hizb ut Tahrir is just a victim of a wicked Government plot against Muslims. It is incredible that so many people in positions of influence could sign something so inflammatory - and it is a shock that so few journalists have the courage or insight now to call them out:
Australia’s most senior Muslim leader has said he won’t “repeat the mistake” of voting for Tony Abbott, and publicly advised the prime minister to “work in any field other than politics”.Actually, Abbott’s criticism was of something far more troubling - the Mufti legitimising the anti-Western rage of the Islamic State, even though he criticises their violence and condemns terrorism. It is unfortunately typical that this very worrying point is evaded in the Guardian story above.
The strong comments by the Grand Mufti Ibrahim Abu Mohammed come amid other signs of a serious breakdown in relations between the Abbott government and large elements of Australia’s Muslim communities, ahead of the expected announcement of new security legislation on Monday. Abbott criticised the grand mufti on the Bolt Report last Sunday for suggesting it would be a political mistake to ban the Islamic group Hizb ut-Tahrir, saying his comments were “wrong-headed” and unhelpful.
And now we have the Mufti essentially urging Muslims through his example to reject the Prime Minister as an enemy of Muslims, with his attack on Abbott appearing in a video titled: “Muslim Community Confronts Abbott.”
In that video the Mufti defends Hizb ut-Tahrir, a Jew-hating and jihad-preaching Islamist group, as an organisation that does not believe in violence, adding: “Nor do they support any organisation that engages in violence.” ( This is also ignored in The Guardian report.)
Then there’s this taunt of Abbott by the Mufti: “Perhaps you are annoyed with Hizb ut-Tahrir because they criticise you.”
True. the Mufti says he opposes Hizb ut-Tahrir (but without saying why in this video). But he is grossly irresponsible and misleading to suggest Hizb ut-Tahrir’s sin is merely to criticise the Government like, he suggests, some Noam Chomsky or Robert Fisk.
False. Utterly false.
Why is the true reason the Government is worried about Hizb ut-Tahrir?
Because, yes, although it says it opposes terrorism, Hizaby ut-Tahrir publicly demonises and threatens Jews , claiming “Wherever the Jews thrive, corruption abounds”, and asking: “Who will set the world free from the Israelites, so that the world will be able to say that it has rid itself of that hidden evil?”.
Because, yes, although it says it opposes terrorism, Hizb ut-Tahrir attacks Australia as Muslim-hating and sinful, warning ominously: ”Even if a thousand bombs went off in this country, all that it will prove is that the Muslims are angry, and they have every reason to be angry.”
Because, yes, although it says it opposes terrorism, Hizb ut-Tahrir issues veiled warnings - that “Prime Minister Tony Abbott has been leading the way in demonising Islam and Muslims”, for instance, and that if he … goes again into Iraq (to attack the Islamic State) “his government and those who support such a move alone will be responsible for the repercussions that ensue”.
Because, yes, although it says it opposes terrorism, Hizb ut-Tahrir refuses to criticise even the Islamic State, criticising instead the Islamic State’s critics and offering the excuse that “ISIS or al-Qaeda don’t exist in a vacuum. They exist as a reaction to Western interference in the Islamic lands”.
Because, yes, although it says it opposes terrorism, Hizb ut-Tahrir defends Australians who fight for the Islamic State, complaining that “Muslims in the west who make the sacrifice of going abroad to fight tyranny and assist the oppressed are characteristed as ‘extremists’ and ‘terrorists’”
Because, yes, although it says it opposes terrorism, Hizb ut-Tahrir tells followers that Australia is “at war with Muslims”, and “the world has seen no greater terrorists than western states who have laid entire nations to waste through decade-long invasions and war”.
Because, yes, although it says it opposes terrorism, Hizb ut-Tahrir says Muslims are “forced to react” against our “Western violence”: that “the real problem, the root problem, is western violence, which eclipses the violence of any individual or group many times over and is in fact the cause of the oppression to which people are forced to react”.
Because, yes, although it says it opposes terrorism, Hizb ut Tahrir held a protest seeming to justify the slaughter by Islamists of Charlie Hebdo journalists, declaring “Je suis Muslims”, promising to protect Muhammad from insults and warning: “We need to defend him. Should we turn the other cheek?”
And because, yes, although it says it opposes violence, Hizb ut-Tahrir gives cover to wife killers, agreeing to give a talk titled “Honor killings are morally justified”.
For the Mufti to insist in the interview above that his response to such radicalism has been “more than adequate”, and at the very same time whitewash Hizb ut-Tahrir as opposed to violence and guilty of no more than criticing the government, is simply frightening.
And for the Mufti to insist I have no right to criticise him or other leaders of the Muslim community - “what right does he have to meddle in its internal affairs” - is not simply evading his duty as an Australian citizen but putting me at personal risk for pointing this out.
As it happens, I actually have concerns of my own about government plans to take away Hizb ut Tahrir’s free speech. But one can defend free speech without defending those who use it to threaten us and incite potentially lethal hatreds when so many have already died.
UPDATE
The Mufti is not alone, unfortunately, in giving Hizb ut Tahrir cover and attacking its critics. In suggesting that too many Muslim leaders have a “touch-one-touch-all” defence to criticism even of extremists in their ranks.
Dozens of Muslim groups, Muslim academics and Muslim clerics have actually joined with Hizb ut Tahrir in signing a joint letter damning the Abbott Government, claiming Hizb ut Tahrir is just a victim of a wicked Government plot against Muslims. It is incredible that so many people in positions of influence could sign something so inflammatory - and it is a shock that so few journalists have the courage or insight now to call them out:
This joint Muslim community statement expresses our position with respect to the Abbott Government’s ongoing demonisation of Muslims in Australia, their organisations, their leaders and their values.Here are just some of the signatories:
We – the undersigned Sheikhs, advocates, community leaders, community organisations and student bodies of the Muslim community – ... reject the Abbott Government’s predictable use of Muslim affairs and the ‘terror threat’ to attempt to stabilise a fragile leadership and advance its own political agendas…
We deplore and denounce the continued public targeting of Muslims through abominable ‘anti-terror’ laws. The laws passed in late 2014 have been used to justify opportunistic raids on Muslim homes… We deplore the undefined and politically expedient use of the words ‘radicalisation’ and ‘extremism’ to criminalise legitimate political discourse and critique of the Government’s policies by members of the Muslim community…
We strongly oppose Prime Minster Abbott’s politically convenient threats to ‘tackle’ and ‘crack down’ on Islamic groups such as Hizb ut-Tahrir who disavow and have never supported terrorist acts, and whose only ‘crime’ has been to criticise the Abbott Government’s stance towards Muslims domestically and abroad, as they are well within their rights to do. We also oppose the bullying of Sheikh Dr Ibrahim Abu Muhammad by Mr Abbott for his criticism of Mr Abbott’s attempts to silence individuals’ and organisations’ legitimate criticisms of his policies…
We affirm our concern about peace and security for all. We refuse, however to be lectured on peace-building and harmony by a Government that plays divisive politics…
Fitzroy Mosque, Forum on Australia’s Islamic Relations, Global Islamic Youth Centre, Gold Coast Mosque, Hizb ut-Tahrir Australia. Indonesian Islamic Association Inc.. Islamic Awareness Forum of UNSW, Islamic Council of Western Australia, Islamic Information and Services Network of Australasia, Islamic Society of Deakin University, Islamic Society of Gold Coast, Islamic Society of Victoria University, La Trobe University Islamic Society, Macquarie University Muslim Students Association, Monash University Islamic Society, Muslim Legal Network Western Australia, Muslim Students Association of Victoria, Muslim Women Welfare and Advocacy Association of Western Australia, Preston Mosque, RMIT University Islamic Society, Somali Organisation for Development Aid , Sydney University Muslim Students Association, Taqwah Mosque, University of Melbourne Islamic Society, University of Technology Sydney Muslim Students, University of Western Sydney Muslim Students Association, Werribee Mosque, Western Australia Muslim Lawyers Association, plus many sheiks, some known radicals.This is one of the most dangerous political documents I’ve seen in years. Many journalists have made extraordinary efforts to distinguish between the many moderate Muslims and the extremists. But here are leading Muslims instead drawing ranks. And few journalists now dare note it.
===
By any means: Media Watch vs Murdoch
Andrew Bolt February 21 2015 (8:37am)
Every single host of the ABC’s Media Watch over its 25 years has been of the Left.
What makes current host Paul Barry even more unbalanced is his obsession with Rupert Murdoch and his newspapers. Barry’s obsession also benefits him indirectly, given he gains a benefit from selling his angry book on Murdoch.
The danger, then, is this - that Barry will grab at any stick to beat Murdoch and his most beloved newspapers, particularly The Australian, and especially when they blaspheme against the Left’s global warming faith. For instance:
But what do such details matter when you are on a crusade?
What makes current host Paul Barry even more unbalanced is his obsession with Rupert Murdoch and his newspapers. Barry’s obsession also benefits him indirectly, given he gains a benefit from selling his angry book on Murdoch.
The danger, then, is this - that Barry will grab at any stick to beat Murdoch and his most beloved newspapers, particularly The Australian, and especially when they blaspheme against the Left’s global warming faith. For instance:
MEDIA Watch on Monday:The truth is more on Henderson’s side. Chapman’s PhD was indeed gained in medicine, but his training was actually in sociology. He is no medico and never studied to be one. That is why his PhD paper - Cigarette Advertising As Myth: A Re-Evaluation Of The Relationship Of Advertising To Smoking - was not specifically on medicine but advertising. He is not a medical expert in the common understanding of that phrase.
