Tuesday, May 09, 2017

Tue May 9th Todays News

James Bolt from IPA has highlighted a few howlers. "Last week doctoral students at Yale staged a hunger strike, with one key difference - they can eat when they get hungry. The college's Young Republican club had a classic response. 
This is absurd. In Oregon, Mats Jarlstrom used mathematical equations to argue to the government that the state's yellow lights should last longer before cutting to red. He was promptly hit with a $500 fine for the "practice of engineering" without a license." 

Some things should not happen, but they do. Tonight's federal budget was delivered by Scott Morrison. Morrison has made the best of what he had to work with. It is a tax and spend budget with questionable spending choices. But Morrison justified his choices, and can reason a surplus in 2021. It seems as if Turnbull has locked in spending to save his position as PM. It was similar with Pyne's $50 billion seat. But Morrison is curbing expenditure. It isn't uncontrolled. Schools don't need extra spending to improve. Already there are plans for schools that don't require an extra dollar, which deliver better results. James Bolt provides a counterpoint to Scott Morrison with "Listen to this 4 minute debacle of an answer from Shadow Home Secretary Diane Abbott on British radio from Tuesday on the UK Labour Party's law enforcement policy. I made it 41 seconds in the first time I heard it. In this month's edition of Standpoint, the magazine's founder Daniel Johnson says Theresa May's call for a snap general election is "a stroke of genius.""Diane is a future Labor leader. Morrison could lead the Liberals. 

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. Meanwhile, I am hostage to abysmal political leadership and hopeless journalists. My shopfront has opened on Facebook.

Here is a video I made Man from Snowy River

 "The Man from Snowy River" is a poem by Australian bush poet Banjo Paterson. It was first published in The Bulletin, an Australian news magazine, on 26th April 1890.

http://conservativeweasel.blogspot.com/2011/12/man-from-snowy-river.html

 
There was movement at the station, for the word had passed around
That the colt from old Regret had got away,
And had joined the wild bush horses - he was worth a thousand pound,
So all the cracks had gathered to the fray.
All the tried and noted riders from the stations near and far
Had mustered at the homestead overnight,
For the bushmen love hard riding where the wild bush horses are,
And the stockhorse snuffs the battle with delight.


There was Harrison, who made his pile when Pardon won the cup,
The old man with his hair as white as snow;
But few could ride beside him when his blood was fairly up -
He would go wherever horse and man could go.
And Clancy of the Overflow came down to lend a hand,
No better horseman ever held the reins;
For never horse could throw him while the saddle girths would stand,
He learnt to ride while droving on the plains.

=== from 2016 ===
I have moved to a good home. I leave behind the ice house. Dan Andrews would rather I lived with an ice addict, and that you should too. 

For some, at the moment, the Sex Party has more credibility. 
=== from 2015 ===
The news of Cameron's stunning success in the UK election has been muted. Some Facebook snobs have commented on leaving the UK. Some press outlets have expressed the hope that the exit polls would be misleading. But in the end, it was the news media that were misleading the public. The abysmal Labor party who had left government the previous election, remarking there was no more money in treasury, put forward empty symbols again. It is ok to, as the news media do, wish that Labor were great. But they have to earn it. They have betrayed the public trust for decades and have not reformed following their loss. The Scottish National Party are new as a political force, but also offer no sensible economic policy. The Liberals were left wing in alliance with the conservatives and UKIP offered no sensible policy. The media only offered reasons not to vote for Conservatives, but reasonable policies meant that allowing the conservatives to govern in their own right was the best solution. And so the voters have spoken, and the news media will struggle to explain it with their own fantasy narratives.

Fantasy narratives have a tendency to govern what individuals think. A would be bomber has been found in Melbourne. A son of a doctor, this young man had wanted to blow up things, possibly on mother's day. Apparently jihadists don't celebrate mother's day, except by blowing up people, possibly as their mothers told them to. But the sting is when it turns out that a radicalised youth was radicalised within Australian mainstream institutions because their fantasy agenda has been protected from free speech. Australia does not have free speech, as a WA university reminded us after refusing funding for research that might be groundbreaking. The researcher, Lombard, believes in climate change but doesn't think it is wise to use empty, expensive gestures to address it. Naturally the Greens Bant hailed the ridiculous action of the WA University and expressed the hope the funds would go to an AGW hysteric.

In 1092, Lincoln Cathedral in London was consecrated. It has a large floorspace and is still quite pretty. In 1386, England and Portugal signed a treaty they still honour, making the Treaty of Windsor agreement the oldest such alliance still going. In 1671, Thomas Blood, disguised as a clergyman, attempted to steal England's Crown Jewels from the Tower of London. Blood was pardoned by King Charles II and had a great life at court, until the end, when Blood fell into disfavour with his patron, Buckingham, and died after being sued. Some suspected the death was a ruse. In 1873, Der Krach: Vienna stock market crash heralded the Long Depression. The long depression lasted until 1879, going for 65 months and so out achieving the Great Depression which only lasted 43 months. But unlike the great depression, the long depression included real wages and production increasing. The long depression was probably hardest on the United Kingdom because they were so connected internationally. In 1901, Australia's first parliament met in Melbourne. In 1911, the works of Gabriele D'Annunzio were placed in the Index of Forbidden Books by the Vatican. In 1927, Australia's parliament moved to Canberra. In 1941, the German submarine U-110 was captured by the Royal Navy. On board was the latest Enigma cryptography machine which Allied cryptographers later used to break coded German messages. In 1942, the SS murdered 588 Jewish residents of the Podolian town of Zinkiv (Khmelnytska oblast, Ukraine). The Zoludek Ghetto (in Belarus) was destroyed and all its inhabitants murdered or deported. In 1945, World War II: Ratification in Berlin-Karlshorst of the German unconditional surrender of May 8 in Rheims, France, with the signatures of Marshal Georgy Zhukov for the Soviet Union, and for the Western Headquarters Sir Arthur Tedder, British Air Marshal and Eisenhower's deputy, and for the German side of Colonel-General Hans-Jürgen Stumpff as the representative of the Luftwaffe, Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel as the Chief of Staff of OKW, and Admiral Hans-Georg von Friedeburg as Commander-in-Chief of the Kriegsmarine. Also 1945, World War II: The Channel Islands were liberated by the British after five years of German occupation. In 1950, Robert Schuman presented his proposal on the creation of an organised Europe, which according to him was indispensable to the maintenance of peaceful relations. This proposal, known as the "Schuman declaration", is considered by some people to be the beginning of the creation of what is now the European Union. In 1961, FCC Chairman Newton N. Minow gave his Wasteland Speech. In it he implored people to act to have better tv, noting that programming was awful. In 1964, Ngo Dinh Can, de facto ruler of central Vietnam under his brother President Ngo Dinh Diem before the family's toppling, was executed. In 2001, in Ghana 129 football fans died in what became known as the Accra Sports Stadium disaster. The deaths were caused by a stampede (caused by the firing of teargas by police personnel at the stadium) that followed a controversial decision by the referee. In 2002, the 38-day stand-off in the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem came to an end when the Palestinians inside agreed to have 13 suspected terrorists among them deported to several different countries.
From 2014
Not long ago, the political chief of Iran claimed that there were no more Gays in Iran. It followed a highly publicised execution of a couple. The justice over reach into people's bedrooms is appalling, and left wing mainstream media immediately began comparing it to times when, in England, people were executed for sodomy. Today is an anniversary of an example, and it highlights the difference between Iran's religiously based judicial system and England's secular administration. It involves the hanging of Gays in England in 1726. They had been the unfortunates to be caught among forty in total at Mary Clap's molly house in London. A molly house is a bit like an ABC tuck shop. People go there to eat, drink and socialise .. and have gay relations. A completely harmless activity that the law has no place investigating .. except the law had been given a foot in the door when a jilted lover denounced his haunts to the authorities. The stool pigeon was never charged, but he identified several places, including Mother Clap's place. The place was raided. Forty were arrested. Five were hung. The executions were despicable, but the letter of the law. Note the thirty five who weren't executed. Clearly the authorities were keener to make an example, rather than declare that there were no Gays in England. And that was in 1726.  
More Iranian 'glory' is related to this day, in 1979, when Iranian Jewish businessman Habib Elghanian was executed by firing squad in Tehran, prompting the mass exodus of the once 100,000 member strong Jewish community of Iran. So that it could now be said that no Jews live in Iran. And that is the nation the UN uses to head it's Human Rights committee. And that is the nation Obama is helping to acquire nuclear bombs. 

