Friday, June 09, 2017

Fri Jun 9th Todays News

Some things should not happen, but they do. Theresa May, PM of UK is being castigated over her campaign which may see Jeremy Corbyn achieve minority government. She has taken UK conservatives from majority government to at best a minority one. It is possible that she forms a coalition with Northern Irish conservatives who tend to be a little more centre right than the average English conservative. Which could mean better government for the UK. It is too soon to tell. But many are calling for May to resign the leadership of the conservative party. Among those voices are many who also said that Malcolm Turnbull should remain leader after his abysmal performance in the last Australian federal election. The criticism of may is hyper as it is also apt. The performance was awful in election, but that was because the conservatives as a party were not prepared to run. That wasn't May's fault, as the party was still recovering from the disastrous Cameron leadership which caused divisions over Brexit. 

 The never Trump and anti Trump crowd are in disarray after their hope of an impeachment over Russia scandal imploded. The corrupt or inept (he might be both) former FBI chief Comey admitted that he had leaked to make Trump look bad. Trump is not being investigated for his campaign contacts with Russia. Corey's testimony ruined the career of a friend he leaked to. Trump is winning the culture wars and draining the swamp. 

One of the faux complaints regarding May is that she is weak on terror. As if a terrorist supporter like Corbyn would be better? The recent terrorist attacks in UK are not May's fault, but can be laid at the feet of British Press who have lied about the nature of the attacks. The prima facie justification given terrorist attacks is Islamic inspired, but more closely aligned with Fleet street talking points than Islamic issues. When a terrorist yells out "This is for my country" they are unaware of what actually goes on in that mythical state, but they are aware of the anti semitic, anti American catch cries of press simpletons. And that is the reason why the Left are so chummy with terrorism these days. But something happened in London which the press have downplayed which shows the death cult is more politically inspired than religiously inspired. When Lee Rigby was butchered, a young woman asked if she could pray over him, and the terrorists acceded. They didn't harm her as they wanted witnesses and it made good drama as they called out press slogans about mythical abuses in their so called home nations. But this time in London, a young beautiful Nurse was attacked by all three terrorists as she tried to help the wounded and dying. A real man tried to intervene to save her, but the evil losers had their terrorist porn moment and weren't distracted. That nurse was brave and innocent, and they slaughtered her in a way that brings Islam into disrepute, using Islam's name. Even under Islam, those evil losers are going to hell. There is no reward for them. People want to know where Corbyn's support came from. It came from the very press supporting terrorism. 

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 The Forsaken Merman

Matthew Arnold (24 December 1822 -- 15 April 1888) was an English poet and cultural critic who worked as an inspector of schools. He was the son of Thomas Arnold, the famed headmaster of Rugby School, and brother to both Tom Arnold, literary professor, and William Delafield Arnold, novelist and colonial administrator. Matthew Arnold has been characterized as a sage writer, a type of writer who chastises and instructs the reader on contemporary social issues
The Forsaken Merman

Related Poem Content Details

BY MATTHEW ARNOLD
Come, dear children, let us away;
Down and away below!
Now my brothers call from the bay,
Now the great winds shoreward blow,
Now the salt tides seaward flow;
Now the wild white horses play,
Champ and chafe and toss in the spray.
Children dear, let us away!
This way, this way!

Call her once before you go—
Call once yet!
In a voice that she will know:
"Margaret! Margaret!"
Children's voices should be dear
(Call once more) to a mother's ear;

Children's voices, wild with pain—
Surely she will come again!
Call her once and come away;
This way, this way!
"Mother dear, we cannot stay!
The wild white horses foam and fret."
Margaret! Margaret!

Come, dear children, come away down;
Call no more!
One last look at the white-wall'd town
And the little grey church on the windy shore,
Then come down!
She will not come though you call all day;
Come away, come away!

Children dear, was it yesterday
We heard the sweet bells over the bay?
In the caverns where we lay,
Through the surf and through the swell,
The far-off sound of a silver bell?
Sand-strewn caverns, cool and deep,
Where the winds are all asleep;
Where the spent lights quiver and gleam,
Where the salt weed sways in the stream,
Where the sea-beasts, ranged all round,
Feed in the ooze of their pasture-ground;
Where the sea-snakes coil and twine,
Dry their mail and bask in the brine;
Where great whales come sailing by,
Sail and sail, with unshut eye,
Round the world for ever and aye?
When did music come this way?
Children dear, was it yesterday?

Children dear, was it yesterday
(Call yet once) that she went away?
Once she sate with you and me,
On a red gold throne in the heart of the sea,
And the youngest sate on her knee.
She comb'd its bright hair, and she tended it well,
When down swung the sound of a far-off bell.
She sigh'd, she look'd up through the clear green sea;
She said: "I must go, to my kinsfolk pray
In the little grey church on the shore to-day.
'T will be Easter-time in the world—ah me!
And I lose my poor soul, Merman! here with thee."
I said: "Go up, dear heart, through the waves;
Say thy prayer, and come back to the kind sea-caves!"
She smiled, she went up through the surf in the bay.
Children dear, was it yesterday?

Children dear, were we long alone?
"The sea grows stormy, the little ones moan;
Long prayers," I said, "in the world they say;
Come!" I said; and we rose through the surf in the bay.
We went up the beach, by the sandy down
Where the sea-stocks bloom, to the white-wall'd town;
Through the narrow paved streets, where all was still,
To the little grey church on the windy hill.
From the church came a murmur of folk at their prayers,
But we stood without in the cold blowing airs.
We climb'd on the graves, on the stones worn with rains,
And we gazed up the aisle through the small leaded panes.
She sate by the pillar; we saw her clear:
"Margaret, hist! come quick, we are here!
Dear heart," I said, "we are long alone;
The sea grows stormy, the little ones moan."
But, ah, she gave me never a look,
For her eyes were seal'd to the holy book!
Loud prays the priest; shut stands the door.
Come away, children, call no more!
Come away, come down, call no more!

Down, down, down!
Down to the depths of the sea!
She sits at her wheel in the humming town,
Singing most joyfully.
Hark what she sings: "O joy, O joy,
For the humming street, and the child with its toy!
For the priest, and the bell, and the holy well;
For the wheel where I spun,
And the blessed light of the sun!"
And so she sings her fill,
Singing most joyfully,
Till the spindle drops from her hand,
And the whizzing wheel stands still.
She steals to the window, and looks at the sand,
And over the sand at the sea;
And her eyes are set in a stare;
And anon there breaks a sigh,
And anon there drops a tear,
From a sorrow-clouded eye,
And a heart sorrow-laden,
A long, long sigh;
For the cold strange eyes of a little Mermaiden
And the gleam of her golden hair.

Come away, away children
Come children, come down!
The hoarse wind blows coldly;
Lights shine in the town.
She will start from her slumber
When gusts shake the door;
She will hear the winds howling,
Will hear the waves roar.
We shall see, while above us
The waves roar and whirl,
A ceiling of amber,
A pavement of pearl.
Singing: "Here came a mortal,
But faithless was she!
And alone dwell for ever
The kings of the sea."

But, children, at midnight,
When soft the winds blow,
When clear falls the moonlight,
When spring-tides are low;
When sweet airs come seaward
From heaths starr'd with broom,
And high rocks throw mildly
On the blanch'd sands a gloom;
Up the still, glistening beaches,
Up the creeks we will hie,
Over banks of bright seaweed
The ebb-tide leaves dry.
We will gaze, from the sand-hills,
At the white, sleeping town;
At the church on the hill-side—
And then come back down.
Singing: "There dwells a loved one,
But cruel is she!
She left lonely for ever
The kings of the sea."


=== from 2016 ===
The triumph of Trump is nothing to cheer for Turnbull. They are too different from each other. While they have similarities, both being successful entrepreneuers and both taking party leadership from more competent politicians. Trump would not suffer from Turnbull's deadly fear of failure and decisiveness. Turnbull does not make decisions, and so his talking to the public needs to be managed. Turnbull sounds disagreeable, and snobbish. But regardless of how bad Turnbull is, Shorten is worse. Shorten has no plan to improve Australia, but chortles at blocking responsible cuts to spending and promtes spending that is irresponsible. Australia exceeds $500 billion in debt, thanks to policies Shorten voted for. Ten years ago, Australia was in surplus. 

