Infrastructure has to be built, but it doesn't have to be built badly. Australia, and Victoria, could do much with $175 billion. She could have reliable cheap coal energy, better roads, better public transport, cheaper CBD costs, less crime, higher real wages, less unemployment .. if only the ALP were not in government, or obstructing the federal senate.LNP in Queensland chose Deb Frecklington to lead LNP against the awful Palaszczuk government. But idiot journalist does not write about policy differences, but claims the previous leader of the LNP had been tainted by successful government. Paid rioters in Melbourne oppose Trump's Jerusalem move. Europe funding anti semitism. Don’t worry about terrorists .. they are more scared of you than you are of them.
People agree our politicians are overpaid in Australia. They say that politicians need to be paid less. But if our politicians are so well off, why are they so awful? How would taking money away from the few good politicians benefit Australia? How could ruining industry and ratcheting up power prices get bilateral support, but something family friendly like maternity leave get so little? Allegedly, paying teachers, police, firies, healthcare workers more produces better employees.
<During the 3-1/2 years of World War II that started with the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor in December of 1941 and ended with the surrender of Germany and Japan in 1945, "We the People of the U.S.A. " produced the following:
22 aircraft carriers
8 battleships
48 cruisers
349 destroyers
420 destroyer escorts
203 submarines
34 million tons of merchant ships
100,000 fighter aircraft
98,000 bombers
24,000 transport aircraft
58,000 training aircraft
93,000 tanks
257,000 artillery pieces
105,000 mortars
3,000,000 machine guns and
2,500,000 military trucks
We put 16.1 million men in uniform in the various armed services, invaded Africa, invaded Sicily and Italy, won the battle for the Atlantic, planned and executed D-Day, marched across the Pacific and Europe, developed the atomic bomb and, ultimately, conquered Japan and Germany.
It's worth noting that during the almost exact amount of time, the Obama Administration couldn't even build a website that worked!> Via J Murphy
I am a decent man and don't care for 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.
I knew this killer. He was in my class in 1992. And his mother worked to prevent him from growing up.
I knew this killer. He was in my class in 1992. And his mother worked to prevent him from growing up.
Here is a video I made Two of Us
Supertramp are a British art rock band that released a series of top-selling albums in the 1970s and early 1980s.
===
I was raised as an Atheist. I learned, after reading the Bible, that God loves me, and you. This is his song for you too. He loves you, and wants to be with you.
All the elements are me and mine. ARIA ISRC number AUAWN1009118
=== from 2016 ===
There is a particular form of cowardice I wish to call out. It is bullying. It isn't illegal. How it works is an anonymous person, or relative stranger, enters into a conversation and says they don't understand something. Or they insist on evidence of it that they know would not be easy to obtain, but isn't really germane to the discussion. So John Durant's meme "I am hearing disturbing rumours that Russia supported the candidate that didn't want to go to war with Russia" can be attacked by the bully who wants to know when Hillary said she wanted to go to war with Russia. It doesn't matter that those words might never have been uttered by Hillary, her hawk like stance on Russia was apparent over Ukraine and Wikileaks trolling her during her campaign. Hillary was said to be a 'safe pair of hands.' However, supporters of Hillary (and opposers of Trump) merely were enamoured with her evident corruption. Hillary could say *anything* and believed nothing. As evidence, after Benghazi, her department fingered a coptic film maker even though she knew it wasn't true.
Such bullying is widespread and pernicious. My column yesterday was clear, but might have people disagreeing vehemently. That happens when a Christian, conservative writes their thoughts. It is ok to disagree. It can be enlightening to argue. However, as has happened in the past, to merely say one doesn't understand the points made is merely argumentative. Were I to expand on a point, I might overstate things and not mean what I wrote. I can defend myself, I can't explain some stranger's abnormality. I will provide a reminder of an old column.
38 Ways To Win An Argument when you are wrong
by Arthur Schopenhauer
1 Carry your opponent’s proposition beyond its natural limits; exaggerate it.
The more general your opponent’s statement becomes, the more objections you can find against it.
The more restricted and narrow your own propositions remain, the easier they are to defend.
2 Use different meanings of your opponent’s words to refute his argument.
Example: Person A says, “You do not understand the mysteries of Kant’s philosophy.”
Person B replies, “Oh, if it’s mysteries you’re talking about, I’ll have nothing to do with them.”
3 Ignore your opponent’s proposition, which was intended to refer to some particular thing.
Rather, understand it in some quite different sense, and then refute it.
Attack something different than what was asserted.
4 Hide your conclusion from your opponent until the end.
Mingle your premises here and there in your talk.
Get your opponent to agree to them in no definite order.
By this circuitous route you conceal your goal until you have reached all the admissions necessary to reach your goal.
5 Use your opponent’s beliefs against him.
If your opponent refuses to accept your premises, use his own premises to your advantage.
Example, if the opponent is a member of an organization or a religious sect to which you do not belong, you may employ the declared opinions of this group against the opponent.
6 Confuse the issue by changing your opponent’s words or what he or she seeks to prove.
Example: Call something by a different name: “good repute” instead of “honor,” “virtue” instead of “virginity,” “red-blooded” instead of “vertebrates”.
7 State your proposition and show the truth of it by asking the opponent many questions.
By asking many wide-reaching questions at once, you may hide what you want to get admitted.
Then you quickly propound the argument resulting from the proponent’s admissions.
8 Make your opponent angry.
An angry person is less capable of using judgment or perceiving where his or her advantage lies.
9 Use your opponent’s answers to your question to reach different or even opposite conclusions.
10 If your opponent answers all your questions negatively and refuses to grant you any points, ask him or her to concede the opposite of your premises.
This may confuse the opponent as to which point you actually seek him to concede.
11 If the opponent grants you the truth of some of your premises, refrain from asking him or her to agree to your conclusion.
Later, introduce your conclusions as a settled and admitted fact.
Your opponent and others in attendance may come to believe that your conclusion was admitted.
12 If the argument turns upon general ideas with no particular names, you must use language or a metaphor that is favorable to your proposition.
Example: What an impartial person would call “public worship” or a “system of religion” is described by an adherent as “piety” or “godliness” and by an opponent as “bigotry” or “superstition.”
In other words, insert what you intend to prove into the definition of the idea.
13 To make your opponent accept a proposition, you must give him an opposite, counter-proposition as well.
If the contrast is glaring, the opponent will accept your proposition to avoid being paradoxical.
Example: If you want him to admit that a boy must to everything that his father tells him to do, ask him, “whether in all things we must obey or disobey our parents.”
Or , if a thing is said to occur “often” you are to understand few or many times, the opponent will say “many.”
It is as though you were to put gray next to black and call it white; or gray next to white and call it black.
14 Try to bluff your opponent.
If he or she has answered several of your question without the answers turning out in favor of your conclusion, advance your conclusion triumphantly, even if it does not follow.
If your opponent is shy or stupid, and you yourself possess a great deal of impudence and a good voice, the technique may succeed.
15 If you wish to advance a proposition that is difficult to prove, put it aside for the moment.
Instead, submit for your opponent’s acceptance or rejection some true proposition, as though you wished to draw your proof from it.
Should the opponent reject it because he suspects a trick, you can obtain your triumph by showing how absurd the opponent is to reject an obviously true proposition.
Should the opponent accept it, you now have reason on your side for the moment.
You can either try to prove your original proposition, as in #14, maintain that your original proposition is proved by what your opponent accepted.
For this an extreme degree of impudence is required, but experience shows cases of it succeeding.
16 When your opponent puts forth a proposition, find it inconsistent with his or her other statements, beliefs, actions or lack of action.
Example: Should your opponent defend suicide, you may at once exclaim, “Why don’t you hang yourself?”
Should the opponent maintain that his city is an unpleasant place to live, you may say, “Why don’t you leave on the first plane?”
17 If your opponent presses you with a counter-proof, you will often be able to save yourself by advancing some subtle distinction.
Try to find a second meaning or an ambiguous sense for your opponent’s idea.
18 If your opponent has taken up a line of argument that will end in your defeat, you must not allow him to carry it to its conclusion.
Interrupt the dispute, break it off altogether, or lead the opponent to a different subject.
19 Should your opponent expressly challenge you to produce any objection to some definite point in his argument, and you have nothing to say, try to make the argument less specific.
Example: If you are asked why a particular hypothesis cannot be accepted, you may speak of the fallibility of human knowledge, and give various illustrations of it.
20 If your opponent has admitted to all or most of your premises, do not ask him or her directly to accept your conclusion.
Rather, draw the conclusion yourself as if it too had been admitted.
21 When your opponent uses an argument that is superficial and you see the falsehood, you can refute it by setting forth its superficial character.
But it is better to meet the opponent with a counter-argument that is just as superficial, and so dispose of him.
For it is with victory that you are concerned, not with truth.
Example: If the opponent appeals to prejudice, emotion or attacks you personally, return the attack in the same manner.
22 If your opponent asks you to admit something from which the point in dispute will immediately follow, you must refuse to do so, declaring that it begs the question.
23 Contradiction and contention irritate a person into exaggerating their statements.
By contradicting your opponent you may drive him into extending the statement beyond its natural limit.
When you then contradict the exaggerated form of it, you look as though you had refuted the original statement.
Contrarily, if your opponent tries to extend your own statement further than your intended, redefine your statement’s limits and say, “That is what I said, no more.”
24 State a false syllogism.
Your opponent makes a proposition, and by false inference and distortion of his ideas you force from the proposition other propositions that are not intended and that appear absurd.
It then appears that opponent’s proposition gave rise to these inconsistencies, and so appears to be indirectly refuted.
25 If your opponent is making a generalization, find an instance to the contrary.
Only one valid contradiction is needed to overthrow the opponent’s proposition.
Example: “All ruminants are horned,” is a generalization that may be upset by the single instance of the camel.
26 A brilliant move is to turn the tables and use your opponent’s arguments against himself.
Example: Your opponent declares: “so and so is a child, you must make an allowance for him.”
You retort, “Just because he is a child, I must correct him; otherwise he will persist in his bad habits.”
27 Should your opponent surprise you by becoming particularly angry at an argument, you must urge it with all the more zeal.
Not only will this make your opponent angry, but it will appear that you have put your finger on the weak side of his case, and your opponent is more open to attack on this point than you expected.
28 When the audience consists of individuals (or a person) who is not an expert on a subject, you make an invalid objection to your opponent who seems to be defeated in the eyes of the audience.
This strategy is particularly effective if your objection makes your opponent look ridiculous or if the audience laughs.
If your opponent must make a long, winded and complicated explanation to correct you, the audience will not be disposed to listen to him.
29 If you find that you are being beaten, you can create a diversion--that is, you can suddenly begin to talk of something else, as though it had a bearing on the matter in dispute.
This may be done without presumption if the diversion has some general bearing on the matter.
30 Make an appeal to authority rather than reason.
If your opponent respects an authority or an expert, quote that authority to further your case.
If needed, quote what the authority said in some other sense or circumstance.
Authorities that your opponent fails to understand are those which he generally admires the most.
You may also, should it be necessary, not only twist your authorities, but actually falsify them, or quote something that you have entirely invented yourself.
31 If you know that you have no reply to the arguments that your opponent advances, you by a fine stroke of irony declare yourself to be an incompetent judge.
Example: “What you say passes my poor powers of comprehension; it may well be all very true, but I can’t understand it, and I refrain from any expression of opinion on it.”
In this way you insinuate to the audience, with whom you are in good repute, that what your opponent says is nonsense.
This technique may be used only when you are quite sure that the audience thinks much better of you than your opponent.
32 A quick way of getting rid of an opponent’s assertion, or of throwing suspicion on it, is by putting it into some odious category.
Example: You can say, “That is fascism” or “Atheism” or “Superstition.”
In making an objection of this kind you take for granted
1)That the assertion or question is identical with, or at least contained in, the category cited;
and
2)The system referred to has been entirely refuted by the current audience.
33 You admit your opponent’s premises but deny the conclusion.
Example: “That’s all very well in theory, but it won’t work in practice.”
34 When you state a question or an argument, and your opponent gives you no direct answer, or evades it with a counter question, or tries to change the subject, it is sure sign you have touched a weak spot, sometimes without intending to do so.
You have, as it were, reduced your opponent to silence.
You must, therefore, urge the point all the more, and not let your opponent evade it, even when you do not know where the weakness that you have hit upon really lies.
35 Instead of working on an opponent’s intellect or the rigor of his arguments, work on his motive.
If you succeed in making your opponent’s opinion, should it prove true, seem distinctly prejudicial to his own interest, he will drop it immediately.
Example: A clergyman is defending some philosophical dogma.
You show him that his proposition contradicts a fundamental doctrine of his church.
He will abandon the argument.
36 You may also puzzle and bewilder your opponent by mere bombast.
If your opponent is weak or does not wish to appear as if he has no idea what your are talking about, you can easily impose upon him some argument that sounds very deep or learned, or that sounds indisputable.
37 Should your opponent be in the right but, luckily for you, choose a faulty proof, you can easily refute it and then claim that you have refuted the whole position.
This is the way in which bad advocates lose good cases.
If no accurate proof occurs to your opponent, you have won the day.
38 Become personal, insulting and rude as soon as you perceive that your opponent has the upper hand.
In becoming personal you leave the subject altogether, and turn your attack on the person by remarks of an offensive and spiteful character.
This is a very popular technique, because it takes so little skill to put it into effect.
Such bullying is widespread and pernicious. My column yesterday was clear, but might have people disagreeing vehemently. That happens when a Christian, conservative writes their thoughts. It is ok to disagree. It can be enlightening to argue. However, as has happened in the past, to merely say one doesn't understand the points made is merely argumentative. Were I to expand on a point, I might overstate things and not mean what I wrote. I can defend myself, I can't explain some stranger's abnormality. I will provide a reminder of an old column.
38 Ways To Win An Argument when you are wrong
by Arthur Schopenhauer
1 Carry your opponent’s proposition beyond its natural limits; exaggerate it.
The more general your opponent’s statement becomes, the more objections you can find against it.
The more restricted and narrow your own propositions remain, the easier they are to defend.
2 Use different meanings of your opponent’s words to refute his argument.
Example: Person A says, “You do not understand the mysteries of Kant’s philosophy.”
Person B replies, “Oh, if it’s mysteries you’re talking about, I’ll have nothing to do with them.”
3 Ignore your opponent’s proposition, which was intended to refer to some particular thing.
Rather, understand it in some quite different sense, and then refute it.
Attack something different than what was asserted.
4 Hide your conclusion from your opponent until the end.
Mingle your premises here and there in your talk.
Get your opponent to agree to them in no definite order.
By this circuitous route you conceal your goal until you have reached all the admissions necessary to reach your goal.
5 Use your opponent’s beliefs against him.
If your opponent refuses to accept your premises, use his own premises to your advantage.
Example, if the opponent is a member of an organization or a religious sect to which you do not belong, you may employ the declared opinions of this group against the opponent.
6 Confuse the issue by changing your opponent’s words or what he or she seeks to prove.
Example: Call something by a different name: “good repute” instead of “honor,” “virtue” instead of “virginity,” “red-blooded” instead of “vertebrates”.
7 State your proposition and show the truth of it by asking the opponent many questions.
By asking many wide-reaching questions at once, you may hide what you want to get admitted.
Then you quickly propound the argument resulting from the proponent’s admissions.
8 Make your opponent angry.
An angry person is less capable of using judgment or perceiving where his or her advantage lies.
9 Use your opponent’s answers to your question to reach different or even opposite conclusions.
10 If your opponent answers all your questions negatively and refuses to grant you any points, ask him or her to concede the opposite of your premises.
This may confuse the opponent as to which point you actually seek him to concede.
11 If the opponent grants you the truth of some of your premises, refrain from asking him or her to agree to your conclusion.
Later, introduce your conclusions as a settled and admitted fact.
Your opponent and others in attendance may come to believe that your conclusion was admitted.
12 If the argument turns upon general ideas with no particular names, you must use language or a metaphor that is favorable to your proposition.
Example: What an impartial person would call “public worship” or a “system of religion” is described by an adherent as “piety” or “godliness” and by an opponent as “bigotry” or “superstition.”
In other words, insert what you intend to prove into the definition of the idea.
13 To make your opponent accept a proposition, you must give him an opposite, counter-proposition as well.
If the contrast is glaring, the opponent will accept your proposition to avoid being paradoxical.
Example: If you want him to admit that a boy must to everything that his father tells him to do, ask him, “whether in all things we must obey or disobey our parents.”
Or , if a thing is said to occur “often” you are to understand few or many times, the opponent will say “many.”
It is as though you were to put gray next to black and call it white; or gray next to white and call it black.
14 Try to bluff your opponent.
If he or she has answered several of your question without the answers turning out in favor of your conclusion, advance your conclusion triumphantly, even if it does not follow.
If your opponent is shy or stupid, and you yourself possess a great deal of impudence and a good voice, the technique may succeed.
15 If you wish to advance a proposition that is difficult to prove, put it aside for the moment.
Instead, submit for your opponent’s acceptance or rejection some true proposition, as though you wished to draw your proof from it.
Should the opponent reject it because he suspects a trick, you can obtain your triumph by showing how absurd the opponent is to reject an obviously true proposition.
Should the opponent accept it, you now have reason on your side for the moment.
You can either try to prove your original proposition, as in #14, maintain that your original proposition is proved by what your opponent accepted.
For this an extreme degree of impudence is required, but experience shows cases of it succeeding.
16 When your opponent puts forth a proposition, find it inconsistent with his or her other statements, beliefs, actions or lack of action.
Example: Should your opponent defend suicide, you may at once exclaim, “Why don’t you hang yourself?”
Should the opponent maintain that his city is an unpleasant place to live, you may say, “Why don’t you leave on the first plane?”
17 If your opponent presses you with a counter-proof, you will often be able to save yourself by advancing some subtle distinction.
Try to find a second meaning or an ambiguous sense for your opponent’s idea.
18 If your opponent has taken up a line of argument that will end in your defeat, you must not allow him to carry it to its conclusion.
Interrupt the dispute, break it off altogether, or lead the opponent to a different subject.
19 Should your opponent expressly challenge you to produce any objection to some definite point in his argument, and you have nothing to say, try to make the argument less specific.
Example: If you are asked why a particular hypothesis cannot be accepted, you may speak of the fallibility of human knowledge, and give various illustrations of it.
20 If your opponent has admitted to all or most of your premises, do not ask him or her directly to accept your conclusion.
Rather, draw the conclusion yourself as if it too had been admitted.
21 When your opponent uses an argument that is superficial and you see the falsehood, you can refute it by setting forth its superficial character.
But it is better to meet the opponent with a counter-argument that is just as superficial, and so dispose of him.
For it is with victory that you are concerned, not with truth.
Example: If the opponent appeals to prejudice, emotion or attacks you personally, return the attack in the same manner.
22 If your opponent asks you to admit something from which the point in dispute will immediately follow, you must refuse to do so, declaring that it begs the question.
23 Contradiction and contention irritate a person into exaggerating their statements.
By contradicting your opponent you may drive him into extending the statement beyond its natural limit.
When you then contradict the exaggerated form of it, you look as though you had refuted the original statement.
Contrarily, if your opponent tries to extend your own statement further than your intended, redefine your statement’s limits and say, “That is what I said, no more.”
