Left wing women make their voices heard. But what they say is not edifying. Soros pays $246 million to marchers? Or to corrupt inciters directing marchers? NZ re starts people smuggling with their compassion.
Justin Trudeau dislikes Christians? What about compassion? Level crossings don't substantially improve traffic? Dan Andrews is spending almost $9 billion to prove even this life saving measure can be badly handled.
New Whig is centre left. It is ok to be centre left. It shows awareness of social issues, but a tendency to plump for bad economic measures and big government. For example on Jan 23rd, in separate articles, New Whig questions whether corporate business can more fairly and efficiently deliver services than government departments. The editorial despises Thatcher for selling off too much. Presumably New Whig liked UK miners costing more than what they mined. In another editorial, New Whig adores the inclusiveness of lost Aboriginal culture Apparently the New Whig author had not heard of, or understood, how Aboriginal activists lied about Aboriginal culture to try to prevent a bridge being built to Hindmarsh Island.
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.
French .. http://www.amazon.fr/-/e/B01683ZOWG
Japan .. http://www.amazon.co.jp/-/e/B01683ZOWG
German .. http://www.amazon.de/-/e/B01683ZOWG
Happy birthday and many happy returns Joey Duong and Trangsta Meow. Born on the same day, across the years, along with
===
Here is a video I made "I Honestly Love You"
"I Honestly Love You" was a worldwide pop hit single for Olivia Newton-John in 1974. The song was Newton-John's first number-one single in the United States and Canada, thus cementing her as a household name in North America. Released on the Long Live Love album in the United Kingdom by EMI, it was eventually released on the album If You Love Me, Let Me Know in the United States on MCA. The song was written by Jeff Barry and the Australian composer Peter Allen; the latter recorded it around the same time on his album Continental American. VH1 placed the song at #11 in the "40 Most Softsational Soft-Rock Songs" list.
=== from 2017 ===
Gladys Berejiklian is NSW Premier. The first conservative Premier in Australia to identify as female. The first question asked of her was of her childless status. News.com.au journalist Liz Burke was up in arms over the alleged sexism. But doesn't seem to know that John Hewson was highly criticised for raising Bob Carr's childless status in parliament. At the time Peter Collins regretfully attacked the then Liberal leader, which is ironic because Collins has had no problem criticising conservative leaders like Howard and Abbott. It was during the time of the Woods Royal commission which would branch off into investigating pedophile teachers as well as police. The sub text for Carr was chilling and unlike Berejiklian, was never answered. It highlights how well NSW has been run under Liberals that that was the most pressing question directed to the new Premier. Berejiklian has done much to earn the position. She brought in the Opal card when it was best, before the press campaigned to make it more expensive. She was Liberal Deputy following Barry O'Farrell's resignation. She had been President of the NSW Young Liberals. She has been treasurer of NSW and has brought NSW into surplus. She is a grandchild of survivors of the Armenian genocide. She speaks English as a second language, having spoken Armenian solely until age five.
My concerns regarding Liberals in NSW is to do with my campaign regarding a dead school child and a bungled pedophile investigation. The two issues are related, but predate the Liberal government. The Liberals have acted responsibly on the issue when in opposition. But the public service has apparently intervened corruptly to protect ALP from criticism. In some ways, it looks like the Libs did a deal with corrupt elements not to rock the boat and restrict their governance from industry areas where unions have run amok. And when Baird crossed the industry divide over greyhounds and drunken violence then the partisan media and corrupt unions have cried foul. So that many on the sidelines have joined in, not knowing which way is up. ALA supporters seemed to feel that over run emergency services, killings and racing corruption are acceptable and saleable for tourism and trade. Berejiklian is a cleanskin. Not even the ICAC have pointed their finger at her. Although they have wrongly pointed it at a number of conservatives. If Berejiklian wishes to clean up NSW public service, or improve the NSW education sector, I am here to help.
For some, at the moment, the Sex Party has more credibility
We know that the building unions in Victoria have acted corruptly. We know they have used stand over tactics to extort money from business. We know they have used slush funds to make elections undemocratic. We know that they have diverted funds meant for their members to personal things. What we have not heard is the mainstream press questioning the government about what they will do to prevent it from getting worse. But now we have new Premier Dan Andrews actually making it worse by removing the protections business have of a body supervising Union activity. Special thanks to Dan Andrews for the next worker to die from compromised safety standards.
My concerns regarding Liberals in NSW is to do with my campaign regarding a dead school child and a bungled pedophile investigation. The two issues are related, but predate the Liberal government. The Liberals have acted responsibly on the issue when in opposition. But the public service has apparently intervened corruptly to protect ALP from criticism. In some ways, it looks like the Libs did a deal with corrupt elements not to rock the boat and restrict their governance from industry areas where unions have run amok. And when Baird crossed the industry divide over greyhounds and drunken violence then the partisan media and corrupt unions have cried foul. So that many on the sidelines have joined in, not knowing which way is up. ALA supporters seemed to feel that over run emergency services, killings and racing corruption are acceptable and saleable for tourism and trade. Berejiklian is a cleanskin. Not even the ICAC have pointed their finger at her. Although they have wrongly pointed it at a number of conservatives. If Berejiklian wishes to clean up NSW public service, or improve the NSW education sector, I am here to help.
=== from 2016 ===
This time last year Campbell Newman was going for reelection in Queensland. Campbell's bitterest opposition was not the ALP whose leader claimed after election that she was unready to lead. The opposition was the trio of Palmer, Alan Jones and Malcolm Turnbull. It was a strange trio. Turnbull wanted to undermine Abbott and so whispered the possibility to Palmer that opposing Abbott could be beneficial with the promise of future agreements should Abbott be rolled. Meanwhile Alan Jones was running a highly political, false campaign against coal seam gas. A very good government was ruined and Queensland pays a high price. Something worth thinking about as some consider why they supported Palmer and who they will support next. One well circulated meme relates to former PM Barton in 1907. Only the words are not his but Theodore Roosevelt and they don't translate to Australia well. But they are very appealing to people who don't understand politics and don't like to be lied to but are willing to embrace a lie. The kind of lie Palmer spoke in order to be elected. For some, at the moment, the Sex Party has more credibility
=== from 2015 ===
David Hicks 'innocent'
There are elements of the US government that do not treasure freedom and undermine the government. Such is the case today where on the date that John Walker Lind was returned to the US and separately, Daniel Pearl was murdered in 2002, David Hicks, a former inmate of GITMO who had been found training with the Taliban has been declared 'innocent' by the US government. He had previously accepted his guilt of training with terrorists so as to be released. He has celebrity status among the left who prize his having faced US armed services and survived. He is invited to speaking engagements for things like 'festival of dangerous ideas' or writer's festivals where he proudly forgets activities he wrote to his home about, like being able to shoot people legally in former Yugoslavia. David was bankrolled by Amnesty International, who are not supposed to protect people who want to kill, but to defend prisoners of conscience. When David has spoken, he has displayed anti semitism in his stated beliefs, and understanding of world organisation and foreign affairs. So what precisely is it the US government finds Hicks innocent of? Apparently training with the Taliban is not, now, considered an act of terror by some in the US government.
Dan Andrews quietly removes industry protection from unions
We know that the building unions in Victoria have acted corruptly. We know they have used stand over tactics to extort money from business. We know they have used slush funds to make elections undemocratic. We know that they have diverted funds meant for their members to personal things. What we have not heard is the mainstream press questioning the government about what they will do to prevent it from getting worse. But now we have new Premier Dan Andrews actually making it worse by removing the protections business have of a body supervising Union activity. Special thanks to Dan Andrews for the next worker to die from compromised safety standards.
Qld election
The QLD ALP have not reformed from the same party which failed to insure from floods they created when they over filled a dam. They had over filled the dam after they assured the public that dams would never be filled again because of global warming. They have opposed sensible measure which have benefited Queensland. The LNP government have been opposed by the press and the ALP on every measure, and yet the have created sensible financial positions which will ensure prosperity for the future. ALP had claimed they would, but never did it. There is no good reason why the QLD Premier would lose his seat, based on performance. One week to go. Good luck Campbell Newman.
From 2014
On the same day John Walker Lind was returned to the US on FBI custody, Journalist Daniel Pearl was murdered by terrorists. On this day, in 2002. One cannot surrender to terrorism and expect justice. Appeasement does not work. Give a little, and terrorists will view their efforts as succeeding. There are no historical examples of success through appeasing terror. But terror is not addressed through terror. Terrorist peoples largely don't want to succeed or die. They want to be made to stop. The concept of restraint and proportionality might be politically expedient, but it isn't what stakeholders want (note, I deny terrorist leadership as stake holders). I invite readers to post where they feel I am wrong. Examples please.
Historical perspective on this day
In 393, Roman Emperor Theodosius I proclaimed his eight-year old son Honorius co-emperor. 971, in China, the war elephant corps of the Southern Han were soundly defeated at Shao by crossbow fire from Song Dynasty troops. 1368, in a coronation ceremony, Zhu Yuanzhangascended the throne of China as the Hongwu Emperor, initiating Ming Dynasty rule over Chinathat would last for three centuries. 1546, having published nothing for eleven years, François Rabelais published the Tiers Livre, his sequel to Gargantua and Pantagruel. 1556, the deadliest earthquake in history, the Shaanxi earthquake, hit Shaanxi province, China. The death toll may have been as high as 830,000. 1570, James Stewart, 1st Earl of Moray, regentfor the infant King James VI of Scotland, was assassinated by firearm, the first recorded instance of such. 1571, the Royal Exchange opened in London. 1579, the Union of Utrechtformed a Protestant republic in the Netherlands. 1656, Blaise Pascal published the first of his Lettres provincials.
In 1719, the Principality of Liechtenstein was created within the Holy Roman Empire. 1789, Georgetown College, the first Catholic University in the United States, was founded in Georgetown, Maryland (now a part of Washington, D.C.) 1793, Second Partition of Poland. 1849, Elizabeth Blackwell was awarded her M.D. by the Geneva Medical College of Geneva, New York, becoming the United States' first female doctor. 1855, the 1855 Wairarapa earthquake and tsunami left 9 dead in New Zealand. Also 1855, the first bridge over the Mississippi River opened in what is now Minneapolis, Minnesota, a crossing made today by the Hennepin Avenue Bridge. 1870, in Montana, U.S. cavalrymen killed 173 Native Americans, mostly women and children, in what became known as the Marias Massacre. 1879, Anglo-Zulu War: the Battle of Rorke's Drift ended. 1897, Elva Zona Heaster was found dead in Greenbrier County, West Virginia. The resulting murder trial of her husband is perhaps the only case in United States history where the alleged testimony of a ghost helped secure a conviction. 1899, the Malolos Constitution was inaugurated, establishing the First Philippine Republic. Also 1899, Emilio Aguinaldo was sworn in as President of the First Philippine Republic.
In 1900, Second Boer War: The Battle of Spion Kop between the forces of the South African Republic and the Orange Free State and British forces ended in a British defeat. 1904, Ålesund Fire: the Norwegian coastal town Ålesund was devastated by fire, leaving 10,000 people homeless and one person dead. Kaiser Wilhelm II funded the rebuilding of the town in Jugendstil style. 1909, RMS Republic, a passenger ship of the White Star Line, became the first ship to use the CQD distress signal after colliding with another ship, the SS Florida, off the Massachusetts coastline, an event that killed six people. The Republic sank the next day. 1912, the International Opium Convention was signed at The Hague. 1920, the Netherlands refused to surrender the exiled Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany to the Allies. 1937, in Moscow, 17 leading Communists went on trial accused of participating in a plot led by Leon Trotsky to overthrow Joseph Stalin's regime and assassinate its leaders. 1941, Charles Lindbergh testified before the U.S. Congress and recommended that the United States negotiate a neutrality pact with Adolf Hitler. 1942, World War II: The Battle of Rabaul began, the first fighting of the New Guinea campaign. 1943, World War II: Troops of Montgomery's 8th Army captured Tripoli in Libya from the German-Italian Panzer Army. Also 1943, World War II: Australian and American forces finally defeated the Japanese army in Papua. Also 1943, Duke Ellington played at Carnegie Hall in New York City for the first time. Also 1943, World War II: The Battle of Mount Austen, the Galloping Horse, and the Sea Horse on Guadalcanal during the Guadalcanal campaign ended. 1945, World War II: German admiral Karl Dönitz launched Operation Hannibal.