For some, at the moment, the Sex Party has more credibility. 
=== from 2015 ===
Be a union leader. Then you'll never need to work. Chris Bowen has denounced Hockey's statement that first home owners should have a job that pays well. Bowen feels Hockey is out of touch. Some say Hockey is tone deaf politically, saying his statement that poor people are less likely to own cars is insensitive. But Hockey is right. It is far better to follow Hockey's advice than the ALP belief in entitlement. Not everyone can, as union leaders do, achieve large houses without effort, after union members are fleeced.

As for fleecing union members, former ALP whip, Cesar Melham, has quit from the whip's position in Victoria. He should also resign as a member. He was union chief when he followed Bowen's implied advice to achieve a large house. Don't blame Bowen. Shorten is leader. 
From 2014
When Jefferson warned that the price of Liberty was eternal vigilance he had had fair warning of it. On this day in 411 BC Democracy in Athens was overthrown by some hoping to negotiate with Persia for aid in fighting Sparta. Athens had devolved, with a significant administrative presence in naval dockyards of Samos, home town to long dead Pythagoras. The plotters succeeded in Athens but failed in Samos. The hopes of Persian aid failed, and the 500 strong Oligarchy got overthrown by a 5000 strong group, which eventually gave way to Democracy. It is a salient reminder of the importance of Crimean dockyards to Russia too, which apparently Obama gave a nod to, with a wink. It is also a reminder of how seductive a baseless promise is. Palmer can promise anything, but it means nothing if it doesn't work. Gillard claimed the Pacific Solution was cold and heartless, but in fact the ALP abrogation of responsibility of border protection was murderous and harmful for desperately poor people. Our democracy is no stronger than the Athenian one. Or the US. 

When it comes to poor administration, Nero is gold standard. He married his first wife (a step sister) on this day in 53, and then suicided fifteen years later, six years after her death on the same day. His wife's death had not been an accident, he had ordered her suicide. The final words of Nero are said to be a quote from the Illiad "What an artist leaves the world." Such hubris is apparent in corrupt characters such as Shorten, Gillard, Rudd and Palmer. One may defend their activity, but one need only point to their inability to substantiate or validate their activity. Note Palmer may say that cuts are not necessary to spending, or that spending which does not benefit him is wrong. Remember, he has no reason supporting the assertion, beyond wishes.  
Historical perspective on this day
In 411 BC, the Athenian coup succeeded, forming a short-lived oligarchy. 53, the Roman Emperor Nero married Claudia Octavia. 68, the Roman Emperor Nero committed suicide, after quoting Homer's Iliad, thus ending the Julio-Claudian dynasty and starting the civil war known as the Year of the Four Emperors. 721, Odo of Aquitaine defeated the Moors in the Battle of Toulouse. 747, Abbasid Revolution: Abu Muslim Khorasani, Arab military leader, began an open revolt against Umayyad rule, which was carried out under the sign of the Black Standard. 1311, Duccio's Maestà Altarpiece, a seminal artwork of the early Italian Renaissance, was unveiled and installed in Siena Cathedral in Siena, Italy.

In 1534, Jacques Cartier was the first European to discover the Saint Lawrence River. 1650, the Harvard Corporation, the more powerful of the two administrative boards of Harvard, was established. It is the first legal corporation in the Americas. 1667, Second Anglo-Dutch War: The Raid on the Medway by the Dutch fleet began. It lasted for five days and resulted in the worst ever defeat of the Royal Navy. 1732, James Oglethorpe was granted a royal charter for the colony of the future U.S. state of Georgia. 1762, British forces began the Siege of Havana and captured the city during the Seven Years' War. 1772, the British schoonerGaspee was burned off the coast of Rhode Island. 1798, Irish Rebellion of 1798: Battle of Arklow and Battle of Saintfield.

In 1815, end of the Congress of Vienna: the new European political situation was set. Also, Luxembourg declared independence from the French Empire. 1856, 500 Mormons left Iowa City, Iowa, and headed west for Salt Lake City carrying all their possessions in two-wheeled handcarts. 1862, American Civil War: Stonewall Jackson concluded his successful Shenandoah Valley Campaign with a victory in the Battle of Port Republic; his tactics during the campaign are now studied by militaries around the world. 1863, American Civil War: Battle of Brandy Station, Virginia. 1873, Alexandra Palace in London burned down after being open for only 16 days. 1885, Treaty of Tientsin was signed to end the Sino-French War, with China eventually giving up Tonkin and Annam – most of present-day Vietnam – to France.

In 1900, Birsa Munda, an important figure in the Indian independence movement, died in a British prison under mysterious circumstances. 1915, William Jennings Bryan resigned as Woodrow Wilson's Secretary of State over a disagreement regarding the United States' handling of the sinking of the RMS Lusitania. 1923, Bulgaria's military took over the government in a coup. 1928, Charles Kingsford Smith completed the first trans-Pacific flight in a Fokker Trimotor monoplane, the Southern Cross. 1930, a Chicago Tribune reporter, Jake Lingle, was killed during rush hour at the Illinois Central train station by Leo Vincent Brothers, allegedly over a $100,000 gambling debt owed to Al Capone. 1934, Donald Duck made his debut in The Wise Little Hen. 1944, World War II: 99 civilians were hanged from lampposts and balconies by German troops in Tulle, France, in reprisal for maquisards attacks. Also 1944, World War II: the Soviet Union invaded East Karelia and the previously Finnish part of Karelia, occupied by Finland since 1941. 1946, King Ananda Mahidol was found shot dead in his bedroom, Bhumibol Adulyadej ascended to the throne of Thailand. He is currently the world's longest reigning monarch. 1948, foundation of the International Council on Archivesunder the auspices of the UNESCO.

In 1953, Flint–Worcester tornado outbreak sequence: a tornado spawned from the same storm system as the Flint tornado hit in Worcester, Massachusetts, killing 94. 1954, McCarthyism: Joseph Welch, special counsel for the United States Army, lashed out at Senator Joseph McCarthy during hearings on whether Communism had infiltrated the Army giving McCarthy the famous rebuke, "You've done enough. Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?" 1957, first ascent of Broad Peak by Fritz Wintersteller, Marcus Schmuck, Kurt Diemberger, and Hermann Buhl. 1958, Queen Elizabeth II officially opened London's Gatwick Airport in Crawley, West Sussex, United Kingdom. 1959, the USS George Washington was launched. It was the first submarine to carry ballistic missiles. 1965, the civilian Prime Minister of South Vietnam, Phan Huy Quát, resigned after being unable to work with a junta led by Nguyễn Cao Kỳ. Also 1965, Vietnam War: The Viet Cong commenced combat with the Army of the Republic of Vietnam in the Battle of Đồng Xoài, one of the largest battles in the war. 1967, Six-Day War: Israel captured the Golan Heights from Syria 1968, U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnsondeclared a national day of mourning following the assassination of Senator Robert F. Kennedy.

