Sunday, June 21, 2015

Sun Jun 21st Todays News

Bolt report Instructions follow the publishing news. 
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The secret to good conservative governance is that a diverse range of ideas can be publicly examined. No individual politician can espouse diverse views without appearing addled, so conservative leaders take on the role of advocate for different ideas and the public get a say as to how they feel. That was how the Howard government worked and how the Abbott administration is working. The ABC had a division party while Mr Turnbull put forward the view, recently, that the laws regarding citizenship of terrorists needed to be commensurate with what the High Court could accept. Many government backbenchers were keen to simply allow a government minister to make a decision without regard to courts. Now there is water tight legislation, not party division, and ABC has a hangover following their premature celebration. And the ABC is finding it hard to be excited that the incompetent ALP is divided from abysmal leadership. Senior shadow ministers are mugging for the press

 In the United States, a murderous racist bigot is giving his thoughts regarding his crime. His unoriginal thoughts are rooted in the Civil War and the racists who prospered under the confederate flag since. On this day in 1964, KKK killed three civil rights workers. In 2005, one man was convicted for the murders. Forward thinking Obama has regressed the US to 1964. Obama has the US being beaten up in a cold war where regional powers China and Russia have a disproportionate say in how the world is run, and domestically, Democrat style racism dating back to the Civil War. All that is needed to make it complete is some George Wallace figure to stand up for the confederate flag on top of the capitol building in South Carolina. 

 In 217 BC, the Romans, led by Gaius Flaminius, were ambushed and defeated by Hannibal at the Battle of Lake Trasimene. 533, a Byzantine expeditionary fleet under Belisarius sailed from Constantinople to attack the Vandals in Africa, via Greece and Sicily. 1307, Külüg Khan was enthroned as Khagan of the Mongols and Wuzong of the Yuan. 1529, French forces were driven out of northern Italy by Spain at the Battle of Landriano during the War of the League of Cognac. 1582, Sengoku jidai: Oda Nobunaga, the most powerful of the Japanese daimyo, was forced to commit suicide by his own general Akechi Mitsuhide. 1621, execution of 27 Czech noblemen on the Old Town Square in Prague was a consequence of the Battle of White Mountain.

 1734, in Montreal in New France, a slave known by the French name of Marie-Joseph Angélique was put to death, having been convicted of setting the fire that destroyed much of the city. 1749, Halifax, Nova Scotia, was founded. 1768, James Otis, Jr. offended the King and Parliament in a speech to the Massachusetts General Court. 1788, New Hampshire ratified the Constitution of the United States and was admitted as the 9th state in the United States. 1791, King Louis XVI of France and his immediate family began the Flight to Varennes during the French Revolution. 1798, Irish Rebellion of 1798: The British Army defeated Irish rebels at the Battle of Vinegar Hill.

 In 1813, Peninsular War: Battle of Victoria. 1824, Greek War of Independence: Egyptian forces captured Psara in the Aegean Sea. 1826, Maniots defeated Egyptians under Ibrahim Pasha in the Battle of Vergas. 1848, in the Wallachian Revolution, Ion Heliade Rădulescu and Christian Tell issued the Proclamation of Islaz and created a new republican government. 1854, the first Victoria Cross was awarded during the bombardment of Bomarsund in the Åland Islands. 1864, American Civil War: The Battle of Jerusalem Plank Road began. Also 1864, New Zealand Land Wars: The Tauranga Campaign ended. 1877, the Molly Maguires, ten Irish immigrants convicted of murder, were hanged at the Schuylkill County and Carbon County, Pennsylvania prisons. 1898, the United States captured Guam from Spain.

 In 1900, Boxer Rebellion. China formally declared war on the United States, Britain, Germany, France and Japan, as an edict issued from the Empress Dowager Cixi. 1915, the U.S. Supreme Court handed down its decision in Guinn v. United States 238 US 347 1915, striking down an Oklahoma law denying the right to vote to some citizens. 1919, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police fired a volley into a crowd of unemployed war veterans, killing two, during the Winnipeg General Strike. Also 1919, Admiral Ludwig von Reuter scuttled the German fleet in Scapa Flow, Orkney. The nine sailors killed were the last casualties of World War I. 1929, an agreement brokered by U.S. Ambassador Dwight Whitney Morrow ended the Cristero War in Mexico. 1930, one-year conscription came into force in France.