But, today is not terrible or awful, there are many good things that happened too. Mr Punch made his first appearance in 1662. It took time, but along came Judy. In Mumbai in 1874, the first horse drawn bus began work on two routes on this day. In 1904, a european steam train exceeded 100mph for the first time. Sydney trains struggle to reach half that speed a century later. Billy Joel, Howard Carter and JM Barrie also have birthdays today. Cheers. 
Historical perspective on this day
In 1092, Lincoln Cathedral was consecrated. 1386, England and Portugal formally ratified their alliance with the signing of the Treaty of Windsor, making it the oldest diplomatic alliance in the world which is still in force. 1450, 'Abd al-Latif (Timurid monarch) was assassinated. 1662, the figure who later became Mr. Punch made his first recorded appearance in England. 1671, Thomas Blood, disguised as a clergyman, attempted to steal England's Crown Jewels from the Tower of London.

In 1726, five men arrested during a raid on Mother Clap's molly housein London were executed at Tyburn. 1763, the Siege of Fort Detroitbegan during Pontiac's War against British forces. 1864, Second War of Schleswig: The Danish navy defeated the Austrian and Prussian fleets in the Battle of Heligoland. 1873, Der Krach: Vienna stock market crash heralded the Long Depression. 1874, the first horse-drawn bus made its début in the city of Mumbai, traveling two routes. 1877, Mihail Kogălniceanu reads, in the Chamber of Deputies, the Declaration of Independence of Romania. This day became the Independence Day of Romania. Also 1877, a magnitude 8.8 earthquake off the coast of Perukilled 2,541, including some as far away as Hawaii and Japan. 1887, Buffalo Bill Cody's Wild West Show opened in London.

In 1901, Australia opened its first parliament in Melbourne. 1904, the steam locomotive City of Truro became the first steam engine in Europe to exceed 100 mph (160 km/h). 1911, the works of Gabriele D'Annunzio were placed in the Index of Forbidden Books by the Vatican. 1915, World War I: Second Battle of Artois between German and French forces. 1918, World War I: Germany repelled Britain's second attempt to blockade the port of Ostend, Belgium. 1920, Polish-Soviet War: The Polish army under General Edward Rydz-Śmigłycelebrated its capture of Kiev with a victory parade on Khreschatyk. 1926, Admiral Richard E. Byrd and Floyd Bennett claimed to have flown over the North Pole (later discovery of Byrd's diary appears to cast some doubt on the claim.) 1927, the Australian Parliament first convened in Canberra. 1936, Italy formally annexed Ethiopia after taking the capital Addis Ababa on May 5.

In 1940, World War II: The German submarine U-9 sank the French coastal submarine Doris near Den Helder. 1941, World War II: The German submarine U-110 was captured by the Royal Navy. On board was the latest Enigma cryptography machine which Alliedcryptographers later used to break coded German messages. 1942, Holocaust: The SS murdered 588 Jewish residents of the Podolian town of Zinkiv (Khmelnytska oblast, Ukraine). The Zoludek Ghetto (in Belarus) was destroyed and all its inhabitants murdered or deported. 1945, World War II: Ratification in Berlin-Karlshorst of the German unconditional surrender of May 8 in Rheims, France, with the signatures of Marshal Georgy Zhukov for the Soviet Union, and for the Western Headquarters Sir Arthur Tedder, British Air Marshal and Eisenhower's deputy, and for the German side of Colonel-GeneralHans-Jürgen Stumpff as the representative of the Luftwaffe, Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel as the Chief of Staff of OKW, and Admiral Hans-Georg von Friedeburg as Commander-in-Chief of the Kriegsmarine. Also 1945, World War II: The Channel Islands were liberated by the British after five years of German occupation. 1946, King Victor Emmanuel III of Italy abdicates and is succeeded by Umberto II. 1948, Czechoslovakia's Ninth-of-May Constitution came into effect. 1949, Rainier III of Monaco became Prince of Monaco. 1950, Robert Schuman presented his proposal on the creation of an organised Europe, which according to him was indispensable to the maintenance of peaceful relations. This proposal, known as the "Schuman declaration", is considered by some people to be the beginning of the creation of what is now the European Union. 1955, Cold War: West Germany joined NATO. 1958, Film: Vertigo had world premiere in San Francisco.

In 1960, the Food and Drug Administration announced it would approve birth control as an additional indication for Searle's Enovid, making Enovid the world's first approved oral contraceptive pill. 1961, FCC Chairman Newton N. Minow gave his Wasteland Speech. 1964, Ngo Dinh Can, de facto ruler of central Vietnam under his brother President Ngo Dinh Diem before the family's toppling, was executed. 1969, Carlos Lamarca led the first urban guerrilla action against the military dictatorship of Brazil in São Paulo, by robbing two banks. 1970, Vietnam War: In Washington, D.C., 75,000 to 100,000 war protesters demonstrated in front of the White House. 1974, Watergate Scandal: The United States House of Representatives Judiciary Committee opened formal and public impeachment hearings against President Richard Nixon. 1977, Hotel Polen fire: A disastrous fire burned down the Hotel Polen in Amsterdam causing 33 deaths and 21 severe injuries. 1979, Iranian Jewish businessman Habib Elghanian was executed by firing squad in Tehran, prompting the mass exodus of the once 100,000 member strong Jewish community of Iran.

In 1980, in Florida, Liberian freighter MV Summit Venture collided with the Sunshine Skyway Bridge over Tampa Bay, making a 1,400-ft. section of the southbound span collapse. Thirty-five people in six cars and a Greyhound bus fell 150 ft. into the water and died. Also 1980, in Norco, California, five masked gunmen held up a Security Pacific bank, leading to a violent shoot-out and one of the largest pursuits in California history. Two of the gunmen and one police officer were killed and thirty-three police and civilian vehicles were destroyed in the chase. 1987, an LOT Polish Airlines Ilyushin IL-62M, Tadeusz Kościuszko (SP-LBG), crashed after takeoff in Warsaw, Poland, killing all 183 people on board. 1992, Armenian forces captured Shusha, marking a major turning point in the Karabakh War. Also 1992, Westray Mine Disaster killed 26 workers in Nova Scotia, Canada. 2001, in Ghana129 football fans died in what became known as the Accra Sports Stadium disaster. The deaths were caused by a stampede (caused by the firing of teargas by police personnel at the stadium) that followed a controversial decision by the referee. 2002, the 38-day stand-off in the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem came to an end when the Palestinians inside agreed to have 13 suspected terrorists among them deported to several different countries. 2012, a Sukhoi Superjet 100aircraft crashed into Mount Salak in West Java, Indonesia, killing 45 people.
=== 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
===
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
Happy birthday and many happy returns Leslie-Ann Stoffel. Born on the same day, across the years, as
Deaths
May 9: Europe Day/Schuman Day in the European Union
Thomas Blood
We are bloods. Ignore the panic. The offensive will fail. TV is a vast wasteland. Let it be. Let's party. 
===
Andrew Bolt