SYDNEY University’s professor of public health Simon Chapman was even more damning, telling Media Watch: “Scientifically, it’s an absolutely atrocious piece of research and is entirely unpublishable other than on the front page of The Australian.”Gerard Henderson writing to Media Watch host Paul Barry and EP Tim Latham on Wednesday:
PROFESSOR Chapman’s comments to Media Watch were quoted on three occasions condemning the research of Steven Cooper which has been reported in The Australian and elsewhere. … Paul Barry neglected to advise Media Watch viewers that Simon Chapman had no scientific or engineering or medical qualifications. He has a BA (Hons) from the University of NSW and a PhD from Sydney University. Dr Chapman’s PhD is in sociology.Latham replying that day:
I AM comfortable quoting a professor of public health on the matter, who has previously written on wind farms and health concerns and has, according to his CV, a PhD in medicine.Henderson replying:
WHEN Simon Chapman addressed the Sydney Institute in June 2011, he told me that his PhD was in sociology. Dr Chapman should know … Is Media Watch going to make a correction/clarification for giving the misleading impression that Simon Chapman is an “expert” who is “scientifically” qualified to study the health impact of wind farms?Latham:
THE answer to your question is no. I outlined in my previous email as to why I believe Simon Chapman is qualified to talk about health and wind farms. Therefore no correction or clarification is required.
But what do such details matter when you are on a crusade?
===
Turnbull supporters go nuts: now attack Abbott and Credlin for not doing bad things
Andrew Bolt February 21 2015 (8:32am)
Tony Abbott’s enemies - and Malcolm Turnbull supporters - are suffering from Abbott Derangement Syndrome.
Yesterday came the despicable and plainly false suggestion that Abbott had cost Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran their lives by offending Indonesia.
Today comes more criticism - again pushed by anonymous critics - that simply makes no sense [and which has now been completely denied as false - see UPDATE below]:
But wait. Is this breathlessly reported anecdote proof of Credlin’s terrible overreach?
Er, actually the very opposite. Now we’re meant to be horrified that Credlin did NOT influence Abbott and did NOT make decisions for him. As far as we can tell from this, she barely spoke before the military chiefs, if at all.
And then there’s the almost equally dumb attack on Abbott’s judgement.
The critic’s usual criticism of Abbott is that he doesn’t take advice and makes silly “captain’s calls”.
But wait. Once again, does this anecdote prove any such thing?
Here is Abbott quite properly canvassing with his most senior military advisers all the options available to him in confronting once of the most brutal and dangerous terrorist armies ever seen. Winston Churchill would have done precisely the same, considering everything from the sound to the sensational.
But here is Abbott also NOT ignoring advice and NOT making a captain’s call. He does NOT make the decision that reporter John Lyon and Abbott’s anonymous critics mock.
I have been critical of Abbott’s judgement, and lately to the point where the ABC made my criticisms a lead item of their news bulletins. So I’m not shy to call out Abbott for real mistakes.
But what do the leaked criticisms of Abbott over the past couple of days suggest?
First, that Turnbull supporters in the Liberal party, aided by sympathetic journalists, are utterly determined not to let Abbott succeed. They are selfish and disloyal to the wider Liberal cause.
Second, that they will use any foul trick to drag him down. They have no honor.
Alternately, of course, they could simply be deranged by hatred.
Abbott is actually far more competent than he’s being painted, as his government’s many achievements so far show. He is also genuinely addressing many of his weaknesses, after the party room revolt.
For me, that makes Abbott head and shoulders over any rival being touted by self-serving leakers who are mad, bad and treacherous to know.
POSTSCRIPT
Yes, Credlin has been too dominant and too noticeably so. Yes, the Prime Minister should have more sources of advice - and a contest of ideas - at the very heart of his office. And yes, some of Credlin’s critics (but far from all) want Abbott to sack her so they can then pounce and call her a mere scapegoat for Abbott’s own failures. She will just be their entree.
So I’ll repeat the suggestion I have been giving since last year. It is a compromise that doesn’t just take the heat off Credlin but makes Abbott’s office stronger.
Abbott should appoint at least one more person, every bit as senior and as trusted as Credlin, as his political or communications guru - the kind of intimate confidant that Peter Barron and Geoff Walsh were to Bob Hawke. That Alistair Campbell was to Tony Blair. That Dick Morris and James Carville were to Bill Clinton. That Bruce Hawker was to Bob Carr.
But who? Who does Abbott trust and who could do that job well? If there’s no natural candidate, let Abbott appoint one of his MPs, as Blair appointed Peter Mandelson, which would also provide backbenchers with an alternative access to Abbott. They could, say, become the Cabinet Secretary, a position that could and should be far more influential and which is currently filled by a man whose name I don’t even know. Oh, and don’t stop there: add a friendly mentor, too, a Michael L’Estrange kind of figure, to play watchman.
Critics say Credlin would never accept a rival to her power. But she is highly intelligent. I am sure she knows changes must be made - and signalled every day - if she is to save not just herself but the Prime Minister whose interests she serves.
UPDATE
This is stinking more and more of a stitch-up, not just false in detail, but written without giving the Prime Minister a chance to put his side:
Yesterday came the despicable and plainly false suggestion that Abbott had cost Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran their lives by offending Indonesia.
Today comes more criticism - again pushed by anonymous critics - that simply makes no sense [and which has now been completely denied as false - see UPDATE below]:
TONY Abbott suggested a unilateral invasion of Iraq, with 3500 Australian ground troops to confront the Islamic State terrorist group.Has Credlin had too much influence and been too prominent and too rude? Undoubtedly, although that lesson has now been well and truly learned.
Flanked by his chief of staff, Peta Credlin, in a meeting in Canberra on November 25, the Prime Minister said the move would help halt the surge of Islamic State in northern Iraq.
After receiving no resistance from Ms Credlin or his other staff in the room, Mr Abbott then raised the idea with Australia’s leading military planners. The military officials were stunned, telling Mr Abbott that sending 3500 Australian soldiers without any US or NATO cover would be disastrous for the Australians.
They argued that even the US was not prepared to put ground troops into Iraq and it would make Australia the only Western country with troops on the ground.
Asked this week about the suggestion by the Prime Minister of sending Australian ground troops to Iraq, a spokesman for Mr Abbott said: “The Prime Minister has consistently said that the Australian government will continue to talk to the government of Iraq and to our coalition partners about what Australia can usefully do to make the world a safer place and to make Australia a safer country."…
One minister said the partyroom would not permit the management style of Mr Abbott’s office, under Ms Credlin, to continue. He said: “If the management style continues this way, Tony Abbott will not take us to the next election — Malcolm Turnbull will."…
The proposal to invade Iraq raises the issue of Mr Abbott’s judgment — it was made two months before his decision to award a knighthood to Prince Philip.... The Weekend Australian investigation has uncovered the enormous power of Ms Credlin… Mr Abbott has allowed Ms Credlin a role previous prime ministerial advisers have never had. The investigation found a widespread view among his colleagues that Mr Abbott has become remote and inaccessible.
But wait. Is this breathlessly reported anecdote proof of Credlin’s terrible overreach?
Er, actually the very opposite. Now we’re meant to be horrified that Credlin did NOT influence Abbott and did NOT make decisions for him. As far as we can tell from this, she barely spoke before the military chiefs, if at all.
And then there’s the almost equally dumb attack on Abbott’s judgement.
The critic’s usual criticism of Abbott is that he doesn’t take advice and makes silly “captain’s calls”.
But wait. Once again, does this anecdote prove any such thing?
Here is Abbott quite properly canvassing with his most senior military advisers all the options available to him in confronting once of the most brutal and dangerous terrorist armies ever seen. Winston Churchill would have done precisely the same, considering everything from the sound to the sensational.
But here is Abbott also NOT ignoring advice and NOT making a captain’s call. He does NOT make the decision that reporter John Lyon and Abbott’s anonymous critics mock.
I have been critical of Abbott’s judgement, and lately to the point where the ABC made my criticisms a lead item of their news bulletins. So I’m not shy to call out Abbott for real mistakes.
But what do the leaked criticisms of Abbott over the past couple of days suggest?
First, that Turnbull supporters in the Liberal party, aided by sympathetic journalists, are utterly determined not to let Abbott succeed. They are selfish and disloyal to the wider Liberal cause.
Second, that they will use any foul trick to drag him down. They have no honor.
Alternately, of course, they could simply be deranged by hatred.
Abbott is actually far more competent than he’s being painted, as his government’s many achievements so far show. He is also genuinely addressing many of his weaknesses, after the party room revolt.
For me, that makes Abbott head and shoulders over any rival being touted by self-serving leakers who are mad, bad and treacherous to know.
POSTSCRIPT
Yes, Credlin has been too dominant and too noticeably so. Yes, the Prime Minister should have more sources of advice - and a contest of ideas - at the very heart of his office. And yes, some of Credlin’s critics (but far from all) want Abbott to sack her so they can then pounce and call her a mere scapegoat for Abbott’s own failures. She will just be their entree.
So I’ll repeat the suggestion I have been giving since last year. It is a compromise that doesn’t just take the heat off Credlin but makes Abbott’s office stronger.
Abbott should appoint at least one more person, every bit as senior and as trusted as Credlin, as his political or communications guru - the kind of intimate confidant that Peter Barron and Geoff Walsh were to Bob Hawke. That Alistair Campbell was to Tony Blair. That Dick Morris and James Carville were to Bill Clinton. That Bruce Hawker was to Bob Carr.
But who? Who does Abbott trust and who could do that job well? If there’s no natural candidate, let Abbott appoint one of his MPs, as Blair appointed Peter Mandelson, which would also provide backbenchers with an alternative access to Abbott. They could, say, become the Cabinet Secretary, a position that could and should be far more influential and which is currently filled by a man whose name I don’t even know. Oh, and don’t stop there: add a friendly mentor, too, a Michael L’Estrange kind of figure, to play watchman.