 In 1940, the first successful west-to-east navigation of Northwest Passage began at Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. 1942, World War II: Tobruk fell to Italian and German forces. Also 1942, World War II: A Japanese submarine surfaced near the Columbia River in Oregon, firing 17 shells at nearby Fort Stevens in one of only a handful of attacks by Japan against the United States mainland. 1945, World War II: The Battle of Okinawa ended when the organised resistance of Imperial Japanese Army forces collapsed in the Mabuni area on the southern tip of the main island.

 In 1952, the Philippine School of Commerce, through a republic act, was converted to Philippine College of Commerce, later to be the Polytechnic University of the Philippines. 1957, Ellen Fairclough was sworn in as Canada's first female Cabinet Minister. 1963, Cardinal Giovanni Battista Montini was elected as Pope Paul VI. 1964, three civil rights workers, Andrew Goodman, James Chaney and Mickey Schwerner, were murdered in Neshoba County, Mississippi, United States, by members of the Ku Klux Klan. 1970, Penn Central declared Section 77 bankruptcy, largest ever US corporate bankruptcy up to that date. 1973, in handing down the decision in Miller v. California 413 US 15, the Supreme Court of the United States established the Miller Test for obscenity in U.S. law. 1977, Bülent Ecevit, of the CHP formed the new government of Turkey. 1982, John Hinckley was found not guilty by reason of insanity for the attempted assassination of U.S. President Ronald Reagan.

 In 2000, Section 28 (of the Local Government Act 1988), outlawing the 'promotion' of homosexuality in the United Kingdom, was repealed in Scotland with a 99 to 17 vote. 2001, a federal grand jury in Alexandria, Virginia, indicted 13 Saudis and a Lebanese in the 1996 bombing of the Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia that killed 19 American servicemen. 2004, SpaceShipOne became the first privately funded spaceplane to achieve spaceflight. 2005, Edgar Ray Killen, who had previously been acquitted for the murders of James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Mickey Schwerner, was convicted of manslaughter 41 years afterwards (the case had been reopened in 2004). 2006, Pluto's newly discovered moons were officially named Nix & Hydra. 2009, Greenland assumed self-rule.
2014
If it had happened to a rich journalist there would be an outcry. It involves several people being investigated by royal commissions or corruption investigating bodies like the ICAC. And the silence is telling. Older journalists who are conservative have sidestepped it artfully. Tim Blair referred it to senior News corp editors who later jumped ship. More than a few NSW Premiers have jumped or been pushed as the issue approached them. I approached Barry O'Farrell after his election win in '11, and now with 9 months to go to the NSW government facing re-election, there is little hope that my issue will ever be addressed. 

A politicised public service have corruptly opposed resolution of my issue, and government are not in a position to oppose public service. So, I have correctly forwarded my issue to a royal commission and their officers have negligently handled it. Government cannot intervene as the royal commission is independent. However, a minister could responsibly address issues surrounding the primary one. I have lost my career and my home and been isolated by the corruption. I am innocent. At worst, I'm a whistleblower. At best, those opposing me are inept and show a depraved indifference to my welfare. 

My life is not inconsequential. I insist that elected officials act responsibly. I stand by my actions. 
Historical perspectives on this day
In 217 BC, the Romans, led by Gaius Flaminius, were ambushed and defeated by Hannibal at the Battle of Lake Trasimene. 533, a Byzantine expeditionary fleet under Belisarius sailed from Constantinople to attack the Vandals in Africa, via Greece and Sicily. 1307, Külüg Khan was enthroned as Khagan of the Mongols and Wuzong of the Yuan. 1529, French forces were driven out of northern Italy by Spain at the Battle of Landriano during the War of the League of Cognac. 1582, Sengoku jidai: Oda Nobunaga, the most powerful of the Japanese daimyo, was forced to commit suicide by his own general Akechi Mitsuhide. 1621, execution of 27 Czech noblemen on the Old Town Square in Prague was a consequence of the Battle of White Mountain.