In 1950, the Knesset passed a resolution that stated Jerusalem is the capital of Israel. 1957, American inventor Walter Frederick Morrison sold the rights to his flying disc to the Wham-Otoy company, which later renamed it the "Frisbee". 1958, after a general uprising and rioting in the streets, President Marcos Pérez Jiménez left Venezuela. 1960, the bathyscaphe USS Trieste broke a depth record by descending to 10,911 metres (35,797 ft) in the Pacific Ocean. 1961, the Portuguese luxury cruise ship Santa Maria was hijacked by opponents of the Estado Novo regime with the intention of waging war until dictator António de Oliveira Salazar was overthrown. 1963, the Guinea-Bissau War of Independence officially began when PAIGCguerrilla fighters attacked the Portuguese army stationed in Tite. 1964, the 24th Amendmentto the United States Constitution, prohibiting the use of poll taxes in national elections, was ratified. 1967, Diplomatic relations between the Soviet Union and Côte d'Ivoire were established. Also 1967, Milton Keynes (England) was founded as a new town by Order in Council, with a planning brief to become a city of 250,000 people. Its initial designated area enclosed three existing towns and twenty one villages. 1968, North Korea seized the USS Pueblo, claiming the ship had violated its territorial waters while spying.
In 1973, President Richard Nixon announced that a peace accord had been reached in Vietnam. Also 1973, a volcanic eruption devastated Heimaey in the Vestmannaeyjar chain of islands off the south coast of Iceland. 1986, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inducted its first members: Little Richard, Chuck Berry, James Brown, Ray Charles, Fats Domino, the Everly Brothers, Buddy Holly, Jerry Lee Lewis and Elvis Presley. 1997, Madeleine Albright became the first woman to serve as United States Secretary of State. Also 1997, Greek Serial Killer Antonis Daglis was sentenced to thirteen consecutive life sentences, plus 25 years for the serial slayings of three women and the attempted murder of six others. 2001, five people attempted to set themselves on fire in Beijing's Tiananmen Square, an act that many people later claim was staged by the Communist Party of China to frame Falun Gong and thus escalate their persecution. 2002, "American Taliban" John Walker Lindh returned to the United States in FBI custody. Also 2002, reporter Daniel Pearl was kidnapped in Karachi, Pakistanand subsequently murdered. 2003, final communication between Earth and Pioneer 10. 2012, a group of Gaddafi loyalists took control of part of the town of Bani Walid and flew the green flag after a battle with NTC forces left 5 dead and 20 injured.
In 1719, the Principality of Liechtenstein was created within the Holy Roman Empire. 1789, Georgetown College, the first Catholic University in the United States, was founded in Georgetown, Maryland (now a part of Washington, D.C.) 1793, Second Partition of Poland. 1849, Elizabeth Blackwell was awarded her M.D. by the Geneva Medical College of Geneva, New York, becoming the United States' first female doctor. 1855, the 1855 Wairarapa earthquake and tsunami left 9 dead in New Zealand. Also 1855, the first bridge over the Mississippi River opened in what is now Minneapolis, Minnesota, a crossing made today by the Hennepin Avenue Bridge. 1870, in Montana, U.S. cavalrymen killed 173 Native Americans, mostly women and children, in what became known as the Marias Massacre. 1879, Anglo-Zulu War: the Battle of Rorke's Drift ended. 1897, Elva Zona Heaster was found dead in Greenbrier County, West Virginia. The resulting murder trial of her husband is perhaps the only case in United States history where the alleged testimony of a ghost helped secure a conviction. 1899, the Malolos Constitution was inaugurated, establishing the First Philippine Republic. Also 1899, Emilio Aguinaldo was sworn in as President of the First Philippine Republic.
In 1900, Second Boer War: The Battle of Spion Kop between the forces of the South African Republic and the Orange Free State and British forces ended in a British defeat. 1904, Ålesund Fire: the Norwegian coastal town Ålesund was devastated by fire, leaving 10,000 people homeless and one person dead. Kaiser Wilhelm II funded the rebuilding of the town in Jugendstil style. 1909, RMS Republic, a passenger ship of the White Star Line, became the first ship to use the CQD distress signal after colliding with another ship, the SS Florida, off the Massachusetts coastline, an event that killed six people. The Republic sank the next day. 1912, the International Opium Convention was signed at The Hague. 1920, the Netherlands refused to surrender the exiled Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany to the Allies. 1937, in Moscow, 17 leading Communists went on trial accused of participating in a plot led by Leon Trotsky to overthrow Joseph Stalin's regime and assassinate its leaders. 1941, Charles Lindbergh testified before the U.S. Congress and recommended that the United States negotiate a neutrality pact with Adolf Hitler. 1942, World War II: The Battle of Rabaul began, the first fighting of the New Guinea campaign. 1943, World War II: Troops of Montgomery's 8th Army captured Tripoli in Libya from the German-Italian Panzer Army. Also 1943, World War II: Australian and American forces finally defeated the Japanese army in Papua. Also 1943, Duke Ellington played at Carnegie Hall in New York City for the first time. Also 1943, World War II: The Battle of Mount Austen, the Galloping Horse, and the Sea Horse on Guadalcanal during the Guadalcanal campaign ended. 1945, World War II: German admiral Karl Dönitz launched Operation Hannibal.
In 1950, the Knesset passed a resolution that stated Jerusalem is the capital of Israel. 1957, American inventor Walter Frederick Morrison sold the rights to his flying disc to the Wham-Otoy company, which later renamed it the "Frisbee". 1958, after a general uprising and rioting in the streets, President Marcos Pérez Jiménez left Venezuela. 1960, the bathyscaphe USS Trieste broke a depth record by descending to 10,911 metres (35,797 ft) in the Pacific Ocean. 1961, the Portuguese luxury cruise ship Santa Maria was hijacked by opponents of the Estado Novo regime with the intention of waging war until dictator António de Oliveira Salazar was overthrown. 1963, the Guinea-Bissau War of Independence officially began when PAIGCguerrilla fighters attacked the Portuguese army stationed in Tite. 1964, the 24th Amendmentto the United States Constitution, prohibiting the use of poll taxes in national elections, was ratified. 1967, Diplomatic relations between the Soviet Union and Côte d'Ivoire were established. Also 1967, Milton Keynes (England) was founded as a new town by Order in Council, with a planning brief to become a city of 250,000 people. Its initial designated area enclosed three existing towns and twenty one villages. 1968, North Korea seized the USS Pueblo, claiming the ship had violated its territorial waters while spying.
In 1973, President Richard Nixon announced that a peace accord had been reached in Vietnam. Also 1973, a volcanic eruption devastated Heimaey in the Vestmannaeyjar chain of islands off the south coast of Iceland. 1986, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inducted its first members: Little Richard, Chuck Berry, James Brown, Ray Charles, Fats Domino, the Everly Brothers, Buddy Holly, Jerry Lee Lewis and Elvis Presley. 1997, Madeleine Albright became the first woman to serve as United States Secretary of State. Also 1997, Greek Serial Killer Antonis Daglis was sentenced to thirteen consecutive life sentences, plus 25 years for the serial slayings of three women and the attempted murder of six others. 2001, five people attempted to set themselves on fire in Beijing's Tiananmen Square, an act that many people later claim was staged by the Communist Party of China to frame Falun Gong and thus escalate their persecution. 2002, "American Taliban" John Walker Lindh returned to the United States in FBI custody. Also 2002, reporter Daniel Pearl was kidnapped in Karachi, Pakistanand subsequently murdered. 2003, final communication between Earth and Pioneer 10. 2012, a group of Gaddafi loyalists took control of part of the town of Bani Walid and flew the green flag after a battle with NTC forces left 5 dead and 20 injured.
=== 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
- 1350 – Vincent Ferrer, Spanish missionary and saint (d. 1419)
- 1786 – Auguste de Montferrand, French-Russian architect, designed Saint Isaac's Cathedral and Alexander Column (d. 1858)
- 1832 – Édouard Manet, French painter (d. 1883)
- 1855 – John Browning, American weapons designer, founded the Browning Arms Company (d. 1926)
- 1862 – David Hilbert, German mathematician (d. 1943)
- 1920 – Walter Frederick Morrison, American inventor, invented the Frisbee (d. 2010)
- 1928 – Jeanne Moreau, French actress, singer, screenwriter, and director
- 1944 – Rutger Hauer, Dutch actor
- 1954 – Richard Finch, American bass player, songwriter, and producer (KC and the Sunshine Band)
- 1994 – Wesley Jobello, French footballer
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- 1719 – Emperor Charles VI established Liechtenstein, the only principality in the Holy Roman Empire still in existence today.
- 1870 – American Indian Wars: The United States Army massacred a friendly band of Piegan Blackfeet in Montana Territory, resulting in about 200 deaths, mostly women, children, and elderly men.
- 1899 – Pursuant to the adoption of the Malolos Constitution and the establishment of the First Philippine Republic, Emilio Aguinaldo (pictured) was sworn in as the first President of the Philippines.
- 1915 – The Chilembwe uprising, regarded as a seminal moment in the history of Malawi, began as rebels, led by a minister, attacked local plantation owners.
- 1945 – German Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz ordered the beginning of Operation Hannibal, which became one of the largest emergency evacuations by sea in history, with over 1 million people transferred over 15 weeks.
Deaths
- 1002 – Otto III, Holy Roman Emperor (b. 980)
- 1199 – Abu Yusuf Yaqub al-Mansur, Moroccan caliph (b. 1160)
- 1516 – Ferdinand II of Aragon (b. 1452)
- 1548 – Bernardo Pisano, Italian priest, scholar, and composer (b. 1490)
- 1549 – Johannes Honter, Romanian theologian (b. 1498)
- 1567 – Jiajing Emperor of China (b. 1507)
- 1570 – James Stewart, 1st Earl of Moray, Scottish son of James V of Scotland (b. 1531)
- 1622 – William Baffin, English explorer and navigator
- 1744 – Giambattista Vico, Italian philosopher and historian (b. 1668)
- 1785 – Matthew Stewart, Scottish mathematician (b. 1717)
- 1789 – Frances Brooke, English author and playwright (b. 1724)
- 1789 – John Cleland, English author (b. 1709)
- 1800 – Edward Rutledge, American politician, 39th Governor of South Carolina (b. 1749)
- 1803 – Arthur Guinness, Irish brewer, founded Guinness (b. 1725)
- 1805 – Claude Chappe, French engineer (b. 1763)
- 1806 – William Pitt the Younger, English politician, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (b. 1759)
- 1810 – Johann Wilhelm Ritter, German chemist and physicist (b. 1776)
- 1875 – Charles Kingsley English priest and author (b. 1819)
- 1931 – Anna Pavlova, Russian ballerina (b. 1881)
- 1943 – Alexander Woollcott, American actor and journalist (b. 1887)
- 1944 – Viktor Gusev, Russian poet (b. 1909)
- 1944 – Edvard Munch, Norwegian painter (b. 1863)
- 1976 – Paul Robeson, American actor, singer, and activist (b. 1898)
- 1978 – Terry Kath, American guitarist (Chicago) (b. 1946)
- 2005 – Johnny Carson, American talk show host (b. 1925)
- 2014 – Riz Ortolani, Italian composer and conductor (b. 1926)
Tim Blair 2018
MARVEL AT THE MARKET
The free market is a beautiful thing. Offer it a good idea and the market will reward you. Present it with a lame idea and you’ll be shunned like a single-syllable surname in South Australia.