Critics say Credlin would never accept a rival to her power. But she is highly intelligent. I am sure she knows changes must be made - and signalled every day - if she is to save not just herself but the Prime Minister whose interests she serves.
UPDATE
This is stinking more and more of a stitch-up, not just false in detail, but written without giving the Prime Minister a chance to put his side:
Senior Cabinet Minister Mathias Cormann has issued an emphatic denial of a news report that Prime Minister Tony Abbott raised the prospect of unilaterally sending thousands of ground troops to Iraq…If Cormann is right, Lyons must issue an apology. He should also out the sources that fed him such bull.
“That story is wrong… The Prime Minister never sought such advice.”
The Australian does reference a statement from a spokesman for the Prime Minister, which says: “The Prime Minister has consistently said that the Australian Government will continue to talk to the government of Iraq and to our coalition partners about what Australia can usefully do to make the world a safer place and to make Australia a safer country.”
But Senator Cormann said the paper only requested comment from the Government on a very general question about increasing Australia’s military efforts in Iraq, and did not raise the details that have been published in the report.
“May I say my advice is the journalist who wrote that story actually never put that proposition to the Prime Minister’s office when seeking comment,” he said.
===
Blainey: we may admire old Aboriginal ways, but they could not last
Andrew Bolt February 21 2015 (6:14am)
Our greatest historian, Geoffrey Blainey, reflects on what he’s learned or re-learned of Aboriginal society while writing his latest book, The Story of Australia’s People: Volume I:
Seen from some angles there is a simple charm and complex ingenuity in the traditional Aboriginal way of life… This way of life – now vanished – heartens the more dedicated of the Greens, perhaps because the indigenous population did not grow too rapidly. Furthermore, pollution was low except when the bush was deliberately and systematically burnt....A wonderfully wise man, whose contributions to public debate continue to shame that pack of academics and journalists which once tried to howl him down, and drove him from his Melbourne University job.
But this unique lifestyle could not continue into the modern era… We can outline to any audience the virtues of this lifestyle, but something additional must be told: that fewer than a couple out of every 100 listening could survive today – they could not be fed and clothed – if that way of life had prevailed. It had to end, and it ended tragically and at times ruthlessly…
There have been astonishing advances in knowledge about oldtime Australia. One was quietly announced last December. The outcome of research based on ice cores drilled in the East Antarctic, it reveals that Australia even in the Christian era has experienced droughts of a severity that we can hardly imagine. In the eastern or populous half of Australia the climate was already extremely dry in AD1174, when a 39-year drought began. It makes the forbidding drought of the early 2000s, fresh in our memory, seem a mere gust of hot wind.
Did Australia’s population during that century decline by one quarter or one half? We can only guess…
My present view is that research will reveal that the Aborigines’ traditional way of life was more perilous than we have long assumed. Moreover, the loss of life through famine – even if a grave famine arrived only twice in a millennium – must have been prodigious. Whether the intense rivalry, hostility and periodical warfare between many of the tribes is linked to these famines I do not know: probably it is not closely related.
Could the Aboriginal and the British cultures have been reconciled when they first met?… Even today, the 80,000 Aborigines who live in their own isolated townships in the semi-deserts and the tropics seem, in some ways, to remain a distinctive group in outlook and way of life…
It was unlikely that 10 or 20 of these major tribes or nations [at the time of white settlement] would ever come together and sign a treaty among themselves, let alone with Britain… In contrast, the Maori, who were already gardeners and builders of forts, were more easily understood by the British…
Many of the clashes in Australian history in the century after 1788 were unavoidable. Of course the British, in a display of 21st-century morality, could have withdrawn. But another invading power would eventually have arrived.
The decline of the indigenous population after 1788 was steep. The extent of the decline can be disputed, because the size of the original population is wide open to debate. Violence inflicted by Europeans was terrible in some districts and massacres are well known. Overall, however, this was not the largest single cause of death; that was probably new diseases… Alcohol, especially brandy and rum, also cut down thousands… If we learn to respect the way in which Aborigines once made their living, we also have to respect the way in which the incoming British began to turn this continent into a major producer of foods, clothing materials and minerals for Australians and the wider world… New technology has probably been the main pilot of Australian history and the crucial creator of a high standard of living for more and more people.
===
The Bolt Report tomorrow, February 21
Andrew Bolt February 20 2015 (11:00pm)
On the The Bolt Report on Channel 10 tomorrow at 10am and 4pm.
Editorial: Is Bill Shorten ready to be your Prime Minister?
My guest: Jeremy Jones on Europe, no longer safe for Jews. A warning.
The panel: former Labor campaign guru Bruce Hawker and Michael Kroger, Victorian Liberal President.
NewsWatch: Daily Telegraph columnist Miranda Devine. On Hicks, the ABC and more.
And a little lesson no conservative politician should miss: what to do about the ABC reporter getting in your face. Examples given.
Has the campaign to save two Australian drug smugglers gone too far? Has Abbott rallied, and did Bill Shorten just blow it? And lots more.
The videos of the shows appear here.
Editorial: Is Bill Shorten ready to be your Prime Minister?
My guest: Jeremy Jones on Europe, no longer safe for Jews. A warning.
The panel: former Labor campaign guru Bruce Hawker and Michael Kroger, Victorian Liberal President.
NewsWatch: Daily Telegraph columnist Miranda Devine. On Hicks, the ABC and more.
And a little lesson no conservative politician should miss: what to do about the ABC reporter getting in your face. Examples given.
Has the campaign to save two Australian drug smugglers gone too far? Has Abbott rallied, and did Bill Shorten just blow it? And lots more.
The videos of the shows appear here.
===
Fairfax claims one cyclone is a trend and blames warming
Andrew Bolt February 20 2015 (7:55pm)
It took no time at all for the Sydney Morning Herald’s Peter Hannan to find an alarmist to claim that one cyclone this week could be a trend - and a sign of global warming:
The southward shift of cyclones under climate change will force planners to demand stronger building standards as far south as Coffs Harbour on the NSW North Coast, Cairns climatologist Steve Turton says.Completely missing in this beat-up is the evidence from the Bureau of Meteorology - that we haven’t actually been getting more big cyclones:
Storms such as the category 5 Cyclone Marcia, which crossed the central Queensland coast on Friday, “are going to become more common in the future along the eastern seaboard of Australia,” Professor Turton from James Cook University told Fairfax Media…“The research is suggesting that, in a warmer world, we’ll get more intense cyclones because there’ll be more energy in the oceans and also the atmosphere,” he said.
Nor does Hannan report that even the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, in its latest big report, also finds no real evidence so far that cyclones are getting worse, although they are certainly getting rarer:
In summary, this assessment does not revise the SREX conclusion of low confidence that any reported long-term (centennial) increases in tropical cyclone activity are robust, after accounting for past changes in observing capabilities…This kind of partial reporting, designed more to scare than truly inform, is disgraceful.
In summary, confidence in large scale changes in the intensity of extreme extratropical cyclones since 1900 is low… Over periods of a century or more, evidence suggests slight decreases in the frequency of tropical cyclones making landfall in the North Atlantic and the South Pacific, once uncertainties in observing methods have been considered. Little evidence exists of any longer-term trend in other ocean basins… Several studies suggest an increase in intensity, but data sampling issues hamper these assessments…
Callaghan and Power (2011) find a statistically significant decrease in Eastern Australia land-falling tropical cyclones since the late 19th century although including 2010/2011 season data this trend becomes non-significant (i.e., a trend of zero lies just inside the 90% confidence interval).
===
Post by A Mighty Girl.
===
Post by A Mighty Girl.
===
Post by Doyoueven.com.
===
Post by Fiona Patten.
Thomson? Richo?
===
===
===
===
===
===
===
===
Post by Wake Up World.
===
===
Weren’t these islands supposed to be drowning instead?
Andrew Bolt February 21 2014 (5:26pm)
Yet more of those islands - like Kiribati and Tuvalu - that are growing, not drowning as the warmists predicted:
A string of Pacific islands have apparently “grown back” after they were devastated by a typhoon a century ago.UPDATE
A powerful typhoon in 1905 killed all but two inhabitants of the Nadikdik Atoll [above] - part of the Marshall Islands - and washed away most of the islands’ landmass. But the islands seem to have re-established themselves - one has become a fully vegetated, stable island again - while several smaller islands have reappeared and formed into a single, larger landmass, the New Zealand Herald reports.
“The storm obviously generated huge amounts of sediment and threw up large amounts of coral on to the islands, which has helped them to re-organise themselves,” says Dr Murray Ford of the University of Auckland. Aerial photographs taken across seven decades since 1945 show that vegetated areas on the previously barren islands has grown by nearly a quarter, a report on the NZCity website says.
Rupert Murdoch once said we said we should “give the planet the benefit of the doubt”. Since then, though, the failure of the planet to warm as predicted suggests it’s the warmists we should doubt instead:
===
Some inconvenient truths for Secretary of Scares John Kerry
Andrew Bolt February 21 2014 (5:14pm)
Dr. Richard McNider and Dr. John Christy - both professors of atmospheric science - take the big fact-stick to warming catastrophist John Kerry:
In a Feb. 16 speech in Indonesia, Secretary of State John Kerry assailed climate-change skeptics as members of the “Flat Earth Society” for doubting the reality of catastrophic climate change. He said,Read on.
“We should not allow a tiny minority of shoddy scientists” and “extreme ideologues to compete with scientific facts.”But who are the Flat Earthers, and who is ignoring the scientific facts?