24 State a false syllogism.
Your opponent makes a proposition, and by false inference and distortion of his ideas you force from the proposition other propositions that are not intended and that appear absurd.
It then appears that opponent’s proposition gave rise to these inconsistencies, and so appears to be indirectly refuted.
25 If your opponent is making a generalization, find an instance to the contrary.
Only one valid contradiction is needed to overthrow the opponent’s proposition.
Example: “All ruminants are horned,” is a generalization that may be upset by the single instance of the camel.
26 A brilliant move is to turn the tables and use your opponent’s arguments against himself.
Example: Your opponent declares: “so and so is a child, you must make an allowance for him.”
You retort, “Just because he is a child, I must correct him; otherwise he will persist in his bad habits.”
27 Should your opponent surprise you by becoming particularly angry at an argument, you must urge it with all the more zeal.
Not only will this make your opponent angry, but it will appear that you have put your finger on the weak side of his case, and your opponent is more open to attack on this point than you expected.
28 When the audience consists of individuals (or a person) who is not an expert on a subject, you make an invalid objection to your opponent who seems to be defeated in the eyes of the audience.
This strategy is particularly effective if your objection makes your opponent look ridiculous or if the audience laughs.
If your opponent must make a long, winded and complicated explanation to correct you, the audience will not be disposed to listen to him.
29 If you find that you are being beaten, you can create a diversion--that is, you can suddenly begin to talk of something else, as though it had a bearing on the matter in dispute.
This may be done without presumption if the diversion has some general bearing on the matter.
30 Make an appeal to authority rather than reason.
If your opponent respects an authority or an expert, quote that authority to further your case.
If needed, quote what the authority said in some other sense or circumstance.
Authorities that your opponent fails to understand are those which he generally admires the most.
You may also, should it be necessary, not only twist your authorities, but actually falsify them, or quote something that you have entirely invented yourself.
31 If you know that you have no reply to the arguments that your opponent advances, you by a fine stroke of irony declare yourself to be an incompetent judge.
Example: “What you say passes my poor powers of comprehension; it may well be all very true, but I can’t understand it, and I refrain from any expression of opinion on it.”
In this way you insinuate to the audience, with whom you are in good repute, that what your opponent says is nonsense.
This technique may be used only when you are quite sure that the audience thinks much better of you than your opponent.
32 A quick way of getting rid of an opponent’s assertion, or of throwing suspicion on it, is by putting it into some odious category.
Example: You can say, “That is fascism” or “Atheism” or “Superstition.”
In making an objection of this kind you take for granted
1)That the assertion or question is identical with, or at least contained in, the category cited;
and
2)The system referred to has been entirely refuted by the current audience.
33 You admit your opponent’s premises but deny the conclusion.
Example: “That’s all very well in theory, but it won’t work in practice.”
34 When you state a question or an argument, and your opponent gives you no direct answer, or evades it with a counter question, or tries to change the subject, it is sure sign you have touched a weak spot, sometimes without intending to do so.
You have, as it were, reduced your opponent to silence.
You must, therefore, urge the point all the more, and not let your opponent evade it, even when you do not know where the weakness that you have hit upon really lies.
35 Instead of working on an opponent’s intellect or the rigor of his arguments, work on his motive.
If you succeed in making your opponent’s opinion, should it prove true, seem distinctly prejudicial to his own interest, he will drop it immediately.
Example: A clergyman is defending some philosophical dogma.
You show him that his proposition contradicts a fundamental doctrine of his church.
He will abandon the argument.
36 You may also puzzle and bewilder your opponent by mere bombast.
If your opponent is weak or does not wish to appear as if he has no idea what your are talking about, you can easily impose upon him some argument that sounds very deep or learned, or that sounds indisputable.
37 Should your opponent be in the right but, luckily for you, choose a faulty proof, you can easily refute it and then claim that you have refuted the whole position.
This is the way in which bad advocates lose good cases.
If no accurate proof occurs to your opponent, you have won the day.
38 Become personal, insulting and rude as soon as you perceive that your opponent has the upper hand.
In becoming personal you leave the subject altogether, and turn your attack on the person by remarks of an offensive and spiteful character.
This is a very popular technique, because it takes so little skill to put it into effect.
=== from 2015 ===
Julie Bishop's announcement that Australia signed up to a New Zealand-led declaration at the Paris climate summit backing the use of international carbon markets in tackling climate change is disturbing. The islands are not sinking. Plant food is not harming them. Yet Turnbull is willing to overturn government policy to embrace this alarmism. It is the closest he has come to making a decision, and he got his deputy to announce it. Limiting plant food will not raise islands that are not sinking. It will restrict plant growth globally. Turnbull has not discussed this with his colleagues. It is a captain's pick. Even those who supported him in the leadership change are startled by this bad call. It is apparent that every bad inflation made against Tony Abbott was in fact accurate self criticism of Malcolm Turnbull.
For some, at the moment, the Sex Party has more credibility.
For some, at the moment, the Sex Party has more credibility.
From 2014
Mr Abbott has pointed out that criticism of Peta, almost none of which provides any substantive detail, is sexist. Peta has been denounced, not accused, of running a tight office which was disciplined while facing election and is now called by some deficient in government. But the government has been effective and the criticism is overstated. It is almost as if the government cannot tell the truth without hysterics of the left going into a tizzy. The senate has gummed up the works, and is costing $billions as a result of irresponsible decision making. It is a perfectly reasonable conclusion of Mr Abbott that Peta's critics are drawing long bows because of her gender. The Channel 9 reporter in crossover quoted Mr Abbott's response to Julia Gillard when she denounced him baselessly as a misogynist. After quoting Mr Abbott ('Gillards' speech was the speech of a desperate, inept and irrelevant government') The reporter inappropriately spun it, saying the same would be said of Mr Abbott's government, and this makes it very hard to watch or accept any of the content that followed on Channel 9. If one wanted that unprofessional rubbish, they'd watch ABC news. Note, the reporter's comments were not repeated on the evening news, but Gillard's comment was and the announcer made it clear that they felt the government was bad.
Meanwhile monocultural Greens demonise white men for being of the same culture, but higher class, from which the Greens underclass are spawned.
Many thanks to Tim Blair for inventing the word 'Frightbat' without which the screeching fishwives of the left could not be accurately described in a single word. Tim is to be lauded by Frightbats discussing 'Frightbat' at the Sydney Opera House. It is expected no conservative will actually be invited to the event but one should be able to hear the shrieks from an adjacent suburb on 8th March 2015, 11am. From $35 at the Joan Sutherland theatre for those wishing to see the fluttering ones, sponsored by the ABC.
Why is Waleed Aly smiling? Is it because the SMH is being sued for its campaign against the Australian treasurer? The paper never blinked while Swan, the former treasurer turned the economy from a modest $80 billion surplus to $650 billion deficit. Hockey is trying to get things balanced. The criticisms levelled against Hockey of incompetence are overstated. He does not control the senate, but has masterfully, with the government, got a substantial amount passed, and achieved an upper hand in future negotiations by not being foolish. Meanwhile the ridiculous independents have delayed important savings which will cost the economy an estimated $8 billion. Also, the independents have not supported important legislation with humanitarian side effects. Had the senate acted properly, children would have been out of detention before Christmas last year. And had the Pacific Solution not been rescinded then over a thousand need not have drowned. A senate can be very useful as a house of review, or very bad.
With all the finger pointing, the partisan press have sidelined the news that former ALP President and AHU President Michael Williamson, who stole millions of dollars from the poorest professionals in the land, had a mistress who worked in the union. She has been ordered to pay back $4 million. That is how the ALP 'serves' the workers it represents. The partisan media were looking away, and they were looking towards a historian who wrote a book about unions in WW2 fighting against the national interest. Leading lights of the partisan press corp lied about the book. Mike Carlton is un-penitant at failing fact checks he levelled against Colebatch.
Mr Abbott is even handed and generous too. Sometimes too generous. He welcomed the Chinese President recently by kindly referring to Whitlam and Wran for their normalising state relations with China in the '70s. But, Bill Shorten in return sledged Australia over the ineffective AGW tax she'd dumped. No conservative can ever lean far enough left to please left wing voters. Was there a hidden reason behind Mr Abbott giving away $200 million for a global climate fund designed to prevent poor nations from modernising? One hopes so, but if so, we may never know.
Banks support AGW because the corruption is that big. First, banks are entangled through the ponzie type schemes set up to promote the hysteria. Then, in order to make good their exposure they must promote it. So they have products they must support. But with that much money, people lose their vision. And so the environmental group Greenpeace which pollutes water with dumped boat fuel and threatens trade where it is profitable has vandalised ancient Nazca drawings so as to promote itself. World heritage items have been vandalised on an enormously large scale visible from space. Money does that.
David Hicks is an Australian jihadist who was captured by the CIA and interrogated at GITMO. They never did to him what he wanted to do to others. He had claimed to have forgotten things. But now he remembers, sort of. He remembers what happened to him, but not what he did. Do enemas do that? Anyway, he is only one jihadist. Other Australian jihadists are being killed as quickly as they fly off to clean toilets and carry bodies in the Levant. Maybe we aren't doing enough for them.
Meanwhile monocultural Greens demonise white men for being of the same culture, but higher class, from which the Greens underclass are spawned.
Many thanks to Tim Blair for inventing the word 'Frightbat' without which the screeching fishwives of the left could not be accurately described in a single word. Tim is to be lauded by Frightbats discussing 'Frightbat' at the Sydney Opera House. It is expected no conservative will actually be invited to the event but one should be able to hear the shrieks from an adjacent suburb on 8th March 2015, 11am. From $35 at the Joan Sutherland theatre for those wishing to see the fluttering ones, sponsored by the ABC.
Why is Waleed Aly smiling? Is it because the SMH is being sued for its campaign against the Australian treasurer? The paper never blinked while Swan, the former treasurer turned the economy from a modest $80 billion surplus to $650 billion deficit. Hockey is trying to get things balanced. The criticisms levelled against Hockey of incompetence are overstated. He does not control the senate, but has masterfully, with the government, got a substantial amount passed, and achieved an upper hand in future negotiations by not being foolish. Meanwhile the ridiculous independents have delayed important savings which will cost the economy an estimated $8 billion. Also, the independents have not supported important legislation with humanitarian side effects. Had the senate acted properly, children would have been out of detention before Christmas last year. And had the Pacific Solution not been rescinded then over a thousand need not have drowned. A senate can be very useful as a house of review, or very bad.
With all the finger pointing, the partisan press have sidelined the news that former ALP President and AHU President Michael Williamson, who stole millions of dollars from the poorest professionals in the land, had a mistress who worked in the union. She has been ordered to pay back $4 million. That is how the ALP 'serves' the workers it represents. The partisan media were looking away, and they were looking towards a historian who wrote a book about unions in WW2 fighting against the national interest. Leading lights of the partisan press corp lied about the book. Mike Carlton is un-penitant at failing fact checks he levelled against Colebatch.
Mr Abbott is even handed and generous too. Sometimes too generous. He welcomed the Chinese President recently by kindly referring to Whitlam and Wran for their normalising state relations with China in the '70s. But, Bill Shorten in return sledged Australia over the ineffective AGW tax she'd dumped. No conservative can ever lean far enough left to please left wing voters. Was there a hidden reason behind Mr Abbott giving away $200 million for a global climate fund designed to prevent poor nations from modernising? One hopes so, but if so, we may never know.
Banks support AGW because the corruption is that big. First, banks are entangled through the ponzie type schemes set up to promote the hysteria. Then, in order to make good their exposure they must promote it. So they have products they must support. But with that much money, people lose their vision. And so the environmental group Greenpeace which pollutes water with dumped boat fuel and threatens trade where it is profitable has vandalised ancient Nazca drawings so as to promote itself. World heritage items have been vandalised on an enormously large scale visible from space. Money does that.
David Hicks is an Australian jihadist who was captured by the CIA and interrogated at GITMO. They never did to him what he wanted to do to others. He had claimed to have forgotten things. But now he remembers, sort of. He remembers what happened to him, but not what he did. Do enemas do that? Anyway, he is only one jihadist. Other Australian jihadists are being killed as quickly as they fly off to clean toilets and carry bodies in the Levant. Maybe we aren't doing enough for them.
From 2013
For left wing advocates, 'Rape' is just a word to toss around. But to describe an organisation responsible, recently for causing the death by drowning of three people and jeopardising bilateral relations between Indonesia and Australia, the description "harmless and largely inoffensive" ABC is terribly misleading, and not merely a lie. Meanwhile Wilkinson seems to rape the truth regarding the lighting of the Eiffel Tower for Mandela. ABC are now willing, on a different day, to label a terrorist killer as Islamic. Adams read something, somewhere, but we aren't certain if he understood the complexity of it. Sarah H-Y has now got a clear path to sue her own party for a misogynistic application of her image. Doug Walters is remembered as the oldest debutant in first class or test cricket. It is ok if others joke about Mandela, but not to smile at the joke.
Andrew Bolt writes about the injustice surrounding his silencing. His case is compelling. Those endorsing the law abused to silence him, are wrong. A scandal is evident over media silence regarding the AWU affair. Australia is losing its' car industry, and that is because of that kind of corruption. Unions have finally killed their host, and the parasites will fall about, dying slowly. Official silence over a hand waver pretending to sign for a hand wringer pretending to care. Evidence gathers for the young of today being a stolen generation denied access to the truth. As the UN encourages suicide bombers by children, child abuse by so called Palestinians raising children to attack police, the UN wants to stop good parents from raising their children with respect and love.
Andrew Bolt writes about the injustice surrounding his silencing. His case is compelling. Those endorsing the law abused to silence him, are wrong. A scandal is evident over media silence regarding the AWU affair. Australia is losing its' car industry, and that is because of that kind of corruption. Unions have finally killed their host, and the parasites will fall about, dying slowly. Official silence over a hand waver pretending to sign for a hand wringer pretending to care. Evidence gathers for the young of today being a stolen generation denied access to the truth. As the UN encourages suicide bombers by children, child abuse by so called Palestinians raising children to attack police, the UN wants to stop good parents from raising their children with respect and love.
Historical perspective on this day
In 627, Battle of Nineveh: A Byzantine army under Emperor Heraclius defeated Emperor Khosrau II's Persian forces, commanded by General Rhahzadh. In 1098, First Crusade: Siege of Ma'arrat al-Numan – Crusaders breached the town's walls and massacred about 20,000 inhabitants. After finding themselves with insufficient food, they reportedly resorted to cannibalism. In 1388, Mary of Enghien sold the lordship of Argos and Nauplia to the Republic of Venice. In 1408, the Order of the Dragon a monarchical chivalric order was created by Sigismund of Luxembourg, then King of Hungary. In 1781, American Revolutionary War: Second Battle of Ushant – A British fleet led by HMS Victory defeated a French fleet. In 1787, Pennsylvania became the second state to ratify the United States Constitution, five days after Delaware became the first.
In 1862, American Civil War: USS Cairo sank on the Yazoo River, becoming the first armored ship to be sunk by an electrically detonated mine. In 1870, Joseph H. Rainey of South Carolina became the second black U.S. congressman, the first being Hiram Revels. In 1897, Belo Horizonte, the first planned city in Brazil, was founded. In 1901, Guglielmo Marconi received the first transatlantic radio signal (the letter "S" [***] in Morse Code), at Signal Hill in St John's, Newfoundland. In 1911, Delhi replaced Calcutta as the capital of India. Also, King George V of the United Kingdom and Mary of Teck were enthroned as Emperor and Empress of India. In 1915, President of the Republic of China, Yuan Shikai, announces his intention to reinstate the monarchy and proclaim himself Emperor of China. In 1917, in Nebraska, Father Edward J. Flanagan founded Boys Town as a farm village for wayward boys. In 1918, the Flag of Estonia was raised atop the Pikk Hermann for the first time. In 1925, the Majlis of Iran voted to crown Reza Khan as the new Shah of Iran, starting the Pahlavi dynasty.
In 1935, Lebensborn Project, a Nazi reproduction program, was founded by Heinrich Himmler. In 1936, Xi'an Incident: The Generalissimo of the Republic of China, Chiang Kai-shek, was kidnapped by Zhang Xueliang. In 1937, Second Sino-Japanese War: USS Panay incident – Japanese aircraft bombed and sank U.S. gunboat USS Panay on the Yangtze river in China. In 1939, Winter War: Battle of Tolvajärvi – Finnish forces defeated those of the Soviet Union in their first major victory of the conflict. Also, HMS Duchess sank after a collision with HMS Barham off the coast of Scotland with the loss of 124 men. In 1940, World War II: Approximately 70 people were killed in the Marples Hotel, Fitzalan Square, Sheffield, as a result of a German air raid. In 1941, World War II: Fifty-four Japanese A6M Zero fighters raided Batangas Field, Philippines. Jesús Villamor and four Filipino fighter pilots fend them off; César Basa was killed. Also, World War II: USMC F4F "Wildcats" sank the first 4 major Japanese ships off Wake Island. Also, World War II: The United Kingdom declared war on Bulgaria. Hungary and Romania declared war on the United States. India declared war on Japan. Also, Adolf Hitler declared the imminent extermination of the Jews at a meeting in the Reich Chancellery In 1942, World War II: German troops began Operation Winter Storm, an attempt to relieve encircled Axis forces during the Battle of Stalingrad. Also, a fire in a hostel in St. John's, Newfoundland, killed 100 people. In 1946, a fire at a New York City ice plant spread to a nearby tenement, killing 37 people. In 1948, Malayan Emergency: Batang Kali massacre – 14 members of the Scots Guards stationed in Malaya allegedly massacred 24 unarmed civilians and set fire to the village.
1950, Paula Ackerman, the first woman appointed to perform rabbinical functions in the United States, led the congregation in her first service. In 1956, beginning of the Irish Republican Army's "Border Campaign". In 1958, Guinea joined the United Nations. In 1963, Kenya gained its independence from the United Kingdom. In 1964, Prime Minister Jomo Kenyatta became the first President of the Republic of Kenya. In 1969, Years of Lead: Piazza Fontana bombing – The offices of Banca Nazionale dell'Agricoltura in Piazza Fontana, Milan, were bombed. In 1979, Coup d'état of December Twelfth: South Korean Army Major General Chun Doo-hwan ordered the arrest of Army Chief of Staff General Jeong Seung-hwawithout authorization from President Choi Kyu-ha, alleging involvement in the assassination of ex-President Park Chung-hee. In 1979, President of Pakistan Muhammad Zia-ul-Haqconferred Nishan-e-Imtiaz on Nobel laureate Dr Abdus Salam. Also, the unrecognised state of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia returned to British control and resumed using the name Southern Rhodesia.