In 1972, Severe rainfall causes a dam in the Black Hills of South Dakota to burst, creating a flood that killed 238 people and caused $160 million in damage. 1973, in horseracing, Secretariat won the U.S. Triple Crown. 1974, Portugal and the Soviet Unionestablished diplomatic relations. 1978, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saintsopened its priesthood to "all worthy men", ending a 148-year-old policy of excluding black men. 1979, the Ghost Train fire at Luna Park Sydney (Australia) killed seven. 1985, Thomas Sutherland was kidnapped in Lebanon. He would not be released until 1991. 1999, Kosovo War: the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and NATO signed a peace treaty. 2006, 60th Anniversary Celebrations of Bhumibol Adulyadej's Accession.
=== 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 Will Son, Vi Nguyen, Sia Maria Manimoi  and Edwinus Kenny Thai. Born on the same day, across the years. On your day in 1815, The Congress of Vienna ended, redrawing the political map of Europe after the defeat of Napoleon. In 1863, In the largest cavalry engagement in U.S. history, Union and Confederate forces fought to a draw in the Battle of Brandy Station. In 1928, Australian aviator Charles Kingsford Smith and his crew landed their Southern Cross aircraft in Brisbane, completing the first ever trans-Pacific flight from the United States mainland to Australia. And, in 1973, Secretariat won the Belmont Stakes by 31 lengths, achieving the first American Triple Crown victory in a quarter-century, and lowering the track and world record times for 1½ mile distance races to 2:24. That is right, they noticed in primary school: you like to draw. And you like to race. Above ground you fly .. if you were a horse, you'd win. And this is your day.
Despatches
Charles Kingsford Smith
We be the many. We support navigation if it gets us home. We will study that victory. Southern Cross meet Victoria Bitter. We fight our battles. Let's party. 
===
Tim Blair


CORBYN CLOSING IN

Remarkably, considering how far behind was Jeremy Corbyn when the UK election campaign began, the Labour leader could be closing in on a potential Labour-led coalition victory.
9 Jun  39
===
Andrew Bolt


===

HORROR IN HORNSBY

Tim Blair – Thursday, June 09, 2016 (2:27pm)

Four people reportedly injured in a Sydney shopping centre knife confrontation: 
It is believed police shot a 23-year-old man wielding a knife at least three times after a stabbing.
It is understood as many as four people have suffered injuries, including to their lower limbs and abdomen. They range from serious to critical.


Local businessman Geoff Milner saw the attacker walking through the lunchtime market stalls holding a knife.
“I saw this old couple staring at him and that’s when I realised he had a full knife,” he said.
Mr Milner said police arrived shortly after.
“When I walked out of the cafe he was just standing there, like he was waiting for them.” 
Early reports indicated the attacker was alive following the police response. More to come.
UPDATE. Seven’s Robert Ovadia reports the man was heard shouting “Allahu Akhbar”.
Assistant Commissioner Denis Clifford said the armed man was known to police and had been reported missing from a nearby psychiatric centre yesterday.
“It will be alleged the man approached police with a large carving knife, the officers each fired shots at the offender and he was wounded several times,” he said. 
UPDATE III. A witness reports: 
Mr Yeom said he believed three shots were fired and it appeared police were aiming for the man’s legs. 
This could prove significant. If police were aiming at the man’s legs, in a paved area, it might explain the injuriessustained by three female shoppers: 
All three women are in a stable condition and the man remains under police guard in hospital. The women, who were not together, sustained leg injuries, with bullet fragments in the calves and ankles. 
Aiming down is a recipe for ricochets. Then again, aiming higher – and missing – may have been catastrophic.
UPDATE IV: 
Terrorists have fired on civilians in Tel Aviv’s popular Sarona Market, killing 3 and seriously injuring 4 others. According to some reports, they had dressed up as ultra-Orthodox Jews. 
===

WEAKENED AT BERNIE’S

Tim Blair – Thursday, June 09, 2016 (2:17pm)

Hillary Clinton may be celebrating, but it’s Bernie’s party, according to Dan Henninger: 
Sanders has recentered the Democrats, once and for all, as a party of the political left. He has reimagined the Democrats—almost with the force of his personality—as a party of the state, of government and of redistribution. Period …
The party of Franklin Roosevelt through Lyndon Johnson and its alliance with private-sector industrial unions made Democrats aware that their fortunes ultimately were joined to the success of the private sector.
The Democrats are now the party of Bernie Sanders, the progressive icon Sen. Elizabeth Warren and—make no mistake—of Barack Obama, a man of the left from day one. Rather than distrust the private sector, they disdain and even loathe it …
The policies of John Kennedy and Bill Clinton, now in disrepute, ensured that annual economic growth remained at its postwar average of about 3%. Those Democrats understood the private sector, even if they distrusted it.
That understanding is gone, as proven by the seven-year Obama growth rate between zero and little more than 2% … In the new Democratic Party, defined by the substance of Sen. Sanders’s campaign, the role of the private sector is to transmit revenue to the public purse. Private business has become an exotic abstraction, like the province of Cappadocia in the Roman empire. 
Bernie wouldn’t know about that. He was just a kid at the time.
===

THEY’VE BEEN THERE AND THEY KNOW

Tim Blair – Thursday, June 09, 2016 (2:57am)

In an absolutely stunning development, it emerges that Australian soldiers who have served in Afghanistan and Iraqsomehow don’t believe Islam is peaceful: 
The vast majority of Australian Defence Force personnel believes the Muslim religion promotes ¬violence and terrorism, despite “cultural sensitivity training” by the ADF to have its soldiers take the view that Islam is a religion of peace.
The bombshell new study sponsored by the army finds that such “anti-Muslim sentiments” are “probably quite widespread” among Australian frontline troops in Iraq and Afghanistan ... 
There’s a shock. How on earth could these people have ever come to such a puzzling conclusion? 
The study by academic Charles Miller, published yesterday in the Australian Army Journal, was clearly perceived by top military brass as likely to be highly controversial, prompting Chief of Army General Angus Campbell to write a preamble saying his staff “have a number of opposing views on this article’s content”. 
Not to mention a certain former Army leader. David Morrison’s orange texta of language justice would’ve torn through that article like Jonah Lomu through Englishmen. 
Dr Miller, who is a lecturer in Strategic and Defence Studies at the Australian National Univer¬sity, writes that “in this study, I use a technique designed to elicit frank responses to sensitive questions — the ‘list experiment’ — to examine ADF views on Islam.”
“I find little evidence that the official ‘Islam as a religion of peace’ narrative is widely accepted, nor is there evidence that cultural sensitivity training has any effect,” he says. 
Sensitivity training isn’t much use when it runs counter to empirical observation.
===

EMBIGGENING BILL

Tim Blair – Thursday, June 09, 2016 (1:09am)

Bill Shorten yesterday: 
“We will put forward a very clear plan to pay down the national debt we inherit in a responsible way. Without damaging jobs in a fragile economy or depriving Australians of the essential services upon which they rely.” 
He means “the national debt we created”, but let the man continue: 
“Every decision that we make will be governed by our solemn understanding that taxpayer money belongs to the taxpayers. We recognise the national mood of concern about wasteful spending. It is a concern that we share.
“We will not be a big spending Government. We will apply rigorous budget discipline. Only policies that we can fund, only policies we can afford, only policies we can deliver.” 
But then: 
Bill Shorten has admitted that Labor’s economic plan will plunge Australia further into the red, but says he will return the country to surplus at the same time as the Coalition would.
Mr Shorten made the admission on Wednesday when he confirmed the deficit would grow over the next four years, before improving.
Delivering an economic speech in Brisbane, Mr Shorten said both Labor and the Coalition would be in deficit over the four years of the forward estimates.
But he went on to say: “It is true; Labor will not have the same degree of fiscal contraction as the Liberals, over this period.” 
If you spend even more than the Coalition, which is running a big-spending government itself, then by definition you’d also be running a big-spending government. Bigger, in fact.
===

If Hutchins lied about the CFA she must resign

Andrew Bolt June 09 2016 (7:11pm)

If true, she must resign - and again I wonder why on earth Daniel Andrews thinks it’s worth this pain of handing his pet union more control over the CFA volunteers:
THE CFA row engulfing the Victorian government has taken a dramatic new twist with the Opposition now calling for the dismissal of Industrial Relations Minister Natalie Hutchins claiming she misled parliament. 
The claims came after Ms Hutchins told Parliament she had contacted Fair Work Commission Iain Ross and he had endorsed the government’s preferred proposal to settle the dispute.
The Minister had said Mr Ross had assured her the agreement would improve diversity in the CFA, the dispute resolution clause was not a veto and the deal did not hurt the role of volunteers.
But the Opposition said in discussions it had had with Mr Ross he had rejected that account… 
Ms Hutchins is yet to respond to the Opposition’s claims.
===

Andrews promises to ban Victoria’s cheap and reliable power

Andrew Bolt June 09 2016 (2:12pm)