Kerry goes the full alarmist:
===
Uh, oh. I might regret this
Andrew Bolt February 21 2014 (3:41pm)
Reader Ian of Cairns:
But I found Jane to be a very nice woman indeed. That could have been the problem.
UPDATE
The ABC tells me there has been “quite a strong reaction” to the show - for and against - even though only a small grab has so far been shown as a teaser. I suspect there are many people who object to the ABC giving Satan a pulpit.
I’m told the show will screen at the following times:
This is the bit that has some on the Left gloating:
Andrew, you have been quiet with respect to your interview on One Plus One. A section of it was played on this morning’s ABC News Breakfast. Looking forward to seeing it in full.Sorry, Ian. I didn’t know it was on tonight until you prompted me to check:
And maybe I’d deliberately wiped it from my mind. I fear I revealed too much - and was too inarticulate at the same time. Now I also worry that I clumsily, but this time inadvertently, might offend some people.
But I found Jane to be a very nice woman indeed. That could have been the problem.
UPDATE
The ABC tells me there has been “quite a strong reaction” to the show - for and against - even though only a small grab has so far been shown as a teaser. I suspect there are many people who object to the ABC giving Satan a pulpit.
I’m told the show will screen at the following times:
ABC News 24UPDATE
Friday 2030 AEDT
Saturday 0630 & 1730 AEDT
Sunday 2130 AEDT
ABC 1
Wednesday 1100 LOCAL
This is the bit that has some on the Left gloating:
===
Boats still stopped
Andrew Bolt February 21 2014 (2:40pm)
Scott Morrison says there have been no boats for 64 days, the longest stretch since August in 2008, just a few months after the Rudd Government weakened our border laws.
===
This pack-hate of Abbott should stop before worse happens
Andrew Bolt February 21 2014 (11:56am)
This is the kind of crap politicians on both sides have to deal with (but Liberals more than most) and which threatens our happy tradition of having politicians mix with the public without heavy security. Note that the bigot screaming abuse slips straight into the anti-Semitism now distressingly fashionable in Leftist circles in particular.
The Left is now the natural home of the barbarian. Snapped in Melbourne’s Bourke St Mall:
(Thanks to readers Allan and Nick.)
UPDATE
Here is the troll who chased after Abbott, shouting abuse and “Jewish banker” theories:
He’s a Christian in name only who boasts that he’s already been arrested for doing the same to John Howard. And he has very disturbing views on Jews. Antony Loewenstein deserves such people in his audience. But there is something here our authorities need to check up on.
Reader John:
The Left is now the natural home of the barbarian. Snapped in Melbourne’s Bourke St Mall:
Before that was the same-sex marriage rally featuring a banner of Abbott being hanged:
The abuse is astonishing, and some of it seems licensed by the Leftist media:
Abbott hadn’t even been sworn in before a new Facebook site - “Tony Abbott - Worst PM in Australian History” - savaged him as “a misogynist, sexist, homophobic pr---, a bully, a racist, a liar ...”. It has 170,000 “likes”.Had these things been done to Julia Gillard, would we have heard the end of it?
Other Facebook sites were worse. “Tony Abbott should be assassinated” was created from an office at the Geelong Trades Hall.
ADS hit the mainstream media, too. The Age even promoted “ethically produced” T shirts from columnist Clementine Ford with the slogan “F--- Abbott”.
The ABC’s Q & A website left up a tweet about performing a sexual act on Abbott and The Drum vilified him as a religious bigot who denied evolution and wanted to “score points against the ‘feminazis’ and ‘poofs’ “. Meanwhile, Catherine Deveny, a Guardian writer, boasted on Twitter how her teenage son hated Abbott, and published a photograph of his profanity-strewed poster.
(Thanks to readers Allan and Nick.)
UPDATE
Here is the troll who chased after Abbott, shouting abuse and “Jewish banker” theories:
UPDATE
He’s a Christian in name only who boasts that he’s already been arrested for doing the same to John Howard. And he has very disturbing views on Jews. Antony Loewenstein deserves such people in his audience. But there is something here our authorities need to check up on.
Reader John:
He describes himself as a lefty extreme daredevil anti-bankster/war/Zio activist
===
King should choose: bikie enforcer or Richmond
Andrew Bolt February 21 2014 (11:44am)
It’s not often I agree with Andrew Demetriou and David Koch, and it’s even more unusual given I am a Richmond supporter who long admired Jake King’s spirit. But:
AFL boss Andrew Demetriou says Jake King’s continued association with bikie figure Toby Mitchell “defies belief” and the Tigers forward should reconsider the friendship for his and his club’s sake…King is being a fool and destroying Richmond’s credentials as a family club.
And his stance was backed by Port Adelaide president David Koch, who today said he would sack King if he was a Power player.
===
Hockey: “Australia is going to run out of money”
Andrew Bolt February 21 2014 (11:38am)
Treasurer Joe Hockey is doing a terrific job of selling the need for deep spending cuts:
UPDATE
I’m a bit surprised by this headline in The Australian:
Mr Hockey said he was ‘’ringing an early warning bell’’ about the sustainability of federal funding for vital programs, saying hard work will be needed in the future just to maintain the quality of life expected by most Australians.Good stuff. But let’s see what actually happens - and what the Senate will permit.
‘’The starting point is if our health and welfare and education systems stay exactly the same, Australia is going to run out of money to pay for them,’’ Mr Hockey told the Seven Network on Friday.
‘’If nothing happens, we will never get back into surplus, we’ll never pay off debt. ‘’We’ll either have to have a massive increase in taxes, and that means fewer jobs at the end of the day, or we’re going to have to look at ways we can restructure the system to make it sustainable.’’
UPDATE
I’m a bit surprised by this headline in The Australian:
===
Workplace change coming … slowly
Andrew Bolt February 21 2014 (8:54am)
The pace of these changes is dangerously slow, but the direction is good:
THE Productivity Commission will be given wide-ranging powers to recommend sweeping workplace changes, including giving employers greater rights to try to remove conditions from enterprise agreements, under the terms of reference that cabinet is finalising for its inquiry.The conversation does seem to be moving towards a consensus that we need to work out way out of this trough.
Employment Minister Eric Abetz will announce the terms of reference next week when he introduces a bill into parliament to allow workers to trade off more easily key entitlements, including penalty rates, for more flexible working hours.
The bill will also impose fresh restrictions on unions entering workplaces and limit their ability to get pay deals on new resource projects…
Business groups have been urging the government to order specific inquiries into the range of issues over which unions can strike, variation of enterprise agreements and the ability to end enterprise agreements after their expiry date… The Coalition promised to order a Productivity Commission review into the Fair Work Act and the industrial relations system before last year’s election with the aim of ... seeking a “mandate” for any changes at the 2016 election.
===
Prize exaggeration at Curtin University’s shrine
Andrew Bolt February 21 2014 (8:37am)
Jo Nova is astonished by the homage Curtin University has mounted on a wall in honour of its latest big signing, man-with-halo Professor Richard Warrick:
One of Jo’s readers, on Curtin’s staff, reports:
Warrick’s bio pages say that he is a “co-recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize” and that “he shared a Nobel Peace Prize with former U.S. Vice President Al Gore and other selected IPCC authors in 2007.” And the Nobel Prize appears in that mural, too, and this official Curtin page too. If he stretches the facts so much in his own bio, shall I trust the results of his research?Good question. As Jo notes:
Everyone knows these Nobel claims are just an empty fawning political embellishment. Firstly, good scientific work gets a science prize, not a peace prize. Secondly, a peace prize is worthless even as a peace prize since Obama got one for 11 days of just being in office.Much more at Jo’s blog.
Not only is the peace prize meaningless, but Prof Warrick didn’t get one, even the low-standard Nobel committee themselves say so…
The official word as quoted by Donna LaFramboise:
“the IPCC issued a statement contradicting Pachauri’s 2007 proclamation. It says the prize was awarded to the IPCC as a whole “and not to any individual associated with the IPCC. Thus it is incorrect to refer to any IPCC official, or scientist who worked on IPCC reports, as a Nobel laureate or Nobel Prize winner."” ...
(Thanks to reader Steve.)
===
Once was normal, now “alternative”
Andrew Bolt February 21 2014 (8:27am)
America’s NBC finds a wild out-there athlete getting a gold medal at Sochi:
(Thanks to reader Abe.)
The athlete:
...David Wise, the freestyle skiing halfpipe gold medalist Tuesday night ...And what makes his lifestyle so “alternative” to the usual you find with such people?
He is mature ... he has a wife ... they have a two-year-old daughter ... attends church regularly ... focused on being the best father and husband he can be ... hurrying home for quality time with the family ... stable life ...Crazy guy.
(Thanks to reader Abe.)
===
Roy Spencer: while they call people like me “deniers”, I will call them “global warming Nazis”
Andrew Bolt February 21 2014 (8:21am)
Climate scientist Dr Roy Spencer has had enough:
When politicians and scientists started calling people like me “deniers”, they crossed the line....(Thanks to reader pro.)
They indirectly equate (1) the skeptics’ view that global warming is not necessarily all manmade nor a serious problem, with (2) the denial that the Nazi’s extermination of millions of Jews ever happened.
Too many of us for too long have ignored the repulsive, extremist nature of the comparison. It’s time to push back.
I’m now going to start calling these people “global warming Nazis”.
The pseudo-scientific ramblings by their leaders have falsely warned of mass starvation, ecological collapse, agricultural collapse, overpopulation…all so that the masses would support their radical policies. Policies that would not voluntarily be supported by a majority of freedom-loving people…
Like the Nazis, they advocate the supreme authority of the state (fascism)… Like the Nazis, they are anti-capitalist. They are willing to sacrifice millions of lives of poor people at the altar of radical environmentalism, advocating expensive energy policies that increase poverty… So, as long as they continue to call people like me “deniers”, I will call them “global warming Nazis”.