In 1983, the Australian Labor government led by Prime Minister Bob Hawke and Treasurer Paul Keating floated the Australian dollar. In 1984, Maaouya Ould Sid'Ahmed Taya became the third president of Mauritania after a coup d'état against Mohamed Khouna Ould Haidallawhile the latter was attending a summit. In 1985, Arrow Air Flight 1285, a McDonnell Douglas DC-8, crashed after takeoff in Gander, Newfoundland, killing all 256 people on board, including 236 members of the United States Army's 101st Airborne Division. In 1988, the Clapham Junction rail crash killed thirty-five and injured hundreds after two collisions of three commuter trains—one of the worst train crashes in the United Kingdom. In 1991, the Russian Federation gained independence from the USSR. In 2000, the United States Supreme Courtreleased its decision in Bush v. Gore. In 2001, Prime Minister of Vietnam Phan Văn Khảiannounced the decision on upgrading Phong Nha–Kẻ Bàng to the Phong Nha-Kẻ Bàng National Park, providing information on projects for the conservation and development of the park and revised maps. In 2012, North Korea successfully launched its first satellite, Kwangmyŏngsŏng-3 Unit 2, using an Unha-3 carrier rocket.
In 1862, American Civil War: USS Cairo sank on the Yazoo River, becoming the first armored ship to be sunk by an electrically detonated mine. In 1870, Joseph H. Rainey of South Carolina became the second black U.S. congressman, the first being Hiram Revels. In 1897, Belo Horizonte, the first planned city in Brazil, was founded. In 1901, Guglielmo Marconi received the first transatlantic radio signal (the letter "S" [***] in Morse Code), at Signal Hill in St John's, Newfoundland. In 1911, Delhi replaced Calcutta as the capital of India. Also, King George V of the United Kingdom and Mary of Teck were enthroned as Emperor and Empress of India. In 1915, President of the Republic of China, Yuan Shikai, announces his intention to reinstate the monarchy and proclaim himself Emperor of China. In 1917, in Nebraska, Father Edward J. Flanagan founded Boys Town as a farm village for wayward boys. In 1918, the Flag of Estonia was raised atop the Pikk Hermann for the first time. In 1925, the Majlis of Iran voted to crown Reza Khan as the new Shah of Iran, starting the Pahlavi dynasty.
In 1935, Lebensborn Project, a Nazi reproduction program, was founded by Heinrich Himmler. In 1936, Xi'an Incident: The Generalissimo of the Republic of China, Chiang Kai-shek, was kidnapped by Zhang Xueliang. In 1937, Second Sino-Japanese War: USS Panay incident – Japanese aircraft bombed and sank U.S. gunboat USS Panay on the Yangtze river in China. In 1939, Winter War: Battle of Tolvajärvi – Finnish forces defeated those of the Soviet Union in their first major victory of the conflict. Also, HMS Duchess sank after a collision with HMS Barham off the coast of Scotland with the loss of 124 men. In 1940, World War II: Approximately 70 people were killed in the Marples Hotel, Fitzalan Square, Sheffield, as a result of a German air raid. In 1941, World War II: Fifty-four Japanese A6M Zero fighters raided Batangas Field, Philippines. Jesús Villamor and four Filipino fighter pilots fend them off; César Basa was killed. Also, World War II: USMC F4F "Wildcats" sank the first 4 major Japanese ships off Wake Island. Also, World War II: The United Kingdom declared war on Bulgaria. Hungary and Romania declared war on the United States. India declared war on Japan. Also, Adolf Hitler declared the imminent extermination of the Jews at a meeting in the Reich Chancellery In 1942, World War II: German troops began Operation Winter Storm, an attempt to relieve encircled Axis forces during the Battle of Stalingrad. Also, a fire in a hostel in St. John's, Newfoundland, killed 100 people. In 1946, a fire at a New York City ice plant spread to a nearby tenement, killing 37 people. In 1948, Malayan Emergency: Batang Kali massacre – 14 members of the Scots Guards stationed in Malaya allegedly massacred 24 unarmed civilians and set fire to the village.
1950, Paula Ackerman, the first woman appointed to perform rabbinical functions in the United States, led the congregation in her first service. In 1956, beginning of the Irish Republican Army's "Border Campaign". In 1958, Guinea joined the United Nations. In 1963, Kenya gained its independence from the United Kingdom. In 1964, Prime Minister Jomo Kenyatta became the first President of the Republic of Kenya. In 1969, Years of Lead: Piazza Fontana bombing – The offices of Banca Nazionale dell'Agricoltura in Piazza Fontana, Milan, were bombed. In 1979, Coup d'état of December Twelfth: South Korean Army Major General Chun Doo-hwan ordered the arrest of Army Chief of Staff General Jeong Seung-hwawithout authorization from President Choi Kyu-ha, alleging involvement in the assassination of ex-President Park Chung-hee. In 1979, President of Pakistan Muhammad Zia-ul-Haqconferred Nishan-e-Imtiaz on Nobel laureate Dr Abdus Salam. Also, the unrecognised state of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia returned to British control and resumed using the name Southern Rhodesia.
In 1983, the Australian Labor government led by Prime Minister Bob Hawke and Treasurer Paul Keating floated the Australian dollar. In 1984, Maaouya Ould Sid'Ahmed Taya became the third president of Mauritania after a coup d'état against Mohamed Khouna Ould Haidallawhile the latter was attending a summit. In 1985, Arrow Air Flight 1285, a McDonnell Douglas DC-8, crashed after takeoff in Gander, Newfoundland, killing all 256 people on board, including 236 members of the United States Army's 101st Airborne Division. In 1988, the Clapham Junction rail crash killed thirty-five and injured hundreds after two collisions of three commuter trains—one of the worst train crashes in the United Kingdom. In 1991, the Russian Federation gained independence from the USSR. In 2000, the United States Supreme Courtreleased its decision in Bush v. Gore. In 2001, Prime Minister of Vietnam Phan Văn Khảiannounced the decision on upgrading Phong Nha–Kẻ Bàng to the Phong Nha-Kẻ Bàng National Park, providing information on projects for the conservation and development of the park and revised maps. In 2012, North Korea successfully launched its first satellite, Kwangmyŏngsŏng-3 Unit 2, using an Unha-3 carrier rocket.
=== Publishing News ===
This column welcomes feedback and criticism. The column is not made up but based on the days events and articles which are then placed in the feed. So they may not have an apparent cohesion they would have had were they made up.
===
I am publishing a book called Bread of Life: January.
Bread of Life is a daily bible quote with a layman's understanding of the meaning. I give one quote for each day, and also a series of personal stories illustrating key concepts eg Who is God? What is a miracle? Why is there tragedy?
January is the first of the anticipated year-long work of thirteen books. One for each month and the whole year. It costs to publish. It (Kindle version) should retail at about $2US online, but the paperback version would cost more, according to production cost.If you have a heart for giving, I fundraise at gofund.me/27tkwuc
Bread of Life is a daily bible quote with a layman's understanding of the meaning. I give one quote for each day, and also a series of personal stories illustrating key concepts eg Who is God? What is a miracle? Why is there tragedy?
January is the first of the anticipated year-long work of thirteen books. One for each month and the whole year. It costs to publish. It (Kindle version) should retail at about $2US online, but the paperback version would cost more, according to production cost.If you have a heart for giving, I fundraise at gofund.me/27tkwuc
===
Editorials will appear in the "History in a Year by the Conservative Voice" series, starting with August, September, October, or at Amazon http://www.amazon.com/dp/1482020262/ref=cm_sw_r_tw_dp_dVHPub0MQKDZ4 The kindle version is cheaper, but the soft back version allows a free kindle version.
List of available items at Create Space
The Amazon Author Page for David Ball
UK .. http://www.amazon.co.uk/-/e/B01683ZOWGFrench .. http://www.amazon.fr/-/e/B01683ZOWG
Japan .. http://www.amazon.co.jp/-/e/B01683ZOWG
German .. http://www.amazon.de/-/e/B01683ZOWG
- 1298 – Albert II, Duke of Austria (d. 1358)
- 1724 – Samuel Hood, 1st Viscount Hood, English admiral (d. 1816)
- 1731 – Erasmus Darwin, English physician and poet (d. 1802)
- 1821 – Gustave Flaubert, French author (d. 1880)
- 1849 – William Kissam Vanderbilt, American businessman and horse breeder (d. 1920)
- 1881 – Harry Warner, Polish-American businessman, co-founded Warner Bros. (d. 1958)
- 1900 – Sammy Davis, Sr., American dancer (d. 1988)
- 1915 – Frank Sinatra, American singer and actor (d. 1998)
- 1927 – Robert Noyce, American inventor and businessman, co-invented the microchip and co-founded the Intel Corporation (d. 1990)
- 1937 – Michael Jeffery, Australian politician and army officer, 24th Governor-General of Australia
- 1938 – Connie Francis, American singer
- 1970 – Jennifer Connelly, American actress
- 1991 – Daniel Magder, Canadian actor
- 627 – A Byzantine army under Emperor Heraclius defeated Emperor Khosrau II's Persian forces, commanded by General Rhahzadh, near present-day Mosul, Iraq.
- 1531 – According to traditional Catholic accounts, the image of the Blessed Virgin Mary miraculously appeared imprinted on Juan Diego's tilma.
- 1939 – The Royal Navy destroyer HMS Duchess collided with the battleship HMS Barham she was escorting and sank with heavy loss of life.
- 1964 – Jomo Kenyatta (pictured) became the first President of the Republic of Kenya.
- 2000 – The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Bush v. Gore that the election recount of the ballots cast in Florida for the presidential election must stop, effectively making George W. Bush the winner.
Deaths
- 884 – Carloman II, Frankish king (b. 866)
- 1212 – Geoffrey, English archbishop (b. 1152)
- 1569 – Philip II, Metropolitan of Moscow (b. 1507)
- 1586 – Stephen Báthory, Polish king (b. 1533)
- 1685 – John Pell, English mathematician and linguist (b. 1610)
- 1751 – Henry St John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke, English philosopher and politician, Secretary at War (b. 1678)
- 1766 – Johann Christoph Gottsched, German philosopher, author, and critic (b. 1700)
- 1789 – John Ponsonby, Irish politician (b. 1713)
- 1790 – Mikhail Shcherbatov, Russian historian and philosopher (b. 1733)
- 1817 – Tekle Giyorgis I, Ethiopian emperor (b. 1751)
- 1889 – Robert Browning, English poet and playwright (b. 1812)
- 1939 – Douglas Fairbanks, American actor, producer, and screenwriter (b. 1883)
- 1941 – César Basa, Filipino lieutenant and pilot (b. 1915)
- 1977 – Clementine Churchill, Baroness Spencer-Churchill, English wife of Winston Churchill (b. 1885)
- 1985 – Ian Stewart, Scottish keyboard player (The Rolling Stones) (b. 1938)
- 1999 – Joseph Heller, American author and playwright (b. 1923)
- 2000 – George Montgomery, American actor, stuntman, director, producer, and screenwriter (b. 1916)
- 2003 – Keiko, Icelandic-Norwegian whale (b. 1976)
- 2007 – Ike Turner, American singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer (Kings of Rhythm and Ike & Tina Turner) (b. 1931)
- 2013 – Leo Sachs, German-Israeli biologist and academic (b. 1924)
- 2013 – Audrey Totter, American actress and singer (b. 1917)
Tim Blair 2017
ONE ENCHANTED EVENING
Like me, you’ve probably wondered what it might be like to go on a first date with an intersectional feminist.
KENNY TELLS ALL
This is excellent. Stephen Brook interviews Chris Kenny about leftoid journalists, whether Kevin Rudd really tried to stop him working at The Australian, why he sued the Chaser boys …
DIM SAM QUITS SENATE
As expected, Labor’s senator for Jingjinji metropolitan region has resigned.
AKAYED THE SUICIDE BUMBLER
Details emerge regarding Akayed Ullah, the devoted servant of Islam who couldn’t even blow himself up, much less anybody else.
Tim Blair
GILLIAN’S BRILLIANT IDEA
LEAVE US, WARMIST WEAVERS
MONDAY NOTICEBOARD
YEAR OF THE BIG DEAD BIRD
YOU’VE GOT TO KNOW WHEN TO FOLD ’EM
THE AUSTRALIAN GOONBOX SLUMBERDRUNK
FIRST DOG ON A ROPE
Andrew Bolt
How Turnbull doublecrossed Frydenberg
Rowan for Christmas
LISTEN TO SOMETHING ELSE
Tim Blair – Saturday, December 12, 2015 (1:28pm)
Australian author Sophie Laguna “listens to a lot of ABC”, which might explain why she seems so extremely anxiousabout climate change:
NO EXPLANATION
Tim Blair – Saturday, December 12, 2015 (1:08pm)
Remember when Malcolm Turnbull vowed to explain everything?
You build confidence by explaining, as I said earlier, explaining what the problem is, making sure people understand it, and then setting out the options for dealing with it …That’s the approach I have taken: Laying out what the issues are, getting the facts straight, explainingthat and then presenting a path forward and then making the case for that path forward. My firm belief is that to be a successful leader in 2015 – perhaps at any time – you have to be able to bring people with you by respecting their intelligence in the manner you explain things.
Well, Turnbull’s government now seems to have moved on from that explaining phase:
Eyebrows were raised after the Turnbull government shifted its stance overnight when Foreign Affairs Minister Julie Bishop signed up to a New Zealand-led declaration at the Paris climate summit backing the use of international carbon markets in tackling climate change.Former prime minister Tony Abbott shunned the use of international carbon permits, once saying that: “money that shouldn’t be going offshore into dodgy carbon farms in Equatorial Guinea and Kazakhstan”.But in a speech on Wednesday, Ms Bishop said: “We recognise that international carbon markets are a key part of the global effort to reduce emissions”.
Nobody explained this to Liberal MP Craig Kelly:
WHAT?We’re going to start buying “international carbon permits” … ?I must have ducked off to the bathroom when that was discussed in the partyroom, because I can’t recall any such discussions.Surely this can’t be right?
(Via A.R.M. Jones.)
DEPENDS ON HOW YOU DRIVE
Tim Blair – Saturday, December 12, 2015 (12:42pm)
A prediction from LA’s Alissa Walker:
Cars are an old idea from the past. But believing that cars are the future could destroy our entire civilization.
Someone ought to tell Islamic State. Instead of bombings and beheadings, they can crush the decadent west just by picking the kids up from school.
CLAIMS UP IN SMOKE
Tim Blair – Saturday, December 12, 2015 (12:08pm)
Australia’s inevitable summer bushfires will be followed by equally inevitable claims that they are caused by global warming. When that happens, please remember this report:
(Lead author Kathryn Collins of the University of Wollongong’s Centre for Environmental Risk Management of Bushfires) and colleagues gathered official data on more than 113,000 bushfires ignited between 1997 and 2009 in 144 bioregions across New South Wales and Victoria.Of the fires with a known cause, 47 per cent were due to accidental causes, due to such things as cigarettes, escaped burn-offs and campfires, or sparks from equipment or powerlines.Forty per cent were deliberately lit and 13 per cent were caused by lightning.
So that’s 87 per cent of fires caused inadvertently or deliberately by people and the remainder caused by electrical storms – and zero per cent caused by our old friend climate change, who nevertheless still receives a passing mention:
Ms Collins said that in the future, population increases together with climate change are predicted to increase the number of bushfire ignitions in coastal and hinterland areas.
Yep. One day climate change might be even as destructive as carelessly discarded cigarettes.
(Via J.F. Beck.)
AXIS TROUBLE
Tim Blair – Saturday, December 12, 2015 (2:31am)
According to Sky’s Matt Kelly – usually a sharp sports reporter – this stunning catch depicts “Nathan Lyon going vertical to dismiss Samuels for nine”:
Matt’s vertical/horizontal confusion is remarkably common, and obviously not the most shameful journalistic error ever committed (I’ve done much worse, probably daily). For those struggling with similar issues, Olivia Newton-John provided a helpful lyrical guide several decades ago, at least in terms of the x-axis.
Matt’s vertical/horizontal confusion is remarkably common, and obviously not the most shameful journalistic error ever committed (I’ve done much worse, probably daily). For those struggling with similar issues, Olivia Newton-John provided a helpful lyrical guide several decades ago, at least in terms of the x-axis.
EQUALITY REALISED
Tim Blair – Saturday, December 12, 2015 (1:18am)
Fairfax’s Clementine Ford takes a stand:
Inequality can only be countered through tangible loss for the people who enjoy unyielding power. As I have repeatedly argued, equality can’t be realised through platitudes and pledges alone. For equality to work, actual loss will need to be experienced. Because if there is only a finite amount of space in any given area and we want to diversify that space to make it more equal, how can that possibly happen unless the dominant group currently taking up that space isn’t forced to downsize … ?Advocating for change means accepting that things will actually, you know, have to change.
Recognising her own power and privilege, Ford then surrendered her job to a Sudanese immigrant and mother of three who cannot speak English.
UPDATE. Camille Paglia:
The problem with too much current feminism, in my opinion, is that even when it strikes progressive poses, it emanates from an entitled, upper-middle-class point of view. It demands the intrusion and protection of paternalistic authority figures to project a hypothetical utopia that will be magically free from offence and hurt. Its rampant policing of thought and speech is completely reactionary …
Do read on.
TIM IS IN THE HOUSE
Tim Blair – Friday, December 12, 2014 (3:22pm)
I’ve always loved the Sydney Opera House, although I long ago accepted that my limited musical and theatrical abilities meant I would never be more than a passive presence there. But now my time has come – and it’s all thanks to one little word. Here’s the Guardian‘s promotion of next year’s All About Women talkfest, which will “revisit June’s‘frightbat’ row”:
Australia currently lacks a mainstream debate about feminism, says Ann Mossop, curator of the forthcoming All About Women festival at Sydney Opera House.Six months after the Daily Telegraph columnist Tim Blair polled his readers to name Australia’s “craziest left-wing frightbat” from a shortlist of 10 women journalists, Mossop said she hoped the programme of talks and lectures on International Women’s Day would open up the conversation.“Australia has figures like Germaine Greer and Anne Summers, a generation who have been influential across the world, and there are some really interesting young voices talking about feminism in Australia, people like Clementine Ford,” said Mossop as she announced the full line-up.“But I feel, in some ways, there is not actually a mainstream conversation about this – something the frightbats brou-ha-ha illustrated. Writing from a mainstream position, somebody like Tim Blair was able to dismiss a whole group of female journalists and commentators in a way that was only remarked on in that community.”
This may be due to the fact that the frightbat community is utterly obsessed with itself. Tickets for this important cultural event start at $35, but even non-attendees will be partly paying for it through sponsorship from the ABC.
UPDATE. Shortly after the word’s invention, Melbourne academic Edward Jeremiah wondered if frightbat would have any staying power:
Frightbat? As simply as that a new word is born, delivered kicking and screaming into an ever-evolving linguistic world. Welcome aboard you of great promise, though your chances at long-term survival are probably pretty grim.
Thanks to the frightbats themselves, Jeremiah’s concerns may now be put at rest. Also planned for 2015: a frightbat-flavoured art exhibit in Tasmania.
SMILIN’ WALLY
Tim Blair – Friday, December 12, 2014 (2:48pm)
Following recent legal issues, the Sydney Morning Herald has now decided on a policy of complete accuracy.