It is not often that a Premier promises to destroy his own state:
Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews has declared that the state will aim to emit no greenhouse gas emissions by the middle of the century… 
The goal will come with its challenges given most of Victoria’s power is generated by brown coal, which is a higher emitter than black coal.
===

Burning priorities for our feminists

Andrew Bolt June 09 2016 (1:59pm)

Still no interest in the Islamic State from our feminists?
Islamic State fighters in Mosul burned 19 women to death in cages in front of hundreds of ­people after they refused to have sex with them, according to local reports. 
The women had been taken as sex slaves in Mosul, the jihadists’ de facto capital in Iraq.
No, they’ve got much bigger wars to fight:
Former Sex Discrimination Commissioner Elizabeth Broderick has voiced her support for the controversial campaign #WordsatWork, saying it caused her to think about gendered language… 
The Diversity Council’s campaign asks people to ... stop the use of gender-specific terms such as “guys”. 
I do not know if this photo of the alleged killings is genuine, but no doubt the Sex Discrimination Minister will be checking.
UPDATE
Tim Blair is shocked - shocked - that Australian troops in Afghanistan have made certain conclusions about the faith of the people they have met there:
The vast majority of Australian Defence Force personnel believes the Muslim religion promotes ¬violence and terrorism, despite “cultural sensitivity training” by the ADF to have its soldiers take the view that Islam is a religion of peace. 
The bombshell new study sponsored by the army finds that such “anti-Muslim sentiments” are “probably quite widespread” among Australian frontline troops in Iraq and Afghanistan ... 
How could these soldiers have let mere experience hamper the work of their “cultural sensitivity” trainers? 
===

Hastie can’t fight for us because he’s too proud of his uniform

Andrew Bolt June 09 2016 (1:50pm)

Andrew Hastie, a former SAS captain, is not allowed to fight for the defence of Australia in an emergency because he showed voters a picture of himself in uniform:
Mr Hastie, who served in Afghanistan, was given the boot by the Department of Defence after he failed to comply with requests to remove pictures showing him in Army uniform from election campaign material...
Strange priorities.
And selective indignation from the army:
The high profile backbencher hit back over claims he was politicising the armed forces, accusing former army chief, retired Lieutenant General David Morrison, of doing the same.

“David Morrison politicised the ADF long before I ever put my mug on a billboard. In fact, he hastened my exit from the army into politics,” Mr Hastie said of the of the Australian of the Year who gained national fame for demanding women be treated equally within the armed forces. 
===

The real Malcolm at last

Andrew Bolt June 09 2016 (8:56am) 

Malcolm Turnbull, three

MALCOLM Turnbull’s gutless decision to boycott Wednesday night’s debate with Labor leader Bill Shorten should finally alert you about him.
Yes, I’d be exaggerating if I said the Prime Minister was another dysfunctional Kevin Rudd. He’s far more competent.
But, for one, they share the same tin ear. How could Turnbull have skipped last week’s ceremony to welcome home the bodies of 25 Diggers who’d died in the Vietnam War?
Then there’s Turnbull’s obvious discomfort in meeting people who are not PLU — People Like Us.
(Read the full column here.) 
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Shorten and Turnbull get 10 out of 10 for fraud

Andrew Bolt June 09 2016 (8:53am) 

Economy, three

LABOR on Wednesday copied the great Liberal con — the scam the media has fallen for that puts us on the road to Greek-style ruin.
It’s the 10-year promise that’s now the rage.
Both Labor and the Liberals say they’re gunna fix our finances but — oops — not for 10 years.
That means you have to vote for these shysters for four elections in a row before they’ll finally deliver.
By that time, of course, the country will be broke and Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and Labor leader Bill Shorten long retired. So why are so many serious people falling for this fraud?
Same story on Wednesday. There was Shorten announcing Labor “will fix the national Budget without smashing the family budget”.
But then came the catch.
No, this fixing of a Budget deep in the red wouldn’t actually happen over the next three years of a Shorten government, or even the first year of the one after.
(Read full column here.) 
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Houses badly Harmered in storm

Andrew Bolt June 09 2016 (8:16am)

An ABC green was keen to conserve everything except people’s houses:
COMEDIAN and radio personality Wendy Harmer has been fighting for 14 years against a sea wall that could have stopped the surging surf destroying 10 multimillion-dollar beachfront homes. 
The presenter and her conservationist husband Brendan Donohue, who live on high ground about 400m from the sand, have been lobbying to stop the surf barrier in front of homes on Collaroy Beach. A stretch of houses and a four-storey unit block are in danger of collapsing after this week’s east coast low and a series­ of king tides undermined their foundations.
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IMAGINE PAYING THIS BLOKE $180,000

Tim Blair – Tuesday, June 09, 2015 (1:06pm)

Just imagine:

Flannery’s solution, proposed immediately following his no-ice prediction: 
Sometimes we actually cut off a leg to save the patient, and in this case, we may need to inject sulphur into the stratosphere to cool our planet. It’s going to change the colour of our sky, it’s going to change the amount of sunlight we get; but we may need to do it to buy ourselves a bit of time. Unfortunately we have foot-dragged for so long that we are now in a position where those very unpalatable remedies may have to be resorted to, even if they are dangerous. 
People actually took this seriously, back in the day.
(Via the Galileo Movement)
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FAVOURITE FOLIAGE

Tim Blair – Tuesday, June 09, 2015 (12:46pm)

It’s always nice when an old pal drops by during a long weekend:
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Obama admits still waiting for a “complete strategy” to fight Islamic State

Andrew Bolt June 09 2015 (3:33pm)

 Incredible:
President Obama took heat Monday for admitting he doesn’t yet have a “complete strategy” in hand for training Iraqis to fight the Islamic State—months into the coordinated campaign to defeat the deadly terrorist network. 
“When a finalized plan is presented to me by the Pentagon, then I will share it with the American people,” Obama said, adding, “We don’t yet have a complete strategy.”
Misjudged and bungled at every stage, from the time he yanked out troops against the advice of his generals:
2011:
Obama made that same victory cry in December 2011 as he ordered the last US troops out of Iraq: “We’re leaving behind a sovereign, stable and self-reliant Iraq ... 
“And we are ending a war, not with a final battle, but with a final march toward home. This is an extraordinary achievement, nearly nine years in the making.”
January 2014:
In the 2012 campaign, Obama spoke not only of killing Osama bin Laden; he also said that Al Qaeda had been “decimated.” I pointed out that the flag of Al Qaeda is now flying in Falluja, in Iraq, and among various rebel factions in Syria [including the Islamic State]; Al Qaeda has asserted a presence in parts of Africa, too. 
“The analogy we use around here sometimes, and I think is accurate, is if a jayvee team [junior university] puts on Lakers uniforms that doesn’t make them Kobe Bryant,” Obama said, resorting to an uncharacteristically flip analogy. “I think there is a distinction between the capacity and reach of a bin Laden and a network that is actively planning major terrorist plots against the homeland versus jihadists who are engaged in various local power struggles and disputes, often sectarian.”
August 2014:
“We don’t have a strategy yet,” Obama said, in response to questions about when he is prepared to begin military action in Syria, and, if not, why not?… 
“I don’t want to put the cart before the horse,” he said. The suggestion that “we’re about to go full scale on an elaborate strategy for defeating ISIL . . . that we’ll start moving forward imminently..., that’s not what’s going to happen.” ISIL is one of several acronyms referring to the Islamic State.
Ten months later and he’s still waiting for a complete strategy?
No wonder the war against the Islamic State is being lost. 
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Melham quits. Now what about Bill Shorten?