===
Don’t sign me up to a “race”
Andrew Bolt February 21 2014 (8:08am)
Clarissa Tan expresses exactly the concerns I have with our own new racism - and the proposed constitutional recognition of “indigenous Australians”:
I am a banana. In Singapore, where I used to live, this needs no explanation — it means I’m yellow on the outside but white on the inside, someone who looks ethnically Chinese but whose way of thinking is ‘western’…(Thanks to reader Wade.)
In Asia, there are lots of labels like these, based along racial lines. Most trenchant of all, an entire kaleidoscope of words exist to refer to foreigners, more often than not whites: farang in Thailand, gaijin in Japan, mat salleh in Malaysia, gweilo in Hong Kong. In the latter, ‘gwei’ means ‘ghost’ — taken literally, it means a white person is not fully human...And where’s the outrage?…
In Britain though, where I now live, ...I can’t help noticing that certain sections of the population are now so acutely tuned into the issue of race that they spot racism where none is intended…
Britain is not a racist country. I have not, as a member of a minority ethnic group here, encountered racist comments or treatment from anyone…
The danger with crying racism at every turn is that it conceals real problems. Immigration cannot be discussed properly here, because anyone who wants to raise the subject is labelled bigoted or racist — even if they’re talking about white Poles…
And while Britain is looking out for the old bigotry, new ones creep in...: too much race awareness tends to cause division, rather than inclusion.
Just a few weeks ago I discovered that I fall under a group known as BAME — Black and Minority Ethnic. Such categorisation, used mainly by the political left, is meant to protect my rights against discrimination… Ironically, this well-meant labelling might be the most racist thing that I have ever encountered in the UK. The truth is, I didn’t come all the way to Britain to hide myself under an umbrella acronym. I refuse to be the ‘ME’ in BAME. I don’t want to feel safe and secure by cordoning myself off from the larger community. I can’t bear to feel perpetually aggrieved, offended, slighted, victimised. Most of all, I don’t want to be viewed purely according to my race — I’ve had enough of that back where I come from, thank you very much.
===
Detainees met a PNG police force that hits back
Andrew Bolt February 21 2014 (7:59am)
Reader Herb gives background to the violent police response to the Manus detention centre riot:
As a PNG resident of long standing, I was based in Port Moresby… I moved extensively around PNG , New Britain, Bouganville, and Manus Island.etc
Driving back from the town to the airport I often came across and watched ‘the Police Boi Riot Squad ‘ at work in Koki market… The Police Bois were Manus Islanders and highlanders (Police Bois never policed their own provinces)
The squad would be arranged in a rectangle with about 3 lines of 8 walking slowly in front of the backward moving calaboose wagon. The rear squad line were ‘handlers’ with no special equipment just helmets and big boots.
The next line all had batons and helmets as the front line clobbered the ‘orley’ and walked over them, generously kicking them the baton handlers would continue to baton and kick them and the handlers would rocket them into the calkaboose wagon.
However, the most formidable part of the squad was the front line ‘shock’ troops.
When the officer blew his whistle once, they interlocked their bamboo shields and walked very orderly toward the rioting orley. When they were about 10 metre away the officer gave short bursts on his whistle and the interlocked shields charged the orley
Great confusion and shouting etc as those pinned by the shield wall tried to go back, leaving heads and shoulders over the shield line. The Police Bois laid into anything over their shields with enormous ferocity, arcing their batons from near the ground…
However the most alarming thing was the noise. Standing about 200m from the squad , and over all the shouting was a cacophony of very loud ‘boinks’! ‘boink , boink boink , boink, really unbelievable.!
The ‘boinks ‘ were the police bois giving a massive clobber on the skulls like slamming two wooden blocks together… If the refugees fronted a Poice Boi riot squad anywhere near as disciplined in earlier times , they would for sure clobber those thin middle eastern skulls....
===
If the guard was ours, so is the responsibility. But…
Andrew Bolt February 21 2014 (7:27am)
If true, our responsibility and action is needed against those responsible:
On the other hand:
ABC host Waleed Aly:
It is, in fact, perfectly possible to run a detention centre humanely.
Aly continues:
UPDATE
The Australian is wise to warn that the “horror” is being exaggerated by people with a political agenda:
AS BLAME is exchanged on the Manus Island detention centre bloodbath, it has been claimed that the Iranian asylum seeker killed on Monday night may have been murdered by out-of-control guards who stomped his skull as he lay defenceless on the ground.Immigration Minister Scott Morrison has said he has no information about a throat being cut, but I’d like to know a lot more before I dismiss it. The dead man was earlier said to have been hit by a rock, an account I accepted but now doubt.
According to an account from an Australian guard working for security contractor GS4, obtained by New Corp, local guards working for GS4 were in a frenzy and jumped on the man’s head in a rage on Monday night, inside the detention compound… Another man survived after his throat was apparently slit with a machete on Sunday evening, after he and six others apparently broke free from the compound.
On the other hand:
Manus Island Member of Parliament Ron Knight said he believed that gun butts and batons had been used against rioting asylum-seekers by the notorious ‘’mobile squad’’, a paramilitary branch of the police who are the main law enforcers outside the camp.UPDATE
Mr Knight said the blame for the violence lay primarily with the asylum seekers but said that their claims should be processed more quickly and the security infrastructure should be improved.
ABC host Waleed Aly:
It is the very logic of our asylum seeker policy - which is built on the sole rationality of deterrence - to create horror.What hyperbole. No, the very logic of our asylum seeker policy is in fact just a shut gate. The detention centres when operating normally are not scenes of “horror” - not like scenes of drowning children under Labor’s policies. The are just places where boat people realise they can’t get to Australia.
It is, in fact, perfectly possible to run a detention centre humanely.
Aly continues:
Put any group of people through this wringer, and they will eventually respond with riotous protest. Such behaviour, then, is not a function of the defective personalities of individuals, but the inevitable human reaction to inhuman treatment: that the violence we’ve witnessed over and over is simply a product of the system.I suspect such violence is also a product of the culture of the asylum seekers, and many Australians would doubt the wisdom of importing it.
UPDATE
The Australian is wise to warn that the “horror” is being exaggerated by people with a political agenda:
VIEWERS of the ABC’s 7.30 on Wednesday witnessed an alarming story about the Manus Island detention centre riots. Reporter Conor Duffy promised viewers a “fresh” account of what went on “inside” the centre. He interviewed an Iranian-Australian interpreter, Azita Bokan, who worked for the Immigration Department and, according to Duffy, “was at the centre”. Ms Bokan said PNG locals employed by security guards attacked asylum-seekers with machetes, knives and rocks, leaving one detainee dead and scores of others injured… Yesterday, The Sydney Morning Herald published its own interview with Ms Bokan on the front page of the newspaper. It could have been a great story. The problem was that the reporting, based on Ms Bokan’s allegations, was seriously flawed.
Ms Bokan did not witness the riots. She was not even inside the facility. Her claims, breezily reported with authority by both the ABC and Fairfax, were not verified by the department or the minister, Scott Morrison. It was not until the sixth paragraph of the Fairfax article by Michael Gordon and Sarah Whyte that it was noted Ms Bokan “did not witness the violence”. This fact was not allowed to get in the way of the sensationalised allegations designed to support the barely disguised ABC/Fairfax agenda: relentless opposition to the government’s policies.... Ms Bokan was on Manus Island for only a week. Her claim that locals were involved in the riots was rejected by PNG Prime Minister Peter O’Neill. The real reason for running these unverified allegations is that the ABC and Fairfax detest the government’s hardline, but necessary, asylum-seeker policies. The Herald’s chief political correspondent, Mark Kenny, made the extraordinary claim that the policy of offshore processing at Manus Island without resettlement in Australia “has begun killing people”. Kenny described the policy as morally bankrupt and structurally flawed. On the ABC’s The Drum website, Fairfax journalist Jacqueline Maley argued there was “a strong moral difference” between the death of one person on Manus Island and the 1200 who drowned while trying to seek asylum in Australia. In other words, one death on the Coalition’s watch is worse, morally, than 1200 deaths on Labor’s watch. These arguments could not be more twisted in their logic or ignorant of the facts.
===
Channel Seven confirms it indeed plans to reward Corby family for Schapelle’s crime
Andrew Bolt February 21 2014 (7:00am)
And Channel Seven had the gall to get huffy about a raid by police seeking to uphold the law against criminals profiting from their crime:
Channel 7 said this afternoon the money offered to the Corby family for an interview was in the “ballpark” of $500,000.That is an open flouting of the spirit of the law. I hope there is another raid soon.
In an interview with Fairfax Radio, Seven’s commercial director Bruce McWilliam said: “I’m not going to tell you the actual figure, but you’re not saying a crazy thing. “It’s in that ballpark.”
===
Good mates
Andrew Bolt February 21 2014 (6:44am)
I knew Cate as a fellow panelist on Insiders, when she was Malcolm, and liked and respected her very much. So it’s no surprise at all to me that Tony Abbott does, too:
Prime Minister Tony Abbott may have recently had some stern words for the ABC, but he will be in a friendlier mood next Monday, when he introduces the Australian Story for his friend Cate McGregor.Abbott’s review of McGregor’s last book - on cricket - is beautiful. To order the book, go here.
The ABC program will next week feature Lieutenant Colonel McGregor, an army officer and cricket expert who is also one of Australia’s most high profile transgender people.