===

CHECK THE SUNDAY SCHOOLS

Tim Blair – Saturday, May 09, 2015 (2:41pm)

Following yesterday’s terror raids, AFP Deputy Commissioner Mike Phelan delivers an urgent message to the wider community: 
Deputy Commissioner Phelan said the wider community needed to address the radicalisation of young people.
“We’ve got to do something about this problem. All of us. All in the community. It’s got nothing to do with faith,” he said.
“This is about all the community, all families getting together, having a greater understanding of what your children are doing.” 
Are there any particular clues we should be looking for, Deputy Commissioner? Any signs that could indicate possible radicalisation? Might there be, perhaps, some factor common to every single one of Australia’s radical, terror-plotting youngsters? 
(Via J.F. Beck)
===

CARLTON SUBTRACTED

Tim Blair – Saturday, May 09, 2015 (2:12pm)

Mike Carlton – not a bitter man, not at all – implies that his departure is responsible for the Saturday SMH’s latest decline in sales:


Come on, Mike. Surely some of the credit belongs to your underwhelming replacement, Carlton Light. Further from Mike’s former Fairfax colleague Joe Aston: 
After our publisher, Fairfax Media, parted ways with Mike Carlton last year, we briefly feared there’d no longer be anything sufficiently stupid to read in The Sydney Morning Herald.
Then we discovered Elizabeth Farrelly.
John Deason knows the feeling.
===

UK ELECTION SCORECARD

Tim Blair – Saturday, May 09, 2015 (4:36am)

Conservative leader David Cameron: returned as British Prime Minister with a near-100 seat majority over Labour.
Labour leader Ed Miliband: gone.
Lib-Dem leader and former deputy PM Nick Clegg: gone.
UKIP leader Nigel Farage: gone.  
George Galloway: gone.
Labour’s Balls: gone. 
The Edstone: on eBay.
Pollsters: humiliated.
The team at Guido Fawkes: delighted.
Russell Brand: pathetic.
Guardian journo-child Owen Jones: slightly mistaken.
===

LABOR’S RECEPTION CENTRES

Tim Blair – Saturday, May 09, 2015 (3:58am)

Having lured more than 1000 asylum seekers to their deaths at sea, Labor decides to try it again: 
Labor will dump John Howard’s successful temporary protection visas for illegal arrivals, which have twice stopped the boats, and consider reopening detention centres as “reception centres” under the party’s draft policy. 
That should be “death policy”, obviously. Probably a typo.
===

SEXIST, GENDERIST, ELITIST, CLASSIST, MARXIST AND LINDQVIST

Tim Blair – Saturday, May 09, 2015 (3:44am)

Joe Hildebrand infiltrates the Greens’ leadership meeting.
===

KIDS THESE DAYS

Tim Blair – Saturday, May 09, 2015 (3:32am)

A doctor’s son in Melbourne and a 14-year-old in Sydney were allegedly at the centre of a bomb plot: 
Police and ASIO have foiled a teenage terror plot to detonate three bombs in an attack believed to have been planned for this Sunday in Melbourne.
Senior intelligence sources confirmed a 14-year-old from Sydney was among a group of teenagers targeted in co-ordinated counter-terrorism raids across Sydney and Melbourne on Friday.
In Melbourne, the bomb squad and heavily armed police were used in a raid on a doctor’s home, where his son was arrested.
Three bombs were found at the upmarket home and a 300m exclusion zone put in place as they were detonated in a nearby reserve. 
The arrested Melbourne teen is an enthusiastic Facebook user.
===

DARRYL DOWN

Tim Blair – Saturday, May 09, 2015 (2:11am)

Following days of frantic Twittering as he lusted for a Labour victory, Sydney conspiracy theorist Darryl Mason hasn’t posted a single item for 17 hours. I hope he is well.
===

SWEET REPEAT

Tim Blair – Saturday, May 09, 2015 (1:51am)

Australian Prime Minister Paul Keating, 1993: 
This is the sweetest victory of all. 
British Prime Minister David Cameron, 2015: 
This is the sweetest victory of them all. 
Cameron’s use of that line hints at just how closely he worked with Australian tacticians Lynton Crosby and Mark Textor, who right now should be taking calls from Republican presidential candidates in the US.
And then there’s poor old John McTernan. Back in 2012, when strategist McTernan joined then-PM Julia Gillard’s team, some suspected he would not be entirely successful: 
‘’All I can say is, god help the Australian Labor Party,’’ a veteran union leader and former chairman of the Scottish Labour Party, Bob Thomson, says. 
History does not record Thomson’s reaction upon hearing that McTernan, following his Australian adventure, was returning to Scottish Labour ahead of this year’s vote. God help them: 
Spare a thought for John McTernan, who has of late been earning his crust as chief of staff to Scottish Labour leader Jim Murphy. Having achieved the results he did as Julia Gillard’s communications director (ah, well), McTernan has had to stand and watch Scottish Labour – Murphy included – wiped out by the Scottish National Party. 
Scottish Labour won just one seat. 
===

Not marginalised. Just angry

Andrew Bolt May 09 2015 (6:41pm)

A doctor’s home raided? We need to drop this self-blaming narrative that Islamist radicals are poor youths “marginalised” by our heartless and racist society:
POLICE and ASIO have foiled a teenage terror plot to detonate three bombs in an attack believed to have been planned for this Sunday in Melbourne. 
Senior intelligence sources confirmed a 14-year-old from Sydney was among a group of teenagers targeted in co-ordinated counter-terrorism raids across Sydney and Melbourne on Friday.
In Melbourne, the bomb squad and heavily armed police were used in a raid on a doctor’s home, where his son was arrested.Three bombs were found at the upmarket home and a 300m exclusion zone put in place as they were detonated in a nearby reserve.
(NOTE: Police have stressed that the “bombs” were “suspected” explosive devices.)
Sunday is Mother’s Day.
His Facebook rants suggest that what helped to “marginalise” the doctor’s son were texts in the Koran:
“THE ‘Muslims’ are quick to condemn the actions of the Islamic State, but you will never see them condemning the US atrocities against Muslims, you will never see them condemning the crimes against Muslims in Yemen, Egypt, Syria, Iraq etc etc ... 
“Likewise, when you see an attack done in defend of the honour of our Prophet (peace and blessing be upon him), you will see them rush to attack the attackers but they always forget to condemn the abusers of the Prophet (salallahu alaihi wa sallam).
“When people wrote poems about him, do you think he forgave them?
“He forgave everyone that harmed him except the people that attacked his honour. So who are you to forgive on his behalf? “Such is the trend of the coconut hypocrite ‘Muslims’.”
Those arrested must be presumed innocent.
Even so, I marvel again at the level of skill of counter-intelligence authorities. Remember their startling successes so far before there is an inevitable failure to stop someone else.
UPDATE
Liberal Democratic Senator David Leyonhjelm:
Australia neither needs nor wants to import illiberal values, whether from Sharia or any other value system. Indeed, we are far too accepting of those who come to Australia with its respect for liberty, only to seek to transform it into something like the illiberal, authoritarian country they left behind.
UPDATE
The latest terrorist plot (alleged) has ”nothing to do with faith”, claims the Australian Federal Police. We can only hope that the AFP says this for strategic reasons, and not because they are so dumb as to believe it. 
===

On The Bolt Report tomorrow, May 10

Andrew Bolt May 09 2015 (11:08am)