Andrew Bolt June 09 2015 (10:16am)

He had to quit or be sacked after the disgraceful revelations at the royal commission into unions:
EMBATTLED Labor MP Cesar Melhem has told Premier Daniel Andrews he will step down as the Government’s Legislative Council Whip… 
Mr Melhem came under fire last week after the trade union royal commission alleged, in his time as AWU state secretary, he oversaw a deal with a cleaning company which saw workers lose $2 million a year in penalty rates. Mr Melhem was also state secretary when false invoices were issued to companies for “training”, which were actually union membership fees to boost the AWU’s numbers.
Incredible, trading workers’ pay for donations to the union, and training money for a boost in membership numbers, used to advance the union bosses’ clout and career within Labor.
And here is a bizarre reminder of how the AWU treats Labor as its political wing, and a career path for its officials:
Members of Mr Melhem’s own Right sub-faction linked to the Australian Workers’ Union - including Roads Minister Luke Donnellan, Natalie Hutchins, Anthony Carbines, Danny Pearson, Shaun Leane, Jaclyn Symes and Natalie Suleyman - told Fairfax Media on Monday they hoped, and expected, he would voluntarily step down ahead of the ALP caucus meeting at 10am.
An AWU faction of Labor MPs? Who exactly are these guys representing? It doesn’t look like it’s their voters.
Now the heat is on Bill Shorten:
The Opposition Leader yesterday refrained from backing Cesar Melhem, a Labor MP and government whip in the Victorian parliament who succeeded him as state secretary of the Australian Workers Union. The trade union royal commission has heard claims the AWU, under Mr Melhem, traded away $6 million in entitlements for cleaners in return for $75,000 and signed up phantom members by charging fees of more than $225,000 disguised as payments for safety training. 
Asked yesterday about the collection of fees when he was head of the AWU, Mr Shorten replied: “I’ve spent my adult life representing workers and I stand on my record representing workers.” Mr Shorten was AWU Victorian secretary from 1998 to 2006 and national secretary from 2001 to 2007. 
I think a longer answer than “trust me” is needed here. 
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Australia’s biggest borrowers are WA Liberals

Andrew Bolt June 09 2015 (10:13am)

It is astonishing that Western Australia should be left with this massive debt even after the greatest mining boom in a century:
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Is there actually no evidence of man-made warming at all?

Andrew Bolt June 09 2015 (8:11am)

Professor Fred Singer, founding director of the US Weather Satellite Service and former vice chair of the US National Advisory Committee on Oceans & Atmosphere, says there areplenty of reasons to doubt a controversial claim by the National Climate Data Center that the pause in global warming is just a result of errors in its data:
Not surprisingly, they used the surface temperature record, with its well-known problems. Not only that, but a look at the detailed NCDC evidence shows that much depends on polar temperatures — which are mostly guessed at, for lack of good observations. If one uses the (truly global) satellite data, analyzed either by UAH or by RSS, the pause is still there, starting around 2003 [see Figure; it shows a sudden step increase around 2001, not caused by GH gases]. 
Not only that, but the same satellite data show no warming trend from 1979 to 2000 – ignoring, of course, the exceptional super-El-Nino year of 1998. This finding is confirmed by other, independent instrumental data — and also by (non-instrumental) proxy records (from tree rings, ice cores, lake sediments)....
IPCC-4 [2007] and IPCC-5 [2013] both present claims for anthropogenic global warming (AGW) that are based mainly on reported surface warming from 1979 to 2000. In the absence of such a warming trend, the IPCC claims become invalid; there would be no human-caused greenhouse warming in the 20th century – and certainly not earlier.
It is worthwhile, therefore, to re-examine carefully the absence of warming in the last two decades of the 20th century.
The satellite results of near-zero warming trend are fully backed by radiosonde data from balloon flights — notwithstanding spurious claims by Santer et al [in Int’l J of Climatology 2008; see full discussion by Singer in Energy&Envir 2013]....
Sea-surface temperatures (SST) show only a slight warming – as do night-time marine air temperatures (NMAT), assembled by the Hadley group. Data on ocean heat content before 2000 are spotty and not very useful....
Proxy data of various types, assembled by Fredrik Ljungqvist in Sweden, and independently by NOAA scientist David Anderson, generally show no warming…
A quick word about the observed (and genuine) warming interval 1910-40. It can be seen not only in surface thermometers at weather stations, temperature records from ships, but in all published proxy records… It is generally agreed, however – including by IPCC –that this warming is of natural origin and not from GH gases. Thus there is no evidence whatsoever of any GH warming from human-released CO2 — during the whole of the 20th century or earlier.
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What kind of government did Queenslanders accidentally vote in?

Andrew Bolt June 09 2015 (8:03am)

Is three in three weeks a record?
THE Opposition has called on Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk to explain how three of her MPs have been referred to police in just three sitting weeks.  
The Courier-Mail yesterday revealed Cairns law firm Williams Graham Carman – which had accused Labor’s Rick Williams of extortion after he threatened to “bring it undone” during a 2009 dispute – had handed its information to police… [Williams denies wrongdoing.]
Police Minister Jo-Ann Miller was referred to both police and the Crime and Corruption Commission by Opposition police spokesman Jarrod Bleijie after she phoned whistleblower Bruce McLean – who she also considers a good friend – on the morning he went public with his allegations against Mr Williams. Ms Miller made a personal explanation to State Parliament last week, insisting she had called Mr McLean to check on his wellbeing.... Former Labor MP Billy Gordon remains the subject of a police investigation into allegations of domestic violence, which he denies.
(Thanks to reader Peter of Bellevue Hill.) 
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Now less reason to believe the acid scare, too

Andrew Bolt June 09 2015 (7:47am)

The latest warming scare about the Great Barrier Reef seems as phoney as the last few. As Jo Nova notes, coral isn’t actually being wiped out as the seas become “more acidic”:
The researchers at Woods Hole have spent four years doing a comprehensive study at Palau Rock Islands in the far Western Pacific, where pH levels are naturally “more acidic” (which is big-government speak for less alkaline). Because of laboratory experiments Barkley et al [1] expected to find all kinds of detrimental effects, but instead found a diverse healthy system they describe as “thriving” with “greater coral cover” and more “species”. 
A new study led by scientists at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) found that the coral reefs there seem to be defying the odds, showing none of the predicted responses to low pH except for an increase in bioerosion — the physical breakdown of coral skeletons by boring organisms such as mollusks and worms… ‘Based on lab experiments and studies of other naturally low pH reef systems, this is the opposite of what we expected,’ says lead author Hannah Barkley, a graduate student in the WHOI-MIT joint program in oceanography.... 
‘Surprisingly, in Palau where the pH is lowest, we see a coral community that hosts more species, and has greater coral cover than in the sites where pH is normal,’ says Anne Cohen, a co-author on the study and Barkley’s advisor at WHOI. ‘That’s not to say the coral community is thriving because of it, rather it is thriving despite the low pH, and we need to understand how.’
(Thanks to reader fulchrum.) 
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Rudd saved us from nothing but a balanced budget

Andrew Bolt June 09 2015 (7:27am)

Peter Costello warns against trusting any spin on The Killing Season that Labor’s massive “stimulus” spending saved Australia from recession:
...in 2009 the [Rudd] government increased spending by nearly 13 per cent… He did it to “save” Australia, he said… 
The Treasury produced a paper to show the spending increase would only be “temporary” and the Budget would be back in balance by 2015. But once the spending was turned on, it was hard to turn it off. We have racked up $280 billion in cumulative deficits since those “temporary” increases…
Did spending “save” Australia? ... Government spending put more money into household budgets but there is no evidence they spent it… The real stimulus to the Australian economy came from soaring terms of trade: the China effect…
Of the era, the part I like best is the Treasury explanation of the benefits of the stimulus in the 2009 Budget. It showed that without “temporary” stimulus, unemployment would peak in 2010 at 10 per cent but with it the outcome would only be 8.5 per cent. Do you know what unemployment turned out to be in 2010? It was 5.25 per cent. In other words, Treasury completely overestimated the effect of the crisis then completely overestimated the response required to deal with it. Spending didn’t make the difference. What really mattered was we had a strong and well run financial system. And far from following the US into a downturn, we were following China in a boom.
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No to being ruled by judges

Andrew Bolt June 09 2015 (7:17am)

