Monday, February 16, 2015

Mon Feb 16th Todays News

On Bolt Report an ongoing policy is that any Islam post can only be on the pinned leader. Normal rules apply in that if it is merely foul and abusive it will be deleted. Otherwise comments are welcome.  
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NSW ALP are in total disarray. They have no policy on any issue which addresses a positive direction for NSW. The leadership does not know who to trust. They are willing to be disciplined in campaign, but they don't know what to say or do, beyond bad mouthing successful conservative policy. Prior to the 2011 election, ALP claimed it was not possible to improve public transport in NSW. They had no infrastructure plan. They had substantial debt. Schools were dysfunctional or elitist and it became harder to be a functional community school. Hospitals were struggling, needing to grow but starved of resources and few plans beyond occasional belt tightening and splurging which had blown out waiting lists. Police and judiciary were compromised with unwritten rules which made for embarrassing positions in public. Now, conservative government has shown it is possible to balance the budget, fund growth. improve public transport, education and hospitals while allowing the police and judiciary to be separate from the government and independent. The media have not known how to attack the government. They have tried to portray Mr Baird as being unreasonable for his faith. They have inflated issues and obfuscated. But the partisan press have not been able to point a policy direction for the unreformed NSW ALP. 

 Federal ALP are in disarray too, but because Rudd 'saved furniture' they are able to look powerful in blocking good administration. The anti Abbott campaign, led by the media has bitten, and public perception is that the federal Liberal Government is not very good despite its success in every sphere it controls. The partisan media very loudly direct campaigns against the federal government while they are largely quiet about the state NSW government. Both governments rely on independents to pass important legislation. for NSW it is Shooters and Fishers and Christian Democrats who are needed to get things past an incompetent ALP and Green alliance. Federally, PUP has been siding with the ALP and Greens. It is unlikely PUP voters thought that was how PUP would behave. Many are saying how Mr Abbott has to change. But Mr Abbott is not the problem, but a functioning cog in a good administration which is being blocked by the inept and corrupt. 

 NSW has problems with a corrupt judiciary too. The behaviour of the ICAC is no less outrageous than the HRC, no less partisan. And a partisan media with few that even pretend to be balanced make the problems worse. With an election six weeks away in NSW, it would be good to know what the ALP believes it has to offer. Sadly, he health or teachers unions are running campaigns when both are compromised by slush fund issues with the ALP. Is that what a vote for ALP is going to be? More corruption? More theft from union members? Are the ALP planning to not fund growth but use state assets to extend tax? 
2014
Published in 1969, French Connection was about drug trafficking. Made into a popular movie for adults (rated R) in 1971, Calvin Klein began a business for fashion in 1972, and called it French Connection. The drug scheme involved transport of heroin through France to USA from Turkey. The money came from Nazi France. Violence. Nudity. The brand was hip and cool and international. A fax from French Connection Hong Kong to French Connection United Kingdom was sent in anagram form in '97, FCHK to FCUK. A brand was born. T-shirts soon sported "fcuk fashion", "hot as fcuk", "too busy to fcuk", "fcuk safely", in Australia, "no fcukin worries". 

In 1987, I was busy and desperate, working several jobs to get through university, living in the Liverpool Motel and failing much. I visited a friend in Chatswood. We were hanging at the top of the station steps waiting for my train home. It was getting close to 11pm. A few police come by and order everyone onto the platform. I say my friend lived in Chatswood. They said "Go home." I say my friend lived in Chatswood, but I was catching a train home." One police officer smirked and said "Why, just so you can hold hands?" and I told the two police men to fuck off. I was about twenty years old and did not know what to expect. I was arrogant. My friend was scared, and bolted, as the senior constable unbuttoned his sidearm and rested his hand on the undrawn weapon, and approached me, eyeballing me. He ordered me to produce ID. I had my university library card and a train ticket. They escorted me onto the platform and wanted to know where I was living. I lived in the Liverpool Motel, but felt a friend's place in Lindfield was closer. The two policemen explained they could take me to the station and charge me with obstruction, or take me to a back alley and beat me up if I continued to act smart. It was a humbling introduction to ALP Premier Unsworth's Sydney. I'd never interacted with police before. It illustrates how quickly standards get corroded by pop culture, where a mere twelve years later an arrest able offence became hip and cool and edgy. 

Another brand began on this day in 1937. Nylon. Made up of two cities NY and LONdon, according to pop culture. Although it wasn't named that way. It was named after cotton and Rayon, so it ended with ON. NYL was accidental, it was going to be called NURON as in 'no run' but sounded too much like a nerve tonic. But I was born in NYC and my Nanna was born in London. I don't think I will be able to patent that name for any children I might have. But I'm really good on the right pair of legs.
Historical perspectives on this day 
In 116, Emperor Trajan sent laureatae to the Roman Senate at Rome on account of his victories and being conqueror of Parthia. 1249, Andrew of Longjumeau was dispatched by Louis IX of France as his ambassador to meet with the Khagan of the Mongol Empire. 1270, Grand Duchy of Lithuania defeated the Livonian Order in the Battle of Karuse. 1630, Dutch forces led by Hendrick Lonck captured Olinda in what was to become part of Dutch Brazil. 1646, Battle of Torrington, Devon – the last major battle of the first English Civil War. 1699, first Leopoldine Diploma was issued by the Holy Roman Emperor, recognising the Greek Catholic clergy enjoyed the same privileges as Roman Catholic priests in the Principality of Transylvania.

 In 1742, Spencer Compton, Earl of Wilmington, became British Prime Minister. 1804, First Barbary War: Stephen Decatur led a raid to burn the pirate-held frigate USS Philadelphia. 1852, Studebaker Brothers wagon company, precursor of the automobile manufacturer, was established. 1862, American Civil War: General Ulysses S. Grant captured Fort Donelson, Tennessee. 1866, Spencer Compton Cavendish, Marquess of Hartington became British Secretary of State for War. 1874, Silver Dollar became legal US tender. 1881, the Canadian Pacific Railway was incorporated by Act of Parliament at Ottawa (44th Vic., c.1). 1899, Iceland's first football club, Knattspyrnufélag Reykjavíkur, was founded.

 In 1918, the Council of Lithuania unanimously adopted the Act of Independence, declaring Lithuania an independent state. 1923, Howard Carter unsealed the burial chamber of Pharaoh Tutankhamun. 1930, the Romanian Football Federation joined FIFA. 1934, the Austrian Civil War ended with the defeat of the Social Democrats and the Republican Schutzbund. 1936, elections bring the Popular Front to power in Spain. 1937, Wallace H. Carothers received a United States patent for nylon.