On the  The Bolt Report on Channel 10 tomorrow at 10am and 3pm.
Guest: Agriculture Minister Barnaby Joyce on drought, the banning of Bjorn Lomborg and the Budget.
The panel - former Treasurer Peter Costello and former NSW Treasurer Michael Costa.
NewsWatch: Courier Mail columnist and Spectator Australia editor Rowan Dean on Struggle Street , what Russell Brand should teach Labor and Peter Hartcher.
Plus much more, including the smearing of Tony Abbott. the Conservative election triumph in Britain, the Greens’ new leader, Joe Hockey’s last chance and Shorten’s remarkable non-press conference.
The videos of the shows appear here.
===

Cameron triumphant, UKIP robbed

Andrew Bolt May 09 2015 (9:50am)

David Cameron has not just won an absolute majority, but has destroyed three rivals:
Labour leader Ed Miliband said he would stand down on Friday, saying his party must “rebuild” with a new leader. 
Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg has also said he will quit, with his party set to be reduced from 57 to eight MPs.
UKIP leader Nigel Farage is also quitting after he failed to win Thanet South ...
But something is surely wrong here:
The BBC forecast ...  is Conservative 331, Labour 232, the Lib Dems 8, the SNP 56, Plaid Cymru 3, UKIP 1, the Greens 1 and others 19. 
The Conservatives are expected to get a 37% share of the national vote, Labour 31%, UKIP 13%, the Lib Dems 8%, the SNP 5%, the Green Party 4% and Plaid Cymru 1%… 
UKIP wins 13 per cent of the vote and gets one seat.
The Scottish Nationals win 5 per cent of the vote and get 56 seats.
Pardon?
UPDATE
Nick Sutton:
With all seats declared. How many votes to elect an MP? 
SNP 25,972
CON 34,244
LAB 40,290
LD 301,986
GRN 1,157,613
UKIP 3,881,129 
(Thanks to reader Peter of Bellevue Hill.) 
===

Hartcher loses the Green vote

Andrew Bolt May 09 2015 (9:38am)

Credit where due. Peter Hartcher’s disgraceful smearing of Tony Abbott is too much even for the ABC’s Jonathan Green. 
===

ABC makes its bias a headline act

Andrew Bolt May 09 2015 (9:15am)

“Tirade”? The ABC’s Lateline indulges in pejorative editorialisingagainst a former ABC chairman and warming sceptic:
How does this - and the extraordinarily biased interview of a warming alarmist - comply with the ABC’s statutory duty to offer balance?
(Thanks to reader Ian.) 
===

University fears it’s polarising to let true talent come teach

Andrew Bolt May 09 2015 (8:25am)

A craven surrender to group think and mediocrity from the kind of people who believe that challenging the errors of a vindictive collective is “polarising”:
The University of Western Australia intends to hand back $4 million of federal funds it accepted for a policy research unit after an apparent­ revolt within its business school over the centre’s links to polarising Danish academic Bjorn Lomborg… 
A review of climate change targets was reportedly to be part of that agenda, a fact that enraged critics of Professor Lomborg, including the Greens, who label him a climate sceptic…
One of [the centre’s] projects was working with “several Nobel laureates and more than 80 of the world’s and Australia’s top economists” to find the smartest development goals for the UN’s post-2015 agenda, which will be adopted in New York in September.
Professor Lomborg said ... “I’m struggling to understand why anyone would say they do not want to see a centre that involves some of the world’s top economists and several Nobel laureates...”
Because talent would show them up?
Students have rated the University of WA, the State’s oldest and most prestigious institution, just one star out of five for teaching quality for the second year in a row. 
The annual Good Universities Guide ranks institutions on their graduate outcomes and educational experience based on surveys and government data… The latest edition, released this week, revealed a one-star rating for teaching quality at the UWA, compared with two stars for Curtin and Murdoch and five for Edith Cowan and Notre Dame Universities.
The university’s vice chancellor admits it was indeed the precious petals on his staff, none with Lomborg’s profile, who made him withdraw Lomborg’s permission to come:
I believe that a man who has worked with many Nobel Laureate economists, has been named one of Time Magazine’s most influential people, and has published with Cambridge University Press meets the criteria of being made an Adjunct Professor – an honorary position that carries no salary. 
Despite all this, ... I have formed the view that the events of the past few weeks places the Centre in an untenable position as it lacks the support needed across the University and the broader academic community to meet its contractual obligations…
The University of Western Australia has advertised itself to the world as an institution in which the mediocre rule, free thinkers are unwelcome and debate stifled. Given that tertiary education is a vital export of this country, this decision is not just a disgrace but a disaster.

Meanwhile, here is a list of other academic appointments and grants that raised no protests by academics:
- former Labor prime minister Julia Gillard appointed honorary professor at Adelaide University.
- former Labor foreign affairs minister Stephen Smithappointed Winthrop Professor of Law at the University of Western Australia.
- former Labor Premier Carmen Lawrence appointed professor of psychology at the University of Western Australia.
- former Labor Premier John Bannon appointed associate professor at Adelaide University.
- former Labor backbencher Maxine McKew appointed a Vice Chancellor’s Fellow at Melbourne University.
- former Labor NT Chief Minister Clare Martin appointed Professorial Fellow at Charles Darwin University.
- former Labor Deputy Premier John Thwaites appointed Professorial Fellow and head of the Monash Sustainability Institute at Monash Unviersity.
- former Labor science minister Barry Jones appointed honorary professor at Melbourne University.
- former Labor Premier John Brumby appointed Professorial Fellow at Monash University.
- former Labor ACT Chief Minister John Stanhope appointed Professorial Fellow at Canberra University.
- the Grattan Institute, a Left-leaning think tank at Melbourne University, given $30 million by the Rudd and Brumby Labor governments.
- the Whitlam Institute, a shrine to Labor Prime Minister Gough Whitlam at the University of Western Sydney, created by Labor Governments and given $7 million by the Gillard Government for refurbishment.
- Islamist apologist Waleed Aly appointed lecturer at Monash University’s Global Terrorism Research Centre despite not having a doctorate.
- former Age editor  Andrew Jaspan appointed head of The Conversation, a Leftist on-line news and views site funded by universities and the then Labor federal government.
- former Age editor-in-chief and Leftist Paul Ramage appointed Vice Chancellor Professorial Fellow at Monash University.
- warming alarmist Tim Flannery appointed professorial fellow at Melbourne University’s Melbourne Sustainable Society Institute to preach global warming. 
===

Will Shorten tear up Miliband’s tips? Like trusting Twitter, stunts or Russell Brand?

Andrew Bolt May 09 2015 (8:14am)

A good meeting of minds, one of which has since been involuntarily retired:
Shorten wants to learn from Miliband?
Lesson one: scrub Miliband’s dumb stunts. Wanted, a home for this great stone prop, now unneeded:
Lesson two: avoid slackivist heroes and distrust Twitter:
As Brendan O’Neill happily notes, one of the election’s biggest losers was Russell Brand:
The bigging-up of Brand’s intervention in the election was seat-shiftingly embarrassing. ‘He has nearly 10 million Twitter followers… he is listened to by hundreds of thousands of disillusioned Britons… Russell Brand matters’, said Owen Jones, clearly viewing Brand as a kind of priestly figure with a mystical hold over that inscrutable blob (us lot) that politicians can’t connect with. In another piece, Jones said ‘Miliband’s best route to young voters is Russell Brand’, not stopping to think that it might be super-weird that the leader of the alleged party of working people can only speak to the youth via a floppy-haired 40-year-old tabloid filler who hasn’t made a decent gag since 2008… 
Brandmania ultimately spoke to the gaping, chasm-like disconnection of the Labour movement, the liberal elite and the Twitterati from ordinary people. 
How foolishly excited The Guardian was by Brand’s backing of Miliband and the social media response:
… the general consensus across social media, as well as among a selection of the Guardian’s polled voters, was that Miliband’s decision to meet Brand was completely vindicated.