CALL THIS BEARNAISE?
As always, former Sydney Morning Herald petal Mike Carlton finds a negative amid a welter of positives.
GUESS THAT CAR
UPDATED Your challenge: name the car company that originally designed the engine which ended up powering this wheel.
FUN AND GAMES IN AUSTRALIA’S SUDANESE CAPITAL
UPDATED Judith Sloan is right to say “state governments, assisted by the senior police managers, have made it an art form to delay and fudge crime statistics”.
NO NEED FOR GUESTS WHEN CATHY ARGUES WITH HERSELF
Cathy Newman employed a curious tactic during her now-infamous interview with University of Toronto professor Jordan Peterson. Rather than discuss Peterson's actual words, she argued instead against points Peterson never made. Over and over again.
IT’S NOT A S**THOLE, IT’S A S**TPARADISE
UPDATED According to ABC guest Bella Zanesco, all of those Africans fleeing their violent, economically busted sub-optimal nations are making a terrible mistake.
Tim Blair
Continue reading 'Forgoing substance for style up north'
Continue reading 'THREE SPEECH'
===
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MONDAY NOTICEBOARD
IF SOMETHING DOESN’T WORK, TRY IT AGAIN
PIRATE PETE’S PHOTOCOPY FEAT
A UNITED FRONT IS VITAL
YOU’LL GROW OUT OF IT, KID
BAIL INSTEAD OF JAIL
AN EPIDEMIC OF HUSBAND BEATING
EVERY PROTEST NEEDS A PEACE MERCEDES
NOOSA HEAD
Tim Blair – Saturday, January 23, 2016 (2:50pm)
“Check the head tilt on this bloke, Tim!” emails Geoff H. Indeed, Noosa Greens council candidate Aaron White does possess some quality tiltage, combined with at least 3.7 Gillians of smug:
Queensland Greens are an especially colourful bunch.
Queensland Greens are an especially colourful bunch.
UPDATE. They’re tilting all over the place!
===
MALCOLM’S MATES
Tim Blair – Saturday, January 23, 2016 (2:27pm)
Besides Barack Obama, who else did Malcolm Turnbull contact during his US visit?
Turnbull spoke on the phone to Marco Rubio, regarded as the leading “mainstream” candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, but he attempted no contact with the two frontrunners in that contest – Donald Trump and Ted Cruz.And no one close to either of them was invited to an Australian embassy dinner for Republican officials to meet the Australian leader.That is despite the fact that experts Turnbull spoke to in Washington advised him that, on current evidence, one of those men, rather than Rubio or any of the other “establishment” Republican candidates, would be Hillary Clinton’s opponent at the end of the year. Turnbull did get in touch with Clinton.The truth is that he dreads the thought of either Trump, nuttily Right-wing and populist, or Cruz, darling of Tea Party extremists, becoming president of the US.If he can’t have a Rubio-style Republican he would prefer, although he can hardly say so publicly, to see Clinton and the Democrats win.
Add this to this lists of things Thucydides can’t say in public. He can’t even bring himself to mention the Liberal party at his own website.
UPDATE. Seriously:
The Federal Government says it will consider backing Kevin Rudd for a top United Nations job if the former prime minister puts his hat in the ring …Foreign Minister Julie Bishop today said the former Labor leader has yet to apply for the position.“Should Kevin Rudd nominate, then of course the Australian government would consider what sort of support he would require,” she told reporters in New York.
===
OFFER REJECTED
Tim Blair – Saturday, January 23, 2016 (2:06am)
Yesterday afternoon I received the following email from Chris Graham, the editor and publisher of leftist site New Matilda:
Hi Tim,I was wondering if I you had time for a brief chat? I don’t have a problem with your latest piece, I’m just interested in offering our perspective.Also, we haven’t released the transcript of the tape yet – we’re planning that for Sunday. I’d be prepared to ‘leak’ you a copy exclusively, with no caveats attached. All I ask is that if you read it and decide that there is a clear public interest contained within it, you either write a column about it yourself, or you pass it on to the appropriate colleague at News who then files on it. And obviously, if you decide it’s rubbish you’re welcome to bin it.Keen for your thoughts?
My emailed reply:
Chris,You are attempting to trade in illegally-obtained material.I’ll retain your email for any future legal requirements. Please do not contact me again.Tim
Chris Graham is, by the way, a relatively senior member of the Australian Press Council, the body that polices media behaviour in this country.
===
Forgoing substance for style up north
Piers Akerman – Friday, January 23, 2015 (12:38am)
QUEENSLANDERS are just over a week away from what is really a no-brainer of an election. The choice they are being offered is, or should be, extremely clear. It is between an active reforming premier in Campbell Newman and an opposition leader, Annastacia Palaszczuk, who offers nothing but retrovision of the worst possible kind.
Continue reading 'Forgoing substance for style up north'
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IT’S GERMAN FOR GREENS
Tim Blair – Friday, January 23, 2015 (3:07pm)
Word of the day: Sitzpinkler.
===
FEEL LIKE BACON LOVE
Tim Blair – Friday, January 23, 2015 (2:28pm)
Newtown’s slide into vegetarian degeneracy is briefly halted:
Australia’s first Bacon Festival is being staged on February 9 at Cuckoo Callay, Newtown, with an eight-dish menu packed with piggy products designed to challenge your tastebuds.Expect to be dazzled by dishes including the Don’t Go Bacon My Heart beer-candied bacon and popcorn chicken burger and the What a Croque of Bacon (bacon, basil and vintage cheddar croquettes).
In other Sydney culinary news, the excellent Maloneys grocery on Crown Street is now stocked with all three varieties of Frank’s RedHot Sauce – Original, Buffalo and Xtra Hot. You need this miracle substance if you aim to cookthe world’s finest chicken wings. If you can’t find your Frank’s sauce at Maloneys, just ask always-helpful staffers Hamid or Asim.
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THREE SPEECH
Tim Blair – Friday, January 23, 2015 (12:42pm)
Feminists and leftists in the UK and Australia rejoiced this week in the belief that the London Sun had ceased publishing topless page 3 girls. But there’s just one small problem ...
Continue reading 'THREE SPEECH'
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RIDERS ATTACKED
Tim Blair – Friday, January 23, 2015 (10:58am)
Recently trending on Twitter: the deceptively sweet-sounding phrase Je Suis Couteau. Although it refers to events on a bus, there has been no subsequent outbreak of “I’ll ride with you” heroics.
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WORST OF THE WORST
Tim Blair – Friday, January 23, 2015 (10:41am)
The ABC’s Matt Brown and Mat Marsic locate and interview four Yazidi women who were held captive in northern Iraq by Australian jihadists Khaled Sharrouf and Mohammed Elomar:
It’s a miracle the women escaped, and for security reasons, we won’t describe how they did it. But, now that they’re free, they hope some day, somehow, the Australian Government will avenge them.‘LAYLA’ (voiceover translation): “If those terrorists are ever caught, they must make sure that they will never escape. I want them to punish those terrorists and torture them.”
After reading the whole transcript, you’ll be inclined to agree. The ABC, reporter Brown and cameraman Marsic deserve massive congratulations for this stunning piece.
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READY, AIM, TOASTIE
Tim Blair – Thursday, January 23, 2014 (1:37pm)
As Wade Laube notes, the ABC considers video of asylum seeker burns to be proof of how the burns occurred. But Prime Minister Tony Abbott requires a higher evidentiary standard:
Asked if the aired footage constituted as evidence, Mr Abbott said: “Who do you believe?“Do you believe Australian naval personnel or do you believe people who were attempting to break Australian law? I believe Australian naval personnel.”
So do most sane people. However, given that so many completely credible and utterly trustworthy individuals are convinced that Australian naval personnel have variously shot at, burned and assaulted asylum seekers, it’s worth asking the question …
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TURNEY RETURNS
Tim Blair – Thursday, January 23, 2014 (4:52am)
The Sydney Morning Herald‘s Nicky Phillips and Colin Cosier have thrown Antarctic tourism leader Chris Turney under the boat. They’re joined by the BBC’s Andrew Luck-Baker, a member of the expedition who also finds fault with the tour’s ice management:
Expedition leaders could have some tough questions to face about logistical shortcomings which may have put the vessel at increased risk of becoming trapped. These were operational errors and mishaps during a visit by scientists and tourists to a location close to the Antarctic shore on 23 December.Ship insurance companies along with the Australian Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre will be keen to establish what happened and whether human error contributed to the Akademik Shokalskiy becoming trapped …Some of the paying passengers on the Australasian Antarctic Expedition 2013 spoke unfavourably about the manner in which the situation at the islands was handled. Everyone I spoke to asked to be quoted anonymously, mindful of the considerable media interest that may await in Tasmania.“The teacher in me cringes at the logistics,” said one of the paying members of the expedition.Another said the expedition was run like a “boys own adventure” and expressed concern over what she believed was a lack of thorough briefing on safety procedures throughout the Antarctic leg of the expedition.Others I spoke to agreed that the expedition had its shortcomings in the logistics department.However, Terry Gostlow, a resident of Adelaide, said he wanted to praise expedition leader Chris Turney for mounting a privately funded Antarctic scientific expedition of which members of the public could be part and in which they could actively contribute as scientific assistants, if they chose.
Turney, now returned to Australia, appeared last night on the ABC. He isn’t a great television performer.
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ORDER GIVEN
Tim Blair – Thursday, January 23, 2014 (4:13am)
ABC games nerd Daniel Golding demands:
Australia’s refugee policies should be compared, regularly and specifically, to Nazism and the Holocaust.
If you say so, Daniel.
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BIGGEST MYSTERY
Tim Blair – Thursday, January 23, 2014 (3:42am)
She’s probably never lit a cigarette in her life, so why does fitness queen Michelle Bridges sound like a chain smoker?
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FINAL SOLUTION LOOMS
Tim Blair – Thursday, January 23, 2014 (3:37am)
Guardian readers previously applied their collective intelligence to allegations that the Australian Navy fired at asylum seeker vessels. Now these experts consider claims of torture:
• My gut instinct is that the rhetoric of “illegal arrivals” is now being taken one step further. Logic says that it might be more effective if the navy were to apply a “Final Solution” to these “problem people” and be done with it. That’s where this is heading. Very scary.• Unacceptable injury caused by the navy. Don’t care what excuses the Navy and govt comes up with. Completely unacceptable.• the hate campaign to dehumanise asylum seekers has worked.• Probably just a coincidence that the government recently absolved all navy personnel of any responsibility for harm caused to asylum seekers in these operations.• What the Australian government is doing is unbelievably wrong in so many ways. Time to stop the madness, not the boats.• redneck navy plus the recent facebook posts, proof that they are encouraged to act this way• Australian officials often carry out cruel illegal acts especially when they are stressed.• War time operations have been invoked against unarmed vulnerable women, children and men.• As if shooting at women and children in the high seas and incarcerating them in disused phosphate mines without proper facilities are not enough.• When it comes to Scott Morrison, nothing would surprise me, the gutless wonder is a compulsive liar and bloody evil.• Mocking a burns patient for political gain is a ruthless and desperate act.• We grow closer to war with Indonesia every day this government is in power.• Often asylum seekers - in the stress of their condition and further stress of being forcibly expelled from countries - may not identify clearly, who perpetrators were. My theory is that they were indeed injured - likely by some special riot squad aboard the RAN boats.