THEY FRACK US WHEN WE’RE SLEEPING
Tim Blair – Friday, December 12, 2014 (2:29pm)
Screech along with the atonal Ecopella Choir, whose Christmas theme is enhanced by one performer who doesn’t even need any Santa accessories. Another member appears to be playing her tie, which as a musical instrument lacks a little something in the volume department:
UNCLE ISLAM WANTS YOU
Tim Blair – Friday, December 12, 2014 (4:17am)
Australian bludjahideen have a remarkably poor survival rate in Syria and Iraq:
Australians going to fight with extremist groups in the Middle East are dying as fast as they are arriving, meaning that the total number of fighters has remained stable at about 70, security agency ASIO has revealed.ASIO deputy director-general Kerri Hartland told a Senate hearing on Thursday that the organisation knew of at least 20 Australians who have now been killed in Syria and Iraq while fighting with groups such as the Islamic State.“The overall number of Australians currently fighting with or supporting Islamic extremist groups in Syria and Iraq has remained consistent over recent months,” Ms Hartland said.“However, this does not reflect a reduction in the number of Australian travellers. Instead it reflects the relatively high casualty rate for Australians, with the numbers of new arrivals roughly keeping pace with the fatalities.”
Keep on truckin’, losers. Australia’s Islamic State exports are history’s only known examples of lead magnetism.
OPERATION DESERT SCRIBBLE
Tim Blair – Friday, December 12, 2014 (3:35am)
Greenpeace cultural imperialists desecrate a sacred Peruvian landmark:
Peru will seek criminal charges against Greenpeace activists who it says damaged the world-renowned Nazca lines by leaving footprints in the adjacent desert during a publicity stunt.“It’s a true slap in the face at everything Peruvians consider sacred,” said Luis Jaime Castillo, the deputy culture minister, after the action by the environmental group on Monday, at the famed drawings etched into Peru’s coastal desert, a UN world heritage site.He said the government was seeking to prevent those responsible from leaving the country while it asks prosecutors to file charges of attacking archaeological monuments, a crime punishable by up to six years in prison.The activists entered a “strictly prohibited” area beside the figure of a hummingbird, the culture ministry said. They laid big yellow cloth letters reading: “Time for Change! The Future is Renewable.” The message was intended for delegates from 190 countries at the UN climate talks being held in Lima.
They could have just sent an email.
CASH TRASHED
Tim Blair – Friday, December 12, 2014 (3:17am)
Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s $200 million climate change backflip is an electoral, political and practical disaster:
Money allocated to fund an international climate fund could have been used to fund 40 million Australian GP visits, removed budget cuts for our 8000 poorest families or funded more than 40,000 skin cancer removals.These were some of the suggestions made to The Daily Telegraph in the wake of Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s decision to divert $200 million in foreign aid over four years as an investment in the Green Climate Fund.The fund will assist developing nations combat climate change. The backflip has angered conservative voters who do not support climate change, given Australia is responsible for only 1 per cent of global emissions.There are some on Mr Abbott’s own backbench who believe the backdown was a sign of weakness.
That’s because it is a sign of weakness. It’s also a sign of idiocy. This wasted $200 million won’t win the government a single vote.
DAVE’S SLAVES
Tim Blair – Friday, December 12, 2014 (2:53am)
Piers Akerman stomps down hard on Jew-hating Muslim apostate David Hicks and his adoring leftist fans.
FUTURE UNION NON-SCANDAL
Tim Blair – Friday, December 12, 2014 (2:29am)
In the grand tradition of unions selflessly assisting their fellow Australians:
The alleged mistress of jailed ex-HSU boss Michael Williamson has been ordered to pay back almost $4 million in funds siphoned as part of a kickback scheme.Cheryl McMillan was the purchasing officer for the union, which looks after some of the state’s lowest paid workers, during the Williamson era.She and Alf Downing, the proprietor of Access Focus, were yesterday ordered in the Supreme Court to pay $3.77 million to the union, including interest and legal costs. Downing was also hit with an additional payment of $552, 686.Williamson was jailed in March for a minimum of five years after the “parasitic plundering” of the union.
Start the clock. We’re now just 70 years away from the moment when leftists deny that this ever happened.
No more Mr Nice Guy
Andrew Bolt December 12 2014 (7:39pm)
Tony Abbott keeps trying to win over the Left. The Left keeps kicking him in the teeth, hailing each concessions as a sign of weakness.
And the Liberal base just gets more and more depressed.
This is not a winning strategy - and I do not know how much more forcefully I can put it than I have so far tried.
The latest example:
Previous attempts by Abbott to placate the implacable:
I admire Abbott’s Christian spirit. But his enemies have no such spirit themselves. Time to be inspired not by the New Testament but the Old. Time for some smiting.
“And I will bring the sword on you to avenge the breaking of the covenant.”
UPDATE
And to reinforce earlier messages:
More:
===And the Liberal base just gets more and more depressed.
This is not a winning strategy - and I do not know how much more forcefully I can put it than I have so far tried.
The latest example:
Money allocated to fund an international climate fund could have been used to fund 40 million Australian GP visits, removed budget cuts for our 8000 poorest families or funded more than 40,000 skin cancer removals.Name one single warmist who will now switch their voted from the Greens or Labor to the Coalition. Now let me start listing the Coalition voters who are giving up.
These were some of the suggestions made to The Daily Telegraph in the wake of Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s decision to divert $200 million in foreign aid over four years as an investment in the Green Climate Fund.
The fund will assist developing nations combat climate change. The backflip has angered conservative voters who do not support climate change, given Australia is responsible for only 1 per cent of global emissions. There are some on Mr Abbott’s own backbench who believe the backdown was a sign of weakness.
Previous attempts by Abbott to placate the implacable:
Abbott welcomed Chinese president Xi Jinping with a tribute to Labor heroes Gough Whitlam and Neville Wran for fostering the relationship. Labor’s Bill Shorten reciprocated by praising China’s allegedly superior response to global warming and the ebola crisis.And on each of those issues Abbott’s core supporters wilted.
Abbott pledged to hold a referendum to recognise Aborigines were here first. Aboriginal leader Mick Dodson responded by saying Abbott made Aborigines feel “sick”. Noel Pearson said - with Abbott sitting before him at the Whitlam funeral - that Whitlam was the only prime minister of whom it could be said he had not a racist bone in his body. Labor said Abbott’s plans did not go far enough.
Abbott dropped his promise to defend free speech by reforming the Racial Discrimination Act as a sign of goodwill to Muslim leaders. Muslim leaders still pilloried him for suggesting they were part of “Team Australia”. Audiences at the Human Rights Commission, which opposed changes to the RDA, still heckled two Abbott Ministers giving speeches this week.
Abbott broke a no-new-taxes promises by introducing a 2 per cent wealth tax to prove his Budget was “fair”. Labor, the Greens, crossbench senators, the media and unions have since slammed Abbott for actually being unfair, and polls now say most voters agree.
I admire Abbott’s Christian spirit. But his enemies have no such spirit themselves. Time to be inspired not by the New Testament but the Old. Time for some smiting.
“And I will bring the sword on you to avenge the breaking of the covenant.”
UPDATE
And to reinforce earlier messages:
- no more self-deprecationAll messages ignored these past two days.
- keep Peta Credlin low profile
- don’t dismay the base
More:
- it’s the economyAnd more advice upon application.
- jettison the ballast
- get a media guru
- give Scott Morrison a role that lets him train his firepower more broadly in the Opposition.
- get friends, and start with the ones who got you there
Blind racism: White Greens men demonise white men
Andrew Bolt December 12 2014 (10:57am)
Lacking a mirror, Greens Senator Scott Ludlam indulges in the fashionable racism of the Left(other than bagging Jews, of course) - and adds some sexism and ageism besides:
===Alan RM Jones points out the hypocrisy:
Meanwhile, Bob Brown, who left the Senate two years ago, is days away from his seventieth birthday. Lee Rhiannon is 63, Christine Milne is 61, Siewert is 63. No spring chicken, Ludlam’s about to turn 45. All of the parliamentary Greens are as white as snow. Yet, the Greens want to make climate change into a race war.
Hail Hicks, hero of the human rights rabble - like Hanson-Young
Andrew Bolt December 12 2014 (10:08am)
Stephen Kenny, barrister for former al Qaeda recruit David Hicks, who heckled Attorney General George Brandis at a Human Rights Commission awards night:
Piers Akerman on the Human Rights Commission’s frauds, who cannot applaud genuine advances if they’re achieved by conservatives:
UPDATE
Frontbencher Scott Ryan was also heckled at a Human Rights Commission function - at this part of his excellent speech:
Fight.
===I think David was surprised to find Minister Brandis there, talking about human rights...Brandis was more surprised to see Hicks:
You don’t expect to run into a terrorist at a human rights awards event.So which of the two deserves to be most surprised to see the other at a function meant to discuss human rights?
Darling of the human rights crowd? Hicks, in a letter in May 2001:Hicks to his mother Sue King in October and November 2000:
I HAVE met Osama bin Laden about 20 times he is a lovely brother the only reason the West call him the most wanted terrorist is because he got the money to take action. Im (sic) going back again (to afghan) ... So I will get to meet him (Osama bin Laden) again…Hicks, letter from Pakistan, 2000:
THAT night we crossed the LOC (thought to be Line of Control in Kashmir) four people each with rocket propelled grenades 200m from a bunker holding two soldiers. I hope one (soldier) was the same one who killed the two civilians.Upholding human rights? Hicks, letter August 10, 2000:
I GOT to fire hundreds of bullets. ... There are not many countries ... where a tourist, according to his visa, can go to stay with the army and shoot across the border at its enemy, legally.
The West is full of poison. The western society is controlled by the Jews with music, TV, houses, cars, free sex takes Muslims away from the true Islam keeps Islam week and in the third world… The Jews have complete financial and media control many of them are in the Australian government.Leigh Sales notes the most telling part of Hicks’ history - that on seeing al Qaeda’s September 11 attacks he rejoined the terrorist camp in Pakistan:
Hicks wrote that he had met bin Laden 20 times, although he later told the Australian Federal Police in an interview that figure was closer to eight… The glaring weakness in Hicks’s case has always been that although he was in Pakistan on September 11, he chose to return to Afghanistan after seeing the events on television. Hicks writes that his passport was back in Afghanistan so he had no choice but to return for it. Yet he also claims he was in Pakistan on September 11 because he was en route home to Australia, having had enough of Afghanistan. In that case, why was his passport not with him?Greens Senator Sarah Hanson-Young lauds her hero:
UPDATE
Piers Akerman on the Human Rights Commission’s frauds, who cannot applaud genuine advances if they’re achieved by conservatives:
At a lavish and well-lubricated human rights award ceremony at the Museum of Contemporary Art on Thursday, Hicks heckled keynote speaker Attorney-General George Brandis after Brandis concluded his address…The Coalition should realise that key cultural institutions of the state - such as the Human Rights Commission and the ABC - have inevitably been captured by the Left and turned into shills for Labor and the Greens. In the long term there is no alternative to abolishing or drastically shrinking them.
Late yesterday, almost 24 hours after the event and despite the 24-hour news cycle the ABC spends so much money covering, Hicks outburst was still leading the ABC’s online website…
Before addressing Hicks’ appalling record, it should be noted Brandis asked the audience to celebrate International Human Rights Day by noting that most of the 1992 children who were in detention when the Coalition came to office last year have now been released.
This factual statement was greeted with a smattering of reluctant applause from about a dozen of the 400 or so in the angrily self-righteous crowd.
Brandis went on to say all children detained on Christmas Island would be out before Christmas — to no applause. “All of the children in detention will have been released by the early months of next year and we will be back to where we were in November, 2007, when the number of children in detention was zero,” he said.
“And of course the other number zero, which I think ought to be celebrated by all of us, is the fact that 2014 was the first year since 2008 in which we can confidently say that no children, and no adults, died at sea on asylum seeker vessels.” There was not a murmur from the mulish crowd, resentful a Coalition minister exposed the fact it was the disastrous policies of the Labor-Green-independent governments between 2007 and 2013 that were responsible for deaths at sea and the detention of children.
UPDATE
Frontbencher Scott Ryan was also heckled at a Human Rights Commission function - at this part of his excellent speech:
[As] a Liberal I consider myself a proud champion of human rights.The Government must realise the Left is implacable and tribalist to its core. Extend a hand, as is the Christian Abbott’s preference, and you will just get kicked in the head - and mocked for your weakness.
Given my perspective, you might not be surprised to hear that I consider the last two centuries to be a time of achievement, nor than I consider this achievement to be one driven by limiting the power of the state and freeing individuals from shackles imposed by others, whether that be in the name of tradition, religion or an alleged common class interest.
A few weeks ago, we celebrated a quarter-century of the anniversary of the fall of Marxism-Leninism, and I thought it was a moment to pause and reflect on the collapse of the legitimacy of totalitarianism, at least in the West…
I fear, since then, the human rights debate has moved from one of seeking common ground with the implicit decency of the great majority to one that fails to acknowledge it.
Human rights now occasionally seem a little selective with the abrogation of some rights, such as speech and property… I have seen some in the Australian human rights lobby over my time in Parliament propose and accept regulations on speech, and what was tantamount to the effective state licensing of speech on media opinion and comment. A proposal that was unimaginable not that long ago.
I have seen the work of artists rightly defended, but the freedom of journalists disregarded.
It doesn’t matter whether I care for Bill Henson’s photos, or Andres Serrano’s submerged crucifix, but to some, the fact that some were more concerned with those than they were about journalists like Andrew Bolt being dragged through the Federal Court for an opinion, or the prospect of anyone else being treated similarly, does raise a concern, and in my view, weakens the case for human rights. Sometimes, it seems, making a claim of human rights reflects the desire by some, not all, to close down debate or to limit particular policies from debate… If the human rights debate is seen as a vehicle for one side of politics, or indeed, even one philosophical perspective, then I believe it gets weakened, and it loses its political potency as much it can lose its legitimacy.
Fight.
Mike Carlton says Hal Colebatch wrong to say poor Bill Monks existed
Andrew Bolt December 12 2014 (9:19am)
Mike Carlton, whose own book missed out, attacks Hal Colebatch’s book on war-time union bastardry for winning a Prime Minister’s literary award:
===In October 1945, [Colebatch] says, [returning prisoners of war] were held penned-up on a British aircraft carrier, HMS Speaker, which had brought them home. The wharfies would not allow them ashore to meet their loved ones for 36 hours… Colebatch gives his only source for this nonsense as a letter from one W.S. Monks, dated 1995, 50 years after the event and 20 years ago. He does not reveal who this Monks might be, but there was no soldier or POW of that name in WWII.Roger Franklin in Quadrant on-line:
According to Carlton, who fancies himself a naval historian, no Australian by the name of W.S. Monks ever served beneath the AIF’s Rising Sun or fell into the hands of the Japanese… What about an hourlong interview with the man who doesn’t exist?(Thanks to reader Peter of Bellevue Hill.)
Meet the real wreckers. UPDATE: Five years to fix so get serious, warns Reserve Bank Governor
Andrew Bolt December 12 2014 (9:13am)
This Senate is costing us billions:
===SENATE decisions have added almost $8 billion to federal deficits over the next four years in a hit to be revealed next week…Labor and rabble like Jacqui Lambie seem happy to destroy Australia if that’s what it takes to tear down Tony Abbott:
The federal government will warn of the impact as it uses a midyear budget revision to sharpen debate on unpopular cuts including Medicare reforms that are being heavily revised to avoid a Senate veto…
(T)he Treasurer will have to sacrifice the $8bn in savings to factor in deals done in the Senate in recent months to amend his mining tax repeal and other legislation…
Spending will be higher by at least $1.3bn a year for the next two years as a result of a deal with crossbench senators to keep the Schoolkids Bonus longer than planned, while almost $2bn will go towards a superannuation top-up for workers on low incomes…
Also in the midyear revision is a cost of about $600 million from a deal in the Senate to keep paying the Income Support Bonus until the end of 2016, in contrast to the original government proposal to cut it this year…
Mr Hockey is seeking to raise the stakes in the ongoing fight in parliament to legislate savings including the $5bn meant to cut from university funding, the $1.2bn to come from the PBS co-payment and about $3.5bn in changes to Medicare including a cut to rebates on GP visits… With income tax under pressure from slow wage growth and company tax under pressure from falling commodity prices, economists expect next week’s budget update to reveal a deficit of about $40bn this year — up about $10bn from the forecast in May.
[Reserve Bank of Australia governor] Glenn Stevens has issued a blistering challenge to all federal politicians that they need to “get real” about fixing medium-term budget difficulties by having a serious discussion that avoids simplistic “slogans and name-calling.”(Thanks to reader Peter of Bellevue Hill.)
He indicated that failure to fix the budget within the next five years could result in Australia potentially losing its AAA credit rating – and see the nation forced into European-style austerity measures against its wishes…
Strong leadership, “not just from the government, but from other political parties and individuals who claim to be serious” would be needed to fix the budget over the medium term, he said.
“You have to have a serious conversation about this stuff and not get into slogans and name-calling. The serious issue is that five-year horizon.
“We’re not going to have a surplus any time soon, are we? But the real question is do we have a sustainable fiscal position over the medium term?"… In some of his most blunt public remarks, Mr Stevens lamented how the past two years had confirmed how difficult fixing the budget had become – a dispiriting trend he blamed on an “over-simplification” of the fiscal debate...He also referred to the ongoing obstructionism in the Senate, including by figures such as Palmer United leader Clive Palmer and former PUP senator Jacqui Lambie.
Why banks love global warming
Andrew Bolt December 12 2014 (9:05am)
Wonder why so many businesses lobby government to keep believing the global warming scare - and keep subsidising green power?
Alan Moran:
===Alan Moran:
... the National Australia Bank launched its “Climate Bonds” fund this week. Carrying a 4 per cent interest rate (less than the amount banks offer all long-term investors) this will invest in 17 Australian wind farms and solar energy facilities.
These facilities are intrinsically risky. They are uncompetitive and depend on the Government requiring electricity consumers to buy their output for 15 years at three times its value. If the Government withdraws that requirement, the renewable facilities become insolvent, hence their lobbying for continued climate action, including at the current Lima Conference.
A new team will give just the pep the Government needs
Andrew Bolt December 12 2014 (8:31am)
More free advice for Tony Abbott, this time from David Crowe:
The problem isn’t Credlin, a powerful, trusted and effective chief of staff. The problem is that there are not more like her, particularly in the government’s area of maximum weakness - communications and political strategy. A second and even third figure of Credlin’s stature and talent would improve the government’s fighting trim, allow more debate and consideration of contentious policies, take heat off Credlin, improve communications with the backbench and help Abbott seem less remote and feel less alone.
My own suggestion: appoint a communications chief from within the ranks of the MPs themselves, backed by a senior figure from the media. Appoint someone trusted by Abbott to do for him what, say, Peter Mandelson did for Tony Blair. Options include add Cabinet secretary to Scott Morrison’s duties, or, less provocatively, giving an informal role to a Josh Frydenberg, Christian Porter or some straight-shooter MP trusted absolutely. Tell them they and their team have a month to devise a strategy for the Government to come roaring out of the blocks after the break.
Remember: Clinton had communications gurus such as Dick Morris and James Carville. Blair had Mandelson and Alistair Campbell. George Bush had Karl Rove, among others. Abbott has....?
So: new faces, new structure, new strategy, new energy, new reason to reconsider the verdict on this government. This could be exciting - if the moment is embraced.
(Thanks to reader brett t r.)