She wishes:
Human Rights Commission president Gillian Triggs ...  said the celebrations of the 800th anniversary of the Magna Carta could reignite calls for some form of legislated Bill of Rights… 
Michael Sexton rightly warns against such calls:
It would be easy to say a bill of rights is a lawyers’ picnic and that is why it is strongly promoted by some sections of the legal profession. While it is true, however, that a bill of rights inevitably leads to increased litigation, most human rights lawyers in Australia are funded by the taxpayer, either as academics or in community law centres, so their interests in this area are not directly financial. 
The real problem with this group is that they welcome a transfer of power from the parliament to the courts and do not see this as anti-democratic. This in turn is because they tend to see every problem as having a legal solution, even if they are fundamentally economic, social or political questions. These kinds of issues are not changed into legal questions by being given to courts. All that happens is that courts are then required to decide economic, social and political questions.
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The science is weak but the faith is strong

Andrew Bolt June 09 2015 (6:55am)

Nick Cater rightly wonders why we put so much trust in such an uncertain faith:
Take Matthew England, an expert on global warming, who on the eve of the Copenhagen Climate Change Conference in December 2009 warned that the Antarctic was “losing ice at an alarmingly fast rate."… 
Five-and-a-half years later the continent remains stubbornly frozen. The sea-ice record has been broken for the third year running…
England and his colleagues believe they have an explanation. Greenhouse gas has changed the wind pattern and Antarctica is stealing Australia’s rain, claims Robert Mulvaney, a co-author with England of a report on the subject last year. “As greenhouse gases continue to rise we’ll get fewer storms chased up into Australia,” Mulvaney claimed.
Yet when storms hit NSW in April, England saw a sign of things to come. “All around the world we’re seeing the return period of storms, heatwaves ... the return periods are shortening,” he said.
“It’s consistent with what we’re seeing with global warming.”
It’s on the strength of this unsettled science that Australia and other nations are being asked to channel a trillion dollars a decade to the developing world and cut greenhouse gas emissions by up to 70 per cent. By agreeing to these measures at a conference in Paris later this year, the theory goes, we can limit this century’s rise in global temperature to 2C.
As we know, however, the guesstimate is a fickle friend. For two-and-a-half decades, the planet has been defying the experts’ expectations. At the 1988 Toronto conference experts warned temperatures would rise by between 1.5C and 4.5C by 2050. With 27 years gone and 35 to go the rise is barely a quarter of a degree… [G]lobal temperatures have levelled over the past 15 years, a hiatus the IPCC did not predict and cannot explain. Yet the catastrophism will not abate.... We have reached a global warming paradox. “The science is weak but the idea is strong,” writes Darwall. 
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Slacktivists rage, but tourism to Bali soars

Andrew Bolt June 09 2015 (6:37am)

Yet more proof that Twitter warriors are all thumbs and no legs:
In the clearest sign yet that the Boycott Bali social media campaign is a major fail, new travel booking data has revealed a big increase in numbers heading to the Indonesian island since the executions of Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran. 
With the help of more direct flights to Bali, bookings from Australian holiday-makers for the winter months climbed 16 per cent on the same period last year…
The booking surge came on the back of a passionate social media campaign, spawned by Indonesia’s refusal to grant clemency to the two Australian heroin traffickers. The #BoycottBali hashtag started trending on Twitter in mid-February and also spawned a Facebook page called Boycott Bali for the Boys.
Previous examples of the no-show Twitter activist:
Millions twiddled thumbs furiously to tweet on the hashtag BringBackOurGirls. Another 235,000 clicked “like” on the BringBackOurGirls Facebook site… 
Actually, the girls are long forgotten because the attention span of the Twitter crowd is about as long as it takes to type 140 characters.
Just ask Joseph Kony.
Two years ago, Kony, head of the Lord’s Resistance Army, was the world’s most hated man after the Invisible Children charity made a film of him rampaging through Uganda, raping, murdering and stealing thousands of children.
It was a YouTube sensation, scoring 100 million views and 1.4 million likes…
But Kony? Oh, he’s still out there in the jungle.... But did the Kony 2012 carers mind? Hell, no. They couldn’t even be bothered getting off the couch. When Invisible Children held “Cover the Night” rallies to show exactly how much their supporters cared, just 25 turned up in Sydney and a dozen in Melbourne.
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If lesson one isn’t Islam, it won’t work

Andrew Bolt June 09 2015 (6:24am)

I have little faith in “deradicalisation” programs, especially when they are proposed by a government and a police force which claim jihadism has nothing to do with religion:
Curfews, internet bans and deradicalisation programs would be enforced for youths falling under the sway of jihadist recruiters, under a proposed class of intervention order being considered in several states. 
Queensland has joined Victoria in considering plans to create a class of intervention order that could be applied to “radicalised” young people even if they were not planning a crime or act of terrorism. The plans have emerged from a proposal by Victoria Police to give law enforcement the ability to deploy a broad range of measures against young people they believe are falling under the spell of jihadist recruiters and their slick online propaganda campaigns.
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Posted by Mandatory on Monday, 23 December 2013
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Posted by Israel Defense Forces on Sunday, 7 June 2015
June 7 1981, 3:55 AM: Under the cover of darkness, a squadron of IAF fighter jets leave Israel on a secret mission—neutralizing Iraq’s Osirak nuclear reactor. After flying almost 1,000 miles through enemy territory, they arrive at their target and put a halt to the Iraqi nuclear program. Two minutes flat. Mission accomplished!
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This is a terrible idea that I really want to try.
Posted by Ebaumsworld on Thursday, 29 December 2011
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Why famous authors are warning against the use of adverbs. Do you agree?: http://bit.ly/1Idqtzt
Posted by Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing on Monday, 8 June 2015
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Does writing help you grow as a person?
Posted by Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing on Monday, 8 June 2015
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Religion?
Posted by Wretched on Monday, 18 May 2015
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RIGHTS FOR WRONGS

Tim Blair – Monday, June 09, 2014 (12:12pm)

According to strict biological definition, members of bikie gangs are in fact human. It’s presumably on this basis that the Australian Human Rights Commission has decided to join with the Nomads bikie gang to oppose NSW legislation aimed at stopping bikie members associating with each other.
But there’s slightly more to being human than just meeting certain physical and genetic requirements. Humans deserving of human rights don’t generally kill other humans, as is the way of our bikie community.
Nomads national president Simon Tajjour put a heroic spin on things last week. “I was born and raised in Australia and was taught free speech was a right we all have,” the 34-year-old said.
“A lot of people may not like us but this fight is not about me or bike gangs. It’s about everyone’s rights.”
How very noble of him. Why, Tajjour is our own version of Martin Luther King Jr, bravely standing up for the oppressed. We should probably forget at this point that Tajjour was convicted in 2006 for the manslaughter of Robin Nassour. His right to free speech, not to mention a pulse, is eternally denied.
And we should perhaps overlook what sometimes happens when bikie gangs associate with each other. In 2009, some open association between the Hells Angels and the Comancheros at Sydney Airport led to a brawl that killed Hells Angel hanger-on Anthony Zervas.
To paraphrase the line often attributed to Voltaire, our bikies may disapprove of what you say, but will defend to the death your right to be bludgeoned, stabbed and shot. They’re not exactly exemplars of the human rights ideal.
Still, that’s just the narrow view of a Sydney resident who would prefer criminals to be jailed rather than be supported by a tax-funded rights group. Let’s imagine the response to the AHRC’s decision from more broad-minded organisations outside of Australia ...

Icon Arrow Continue reading 'RIGHTS FOR WRONGS'
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CONDITIONAL INDEPENDENCE

Tim Blair – Monday, June 09, 2014 (12:07pm)

Australian leftists desperately want complete independence from the US. Except they don’t. It all depends on the issue.