 1734, in Montreal in New France, a slave known by the French name of Marie-Joseph Angélique was put to death, having been convicted of setting the fire that destroyed much of the city. 1749, Halifax, Nova Scotia, was founded. 1768, James Otis, Jr. offended the King and Parliament in a speech to the Massachusetts General Court. 1788, New Hampshire ratified the Constitution of the United States and was admitted as the 9th state in the United States. 1791, King Louis XVI of France and his immediate family began the Flight to Varennes during the French Revolution. 1798, Irish Rebellion of 1798: The British Army defeated Irish rebels at the Battle of Vinegar Hill.

 In 1813, Peninsular War: Battle of Victoria. 1824, Greek War of Independence: Egyptian forces captured Psara in the Aegean Sea. 1826, Maniots defeated Egyptians under Ibrahim Pasha in the Battle of Vergas. 1848, in the Wallachian Revolution, Ion Heliade Rădulescu and Christian Tell issued the Proclamation of Islaz and created a new republican government. 1854, the first Victoria Cross was awarded during the bombardment of Bomarsund in the Åland Islands. 1864, American Civil War: The Battle of Jerusalem Plank Road began. Also 1864, New Zealand Land Wars: The Tauranga Campaign ended. 1877, the Molly Maguires, ten Irish immigrants convicted of murder, were hanged at the Schuylkill County and Carbon County, Pennsylvania prisons. 1898, the United States captured Guam from Spain.

 In 1900, Boxer Rebellion. China formally declared war on the United States, Britain, Germany, France and Japan, as an edict issued from the Empress Dowager Cixi. 1915, the U.S. Supreme Court handed down its decision in Guinn v. United States 238 US 347 1915, striking down an Oklahoma law denying the right to vote to some citizens. 1919, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police fired a volley into a crowd of unemployed war veterans, killing two, during the Winnipeg General Strike. Also 1919, Admiral Ludwig von Reuter scuttled the German fleet in Scapa Flow, Orkney. The nine sailors killed were the last casualties of World War I. 1929, an agreement brokered by U.S. Ambassador Dwight Whitney Morrow ended the Cristero War in Mexico. 1930, one-year conscription came into force in France.

 In 1940, the first successful west-to-east navigation of Northwest Passage began at Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. 1942, World War II: Tobruk fell to Italian and German forces. Also 1942, World War II: A Japanese submarine surfaced near the Columbia River in Oregon, firing 17 shells at nearby Fort Stevens in one of only a handful of attacks by Japan against the United States mainland. 1945, World War II: The Battle of Okinawa ended when the organised resistance of Imperial Japanese Army forces collapsed in the Mabuni area on the southern tip of the main island.

 In 1952, the Philippine School of Commerce, through a republic act, was converted to Philippine College of Commerce, later to be the Polytechnic University of the Philippines. 1957, Ellen Fairclough was sworn in as Canada's first female Cabinet Minister. 1963, Cardinal Giovanni Battista Montini was elected as Pope Paul VI. 1964, three civil rights workers, Andrew Goodman, James Chaney and Mickey Schwerner, were murdered in Neshoba County, Mississippi, United States, by members of the Ku Klux Klan. 1970, Penn Central declared Section 77 bankruptcy, largest ever US corporate bankruptcy up to that date. 1973, in handing down the decision in Miller v. California 413 US 15, the Supreme Court of the United States established the Miller Test for obscenity in U.S. law. 1977, Bülent Ecevit, of the CHP formed the new government of Turkey. 1982, John Hinckley was found not guilty by reason of insanity for the attempted assassination of U.S. President Ronald Reagan.