===If some had their way, Abbott’s reshuffle would include replacing Peta Credlin, his chief of staff. The acrimony over her keeps building as her critics try to ease her grip on power. Julie Bishop asserts her authority, challenging instructions from the Prime Minister’s office, a move that encourages a similar show of strength from other ministers. Despairing over the way Abbott and Credlin run the government, some MPs say one or both will eventually have to go. The idea of Abbott paying with his job if he does not fix the situation is actually canvassed.I am sure there will be - and must be - a reshuffle. I am just as sure that Peta Credlin won’t - and should not - go anywhere.
It is a harsh judgment a little more than a year after an election victory and shows the concerns are more than casual sniping. So great is the frustration over the way the PMO issues orders to ministers that there is no recognition that Credlin has been a key part of the Coalition’s success in the past five years. Nor is there any suspicion that she may be simply sending instructions that the Prime Minister has devised.
The problem isn’t Credlin, a powerful, trusted and effective chief of staff. The problem is that there are not more like her, particularly in the government’s area of maximum weakness - communications and political strategy. A second and even third figure of Credlin’s stature and talent would improve the government’s fighting trim, allow more debate and consideration of contentious policies, take heat off Credlin, improve communications with the backbench and help Abbott seem less remote and feel less alone.
My own suggestion: appoint a communications chief from within the ranks of the MPs themselves, backed by a senior figure from the media. Appoint someone trusted by Abbott to do for him what, say, Peter Mandelson did for Tony Blair. Options include add Cabinet secretary to Scott Morrison’s duties, or, less provocatively, giving an informal role to a Josh Frydenberg, Christian Porter or some straight-shooter MP trusted absolutely. Tell them they and their team have a month to devise a strategy for the Government to come roaring out of the blocks after the break.
Remember: Clinton had communications gurus such as Dick Morris and James Carville. Blair had Mandelson and Alistair Campbell. George Bush had Karl Rove, among others. Abbott has....?
So: new faces, new structure, new strategy, new energy, new reason to reconsider the verdict on this government. This could be exciting - if the moment is embraced.
(Thanks to reader brett t r.)
Abbott offers his hand to Left, which kicks him in the head
Andrew Bolt December 12 2014 (7:59am)
It is time conservatives defended Tony Abbott as well as advise. More on that on Monday.
Yet Rowan Dean is right in this advice to the very Christian and admirably moral Tony Abbott:
And this will be even worse, by alienating Abbott’s base while winning no votes from the Left:
On the other hand reader Seadrift, of the Left, says he’s impressed:
===Yet Rowan Dean is right in this advice to the very Christian and admirably moral Tony Abbott:
The budget blues can largely be slated to two glaring faults – confusion, and self-contradiction. Both problems that stemmed from a flawed desire to play ‘fair’, (ie pander to the left) rather than to play effectively (ie cut spending decisively and dramatically).To that list of concessions thrown back in Abbott’s face add the $200 million given this week to the United Nations” Green Energy Fund.
One salient point is that no matter how gentle Mr Abbott is with the left, his enemies in too many parts of the media will still attack him regardlessly – always with rabid ferocity. So why bother even attempting to find a media-friendly, centrist position? The squeals of protest could hardly get any louder than they are at the moment. Mr Abbott’s various centrist offerings (abandoning 18C, taxes at the top end, a generous paid parental leave scheme, talk of ditching the medical co-payment etc) more often than not fail to find favour. Certainly, they haven’t bought him many new friends on the left side of the playground. Mr Abbott is at his most effective when he’s punching hard and his aim is true.
And this will be even worse, by alienating Abbott’s base while winning no votes from the Left:
TONY Abbott has revealed he wants the vote for constitutional change to recognise indigenous Australians on the 50th anniversary of the 1967 referendum, the 27th of May 2017, saying he is “prepared to sweat blood on this”....UPDATE
In a strong speech to the Recognize dinner in Sydney tonight before many prominent indigenous leaders, Mr Abbott said recognition of indigenous Australians was “at least as important as all the other causes this Government has been prepared to take on."…Mr Abbott told the Recognize fundraising dinner that he was supporter of constitutional recognition because he wanted our country “to transcend the ‘them and us’ mindset to embrace “all of us” in the spirit of generous inclusion that has always marked Australians at our best.”
On the other hand reader Seadrift, of the Left, says he’s impressed:
Tony Abbott’s finest moment to date. For once he spoke clearly and passionately about something important to him. If he can continue to draw on inspiration as he did tonight he would have no need to fret about the polls.But I suspect reader Marshy is closer to the mark:
Tony Abbott says at the Recognise dinner last night that he wants to end the “us and them mindset”. By creating a separate section in the constitution for one particular race. How can our PM not see the blatant absurdity of this? You cannot end a racial divide by creating yet another division based solely on race.
On becoming the Mr Gregarious I see on TV
Andrew Bolt December 12 2014 (7:55am)
My almost annual Christmas diary for The Spectator Australia is here.
===No, we’re not facing huge, rising seas. Just check the beach
Andrew Bolt December 12 2014 (7:39am)
Bob Carter on turning back the sea-level alarmists:
===AUSTRALIA is lucky to possess the high-quality, 128-year-long tide gauge record from Fort Denison (Sydney Harbour), which since 1886 indicates a long-term rate of sea-level rise of 0.65mm a year, or 6.5cm a century…
Similarly low rates of local sea-level rise have been measured at other tide gauges along the east coast. National Tidal Centre records reveal variations between about 5cm and 16cm/century in rates of relative rise. The differences between individual tide gauges mostly represent slightly differing rates of subsidence of the land at each site, and differing time periods.
For example, measurements at Sydney between 2005 and 2014 show the tide gauge site is sinking at a rate of 0.49mm/yr, leaving just 0.16mm/yr of the overall relative rise as representing global sea-level change. Indeed, the rate of rise at Fort Denison, and globally, has been decreasing for the past 50 years.
Despite this high-quality and unalarming data, it is surprising that some east coast councils have implemented coastal planning regulations based on the computer projections of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. For instance, a recent consultancy report for the Shoalhaven and Eurobodalla shire councils, informed by IPCC computer model projections, advised those councils to plan using a rate of rise of 3.3mm/yr, four times the rate at Fort Denison.
The numbers were in part based on experimental estimates of sea-level change provided by satellite altimetry measurements. NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which launches the satellite platforms, says these estimates contain errors larger than the sea-level signal claimed and proposes spending more than $US100 million on launching a new GRASP satellite to rectify the matter…
In mid-2010, the Eurobodalla council, south of Shoalhaven, introduced a unique interim sea level rise policy that shackled more than a quarter of all properties in the shire to restrictive development controls....In three years, individual Eurobodalla properties lost about $40,000 in value…
So it is not surprising that NSW and Queensland governments are reconsidering their coastal management policies.
Queensland Deputy Premier Jeff Seeney recently notified Moreton Bay Regional Council of his intention to direct it to amend its draft planning scheme “to remove any assumption about a theoretical projected sea level rise due to climate change from all and any provisions of the scheme”.... Sea-level alarmism has passed high tide and is at last declining. With luck, empirical sanity will soon prevail over modelling.
Wastrel student union lectures Abbott Government on finances
Andrew Bolt December 12 2014 (6:55am)
The National Union of Students fights a government trying to match spending to income:
The National Union of Students called a national day of action to… protest the federal government’s funding cuts to higher educationThe National Union of Students doesn’t match its own spending to income:
FACTIONALISM, poor management and unchecked expenses have driven the National Union of Students to the financial brink, with a damning audit report revealing that the launching pad of many celebrated political careers is losing money and burning through cash reserves.... Financial statements seen by The Australian show the organisation had a deficit of $192,193 in the year ending June 2012, $78,223 for the year ending June last year and a further loss of $95,9504 for the financial year ending June this year.Strangely enough, the kind of people who blew the nation’s savings are the kind of people who blew the National Union of Students’ savings, too:
A number of former members of the NUS executive said financial reports and audited statements were often not circulated, but were passed by the dominant Labor Party factions that controlled the union even if they had not being sighted....
The NUS, and its predecessor the Australian Union of Students, have launched the careers of many well-known Labor figures, including former prime minister Julia Gillard and opposition immigration spokesman Richard Marles...
===
ACTUAL RAPE VICTIMS MAY DISAGREE
Tim Blair – Thursday, December 12, 2013 (11:32am)
According to John Birmingham:
The harmless and largely inoffensive ABC … has become the target of right wing gang rapists.
John has such a delicate way with metaphors.
UPDATE. Birmingham’s line is now re-written:
The harmless and largely inoffensive ABC … has become the target of the right wing.
Interesting.
DIFFERENT DAY
Tim Blair – Thursday, December 12, 2013 (5:21am)
Upset by criticism of her mistaken belief that the Eiffel Tower was illuminated in South African colours to mark Nelson Mandela’s death, Lisa Wilkinson responds:
Check your own facts. Eiffel Tower WAS lit up to honour Mandela. Just on a different day.
Brilliant! The Wilkinson Gambit works for just about every incorrect claim you can imagine:
• Labor DID win the federal election. Just on a different day.
• Tim Flannery was RIGHT about rain not falling. Just on a different day.
• Peter FitzSimons DOES have hair. Just on a different day.
Readers are invited to offer their own variations on Lisa’s inventive excuse.
OFFICIAL SOURCE
Tim Blair – Thursday, December 12, 2013 (5:10am)
Seven months ago an enraged Islamic fellow stood in a London street and told the world that he’d slaughtered a British soldier in the name of Allah. Many in the media, particularly at the ABC, refused to listen. Even though the blood-drenched murderer cited the Koran, ABC types remained in denial:
“Where is your primary and official source that these crimes were carried out in the name of Islam … ?”“What proof do you have that these crimes were even carried out by a Muslim man or in the name of the religion?”“The ABC does not exist to inflame racial tensions like Tim Blair.”
The accused killer is now on trial:
The Islamist fanatic accused of murdering soldier Lee Rigby told a court he “loves” al Qaeda and considers the terror group “his brothers in Islam”.Michael Adebolajo, 28, also told the Old Bailey jury that he was a “soldier of Allah” and that he had no regrets over the killing because he was obeying his god.Asked who al Qaeda were by his counsel, David Gottlieb, Adebolajo replied: “Al Qaeda, I consider to be Mujahideen. I love them, they’re my brothers. I have never met them. I consider them my brothers in Islam.”He added: “Mujahideen are the army of Allah.”
Finally, the ABC seems to hear him.
AXIS OF ADAMS
Tim Blair – Thursday, December 12, 2013 (4:45am)
“Miranda Devine admits to an error,” gloats Phillip Adams. “Earth stops on its axis.”
This is unseemly. Devine apologised for her error and corrected it within hours. By contrast, let’s see how the clock is ticking on just a few of Phil’s historic howlers:
• Adams presents Washington Post column extracts as though they came from his ABC program. Time waiting for a correction: 11 years and one month.
• Adams relocates GM headquarters from Detroit to New York. Time waiting for a correction: Ten years and four months.
• Plastic turkey. Time waiting for a correction: Nine years and 11 months.
• Adams becomes utterly bewildered about Ralph Nader, at one point committing two errors within four words. Time waiting for a correction: Five years.
And then there was this Adams claim, from 2007:
One of my most chilling experiences on this programme ever was a long interview I did with Helen Demidenko, which made my blood freeze.
That interview never happened. In a rare semi-correction, Adams dismissed his blunder as a mere senior moment.
SUE YOUR OWN PARTY
Tim Blair – Thursday, December 12, 2013 (4:38am)
Sarah Hanson-Young is currently suing Zoo Weekly for publishing an image of the Greens senator’s face photoshopped on to the body of a bikini model. According to a NSW Supreme Court judge, the image is “reasonably capable” of exposing Hanson-Young to ridicule.
Yet Hanson-Young’s own party has created similar artistic works, presenting the senator in a wholly unrealistic and comically sexualised way:
The case continues.
The case continues.
WORLD’S OLDEST MAN
Tim Blair – Thursday, December 12, 2013 (4:20am)
According to Google, former Test batsman Doug Walters is about to celebrate his 168th birthday:
Not bad for a bloke with a long-term smoking hobby.
Not bad for a bloke with a long-term smoking hobby.
(Via reader Dave, who notes that Walters “was actually 117 when he debuted for NSW, if Google is to be believed. Bit of a late starter but he made the most of it.")
FULL NELSON
Tim Blair – Thursday, December 12, 2013 (4:16am)
I may be in trouble:
A shop boss was arrested and quizzed by police for eight hours for cracking Nelson Mandela jokes on the internet.Neil Phillips said he was fingerprinted, DNA-swabbed and had his computers seized.The 44-year-old was held after posting: “My PC takes so long to shut down I’ve decided to call it Nelson Mandela.”
Not a great gag, but he didn’t deserve the complete Robben Island treatment.
Mark Leibler responds. The law may have been “misapplied” against me and the slur was “outrageous”
Andrew Bolt December 12 2013 (8:47am)
Mark Leibler is one of the Jewish leaders fighting reforms to the Racial Discrimination Act under which I had two articles banned.
He yesterday responded to two blog posts in which I criticised Jewish community leaders - although not the community itself - for not just supporting an illiberal law, but for trashing principle and me personally.
My points were:
But I appreciate Mark’s frankness and goodwill, and hold him in the same esteem he professes for me. I particularly appreciate him now revealing publicly what I did not know even privately. As he puts it:
(I have written on this issue in the upcoming Spectator. That article was written before I got Mark’s email.)
UPDATE
On reflection, i can’t let my gratitude to Mark stop me from making some points. I feel Mark has avoided the real issue. The verdict against me was not merely a case of the law being misapplied. The law itself is so recklessly broad that it encouraged this very process and arguably this very verdict. It is for that reason, I believe, that not one of the Jewish community leaders who told me privately they opposed the outcome said so publicly or spoke in my defence. To have done so would have been to concede the law did indeed need reform.
Professor Sinclair Davidson:
===He yesterday responded to two blog posts in which I criticised Jewish community leaders - although not the community itself - for not just supporting an illiberal law, but for trashing principle and me personally.
My points were:
- Several prominent Jewish spokesmen had privately told me they disagreed with the verdict and even the breadth of the Racial Discrimination Act, if used to silence even me, yet not one of those spokesmen had ever said so publicly. It was as if though by conceding an injustice, they risked losing a law they thought useful. I was, in my phrase, “collateral damage”.Leibler has now responded. I disagree with points he makes and vehemently disagree with his attack on our free speech. I wish he’d gone further in denouncing the verdict against me, which I think makes the case for reform of the RDA unanswerable.
- Not a single Jewish spokesman had publicly condemned Ron Merkel QC for telling the Jewish judge in my case that my thinking in the article was of the kind that the Nazis had in drawing up the Nuremberg race laws, (Danny Lamm, however, did offer to speak on my behalf.) I thought this vile slur, explosive in the context of my case, was not just a gross misuse of the victims of the Holocaust, but was false and known to be false by the many members of the Jewish community, who knew me to be one of the most prominent media defenders of Israel and the Jewish community generally. It seemed to me, again, that my reputation was collateral damage in a fight to preserve (unjust) laws.
- I was alarmed that my personal reputation was further being attacked by people who should know better. One very prominent Jewish leader (certainly not Leibler) had even suggested I believed in the “Jewish conspiracy”. I warned that phrasing the debate over the RDA as between racists and non-racists was not just false and offensive, but would damage the standing of someone many Jews felt was useful in defending them publicly.
- These laws would eventually be turned against Jews and those who criticised Islam.
But I appreciate Mark’s frankness and goodwill, and hold him in the same esteem he professes for me. I particularly appreciate him now revealing publicly what I did not know even privately. As he puts it:
It is my view that your column which formed the subject matter of the court case was misconceived. However, there is a respectable legal argument that in fact the judge misapplied the relevant test in your case. I also agree that the analogy used by the barrister in your case was absolutely misconceived and outrageous. Moreover, I have communicated this to him and others and this is no secret.But I won’t go on. I’ve made my case before, and I want Mark to now put his own:
Dear Andrew,Again, I am grateful to Mark for going as far as he did. I wish he’d gone much further, but the difference between us is one of opinion and not respect.
I refer to your recent blogs on 6 and 9 December 2013 in relation to the proposed repeal of S.18C of the Racial Discrimination Act and the Jewish Community.
Let me begin by emphasizing that I regard you as a friend of the Jewish community and hold you in high regard. And may I also add that there are occasions when I have some pretty fundamental disagreements on important issues with people who I would regard as friends. I admire many of your articles, op-eds and blogs on a range of issues, in particular relating to lsrael. They are also admired overwhelmingly within the Jewish community. That does not mean that we will not have differences of opinion with you on specific issues.
I strongly disagree with the views which you articulate from time to time in relation to indigenous affairs. It is my view that your column which formed the subject matter of the court case was misconceived. However, there is a respectable legal argument that in fact the judge misapplied the relevant test in your case. I also agree that the analogy used by the barrister in your case was absolutely misconceived and outrageous. Moreover, I have communicated this to him and others and this is no secret.
The fact that you have a particular view in relation to S.18C of the Racial Discrimination Act cloes not make you an enemy of, or in any way hostile to, the Jewish community. lt certainly does not put you in the category of people who are racist or have any form of racial bias. I have never ever suggested or even hinted otherwise and the same is the case for AIJAC ancl all other responsible Jewish organisations that I am aware of. In fact, many of us are very strongly supportive of some - but not necessarily all - causes that you take up in your columns.
You are, of course, entitled to clisagree with the views of Daniel Meyerowitz-Katz recently published in The Australian. However, to suggest that this article in some way sanctions the ”vilification of people” like yourself or amounts to “publicly insulting” you is, frankly, impossible for me to comprehend. There is nothing in this article which in any way makes you “collateral damage” in the Jewish community’s efforts to persuade the government not to repeal S.18C, albeit, that there is justification for a review. The article by Meyerowitz-Katz concedes that the decision in your case was “controversial” as distinct from almost 20 years of positive outcomes in other cases.
Andrew, I will maintain - and responsible Jewish community organisations will maintain - opposition to the wholesale repeal of S.l8C of the Racial Discrimination Act. This is not in any way directed at you. It ought not to be regarded as damaging to you and it is certainly neither offensive to you or intended to be offensive to you.
I have no problem about the views which I have communicated in this letter being made public. If you so desire, feel free to publish this letter on your blog.
Warm regards. Mark Leibler
(I have written on this issue in the upcoming Spectator. That article was written before I got Mark’s email.)
UPDATE
On reflection, i can’t let my gratitude to Mark stop me from making some points. I feel Mark has avoided the real issue. The verdict against me was not merely a case of the law being misapplied. The law itself is so recklessly broad that it encouraged this very process and arguably this very verdict. It is for that reason, I believe, that not one of the Jewish community leaders who told me privately they opposed the outcome said so publicly or spoke in my defence. To have done so would have been to concede the law did indeed need reform.
Professor Sinclair Davidson:
Well Mark Leibler of the Australia/Israel and Jewish Affairs Council has written to Andrew Bolt – but again only providing private assurance – although he is happy for the letter to be republished on his blog…
Wow. Really? I would have though that the same letter published in the Jewish News or on the op-ed page of The Australian would be far more powerful; that would be a show of public support.
So here is the story. First Leibler throws Judge Mordecai Bromberg to the wolves:
… there is a respectable legal argument that in fact the judge misapplied the relevant test in your case.So we have a bad law on our hands? Or a judge who wouldn’t apply the law? Or both? Regrettably Leibler doesn’t explore this point. Given his continued support for 18C, I suspect this is a criticism of Bromberg.