Icon Arrow Continue reading 'CONDITIONAL INDEPENDENCE'
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SUPER DAN

Tim Blair – Monday, June 09, 2014 (5:46am)

Aussie Daniel Ricciardo has just won the Canadian Grand Prix! The boy is a hero.
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The real embarrassment is this reporting

Andrew Bolt June 09 2014 (8:06pm)

How desperate are journalists of the Left to pretend Tony Abbott is an embarrassment overseas?
Try this, from The Age.
Tony Abbott has been having something of a linguistic outing as he rockets across the world. You needed only to listen in as he chatted merrily to schoolchildren in Villers-Bretonneux in northern France a few days ago. 
‘’C’est Premiere Australie,’’ Abbott tried, or something loosely resembling it. Getting no response or even a vague sign the French kiddies had any idea what he might have been talking about, or in what language, the Australian Premier pressed on: ‘’Premier, Australee - mwaa. Set mwaa, wee?’’…
Touching down in Ottawa,.... Mr Abbott declared: “They’re very forthright remarks, and I think that they’re perfectly appropriate remarks for the Canadian Prime Minister to make. Canad-ia [and for a beat, you could very nearly hear the ‘uh oh’ as the cogs turned] Canada, probably has more involvement in the affairs of Europe than Australia often does, but ...”
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Pakistan airport attacked

Andrew Bolt June 09 2014 (10:52am)

The latest reason not to visit Pakistan:
AT LEAST 23 people have been killed and dozens injured after gunmen disguised as police guards stormed Pakistan’s largest airport in Karachi, hurling grenades and attempting to hijack a plane. 
Most likely the Taliban, but who knows. Chances are there’s reference to Islam in the title of the group responsible. 
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One less vote for Turnbull

Andrew Bolt June 09 2014 (9:08am)

Ouch. The Herald Sun’s editorial:
It is only Labor that wants Mr Turnbull as Liberal leader.
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Judith Durham gets no more than she and the Seekers deserve

Andrew Bolt June 09 2014 (8:54am)

 The only surprise is that it’s taken this long:
Having played their farewell concert at London’s glittering Royal Albert Hall, the quartet of Judith Durham, Athol Guy, Keith Potger and Bruce Woodley today each become officers of the General Division of the Order of Australia in recognition of their “seminal’’ contribution to Australian music.
I’ve met Durham only once, when she challenged something I’d written, saying I’d been wrong. She was utterly charming. She’s had this award before as an individual, but now the group is honoured. 
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Abbott now fourth longest-serving Liberal leader

Andrew Bolt June 09 2014 (8:50am)

Phillip Hudson on a dramatically under-rated leader:
Tony Abbott is now the fourth longest-serving leader in the history of the Liberal Party. While it has been just nine months since he was elected Prime Minister, Abbott has chalked up four years and six months as Liberal leader.

He now sits behind only Robert Menzies (almost 21 years), John Howard (16 years) and Malcolm Fraser (nearly eight years) in the ranks of the 13 men who have been at the helm… Despite low popularity ratings, Abbott’s hold on the leadership and authority over the party and policy (such as his paid parental leave plan, and bringing back knights and dames) has grown.
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Willesee shows up Palmer as a buffoon and his team as a joke

Andrew Bolt June 09 2014 (8:00am)



Clive Palmer will regret letting Mike Willesee interview his four incoming Senators - people who will share the balance of power. Jacqui Lambie talks very big - too big - and mentions having spent time in psychiatric care. Ricky Muir is repeatedly lost for words at even the very simplest question, as one stage pleading: “Can I go out for a minute?” after trying to define what he calls the “after marketing industry”.
Clive Palmer will also regret telling Willesee he would join him in Boston, where he’d sent his team on a freebie. Willesee is furious to find Palmer sent him around the world without turning up in Boston himself. Nor does Willesee appreciate Palmer’s bull in explaining his deceit.
This party is a disgrace and a menace.
(Willesee, though, is a genius interviewer.)
UPDATE
Henry Ergas says Bill Shorten is helping to make Clive Palmer dangerous:
The [Palmer United Party] wants to reduce all income taxes by 15 per cent without raising the GST, while increasing pensions by $150 a fortnight, spending an additional $80 billion on health, fully funding the National Disbaility Insurance Scheme and sticking to Labor’s Gonski commitments… 
Palmer [dismisses] projections of a debt crisis as “just a lie"… PUP senator-elect Jacqui Lambie [says] the government should be “hitting the big banks”, whose profits would provide “$1300 for every man, woman and child that’s living in Australia”.’’
[It] is increasingly clear that the PUP views chaos, which validates the anxiety on which it trades, as its best friend. Its incentives are therefore to undermine, rather than support, the fiscal reforms Australia desperately needs…
Abbott must therefore learn to reach out to the other side; but since 1996, Labor has not once shown a capacity to rise above the scrum, as John Howard did in supporting Bob Hawke’s economic reforms. Now, abdicating any responsibility for Labor’s mess, Bill Shorten has even jettisoned the commitment to a surplus Wayne Swan and Chris Bowen previously trumpeted. That is Shorten’s choice. But it is that choice, not the voters, that will put Palmer, with his poisonous cocktail of economic recklessness and tawdry self-­interest, firmly in control. And it is that choice, not the voters, that is pushing the country to the verge of a fiscal nervous breakdown, from which recovery will be long, painful and uncertain.
UPDATE
Liberal Democrat Senator-elect David Leyonhjelm still hopes he can bring some of Palmer’s people out from under his control:
 ANDREW BOLT: Do you think they’ll always vote together as Clive Palmer dictates?
DAVID LEYONHJELM: Initially, they will. I mean, they’re all new, and there’s strength in unity, and all that sort of thing. But, over time, I have my doubts. They are all individuals.
I don’t think any of them is a puppet. They have their own minds about things. Jacqui Lambie, for example, in Tasmania, is very concerned about Tasmania, very concerned about her state, I should say. And, she mentioned the other day a special economic zone for Tasmania. Well, I’d support that and I know Bob Day from Family First would support that as well. In WA -
ANDREW BOLT: Well, you and Bob Day, David, have approached these four senators that Palmer controls. Palmer says they’ve told you to - told them to get stuffed. That’s what they told you. Is that correct? DAVID LEYONHJELM: No, They didn’t tell - they haven’t told us to get stuffed. I think that was a comment in a newspaper. I’m not sure whether Clive even said that. No, we - Bob Day and I have formed a sort of an informal alliance, we think alike on economic issues, not social issues, I should say, but on economic issues, we are on the same page. We’ve decided to work closely together. We also think that the Palmer United Party senators will find common ground with us on a variety of issues. And we look forward to finding that common ground. We don’t see that the Palmer United people have a common ideology, common value system, anything that binds them together. They’re together because of the fact they joined the Palmer United Party not long before the election. So, on that basis, there’s no strong reason, other than a fear of outsiders, I suppose, for them to work together. We think when Bob and I prove that we don’t have horns and a tail either, we’ll get along fine.
The full Leyonhjelm transcript here:

Icon Arrow Continue reading 'Willesee shows up Palmer as a buffoon and his team as a joke'
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Leave Geoff Shaw his seat

Andrew Bolt June 09 2014 (7:56am)

OUR political class is getting dangerously arrogant in deciding who is allowed to speak. Another state Parliament — this time Victoria’s — is thinking of sacking one of its members, this time just for being obnoxious and submitting dodgy expenses.

This isn’t how democracy should work. Victorian Labor is desperate to get Frankston independent Geoff Shaw kicked out so it can win — it hopes — the by-election. That would give it as many seats as the Napthine Government and force an early election.
Its excuse is that Shaw used his parliamentary car on business for his hardware store, with Parliament’s privileges committee ordering him to repay $6838. The case is so murky, though, that police dropped charges.
Labor’s call to now sack Shaw for contempt of Parliament is bizarre — not least because it robs Frankston voters of their elected representative. Opposition Leader Daniel Andrew argues “the people of Frankston can do much better than Geoff Shaw and that’s why Labor will move to expel him from Parliament”.
(Read full article here.) 
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Witness list proves Gillard is a person of interest

Andrew Bolt June 09 2014 (7:45am)

Media, The AWU scandal

 THE witness list for this week’s hearings of the royal commission into union corruption should shame the journalists who for so long protected Julia Gillard.