 In 1940, World War II: Altmark Incident: The German tanker Altmark was boarded by sailors from the British destroyer HMS Cossack. 299 British prisoners were freed. 1943, World War II: Red Army troops re-entered Kharkov. Also 1943, World War II: Insertion of Operation Gunnerside, Norway. 1945, World War II: American forces landed on Corregidor Island in the Philippines. 1957, the "Toddlers' Truce", a controversial television close down between 6.00 pm and 7.00 pm was abolished in the United Kingdom. 1959, Fidel Castro became Premier of Cuba after dictator Fulgencio Batista was overthrown on January 1.

 In 1960, the U.S. Navy submarine USS Triton began Operation Sandblast, setting sail from New London, Connecticut, began the first submerged circumnavigation of the globe. 1961, Explorer program: Explorer 9 (S-56a) was launched. Also 1961, the DuSable Museum of African American History was chartered. 1962, Flooding in the coastal areas of West Germany killed 315 and destroyed the homes of about 60,000 people. 1968, in Haleyville, Alabama, the first 9-1-1 emergency telephone system went into service. 1978, the first computer bulletin board system was created (CBBS in Chicago, Illinois). 1983, the Ash Wednesday bushfires in Victoria and South Australia killed 75. 1985, Hezbollah was founded. 1986, the Soviet liner MS Mikhail Lermontov ran aground in the Marlborough Sounds, New Zealand. 1987, the trial of John Demjanjuk, accused of being a Nazi guard dubbed "Ivan the Terrible" in Treblinka extermination camp, started in Jerusalem.

 In 1991, Nicaraguan Contras leader Enrique Bermúdez was assassinated in Managua. 1998, China Airlines Flight 676 crashed into a road and residential area near Chiang Kai-shek International Airport in Taiwan, killing all 196 aboard and seven more on the ground. 1999, in Uzbekistan, a bomb exploded and gunfire was heard at the government headquarters in an apparent assassination attempt against President Islam Karimov. Also 1999, across Europe, Kurdish rebels took over embassies and held hostages after Turkey arrested one of their rebel leaders, Abdullah Öcalan. 2005, the Kyoto Protocol came into force, following its ratification by Russia. Also 2005, the National Hockey League canceled the entire 2004-2005 regular season and playoffs. 2006, the last Mobile Army Surgical Hospital (MASH) was decommissioned by the United States Army. 2013, a bomb blast at a market in Hazara Town in Quetta, Pakistan killed more than 80 people and injured 190 others.
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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.
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Editorials will appear in the "History in a Year by the Conservative Voice" series, starting with August https://www.createspace.com/4124406, October https://www.createspace.com/5106951, 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 the purchase of a kindle version for just $3.99 more. 
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For twenty two years I have been responsibly addressing an issue, and I cannot carry on. I am petitioning the Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott to remedy my distress. I leave it up to him if he chooses to address the issue. Regardless of your opinion of conservative government, the issue is pressing. Please sign my petition at https://www.change.org/en-AU/petitions/tony-abbott-remedy-the-persecution-of-dd-ball

Or the US President at
https://www.change.org/p/barack-obama-change-this-injustice#
or
https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/change-injustice-faced-david-daniel-ball-after-he-reported-bungled-pedophile-investigation-and/b8mxPWtJ or http://wh.gov/ilXYR
Douglas Sutherland-Bruce via David Daniel Ball
Mr Ball, I will not sign your petition as it will do no good, but I will share your message and ask as many of friends who read it, to share it also. Let us see if we cannot use the power of the internet to spread the word of these infamous killings. As a father and a former soldier, I cannot, could not, justify ignoring this appalling action by the perpetrators, whoever they may; I thank you Douglas. You are wrong about the petition. Signing it is as worthless and meaningless an act as voting. A stand up guy would know that. - ed

Lorraine Allen Hider I signed the petition ages ago David, with pleasure, nobody knows what it's like until they've been there. Keep heart David take care.

I have begun a bulletin board (http://theconservativevoice.freeforums.net) which will allow greater latitude for members to post and interact. It is not subject to FB policy and so greater range is allowed in posts. Also there are private members rooms in which nothing is censored, except abuse. All welcome, registration is free.
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Happy birthday and many happy returns Andrew Taco Nguyen, Kevin LuctoretEmergo Tran and Favour Erumse. Born on the same day, across the years, along with
February 16: Family Day in various regions of Canada (2015); Statehood Day in Lithuania (1918); Washington's Birthday (Presidents' Day) in the United States (2015)
Facsimile of the Act of Independence of Lithuania
You got your nickname. You have independence. Navy suits you. Step on the cockroaches. Ignore the lies. Let's party. 
Matches
Hatches
Despatches
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2015
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RECENT HISTORY IS A TOTAL MYSTERY

Tim Blair – Monday, February 16, 2015 (6:10am)

Normality was quickly resumed last week in the wake of an attempted party spill against Prime Minister Tony Abbott. By which I mean the left’s completely predictable, hypocritical and historically ignorant obsession with everything the Prime Minister does, says, or even doesn’t say.
Abbott has already faced mountains of criticism and abuse for such high crimes as standing near a sign, looking at his watch and winking. You’d think he’d be safer if he did absolutely nothing, but that isn’t an option either.

Icon Arrow Continue reading 'RECENT HISTORY IS A TOTAL MYSTERY'
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LUCKY JIM

Tim Blair – Monday, February 16, 2015 (5:20am)

Following decades at the ABC, Jim Middleton seems to be enjoying his new career at Sky: 
Its on-air staff and contributors not only command attention, but look to enjoy their work and each other’s company.
This is not only a pleasure for viewers, but infectious internally, transmitting positive collegiality to all staff on and off air.
Discussion about what I should report in the international sphere, for example, rarely takes more than a couple of minutes’ consultation with national editor Greg Byrnes. He not only determines the rundown for much of the day’s coverage, but assigns stories, oversees the technical demands underpinning live coverage, plans arrangements for major events – and reports stories when circumstances demand.
There are next to no barriers between an event and its airing, few hurdles to be leaped, no editorial meetings to be negotiated. 
What a relief that must be after all those years at our overfunded glacial goliath, where breaking stories sometimes run an entire week behind the news.
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BAT FIRST, WIN BIG