And a brilliant suggestion:
• Time for the ABC to buy or hire a vessel … The vessel should be placed between Australia and Indonesia so there can be independent reporting of what is taking place.
Great idea. In fact, the vessel should be large enough to board at least 50 senior ABC presenters, who could float forever in this Guardian reader’s imagined single-lane ocean road between Indonesia and Australia.
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LIQUID LAND
Tim Blair – Thursday, January 23, 2014 (3:06am)
This is an actual headline from Time, perceived by the left as a “small-c conservative mag”:
Readers, who are apparently now in a fluid state, are invited to describe their lives in our newly-liquefied nation.
Readers, who are apparently now in a fluid state, are invited to describe their lives in our newly-liquefied nation.
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TOTAL FRACKING IDIOTS
Tim Blair – Thursday, January 23, 2014 (2:57am)
British anti-fracking protesters glue themselves to petrol pumps. At the wrong petrol station.
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UNSINKABLE URSUS
Tim Blair – Thursday, January 23, 2014 (2:53am)
Ursus Bogus, the world’s favourite photoshopped poley bear, reappears at the Conversation:
Good old Bogus. He does get around.
Good old Bogus. He does get around.
(Via MiltonG)
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SOMEBODY CALL THE ABC
Tim Blair – Wednesday, January 22, 2014 (10:03pm)
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The ABC’s selective ear
Andrew Bolt January 23 2014 (4:16pm)
The ABC recently claimed it never reported mere allegations on matters of public importance- which it defined in this case as the involvement of Prime Minister Julia Gillard in the creation of a slush fund for her then boyfriend:
For instance, here’s part of one ABC letter to a viewer:
Now let’s contrast.
This week the ABC has had not the slightest hesitation in reporting - at great length and with great vehemence - improbable allegations that our navy tortured boat people:
For instance, here’s part of one ABC letter to a viewer:
Reporting that the prime minister of the nation is under police investigation is an enormously significant call to make. It cannot be made on supposition, on rumour, or on hearsay…Here’s another:
According to The Australian they’ve been collecting files but you would expect any police investigation to gather up this sort of primary documentation. That does not mean Ms Gillard is under investigation. For all we know, the investigation could be into Ralph Blewitt, or Bruce Wilson or Slater & Gordon or any number of other individuals and entities.
The ABC is aware of these statements but we do not at this stage believe it warrants the attention of our news coverage. To the extent that it may touch tangentially on a former role of the Prime Minister, we know The Australian newspaper maintains an abiding interest in events 17 years ago at the law firm Slater & Gordon, but the ABC is unaware of any allegation in the public domain which goes to the Prime Minister’s integrity.Had the ABC made some calls it would have found out that the police investigation does indeed include in its scope the activities of Gillard, who insists she did nothing wrong.
Now let’s contrast.
This week the ABC has had not the slightest hesitation in reporting - at great length and with great vehemence - improbable allegations that our navy tortured boat people:
Yesterday, [the ABC] reported unproven claims that Australian navy personnel mistreated asylum-seekers by forcing them to grasp a hot engine in a boat turnback operation, causing “severe” burns. An “exclusively” supplied video showed minor hand damage. Immigration Minister Scott Morrison categorically denied the claims and later reports suggest the burns occurred before the vessel was intercepted, possibly as the vessel was sabotaged. Our navy personnel have, after all, saved the lives of hundreds of asylum-seekers. ABC bulletins also ran strongly with strident criticism from New York-based Human Rights Watch, labelling Australia’s measures “abusive” and accusing the government of “demonising” asylum-seekers. The national broadcaster continues to provide uncritical amplification of this predictable venting, setting itself as the moral conscience of a nation with a brutal government and insensitive populace.
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Reading Kipling
Andrew Bolt January 23 2014 (2:00pm)
I’m reading with huge enjoyment Rudyard Kipling’s Something of Myself, a memoir he left incomplete when he died. (The final words on the last. unfinished page, describing his office: “Left and right of the table were two big globes, on one of which a great airman had once outlined in white paint those air-routes to the East and Australia which were well in use before my death.")
As a teenaged journalist Kipling worked in British India, a land he’d been born in and loved. He knew soldiers and shopkeepers, Christians, Hindus and Muslims, and he knew what it took to rule and the men on whom that duty fell. He knew because he was there and he saw:
I thought of today’s Leftists particularly - those furiously fighting for “compassionate” boat people policies that actually lured more than 1000 people to their deaths - when I read this excerpt:
As a teenaged journalist Kipling worked in British India, a land he’d been born in and loved. He knew soldiers and shopkeepers, Christians, Hindus and Muslims, and he knew what it took to rule and the men on whom that duty fell. He knew because he was there and he saw:
Later I described openings of big bridges and such-like, which meant a night or two with the engineers; floods on railways — more nights in the wet with wretched heads of repair gangs; village festivals and consequent outbreaks of cholera or small-pox; communal riots under the shadow of the Mosque of Wazir Khan, where the patient waiting troops lay in timber-yards or side-alleys till the order came to go in and hit the crowds on the feet with the gun-butt (killing in Civil Administration was then reckoned confession of failure), and the growling, flaring, creed-drunk city would be brought to hand without effusion of blood, or the appearance of any agitated Viceroy...He saw from those early years how power worked, and how it seduced weak men from their even weaker principles:
One evening, while putting the paper to bed, I looked as usual over the [newpaper’s] leader. It was the sort of false-balanced, semi-judicial stuff that some English journals wrote about the Indian White Paper from 1932 to ‘34, and like them it furnished a barely disguised exposition of the Government’s high ideals. In after-life one got to know that touch better, but it astonished me at the time, and I asked my Chief what it all meant. He replied, as I should have done in his place; ‘None of your dam’ business,’ and, being married, went to his home. I repaired to the Club which, remember, was the whole of my outside world.Kipling was, of course, a conservative, like so many of the greatest writers. He knew the difference - moral and practical - between a man’s intentions and a man’s achievements, between a plan and its consequences, between a seeming and a doing. And in that difference he took the side of responsibility. A man owned his deeds.
As I entered the long, shabby dining-room where we all sat at one table, everyone hissed. I was innocent enough to ask; ‘What’s the joke? Who are they hissing?’ ‘You,’ said the man at my side. ‘Your dam’ rag has ratted over the Bill.’
It is not pleasant to sit still when one is twenty while all your universe hisses you. Then uprose a Captain, our Adjutant of Volunteers, and said: ‘Stop that! The boy’s only doing what he’s paid to do.’ The demonstration tailed off, but I had seen a great light. The Adjutant was entirely correct. I was a hireling, paid to do what I was paid to do, and—I did not relish the idea. Someone said kindly; ‘You damned young ass! Don’t you know that your paper has the Government printing-contract?’ I did know it, but I had never before put two and two together. A few months later one of my two chief proprietors received the decoration that made him a Knight. Then I began to take much interest in certain smooth Civilians, who had seen good in the Government measure and had somehow been shifted out of the heat to billets in Simla. I followed under shrewd guidance, often native, the many pretty ways by which a Government can put veiled pressure on its employees in a land where every circumstance and relation of a man’s life is public property. So, when the great and epoch-making India Bill turned up fifty years later, I felt as one re-treading the tortuous byways of his youth. One recognised the very phrases and assurances of the old days still doing good work, and waited, as in a dream, for the very slightly altered formulas in which those who were parting with their convictions excused themselves. Thus; ‘I may act as a brake, you know. At any rate I’m keeping a more extreme man out of the game.’ ‘There’s no sense running counter to the inevitable,’—and all the other Devil-provided camouflage for the sinner-who-faces-both-ways.
I thought of today’s Leftists particularly - those furiously fighting for “compassionate” boat people policies that actually lured more than 1000 people to their deaths - when I read this excerpt:
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Laughing at you, Ben. And the more you abuse, the more we know you know you’re losing
Andrew Bolt January 23 2014 (12:55pm)
Abuse is what you resort to when the facts are against you. After all, there is no surer way to embarrass your foe in a debate than by proving him wrong.
So let’s see how, Ben Cubby, deputy editor of the Sydney Morning Herald, responds to my argument that yesterday’s article on Professor’s Chris Turney’s Antarctic disaster, while damning of the expedition leader, curiously omitted several highly relevant facts.
Here is what I wrote in introducing a excerpt from the Herald piece:
So how does Cubby respond to my points - that the piece failed to note Turney was a professor of climate change backed by a centre of climate change on an expedition to track climate change when he got trapped by an absence of climate change? With facts and argument, or with abuse and misrepresentation?
We are winning the debate and warmists such as Cubby have nothing left but venom.
UPDATE
A lot of warmists are keen to distance themselves and the global warming movement from Turney’s embarrassing expedition.
Before Turney got stuck in the sea ice he claimed was melting around the globe there were no complaints from the Australian and New Zealand organisations his website listed as supporters:
UPDATE
The Kauri Museum is an official supporter? Why?
So let’s see how, Ben Cubby, deputy editor of the Sydney Morning Herald, responds to my argument that yesterday’s article on Professor’s Chris Turney’s Antarctic disaster, while damning of the expedition leader, curiously omitted several highly relevant facts.
Here is what I wrote in introducing a excerpt from the Herald piece:
Sydney Morning Herald reporter Nicky Phillips is a warmist whose past reports on the Ship of Fools, which got stuck in Antarctic ice, failed to mention those on board had actually claimed to be studying global warming.I could have gone further, of course, and asked why the Sydney Morning Herald’s piece didn’t note the essential foolishness behind the expedition - how its leaders had falsely claimed global warming had melted sea ice around the world only to get stuck in sea ice on a continent with more of it than usual. But I was very reasonable.
Today she and co-reporter Colin Cosier play the same trick again.
They have written a long report essentially blaming expedition leader Chris Turney for the expensive disaster, but once again fail to note the people trapped in ice were warmists out to prove man was melting it.
Phillips and Cosier fail to even report Turney’s academic title – Professor of Climate Change – or that he is an adjunct at the University of New South Wales’Climate Change Research Centre. What makes this omission even stranger is that the Climate Change Research Centre, home of prominent climate alarmists such as professors Andy Pitman, Matthew England and Steve Sherwood, is listed as an official supporter of the expedition.
Get the impression that warmists are trying to distance themselves from this propaganda disaster, that has had sceptics around the world laughing?
I’ve already noted that sceptic Steve McIntyre has identified December 23 as the day when the expedition’s biggest blunders were made.Phillips and Cosier, who were on the Aurora Australis which picked up Turney’s team nearly three weeks ago, now add more damning detail on that day – detail that tends to make Turney the fall-guy.
So how does Cubby respond to my points - that the piece failed to note Turney was a professor of climate change backed by a centre of climate change on an expedition to track climate change when he got trapped by an absence of climate change? With facts and argument, or with abuse and misrepresentation?
Sceptics talk facts, warmists just rage.
We are winning the debate and warmists such as Cubby have nothing left but venom.
UPDATE
A lot of warmists are keen to distance themselves and the global warming movement from Turney’s embarrassing expedition.
Before Turney got stuck in the sea ice he claimed was melting around the globe there were no complaints from the Australian and New Zealand organisations his website listed as supporters:
Nor were there complaints from the organisations Turney thanked for their support or “official stamp of approval”:
But now that Turney is the laughing stock of sceptics… Well, first there was this:
Tony Fleming, director of the Australian Antarctic Division tells Louise Maher the AAD wasn’t linked to the Australasian Antarctic Expedition despite an implication by the expedition head that he had an “official stamp of approval”.Now this:
Is Turney’s research into global warming conducted with any closer eye to detail?
UPDATE
The Kauri Museum is an official supporter? Why?