 In 2000, Section 28 (of the Local Government Act 1988), outlawing the 'promotion' of homosexuality in the United Kingdom, was repealed in Scotland with a 99 to 17 vote. 2001, a federal grand jury in Alexandria, Virginia, indicted 13 Saudis and a Lebanese in the 1996 bombing of the Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia that killed 19 American servicemen. 2004, SpaceShipOne became the first privately funded spaceplane to achieve spaceflight. 2005, Edgar Ray Killen, who had previously been acquitted for the murders of James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Mickey Schwerner, was convicted of manslaughter 41 years afterwards (the case had been reopened in 2004). 2006, Pluto's newly discovered moons were officially named Nix & Hydra. 2009, Greenland assumed self-rule.
=== 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.
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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, September https://www.createspace.com/5106914, 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.
=== Bolt Report Items ===
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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Dear Members (YOU MUST READ THIS THREAD)
As of today, the rules of this forum are going to be enforced more rigorously. This includes the instant removal of members who personally abuse other members of this forum.
Whilst the use of bad language is often invoked as colourful descriptors of politicians, we ask that people refrain from the C word as there are many people on this forum who do not want to see that as part of every day language here.

Blatant racism, homophobia and religious slurs will be removed from the forum, along with the person who posted them.

Crass, vile & vitriolic hate posts will also be removed along with the person who posts those comments or threads.

Generally we will give people a 24 hour time out to cool off after they have been removed and those people will be welcome back to the forum once they have applied via an admin..... we will however, permanently remove repeat offenders with a rule of "3 strikes and you're out".

We are trying to encourage legitimate debate, conversation and discussion on this forum where people are able to have free thought and their own opinions without "mob" rule attacking them for thinking differently, however, in saying this, members who are here to deliberately cause trouble or "troll" will be removed without warning.

The standard of this forum needs to be better and people are responsible for their own behaviour.... bullying of others or bullying of admins will also result in that person being removed.

Legitimate criticism is appreciated, along with logical and rational commentary.

Admins decisions are final.... so make of this forum what you want of it and do not complain if you are removed for behaviour that is contrary to the posting protocols.

If you feel intimated or threatened by another person, contact an admin immediately so the situation can be monitored and mediated.

Regards

Admins

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Happy birthday and many happy returns Madu Odiokwu Pastorvin, Clint Colombin, Amreeta Goundar, Kelly Lam and George Knapman. Born on the same day, across the years. The shortest day of the year in the southern hemisphere. In 1529, War of the League of Cognac: The French army under Francis de Bourbon was destroyed in Lombardy, present-day Italy, by the Spanish army. In 1826, Greek War of Independence: A combined Egyptian and Ottoman army began their invasion of the Mani Peninsula, but they were initially held off by the Maniots at the fortifications of Vergas. In 1848, In the Wallachian Revolution, Ion Heliade Rădulescu and Christian Tell proclaimed a new republican government. In 1963, Italian cardinal Giovanni Battista Montini was elected as Pope Paul VI. In 2004, SpaceShipOne completed the first privately funded human spaceflight. See how your day is encapsulated? When you are careful with warring spirits, when your fortifications ensure the right kind of revolutionary government, you can (in private) reach for the stars. That is not at all show offy.
Deaths
June 21: June solstice (16:58 UTC, 2015); Midsummer festivities (Northern Hemisphere); Winter solstice festivals (Southern Hemisphere);World Music Day; Father's Day in various countries (2015); National Aboriginal Day in Canada
Replica of the Manchester Small-Scale Experimental Machine
Hannibal won 'hide and seek.' We are independent, now. She didn't really fight. We scuttled it. We've a great program in store. Let's party. 
Matches
Hatches
Despatches
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2015
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Bill Shorten’s secret past as a workplace hardliner

Piers Akerman – Sunday, June 21, 2015 (1:33am)

BILL Shorten is to be congratulated on his introduction of flexible working arrangements when he was the Victorian secretary and then national secretary of the Australian Workers’ Union.

Icon Arrow Continue reading 'Bill Shorten’s secret past as a workplace hardliner'
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Thought Pope Francis was a warmist? Think again

Miranda Devine – Sunday, June 21, 2015 (1:35am)

CLIMATE alarmists are cock-a-whoop over Pope Francis’s much-anticipated call to action on global warming.