Tim Blair – Monday, February 16, 2015 (4:42am)

All four games played thus far in the 2015 World Cup have seen first innings scores of 300 or greater – averaging 328. Those are remarkable totals, even given today’s powerful bats and shrunken boundaries.
A less impressive trend is evident in the response scores, which on average fall short by nearly 90 runs. No close games to this point, but these are very early days. 2015 could still become the best World Cup.
UPDATE. The best World Cup brawl of 2015: 
Four cricket fans have been injured in a wild brawl during a World Cup telecast at a Sydney club.
The fight involved about 40 people who were watching the match at a club on Military Road at Merrylands about 9.30pm last night, police say. 
No word yet on who won.
UPDATE II. Ireland break the pattern with a stunning victory over the West Indies.
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LINES DRAWN

Tim Blair – Monday, February 16, 2015 (4:08am)

In theory, all journalists should be natural advocates for freedom of information. In practice, this is not always so.
Personally, I draw a line at information that would compromise national security – information, for example, that might assist people smugglers working to defeat Australian border protection. This reasonable view led to me being denounced by former Fairfax writer David Marr on radio a few months ago. “You are not a journalist!” David squealed.
But my accuser, of course, has his own limits. He is fine with any revelations about border security, but Marr draws the line when it comes to exposing tax-funded ABC salaries. Those salaries, he sniffed, are private.

Icon Arrow Continue reading 'LINES DRAWN'
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ABC audit admits bias. When will the ABC address it?

Andrew Bolt February 16 2015 (8:00pm)

Why is that every time the ABC admits bias - or nearly - that it’s a bias to the Left? When will it address the cause?
One of the ABC’s most acclaimed journalists, Sarah Ferguson, was so hostile towards Treasurer Joe Hockey in an interview last year that she breached the broadcaster’s bias guidelines, an ABC-commissioned editorial review has found…
Colleen Ryan, a former editor of The Australian Financial Review, singles out the interview for criticism in an audit of ABC TV’s budget coverage. In the audit Ms Ryan said the interview showed how “perceptions of bias could be inflamed unnecessarily” and that Ms Ferguson did not appear to show the Treasurer enough respect…
Ms Ryan singles out three points of the interview for criticism, starting with Ms Ferguson’s first question to Mr Hockey.
“Now, you’ve just delivered that budget,” Ms Ferguson said. “It’s a budget with a new tax, with levies, with co-payments. Is it liberating for a politician to decide election promises don’t matter?
Ms Ryan found the question was factually correct but said its tone made the Treasurer seem “under attack"…
Ms Ferguson later told Mr Hockey that she had asked a “yes or no question”. She then said: “I don’t need to teach you, Treasurer, what a tax is. You know that a co-payment, a levy and a tax are all taxes by any other name.” ...

The audit also finds that Lateline host Emma Alberici would have given the impression of bias by asking a Coalition MP: “Do you think voters are really stupid and can’t recognise a lie when they see one?” ...
A 7.30 Tasmania story on welfare cuts was also singled out for being “overwhelmingly negative” to the government. ABC panel program The Drum also erred in an episode by giving two spots to two “obviously Labor panellists” – former Labor speechwriter Michael Cooney and Saturday Paper columnist Mike Seccombe. 
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Abbott nearly got killed repeating what John Key got praised for

Andrew Bolt February 16 2015 (12:07pm)

Luke Malpas makes a fascinating comparison:
When New Zealand’s Prime Minister John Key cut government spending, voters understood. When he brought back Kiwi knighthoods, his popularity rose. When Prince Philip was knighted, Key got an invite to Balmoral with Queen Elizabeth.
When Tony Abbott did the same, he almost lost his job.
So why the different reception - besides our ferally anti-Abbott media, that is?
To get to this point, clear, consistent communication was crucial. Both Key and Finance Minister Bill English delivered a clear message: the country could not afford its spending and was strangling the economy to boot…

As part of this process, English’s office in particular cultivated an environment of “policy contestability”, drawing advice and research from outside the Treasury and bureaucracy to counter policy group-think. Although genuinely consultative on many policy reform areas, particularly in social services, the Key government has not tried to be friends with its enemies and those who will never agree with it anyway.
Professor Sinclair Davidson sums up.
In short, everything our Liberals haven’t done.
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Bloated, biased and - a former ABC star reveals - slow and wasteful

Andrew Bolt February 16 2015 (11:41am)

The first problem with the ABC is its flagrant Leftist bias - a clear breach of its charter and the law.
The second is its massive size. It is by far the biggest media organisation in the country and is stilfling alternative voices. 
The third problem is the sheer waste. Jim Middleton, now with Sky News after four decades with the ABC, explains:
There is no statistically reliable way of comparing Sky News’s ­audience with ABC News 24, but suffice to say that in those households with Foxtel, Sky News ­significantly outrates its public competitor…
My brief experience is that Sky is generally both faster and more authoritative than the cumbersome competition. In last week’s Liberal leadership showdown, for example, Sky News was once again first to reveal the result and the numbers, with a team of political players from across the spectrum on hand to provide immediate and definitive analysis of the outcome…
There are next to no barriers between an event and its airing, few hurdles to be leaped, no editorial meetings to be negotiated....
Sky News chief executive ­Angelos Frangopoulos is supported by just two senior executives, a chief financial officer and a ­business development manager. ABC News management is much larger and more labyrinthine…
Incidentally, why does a cash-strapped ABC use two presenters for much of the news day when ... Sky has found that single presenters make the business of getting the news to viewers more effective and less wasteful of resources?
At Sky there are 200 staff, most of them journalists, compared with 1500 employees at ABC News at the end of last year, according to a spokeswoman quoted by The Australian.
For that, Sky News viewers have access to four full-service channels (including News Live and Business) as well as 10 channels on Multiview (including local services for Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth and the recently launched OTT ­Australia channel for overseas viewers (another five services).
(Thanks to reader brett tr.) 
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Taking on the haters of Australia

Andrew Bolt February 16 2015 (11:28am)