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The return of the sceptic
Andrew Bolt January 23 2014 (11:51am)
Just six years ago the ABC’s Chaser team featured a map in their stage show indicating the whereabouts of the last sceptic in Australia. The single pink dot was placed right over my office.
That was just at the height of the warming madness, where few dared to express doubt and those who did were simply blanked from news coverage as blasphemers or random crazies.
But note, especially after 16 years of the planet failing to further warm as predicted, how scepticism has slowly gone mainstream. Respectable. A sign of independent thought.
Today two more examples. First this, from Don Aitkin, former vice chancellor of the University of Canberra, responding to a critic of sceptic Maurice Newman, the former ABC chairman:
That was just at the height of the warming madness, where few dared to express doubt and those who did were simply blanked from news coverage as blasphemers or random crazies.
But note, especially after 16 years of the planet failing to further warm as predicted, how scepticism has slowly gone mainstream. Respectable. A sign of independent thought.
Today two more examples. First this, from Don Aitkin, former vice chancellor of the University of Canberra, responding to a critic of sceptic Maurice Newman, the former ABC chairman:
Australia’s Chief Scientist, Professor Ian Chubb ... is not a Nobel Prize winner, but he was an exceedingly able experimentalist, a vice-chancellor in two universities, a senior bureaucrat and someone who is most travelled in the corridors of power. I have known him for more than twenty-five years…Then there’s the Facebook site of federal Liberal MP Craig Kelly:
The title of his op-ed is ’Surely CO2 is a culprit‘, and while he shouldn’t be blamed for it (it is usually the sub-editor who chooses the title for your essay, and I can’t recall ever being asked if I agreed when I had put in my work) the title does embody the whole spirit of the AGW scare: that there is a crime, and we know who dunnit. Professor Chubb’s essay carries through that theme. It is a rhetorical exercise, built around questions for which he doesn’t supply any answers, but for which the right answer is assumed, and will be obvious to any reader of the right persuasion.
Take this one. “We have pumped two trillion tonnes of a greenhouse gas, CO2, into our atmosphere since the Industrial Revolution, at a rate faster than ever before. Why should we presume that it would have no effect?” The right answer is that we shouldn’t presume, and that the effects have been bad ones. Evidence? Well, I’m not aware of any substantial body of evidence that the effects have been bad ones, and the jury is still out on whether or not there have been any discernible effects at all that can be distinguished from natural variability....
There are six of these rhetorical questions, the kind that are put to you in cocktail party discussions. They are all part of the ‘precautionary principle’ approach to ‘climate change’, and their point is to put you on the defensive. In fact, the AGW scare is a hypothesis, and those who support it need to be able to defend it. The rest of us have no need of an alternative theory, nor are we obliged to answer these rhetorical questions.
The level of this contribution is really disappointing, given Professor Chubb’s undoubted intellect. Some of us, he says, aren’t worried that the planet’s temperature has gone up ‘by just a few tenths (0.9C) of a degree. I wonder if they’d be as sanguine if their core body temperature increased by the same few tenths of a degree’. How on earth is that comparison relevant? What if he’d made the same point about an increase in temperature in my house or my car? ...
What is really interesting is a passage towards the end, where he suggests that the ‘climate change’ debate should be ‘a healthy and constructive discussion based on all the empirical evidence, not bits of it…’ I and many others have been asking for that sort of discussion for years, and we might ask the Chief Scientist why he hasn’t initiated such a debate much earlier in his term. And why indeed is he talking that way now? My guess is that he can sense the shift in the winds. No one much is talking about ‘settled science’ any more in this field. The climate models have simply failed to predict the lack of significant warming despite the continual increase in CO2, and there is no obvious reason why the warming should resume its former trajectory.
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What 7.30 forgot to add that makes the Ship of Fools such a joke
Andrew Bolt January 23 2014 (9:20am)
The ABC finally deals with the irony of the Ship of Fools being trapped by sea ice that the warmists on board claimed was actually meting away:
Fact: Total sea ice around the globe has expanded recently to above average levels:
The ABC failed in its report to note there has been no warming of the planet’s atmosphere in 16 years and sea ice around the world has expanded, not shrunk. These are the key points that make the Ship of Fools saga such an iconic story of global warming hysteria.
And of the media’s complicity.
MATT PEACOCK: And, if Antarctic ice is really melting faster because of climate change, why then was there more sea ice in the bay where the ship became stuck?This is disingenuous and misleading, to put it mildly. It fits the self-serving narrative put out by expedition leader Chris Turney that global warming is melting sea ice everywhere except - unfortunately - just the bit of sea he was sailing in:
TONY FLEMING: A huge iceberg has grounded in Commonwealth Bay region and the Mertz Glacier Tongue has been knocked off by that iceberg and that led to a buildup of sea ice over many years, so there were specific conditions in the Commonwealth Bay region that aren’t related to climate change.
”Sea ice is disappearing due to climate change, but here ice is building up,” the Australasian Antarctic Expedition said in a statement.Here is what 7.30 last night failed to note in covering for the warming cause or giving Turney his chance to ramble and dissemble.
Fact: Total sea ice around the globe has expanded recently to above average levels:
Fact: Antarctic sea ice has increased in far more areas than around Commonwealth Bay (red dot):
Fact: The ice that trapped the Ship of Fools was not in Commonwealth Bay, trapped by an iceberg, but on the other side of the Mertz glacier:
The leader of the expedition, Chris Turney (also a secondary Climategate correspondent and co-signer of Lewandowsky’s multisignatory letter in the Conversation), claimed that the incident could not have been predicted. He said that they were trapped by a sudden “breakout” of multi-year ice ("fast ice") that had previously been part of the ice shelf and that there was no way that they could have anticipated this. Turney’s claim has been uncritically accepted by the climate community e.g. Turner of the British Antarctica Survey here.The ABC’s report was again misleading, even peddling global warming scares while reporting on this disastrous expedition of global warming scientists.
However, like other recent claims by Turney, this claim is bogus. In fact, Turney was trapped by sea ice that had been mobile throughout December 2013.... As discussed above, it seems beyond dispute that Turney was pinned by pack ice that was unstably perched to the northeast of Mertz Glacier and not by a sudden break of more or less ‘permanent’ shelf ice; that this “peninsula” of pack ice was highly exposed to the easterly gale that had already developed; and that heavy blowing of this (and other mobile ice) onto the southwest shore of the Mertz Glacier polynya was not only a possibility, but a probability, if not, near certainty.
The ABC failed in its report to note there has been no warming of the planet’s atmosphere in 16 years and sea ice around the world has expanded, not shrunk. These are the key points that make the Ship of Fools saga such an iconic story of global warming hysteria.
And of the media’s complicity.
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Green power wilts in the heat
Andrew Bolt January 23 2014 (8:37am)
Alan Moran on the failure of green power in last week’s heatwave:
About zero.
How insanely irrational our political class has become.
AEMO data shows that during heat wave conditions in the five days to 18 January this year, wind actually contributed 3 per cent of electricity supply across the Australian National Electricity Market. Nobody knows the contribution of roof top solar but it could not conceivably have been more than one per cent.And the difference that all this expensive and unreliable green power has made to global warming?
Overall, wind facilities amount to 3,300 megawatts of capacity, somewhat less than the Loy Yang brown coal power stations in Victoria or Macquarie Generation’s black coal facilities in the Hunter Valley. Windmills produced at an average of 23 per cent of their capacity during the January heat wave. This was below their year-long average of about 30 per cent because the hot spell, as is often the case, was characterised by still air…
The below par performance of windmills in high demand periods means they not only require a subsidy but are also less valuable than other plant because their availability is reduced when they are most needed and when the price is highest… Indeed, during the recent heat wave, wind power earned an average of $123 per megawatt hour in Victoria and $182 in South Australia while the average price was respectively $209 and $285 in the two states.
Investments in wind and other subsidised electricity generation, according to the renewable energy lobby group the Clean Energy Council, has been $18.5 billion. By contrast, the market value of comparable generating capacity in Macquarie Generation coal plants is said to be only $2 billion and a brand new brown coal plant of 3,300 megawatt capacity would cost less than $10 billion. Wind aficionados claim that such costings do not take into account that wind is free whereas fossil fuel plants have to pay for their energy. But that is also untrue. Wind plant maintenance is about $12 per megawatt hour which is more than the fuel plus maintenance costs of a Victorian brown coal power station.
About zero.
How insanely irrational our political class has become.
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The depraved imagination of the Left
Andrew Bolt January 23 2014 (7:24am)
Many on the Left just want to believe our armed forces tortures and shoots directly at boat people, on the orders of evil Liberal politicians. So lurid is their fantasy that the ABC’s Daniel Golding can now barely distinguish between a democracy that safely stops boat people from coming - and drowning - and a totalitarian dictatorship which deliberately murders 6 million Jews:
Here are some counterfactuals for her - real facts to set against her imaginings of sailors tormented by the cruelties they must inflict on boat people under the orders of this heartless government.
It is the morality of the chronic self-pleasurer. Of the child.
Australia’s refugee policies should be compared, regularly and specifically, to Nazism and the Holocaust.This vivid imagining by our Don Quixotes of the Left goes right to the top of the institutions they have captured. Here is Human Rights Commission president Gillian Triggs yesterday after the ABC showed her video of an asylum seeker with a burned hand who blamed our sailors for allegedly forcing him to hold a red-hot exhaust on his boat as punishment:
GILLIAN TRIGGS: Well, I have seen the very graphic pictures that you’ve produced, and they look horrific. We need to know the facts, I’m sure you and all your listeners would agree with that. We don’t know what the facts are, but at the moment things are looking very worrying. But at the same time I think we have to acknowledge that the Navy officials are very well trained, this is not the job they signed up for, they themselves are being traumatized by the ways in which they’re being required to treat people, so I frankly think we need objective, clear evidence.Triggs tries hard to seem a searcher for “objective, clear evidence”, yet:
- she fails to note the Navy’s denial of the claims or the objective implausibility of our sailors torturing boat people in front of witnesses, including their own colleagues, with their captain and officers in an escorting ship.Triggs’ imagination is running riot here.
- she falsely claims protecting our maritime borders from intrusion “is not the job [our Navy personnel] signed up for”.
- she claims without evidence that under the current policies sailors “themselves are being traumatized by the ways in which they’re being required to treat people”.
- she implies that the way our sailors are “being required to treat people” is indeed brutal.
Here are some counterfactuals for her - real facts to set against her imaginings of sailors tormented by the cruelties they must inflict on boat people under the orders of this heartless government.
- under Labor, more than a thousand boat people were lured to their deaths, and for a long time the Left simply looked away. Asked if her party took responsibility for these deaths, a consequence of the Left’s scrapping of our tough border laws in 2008. Greens child-Senator Sarah Hanson-Young airly declined: ”Accidents happen.” When I demanded Labor take responsibility for the dying, Greens leader Bob Brown demanded my resignation.The quality of thought of the Left has deteriorated grotesquely. Imagining has replaced analysis. Fantasy is preferred over fact. Policies which kill boat people are preferred over ones which stop them. How the Left feels is judged to be of far more significance than what it actually achieves.
- this catastrophic failure to stop the boats and the drownings is what actually angered and potentially traumatised our sailors. As the Australian last year reported:NAVY insiders say there is “a growing and burning anger” among sailors on the frontline as they struggle to respond to the spiralling number of deaths and sinkings flowing from the government’s failed asylum-seeker policies…- what navy personnel didn’t sign up for was to run a taxi service for boat people, regularly picking them up within 100km from the Indonesian coast and bringing them to Australia.
A senior source inside the navy’s Armidale-class patrol boat fleet told The Australian yesterday Defence would face a steep spike in the number of post-traumatic stress disorders as young sailors bore witness to desperate people drowning in front of them.