It is well known that Mr Abbott is a long-standing friend of Lieutenant Colonel McGregor, after the two met in their student days.
In December, the Prime Minister announced that he had asked his friend - who has been a cricket commentator and writer - to help him select the Prime Minister’s XI…
Last year, the army officer ... told the ABC that she withdrew for several months during 2012 when she transitioned from her old identity as Malcolm McGregor. When she finally got back in contact with Mr Abbott and told him what was going on, he said: ‘’It changes nothing.’’
===
===
===
===
===
===
===
===
===
Holly Sarah Nguyen
RED ROSE: This is a reminder that you are a powerful, wise being and your power is LOVE, dear one. So please give us any fears you have about stepping into this power and shining bright! And remember, too, no one else is the source of your happiness, so choose to be happy right now and focus on YOU. You have the ability to imagine, and therefore create, anything you desire. Shine on, beautiful soul!
===
The joke is .. people, to this day, are fed .. ed
===
===
===
Can't hide the truth .. but I applaud the decision. The devil is real, but not worthy of study. All you need to know you can learn by walking with God. The devil can teach you to be paralysed by fear or moved by rage. Never useful. - ed
===
===
===
===
===
===
===
===
===
===
===
===
===
===
===
===
===
===
===
===
===
===
===
MADU Odiokwu Pastorvin
PRAY.
Father,I thank You for Your faithfulness to me. I know that You will bring to pass every promise You’ve made.Thank You for restoring my soul and leading me beside still waters. Today, I recommit my life afresh and anew. Help me to follow Your commands and leading in every area of my life. I repent for trying things in my own strength and choose to trust wholly in You in Jesus’ name. Amen.
Father,I thank You for Your faithfulness to me. I know that You will bring to pass every promise You’ve made.Thank You for restoring my soul and leading me beside still waters. Today, I recommit my life afresh and anew. Help me to follow Your commands and leading in every area of my life. I repent for trying things in my own strength and choose to trust wholly in You in Jesus’ name. Amen.
=
WHAT YOU ARE LOOKING FOR WILL COME AT THE APPOINTED TIME!
The Scripture says,“Is anything too hard for the LORD? At the appointed time I will return to you, according to the time of life, and Sarah shall have a son.”
(Genesis 18:14, NKJV)
In the scripture, God gave Sarah a promise that she would have a baby, but she was well beyond the childbearing age. She thought the promise would come through somebody else. That made more sense. She was too old. So she got her husband a maid, together with a young maid, they had a baby. Sarah said, “Thank You, Lord. The promise has come to pass.”
But God said, “No, Sarah. I didn’t put the promise in another woman. I put the promise in you. You have hidden treasure that is still buried in your womb.” But as long as Sarah thought, “I’m too old. I’m at a disadvantage. I don’t look like these younger women,” she was talking herself out of what God wanted to do.
How many times do we do the same thing? I will never be pregnant.May be you have had many abortions,I will never write that book.I could never build that house.I don't have the talent. No, God is saying to you what He said to Sarah. “I didn’t put the promise in somebody else. I put the promise in you.” Look past your circumstances today and look to God. The one who promised is faithful, and He will bring it to pass.God bless you.
The Scripture says,“Is anything too hard for the LORD? At the appointed time I will return to you, according to the time of life, and Sarah shall have a son.”
(Genesis 18:14, NKJV)
In the scripture, God gave Sarah a promise that she would have a baby, but she was well beyond the childbearing age. She thought the promise would come through somebody else. That made more sense. She was too old. So she got her husband a maid, together with a young maid, they had a baby. Sarah said, “Thank You, Lord. The promise has come to pass.”
But God said, “No, Sarah. I didn’t put the promise in another woman. I put the promise in you. You have hidden treasure that is still buried in your womb.” But as long as Sarah thought, “I’m too old. I’m at a disadvantage. I don’t look like these younger women,” she was talking herself out of what God wanted to do.
How many times do we do the same thing? I will never be pregnant.May be you have had many abortions,I will never write that book.I could never build that house.I don't have the talent. No, God is saying to you what He said to Sarah. “I didn’t put the promise in somebody else. I put the promise in you.” Look past your circumstances today and look to God. The one who promised is faithful, and He will bring it to pass.God bless you.
===
===
===
===
===
===
===
===
===
- 362 – Athanasius returns to Alexandria.
- 1245 – Thomas, the first known Bishop of Finland, is granted resignation after confessing to torture and forgery.
- 1437 – James I of Scotland is assassinated.
- 1440 – The Prussian Confederation is formed.
- 1543 – Battle of Wayna Daga – A combined army of Ethiopian and Portuguese troops defeats a Muslim army led by Ahmed Gragn.
- 1613 – Mikhail I is unanimously elected Tsar by a national assembly, beginning the Romanov dynasty of Imperial Russia.
- 1797 – A force of 1,400 French soldiers invaded Britain at Fishguard in support of the Society of United Irishmen. They were defeated by 500 British reservists.
- 1804 – The first self-propelling steam locomotive makes its outing at the Pen-y-Darren Ironworks in Wales.
- 1808 – Without a previous declaration of war, Russian troops cross the border to Sweden at Abborfors in eastern Finland, thus beginning the Finnish War, in which Sweden will lose the eastern half of the country (i.e. Finland) to Russia.
- 1828 – Initial issue of the Cherokee Phoenix is the first periodical to use the Cherokee syllabary invented by Sequoyah.
- 1842 – John Greenough is granted the first U.S. patent for the sewing machine.
- 1848 – Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels publish The Communist Manifesto.
- 1862 – American Civil War: Battle of Valverde is fought near Fort Craig in New Mexico Territory.
- 1874 – The Oakland Daily Tribune publishes its first edition.
- 1878 – The first telephone directory is issued in New Haven, Connecticut.
- 1885 – The newly completed Washington Monument is dedicated.
- 1896 – An Englishman raised in Australia, Bob Fitzsimmons, fought an Irishman, Peter Maher, in an American promoted event which technically took place in Mexico, winning the 1896 World Heavyweight Championship in boxing.
- 1913 – Ioannina is incorporated into the Greek state after the Balkan Wars.
- 1916 – World War I: In France, the Battle of Verdun begins.
- 1918 – The last Carolina parakeet dies in captivity at the Cincinnati Zoo.
- 1919 – German socialist Kurt Eisner is assassinated. His death results in the establishment of the Bavarian Soviet Republic and parliament and government fleeing Munich, Germany.
- 1921 – Constituent Assembly of the Democratic Republic of Georgia adopts the country's first constitution.
- 1921 – Rezā Shāh takes control of Tehran during a successful coup
- 1925 – The New Yorker publishes its first issue.
- 1937 – The League of Nations bans foreign national "volunteers" in the Spanish Civil War.
- 1945 – World War II: Japanese kamikaze planes sink the escort carrier USS Bismarck Sea and damage the USS Saratoga.
- 1947 – In New York City, Edwin Land demonstrates the first "instant camera", the Polaroid Land Camera, to a meeting of the Optical Society of America.
- 1948 – NASCAR is incorporated.
- 1952 – The British government, under Winston Churchill, abolishes identity cards in the UK to "set the people free".
- 1952 – The Bengali Language Movement protests occur at the University of Dhaka in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh).
- 1958 – The CND symbol, aka peace symbol, commissioned by the Direct Action Committee in protest against the Atomic Weapons Research Establishment, is designed and completed by Gerald Holtom.
- 1965 – Malcolm X is assassinated at the Audubon Ballroom in New York City.
- 1971 – The Convention on Psychotropic Substances is signed at Vienna.
- 1972 – United States President Richard Nixon visits the People's Republic of China to normalize Sino-American relations.
- 1972 – The Soviet unmanned spaceship Luna 20 lands on the Moon.
- 1973 – Over the Sinai Desert, Israeli fighter aircraft shoot down Libyan Arab Airlines Flight 114 jet killing 108 people.
- 1974 – The last Israeli soldiers leave the west bank of the Suez Canal pursuant to a truce with Egypt.
- 1975 – Watergate scandal: Former United States Attorney General John N. Mitchell and former White House aides H. R. Haldemanand John Ehrlichman are sentenced to prison.
- 1995 – Steve Fossett lands in Leader, Saskatchewan, Canada becoming the first person to make a solo flight across the Pacific Ocean in a balloon.
- 2013 – At least 17 people are killed and 119 injured following several bombings in the Indian city of Hyderabad.
Births[edit]
- 1397 – Isabella of Portugal (d. 1471)
- 1484 – Joachim I Nestor, Elector of Brandenburg (d. 1535)
- 1556 – Sethus Calvisius, German astronomer, composer, and theorist (d. 1615)
- 1705 – Edward Hawke, 1st Baron Hawke, English admiral and politician (d. 1781)
- 1609 – Raimondo Montecuccoli, Italian military commander (d. 1680)
- 1728 – Peter III of Russia (d. 1762)
- 1783 – Catharina of Württemberg (d. 1835)
- 1788 – Francis Ronalds, British scientist, inventor and engineer (d. 1873)
- 1791 – Carl Czerny, Austrian pianist and composer (d. 1857)
- 1794 – Antonio López de Santa Anna, Mexican general and politician, 8th President of Mexico (d. 1876)
- 1801 – John Henry Newman, English cardinal (d. 1890)
- 1817 – José Zorrilla, Spanish poet and playwright (d. 1893)
- 1821 – Charles Scribner I, American publisher, founded Charles Scribner's Sons (d. 1871)
- 1836 – Léo Delibes, French pianist and composer (d. 1891)
- 1840 – Murad V, Sultan of the Ottoman Empire (d.1904.)