Time we put a higher price on citizenship of this country:
PRIME Minister Tony Abbott is considering stripping citizenship or permanent residency from would-be terrorists and their supporters, saying he would no longer allow “bad people to play us for mugs’’.
The PM said for too long, those who wanted to do Australia harm had been given “the benefit of the doubt’’.
“There’s been the benefit of the doubt at our borders, the benefit of the doubt for residency, the benefit of the doubt for citizenship and the benefit of the doubt at ­Centrelink,’’ he said…
Mr Abbott did not give any details on how the proposed crackdown might work.
But the Herald Sun can ­reveal the Government is considering ways to strip Australian citizenship or permanent residency from those migrants who do not act in Australia’s interests. This could include those who threaten Australian lives, support or fundraise for terrorists, or preach hate against Australia and its easygoing way of life.
Here’s a question: do those who “preach hate against Australia” include many of our academics, racial warriors. public broadcasters and educationalists?
No, I am not calling for censorship against their like, but don’t we need to re-evaluate the wisdom of the long-fashionable denigration of Australia? Of falsely portraying it as a stolen land, guilty of genocide and environmental rape, and rotten with racism?
Don’t we put ourselves in danger by spending so much taxpayers’ money on those behind this vilification, and on passing it on to the children of under-assimilated immigrants?
UPDATE
Liberal MP Andrew Nikolic, Abbott’s new deputy Whip and an immigrant, proposes some changes:

The UN has called for ... states to criminalise travel or attempted travel of foreign fighters.
Britain’s government has introduced a power to suspend citizenship. France and Canada are even tougher, revoking citizenship rights of dual nationals…
At the very least, an objective public debate is needed on whether such a move is justified in Australia at this time… The best practical options are for the state to do its best to stigmatise all participation in terrorism within source communities. Those who persist in associating themselves with terrorist causes must be identified and wherever possible ejected from the state.
Sources of terrorism in places such as Iraq must be neutralised, including by use of military force if necessary. Closer to home and more benignly, it can also be addressed by revoking citizenship, which I believe should be strongly supported in the case of dual nationals.
Of course, the related issue of truly homegrown terror — perpetuated by those rare individuals (so far), who hold only a single national passport, throws up other challenges and less certain solutions. The key impediment is that revocation of citizenship cannot render a person stateless. The British approach of suspending citizenship has the virtue of not rendering the person stateless…
Many will argue persuasively that by pledging allegiance to transnational terrorist organisations and participating in terrorist acts, even Australian-born citizens forfeit their right to be considered Australian. Response options could include the imposition of strict control orders, or denial of family reunion immigration for those in Australia whose support for transnational terrorism breaches our laws.
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Christians beheaded

Andrew Bolt February 16 2015 (9:59am)

image
Islamic State murderers are busy right now killing lots of Muslims they believe are not sufficiently devout. But they do have time to remind Christians that their turn will come:
ISLAMIC State has released a graphic video showing 21 Egyptian Christians being beheaded in Libya as a “message signed with blood to the nations of the cross”.
UPDATE
Ibrahim Issa is a very brave and honest man:
In a recent TV show, Egyptian journalist and TV host Ibrahim Issa said that the barbaric crimes perpetrated by ISIS were indeed based on the Islamic sources but that the clerics were afraid to say so. “I would like to see a single Al-Azhar cleric in Egypt have the courage to admit that Abu Bakr burned a man alive,” he said. This is a vicious circle of barbarity, because it is wrapped in religion, said Issa, whose statements aired on the Egyptian ON TV channel on February 3, 2015.
I cannot think of a single Muslim cleric, spokesman or media celebrity in Australia who speaks as frankly or bravely on the links between the Koran and Islamist terrorism, although they face few of the dangers Issa does.
(Thanks to reader Gordon.) 
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Laming responds

Andrew Bolt February 16 2015 (9:51am)

Liberal [sic] backbencher Andrew Laming responds to my blog post listing his many attacks on the Abbott Government and wondering why he doesn’t attack Labor instead:
You can be a poodle in politics, or a Jack Russell. Those that love poodles resort to name-calling.
Actually, Andrew, I’m sure the Liberal party members who chose you don’t like dogs which bite their owners.
(Thanks to reader Nuts & Bolt.) 
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This is an important topic I am not free to discuss

Andrew Bolt February 16 2015 (9:47am)

TASMANIA’S Aboriginal Land Council wants to make it tougher for people to claim Aboriginality, warning that established indig­enous groups may soon be overrun by “wannabe” and “tick-a-box” Aborigines.
The Australian has obtained a copy of an incendiary discussion paper by Clyde Mansell, the chairman of the Aboriginal Land Council of Tasmania, which urges indigenous groups to push for a tougher approach to accepting people as Aboriginal. “Every day we encounter the impacts of ­people claiming to be Aboriginal; there’s so many tick-a-box and wannabe people out there,” he says in the document,Discussion paper on the determination of ­Aboriginality.
“They know nothing about being Aboriginal. They falsify their identity, their culture, and use whatever they can to gain accept­ance. We need to talk about and seek to reach agreement on how we combat these people...”
(Thanks to reader Michelle and others.) 
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You’d laugh, if this wasn’t actually Labor destroying our finances

Andrew Bolt February 16 2015 (9:38am)

Phillip Hudson has the line of the day:
THE Abbott government is being forced by the Senate to give a tax cut it never offered as compensation for a policy that no longer exists to deliver a promise Labor broke. That’s what’s wrong with the budget.
UPDATE
Brian Toohey on another sick Labor joke:
If the South Australian government wants to turn the new submarine project into a make-work scheme for Adelaide, that’s OK. The only proviso is that it should pay to create the 700 to 800 shipyard jobs at an added cost of up to $15 million a job. Otherwise, Tony Abbott’s government should buy the most cost-effective subs to defend the nation without a ridiculous level of industry protection. This requires Australia to import subs, just as it does with fighter planes. 
(Thanks to reader Peter of Bellevue Hill.) 
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Triggs discredits her cause and must resign

Andrew Bolt February 16 2015 (8:37am)

Boat people policy, Political things

GILLIAN Triggs says it’s “distressing” that Australia has some children of boat people in detention.
But what should really distress her is that she has just betrayed them.
The best she could now do for them is resign as president of the taxpayer-funded Australian Human Rights Commission and hand over to someone not so obviously an activist.
Thanks to Triggs, the commission’s report she hoped would force the Federal Government to instantly release all children has become impossible to trust.
Any good in it has been destroyed by justified suspicions that it is politically motivated, unfair, inaccurate and one-eyed.
Prime Minister Tony Abbott last week said Triggs’ commission “should be ashamed of itself”, and no wonder.
(Read full column here.) 
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Killing Europe. UPDATE: Killing free speech

Andrew Bolt February 16 2015 (8:17am)