“Just try to picture pulling body parts out of the ocean, because that’s what happens to bodies in the water for a few days, they pull apart at the seams,” said the patrol boat insider, who asked not to be named for fear of losing their job..
The Australian spoke yesterday to navy insiders and navy psychologists who painted a grim picture of flagging morale and anger among crew members involved in Operation Resolute, the joint Customs/navy operation tasked with intercepting asylum-seeker boats.
“There is a growing and burning anger among many of them about the position they have been placed in,” said one insider, who has spoken to crew members involved in recent interceptions of asylum-seeker boats.“They have seen bodies out there, they have seen women and children in terrible situations, they can’t come away from this without some emotional distress.”
It is the morality of the chronic self-pleasurer. Of the child.
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"The first step to getting something in life is that you not stay in the place you stand this moment"
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- 393 – Roman Emperor Theodosius I proclaims his eight-year-old son Honorius co-emperor.
- 971 – Using crossbows, Song dynasty troops soundly defeat a war elephant corps of the Southern Han at Shao.
- 1264 – In the conflict between King Henry III of England and his rebellious barons led by Simon de Montfort, King Louis IX of France issues the Mise of Amiens, a one-sided decision in favour of Henry that later leads to the Second Barons' War.
- 1368 – In a coronation ceremony, Zhu Yuanzhang ascends the throne of China as the Hongwu Emperor, initiating Ming dynastyrule over China that would last for three centuries.
- 1546 – Having published nothing for eleven years, François Rabelais publishes the Tiers Livre, his sequel to Gargantua and Pantagruel.
- 1556 – The deadliest earthquake in history, the Shaanxi earthquake, hits Shaanxi province, China. The death toll may have been as high as 830,000.
- 1570 – James Stewart, 1st Earl of Moray, regent for the infant King James VI of Scotland, is assassinated by firearm, the first recorded instance of such.
- 1571 – The Royal Exchange opens in London.
- 1579 – The Union of Utrecht forms a Protestant republic in the Netherlands.
- 1656 – Blaise Pascal publishes the first of his Lettres provinciales.
- 1719 – The Principality of Liechtenstein is created within the Holy Roman Empire.
- 1789 – Georgetown College, the first Catholic university in the United States, is founded in Georgetown, Maryland (now a part of Washington, D.C.)
- 1793 – Second Partition of Poland.
- 1795 – After an extraordinary charge across the frozen Zuiderzee, the French cavalry captured 14 Dutch ships and 850 guns, in a rare occurrence of a battle between ships and cavalry.
- 1846 – Slavery in Tunisia is abolished.
- 1849 – Elizabeth Blackwell is awarded her M.D. by the Geneva Medical College of Geneva, New York, becoming the United States' first female doctor.
- 1870 – In Montana, U.S. cavalrymen kill 173 Native Americans, mostly women and children, in what becomes known as the Marias Massacre.
- 1879 – Anglo-Zulu War: the Battle of Rorke's Drift ends.
- 1899 – The Malolos Constitution is inaugurated, establishing the First Philippine Republic.
- 1899 – Emilio Aguinaldo is sworn in as President of the First Philippine Republic.
- 1900 – Second Boer War: The Battle of Spion Kop between the forces of the South African Republic and the Orange Free State and British forces ends in a British defeat.
- 1904 – Ålesund Fire: the Norwegian coastal town Ålesund is devastated by fire, leaving 10,000 people homeless and one person dead. Kaiser Wilhelm II funds the rebuilding of the town in Jugendstil style.
- 1909 – RMS Republic, a passenger ship of the White Star Line, becomes the first ship to use the CQD distress signal after colliding with another ship, the SS Florida, off the Massachusetts coastline, an event that kills six people. The Republic sinks the next day.
- 1912 – The International Opium Convention is signed at The Hague.
- 1920 – The Netherlands refuses to surrender the exiled Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany to the Allies.
- 1937 – The trial of the anti-Soviet Trotskyist center sees seventeen mid-level Communists accused of sympathizing with Leon Trotsky and plotting to overthrow Joseph Stalin's regime.
- 1941 – Charles Lindbergh testifies before the U.S. Congress and recommends that the United States negotiate a neutrality pact with Adolf Hitler.
- 1942 – World War II: The Battle of Rabaul commences Japan's invasion of Australia's Territory of New Guinea.
- 1943 – World War II: Troops of Montgomery's Eighth Army capture Tripoli in Libya from the German–Italian Panzer Army.
- 1945 – World War II: German admiral Karl Dönitz launches Operation Hannibal.
- 1950 – The Knesset resolves that Jerusalem is the capital of Israel.
- 1957 – American inventor Walter Frederick Morrison sells the rights to his flying disc to the Wham-O toy company, which later renames it the "Frisbee".
- 1958 – After a general uprising and rioting in the streets, President Marcos Pérez Jiménezleaves Venezuela.
- 1960 – The bathyscaphe USS Trieste breaks a depth record by descending to 10,911 metres (35,797 ft) in the Pacific Ocean.
- 1961 – The Portuguese luxury cruise ship Santa Maria is hijacked by opponents of the Estado Novo regime with the intention of waging war until dictator António de Oliveira Salazar is overthrown.
- 1963 – The Guinea-Bissau War of Independence officially begins when PAIGC guerrilla fighters attack the Portuguese army stationed in Tite.
- 1964 – The 24th Amendment to the United States Constitution, prohibiting the use of poll taxesin national elections, is ratified.
- 1967 – Diplomatic relations between the Soviet Union and Ivory Coast are established.
- 1967 – Milton Keynes (England) is founded as a new town by Order in Council, with a planning brief to become a city of 250,000 people. Its initial designated area enclosed three existing towns and twenty one villages. The area to be developed was largely farmland, with evidence of continuous settlement dating back to the Bronze Age.
- 1973 – United States President Richard Nixon announces that a peace accord has been reached in Vietnam.
- 1986 – The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inducts its first members: Little Richard, Chuck Berry, James Brown, Ray Charles, Sam Cooke, Fats Domino, The Everly Brothers, Buddy Holly, Jerry Lee Lewis and Elvis Presley.
- 1997 – Madeleine Albright becomes the first woman to serve as United States Secretary of State.
- 1998 – Netscape announced Mozilla, with the intention to release Communicator code as open source.
- 2001 – Five people attempt to set themselves on fire in Beijing's Tiananmen Square, an act that many people later claim is staged by the Communist Party of China to frame Falun Gong and thus escalate their persecution.
- 2002 – U.S. journalist Daniel Pearl is kidnapped in Karachi, Pakistan and subsequently murdered.
- 2003 – A very weak signal from Pioneer 10 is detected for the last time, but no usable data can be extracted.
- 2018 – A 7.9 magnitude earthquake occurs in the Gulf of Alaska. It is tied as the sixth-largest earthquake ever recorded in the United States, but there are no reports of significant damage or fatalities.
- 599 – Tai Zong, emperor of the Tang Dynasty (d. 649)
- 1349 – Biligtü Khan Ayushiridara, Mongolian emperor (d. 1378)
- 1350 – Vincent Ferrer, Spanish missionary and saint (d. 1419)
- 1378 – Louis III, Elector Palatine (d. 1436)
- 1382 – Richard de Beauchamp, 13th Earl of Warwick (d. 1439)
- 1514 – Hai Rui, Chinese politician (d. 1587)
- 1585 – Mary Ward, English Catholic Religious Sister (d. 1645)
- 1622 – Abraham Diepraam, Dutch painter (d. 1670)
- 1688 – Ulrika Eleonora, Queen of Sweden (d. 1741)
- 1719 – John Landen, English mathematician and theorist (d. 1790)
- 1737 – John Hancock, American general and politician, 1st Governor of Massachusetts (d. 1793)
- 1745 – William Jessop, English engineer, built the Cromford Canal (d. 1814)
- 1752 – Muzio Clementi, Italian pianist, composer, and conductor (d. 1832)
- 1780 – Georgios Karaiskakis, Greek general (d. 1827)
- 1783 – Stendhal, French novelist (d. 1842)
- 1786 – Auguste de Montferrand, French-Russian architect, designed Saint Isaac's Cathedraland Alexander Column (d. 1858)
- 1799 – Alois Negrelli, Tyrolean engineer and railroad pioneer active in the Austrian Empire (d. 1858)
- 1809 – Surendra Sai, Indian activist (d. 1884)
- 1813 – Camilla Collett, Norwegian novelist and activist (d. 1895)
- 1828 – Saigō Takamori, Japanese samurai (d. 1877)
- 1832 – Édouard Manet, French painter (d. 1883)
- 1833 – Muthu Coomaraswamy, Sri Lankan lawyer and politician (d. 1879)
- 1838 – Marianne Cope, German-American nun and saint (d. 1918)
- 1840 – Ernst Abbe, German physicist and engineer (d. 1905)
- 1846 – Nikolay Umov, Russian physicist and mathematician (d. 1915)
- 1855 – John Browning, American weapons designer, founded the Browning Arms Company (d. 1926)
- 1857 – Andrija Mohorovičić, Croatian meteorologist and seismologist (d. 1936)
- 1862 – David Hilbert, Russian-German mathematician and academic (d. 1943)
- 1862 – Frank Shuman, American inventor and engineer (d. 1918)
- 1872 – Paul Langevin, French physicist and academic (d. 1946)
- 1872 – Jože Plečnik, Slovenian architect, designed Plečnik Parliament (d. 1957)
- 1876 – Otto Diels, German chemist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1954)
- 1878 – Rutland Boughton, English composer (d. 1960)
- 1880 – Antonio Díaz Soto y Gama, Mexican politician (d. 1967)
- 1894 – Jyotirmoyee Devi, Indian author (d. 1988)
- 1896 – Alf Blair, Australian rugby league player and coach (d. 1944)
- 1896 – Alf Hall, English-South African cricketer (d. 1964)
- 1897 – Subhas Chandra Bose, Indian activist and politician (d. 1945)
- 1897 – Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky, Austrian architect (d. 2000)
- 1897 – Ieva Simonaitytė, Lithuanian author (d. 1978)
- 1897 – William Stephenson, Canadian captain and spy (d. 1989)
- 1898 – Georg Kulenkampff, German violinist (d. 1948)
- 1898 – Randolph Scott, American actor (d. 1987)
- 1898 – Freda Utley, English scholar and author (d. 1978)
- 1899 – Glen Kidston, English race car driver and pilot (d. 1931)
- 1900 – William Ifor Jones, Welsh organist and conductor (d. 1988)
- 1901 – Arthur Wirtz, American businessman (d. 1983)
- 1903 – Jorge Eliécer Gaitán, Colombian lawyer and politician, 16th Minister of National Education of Colombia (d. 1948)
- 1905 – Erich Borchmeyer, German sprinter (d. 2000)
- 1907 – Dan Duryea, American actor and singer (d. 1968)
- 1907 – Hideki Yukawa, Japanese physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1981)
- 1910 – Django Reinhardt, Belgian guitarist and composer (d. 1953)
- 1912 – Boris Pokrovsky, Russian director and manager (d. 2009)
- 1913 – Jean-Michel Atlan, Algerian-French painter (d. 1960)
- 1913 – Wally Parks, American businessman, founded the National Hot Rod Association (d. 2007)
- 1915 – Herma Bauma, Austrian javelin thrower and handball player (d. 2003)
- 1915 – W. Arthur Lewis, Saint Lucian-Barbadian economist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1991)