Wednesday’s 15-minute interview was published on Brand’s YouTube channel and has now received more than 500,000 views.... Google said searches for the Labour leader jumped by 17%, making him the most searched for party leader on the search engine on Thursday… 
Brand, an outspoken critic of voting and the political system, backed Miliband over the need for credible change, stating: “I completely agree with you, Ed. We don’t want some giddy, Yes-we-can euphoria … People don’t want euphoria this time. People want security and stability and an end to this fear.” The comedian has almost 10m Twitter followers and more than 1 million people have subscribed to his YouTube channel, so his remarks will not go unnoticed.
Another warning to the Left that social media campaigns are a lazy and totally unreliable substitute for real campaigns. Just all thumbs and no legs to take a voter from the couch to the polling booth.
Besides, who seriously trusts a clown for advice on how to run the country?
UPDATE
Brand now does a hilarious reverse-ferret to retrieve what’s left of his credibililty:

The comedian Russell Brand has performed a swift climbdown over his support for Ed Miliband…
He said: “I think for a moment I got caught up in some mad The Thick of It, oh wow, Ed Miliband’s in my house … People were telling me, journalists, people who know loads about politics, look if Labour don’t get in it’s going to really be bad because independent living fund will get cut, public services are going get cut more than ever, its going to get worse for very poor people, the climate of the country is going to get mean and nasty. And now actually the Conservatives have won.” ...
Perched on the end of his bed, Brand tells his viewers that he did not want to become a “de facto spokesman for people who don’t vote”.
The Essex-born comedian admits that when interviewing Miliband he believed he could “probably influence the outcome of an election” and now accepts this is not the case. 
UPDATE
And don’t trust the predictions of Leftist polemicists such as David Marr, who had a shocker on the ABC’s The Drum on Thursday, as Gerard Henderson sadly notes.:
... your man Marr: 
- Declared that nothing “any politician has said over the last few weeks has budged the polls at all”. 
- Asserted that it looks like Labour and the Conservatives will be “neck and neck in the seats that are won in the House of Commons"… 
- Predicted that the Scottish National Party would support Labour and said that, “on the figures at the moment, you would have to say it’s much more likely that Ed Miliband will be prime minister next week”.
(Thanks to readers John and brett t r.) 
===

Shorten can’t keep screaming “unfair” to serious reform

Andrew Bolt May 09 2015 (8:13am)

Paul Kelly on the trap that is now closing on Bill Shorten:
With both the Greens and the Australian Council of Social Service saying [Social Services Minister Scott Morrison’s pensions reform] is a step in the right direction, Labor is caught between its daily gospel of fairness on the one hand and its constant mantra the pension must not be tampered with because there is no issue of sustainability… 
Morrison has scrapped the Coalition’s unpopular 2014 mega-reform that had a lower pension indexation factor, thereby hurting everybody, in favour of a different conceptual approach of tightening eligibility…
In response to Morrison’s announcement on pensions, Shorten was floundering… “Why is it that part-pensioners are an endangered species in the Abbott government’s budget?” Shorten asked. He proceeded to charge: “Today 320,000 part-pensioners have discovered that they’re the next victims of an Abbott government budget.” This sounds like a Labor Party that will reject Morrison’s policy. Yet Shorten kept his options open, saying Labor would “carefully assess” the details. It would be absurd for Labor to allow the Greens to cut a deal with the government and secure the new pension policy. 
UPDATE
Shorten stumbles into another trap:
LABOR will dump John Howard’s successful temporary protection visas for illegal arrivals, which have twice stopped the boats, and consider reopening detention centres as “reception centres” under the party’s draft policy. 
The policy for the National Labor Party Conference has revealed a plan to “abolish” the successful TPV policy…
It remains unclear if Labor will support turning back boats before they arrive… Fremantle backbencher Melissa Parke yesterday called on the Labor Party not to ­embrace the turnback policy. Last year Mr Marles conceded turnbacks had worked but was hammered by his own party for making the remarks.
(Thanks to reader Peter of Bellevue Hill.) 
===

Costello: decades of debt, and no courage or wit to fix it

Andrew Bolt May 09 2015 (6:54am)

A frightening scenario:
Peter Costello has warned it will take at least several decades to eliminate government debt and predicted that budget surpluses will continue to be rare. 
As Joe Hockey prepares to deliver the Abbott government’s second budget on Tuesday, Australia’s longest-serving treasurer declared that budget surpluses would be delivered only when political courage was combined with compelling advocacy…
“Let’s say the budget went into surplus on Tuesday night. You would have to run surpluses of 1 per cent (of GDP) for 15 years in a row to pay off the debt.
“In my lifetime, I don’t think we’ll see the commonwealth — and I’m talking 20 or 30 years — pay off all its debt. It’s a reflection on the fact that last time to pay off the debt we had to run 10 years of surplus. So, you know, you would have to run at least 10 years of surplus to pay off the debt (today)...”
Government net debt, according to the 2014-15 Mid-year Economic and Fiscal Outlook delivered last December, was $245 billion and gross debt $360bn. The budget deficit is expected to be more than $40bn this financial year.
What makes this scenario even more frightening is that it depends on China’s growth not falling even more, and on unrestrained bracket creep somehow not strangling economic activity.
But in all debates about our debt we must consider political reality: the Government has tried to slash debt and nearly died in the attempt. Labor, the Greens and independents such as Jacqui Lambie have blocked huge spending cuts, and pretended there was no debt crisis to fix. Many journalists cheered them and the public told pollsters they hated this mean Government.
We can blame the Government for not selling the case for cuts better, but in the end we have Labor and the Greens deliberately destroying the rescue of the economy for political advantage.
Despicable and dangerous.
(Costello is on The Bolt Report on Sunday.) 
===

Keating can read, after all, and doesn’t like what Day writes

Andrew Bolt May 09 2015 (6:15am)

Historian David Day has made startling claims before. For instance:
Then there is David Day, whose book Menzies & Churchill At War is soon to run in documentary form on ABC TV. In this tome Dr Day alleged that Menzies was willing to quit Australia in the early years of World War II and settle in Britain where he hoped to succeed Winston Churchill as prime minister of the United Kingdom. What is the evidence for so serious a claim? 
Well, as Allan Martin has documented, it consists of a minute, which Menzies probably did not read, in which one of Menzies’s admirers theorised that it would be a you-beaut idea if his hero took over at 10 Downing Street. Day’s account of this (non) event is replete with such tell-tale words and concepts as “presumably", “it seems", “suggests”, even “Trojan horse”.
And I’ve wondered before at Day’s credulity and enthusiasms:
David Day, an honorary associate in the history program at La Trobe University, demonstrates all the giddy make-believing of the modern warming catastrophist: 
A government that was serious about global warming would not be introducing a price on carbon at the same time as it is overseeing an explosion in coal exports.
It would be far better to restrict the expansion of coal mining and thereby signal to businesses in Australia and overseas that alternatives to coal need to be developed. 
So we should not merely impose the world’s biggest carbon tax, but deny the world our coal - worth around $40 billion a year to our economy, and earning $36 billion in exports. 
Now Paul Keating challenges Day’s history-making - and wins:
HarperCollins Australia has apologised and agreed to pulp unsold copies of its flagship 2015 release – Paul Keating: The Biography by David Day – to settle a fierce legal battle with the former Labor prime minister. 
The spectacular capitulation resolved the previously unreported dispute over incendiary – and it turns out false – claim by the author, that Mr Keating suffered from the reading and comprehension disorder known as dyslexia…
HarperCollins and Dr Day have blinked, “unreservedly” apologising to Mr Keating, agreeing to meet his legal costs, destroy remaining stocks of the hardcover’s 8000-copy print run, and substantially amend any future editions, should it be reprinted…
The central claim in the unauthorised biography is that Mr Keating concealed his dyslexia since childhood and that it had rendered him unable to undertake some of the core tasks required of a treasurer and a prime minister. The claim, which Dr Day conceded was his deduction and had never been put to Mr Keating himself, appeared multiple times throughout the 576-page book which retailed for $49.99.
UPDATE
Gerard Henderson asks David Day to provide sources for his Menzies claim.
===