Icon Arrow Continue reading 'Thought Pope Francis was a warmist? Think again'
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The Bolt Report today, June 21

Andrew Bolt June 21 2015 (7:33am)

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On Channel 10 at 10am and 3pm.
My guests: Anthony Albanese, Labor’s Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism spokesman; political scientist Jennifer Oriel; Nicholas Reece, former advisor to Prime Minister Julia Gillard; and Miranda Devine, Daily Telegraph columnist and 2GB host. 
Is Shorten finished? Is an early election on the cards?
The videos of the shows appear here.
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Define a community by the many, not the misfit

Andrew Bolt June 21 2015 (6:37am)

There is already much talk about how Charleston killer Dylann Root defines the United States.
But wait.
On the one hand there is a disturbed young misfit with a hatred of African Americans and Jews, but feeling lonely in his racism:
We have no skinheads, no real KKK, no one doing anything but talking on the internet. Well someone has to have the bravery to take it to the real world, and I guess that has to be me.
On the other we have a community of people determined to love and to forgive, inspiring millions:
“I forgive you,” said the daughter of 70-year-old Ethel Lance to the 21-year-old man who allegedly murdered her mother in church and appeared at an emotionally charged video court appearance in Charleston on Friday afternoon, two days after a horrific mass shooting here.
Relatives of the Emanuel church victims stood up one by one in the courtroom, offering forgiveness to the man accused of murdering their sons, mothers and grandfathers in cold blood, as a nation continued to call for justice…
“You took something very precious from me, but I forgive you,” Lance’s daughter said through tears. “It hurts me. You hurt a lot of people, but may God forgive you."…
Alanna Simmons, the granddaughter of 74-year-old retired pastor Daniel Simmons, stood after Sanders.
“Although my grandfather and the other victims died at the hands of hate, this is proof that they lived and loved,” she said. “Hate won’t win.”
In all, five representatives of the nine people killed in the massacre spoke at the hearing, with President Barack Obama tweeting shortly after the hearing that the “decency and goodness of the American people shines through in these families”....
The small courthouse in Charleston was packed full of relatives and friends… In an opening statement Judge Gosnell asked that Roof’s family be acknowledged as they were also victims of his crimes....
Roof’s family later issued its first public statement since the shooting: “We have all been touched by the moving words from the victims’ families offering God’s forgiveness and love in the face of such horrible suffering,” the family said.  
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The Liberals should thank Turnbull (and Brandis)

Andrew Bolt June 21 2015 (5:46am)

Despite the anger at Turnbull from some Liberals, it is important that a government thrash out the problem of proposals internally rather than release them without dissent and have them smashed up publically. I’m very keen on every government - even every PM’s office - containing cynics and civilised dissenters.
Sam Maiden:
(T)he thing that is going to become rather obvious when new terrorism legislation is unveiled this week is that Malcolm Turnbull won the battle, if not the war…
But what has been missing is an understanding that Cabinet is on a unity ticket about cancelling the citizenship of dual national terrorists.
The argument has been over the method with complaints over the process and the mechanism, to ensure the laws cannot be overturned by the High Court.
In the simplest of terms, the compromise to be unveiled this week will allow governments to cancel the citizenship of dual nationals if they are terrorists. The laws will not require a conviction.
That means that hundreds of dual nationals fighting overseas for Islamic State could have their citizenship automatically cancelled.
Terrorists living in Australia could also have their citizenship cancelled. But whether the terrorists are offshore or onshore, they will have the power, should they choose, to challenge the decision in the Federal Court. The decision will be subject to judicial review.
The key difference with the proposal originally suggested by [Peter] Dutton is that the powers will be derived from modernising Australia’s existing treason laws. They will not enact new, unprecedented powers for a minister to effectively act as judge and jury.
This is the solution that Turnbull has repeatedly proposed since June 3. It is a proposal that Dutton at first resisted, ironically because he wanted greater discretion not to cancel citizenship.
Instead, the powers that will be derived from the modernising the existing section 35 of the Citizenship Act will automatically cancel citizenship. Section 35 of the Act already states that a person ceases to be an Australian citizen if the person “serves in the armed forces of a country at war with Australia’’. This will be updated to cover terrorism…
Faced with the prospect of 44 backbenchers signing a letter urging Cabinet to toughen up on terrorists, [Attorney-General George] Brandis and Turnbull recognised the view of the partyroom was clear. There has been compromise on both sides. Brandis has said less, but has arguably done more to find a solution.
(Thanks to reader Peter of Bellevue Hill.) 
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Shorten’s great ambition: power