- 1915 – Potter Stewart, American lawyer and judge (d. 1985)
- 1916 – David Douglas Duncan, American photographer and journalist
- 1916 – Airey Neave, English colonel, lawyer, and politician, Shadow Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (d. 1979)
- 1918 – Gertrude B. Elion, American biochemist and pharmacologist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1999)
- 1918 – Florence Rush, American social worker and theorist (d. 2008)
- 1919 – Frances Bay, Canadian-American actress (d. 2011)
- 1919 – Hans Hass, Austrian biologist and diver (d. 2013)
- 1919 – Ernie Kovacs, American actor and game show host (d. 1962)
- 1919 – Bob Paisley, English footballer and manager (d. 1996)
- 1920 – Gottfried Böhm, German architect
- 1920 – Henry Eriksson, Swedish runner (d. 2000)
- 1920 – Walter Frederick Morrison, American businessman, invented the Frisbee (d. 2010)
- 1922 – Leon Golub, American painter and academic (d. 2004)
- 1922 – Tom Lewis, Australian politician, 33rd Premier of New South Wales (d. 2016)
- 1923 – Horace Ashenfelter, American runner (d. 2018)
- 1923 – Cot Deal, American baseball player and coach (d. 2013)
- 1923 – Walter M. Miller, Jr., American soldier and author (d. 1996)
- 1924 – Frank Lautenberg, American soldier, businessman, and politician (d. 2013)
- 1925 – Marty Paich, American pianist, composer, producer, and conductor (d. 1995)
- 1926 – Bal Thackeray, Indian journalist, cartoonist, and politician (d. 2012)
- 1927 – Lars-Eric Lindblad, Swedish-American businessman and explorer (d. 1994)
- 1927 – Fred Williams, Australian painter (d. 1982)
- 1928 – Chico Carrasquel, Venezuelan baseball player and manager (d. 2005)
- 1928 – Jeanne Moreau, French actress (d. 2017)
- 1929 – Myron Cope, American journalist and sportscaster (d. 2008)
- 1929 – Phillip Knightley, Australian journalist, author, and critic (d. 2016)
- 1929 – John Polanyi, German-Canadian chemist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate
- 1930 – Filaret, Patriarch of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Kyivan
- 1930 – Mervyn Rose, Australian tennis player (d. 2017)
- 1930 – Derek Walcott, Saint Lucian poet and playwright, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 2017)
- 1930 – Teresa Żylis-Gara, Polish operatic soprano
- 1932 – George Allen, English footballer (d. 2016)
- 1932 – Larri Thomas, American actress and dancer (d. 2013)
- 1933 – Bill Hayden, Australian politician, 21st Governor General of Australia
- 1933 – Chita Rivera, American actress, singer, and dancer
- 1934 – Pierre Bourgault, Canadian journalist and politician (d. 2003)
- 1935 – Mike Agostini, Trinidadian sprinter (d. 2016)
- 1935 – Tom Reamy, American author (d. 1977)
- 1936 – Brian Howe, Australian minister and politician, 8th Deputy Prime Minister of Australia
- 1936 – Jerry Kramer, American football player and sportscaster
- 1936 – Cécile Ousset, French pianist
- 1938 – Giant Baba, Japanese wrestler and promoter, founded All Japan Pro Wrestling (d. 1999)
- 1938 – Georg Baselitz, German painter and sculptor
- 1939 – Ed Roberts, American disability rights activist (d. 1995)
- 1940 – Alan Cheuse, American writer and critic (d. 2015)
- 1940 – Joe Dowell, American pop singer (d. 2016)
- 1941 – Jock R. Anderson, Australian economist and academic
- 1941 – João Ubaldo Ribeiro, Brazilian journalist, author, and academic (d. 2014)
- 1942 – Laurie Mayne, Australian cricketer
- 1942 – Herman Tjeenk Willink, Dutch judge and politician
- 1943 – Gary Burton, American vibraphone player and composer
- 1943 – Özhan Canaydın, Turkish basketball player and businessman (d. 2010)
- 1943 – Gil Gerard, American actor and producer
- 1944 – Rutger Hauer, Dutch actor, director, and producer
- 1945 – Mike Harris, Canadian politician, 22nd Premier of Ontario
- 1946 – Arnoldo Alemán, Nicaraguan lawyer and politician, President of Nicaragua
- 1946 – Boris Berezovsky, Russian-English businessman and mathematician (d. 2013)
- 1946 – Zvonko Bušić, Croatian terrorist, hijacker of TWA Flight 355 (d. 2013)
- 1946 – Don Whittington, American racing driver
- 1947 – Tom Carper, American captain and politician, 71st Governor of Delaware
- 1947 – Megawati Sukarnoputri, Indonesian politician, 5th President of Indonesia
- 1948 – Anita Pointer, American R&B/soul singer-songwriter
- 1950 – Richard Dean Anderson, American actor, producer, and composer
- 1950 – Bill Cunningham, American bass player and keyboard player
- 1950 – John Greaves, Welsh bass player and songwriter
- 1950 – Guida Maria, Portuguese actress (d. 2018)
- 1950 – Suzanne Scotchmer, American economist and academic (d. 2014)
- 1950 – Luis Alberto Spinetta, Argentinian singer-songwriter, guitarist, and poet (d. 2012)
- 1951 – Margaret Bailes, American sprinter
- 1951 – Chesley Sullenberger, American captain and pilot
- 1952 – Omar Henry, South African cricketer
- 1953 – John Luther Adams, American composer
- 1953 – Alister McGrath, Irish priest, historian, and theologian
- 1953 – Antonio Villaraigosa, American politician, 41st Mayor of Los Angeles
- 1953 – Robin Zander, American rock singer-songwriter and guitarist
- 1954 – Trevor Hohns, Australian cricketer
- 1957 – Caroline, Princess of Hanover
- 1958 – Sergey Litvinov, Russian hammer thrower
- 1959 – Clive Bull, English radio host
- 1960 – Jean-François Sauvé, Canadian ice hockey player
- 1960 – Greg Ritchie, Australian cricketer
- 1961 – Neil Henry, Australian rugby league player and coach
- 1961 – Yelena Sinchukova, Russian long jumper
- 1962 – David Arnold, English composer
- 1962 – Aivar Lillevere, Estonian footballer and coach
- 1962 – Elvira Lindo, Spanish journalist and author
- 1964 – Jonatha Brooke, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
- 1964 – Mariska Hargitay, American actress and producer
- 1964 – Bharrat Jagdeo, Guyanese economist and politician, 7th President of Guyana
- 1964 – Mario Roberge, Canadian ice hockey player
- 1965 – Louie Clemente, American drummer
- 1966 – Damien Hardman, Australian surfer
- 1966 – Haywoode Workman, American basketball player and referee
- 1967 – Owen Cunningham, Australian rugby league player
- 1968 – Taro Hakase, Japanese violinist and composer
- 1968 – Petr Korda, Czech-Monacan tennis player
- 1969 – Andrei Kanchelskis, Ukrainian-Russian footballer and manager
- 1969 – Brendan Shanahan, Canadian ice hockey player and actor
- 1969 – Susen Tiedtke, German long jumper
- 1970 – Spyridon Vasdekis, Greek long jumper
- 1971 – Scott Gibbs, Welsh-South African rugby player and sportscaster
- 1971 – Kevin Mawae, American football player and coach
- 1971 – Marc Nelson, American singer-songwriter
- 1971 – Adam Parore, New Zealand cricketer and mountaineer
- 1971 – Claire Rankin, Canadian actress
- 1971 – Lisa Snowdon, English television and radio presenter and fashion model
- 1972 – Ewen Bremner, Scottish actor
- 1973 – Tomas Holmström, Swedish ice hockey player
- 1974 – Glen Chapple, English cricketer
- 1974 – Rebekah Elmaloglou, Australian actress
- 1974 – Yosvani Pérez, Cuban baseball player
- 1974 – Richard T. Slone, English painter
- 1974 – Tiffani Thiessen, American actress
- 1975 – Phil Dawson, American football player
- 1976 – Brandon Duckworth, American baseball player and scout
- 1976 – Alex Shaffer, American skier
- 1979 – Larry Hughes, American basketball player
- 1979 – Dawn O'Porter, Scottish-English fashion designer and journalist
- 1979 – Juan Rincón, Venezuelan baseball player and coach
- 1981 – Rob Friend, Canadian soccer player
- 1982 – Wily Mo Peña, Dominican baseball player
- 1982 – Oceana Mahlmann, German singer and songwriter. She wrote and performed the official 2012 UEFA song "Endless Summer" for the UEFA European Football Championship.
- 1982 – Andrew Rock, American sprinter
- 1983 – Irving Saladino, Panamanian long jumper
- 1984 – Robbie Farah, Australian rugby league player
- 1984 – Arjen Robben, Dutch footballer
- 1985 – Dong Fangzhuo, Chinese footballer
- 1985 – Doutzen Kroes, Dutch model and actress
- 1985 – Yevgeny Lukyanenko, Russian pole vaulter
- 1985 – Aselefech Mergia, Ethiopian runner
- 1985 – Jeff Samardzija, American baseball player
- 1985 – San E, South Korean rapper
- 1986 – Gelete Burka, Ethiopian runner
- 1986 – Marc Laird, Scottish footballer
- 1986 – José Enrique, Spanish footballer
- 1986 – Michael Stevens, American YouTuber and educator
- 1986 – Steven Taylor, English footballer
- 1986 – Sandro Viletta, Swiss skier
- 1987 – Leo Komarov, Finnish ice hockey player
- 1988 – Shaun Kenny-Dowall, Australian-New Zealand rugby league player
- 1990 – Şener Özbayraklı, Turkish footballer
- 1990 – Alex Silva, Canadian wrestler
- 1990 – Martyn Waghorn, English footballer
- 1992 – Reina Triendl, Japanese model and actress
- 1994 – Addison Russell, American baseball player
- 1995 – Luke Bateman, Australian rugby league player
- 1995 – Tuimoala Lolohea, New Zealand rugby league player
Births[edit]
- 667 – Ildefonsus, bishop of Toledo
- 1002 – Otto III, Holy Roman Emperor (b. 980)
- 1199 – Abu Yusuf Yaqub al-Mansur, Moroccan caliph (b. 1160)
- 1252 – Isabella, Queen of Armenia
- 1297 – Florent of Hainaut, Prince of Achaea (b. c. 1255)
- 1423 – Margaret of Bavaria, Burgundian regent (b. 1363)
- 1516 – Ferdinand II of Aragon (b. 1452)
- 1548 – Bernardo Pisano, Italian priest, scholar, and composer (b. 1490)
- 1549 – Johannes Honter, Romanian-Hungarian cartographer and theologian (b. 1498)
- 1567 – Jiajing Emperor of China (b. 1507)
- 1570 – James Stewart, 1st Earl of Moray, Scottish politician (b. 1531)
- 1620 – John Croke, English politician and judge (b. 1553)
- 1622 – William Baffin, English explorer and navigator (b. 1584)
- 1650 – Philip Herbert, 4th Earl of Pembroke (b. 1584)
- 1744 – Giambattista Vico, Italian historian and philosopher (b. 1668)
- 1785 – Matthew Stewart, Scottish mathematician and academic (b. 1717)
- 1789 – Frances Brooke, English author and playwright (b. 1724)
- 1789 – John Cleland, English author (b. 1709)
- 1800 – Edward Rutledge, American captain and politician, 39th Governor of South Carolina (b. 1749)
- 1803 – Arthur Guinness, Irish brewer, founded Guinness (b. 1725)
- 1805 – Claude Chappe, French engineer (b. 1763)
- 1806 – William Pitt the Younger, English politician, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (b. 1759)
- 1810 – Johann Wilhelm Ritter, German chemist and physicist (b. 1776)
- 1812 – Robert Craufurd, Scottish general and politician (b. 1764)
- 1820 – Prince Edward, Duke of Kent and Strathearn (b. 1767)
- 1833 – Edward Pellew, 1st Viscount Exmouth, English admiral and politician (b. 1757)
- 1837 – John Field, Irish pianist and composer (b. 1782)
- 1866 – Thomas Love Peacock, English author and poet (b. 1785)
- 1875 – Charles Kingsley English priest and author (b. 1819)
- 1883 – Gustave Doré, French engraver and illustrator (b. 1832)
- 1893 – Lucius Quintus Cincinnatus Lamar II, American lawyer and politician, 16th United States Secretary of the Interior (b. 1825)
- 1893 – José Zorrilla, Spanish poet and playwright (b. 1817)
- 1921 – Mykola Leontovych, Ukrainian composer and conductor (b. 1877)
- 1922 – René Beeh, Alsatian painter and draughtsman (b. 1886)
- 1922 – Arthur Nikisch, Hungarian conductor and academic (b. 1855)
- 1923 – Max Nordau, Austrian physician and author (b. 1849)
- 1931 – Anna Pavlova, Russian-English ballerina (b. 1881)