Blaming Pamela Geller means jihadists win

Andrew Bolt May 09 2015 (5:03am)

 Megyn Kelly gets it, even if Bill O’Reilly does not:
RICHARD FOWLER [radio host]: ... There are people that want to kill us. ISIS Wants to kill us, al-Qaeda wants to kill us. But Muslims as a whole do not want to kill us, and I think that is part of the problem. So when you go around depicting who they worship as some sort of caricature, some sort of cartoon, it is offense and it is wrong. You would feel the same way—I feel the same way if someone depicted Jesus as a crazy cartoon. 
MEGYN KELLY, FOX NEWS CHANNEL: There is no debate about whether it is offensive. Everybody knows it is offensive.
RICHARD FOWLER: It is offensive, and I think [Pamela Geller] was really putting this on to create a tension, to create-- to sort of promote her organization.
MEGYN KELLY: Even if you hate her message, she was promoting free speech. And as Rich Lowry put it in a column today, “criticism of Islam is at the vanguard of the fight for free speech since it is susceptible to attack and intimidation by jihadis that call for self censorship in the name of being politically correct.”
RICHARD FOWLER: There is nothing wrong free speech, but as Donald Trump said, be smart, not stupid. Why would you invoke attacks on the people coming to your event by doing something so ridiculous!
MEGYN KELLY: Do you hear what you are saying? We in this country need to limit our constitutional rights, limit our free speech rights, lest we invite attack, or as [Bill] O’Reilly put it, “spur” an attack against us. That is the way we need to look at this?
RICHARD FOWLER: Freedom of speech is an enumerated right which also come with freedom of religion, freedom of press, and freedom of association. Muslims should be free to worship, just like Christians are free to worship.
MEGYN KELLY: And they are.
RICHARD FOWLER: Freedom of speech comes with limits. This is a clear limit… It is just like going into a theater and yelling out fire, or going into a black church and yelling out the n-word… MEGYN KELLY: The more offensive the speech is Richard, the more protection it needs. That is how the first amendment works.... When people exercise their first amendment rights, and two jihadis show up to murder them, the relevant question at that time is not what were they saying? The relevant question is what are we going to do about this group of people that wants to murder us because we believe in free speech and the first amendment. 
Bravo.
(Thanks to readers WaG311 and Peter of Bellevue Hill.) 
===

Tighter immigration rules would spare us much such danger

Andrew Bolt May 08 2015 (9:21pm)

Yet more anti-terror raids in Melbourne:
Police have detonated what is thought to be an improvised explosive device following counter-terrorism raids in Melbourne’s north. 
A loud blast could be heard shortly after 8.30pm tonight at a reserve nearby a house in suburban Greenvale which had been the centre of a major search operation throughout the afternoon and evening.
Before the controlled detonation, police had extended a 300m metre exclusion zone around the residence and sent in a robot along with heavily-armed bomb squad officers.
It’s understood a number of explosive devices may have been found inside the Clare Boulevard house, which has since been rendered safe.
Police warned earlier of imminent “action” at the home.
And:
A nearby resident told the Herald Sun he saw two bearded men of Middle Eastern appearance being led into a police vehicle.

Who opened us to danger? Why? Why did journalists say nothing?
UPDATE
Unrelated to the above arrests, a disturbing glimpse of the paranoid victimology we see only too often - and which is encouraged too often by the Left:
A MELBOURNE teen with alleged links to Islamic State has been refused bail amid fears for public safety. 
Harun Causevic, 18, now faces more than 12 months in custody while he waits for terrorism-related charges to be dealt with in the Supreme Court.
Outside court, his father launched a scathing attacking on the Federal Government in defence of his son.
“This is political. This is clear message from Prime Minister to young muslim who go five times a day to mosque, be charged like terrorist.... ”This is everything setup from government,” he said.
===
How to keep art alive
Posted by G. D. Falksen on Thursday, 26 March 2015
===
New Zealand continues to be one of the highest performing economies in the developed world.ntnl.org.nz/1KNr5N1
Posted by New Zealand National Party on Thursday, 7 May 2015
===

On The Bolt Report on Sunday

Andrew Bolt May 09 2014 (4:10pm)

On the show on Sunday – Network 10 at 10am and 4pm....
Wreckers on one side, promise breakers on the other. Which is worse?
Our guest: Immigration Minister Scott Morrison.
Our panel: Janet Albrechtsen of The Australian and former Labor campaign guru Bruce Hawker.
On NewsWatch, Roger Scruton, the world’s leading conservative philosopher, analyses the socialist protesters who stopped Q&A.
And more, including a hypocrisy check on the ABC’s new comedy show.
The videos of the shows appear here.
===

Union of smearers

Andrew Bolt May 09 2014 (1:50pm)


Louts:
The Electrical Trades Union has apologised for comparing Prime Minister Tony Abbott to Adolf Hitler, infuriating Jewish groups who condemned the portrayal in the union’s newsletter during a campaign. 
The ETU released a brief statement on Friday apologising for the newsletter and pulled the offending article from its Facebook page.
“The ETU sincerely and unreservedly apologises,” the statement said.
“The theme of the magazine was to show the demonisation of unions has had a long history.” The cover of the autumn newsletter for the Victorian branch of the ETU has used a digitally altered picture of Tony Abbott, complete with a tiny moustache and a tattoo on his chest similar to the Third Reich eagle.
Demonisation of conservatives also has a very long history. 
===

Selfies won’t stop Boko Haram

Andrew Bolt May 09 2014 (8:10am)


Monster Hunter Nation doubts a film star holding a sign will stop Boko Haram from enslaving schoolgirls:
I did a lot of research on human trafficking and modern slavery before Mike Kupari and I wrote Swords of Exodus. It is a horrible, evil, and surprisingly gigantic thing. One thing I’m fairly sure of about the kind of people who do that sort of thing for a living, is that they really don’t give a s..t about a bunch of American movie stars taking pouty selfies of themselves holding up signs with hash tag give our girls back. The disapproval of fat, soft, Americans on Facebook really doesn’t move them. They care about getting paid or getting killed, that’s about it. The self-righteous pouting is useless. 
For the idiot libprog pussies with the selfies, the world is a violent place, filled with violent men. If you actually want something to be done about these evil people, maybe you shouldn’t bitch, whine, and moan every time our military takes action against evil people....
This kidnapping event made the news, but this sort of thing happens every day somewhere in the world. You’re shocked and outraged about this, but that just shows how little you know about the subject. There are plenty of outrageous acts of evil out there to choose from. You can take useless photos of yourself holding up a sign, but it will do nothing other than prove to your fellow idiots that you care so hard… But if your selective outrage is really up in arms about this one, movie stars with the hash tag, I’ve got a simple solution for you. Take some of your millions of dollars and hire some mercenaries to go into Africa to shoot all the members of Boko Haram. I wonder how that would trend on Twitter. #gurkhaskillscumbags
The Left’s avoidance of the real issues here is startling. Last night on The Project former Democrats leader Natasha Stott-Despoja summed up the lessons to be learned from the kidnapping of more than 200 girls by an Islamist terrorist group that has declared war on Christians, murdered thousands of civilians and massacred boys whose “crime” was to go to school. According to Stott-Despoja, this should remind us that slavery was bad and girls’ education was important. No word about the dead schoolboys. And certainly no mention - again - of Islam.
This kind of thing is too much even for some stalwarts of the Left:
The Guardian, too, is now angry with its fellow travellors - although even it is still shy of the word “Muslim”:
Writers are typing with one eye over their shoulder: watching their backs to make sure that no one can accuse them of “demonising the other”.
===

Why does a refugee program put our children in danger?