Then Leibler has a go at Ron Merkel:
I also agree that the analogy used by the barrister in your case was absolutely misconceived and outrageous. Moreover, I have communicated this to him and others and this is no secret.Good. Yet the operative word here is “secret”. Who knew? Perhaps this criticism was reported in the media – I haven’t seen it.
Then Leibler throws Daniel Meyerowitz-Katz to the wolves.
You are, of course, entitled to disagree with the views of Daniel Meyerowitz-Katz recently published in The Australian. However, to suggest that this article in some way sanctions the “vilification of people” like yourself or amounts to “publicly insulting” you is, frankly, impossible for me to comprehend.Let’s go to the tape. What did Meyerowitz-Katz say?
If people genuinely think it should be legal for Australians to harass others on the basis of race, then they are welcome to make that argument. What’s troubling about the anti-18C campaign is its dishonesty…Yep – reads like he is saying that anyone opposed to 18C is a racist. Frankly, it’s impossible for me to comprehend how that’s publicly insulting too.
But then, being honest about 18C makes it harder to spin the provision as a threat to free speech, and nobody wants to openly defend racial harassment. Do they?
The bottom line:
Andrew, I will maintain – and responsible Jewish community organisations will maintain – opposition to the wholesale repeal of S.l8C of the Racial Discrimination Act. This is not in any way directed at you. It ought not to be regarded as damaging to you and it is certainly neither offensive to you or intended to be offensive to you.But for the small matter of a court judgement and being described as “some sort of neo-Nazi planning a holocaust” this isn’t about Andrew Bolt at all.
To be fair to Mark Leibler, friends can agree to disagree and this is how he sees the issue. Friends who agree 99 per cent of the time work on the 99 per cent and work around the 1 per cent. I can’t see this as a 1 per cent issue. This is a fork in the road. Those who choose to walk down the path of 18C must do so alone, without the comfort and friendship of those of us who choose freedom over slavery.
The real scandal is how the media ran dead on the AWU scandal
Andrew Bolt December 12 2013 (8:40am)
VICTORIA’S chief magistrate this week shamed the journalists who’d protected former prime minister Julia Gillard.
He disgraced media outlets which claimed for years there was nothing in the Australian Workers Union scandal.
So I wasn’t surprised by the coverage magistrate Peter Lauritsen got when he ruled on Monday that there were reasonable grounds to suspect that legal documents - many prepared or overseen by Gillard as a solicitor - were “in furtherance of the commission of a fraud or an offence” by her then boyfriend and unnamed “others”.
Coverage from Fairfax’s Age newspaper? None.
Coverage from key ABC current affairs shows such as 7.30 and Lateline? None.
Maybe they were too embarrassed. You see, there are two scandals here.
(Read full article here.)
===He disgraced media outlets which claimed for years there was nothing in the Australian Workers Union scandal.
So I wasn’t surprised by the coverage magistrate Peter Lauritsen got when he ruled on Monday that there were reasonable grounds to suspect that legal documents - many prepared or overseen by Gillard as a solicitor - were “in furtherance of the commission of a fraud or an offence” by her then boyfriend and unnamed “others”.
Coverage from Fairfax’s Age newspaper? None.
Coverage from key ABC current affairs shows such as 7.30 and Lateline? None.
Maybe they were too embarrassed. You see, there are two scandals here.
(Read full article here.)
Damned hypocrites and Gillard’s police
Andrew Bolt December 12 2013 (8:33am)
Niki Savva finally gets a squeak out of the misogyny police who’d screamed the house down when Julia Gillard got the kind of abuse now hurled at Christopher Pyne:
===On Friday evening, November 29 ... someone with the moniker Ghost of PJK tweeted a picture of Christopher Pyne with a text message saying: “As the NSW Education Minister rails against the Gonski betrayal, Pyne is smugly loitering. What a c..t.”(Thanks to reader Peter.)
ACT Education Minister Joy Burch pressed three buttons to retweet the picture and text that same night…
Canberra Liberals say Burch’s retweet was still around last Wednesday evening, December 4… Friday, a week after her retweet, Burch rang Pyne’s office, spoke to his chief of staff, Meredith Jackson, and apologised.
Burch, a tweeter of four years standing, assured Jackson it was “an accident” and said she hadn’t really focused on what the tweet said, and when she realised she deleted it almost instantly…
Burch did not return a call seeking to clear up aspects of her story, including the apparent discrepancy between her claim she had immediately deleted the retweet and its appearance onscreen days later…
(I)f it had been a Liberal minister, man or woman, who had retweeted such a crude sentiment… Labor women would have been apopleptic. So on Tuesday I emailed three of them...(Tanya) Plibersek kept her apoplexy in check with seven words: “That kind of language is clearly inappropriate.”
(Kate) Ellis did slightly better: “I understand it was an accident, but she was right to apologise for it. Twitter is a world of far too much abuse, vulgarity and bullying at times, and it shouldn’t be encouraged.”
(Penny) Wong said she only became aware of the tweet through the media, it was obviously inappropriate and it was right that Burch had apologised. Under Labor’s watch, Mitsubishi and Ford failed, Holden foundered, Qantas faltered, debt ballooned and education standards fell. Hypocrisy flourished.
That’s it. No more nice guy. Taking on rogue unions
Andrew Bolt December 12 2013 (8:27am)
Good for the country - and good for the Liberals, who need to realise the best form of defence is attack:
(Thanks to reader Peter of Bellevue Hill.)
===THE Abbott government will establish a royal commission into union malfeasance in the new year.The Liberals should today make an issue of the Toyota union vote as well.
Terms of reference are under development but The Australian understands the inquiry will focus on slush funds and examine union financial management and financial control…
The royal commission replaces an election commitment for a judicial inquiry into the Australian Workers Union. Government sources said it would be inappropriate to proceed in this direction, given current court action involving the one-time boyfriend of former prime minister Julia Gillard, Bruce Wilson, and the operation of the AWU Workplace Reform Association in the early 1990s. The Australian understands the commission will have wide-ranging powers.Sources indicated it could cause severe embarrassment for a range of senior Labor figures.
(Thanks to reader Peter of Bellevue Hill.)
The answer isn’t more subsidies but saner unions
Andrew Bolt December 12 2013 (8:15am)
We have paid Holden annual subsidies amounting to more than $50,000 a year per worker, but high costs still killed it - and especially the high costs imposed by unions.
Now the unions at Toyota, also subsidised, seem hell-bent on killing our last car-maker, too. Grace Collier:
===Now the unions at Toyota, also subsidised, seem hell-bent on killing our last car-maker, too. Grace Collier:
Now that Holden has announced its departure, we need to consider the Toyota situation, which will come to a head with a vote on its enterprise agreement tomorrow. In September 2011, thousands of Toyota workers went on a protracted strike to get a 12 per cent pay rise. The company caved in; a deal with a 13 per cent pay rise between then and March 2015 was given. Base rates for technical and trade workers are in the $65,000 to $97,000 range with generous allowances, loadings and penalties on top.
The Toyota enterprise agreement lists its “purpose” as “to achieve TMCA’s success as a Global Company” yet no single business contract could guarantee its failure more. This document, as much as Holden’s, reflects an extraordinary level of union control over daily workplace organisation.
When Toyota wants to hire someone, a union (employee) representative must sit in every single job interview as “an observer”.... A table in the agreement sets out exactly how many union representatives the company has to have in every section of the workplace and 10 paid union training days a year is given to union reps.
Toyota is allowed to hire casuals only from “time to time” and not at all without union agreement, although agreement must not be “unreasonably withheld”. Casuals can perform only the “agreed specified tasks” for the “agreed specified period” mandated by the union. “The maximum period for which a Casual Employee can work continuously on a full-time basis is one month” and any casual around for six months must be made a permanent employee.
Contract labour can be hired only after Toyota reaches “agreement with the relevant Union official and Employee (union) Representative”. Contractors around for 12 months must be made permanent employees.
This means Toyota can never really have a hiring freeze but are continually bound to a destructive cycle of taking people on before eventually having to make them redundant....
Over-staffing must be a big problem because the agreement mandates one team leader to look after “between 5-7 process workers”. Supervisors, whose base rates range from $75,000 to $103,000, are forbidden from helping with workloads… If Toyota needs to dismiss someone, an outrageous procedure of at least three years and three months continuous disciplinary action is required before dismissal can occur. This defies belief.
Not drowning, just waving to his friends
Andrew Bolt December 12 2013 (8:09am)
I think he was signing: “Look at me! I’m standing next to celebrities!”:
===A MAN who provided sign language interpretation for Barack Obama and other dignitaries at Nelson Mandela’s memorial service was “a fake”, according to multiple sign language experts.
Bruno Druchen, the national director of the Deaf Federation of South Africa, said the man, seen next to the US president and other world leaders, “was moving his hands around but there was no meaning in what he used his hands for.” “He’s a complete fraud,” said Cara Loening, director of Sign Language Education and Development in Cape Town.
All we got for our Holden subsidies were lies
Andrew Bolt December 12 2013 (8:07am)
HOLDEN has confirmed it is closing in four years, so someone lied to us.
Just last year the Gillard Government - aided by South Australia and Victoria - handed Holden another $275 million.
Prime Minister Julia Gillard told us our cash won this guarantee: “Holden will be here in Australia producing cars for at least the next 10 years.”
Complete bull. GM Holden announced it would in fact stop making cars in Australia in 2017.
That’s five years earlier than we were guaranteed by our last handout to Holden, which has had more than $2 billion worth of them over 12 years.
Still, the announcement was the most honest news we’ve had for a long time.
(Read full article here.)
===Just last year the Gillard Government - aided by South Australia and Victoria - handed Holden another $275 million.
Prime Minister Julia Gillard told us our cash won this guarantee: “Holden will be here in Australia producing cars for at least the next 10 years.”
Complete bull. GM Holden announced it would in fact stop making cars in Australia in 2017.
That’s five years earlier than we were guaranteed by our last handout to Holden, which has had more than $2 billion worth of them over 12 years.
Still, the announcement was the most honest news we’ve had for a long time.
(Read full article here.)
Jim Spigelman surely can’t think conservatives are so stupid. Or is the ABC too biased to save?
Andrew Bolt December 12 2013 (7:37am)
The answer to Greg Sheridan’s rhetorical question is yes:
Interestingly, Spigelman did concede that episodes of bias occur in ABC news and current affairs, but he claims the problem is not systemic. That, frankly, is ridiculous. Surely no one seriously contests that the culture across almost all ABC radio and TV programs remotely concerned with politics is centre-left and beyond.
===Surely it is almost beyond parody that the ABC intends to prove it is not biased in its news and current affairs by appointing a BBC journalist to conduct an audit.I cannot believe that ABC chairman Jim Spigelman, a former judge, is this stupid or takes the rest of us to be even more stupid to accept it. I can only assume he does not have the heart or the strength to be frank:
Interestingly, Spigelman did concede that episodes of bias occur in ABC news and current affairs, but he claims the problem is not systemic. That, frankly, is ridiculous. Surely no one seriously contests that the culture across almost all ABC radio and TV programs remotely concerned with politics is centre-left and beyond.
If not, perhaps Spigelman could point to the two hours a night of national radio broadcasts by a centre-right figure to match Phillip Adams. Or he might inform us of the centre-right presenter of Media Watch to match all the centre-left presenters? Or the centre-right equivalent of Jonathan Green and all the others.Bias matters. As Sheridan notes, the ABC’s excuses for leaking stolen intelligence secrets about our spying are informed by bias:
The ... ABC made foolish and offensive arguments.Sheridan then lets rip at ABC types ...
For example, ABC managing director Mark Scott equated the story to the revelations a few years ago that officials of the AWB allegedly had paid kickbacks to Saddam Hussein’s regime in Iraq to secure wheat sales. And the ABC’s director of news, Kate Torney, characterised the story as being about an “abuse of power” by Australian intelligence agencies. In a fascinating piece in last Saturday’s Weekend Financial Review, Christopher Joye quoted an unnamed but “very senior” Australian defence official as saying: “The ABC continues to report that routine and lawful Australian Signals Directorate operations are a scandal....”
Labor blames world factors for Ford closing, the Liberals for Holden closing
Andrew Bolt December 12 2013 (7:00am)
Spot the difference.
May 2013:
Hypocrites.
And deceivers. Ford and Holden both blame, among other things, high local costs.
===May 2013:
Ford will close its manufacturing operations in Broadmeadows and Geelong, Victoria, in October 2016, shedding 1200 jobs and ending its 90-year-old association with vehicle building in Australia…December 2013:
Ford Australia president Bob Graziano ... cited the high cost of manufacturing a relatively small number of cars in Australia, saying costs were four times those of Asia and double those of Europe…
Prime Minister Julia Gillard ... also cited the high dollar…
In July 2012, six months after Ms Gillard gave Ford another $34 million in assistance, her government ruled out another taxpayer bailout of Ford after the car maker said it would cut 440 jobs .. Australian Manufacturers Workers’ Union Victorian assistant state secretary Leigh Diehm said he was worried about the impact of the closures on the rest of the auto industry.
Holden’s decision to ... close its two local plants and shift to importing all models after 2017 brings the curtain down on Australia’s most popular locally made car…And, of course, the unions who made no blame of the Gillard Government for the Ford closure now blame the Abbott Government for Holden’s:
GM chairman and chief executive Dan Akerson said in a statement from Detroit “the decision to end manufacturing in Australia reflects the perfect storm of negative influences the automotive industry faces in the country ... including the sustained strength of the Australian dollar, high cost of production, small domestic market and arguably the most competitive and fragmented auto market in the world”....
Bill Shorten accused the government of “sabotage” against Holden. “I believe that Holden were pushed,” the Opposition Leader said. “What we don’t understand is when the Australian government decides to sabotage its own industry."…
“The blame for this lies squarely at the foot of the Abbott government,” AMWU national vehicles division secretary Dave Smith said…Ford shuts, Labor and unions blame overseas factors. Holden shuts, Labor and unions blame Liberals.
Mr Smith, who was reduced to tears addressing reporters in Melbourne and had to stop briefly to regain his composure, said he was gutted by news of the announcement.
Hypocrites.
And deceivers. Ford and Holden both blame, among other things, high local costs.
A promising change in the weather
Andrew Bolt December 12 2013 (6:51am)
Reader Turtle sees a weather ad he likes:
===I just saw Sky News’ ad for their weather channel for summer. I like the way they criticise other weather reports for making ‘pretty sensational comments’ but ‘you’ll get none of that from us’...’absolutely not’.Does anyone have any insight into this seemingly heartening development?
It’s almost a sly nod to AGW skeptics. Good one.
Another “stolen generations” claim
Andrew Bolt December 12 2013 (6:41am)
Another “stolen generations” claim makes it to court. Not one has yet succeeded - and, no, theBruce Trevorrow case does not fit the classic definition once put by Professor Robert Manne:
===Ms Whitman, 74, said she witnessed Russell Milera and his siblings being taken, by the Aborigine Protection Board, from her stepfather’s Kilburn house in 1957.(Thanks to reader observa.)
She was just 18 when the children’s distraught father - her step-uncle, Douglas - asked her to hand them over because he could not bear to do so…
Mr Milera, 65, is suing the State Government in the District Court, accusing them of unlawfully removing him from his father in 1957…
He asserts his father did not give the board permission to take the children, nor had the board filed court proceedings seeking to take the children due to neglect. The State Government has rejected those assertions, claiming Douglas Milera gave the board written consent to take his children into state care.
http://www.alternet.org/personal-health/14-habits-highly-miserable-people#.UqlUpZSFEks.facebook
They vote ALP and then lose their jobs .. ed
http://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/relationships/female-libido-drug-flibanserin-remains-in-limbo-due-to-impasse-with-us-food-and-drug-administration/story-fnet0gt3-1226781113680
Female sex drug a Pfizer. - ed===
http://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/relationships/teacher-michael-ciccarelli-barges-in-on-students-having-sex-breaks-kids-nose/story-fnet09p2-1226781882059
Lucky the kids weren't doing drugs, or preparing a terrorist action. - ed===
http://www.news.com.au/technology/online/new-slower-national-broadbank-network-to-cost-30-billion-more-than-labors-previous-plan/story-fnjwncel-1226781570899
ALP option failed. Lib option is superior .. but Farr's words are misleading - ed===
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/opinion/leave-us-alone-to-enjoy-our-simple-pleasures-and-sins/story-fni0cwl5-1226780965198
===
http://www.collective-evolution.com/2013/09/22/what-happens-to-our-body-after-drinking-coca-cola/
===Organisation for Islamic Cooperation (OIC) secretary-general Ekmeleddin İhsanoğlu discusses his trip to Burma and the Rohingya:
"There is fear, suspicion and mistrust driven by false propaganda against Islam and Muslims on social media and by some extremists...In fact, the Rohingya are an indigenous people of the land and should be accorded their legal rights."
http://www.dvb.no/interview/rohingya-are-an-indigenous-people-of-the-land-oic-sec-gen-burma-myanmar/35165
===
http://www.livescience.com/41859-ouija-board.html
==="And now it's time for one last bow, like all your other selves. Eleven’s hour is over now. The clock is striking Twelve's."
It's here! Watch the official trailer for this year's Christmas special, #TheTimeoftheDoctor:http://bbc.in/TTOTDtrailer
===
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-12-12/emails-reveal-john-mcternan-oblivious-on-abortion-law/5150964
===Frank Severino
Musicians will get this one: An ad pops up from a music store in my email, "Neumann mics for under $200!" Click the link...it's 8 payments of "under $200" per month lol.
===
http://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/parenting/united-nations-wants-australia-to-ban-smacking-prosecute-offending-parents/story-fnet085v-1226780993923
It won't work .. the UN doesn't insist kids read or write .. The UN endorses child suicide bombers and Palestinians raising killers, but doesn't want a child raised well - ed===
http://www.israpundit.com/archives/63592249#.Uqk5n7KdePg.facebook
Left and right are extremes .. and very similar .. I would argue that Nazis were left wing and had no problems with communism until they fought them .. but that is pedantry. I prefer conservative, not extremist positions - ed
======
http://unitycoalitionforisrael.org/news/?p=10161#.Uqk0CLDnV7I.facebook
===
http://www.timesofisrael.com/measles-vaccine-developer-warns-jewish-anti-vaxxers/#.Uqkx1UHwKIA.facebook
===Only in Israel can something like this happen. Maybe it's because we value life above all else.
israel21c.org
http://israel21c.org/health/===
http://www.israpundit.com/archives/63592281#.UqknPthJV0I.facebook
===Jews ( from the Hebrew יהודי, the name of the proportion of Judah , of the sons of Jacob ) are the sons of the people or nation are characterized by the followers of the Jewish religion , or culture and heritage stemming from this religion . Jews consider themselves modern descendants of the people of the kingdom of Judah , who were attributing to four of the tribes of Israel, twelve : Judah , Samoun , Benjamin and Levi , separated after the Babylonian captivity to the Jews and to the Samaritans . Religion gone through many developments throughout history , especially after the collapse of the kingdom of Judah and the destruction of the Second Temple in the first century AD.