- 1844 – Charles-Marie Widor, French organist and composer (d. 1937)
- 1860 – Goscombe John, Welsh-English sculptor and academic (d. 1952)
- 1865 – John Haden Badley, English author and educator, founded the Bedales School (d. 1967)
- 1867 – Otto Hermann Kahn, German banker and philanthropist (d. 1934)
- 1875 – Jeanne Calment, French super-centenarian (d. 1997)
- 1878 – Mirra Alfassa, French-Indian spiritual leader (d. 1973)
- 1885 – Sacha Guitry, Russian-French actor, director, and playwright (d. 1957)
- 1887 – Korechika Anami, Japanese general and politician, 54th Japanese Minister of War (d. 1945)
- 1888 – Clemence Dane, English author and playwright (d. 1965)
- 1892 – Harry Stack Sullivan, American psychiatrist and psychoanalyst (d. 1949)
- 1893 – Celia Lovsky, Austrian-American actress (d. 1979)
- 1893 – Andrés Segovia, Spanish guitarist (d. 1987)
- 1894 – Shanti Swaroop Bhatnagar, Indian chemist and academic (d. 1955)
- 1895 – Henrik Dam, Danish biochemist and physiologist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1976)
- 1896 – Nirala, Indian poet and author (d. 1961)
- 1902 – Arthur Nock, English theologian and academic (d. 1963)
- 1903 – Anaïs Nin, French-American essayist and memoirist (d. 1977)
- 1903 – Raymond Queneau, French poet and author (d. 1976)
- 1907 – W. H. Auden, English-American poet, playwright, and composer (d. 1973)
- 1909 – Hans Erni, Swiss painter, sculptor, and illustrator (d. 2015)
- 1910 – Douglas Bader, English captain and pilot (d. 1982)
- 1912 – Arline Judge, American actress and singer (d. 1974)
- 1914 – Ilmari Juutilainen, Finnish soldier and pilot (d. 1999)
- 1914 – Zachary Scott, American actor (d. 1965)
- 1914 – Jean Tatlock, American psychiatrist and physician (d. 1944)
- 1915 – Ann Sheridan, American actress (d. 1967)
- 1917 – Lucille Bremer, American actress and dancer (d. 1996)
- 1921 – John Rawls, American philosopher and academic (d. 2002)
- 1921 – Richard T. Whitcomb, American aeronautical engineer (d. 2009)
- 1924 – Thelma Estrin, American computer scientist and engineer (d. 2014)
- 1924 – Robert Mugabe, Zimbabwean educator and politician, 2nd President of Zimbabwe
- 1925 – Sam Peckinpah, American director and screenwriter (d. 1984)
- 1925 – Jack Ramsay, American basketball player, coach, and sportscaster (d. 2014)
- 1927 – Erma Bombeck, American journalist and author (d. 1996)
- 1927 – Hubert de Givenchy, French fashion designer, founded Givenchy
- 1929 – Chespirito, Mexican actor, director, producer, and screenwriter (d. 2014)
- 1933 – Nina Simone, American singer-songwriter and pianist (d. 2003)
- 1934 – Rue McClanahan, American actress (d. 2010)
- 1935 – Richard A. Lupoff, American author
- 1936 – Barbara Jordan, American lawyer and politician (d. 1996)
- 1937 – Ron Clarke, Australian runner and politician, Mayor of the Gold Coast (d. 2015)
- 1937 – Harald V of Norway
- 1938 – Bobby Charles, American singer-songwriter (d. 2010)
- 1938 – Kel Tremain, New Zealand rugby player (d. 1992)
- 1940 – Peter Gethin, English race car driver (d. 2011)
- 1940 – John Lewis, American activist and politician
- 1942 – Tony Martin, Trinidadian-American historian and academic (d. 2013)
- 1942 – Margarethe von Trotta, German actress, director, and screenwriter
- 1943 – David Geffen, American businessman, co-founded DreamWorks and Geffen Records
- 1945 – Maurice Bembridge, English golfer
- 1946 – Tyne Daly, American actress and singer
- 1946 – Anthony Daniels, English actor and producer
- 1946 – Alan Rickman, English actor and director (d. 2016)
- 1946 – Bob Ryan, American journalist and author
- 1947 – Johnny Echols, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
- 1947 – Olympia Snowe, American politician
- 1948 – Bill Slayback, American baseball player and singer (d. 2015)
- 1949 – Frank Brunner, American illustrator
- 1949 – Larry Drake, American actor (d. 2016)
- 1949 – Jerry Harrison, American singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer
- 1949 – Ronnie Hellström, Swedish footballer
- 1951 – Vince Welnick, American keyboard player (d. 2006)
- 1952 – Jean-Jacques Burnel, English bass player, songwriter, and producer
- 1953 – Christine Ebersole, American actress and singer
- 1953 – William Petersen, American actor and producer
- 1954 – Mike Pickering, English DJ and saxophonist
- 1955 – Kelsey Grammer, American actor, singer, and producer
- 1958 – Jake Burns, Northern Irish singer-songwriter and guitarist
- 1958 – Mary Chapin Carpenter, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
- 1958 – Alan Trammell, American baseball player, coach, and manager
- 1959 – José María Cano, Spanish singer-songwriter and painter
- 1960 – Plamen Oresharski, Bulgarian economist and politician, 52nd Prime Minister of Bulgaria
- 1960 – Steve Wynn, American singer-songwriter
- 1961 – Christopher Atkins, American actor and businessman
- 1962 – Chuck Palahniuk, American novelist and journalist
- 1962 – David Foster Wallace, American novelist, short story writer, and essayist (d. 2008)
- 1963 – William Baldwin, American actor
- 1963 – Ranking Roger, English singer-songwriter and musician
- 1963 – Greg Turner, New Zealand golfer
- 1964 – Mark Kelly, American captain, pilot, and astronaut
- 1964 – Scott Kelly, American captain, pilot, and astronaut
- 1967 – Leroy Burrell, American runner and coach
- 1969 – James Dean Bradfield, Welsh singer-songwriter and guitarist (Manic Street Preachers)
- 1969 – Aunjanue Ellis, American actress and producer
- 1969 – Tony Meola, American soccer player and manager
- 1969 – Cathy Richardson, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
- 1970 – Michael Slater, Australian cricketer and sportscaster
- 1970 – Eric Wilson, American bass player and drummer
- 1971 – Pierre Fulke, Swedish golfer
- 1972 – Seo Taiji, South Korean singer-songwriter
- 1973 – Heri Joensen, Faroese singer-songwriter and guitarist
- 1973 – Brian Rolston, American ice hockey player and coach
- 1974 – Iván Campo, Spanish footballer
- 1974 – Roberto Heras, Spanish cyclist
- 1976 – Ryan Smyth, Canadian ice hockey player
- 1976 – Michael McIntyre, English comedian, actor and television presenter
- 1977 – Jonathan Safran Foer, American novelist
- 1977 – Steve Francis, American basketball player
- 1977 – Owen King, American author
- 1977 – Kevin Rose, American businessman and television host, founded Digg
- 1979 – Pascal Chimbonda, Guadeloupean-French footballer
- 1979 – Shane Gibson, American guitarist (stOrk and Jonathan Davis and the SFA) (d. 2014)
- 1979 – Jennifer Love Hewitt, American actress and producer
- 1979 – Carly Colón, Puerto Rican professional wrestler
- 1979 – Jordan Peele, American actor, producer, and screenwriter
- 1980 – Brad Fast, Canadian ice hockey player
- 1980 – Tiziano Ferro, Italian singer-songwriter and producer
- 1982 – Andre Barrett, American basketball player
- 1983 – Braylon Edwards, American football player
- 1983 – Franklin Gutiérrez, Venezuelan baseball player
- 1983 – Mélanie Laurent, French actress
- 1984 – Andrew Ellis, New Zealand rugby player
- 1984 – David Odonkor, German footballer
- 1984 – Marco Paoloni, Italian footballer
- 1984 – James Wisniewski, American ice hockey player
- 1985 – Georgios Samaras, Greek footballer
- 1985 – Jamaal Westerman, American football player
- 1986 – Charlotte Church, Welsh singer-songwriter and actress
- 1987 – Ellen Page, Canadian actress
- 1990 – Mattias Tedenby, Swedish ice hockey player
- 1991 – Riyad Mahrez, Algerian footballer
- 1991 – Ji So-yun, South Korean footballer
- 1991 – Devon Travis, American baseball player
- 1993 – Steve Leo Beleck, Cameroonian footballer
- 1994 – Tang Haochen, Chinese tennis player
- 1994 – Charalampos Mavrias, Greek footballer
- 1996 – Sophie Turner, English actress
Deaths[edit]
- 675 – Randoald of Grandval, prior of the Benedictine monastery of Grandval
- 1437 – James I of Scotland (b. 1394)
- 1471 – Jan Rokycana, Czech bishop and theologian (b. 1396)
- 1513 – Pope Julius II (b. 1443)
- 1543 – Ahmad ibn Ibrahim al-Ghazi, Somalian general (b. 1507)
- 1554 – Hieronymus Bock, German botanist and physician (b. 1498)
- 1572 – Cho Shik, Korean poet and scholar (d. 1501)
- 1595 – Robert Southwell, English priest and poet (b. 1561)
- 1677 – Baruch Spinoza, Dutch philosopher and scholar (b. 1632)
- 1715 – Charles Calvert, 3rd Baron Baltimore, English politician (b. 1637)
- 1730 – Pope Benedict XIII (b. 1649)
- 1821 – Georg Friedrich von Martens, German jurist and diplomat (b. 1756)
- 1824 – Eugène de Beauharnais, French general (b. 1781)
- 1846 – Emperor Ninkō of Japan (b. 1800)
- 1862 – Justinus Kerner, German poet and physician (b. 1786)
- 1891 – James Timberlake, American lieutenant and police officer (b. 1846)
- 1919 – Kurt Eisner, German journalist and politician, Minister-President of Bavaria (b. 1867)
- 1926 – Heike Kamerlingh Onnes, Dutch physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1853)
- 1934 – Augusto César Sandino, Nicaraguan rebel leader (b. 1895)
- 1938 – George Ellery Hale, American astronomer and academic (b. 1868)
- 1941 – Frederick Banting, Canadian physician and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1891)
- 1944 – Ferenc Szisz, Hungarian-French race car driver (b. 1873)
- 1945 – Eric Liddell, Scottish rugby player and runner (b. 1902)
- 1946 – José Streel, Belgian journalist (b. 1911)
- 1958 – Duncan Edwards, English footballer (b. 1936)