Andrew Bolt May 09 2014 (7:34am)

The law insists the safety of this “refugee” comes above the safety of Australian children. That’s why he’s still here:
AN evil child sex predator - who cannot be deported thanks to his protection visa - is now targeting footy training, a school, parks, playground and Melbourne Sports and Aquatic Centre. 
Ali Jaffari, an Afghan ­refugee on the sex offenders register, is under police investigation over his behaviour ­towards young children at footy training and Auskick near Albert Park…
And one mum said Jaffari followed her two children after dark in Albert Park, staring and touching himself. “It was truly frightening,” she said.
Jaffari was convicted and placed on the sex offenders register for 15 years over the assault of a boy at Geelong’s Eastern beach in August but received just 300 hours of community service.
Jaffari kissed the boy on the neck, told him he was “sexy” and rubbed himself against him.
In January he was accused of child stealing and unlawful assault of a four-year-old girl at a Geelong West oval… When interviewed, Jaffari told police: “For us, is not an issue.”
Is a refugee program which produces these outcomes really in the national interest?
Magistrate Ron Saines stood the matter down in March, advising police if he were hearing the matter he would have reasonable doubt finding Jaffari guilty, citing cultural differences.
The charges were dropped.  
===

Teaching tomorrow’s terrorists

Andrew Bolt May 09 2014 (7:28am)

 A wake-up to people who think just signing a peace treaty will guarantee Israel’s safety. From Hamas’ Al Aqsa TV:
Child host (Rawan): “Tulin, why do you want to be a police officer? Like who?” 
Girl (Tulin): “Like my uncle.” …
Moderator: “OK, so what does a policeman do?”
Girl: “He catches thieves, and people who make trouble.”
Child host: “And shoots Jews. Right?”
Girl: “Yes.”
Child host: “You want to be like him?”
[Girl nods]
Child host: “Allah willing, when you grow up.”
Girl: “So that I can shoot Jews.”
[Nahul, an adult in a giant bee costume, claps his hands]
Child host: “All the Jews? All of them?”
Girl: “Yes.” Child host: “Good.” 
(Thanks to reader Bob Gorovoi.) 
===

Nation of dependents

Andrew Bolt May 09 2014 (7:25am)

Hit the rich? How about wean the middle-class off handouts instead:
HALF of Australian families receive more in handouts than they pay in net income tax, new figures reveal.
As the Abbott government sharpens its budget razor on welfare, the figures reveal just how dependent we’ve become. The exclusive modelling for The Daily Telegraph by the National Centre for Social and Economic Modelling at the University of Canberra reveals 48 per cent of Australia’s 12.2 million “income units” pay no net tax. Any tax they do contribute is offset by the welfare — pensions, family tax benefits or childcare rebates — they receive.
===

Wayne Swan shows exactly why we’re in this mess

Andrew Bolt May 09 2014 (7:14am)

Former Labor Treasurer Wayne Swan is in complete denial: 
WE keep hearing from Joe Hockey we need to “fix the budget”. The fact is we left the budget in sound shape.
In fact: 
The Commission of Audit’s (COA) report ...  notes that without reform to Australia’s tax and expenditure system, Australia “faces 16 consecutive years of budget deficits with net debt rising from $190 billion today to $440 billion by 2023-24?.
Swan diagnoses his problem:
Optimist! Swan, SMH, yesterday:
LIKE many Australians, I’m an optimist about the Australian economy ..
Yes, optimist. Swan, May 11, 2010: 
OUR strict spending limits will see the budget return to surplus in three years, three years early — ahead of every major advanced economy.
Boundless optimism. Swan, February 7, 2012: 
WE’VE got our colours nailed to the mast. That’s what we’re doing. We’re producing a surplus in 2012-13. We’re determined to do that and that’s what we’re going to do..
===

The price of a Rudd brain-wave

Andrew Bolt May 09 2014 (6:53am)

Another Labor hot-money scheme: 
KEVIN Rudd’s botched insulation scheme left one installer so traumatised his revival as prime minister last year made her physically ill. 
In emotional evidence to the royal commission, small business owner Kellie Jackson described how the $2.8 billion program devastated her health and sparked the near-collapse of her and her husband’s decade-old company…
Ms Jackson said she and her husband were forced to dismiss most of their 20 staff, ask for loans from their parents and the bank, and chase the federal government for $100,000 in unpaid subsidies… In February 2010, she travelled to Canberra with other installers to protest about the program’s cancellation. Mr Rudd addressed the rally — and Ms Jackson, personally — assuring them help in the form of an assistance package was on its way. It never arrived. Eventually, the Jacksons were offered $440 in compensation from the government.
(Thanks to reader Peter of Bellevue Hill.) 
===

Hockey tweets an argument for cuts, not tax rises

Andrew Bolt May 09 2014 (12:01am)

So why raise taxes with a debt levy and fuel excise rise?
UPDATE
This is what voters expected: 
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/budget-2014/joe-hockey-to-swing-axe-on-public-sector/story-fnmbxr2t-1226911035265” title="MORE than 200 spending programs will be slashed “>MORE than 200 spending programs will be slashed in next week’s federal budget as Joe Hockey vows to shrink the size of government in a “big, structural change” to save billions of dollars.
Agencies will be closed and thousands of staff retrenched over the coming months in a drastic overhaul that will start with the loss of 3000 positions in the Treasurer’s own portfolio.
The axe will fall in major portfolios including environment, transport, industry, agriculture and indigenous affairs. Mr Hockey told The Australian that spending cuts would do the “heavy lifting” in fixing the deficit, despite growing criticism of looming tax hikes including a lift in fuel excise.
Those are the kind of cuts we voted for. But these are the tax rises we didn’t: 
As foreshadowed in The Australian yesterday, fuel excise will be increased to raise an estimated $2.4 billion over four years, amid accusations that the move would be another breach of Tony Abbott’s election pledge to keep taxes down. 
The decision is another hit on top of an income tax increase likely to apply to incomes over $180,000 despite warnings from Liberal MPs against the idea.
How does the debt tax meet this promise?
“If there is a change of government, Australian families will be better off. Their weekly and fortnightly budgets will be under less pressure because the carbon tax will go and no one’s personal tax will go up and no one’s fortnightly pension or benefit will go down,” Mr Abbott said.
David Crowe says Joe Hockey himself explained what the Government’s real mandate would be:
The Treasurer’s message has been clear since he warned of the end of the “age of entitlement” in a London speech more than two years ago… 
Hockey’s vow to “rebuild fiscal discipline” came with an assurance that raising taxes was not the way ahead.
“Budget surpluses must be restored, ideally until the debt is repaid,” he said. “This can only be achieved by cutting spending or by raising taxes. And given the general acceptance that the increased drag from higher taxes would compromise economic growth, the clear mandate is to lower expenditure.”
===

49 more good calls like this and we won’t need that fuel excise increase

Andrew Bolt May 08 2014 (8:50pm)

That’s more like it:
The Abbott government is set to scrap the ABC’s Australia Network international broadcasting service in next Tuesday’s budget. 
Cabinet approved the decision in a meeting on Wednesday, according to a report in The West Australian. The ABC has a 10-year, $223 million contract to run the network, which broadcasts to 44 countries in the Asia Pacific.
===
Larry Pickering
ALP CRIME ENDEMIC

PM Julia Gillard and her hero, Big Bill Ludwig, are no strange bedfellows when it comes to crime and NSW’s Eddie Obeid and his army of corrupt ALP mates should not feel left out. Nor Should the HSU’s Williamson and Thomson. And if you believe that Combet endorsed a dodgy coal mine without knowing it was dodgy then go play with the fairies at the bottom of your garden.