Andrew Bolt June 21 2015 (5:00am)

What has Bill Shorten’s guiding principle been as a politician, other than for Bill to become PM?
Shorten had learned ambition at the knee of his strong-willed mother, Ann.
She was a “tough, tough woman” of freakish intelligence who had a “huge presence” in the lives of young Bill and his twin brother Robert, says university-era friend and now psychologist George Habib.
Ann gave young Bill both a private school education and a vaulting ambition: “Bill had an aspiration to one day govern the country. That was evident from very early,” Habib says.
But for what purpose? We know what’s in it for Shorten, but what’s in that deal for everyone else?
But it was always that way:

His first taste [of ppwer] came while he was still studying arts-law at Monash University in 1990. He and a group of young party right-wingers known as the Networkers launched a takeover bid for the left-wing theatricals union. They were bankrolled by friendly moderate unions and Labor parliamentary and ministerial offices…
The ambitious young moderates hoped that the theatrical union’s resources and handful of votes would give them influence and a base for expansion.

Aaron Patrick, a friend and fellow Networker, now a journalist, acknowledges the takeover bid had little to do with workers’ welfare. It was all about power in the ALP.
Always the backroom boy, making those dark deals with power for power:

The days of rank-and-file party members turning out to suburban branch meetings to debate policy are long gone. These earnest participators have often been replaced by “stacks” - particularly in Melbourne’s west, with recent migrants corralled by a “warlord” from their own ethnic grouping. They never go to meetings… Their warlord pays their membership dues. In Labor party terms, they represent nothing more than numbers to be traded in factional and sub-factional deals.
Local government is at the heart of these stacking machines. Labor councillors dole out ratepayer patronage via sporting and social club facilities - soccer especially - in return for people consenting to free membership of the ALP. For internal Labor ballots, these people are either told how to vote, or have the ballots filled out for them. The membership fees to pay for all these people often comes from union money, raised through dubious slush funds and fund-raisers.
Shorten’s sub-faction, known in the party as the ShortCons - which he heads in partnership with fellow factional leader and federal front-bencher Stephen Conroy – is underpinned by such networks.
The two key doors in Maribyrnong that Shorten had to knock on in 2006 were Serbian-born George Seitz, Labor’s most prolifically successful “warlord”, and Turkish numbers man Hakki Suleyman.
Seitz ...  told Fairfax Media that he and Suleyman controlled the votes of up to 90 per cent of the ALP members in the seat.
“He [Shorten] simply came … asking if I would support him [to win preselection for the seat of Maribyrnong],” Seitz said....
Soon after Shorten was selected, the party’s powerful administrative committee, with Shorten as president, rewarded Seitz - then the veteran member for Keilor - by exempting him from a rule requiring MPs to retire at age 65.
The Suleymans had to wait for their reward. They were embroiled in 2009 in a major scandal centred on Brimbank Council. In 2013, Hakki Suleyman’s daughter, Natalie, was finally shoehorned into the safe seat of St Albans, with the backing of the ShortCon group. She is now a state MP.
Nothing grassroots about Shorten. It’s about gaining power to gain more power:
His union, with Shorten at the helm, directed $25,000 of union members’ money, and a group of its employees’ time, to Bill Shorten’s election campaign.
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Posted by Steve Reichert on Friday, 15 August 2014

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Keeping time.
Posted by Eric Whitacre on Monday, 4 August 2014

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Guardate cosa combina questa vecchietta in auto
Posted by Ridi che ti passa on Friday, 19 June 2015

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They're all in bed together
Posted by Proud American Infidel on Friday, 19 June 2015

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Vegans, please do not do this. Cats are not omnivores like us, they are obligate carnivores and cannot survive on a...
Posted by I fucking love science on Sunday, 8 June 2014

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=== Posts from last year ===

PEACEFUL MAJORITY IRRELEVANT

Tim Blair – Saturday, June 21, 2014 (1:34pm)