- 1937 – Orso Mario Corbino, Italian physicist and politician (b. 1876)
- 1939 – Matthias Sindelar, Austrian footballer and manager (b. 1903)
- 1943 – Alexander Woollcott, American actor, playwright, and critic (b. 1887)
- 1944 – Edvard Munch, Norwegian painter and illustrator (b. 1863)
- 1947 – Pierre Bonnard, French painter (b. 1867)
- 1956 – Alexander Korda, Hungarian-English director and producer (b. 1893)
- 1963 – Józef Gosławski, Polish sculptor (b. 1908)
- 1966 – T. M. Sabaratnam, Sri Lankan lawyer and politician (d. 1895)
- 1971 – Fritz Feigl, Austrian-Brazilian chemist and academic (b. 1871)
- 1973 – Alexander Onassis, American-Greek businessman (b. 1948)
- 1973 – Kid Ory, American trombonist, composer, and bandleader (b. 1886)
- 1976 – Paul Robeson, American actor, singer, and activist (b. 1898)
- 1977 – Toots Shor, American businessman, founded Toots Shor's Restaurant (b. 1903)
- 1978 – Terry Kath, American guitarist and songwriter (b. 1946)
- 1978 – Jack Oakie, American actor (b. 1903)
- 1980 – Giovanni Michelotti, Italian engineer (b. 1921)
- 1981 – Samuel Barber, American pianist and composer (b. 1910)
- 1983 – Fred Bakewell, English cricketer and coach (b. 1908)
- 1984 – Muin Bseiso, Palestinian-Egyptian poet and critic (b. 1926)
- 1986 – Joseph Beuys, German sculptor and painter (b. 1921)
- 1988 – Charles Glen King, American biochemist and academic (b. 1896)
- 1989 – Salvador Dalí, Spanish painter and sculptor (b. 1904)
- 1989 – Lars-Erik Torph, Swedish race car driver (b. 1961)
- 1990 – Allen Collins, American guitarist and songwriter (b. 1952)
- 1991 – Northrop Frye, Canadian author and critic (b. 1912)
- 1992 – Freddie Bartholomew, American actor (b. 1924)
- 1993 – Keith Laumer, American soldier, author, and diplomat (b. 1925)
- 1994 – Nikolai Ogarkov, Russian field marshal (b. 1917)
- 1994 – Brian Redhead, English journalist and author (b. 1929)
- 1999 – Joe D'Amato, Italian director and cinematographer (b. 1936)
- 1999 – Jay Pritzker, American businessman, co-founded the Hyatt Corporation (b. 1922)
- 2002 – Paul Aars, American race car driver (b. 1934)
- 2002 – Pierre Bourdieu, French sociologist, anthropologist, and philosopher (b. 1930)
- 2002 – Robert Nozick, American philosopher, author, and academic (b. 1938)
- 2003 – Nell Carter, American actress and singer (b. 1948)
- 2004 – Bob Keeshan, American television personality and producer (b. 1927)
- 2004 – Helmut Newton, German-Australian photographer (b. 1920)
- 2005 – Morys Bruce, 4th Baron Aberdare, English lieutenant and politician (b. 1921)
- 2005 – Johnny Carson, American talk show host, television personality, and producer (b. 1925)
- 2007 – Syed Hussein Alatas, Malaysian sociologist and politician (b. 1928)
- 2007 – E. Howard Hunt, American CIA officer (b. 1918)
- 2007 – Ryszard Kapuściński, Polish journalist and author (b. 1932)
- 2009 – Robert W. Scott, American farmer and politician, 67th Governor of North Carolina (b. 1929)
- 2010 – Kermit Tyler, American colonel and pilot (b. 1913)
- 2010 – Earl Wild, American pianist and composer (b. 1915)
- 2011 – Jack LaLanne, American fitness instructor, author, and television host (b. 1914)
- 2012 – Wesley E. Brown, American lawyer and jurist (b. 1907)
- 2012 – Maurice Meisner, American historian, author, and academic (b. 1931)
- 2012 – Bingham Ray, American businessman, co-founded October Films (b. 1954)
- 2013 – Józef Glemp, Polish cardinal (b. 1929)
- 2013 – Peter van der Merwe, South African cricketer and referee (b. 1937)
- 2013 – Jean-Félix-Albert-Marie Vilnet, French bishop (b. 1922)
- 2014 – Yuri Izrael, Russian meteorologist and journalist (b. 1930)
- 2014 – Riz Ortolani, Italian composer and conductor (b. 1926)
- 2015 – Ernie Banks, American baseball player and coach (b. 1931)
- 2015 – Prosper Ego, Dutch activist, founded the Oud-Strijders Legioen (b. 1927)
- 2015 – Abdullah of Saudi Arabia (b. 1924)
- 2016 – Jimmy Bain, Scottish bassist (b. 1947)
- 2016 – Bobby Wanzer, American basketball player and coach (b. 1921)
- 2017 – Bobby Freeman, American singer, songwriter and record producer (b. 1940)
- 2017 – Gorden Kaye, English actor (b. 1941)
- 2018 – Hugh Masekela, South African trumpeter, composer and singer (b. 1939)
- 2018 – Nicanor Parra, Chilean poet (b. 1914)
Deaths[edit]
- Bounty Day (Pitcairn Islands)
- Christian feast day:
- Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose's Jayanti (Orissa, Tripura, and West Bengal, India)
- World Freedom Day (Taiwan and South Korea)
Holidays and observances[edit]
===
“Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.” - Matthew 7:7-8
Do you need encouragement to begin a task? Do you feel discouraged and need to persevere. If God wants you to do something, He wants you to finish it.
The door is a barrier. You want to open it. But before you open it, you should knock. Because the door is closed for a reason and you need permission to open it. It is like a plan for an endeavour. You don’t go on a journey without knowing where you are going. Part of raising a child is teaching them to navigate around places so they know their way around the house, to the shops and to the school. Knocking is like planning.
Maybe you don’t need to open the door at all. Maybe just knocking is sufficient. It could be very wrong to open a door without knocking, but by knocking, the door is opened and you don’t need to do more.
Maybe God doesn’t want you to open a door. Be comforted. It is ok to knock. It is not your fault if you are wrong. But don’t open the door without knocking. God loves you and is schooling you to ask Him for permission, and not take Him for granted. Ask.
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Morning and Evening by Charles Spurgeon
January 22: Morning
"Son of man, What is the vine tree more than any tree, or than a branch which is among the trees of the forest?" - Ezekiel 15:2
These words are for the humbling of God's people; they are called God's vine, but what are they by nature more than others? They, by God's goodness, have become fruitful, having been planted in a good soil; the Lord hath trained them upon the walls of the sanctuary, and they bring forth fruit to his glory; but what are they without their God? What are they without the continual influence of the Spirit, begetting fruitfulness in them? O believer, learn to reject pride, seeing that thou hast no ground for it. Whatever thou art, thou hast nothing to make thee proud. The more thou hast, the more thou art in debt to God; and thou shouldst not be proud of that which renders thee a debtor. Consider thine origin; look back to what thou wast. Consider what thou wouldst have been but for divine grace. Look upon thyself as thou art now. Doth not thy conscience reproach thee? Do not thy thousand wanderings stand before thee, and tell thee that thou art unworthy to be called his son? And if he hath made thee anything, art thou not taught thereby that it is grace which hath made thee to differ? Great believer, thou wouldst have been a great sinner if God had not made thee to differ. O thou who art valiant for truth, thou wouldst have been as valiant for error if grace had not laid hold upon thee. Therefore, be not proud, though thou hast a large estate--a wide domain of grace, thou hadst not once a single thing to call thine own except thy sin and misery. Oh! strange infatuation, that thou, who hast borrowed everything, shouldst think of exalting thyself; a poor dependent pensioner upon the bounty of thy Saviour, one who hath a life which dies without fresh streams of life from Jesus, and yet proud! Fie on thee, O silly heart!
Evening
"Doth Job fear God for nought?" - Job 1:9
This was the wicked question of Satan concerning that upright man of old, but there are many in the present day concerning whom it might be asked with justice, for they love God after a fashion because he prospers them; but if things went ill with them, they would give up all their boasted faith in God. If they can clearly see that since the time of their supposed conversion the world has gone prosperously with them, then they will love God in their poor carnal way; but if they endure adversity, they rebel against the Lord. Their love is the love of the table, not of the host; a love to the cupboard, not to the master of the house. As for the true Christian, he expects to have his reward in the next life, and to endure hardness in this. The promise of the old covenant was prosperity, but the promise of the new covenant is adversity. Remember Christ's words--"Every branch in me that beareth not fruit"--What? "He purgeth it, that it may bring forth fruit." If you bring forth fruit, you will have to endure affliction. "Alas!" you say, "that is a terrible prospect." But this affliction works out such precious results, that the Christian who is the subject of it must learn to rejoice in tribulations, because as his tribulations abound, so his consolations abound by Christ Jesus. Rest assured, if you are a child of God, you will be no stranger to the rod. Sooner or later every bar of gold must pass through the fire. Fear not, but rather rejoice that such fruitful times are in store for you, for in them you will be weaned from earth and made meet for heaven; you will be delivered from clinging to the present, and made to long for those eternal things which are so soon to be revealed to you. When you feel that as regards the present you do serve God for nought, you will then rejoice in the infinite reward of the future.
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Today's reading: Exodus 4-6, Matthew 14:22-36 (NIV)
View today's reading on Bible GatewayToday's Old Testament reading: Exodus 4-6
Signs for Moses
1 Moses answered, "What if they do not believe me or listen to me and say, 'The LORD did not appear to you'?"
2 Then the LORD said to him, "What is that in your hand?"
"A staff," he replied.
3 The LORD said, "Throw it on the ground."
Moses threw it on the ground and it became a snake, and he ran from it. 4 Then the LORD said to him, "Reach out your hand and take it by the tail." So Moses reached out and took hold of the snake and it turned back into a staff in his hand. 5 "This," said the LORD, "is so that they may believe that the LORD, the God of their fathers--the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob--has appeared to you...."
Today's New Testament reading: Matthew 14:22-36
Jesus Walks on the Water
22 Immediately Jesus made the disciples get into the boat and go on ahead of him to the other side, while he dismissed the crowd. 23 After he had dismissed them, he went up on a mountainside by himself to pray. Later that night, he was there alone, 24 and the boat was already a considerable distance from land, buffeted by the waves because the wind was against it.
25 Shortly before dawn Jesus went out to them, walking on the lake. 26 When the disciples saw him walking on the lake, they were terrified. "It's a ghost," they said, and cried out in fear.
27 But Jesus immediately said to them: "Take courage! It is I. Don't be afraid."
28 "Lord, if it's you," Peter replied, "tell me to come to you on the water."
29 "Come," he said.
Then Peter got down out of the boat, walked on the water and came toward Jesus. 30 But when he saw the wind, he was afraid and, beginning to sink, cried out, "Lord, save me!"
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