The Islamisation of Europe has made the continent less safe - especially for Jews and lovers of free speech:
Danish police have said the suspected gunman killed by police after two deadly shootings in Copenhagen was ...  born in Denmark and had a criminal record, including for violence and offences. He has been named by Danish media as Omar Abdel Hamid El-Hussein…
The gunman used an automatic weapon to shoot through the windows of the Krudttoenden cultural centre during a freedom of speech event at around 4pm on Saturday, killing a 55-year-old man and wounding three officers. The event was hosting Swedish artist Lars Vilks, a cartoonist who had received death threats for depicting the Prophet Mohammad on the body of a dog in 2007.
Danish national broadcaster DR has named the man killed as Finn Noergaard, who directed documentaries.
A man-hunt had already begun when the second shooting occurred after midnight at a Synagogue in the Krystalgade area of the city. The attack left a Jewish man dead..
The attacks are almost identical in pattern to the ones in Paris last month, where people were slaughtered at Charlie Hebdo and a kosher supermarket. There, too, we saw an Islamist attack on a symbol of free speech, followed by one on Jews, and then a shootout with police.

UPDATE

Boomerang Boy from Filmselskabet on Vimeo.

The Islamist war on free speech has claimed yet another victim from the arts community:
The Danish Film Institute said the 55-year-old man killed at the free speech event was documentary filmmaker Finn Noergaard… Noergaard directed and produced documentaries for Danish television, including the 2004 “Boomerang boy” [above] about an Australian boy’s dreams to become a world boomerang champion and the 2008 “Le Le” about Vietnamese immigrants in Denmark.
It has long surprised and saddened me that the arts and media communities were long quiet about the rising danger of Islamism, and even quieter about defending free speech from Muslim demands for censorship. Artists and the media were more likely to attack Islamism’s critics than its apologists.
They were also more likely to preach surrender or the most saccharine pacifist fantasies, ranging from chants of “the pen is mightier than the sword” to the comically self-pleasuring burblings of one ABC host:
Our best defence is of course our cultured reason. Our tolerance. Our audacious confidence in the fundamental goodness of others.
Meanwhile Islamists have killed one journalist and artist after another, proving that the pen or a superior smirk is no defence against a Kalashnikov or a knife. The list of victims shows that in an Islamist world, the writers are in fact among the first to die:
- Twelve people, most cartoonists and writers, died this year when Islamists attacked Charlie Hebdo, a satirical newspaper which had mocked Islam.
- Two American journalists, James Foley and Steven Sotloff, were beheaded last year by the Islamic State.

- In 2004 Dutch film director Theo van Gogh was stabbed to death by a jihadist in Amsterdam after mocking Islam. Collaborator Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the Somali-born writer and politician, had to go into hiding.

- in 2005 Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten published cartoons mocking Muhammad to demonstrate a commitment to free speech.  An estimated 200 people died in protests around the world, and the cartoonists were threatened with death. One, Kurt Westergaard, was attacked in his home. Several Muslims were jailed for another plot to kill him.

- In 1989 Iran issued a fatwa ordering the murder of novelist Salman Rushdie for insulting Islam. One of the book’s translators was murdered and two others stabbed.
- In 1994 Nobel Prize winner Nagib Mahfouz, the Egyptian novelist, was stabbed in the neck by an Islamist after defending Rushdie and allegedly insulting Islam in one of his own books.
- In 2002 Jewish American journalist Daniel Pearl was beheaded by Islamic extremists in Pakistan.
- In Turkey, suspected Islamists killed journalists Çetin Emec in 1990 and U?ur Mumcu in 1993.  In 1993, a cultural conference commemorating poet Pir Sultan Abdal was attacked by a Muslim mob and 37 conference participants killed.

- In 1993 Algerian writer Tahar Djaout was shot dead as he left the Algiers office of a secularist weekly.  Dozens of other Algerian journalists have been murdered.
- In 1994 Islamists shot dead Algerian playwright Abdelkader Alloula.

- In 1992, Saudi Arabia executed poet Sadiq ‘Abd al-Karim Milalla for calling Islam a false religion and Muhammad a fraud.

- In 2003 suicide bombers attacked an Iraqi TV station, killing five journalists. Other jihadists later murdered a cameraman for the station, Raad al-Azzawi.
- In 2012 Pakistani journalist Mukarram Khan Atif was murdered for criticising the Taliban.
These are just some of the journalists and artists murdered or attacked for offending Islamists. There are many others, especially in the Middle East, Pakistan and India.
And surely it is time that we looked again at the 1991 murder of Sydney radio broadcaster that was dismissed in those more naive times as probably just a robbery gone wrong:
Makin Morcos, a Coptic doctor living in Sydney, Australia, [was] gunned down at his medical practice. A month after the shooting, his offices were torched by an arsonist. An outspoken critic of the oppression of Copts in Egypt, Morcos had since 1985 been making broadcasts on 2BCR radio. Muslim organizations formally complained about his radio show and he received some ten death threats in the mail, one of which stated, “We’re going to get you - we’re going to take your life away.” Despite these leads, Detective Constable Glen Porter said the police had no evidence to suggest the killing was politically or religiously motivated. “At the moment it could just be a robbery gone wrong but something might come up later to suggest otherwise.” That something did not “come up” and the coroner discounted the suggestion that it was a political killing, concluding instead that Morcos was probably murdered by a disgruntled patient or by drug addicts in a robbery that went awry. 
I don’t think any artists realise they are in this fight for freedom, and it is time that they defended their own.
UPDATE
More surrender:
One of Germany’s biggest carnivals has been cancelled at the 11th hour following a “specific threat of an Islamist attack”.
More than 250,000 people were expected to attend the street parade in the northern city of Braunschweig…
The event - which coincides with the Roman Catholic carnival season - would have seen bands and 4,000 people in fancy dress costumes march down a four-mile route through the city. Organisers have said the bands will perform their live music at the town hall instead.
(Thanks to reader wotchathink.) 
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Mufti makes Islam seem a menace

Andrew Bolt February 16 2015 (7:33am)


TWO more deadly attacks – this time in Denmark – on a synagogue and on people defending free speech against Muslim extremists.
Last week, I asked why our top Muslim clerics hadn’t done much more to stop such terrorism from happening here, too.
I specifically asked why “there aren’t Muslim religious leaders here truly trying to reform Islam or issue fatwas damning the likes of Islamic State to hell”.