Terrorism expert Brigitte Gabriel runs through the numbers:



(Via the vindicated Chris Kenny)
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ROADSIDE DISCUSSION

Tim Blair – Saturday, June 21, 2014 (1:24pm)

The key grab is superb.
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CARLTON’S CRYSTAL BALLS

Tim Blair – Saturday, June 21, 2014 (1:17pm)

Unpaid Sydney Morning Herald contributor Mike Carlton: 
Democracy in Iraq evaporated with the oppression of Sunni Muslims by the corrupt and ineffectual Shiite Prime Minister, Nouri al-Maliki. When push came to shove, Baghdad’s army, upon which the Americans spent so much blood and treasure, simply melted away. The wretched Iraqi people find new and unspeakable horrors visited upon them by Islamist fanatics reputedly too extreme even for al-Qaeda to countenance.
It was all so predictable … 
If all of this was so predictable, Mike, please show us where you predicted it. More predictable is Carlton himself.
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Yes, there is a pause, and the Washington Post now admits it. UPDATE: But not Obama

Andrew Bolt June 21 2014 (10:53am)

Global warming - dud predictions

If even the Washington Post can admit to the pause, how much longer can The Age hold out in denying the science?
The recently-released National Climate Assessment (NCA) from the U.S. government offers considerable cause for concern for climate calamity, but downplays the decelerating trend in global surface temperature in the 2000s, which I document here. 
Many climate scientists are currently working to figure out what is causing the slowdown, because if it continues, it would call into question the legitimacy of many climate model projections (and inversely offer some good news for our planet).
An article in Nature earlier this year discusses some of the possible causes for what some have to referred to as the global warming “pause” or “hiatus”.  Explanations include the quietest solar cycle in over a hundred years, increases in Asian pollution, more effective oceanic heat absorption, and even volcanic activity. Indeed, a peer-reviewed paper published in February estimates that about 15 percent of the pause can be attributed to increased volcanism. But some have questioned whether the pause or deceleration is even occurring at all.
You can see the pause (or deceleration in warming) yourself by simply grabbing the freely available data from NASA and NOAA. For the chart below, I took the annual global temperature difference from average (or anomaly) and calculated the change from the prior year. So the very first data point is the change from 2000 to 2001 and so on. One sign of data validation is that the trends are the same on both datasets.  Both of these government sources show a slight downward slope since 2000:
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You can see some of the spikes associated with El Niño events (when heat was released into the atmosphere from warmer than normal ocean temperatures in the tropical Pacific) that occurred in 2004-05 and 2009-10. But the warm changes have generally been decreasing while cool changes have grown. To be sure, both sets of data points show an overall rise in temperature of +0.01C during the 2000s. But, if current trends continue for just a few more years, then the mean change for the 2000s will shift to negative; in other words, the warming would really stop. The current +.01C increase in temperatures is insufficient to verify the climate change projections for major warming (even the low end +1-2C) by mid-to-late century. A peer reviewed study in Nature Climate Change published in 2013 drew the same conclusion: “Recent observed global warming is significantly less than that simulated by climate models,” it says.  
Read on. Meteorologist Matt Rogers addresses all the usual denialist objections.
(Via Watts Up With That, which has been making the same case for years.)
UPDATE
Respect the consensus that says Barack Obama is lying about the science.
The US Senate Committee on Environment & Public Works held a hearing this week on global warming and invited as witnesses four former heads of the Environmental Protection Agency. Senator Jeff Sessions asks:
The President on November 14th 2012 said, ‘The temperature around the globe is increasing faster than was predicted, even ten years ago.’ And then on May 29th last year he also said - quote - ‘We also know that the climate is warming faster than anybody anticipated five or ten years ago.’  
So I would ask each of our former Administrators if any of you agree that that’s an accurate statement on the climate. So if you do, raise your hand.
The fun begins at 1:20:
(Thanks to reader mem.) 
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Labor admits: Gillard was on track to win just 40 of 150 seats

Andrew Bolt June 21 2014 (10:50am)