It should especially shame the ABC, so quiet on the former prime minister’s links to the Australian Workers’ Union slush fund scandal.
The ABC used to sniff at claims that Gillard had a case to answer, even though she’d given legal advice as a solicitor to her then boyfriend, AWU official Bruce Wilson, in creating the slush fund then used to rip off bosses.
No, no, it insisted: nor was there any need to inquire into other claims — such as money from Wilson’s fund, deceptively named the Australian Workers’ Union Workplace Reform Association, not just going to buy him a house but to pay for renovations to Gillard’s.
“Every allegation ... has been aired, and dealt with publicly by Julia Gillard, multiple times,” the ABC’s Media Watch falsely claimed in 2011.
(Read full article here.)
UPDATE
More about one of those witnesses:
Athol James will this week give sworn evidence at the Royal Commission into Trade Union Governance and Corruption about allegations that “substantial” work he performed at Ms Gillard’s house in Abbotsford in the 1990s was paid for by her then boyfriend, Bruce Wilson, who was an Australian Workers Union official at the time. 
Mr James is believed to have given royal commission investigators detailed copies of quotations, invoices, bank accounts and notes related to glasswork, paving, flooring and sanding he did for Ms Gillard.
The former prime minister insists she paid for the renovations herself and that the money did not come from Mr Wilson or the slush fund he is accused of using to siphon off hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Sydney broadcaster and former police officer Michael Smith, who has closely followed the AWU slush fund saga and was dismissed from his Fairfax radio job in 2011 over an unaired related interview, told The Australian yesterday that he was in possession of a sworn statement from Mr James in which the now-retired tradesman claimed the payment for the work came from Mr Wilson. 
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“My kids are starting to notice I'm a little different from the other dads. "Why don't you have a straight job like everyone else?" they asked me the other day. 

I told them this story: 
In the forest, there was a crooked tree and a straight tree. Every day, the straight tree would say to the crooked tree, "Look at me...I'm tall, and I'm straight, and I'm handsome. Look at you...you're all crooked and bent over. No one wants to look at you." And they grew up in that forest together. And then one day the loggers came, and they saw the crooked tree and the straight tree, and they said, "Just cut the straight trees and leave the rest." So the loggers turned all the straight trees into lumber and toothpicks and paper. And the crooked tree is still there, growing stronger and stranger every day.”
― Tom Waits
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Pastor Rick Warren
I think public people should be given a 10% grace factor in everything they say since we all say dumb things eventually.
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Pastor Rick Warren
Given enough words,everyone says stupid things."The more you talk, the more likely you are to sin" Prov.10:19
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DEVELOPING STORY: Thirteen asylum seekers are dead after their boat capsized near Christmas Island, thought to have been carrying about 55 passengers, including women and children.

The bodies are yet to be recovered and authorities are currently searching for survivors as dozens are still missing. 

Home Affairs Minister, Jason Clare, has called this another terrible tragedy.
Jason Clare has said that it is too soon to exploit the tragedy for politics. That is right, and I won't do that. I want to know why the ALP policy is so murderous even after over a thousand people had died? The Pacific Solution had been more fair and more compassionate. - ed
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June 9: Whit Monday/Day of the Holy Spirit (Christianity, 2014); St. Colmcille's Day in Ireland
Joseph Welch
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“The Sovereign LORD is my strength; he makes my feet like the feet of a deer, he enables me to tread on the heights. For the director of music. On my stringed instruments.” Habakkuk 3:19 NIV
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Morning and Evening by Charles Spurgeon

Morning


"There fell down many slain, because the war was of God."
1 Chronicles 5:22
Warrior, fighting under the banner of the Lord Jesus, observe this verse with holy joy, for as it was in the days of old so is it now, if the war be of God the victory is sure. The sons of Reuben, and the Gadites, and the half tribe of Manasseh could barely muster five and forty thousand fighting men, and yet in their war with the Hagarites, they slew "men, an hundred thousand," "for they cried to God in the battle, and he was entreated of them, because they put their trust in him." The Lord saveth not by many nor by few; it is ours to go forth in Jehovah's name if we be but a handful of men, for the Lord of Hosts is with us for our Captain. They did not neglect buckler, and sword, and bow, neither did they place their trust in these weapons; we must use all fitting means, but our confidence must rest in the Lord alone, for he is the sword and the shield of his people. The great reason of their extraordinary success lay in the fact that "the war was of God." Beloved, in fighting with sin without and within, with error doctrinal or practical, with spiritual wickedness in high places or low places, with devils and the devil's allies, you are waging Jehovah's war, and unless he himself can be worsted, you need not fear defeat. Quail not before superior numbers, shrink not from difficulties or impossibilities, flinch not at wounds or death, smite with the two-edged sword of the Spirit, and the slain shall lie in heaps. The battle is the Lord's and he will deliver his enemies into our hands. With steadfast foot, strong hand, dauntless heart, and flaming zeal, rush to the conflict, and the hosts of evil shall fly like chaff before the gale.
Stand up! stand up for Jesus!
The strife will not be long;

This day the noise of battle,

The next the victor's song:

To him that overcometh,

A crown of life shall be;
He with the King of glory
Shall reign eternally.

Evening

"Thou shalt see now whether my word shall come to pass unto thee or not."
Numbers 11:23
God had made a positive promise to Moses that for the space of a whole month he would feed the vast host in the wilderness with flesh. Moses, being overtaken by a fit of unbelief, looks to the outward means, and is at a loss to know how the promise can be fulfilled. He looked to the creature instead of the Creator. But doth the Creator expect the creature to fulfil his promise for him? No; he who makes the promise ever fulfils it by his own unaided omnipotence. If he speaks, it is done--done by himself. His promises do not depend for their fulfilment upon the co-operation of the puny strength of man. We can at once perceive the mistake which Moses made. And yet how commonly we do the same! God has promised to supply our needs, and we look to the creature to do what God has promised to do; and then, because we perceive the creature to be weak and feeble, we indulge in unbelief. Why look we to that quarter at all? Will you look to the north pole to gather fruits ripened in the sun? Verily, you would act no more foolishly if ye did this than when you look to the weak for strength, and to the creature to do the Creator's work. Let us, then, put the question on the right footing. The ground of faith is not the sufficiency of the visible means for the performance of the promise, but the all-sufficiency of the invisible God, who will most surely do as he hath said. If after clearly seeing that the onus lies with the Lord and not with the creature, we dare to indulge in mistrust, the question of God comes home mightily to us: "Has the Lord's hand waxed short?" May it happen, too, in his mercy, that with the question there may flash upon our souls that blessed declaration, "Thou shalt see now whether my word shall come to pass unto thee or not."
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Jesse

[Jĕs'se] - jehovah exists or firm. The son of Obed and father of David, and grandson of Boaz and Ruth, and an ancestor of Christ (Ruth 4:17, 22). Jesse had eight sons and two daughters by different wives (1 Sam. 17:12-14, 25). Isaiah speaks of "the stock of Jesse," a phrase indicating that it was from Jesse the Messiah would come. The humble descent of the Messiah is contrasted with the glorious kingdom He is to have ( Isa 11:1).
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Today's reading: 2 Chronicles 30-31, John 18:1-18 (NIV)

View today's reading on Bible Gateway

Today's Old Testament reading: 2 Chronicles 30-31


Hezekiah Celebrates the Passover

1 Hezekiah sent word to all Israel and Judah and also wrote letters to Ephraim and Manasseh, inviting them to come to the temple of the LORD in Jerusalem and celebrate the Passover to the LORD, the God of Israel. 2 The king and his officials and the whole assembly in Jerusalem decided to celebrate the Passover in the second month. 3 They had not been able to celebrate it at the regular time because not enough priests had consecrated themselves and the people had not assembled in Jerusalem. 4 The plan seemed right both to the king and to the whole assembly. 5They decided to send a proclamation throughout Israel, from Beersheba to Dan, calling the people to come to Jerusalem and celebrate the Passover to the LORD, the God of Israel. It had not been celebrated in large numbers according to what was written....

Today's New Testament reading: John 18:1-18


Jesus Arrested

1 When he had finished praying, Jesus left with his disciples and crossed the Kidron Valley. On the other side there was a garden, and he and his disciples went into it.

2 Now Judas, who betrayed him, knew the place, because Jesus had often met there with his disciples. 3 So Judas came to the garden, guiding a detachment of soldiers and some officials from the chief priests and the Pharisees. They were carrying torches, lanterns and weapons....
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