Since the second century AD took the Jews scattered around the world , where no information on the Jewish communities in many countries throughout history , since the mid- 20th century, concentrated Jews in Israel and North America with a smaller communities in Europe , South America and Iran.
Origin of the term "Jew" and how it is used in the Old Testament did not know , but from religious sources , especially from the books of the Bible , and Sources indicate that the origin of the title "Jew " in the name of Judah, son of Jacob and was originally on the children of the tribe , who came out of him , then fired on the population of the kingdom of Judah founded by the sons of the tribe with the sons of some of the smaller tribes, who live next to it.
In documents archaeological remember this kingdom as the " House of David " relative to the dynasty of King David ( David Prophet in Islam ) . In Kings II ( 18.26 ) mentions the name of " Jewish " as the name of dialect spoken in the city of Jerusalem , since the Babylonian captivity became the title of a Jew refers to both came out of the kingdom of Judah continued to follow their religion and traditions (for example, in the Book of Esther ) , and there are words to say that the word " Jews " is an Arabic word meaning repentance , the verse on the lips of Moses, peace be upon him : "I am Hdna to you ," Al- norms ( 156 ) .
The modern Jewish law , which has evolved since the second century AD regarded as both a Jew born to a Jewish mother , and this account for unimpaired the identity of the father or the lifestyle that is followed by the human .
As well as a non-Jew can convert to Judaism, but skeptics do not encourage rabbis to convert to Judaism . Some Jews defies reformers and secular definition of " Who is a Jew " by Jewish law and suggest alternative definitions such as : the parents of a Jew or a Jew who considers himself a pure heart , there are also attempts to facilitate the process of Judaism and to reduce the demands of those who wanted to convert to Judaism .
After the founding of the State of Israel in 1948, has become the definition of " Who is a Jew " issue severe as the state announced its goal to collect Jews from all over the world , and enacted that every Jew has the right to resettle in Israel . According to the settlement of existing , and set forth in the " Law of Return " Israeli Jew is a person born to a Jewish mother or converted to Judaism , but if you follow our last involuntarily , while a pair of Jewish , children , spouses of children , grandchildren and spouses of grandchildren and becoming the rights set forth in the " Law of Return " had not considered Jews , ( and if the matter was Jewish attributed to them had died ) . Israeli law also recognizes all types of Judaism , including the reform Judaism according to the rules which it argues rabbis Altfezon
===
Analyst: Kerry's Jordan Valley Arrangements 'A Death-Trap'
===
http://www.algemeiner.com/2013/12/11/christians-rising-idf-enlistment-signals-greater-integration-into-israeli-life/
===
http://www.algemeiner.com/2013/12/11/jimmy-carter-meets-knesset-speaker-at-south-africa-airport-asks-about-charedi-idf-enlistment/
===
http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.co.il/2013/12/todays-winner-of-quote-of-day-mohammad.html
===<Shoot the bastards. They deserve nothing better. Let them go to their 72 year old virgins.>
http://youtu.be/YZC7A-Lr4Eo
===
http://www.jerusalemonline.com/israel-news/israel-main-newscast-31-10-2013-2176
===
http://www.jpost.com/International/German-football-club-ends-Saudi-Airline-contract-because-of-Israel-boycott-333959
===
http://www.jewsnews.co.il/2013/12/11/analyst-kerrys-jordan-valley-arrangements-a-death-trap/
=== - 627 – Battle of Nineveh: A Byzantine army under Emperor Heraclius defeats Emperor Khosrau II's Persian forces, commanded by General Rhahzadh.
- 884 – King Carloman II dies after a hunting accident. He is succeeded by his cousin, emperor Charles the Fat, who for the last time reunites the Frankish Empire.
- 1098 – First Crusade: Siege of Ma'arrat al-Numan: Crusaders breach the town's walls and massacre about 20,000 inhabitants. After finding themselves with insufficient food, they reportedly resort to cannibalism.
- 1388 – Mary of Enghien sells the lordship of Argos and Nauplia to the Republic of Venice.
- 1408 – The Order of the Dragon, a monarchical chivalric order, is created by Sigismund of Luxembourg, then king of Hungary.
- 1781 – American Revolutionary War: Second Battle of Ushant: A British fleet led by HMS Victorydefeats a French fleet.
- 1787 – Pennsylvania becomes the second state to ratify the United States Constitution, five days after Delaware became the first.
- 1862 – American Civil War: USS Cairo sinks on the Yazoo River, becoming the first armored ship to be sunk by a controlled mine.
- 1866 – Oaks explosion: The worst mining disaster in England kills 361 miners and rescuers.
- 1870 – Joseph H. Rainey of South Carolina becomes the second black U.S. congressman, the first being Hiram Revels.
- 1897 – Belo Horizonte, the first planned city in Brazil, is founded.
- 1901 – Guglielmo Marconi receives the first transatlantic radio signal (the letter "S" [***] in Morse Code), at Signal Hill in St John's, Newfoundland.
- 1911 – Delhi replaces Calcutta as the capital of India.
- 1911 – King George V of the United Kingdom and Mary of Teck are enthroned as Emperor and Empress of India.
- 1915 – President of the Republic of China, Yuan Shikai, announces his intention to reinstate the monarchy and proclaim himself Emperor of China.
- 1917 – In Nebraska, Father Edward J. Flanagan founds Boys Town as a farm village for wayward boys.
- 1918 – The Flag of Estonia is raised atop the Pikk Hermann for the first time.
- 1925 – The Majlis of Iran votes to crown Reza Khan as the new Shah of Iran, starting the Pahlavi dynasty.
- 1935 – Lebensborn Project, a Nazi reproduction program, is founded by Heinrich Himmler.
- 1936 – Xi'an Incident: The Generalissimo of the Republic of China, Chiang Kai-shek, is kidnapped by Zhang Xueliang.
- 1937 – Second Sino-Japanese War: USS Panay incident: Japanese aircraft bomb and sink U.S. gunboat USS Panay on the Yangtze river in China.
- 1939 – Winter War: Battle of Tolvajärvi: Finnish forces defeat those of the Soviet Union in their first major victory of the conflict.
- 1939 – HMS Duchess sinks after a collision with HMS Barham off the coast of Scotland with the loss of 124 men.
- 1940 – World War II: Approximately 70 people are killed in the Marples Hotel, Fitzalan Square, Sheffield, as a result of a German air raid.
- 1941 – World War II: Fifty-four Japanese A6M Zero fighters raid Batangas Field, Philippines. Jesús Villamor and four Filipino fighter pilots fend them off; César Basa is killed.
- 1941 – World War II: The United Kingdom declares war on Bulgaria. Hungary and Romania declare war on the United States. India declares war on Japan.
- 1941 – Adolf Hitler declares the imminent extermination of the Jews at a meeting in the Reich Chancellery
- 1942 – World War II: German troops begin Operation Winter Storm, an attempt to relieve encircledAxis forces during the Battle of Stalingrad.
- 1946 – A fire at an ice plant in Hudson Heights, Manhattan spreads to an adjacent tenement, killing 37 people.
- 1948 – Malayan Emergency: Batang Kali massacre: Fourteen members of the Scots Guardsstationed in Malaya allegedly massacre 24 unarmed civilians and set fire to the village.
- 1950 – Paula Ackerman, the first woman appointed to perform rabbinical functions in the United States, leads the congregation in her first services.
- 1956 – Beginning of the Irish Republican Army's "Border Campaign".
- 1963 – Kenya gains its independence from the United Kingdom.
- 1964 – Prime Minister Jomo Kenyatta becomes the first President of the Republic of Kenya.
- 1969 – Years of Lead: Piazza Fontana bombing: The offices of Banca Nazionale dell'Agricoltura in Piazza Fontana, Milan, are bombed.
- 1979 – Coup d'état of December Twelfth: South Korean Army Major General Chun Doo-hwanorders the arrest of Army Chief of Staff General Jeong Seung-hwa without authorization from President Choi Kyu-ha, alleging involvement in the assassination of ex-President Park Chung-hee.
- 1979 – President of Pakistan Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq confers Nishan-e-Imtiaz on Nobel laureate Dr Abdus Salam.
- 1979 – The unrecognised state of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia returns to British control and resumes using the name Southern Rhodesia.
- 1979 – The 8.2 Mw Tumaco earthquake shakes Colombia and Ecuador with a maximum Mercalli intensity of IX (Violent), killing 300–600, and generating a large tsunami.
- 1983 – The Australian Labor government led by Prime Minister Bob Hawke and Treasurer Paul Keating floats the Australian dollar.
- 1984 – Maaouya Ould Sid'Ahmed Taya becomes the third president of Mauritania after a coup d'étatagainst Mohamed Khouna Ould Haidalla while the latter is attending a summit.
- 1985 – Arrow Air Flight 1285, a McDonnell Douglas DC-8, crashes after takeoff in Gander, Newfoundland, killing all 256 people on board, including 236 members of the United States Army's 101st Airborne Division.
- 1988 – The Clapham Junction rail crash kills thirty-five and injures hundreds after two collisions of three commuter trains—one of the worst train crashes in the United Kingdom.
- 1991 – The Russian Federation gains independence from the USSR.
- 2000 – The United States Supreme Court releases its decision in Bush v. Gore.
- 2001 – Prime Minister of Vietnam Phan Văn Khải announces the decision on upgrading the Phong Nha–Kẻ Bàng nature reserve to a national park, providing information on projects for the conservation and development of the park and revised maps.
- 2012 – North Korea successfully launches its first satellite, Kwangmyŏngsŏng-3 Unit 2, using an Unha-3 carrier rocket.
- 1298 – Albert II, Duke of Austria (d. 1358)
- 1418 – Archduke Albert VI of Austria (d. 1463)
- 1526 – Álvaro de Bazán, 1st Marquis of Santa Cruz, Spanish admiral (d. 1588)
- 1574 – Anne of Denmark (d. 1619)
- 1610 – Basil of Ostrog, Serbian monk and saint (d. 1671)
- 1685 – Lodovico Giustini, Italian pianist and composer (d. 1743)
- 1724 – Samuel Hood, 1st Viscount Hood, English admiral and politician (d. 1816)
- 1731 – Erasmus Darwin, English physician and poet (d. 1802)
- 1766 – Nikolay Karamzin, Russian poet and historian (d. 1826)
- 1779 – Madeleine Sophie Barat, French nun and saint, founded the Society of the Sacred Heart (d. 1865)
- 1786 – William L. Marcy, American lawyer, judge, and politician, 21st United States Secretary of State (d. 1857)
- 1792 – Alexander Ypsilantis, Greek-Russian general and politician, Military ruler of Moldavia (d. 1828)
- 1799 – Karl Bryullov, Russian painter (d. 1852)
- 1805 – Henry Wells, American businessman, co-founded Wells Fargo and American Express (d. 1878)
- 1806 – Stand Watie, American general (d. 1871)
- 1812 – John Sandfield Macdonald, Canadian lawyer and politician, 1st Premier of Ontario (d. 1872)
- 1814 – Juan Prim, 1st Marquis of los Castillejos, Spanish general and politician, Prime Minister of Spain (d. 1870)
- 1821 – Gustave Flaubert, French novelist (d. 1880)
- 1842 – Adolf Bötticher, German journalist and historian (d. 1901)
- 1845 – Bruce Price, American architect, designed the American Surety Building and Bank of the Metropolis (d. 1903)
- 1849 – William Kissam Vanderbilt, American businessman and horse breeder (d. 1920)
- 1862 – J. Bruce Ismay, English businessman (d. 1937)
- 1863 – Edvard Munch, Norwegian painter and illustrator (d. 1944)
- 1864 – Paul Elmer More, American journalist, author, and critic (d. 1937)
- 1866 – Alfred Werner, Swiss chemist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1919)
- 1870 – Walter Benona Sharp, American businessman, co-founded Hughes Tool Company (d. 1912)
- 1875 – Gerd von Rundstedt, German field marshal (d. 1953)
- 1876 – Alvin Kraenzlein, American hurdler and runner (d. 1928)
- 1881 – Harry Warner, Polish-American businessman, co-founded Warner Bros (d. 1958)
- 1882 – Ioannis Demestichas, Greek admiral and politician (d. 1960)
- 1884 – Zinaida Serebriakova, Ukrainian-French painter (d. 1967)
- 1887 – Kurt Atterberg, Swedish composer and engineer (d. 1974)
- 1892 – Milko Kos, Slovenian historian and academic (d. 1972)
- 1893 – Edward G. Robinson, American actor (d. 1973)
- 1900 – Sammy Davis, Sr., American actor and dancer (d. 1988)
- 1901 – Harald Kaarmann, Estonian footballer (d. 1942)
- 1902 – Adele Dunlap, American educator and supercentenarian (d. 2017)
- 1903 – Yasujirō Ozu, Japanese director and screenwriter (d. 1963)
- 1904 – Nicolas de Gunzburg, French-American banker and journalist (d. 1981)
- 1905 – Manès Sperber, Austrian-French psychologist and author (d. 1984)
- 1905 – Vasily Grossman, Russian journalist and author (d. 1964)
- 1907 – Roy Douglas, English pianist and composer (d. 2015)
- 1908 – Gustav Ernesaks, Estonian composer and conductor (d. 1993)
- 1909 – Hans Keilson, German-Dutch psychologist, author, and poet (d. 2011)
- 1909 – Karen Morley, American actress and political activist (d. 2003)
- 1911 – Boun Oum, Laotian politician, 5th Prime Minister of Laos (d. 1980)
- 1912 – Henry Armstrong, American boxer (d. 1988)
- 1914 – Patrick O'Brian, English author and translator (d. 2000)
- 1915 – Frank Sinatra, American singer, actor, and producer (d. 1998)
- 1918 – Joe Williams, American singer and pianist (d. 1999)
- 1919 – Olivia Barclay, English astrologer and author (d. 2001)
- 1919 – Dan DeCarlo, American soldier and illustrator (d. 2001)
- 1920 – Josef Doležal, Czech race walker (d. 1999)
- 1920 – Fred Kida, American illustrator (d. 2014)
- 1922 – Christian Dotremont, Belgian painter and poet (d. 1979)
- 1923 – Bob Barker, American game show host and producer
- 1923 – Bob Dorough, American musician, composer, and producer
- 1924 – Ed Koch, American lawyer, judge, and politician, 105th Mayor of New York City (d. 2013)
- 1925 – Ted Kennedy, Canadian ice hockey player (d. 2009)
- 1925 – Dattu Phadkar, Indian cricketer (d. 1985)
- 1925 – Vladimir Shainsky, Ukrainian-Russian pianist and composer
- 1925 – Ahmad Shamloo, Iranian journalist and poet (d. 2000)
- 1927 – Robert Noyce, American inventor and businessman, co-founded the Intel Corporation (d. 1990)
- 1928 – Chinghiz Aitmatov, Kyrgyzstani diplomat and author (d. 2008)
- 1928 – Lionel Blair, English actor
- 1928 – Helen Frankenthaler, American painter and academic (d. 2011)
- 1929 – Toshiko Akiyoshi, Japanese pianist and composer
- 1929 – John Osborne, English playwright and screenwriter (d. 1994)
- 1930 – Silvio Santos, Brazilian television host and businessman, founded Sistema Brasileiro de Televisão
- 1932 – Bob Pettit, American basketball player and coach
- 1933 – Manu Dibango, Cameroonian saxophonist and vibraphone player
- 1933 – Christa Stubnick, German sprinter
- 1934 – Miguel de la Madrid, Mexican lawyer and politician, 52nd President of Mexico (d. 2012)
- 1935 – John Wise, Canadian farmer and politician, 23rd Minister of Agriculture (d. 2013)
- 1936 – Iolanda Balaș, Romanian high jumper and educator (d. 2016)
- 1936 – Denise Coffey, English actress and director
- 1937 – Michael Jeffery, Australian general and politician, 24th Governor-General of Australia
- 1937 – Philip Ledger, English pianist, composer, and academic (d. 2012)
- 1937 – Buford Pusser, American police officer (d. 1974)
- 1938 – Connie Francis, American singer and actress
- 1939 – Terry Kirkman, American singer-songwriter and musician
- 1940 – Sharad Pawar, Indian politician, Indian Minister of Agriculture
- 1940 – Dionne Warwick, American singer
- 1942 – Morris Sadek, Egyptian-American lawyer and activist
- 1942 – Brough Scott, English jockey and journalist
- 1943 – Vassilis Alexakis, Greek-French author and translator
- 1943 – Dickey Betts, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
- 1943 – Sadeq Tabatabaei, Iranian journalist and politician (d. 2015)
- 1943 – Grover Washington, Jr., American singer-songwriter, saxophonist, and producer (d. 1999)
- 1944 – Jean Doré, Canadian lawyer and politician, 39th Mayor of Montreal (d. 2015)
- 1944 – Cara Duff-MacCormick, Canadian actress
- 1944 – Zoe Laskari, Greek actress
- 1944 – Rob Tyner, American singer-songwriter and bass player (d. 1991)
- 1945 – Portia Simpson-Miller, Jamaican politician, 7th Prime Minister of Jamaica
- 1945 – Tony Williams, American drummer, composer, and producer (d. 1997)
- 1946 – Emerson Fittipaldi, Brazilian race car driver
- 1947 – Will Alsop, English architect and academic
- 1947 – Wings Hauser, American actor, director, and screenwriter
- 1947 – Chris Mullin, English journalist and politician
- 1948 – Colin Todd, English football player and coach
- 1949 – Gopinath Munde, Indian lawyer and politician, 3rd Deputy Chief Minister of Maharashtra (d. 2014)
- 1949 – Bill Nighy, English actor
- 1949 – Marc Ravalomanana, Malagasy businessman and politician, President of Madagascar
- 1950 – Pedro Ferriz de Con, Mexican journalist
- 1950 – Martina Hellmann, German athlete
- 1950 – Heiner Flassbeck, German economist and academic
- 1950 – Gorman Thomas, American baseball player
- 1950 – Rajinikanth, Indian actor
- 1950 – Billy Smith, Canadian ice hockey player, coach, and manager
- 1951 – Rehman Malik, Pakistani politician, Pakistani Minister of Interior
- 1952 – Herb Dhaliwal, Indian-Canadian businessman and politician, 3rd Canadian Minister of Natural Resources
- 1952 – Sarah Douglas, English actress
- 1952 – Cathy Rigby, American gymnast
- 1953 – Martin Ferguson, Australian lawyer and politician
- 1953 – Bruce Kulick, American guitarist and songwriter
- 1953 – Rafael Septién, Mexican-American football player
- 1955 – Gianna Angelopoulos-Daskalaki, Greek businesswoman
- 1955 – Eddy Schepers, Belgian cyclist
- 1955 – Stephen Smith, Australian lawyer and politician, 53rd Australian Minister of Defence
- 1956 – Johan van der Velde, Dutch cyclist
- 1957 – Sheila E., American singer-songwriter, drummer, and actress
- 1958 – Alexander Crutchfield, American businessman, financier and investor
- 1959 – Jasper Conran, English fashion designer
- 1960 – Martina Hellmann, German discus thrower
- 1961 – Andrey Perlov, Russian race walker
- 1962 – Tracy Austin, American tennis player and sportscaster
- 1962 – Arturo Barrios, Mexican-American runner
- 1962 – Peter Bergen, American-English journalist and author
- 1962 – Mike Golic, American football player and radio host