Well, the Grand Mufti, Australia’s highest-ranked Muslim cleric, promptly did do some damning.
But of the Abbott Government.
This is alarming. Dr Ibrahim Abu Mohammed made his faith again a legitimate source of suspicion by warning the Government to abandon Israel and stop fighting the Islamic State in Syria, if it wanted to stop Muslims turning to terrorism.
(Read full column here.) 
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Abbott’s enemies exploit the Holocaust

Andrew Bolt February 16 2015 (6:55am)

Long-time Labor speechwriter Bob Ellis beautifully demonstrates the double-standards of the archetypal Abbott-hater.
Bob Ellis, 12 February 2015:
Abbott then upped his daily quota of goofs… calling ‘Labor’s holocaust‘ the jobs lost in the GFC....
Bob Ellis, 29 September 2010:

Unfettered private enterprise can evict six million Americans from their houses - a convenient figure, an economic Holocaust, you could say, as many displaced Americans as Iraqis - and elective government doesn’t dare to. 
Tim Blair describes the monstrous army of hypocrites now on Abbott’s case:

Last week Abbott excited his left-wing foes by using the word “holocaust” to describe one example of Labor’s ineptitude in government… “There was a holocaust of jobs in defence industries under members opposite.”
Abbott quickly realised his use of the term might be perceived as insensitive. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m sorry and I withdraw."…
Abbott’s enemies, however, are as unforgiving as they are unaware. “PM just said there was a ‘holocaust’of jobs under former govt,” tweeted Greens MP Adam Bandt. “I’m lost for words, to be honest … I feel ashamed to witness this.”
The Sydney Morning Herald ran this remarkably dishonest headline: “Abbott compares job losses to Holocaust.” Note the capital H, indicating reference to the slaughter of millions of Jews by Nazis in World War II.
News.com.au declared Abbott had committed a “huge ‘holocaust’ gaffe”. The Adelaide Advertiser‘s Tory Shepherd claimed that “Prime Minister Tony Abbott invoked the Holocaust in Question Time today. You know, that thing where the Nazis killed millions of Jewish people … Using the word in that context was offensive, and startlingly stupid.”
But Abbott did not use the word in that context. He referred to “a holocaust of jobs”. Sailing right past the obvious, The Australian‘s Peter van Onselen tweeted: “Somebody should shirtfront the PM for that holocaust line.”;;;
“PM Abbott compares job losses to holocaust … twice. Disgraceful,” raged Labor MP Michael Danby. “Sometimes I loathe this place,” seethed Greens senator Scott Ludlam.
Presumably Ludlam’s loathing of Parliament did not include the day he told the Senate that Australia needed to “offset the kind of holocaust we are driving our economy, our society and our environment towards.”
Ludlam is far from alone in previously using the word holocaust to describe events in Australia. Freelance political observer Alan R.M. Jones ... assembled a list of prior users.
In 2013, former Labor PM Paul Keating told ABC radio the Rudd government had taken measures to “save us from that kind of holocaust, economic holocaust” engulfing Greece....
In 1998, then-PM John Howard escaped censure when he applauded the strength shown by the Australian economy “in the face of the Asian economic holocaust.”
In 2007, Senator Ludlam’s sainted former party leader Bob Brown used the unusable word to describe Tasmanian logging: “It is an environmental holocaust..."…
Six years ago, academic and global warming alarmist Robert Manne made absolutely clear the left’s intended rhetorical connection of Holocaust denialism to so-called climate denialism. “Scepticism is in general, as it should be, a positive word, denoting scientific or humanistic curiosity and in particular the presence of an open mind,” Manne said. “Denialism, a concept that was first widely used, as far as I know, for those who claimed that the Holocaust was a fraud, is the concept I believe we should use.”
UPDATE
The attempts by Fairfax and the ABC to beat up any criticism of Abbott are truly astounding - and disgraceful. Even a young Left-wing blogger’s rant on a blog is portrayed as serious criticism by an international think-tank:
Fairfax Media headline, Thursday: 
US think tank asks “Is Tony Abbott the most incompetent leader of any industrialised democracy?”
Their US correspondent, Nick O’Malley, writes: 
THE Council on Foreign Relations website ... piece argues that he has proven so “shockingly incompetent” that he deserved to lose his job.
The item in question is actually a blog post. O’Malley omits to say it says this at the top:

IMPORTANT: The views expressed on this blog are my own. The Council on Foreign Relations takes no positions on matters of policy or politics.
And at the bottom:

OPINIONS expressed on CFR blogs are solely those of the author or commenter, not of CFR, which takes no institutional positions.
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=== Posts from last year ===

Apology foundation perpetuate fable

Piers Akerman – Saturday, February 15, 2014 (11:48pm)

FORMER Prime Minister Kevin Rudd could never be described as self-effacing.

Icon Arrow Continue reading 'Apology foundation perpetuate fable'
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Looking for the truth in beauty

Miranda Devine – Saturday, February 15, 2014 (11:48pm)

IN this selfie era, the tyranny of beauty is inescapable, especially for young women. On social media, girls are defining their self-worth by how many likes or followers their images attract. They pose like pop stars, seeking affirmation of their “hotness”.

Icon Arrow Continue reading 'Looking for the truth in beauty'
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THE LATEST SCIENCE

Tim Blair – Saturday, February 15, 2014 (10:11pm)

I am currently in Los Angeles investigating important climate science. This evening my research led me here, in the company of leading climate authority Iowahawk:

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Previously, we inspected the recent scientific work undertaken by Coop at his LA laboratory:

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This is the scene at Musso and Frank’s heat investigation unit:

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Among that night’s climate study group was none other than turbo genius Gale Banks, creator of several eco-awaremicro-vehicles. Investigations continue.
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The Left’s myths are destroying Aboriginal children

Andrew Bolt February 16 2014 (7:54am)

The "stolen generations", The politics of race

The media Left’s addiction to the stereotypes of white racists and black victims puts Aboriginal children in grave danger.