But now it’s Queensland and a series of ALP rorts involving 200 million dodgy dollars that's about to suffer the microscope of a Newman Commission of Inquiry.

No prizes for guessing who’s involved. Yep, Bill Ludwig, the racing industry (RQL) and the Bligh Government.

Just days before the QLD electorate delivered a death sentence to the Bligh Government, $20 million was transferred from QLD Treasury to Racing Queensland Limited’s trust account.

Was Anna Bligh was trying to make something favourite at Doomben? Not really. More likely to line the pockets of her corrupt supporters on the QLD Racing Board and her government employees who were about to be thrown on the job heap.

RQL and the Bligh Government then entered into funding contracts for over $60 million of public works in key Labor electorates.

Interesting also is the arrangement between RQL and Sunshine Coast engineering firm, Contour Consulting. This little deal involved tens of millions of dollars and more than 30 contracts that were awarded without one going to tender.

Coincidentally, two key executives resigned from RQL and immediately took up positions with guess who, Contour Consulting.

The two executives were handed astoundingly large payouts by RQL, the subject of which is now under investigation by ASIC. But there’s more!

The Inquiry will also probe Queensland Race Product Co’s (a non-profit subsidiary of RQL) grant of almost $100 million in deductions to gaming giant Tatts Group. And against legal advice.

Now stay with me here... the boss of QRL is the notorious Bob Bentley and Mr Bentley is also on the board of Tatts Group.

Bob Bentley remained boss of QRL for over ten years without ever facing re-election as required under the RQL’s Constitution.

Both Bill Ludwig and Bob Bentley have insisted they did nothing wrong. Phew! For a moment I was a bit worried there.

Of course Julia has learnt from her friend Anna how to empty Treasury coffers prior to the dreaded conservatives taking over.

Anna was a friend of mine but I guess not now she reads this and Julia hated me anyway.

Bugger, I don’t seem to have much luck with some women.

But some women seem to have a lot of luck getting away with murder!
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SWAMI VIKEVANANDA was made famous when he made a speech, over 100 years ago, at a world wide conference of religions. He, more than anyone, called for religious tolerance. His speech made headlines in the major newspapers. His own religious orientation was mystic Hinduism (Vedanta) which calls for nonviolence - AND YET here is what he had to say about the followers of Islam:
“...Every step forward (for the Mohamadeans) was made with the word of the Koran in the one hand and the sword in the other. Take the Koran, or you must die; there is no alternative”. [The speech, delivered in the Universalist Church, Pasadena, California, USA, on 28th January, 1890]
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May 9: Europe Day/Schuman Day in the European Union;Independence Day in Romania (1877)
Thomas Blood
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Births[edit]

Deaths[edit]

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“Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders; make the most of every opportunity. Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.” - Colossians 4:5-6
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Morning and Evening by Charles Spurgeon

Morning


"He that was healed wist not who it was."
John 5:13

Years are short to the happy and healthy; but thirty-eight years of disease must have dragged a very weary length along the life of the poor impotent man. When Jesus, therefore, healed him by a word, while he lay at the pool of Bethesda, he was delightfully sensible of a change. Even so the sinner who has for weeks and months been paralysed with despair, and has wearily sighed for salvation, is very conscious of the change when the Lord Jesus speaks the word of power, and gives joy and peace in believing. The evil removed is too great to be removed without our discerning it; the life imparted is too remarkable to be possessed and remain inoperative; and the change wrought is too marvellous not to be perceived. Yet the poor man was ignorant of the author of his cure; he knew not the sacredness of his person, the offices which he sustained, or the errand which brought him among men. Much ignorance of Jesus may remain in hearts which yet feel the power of his blood. We must not hastily condemn men for lack of knowledge; but where we can see the faith which saves the soul, we must believe that salvation has been bestowed. The Holy Spirit makes men penitents long before he makes them divines; and he who believes what he knows, shall soon know more clearly what he believes. Ignorance is, however, an evil; for this poor man was much tantalized by the Pharisees, and was quite unable to cope with them. It is good to be able to answer gainsayers; but we cannot do so if we know not the Lord Jesus clearly and with understanding. The cure of his ignorance, however, soon followed the cure of his infirmity, for he was visited by the Lord in the temple; and after that gracious manifestation, he was found testifying that "it was Jesus who had made him whole." Lord, if thou hast saved me, show me thyself, that I may declare thee to the sons of men.

Evening

"Acquaint now thyself with him."
Job 22:21
If we would rightly "acquaint ourselves with God, and be at peace," we must know him as he has revealed himself, not only in the unity of his essence and subsistence, but also in the plurality of his persons. God said, "Let us make man in our own image"--let not man be content until he knows something of the "us" from whom his being was derived. Endeavour to know the Father; bury your head in his bosom in deep repentance, and confess that you are not worthy to be called his son; receive the kiss of his love; let the ring which is the token of his eternal faithfulness be on your finger; sit at his table and let your heart make merry in his grace. Then press forward and seek to know much of the Son of God who is the brightness of his Father's glory, and yet in unspeakable condescension of grace became man for our sakes; know him in the singular complexity of his nature: eternal God, and yet suffering, finite man; follow him as he walks the waters with the tread of deity, and as he sits upon the well in the weariness of humanity. Be not satisfied unless you know much of Jesus Christ as your Friend, your Brother, your Husband, your all. Forget not the Holy Spirit; endeavour to obtain a clear view of his nature and character, his attributes, and his works. Behold that Spirit of the Lord, who first of all moved upon chaos, and brought forth order; who now visits the chaos of your soul, and creates the order of holiness. Behold him as the Lord and giver of spiritual life, the Illuminator, the Instructor, the Comforter, and the Sanctifier. Behold him as, like holy unction, he descends upon the head of Jesus, and then afterwards rests upon you who are as the skirts of his garments. Such an intelligent, scriptural, and experimental belief in the Trinity in Unity is yours if you truly know God; and such knowledge brings peace indeed.
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Today's reading: 2 Kings 4-6, Luke 24:36-53 (NIV)

View today's reading on Bible Gateway

Today's Old Testament reading: 2 Kings 4-6


The Widow's Olive Oil

1 The wife of a man from the company of the prophets cried out to Elisha, "Your servant my husband is dead, and you know that he revered the LORD. But now his creditor is coming to take my two boys as his slaves."
2 Elisha replied to her, "How can I help you? Tell me, what do you have in your house?"
"Your servant has nothing there at all," she said, "except a small jar of olive oil."
3 Elisha said, "Go around and ask all your neighbors for empty jars. Don't ask for just a few. 4 Then go inside and shut the door behind you and your sons. Pour oil into all the jars, and as each is filled, put it to one side...."

Today's New Testament reading: Luke 24:36-53

Jesus Appears to the Disciples
36 While they were still talking about this, Jesus himself stood among them and said to them, "Peace be with you."
37 They were startled and frightened, thinking they saw a ghost. 38 He said to them, "Why are you troubled, and why do doubts rise in your minds? 39 Look at my hands and my feet. It is I myself! Touch me and see; a ghost does not have flesh and bones, as you see I have."
40 When he had said this, he showed them his hands and feet. 41 And while they still did not believe it because of joy and amazement, he asked them, "Do you have anything here to eat?" 42 They gave him a piece of broiled fish, 43 and he took it and ate it in their presence....

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