- 1965 – Malcolm X, American minister and activist (b. 1925)
- 1967 – Charles Beaumont, American author and screenwriter (b. 1929)
- 1968 – Howard Florey, Australian pathologist and pharmacologist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1898)
- 1972 – Zhang Guohua, Chinese general and politician (b. 1914)
- 1972 – Bronislava Nijinska, Russian-American dancer and choreographer (b. 1891)
- 1972 – Eugène Tisserant, French cardinal (b. 1884)
- 1974 – Tim Horton, Canadian ice hockey player and businessman, co-founded Tim Hortons (b. 1930)
- 1980 – Alfred Andersch, German-Swiss author (b. 1914)
- 1982 – Gershom Scholem, German-Israeli historian and philosopher (b. 1897)
- 1984 – Mikhail Sholokhov, Russian novelist and short story writer, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1905)
- 1985 – Louis Hayward, South African-American actor (b. 1909)
- 1986 – Helen Hooven Santmyer, American novelist (b. 1895)
- 1991 – Dorothy Auchterlonie Green, Australian poet, critic, and academic (b. 1915)
- 1993 – Inge Lehmann, Danish seismologist and geophysicist (b. 1888)
- 1994 – Johannes Steinhoff, German general and pilot (b. 1913)
- 1996 – Morton Gould, American pianist, composer, and conductor (b. 1913)
- 1999 – Gertrude B. Elion, American biochemist and pharmacologist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1918)
- 1999 – Ilmari Juutilainen, Finnish soldier and pilot (b. 1914)
- 1999 – Wilmer Mizell, American baseball player and politician (b. 1930)
- 2002 – John Thaw, English actor and producer (b. 1942)
- 2004 – John Charles, Welsh footballer and manager (b. 1931)
- 2005 – Guillermo Cabrera Infante, Cuban author, screenwriter, and critic (b. 1929)
- 2005 – Zdzisław Beksiński, Polish painter, photographer, and sculptor (b. 1929)
- 2008 – Ben Chapman, American actor (b. 1928)
- 2008 – Neil Chotem, Canadian conductor and composer (b. 1920)
- 2011 – Dwayne McDuffie, American author and screenwriter, co-founded Milestone Media (b. 1962)
- 2011 – Bernard Nathanson, American physician and activist (b. 1926)
- 2012 – H. M. Darmstandler, American general (b. 1922)
- 2012 – Barney Rosset, American publisher (b. 1922)
- 2013 – Hasse Jeppson, Swedish footballer (b. 1925)
- 2014 – Héctor Maestri, Cuban-American baseball player (b. 1935)
- 2014 – Matthew Robinson, Australian snowboarder (b. 1985)
- 2014 – Cornelius Schnauber, German–American historian, playwright, and academic (b. 1939)
- 2014 – John Strawson, English general (b. 1921)
- 2015 – Aleksei Gubarev, Russian general, pilot, and astronaut (b. 1931)
- 2015 – Robert O. Marshall, American businessman (b. 1939)
- 2015 – Sadeq Tabatabaei, Iranian journalist and politician (b. 1943)
- 2015 – Clark Terry, American trumpet player, composer, and educator (b. 1920)
- 2016 – Eric Brown, Scottish-English captain and pilot (b. 1919)
- Christian feast day:
- Armed Forces Day (South Africa)
- Birthday of King Harald V (Norway)
- International Mother Language Day (UNESCO)
- Language Movement Day (Bangladesh)
- The first day of the Birth Anniversary of Fifth Druk Gyalpo, celebrated until February 23 (Bhutan)
- The first day of the Musikahan Festival, celebrated until February 27 (Tagum City, Philippines)
Holidays and observances[edit]
===
“Whoever would foster love covers over an offense, but whoever repeats the matter separates close friends.” - Proverbs 17:9
===
Morning and Evening by Charles Spurgeon
February 20: Morning
"God, that comforteth those that are cast down." - 2 Corinthians 7:6
And who comforteth like him? Go to some poor, melancholy, distressed child of God; tell him sweet promises, and whisper in his ear choice words of comfort; he is like the deaf adder, he listens not to the voice of the charmer, charm he never so wisely. He is drinking gall and wormwood, and comfort him as you may, it will be only a note or two of mournful resignation that you will get from him; you will bring forth no psalms of praise, no hallelujahs, no joyful sonnets. But let God come to his child, let him lift up his countenance, and the mourner's eyes glisten with hope. Do you not hear him sing--
"'Tis paradise, if thou art here;
If thou depart, 'tis hell?"
You could not have cheered him: but the Lord has done it; "He is the God of all comfort." There is no balm in Gilead, but there is balm in God. There is no physician among the creatures, but the Creator is Jehovah-rophi. It is marvellous how one sweet word of God will make whole songs for Christians. One word of God is like a piece of gold, and the Christian is the gold beater, and can hammer that promise out for whole weeks. So, then, poor Christian, thou needest not sit down in despair. Go to the Comforter, and ask him to give thee consolation. Thou art a poor dry well. You have heard it said, that when a pump is dry, you must pour water down it first of all, and then you will get water, and so, Christian, when thou art dry, go to God, ask him to shed abroad his joy in thy heart, and then thy joy shall be full. Do not go to earthly acquaintances, for you will find them Job's comforters after all; but go first and foremost to thy "God, that comforteth those that are cast down," and you will soon say, "In the multitude of my thoughts within me thy comforts delight my soul."
"'Tis paradise, if thou art here;
If thou depart, 'tis hell?"
You could not have cheered him: but the Lord has done it; "He is the God of all comfort." There is no balm in Gilead, but there is balm in God. There is no physician among the creatures, but the Creator is Jehovah-rophi. It is marvellous how one sweet word of God will make whole songs for Christians. One word of God is like a piece of gold, and the Christian is the gold beater, and can hammer that promise out for whole weeks. So, then, poor Christian, thou needest not sit down in despair. Go to the Comforter, and ask him to give thee consolation. Thou art a poor dry well. You have heard it said, that when a pump is dry, you must pour water down it first of all, and then you will get water, and so, Christian, when thou art dry, go to God, ask him to shed abroad his joy in thy heart, and then thy joy shall be full. Do not go to earthly acquaintances, for you will find them Job's comforters after all; but go first and foremost to thy "God, that comforteth those that are cast down," and you will soon say, "In the multitude of my thoughts within me thy comforts delight my soul."
Evening
"Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil." - Matthew 4:1
A holy character does not avert temptation--Jesus was tempted. When Satan tempts us, his sparks fall upon tinder; but in Christ's case, it was like striking sparks on water; yet the enemy continued his evil work. Now, if the devil goes on striking when there is no result, how much more will he do it when he knows what inflammable stuff our hearts are made of. Though you become greatly sanctified by the Holy Ghost, expect that the great dog of hell will bark at you still. In the haunts of men we expect to be tempted, but even seclusion will not guard us from the same trial. Jesus Christ was led away from human society into the wilderness, and was tempted of the devil. Solitude has its charms and its benefits, and may be useful in checking the lust of the eye and the pride of life; but the devil will follow us into the most lovely retreats. Do not suppose that it is only the worldly-minded who have dreadful thoughts and blasphemous temptations, for even spiritual-minded persons endure the same; and in the holiest position we may suffer the darkest temptation. The utmost consecration of spirit will not insure you against Satanic temptation. Christ was consecrated through and through. It was his meat and drink to do the will of him that sent him: and yet he was tempted! Your hearts may glow with a seraphic flame of love to Jesus, and yet the devil will try to bring you down to Laodicean lukewarmness. If you will tell me when God permits a Christian to lay aside his armour, I will tell you when Satan has left off temptation. Like the old knights in war time, we must sleep with helmet and breastplate buckled on, for the arch-deceiver will seize our first unguarded hour to make us his prey. The Lord keep us watchful in all seasons, and give us a final escape from the jaw of the lion and the paw of the bear.
===
Today's reading: Leviticus 26-27, Mark 2 (NIV)
View today's reading on Bible GatewayToday's Old Testament reading: Leviticus 26-27
Reward for Obedience
1 "'Do not make idols or set up an image or a sacred stone for yourselves, and do not place a carved stone in your land to bow down before it. I am the LORD your God.
2 "'Observe my Sabbaths and have reverence for my sanctuary. I am the LORD....
Today's New Testament reading: Mark 2
Jesus Forgives and Heals a Paralyzed Man
1 A few days later, when Jesus again entered Capernaum, the people heard that he had come home. 2 They gathered in such large numbers that there was no room left, not even outside the door, and he preached the word to them. 3 Some men came, bringing to him a paralyzed man, carried by four of them. 4 Since they could not get him to Jesus because of the crowd, they made an opening in the roof above Jesus by digging through it and then lowered the mat the man was lying on. 5 When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralyzed man, "Son, your sins are forgiven...."
No comments:
Post a Comment