Example one, from the Sydney Morning Morning Herald:
Imagine if more than half the young people detained in Australia today were from Sydney. Imagine if they were white. Newspaper letter writers would whip themselves into a frenzy, GetUp! would run a national campaign and tens of thousands would take to the streets to march for the freedom of Australia’s children. 
Instead, 53 per cent of young people in detention are indigenous. And instead of a national outcry, Australia is gripped by a national silence.
According to the latest national figures, indigenous young people - who comprise just 5 per cent of the population - were detained at a staggering 31 times the rate of non-indigenous young people on an average night in June 2012… So how, we should be asking, can we pretend the national shame of mass Aboriginal incarceration isn’t symptomatic of other problems? 
Reporter Bianca Hall’s demand for “freedom” for such children and her suggestion that they are victims of racist double-standards is irresponsible and deceptive.
The children are detained generally because they broke the law or posed a danger to themselves or others. They are not detained because they are Aboriginal. 
But to bolster her argument of racial double-standards, Hall decouples this link between crime and punishment. Indeed, not once in her article does Hall use the word “crime”, talking only of the high rate of “incarceration”. It is as if we arrest Aboriginal children on a whim.
Hall is right, of course, to suggest this high rate of incarceration (or, actually, crime) is related to the terrible dysfunction and family breakdown in so many Aboriginal communities, but she is profoundly wrong to suggest we do not talk about that or try with social policies to fix it. (In fact, Hall herself won’t talk of the role of Aboriginal culture in producing the terrible outcomes she deplores, which is the real silence we must end.)
But Hall again tries to decouple actions from consequences when she insists:
.... cutting the incarceration rate of indigenous people should be at the forefront of attempts to close the gap.
That is exactly the wrong way around. In fact, closing the gap - in education and employment - should be at the forefront of attempts to cut the incarceration rates. Reverse the order, as Hall suggests, and we’d have to refuse to jail Aborigines for crimes for which non-Aborigines would be jailed. We would be entrenching racism in our judicial system, and also entrenching the terrible victim mentality which incarcerates so many Aboriginal children.
Example two, from the ABC’s PM program and the irresponsible Greens:
BRENDAN TREMBATH: For nearly a century, tens of thousands of Indigenous children were forcibly removed from their families by state and federal governments and church missions.
Aunty Hazel from the Gunnedah area in north-eastern New South Wales argues little has changed.
AUNTY HAZEL: There’s never been a gap, there’s never been a stop in stolen generation and that’s evident today…
BRENDAN TREMBATH: Grandmothers and their families have attended a rally outside the New South Wales Parliament to condemn the forced removal of Indigenous children by the State’s Department of Community Services… Greens MP David Shoebridge says there’re no doubt cases where the organisation is doing the right thing, but its first reflex is to remove children. DAVID SHOEBRIDGE: Between 1997 and 2012 we saw a five-fold increase in the number of Aboriginal children being removed across Australia. And New South Wales tragically is a real hot spot, it’s the highest rate of Aboriginal child removal and more than one in 10 Aboriginal children across New South Wales are in care. It’s the new stolen generation.  
Here is the link I’ve often warned of - between preaching the “stolen generations” myth and attacking attempts today to save Aboriginal children from dangers from which we’d rescue them if they were white. How many Aboriginal children have died already, thanks to the poison of this myth?
Yes, PM did also quote NSW Minister Pru Goward rightly insisting that child welfare officials had no choice but to remove Aboriginal children at high rates, given the high levels of danger they faced:
PRU GOWARD: But we also need to see rates of domestic violence, alcohol abuse and child sexual abuse in Aboriginal communities come down too, so we can be sure that Aboriginal children are safe, it’s very much a two way street. 
But PM - and the ABC generally - has never made the obvious link. If we are removing many Aboriginal children for their own safety, how can we say previous generations of welfare officials were racist and wrong to do the same? What exactly are we apologising for when we talk of the “stolen generations”?
Fact: AM misleads in blandly describing the “stolen generations” as comprising “tens of thousands of Indigenous children ... forcibly removed from their families”. The definition is actually more precise and more damning:
Tonight we debate the stolen generations - the claim that between 1910 and 1970 as many as 100,000 aboriginal children were stolen from caring parents for racist reasons. 
Robert [Manne] says the figure is actually lower. He suggests one in 10 Aboriginal children were stolen from 1910, and estimates the total number at up to 25,000.
But what do we mean by “stolen”. Let me tell how Robert has defined it.
Says he: “It was not from harm that the mixed-descent children were rescued but from their Aboriginality.” (1)
And, he said in one essay, this was overseen by authorities who “wished, in part through the child removal policy, to help keep White Australia pure”. So, he adds: The “stolen generations is for Aboriginal Australians what the term Holocaust was for the Jews’’. (2) 
Fact: not one “stolen generations” activist has ever been able to produce even 10 examples of these children stolen from their parents by officials just because they were Aboriginal, and not because they needed care.
Fact: not one of the many court cases since involving “stolen generations” claimants has found there was a policy to remove children just for being Aboriginal. Those findings apply particularly to Western Australia, South Australia and the Northern Territory. An Aboriginal-led Stolen Generations Taskforce concluded that in Victoria, too: ”there was no formal policy for removing children”.
Think of the Aboriginal children who have since paid with their lives for this “stolen generations” myth of the Left:
Just ask the New South Wales Child Death Review Team, which investigated why Aboriginal children of drug addicts were 10 times more likely to die under the noses of welfare officers than were children of white addicts. 
It blamed a fear of the “stolen generations”, pleading: “A history of inappropriate intervention with Aboriginal families should not lead now to an equally inappropriate lack of intervention for Aboriginal children at serious risk.’’
Or this one:
I quote from yesterday’s Australian:
A senior departmental official (said) the child involved was sexually abused at age seven and, as a safety measure, was put with various foster families, eventually ending up in 2005 with a non-indigenous family . . . 
“These non-indigenous people were fantastic—ensuring she went to school, and the father actually took a year off his work to personally supervise this girl,” he said. 
“But two new social workers were appointed to the north and they expressed the view, which was repeated many times to the investigating committee, that putting an indigenous child with white foster parents was another stolen generation . . .”
And so this girl was sent back to Aurukun, to be pack-raped again.
Or more.
(Via Piers Akerman.) 
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Stuff George Bush didn’t do

Andrew Bolt February 16 2014 (7:13am)

Doug Ross reminds the Left of stuff it would never have forgiven the hated George W. Bush:
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(Via American Thinker.) 
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A school for five-year-old Marxists

Andrew Bolt February 16 2014 (12:22am)