- 1962 – Ulrike Tillmann, German mathematician and academic
- 1963 – Eduardo Castro Luque, Mexican businessman and politician (d. 2012)
- 1964 – Reeta Chakrabarti, English journalist
- 1964 – Haywood Jeffires, American football player and coach
- 1965 – Will Carling, English rugby player
- 1966 – Royce Gracie, Brazilian-American mixed martial artist and actor
- 1966 – Ian Paisley, Jr., Northern Irish politician
- 1967 – Yuzo Koshiro, Japanese composer and producer
- 1967 – John Randle, American football player
- 1968 – Rory Kennedy, American director and producer
- 1968 – Sašo Udovič, Slovenian footballer
- 1968 – Laurie Williams, Jamaican cricketer (d. 2002)
- 1969 – Sophie Kinsella, English author and educator
- 1969 – Wilfred Kirochi, Kenyan runner
- 1969 – Fiona May, English-Italian long jumper
- 1969 – Michael Möllenbeck, German discus thrower
- 1970 – Jennifer Connelly, American actress
- 1970 – Regina Hall, American actress
- 1971 – Sammy Korir, Kenyan runner
- 1972 – Nicky Eaden, English footballer and coach
- 1972 – Craig Field, Australian rugby league player
- 1972 – Wilson Kipketer, Kenyan-Danish runner
- 1972 – Georgios Theodoridis, Greek sprinter
- 1972 – Hank Williams III, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
- 1973 – Tony Hsieh, American businessman, founded LinkExchange
- 1973 – Walter Otta, Argentinian footballer
- 1974 – Bernard Lagat, Kenyan-American runner
- 1974 – Nolberto Solano, Peruvian footballer and manager
- 1975 – Mayim Bialik, American actress
- 1975 – Wesley Charles, Vincentian footballer
- 1975 – Craig Moore, Australian footballer and manager
- 1976 – Dan Hawkins, English guitarist, songwriter, and producer
- 1976 – Brent Johnson, Canadian football player
- 1976 – Lloyd Owusu, Ghanaian footballer
- 1977 – Yoel Hernández, Cuban hurdler
- 1977 – Orlando Hudson, American baseball player
- 1977 – Dean Macey, English decathlete and bobsledder
- 1977 – Colin White, Canadian ice hockey player
- 1978 – Gbenga Akinnagbe, American actor and screenwriter
- 1978 – Shin Seung-hwan, South Korean actor
- 1979 – Garrett Atkins, American baseball player
- 1979 – Nate Clements, American football player
- 1979 – John Salmons, American basketball player
- 1980 – Dejene Berhanu, Ethiopian runner (d. 2010)
- 1980 – Dorin Goian, Romanian footballer
- 1980 – Berkant Göktan, Turkish-German footballer
- 1981 – Ronnie Brown, American football player
- 1981 – Jeret Peterson, American skier (d. 2011)
- 1981 – Pedro Ríos, Spanish footballer
- 1981 – Yuvraj Singh, Indian cricketer
- 1981 – Stephen Warnock, English footballer
- 1982 – Dmitry Tursunov, Russian tennis player
- 1984 – Daniel Agger, Danish footballer
- 1984 – Daniel Merrett, Australian footballer
- 1985 – Pat Calathes, Greek-American basketball player
- 1985 – Chris Jennings, American football player
- 1985 – David Veikune, American football player
- 1985 – Giannis Zaradoukas, Greek footballer
- 1986 – Daddy Birori, Rwandan footballer
- 1986 – Përparim Hetemaj, Finnish footballer
- 1986 – Nina Kolarič, Slovenian long jumper
- 1986 – T. J. Ward, American football player
- 1987 – Marte Eberson, Norwegian keyboard player and composer
- 1988 – Isaac John, New Zealand rugby league player
- 1988 – Tony Williams, Australian-Tongan rugby league player
- 1989 – Mike Glennon, American football player
- 1990 – Nixon Chepseba, Kenyan runner
- 1990 – Victor Moses, Nigerian footballer
- 1990 – Seungri, South Korean singer-songwriter
- 1991 – Joseph Leilua, Australian-Samoan rugby league player
- 1993 – Zeli Ismail, English footballer
- 1994 – Mitchell Pinnock, English footballer
- 1994 – Otto Warmbier, American student imprisoned in North Korea (d. 2017)
- 1996 – Lachlan Croker, Australian rugby league player
Births[edit]
- 884 – Carloman II, Frankish king (b. 866)
- 894 – Guy III, king of Italy and Holy Roman Emperor
- 948 – Li Song, Chinese official and chancellor
- 1143 – Kogyo-Daishi, restorer of Shingon Buddhism in Japan (b. 1095)
- 1204 – Maimonides, Egyptian religious scholar, philosopher and physician (b. 1135)
- 1212 – Geoffrey, English archbishop and politician, Lord Chancellor of England (b. 1152)
- 1475 – Joan of Portugal, Queen of Castile (b. 1439)
- 1476 – Frederick I, Elector Palatine (b. 1425)
- 1569 – Philip II, Metropolitan of Moscow (b. 1507)
- 1574 – Selim II, Ottoman Sultan (b. 1524)
- 1586 – Stephen Báthory, Polish king (b. 1533)
- 1685 – John Pell, English mathematician and linguist (b. 1610)
- 1751 – Henry St John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke, English philosopher and politician, Secretary at War (b. 1678)
- 1758 – Françoise de Graffigny, French lettrist (b. 1695)
- 1766 – Johann Christoph Gottsched, German philosopher, author, and critic (b. 1700)
- 1782 – Charles Gray, English lawyer and politician (b. 1696)
- 1789 – John Ponsonby, Irish lawyer and politician (b. 1713)
- 1790 – Mikhail Shcherbatov, Russian historian and philosopher (b. 1733)
- 1794 – Meshullam Feivush Heller, Ukrainian author (b. 1742)
- 1803 – Prince Frederick Adolf of Sweden (b. 1750)
- 1817 – Tekle Giyorgis I, Ethiopian emperor (b. 1751)
- 1843 – William I of the Netherlands (b. 1772)
- 1858 – Jacques Viger, Canadian archeologist and politician, 1st Mayor of Montreal (b. 1787)
- 1889 – Robert Browning, English poet and playwright (b. 1812)
- 1889 – Viktor Bunyakovsky, Ukrainian-Russian mathematician and theorist (b. 1804)
- 1894 – John Sparrow David Thompson, Canadian lawyer, judge, and politician, 4th Prime Minister of Canada (b. 1845)
- 1913 – Menelik II, Ethiopian emperor (b. 1844)
- 1921 – Henrietta Swan Leavitt, American astronomer and academic (b. 1868)
- 1923 – Raymond Radiguet, French author and poet (b. 1903)
- 1924 – Alexander Parvus, Russian-German theorist and politician (b. 1867)
- 1926 – Jean Richepin, French author, poet, and playwright (b. 1849)
- 1934 – Thorleif Haug, Norwegian skier (b. 1894)
- 1939 – Douglas Fairbanks, Sr., American actor, producer, and screenwriter (b. 1883)
- 1941 – César Basa, Filipino lieutenant and pilot (b. 1915)
- 1951 – Mildred Bailey, American singer (b. 1907)
- 1952 – Bedřich Hrozný, Czech orientalist and linguist (b. 1879)
- 1958 – Albert Walsh, Canadian lawyer and politician, 1st Lieutenant Governor of Newfoundland (b. 1900)
- 1963 – Yasujirō Ozu, Japanese director and screenwriter (b. 1903)
- 1964 – Maithili Sharan Gupt, Indian poet and playwright (b. 1866)
- 1964 – William Rootes, 1st Baron Rootes, English businessman, founded Rootes Group (b. 1894)
- 1966 – Karl Ruberl, Austrian-American swimmer (b. 1880)
- 1968 – Tallulah Bankhead, American actress (b. 1902)
- 1970 – Doris Blackburn, Australian politician (b. 1889)
- 1970 – George Terwilliger, American director and screenwriter (b. 1882)
- 1971 – Yechezkel Kutscher, Israeli philologist and linguist (b. 1909)
- 1971 – David Sarnoff, Belarusian-American businessman (b. 1891)
- 1975 – Richard Baggallay, English colonel and cricketer (b. 1884)
- 1976 – Jack Cassidy, American actor (b. 1927)
- 1978 – Fay Compton, English actress (b. 1894)
- 1980 – Jean Lesage, Canadian lawyer and politician, 19th Premier of Quebec (b. 1912)
- 1985 – Anne Baxter, American actress (b. 1923)
- 1985 – Ian Stewart, Scottish keyboard player and manager (b. 1938)
- 1986 – Paul Verner, German politician (b. 1911)
- 1987 – Enrique Jorrín, Cuban violinist and composer (b. 1926)
- 1992 – Suzanne Lilar, Belgian author and playwright (b. 1901)
- 1993 – József Antall, Hungarian historian and politician, 35th Prime Minister of Hungary (b. 1932)
- 1994 – Stuart Roosa, American colonel, pilot, and astronaut (b. 1933)
- 1994 – Donna J. Stone, American poet and philanthropist (b. 1933)
- 1996 – Vance Packard, American journalist, author, and critic (b. 1914)
- 1997 – Evgenii Landis, Ukrainian-Russian mathematician and academic (b. 1921)
- 1998 – Lawton Chiles, American soldier, lawyer, and politician, 41st Governor of Florida (b. 1930)
- 1998 – Marco Denevi, Argentinian author and screenwriter (b. 1922)
- 1998 – Mo Udall, American captain and politician (b. 1922)
- 1999 – Paul Cadmus, American painter and illustrator (b. 1904)
- 1999 – Joseph Heller, American novelist, short story writer, and playwright(b. 1923)
- 2000 – George Montgomery, American actor, stuntman, director, producer, and screenwriter (b. 1916)
- 2000 – Ndabaningi Sithole, Zimbabwean militant leader, founded Zimbabwe African National Union(b. 1920)
- 2001 – Ardito Desio, Italian geologist and explorer (b. 1897)
- 2002 – Dee Brown, American historian and author (b. 1908)
- 2003 – Heydar Aliyev, Azerbaijani general and politician, 3rd President of Azerbaijan (b. 1923)
- 2003 – Gangodawila Soma Thero, Sri Lankan monk and educator (b. 1948)
- 2005 – Robert Newmyer, American actor and producer (b. 1956)
- 2005 – Ramanand Sagar, Indian director, producer, and screenwriter (b. 1917)
- 2005 – Annette Stroyberg, Danish actress (b. 1936)
- 2005 – Gebran Tueni, Lebanese journalist and politician (b. 1957)
- 2006 – Paul Arizin, American basketball player (b. 1928)
- 2006 – Peter Boyle, American actor (b. 1935)
- 2006 – Kenny Davern, American clarinet player and saxophonist (b. 1935)
- 2006 – Raymond P. Shafer, American lawyer and politician, 38th Governor of Pennsylvania (b. 1917)
- 2006 – Alan Shugart, American engineer and businessman, co-founded Seagate Technology (b. 1930)
- 2007 – François al-Hajj, Lebanese general (b. 1953)
- 2007 – Ike Turner, American singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer (b. 1931)
- 2008 – Avery Dulles, American cardinal and theologian (b. 1918)
- 2008 – Van Johnson, American actor (b. 1916)
- 2008 – Tassos Papadopoulos, Cypriot lawyer and politician, 5th President of Cyprus (b. 1934)
- 2010 – Tom Walkinshaw, Scottish race car driver, founded Tom Walkinshaw Racing (b. 1946)
- 2012 – Joe Allbritton, American banker, publisher, and philanthropist, founded the Allbritton Communications Company (b. 1924)
- 2012 – Nityanand Swami, Indian lawyer and politician, 1st Chief Minister of Uttarakhand (b. 1927)
- 2012 – David Tait, English rugby player (b. 1987)
- 2013 – Tom Laughlin, American actor, director, producer, and screenwriter (b. 1931)
- 2013 – Abdul Quader Molla, Bangladeshi journalist and politician (b. 1948)
- 2013 – Leo Sachs, German-Israeli biologist and academic (b. 1924)
- 2013 – Jang Sung-taek, North Korean general and politician (b. 1946)
- 2013 – Audrey Totter, American actress (b. 1917)
- 2014 – Norman Bridwell, American author and illustrator, created Clifford the Big Red Dog (b. 1928)
- 2014 – Ivor Grattan-Guinness, English mathematician, historian, and academic (b. 1941)
- 2014 – Herb Plews, American baseball player (b. 1928)
- 2014 – Yury Shutov, Russian politician (b. 1946)
- 2015 – Luis Bermejo, Spanish illustrator (b. 1931)
- 2015 – Frans Geurtsen, Dutch footballer (b. 1942)
- 2015 – Sharad Anantrao Joshi, Indian farmer and politician (b. 1935)
- 2015 – Evelyn S. Lieberman, American politician, White House Deputy Chief of Staff (b. 1944)
- 2016 – Shirley Hazzard, Australian-American novelist, short story writer, and essayist (b. 1931)
- 2017 – Ed Lee, American politician and attorney, 43rd Mayor of San Francisco (b. 1952)
Deaths[edit]
- Christian feast day:
- Constitution Day (Russia)
- Croatian Air Force Day (Croatia)
- Feast of Masá'il ("Questions"), the first day of the 15th month of the Bahá'í calendar (Bahá'í Faith)
- Ground Forces Day (Ukraine)
- Jamhuri Day, celebrates the independence of Kenya from Britain in 1963.
- Kanji Day (Japan)
- Neutrality Day (Turkmenistan)
Holidays and observances[edit]
“Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.” Isaiah 7:14NIV
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Morning and Evening by Charles Spurgeon
Morning
Heaven is a place where we shall never sin; where we shall cease our constant watch against an indefatigable enemy, because there will be no tempter to ensnare our feet. There the wicked cease from troubling, and the weary are at rest. Heaven is the "undefiled inheritance;" it is the land of perfect holiness, and therefore of complete security. But do not the saints even on earth sometimes taste the joys of blissful security? The doctrine of God's word is, that all who are in union with the Lamb are safe; that all the righteous shall hold on their way; that those who have committed their souls to the keeping of Christ shall find him a faithful and immutable preserver. Sustained by such a doctrine we can enjoy security even on earth; not that high and glorious security which renders us free from every slip, but that holy security which arises from the sure promise of Jesus that none who believe in him shall ever perish, but shall be with him where he is. Believer, let us often reflect with joy on the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints, and honour the faithfulness of our God by a holy confidence in him.
May our God bring home to you a sense of your safety in Christ Jesus! May he assure you that your name is graven on his hand; and whisper in your ear the promise, "Fear not, I am with thee." Look upon him, the great Surety of the covenant, as faithful and true, and, therefore, bound and engaged to present you, the weakest of the family, with all the chosen race, before the throne of God; and in such a sweet contemplation you will drink the juice of the spiced wine of the Lord's pomegranate, and taste the dainty fruits of Paradise. You will have an antepast of the enjoyments which ravish the souls of the perfect saints above, if you can believe with unstaggering faith that "faithful is he that calleth you, who also will do it."
Evening
To what choice order of officials was this word spoken? To kings who proudly boast a right divine? Ah, no! too often do they serve themselves or Satan, and forget the God whose sufferance permits them to wear their mimic majesty for their little hour. Speaks then the apostle to those so-called "right reverend fathers in God," the bishops, or "the venerable the archdeacons"? No, indeed, Paul knew nothing of these mere inventions of man. Not even to pastors and teachers, or to the wealthy and esteemed among believers, was this word spoken, but to servants, aye, and to slaves. Among the toiling multitudes, the journeymen, the day labourers, the domestic servants, the drudges of the kitchen, the apostle found, as we find still, some of the Lord's chosen, and to them he says, "Whatsoever ye do, do it heartily, as to the Lord, and not unto men; knowing that of the Lord ye shall receive the reward of the inheritance: for ye serve the Lord Christ." This saying ennobles the weary routine of earthly employments, and sheds a halo around the most humble occupations. To wash feet may be servile, but to wash his feet is royal work. To unloose the shoe-latchet is poor employ, but to unloose the great Master's shoe is a princely privilege. The shop, the barn, the scullery, and the smithy become temples when men and women do all to the glory of God! Then "divine service" is not a thing of a few hours and a few places, but all life becomes holiness unto the Lord, and every place and thing, as consecrated as the tabernacle and its golden candlestick.
"Teach me, my God and King, in all things thee to see;
And what I do in anything to do it as to thee.
All may of thee partake, nothing can be so mean,
Which with this tincture, for thy sake, will not grow bright and clean.
A servant with this clause makes drudgery divine;
Who sweeps a room, as for thy laws, makes that and the action fine."
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Today's reading: Hosea 5-8, Revelation 2 (NIV)
View today's reading on Bible GatewayToday's Old Testament reading: Hosea 5-8
Judgment Against Israel
1 “Hear this, you priests!
Pay attention, you Israelites!
Listen, royal house!
This judgment is against you:
You have been a snare at Mizpah,
a net spread out on Tabor.
2 The rebels are knee-deep in slaughter.
I will discipline all of them.
3 I know all about Ephraim;
Israel is not hidden from me.
Ephraim, you have now turned to prostitution;
Israel is corrupt.
Pay attention, you Israelites!
Listen, royal house!
This judgment is against you:
You have been a snare at Mizpah,
a net spread out on Tabor.
2 The rebels are knee-deep in slaughter.
I will discipline all of them.
3 I know all about Ephraim;
Israel is not hidden from me.
Ephraim, you have now turned to prostitution;
Israel is corrupt.
4 “Their deeds do not permit them
to return to their God.
A spirit of prostitution is in their heart;
they do not acknowledge the LORD.
5 Israel’s arrogance testifies against them;
the Israelites, even Ephraim, stumble in their sin;
Judah also stumbles with them.
6 When they go with their flocks and herds
to seek the LORD,
they will not find him;
he has withdrawn himself from them.
7 They are unfaithful to the LORD;
they give birth to illegitimate children.
When they celebrate their New Moon feasts,
he will devour their fields....
to return to their God.
A spirit of prostitution is in their heart;
they do not acknowledge the LORD.
5 Israel’s arrogance testifies against them;
the Israelites, even Ephraim, stumble in their sin;
Judah also stumbles with them.
6 When they go with their flocks and herds
to seek the LORD,
they will not find him;
he has withdrawn himself from them.
7 They are unfaithful to the LORD;
they give birth to illegitimate children.
When they celebrate their New Moon feasts,
he will devour their fields....
Today's New Testament reading: Revelation 2
To the Church in Ephesus
1 “To the angel of the church in Ephesus write:
These are the words of him who holds the seven stars in his right hand and walks among the seven golden lampstands. 2I know your deeds, your hard work and your perseverance. I know that you cannot tolerate wicked people, that you have tested those who claim to be apostles but are not, and have found them false. 3 You have persevered and have endured hardships for my name, and have not grown weary.
4 Yet I hold this against you: You have forsaken the love you had at first. 5 Consider how far you have fallen! Repent and do the things you did at first. If you do not repent, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place. 6 But you have this in your favor: You hate the practices of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate.
7 Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To the one who is victorious, I will give the right to eat from the tree of life, which is in the paradise of God....
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