Australia’s Marxists will gather at their yearly conference at Melbourne University at Easter. Some will drop their children off at the ”School for Rebellion”, run by the conference organisers to  indoctrinate even five-year-olds:
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But the way the Green Left Weekly described it, last year’s school actually taught the children one of the fundamental weaknesses of the Marxist way: 
The first School of Rebellion, held in association with Marxism 2013 over the Easter weekend in Melbourne, drew about 30 kids… 
The school started with philosophy sessions for the younger group aged four to seven…
Next up was a graffiti workshop for the older group… This involved the kids making their demands and ideas known with spray paint… Their demands included, “Free internet”, “Free Food”, “Free everything!"… The older kids rebelled in a slam poetry session, electing a 10-year-old girl as their spokesperson and demanding to go outside and play soccer. Which they did. 
Hmm. Marxist children demand everything be given to them free, and then they go out to play. Only force by their masters will make some work to provide what the others take.
That’s Marxism, kids. It’s amazing that after so many disastrous failures exactly like this in so many countries that your parents still believe this stuff. And, worse, that so many of their preachers work in universities, teaching the next generation how to destroy what works best.
(Thanks to reader Terje.) 
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“This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.” - 1 John 4:10
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Morning and Evening by Charles Spurgeon

February 15: Morning
"To him be glory both now and forever." - 2 Peter 3:18
Heaven will be full of the ceaseless praises of Jesus. Eternity! thine unnumbered years shall speed their everlasting course, but forever and forever, "to him be glory." Is he not a "Priest forever after the order of Melchizedek?" "To him be glory." Is he not king forever?--King of kings and Lord of lords, the everlasting Father? "To him be glory forever." Never shall his praises cease. That which was bought with blood deserves to last while immortality endures. The glory of the cross must never be eclipsed; the lustre of the grave and of the resurrection must never be dimmed. O Jesus! thou shalt be praised forever. Long as immortal spirits live--long as the Father's throne endures--forever, forever, unto thee shall be glory. Believer, you are anticipating the time when you shall join the saints above in ascribing all glory to Jesus; but are you glorifying him now? The apostle's words are, "To him be glory both now and forever." Will you not this day make it your prayer? "Lord, help me to glorify thee; I am poor; help me to glorify thee by contentment; I am sick; help me to give thee honour by patience; I have talents; help me to extol thee by spending them for thee; I have time; Lord, help me to redeem it, that I may serve thee; I have a heart to feel; Lord, let that heart feel no love but thine, and glow with no flame but affection for thee; I have a head to think; Lord, help me to think of thee and for thee; thou hast put me in this world for something; Lord, show me what that is, and help me to work out my life-purpose: I cannot do much; but as the widow put in her two mites, which were all her living, so, Lord, I cast my time and eternity too into thy treasury; I am all thine; take me, and enable me to glorify thee now, in all that I say, in all that I do, and with all that I have."
Evening
"Whereby they have made thee glad." - Psalm 45:8
And who are thus privileged to make the Saviour glad? His church--his people. But is it possible? He makes us glad, but how can we make him glad? By our love. Ah! we think it so cold, so faint; and so, indeed, we must sorrowfully confess it to be, but it is very sweet to Christ. Hear his own eulogy of that love in the golden Canticle: "How fair is thy love, my sister, my spouse! how much better is thy love than wine!" See, loving heart, how he delights in you. When you lean your head on his bosom, you not only receive, but you give him joy; when you gaze with love upon his all-glorious face, you not only obtain comfort, but impart delight. Our praise, too, gives him joy--not the song of the lips alone, but the melody of the heart's deep gratitude. Our gifts, too, are very pleasant to him; he loves to see us lay our time, our talents, our substance upon the altar, not for the value of what we give, but for the sake of the motive from which the gift springs. To him the lowly offerings of his saints are more acceptable than the thousands of gold and silver. Holiness is like frankincense and myrrh to him. Forgive your enemy, and you make Christ glad; distribute of your substance to the poor, and he rejoices; be the means of saving souls, and you give him to see of the travail of his soul; proclaim his gospel, and you are a sweet savour unto him; go among the ignorant and lift up the cross, and you have given him honour. It is in your power even now to break the alabaster box, and pour the precious oil of joy upon his head, as did the woman of old, whose memorial is to this day set forth wherever the gospel is preached. Will you be backward then? Will you not perfume your beloved Lord with the myrrh and aloes, and cassia, of your heart's praise? Yes, ye ivory palaces, ye shall hear the songs of the saints!
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Quartus 
[Quär'tus] - the fourth.
This name is associated with a quarternion of soldiers, that is, a file of four, the usual number for a night watch. Peter was placed under the guard of four quarternions of soldiers, or sixteen soldiers, in order that each might guard him three hours at a time (Acts 12:4).
It may be fitting at this point to discover the significance of the many friends Paul speaks of. Romans and Colossians are unique for their number of personal salutations. Paul himself was such a friendly person that friends gathered around him as moths do around a lighted lamp. In the majority of cases all we have is the mention of a name. Now and again Paul adds a brief, endearing term. But the fact that he mentions many by name, as in the case of Quartus, proves that he must have had some contact with them. Either he had met them on his journeys and they were blessed by his ministry, or they had ministered unto the apostle of their substance. By including their names in his letters, he gave them an imperishable memory.
There were multitudes of others who had labored with Paul in the Gospel, too numerous perhaps to be called by name. The apostle rejoiced, however, that their names, although not mentioned in his lists, were written in the Book of Life, and fully known of the Lord (Phil. 4:3). John also besought Demetrius to greet all his friends by name (3 John 14).
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Today's reading: Leviticus 17-18, Matthew 27:27-50 (NIV)

View today's reading on Bible Gateway

Today's Old Testament reading: Leviticus 17-18

Eating Blood Forbidden
1 The LORD said to Moses, 2 "Speak to Aaron and his sons and to all the Israelites and say to them: 'This is what the LORD has commanded: 3 Any Israelite who sacrifices an ox, a lamb or a goat in the camp or outside of it 4 instead of bringing it to the entrance to the tent of meeting to present it as an offering to the LORD in front of the tabernacle of the LORD--that person shall be considered guilty of bloodshed; they have shed blood and must be cut off from their people....

Today's New Testament reading: Matthew 27:27-50

The Soldiers Mock Jesus
27 Then the governor's soldiers took Jesus into the Praetorium and gathered the whole company of soldiers around him. 28 They stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him, 29 and then twisted together a crown of thorns and set it on his head. They put a staff in his right hand. Then they knelt in front of him and mocked him. "Hail, king of the Jews!" they said. 30They spit on him, and took the staff and struck him on the head again and again. 31 After they had mocked him, they took off the robe and put his own clothes on him. Then they led him away to crucify him....

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