A Labor report admits Julia Gillard was on her way to utterly destroying Labor when she was replaced by Kevin Rudd. But Gillard loyalists couldn’t accept the switch and helped cripple Labor’s campaign:
LABOR’S official review of last year’s election campaign offers a searing condemnation of the dis­unity that plagued the Rudd-Gillard governments and sharply criticises the party’s campaign structure, strategy and operations… 
Labor’s polling showed that in May last year the Gillard government faced possible swings of 18 per cent in some seats and was on track to hold just 40 seats in the 150-seat House of Representatives. The leadership change from Julia Gillard to Kevin Rudd in June last year saved the party 15 seats, the report argues…
But the leadership change “profoundly” impacted on the party’s “campaign strategy and infrastructure”, the report says. Half the campaign staff quit when Mr Rudd returned to the prime ministership....
The report does not specifically name Mr Rudd, his chief strategist Bruce Hawker or Labor’s national secretary George Wright, but the implied criticism of them is evident. It notes the liaison between them was often dysfunctional.
In criticism directed at Mr Rudd and his travelling party, composed mainly of his personal staff, the report finds their micromanagement hampered the campaign effort centred in Melbourne… The report criticises Mr Hawker’s decision to hire US political consultants and his overruling of Mr Wright on key decisions… The “freelancing done in this area by others outside of the central campaign team did not assist our campaign efforts”, the report says.
Reader Peter of Bellevue Hill:
Curious, AB, that as substantial as the leadership and campaign issues were, the report doesn’t appear to have canvassed Labor’s pathetic economic management, its irresponsible and gargantuan spending, its endless parade of Potemkin-esque policy announcements, its mountains of union-friendly legislation, its almost daily deceit and its abuse of power in bullying its critics.
Voters were driven far further up the wall by these kinds of issues than by the leadership turmoil.
Bruce Hawker, scapegoated in the report, will be on The Bolt Report tomorrow - Channel 10 at 10am and 4pm.
(Thanks to reader Whatthe?) 
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Go-away money offered

Andrew Bolt June 21 2014 (10:41am)

A tempting incentive, particularly for those who came for the money - not the safety:
The Abbott government is offering asylum seekers up to $10,000 - a five-fold increase - to leave detention centres on Manus Island and Nauru and return to their countries of origin… 
Lebanese asylum seekers are offered $10,000 to voluntarily return to Lebanon. Iranians are offered $7000, Afghans $4000 and Nepalese, Burmese and Sudanese asylum seekers are all offered $3300… The price increase is a departure from the Labor government’s return policy, which offered asylum seekers an average $1500 to $2000 in May last year.
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Blessed, blessed silence

Andrew Bolt June 21 2014 (10:31am)

One of the best things about this World Cup, other than the avalanche of goals?
A complete absence of the vuvuzelas which destroyed the last World Cup and ensured few of its matches will ever be rescreened:
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Not writing but blurting

Andrew Bolt June 21 2014 (10:29am)

But the politics of good feeling mean such writing is forgiven, even if neither understood nor even read:
Eliz­a­beth Farrelly kicks off her Sydney Morning Herald column, Thursday: 

LEONARDO di Caprio mentions our shameful Barrier Reef devastation and we act like it’s a bad thing. Like tourism is our biggest issue here? What about truth? What about climate change? A new solar roads project shows what we all know. We can’t wait for governments to make this call. It’s time to act. A people’s revo­lution is required. Democracy is failing us. So far, smugness and stupidity seem a more likely sinkhole for the democratic experiment than the bloodshed and tyranny that George Washington predicted, but if climate change really gets going it could still come to that. Democratic governments are abject moral cowards. Like bad parents they yield to our demands before we even voice them.
Mark Colvin on Twitter on September 16, 2011: 
I’M not sure Liz Farrelly’s correctly identified why people can’t get to the end of her columns.
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The Bolt Report tomorrow

Andrew Bolt June 21 2014 (10:28am)

Tomorrow on Channel 10 at 10am and 4pm…
A video warning from Iraq, which Barack Obama lost.
Immigration Minister Scott Morrison on boats and immigration in the age of terror.
The panel: Janet Albrechtsen and former Labor advisor Bruce Hawker, made a scapegoat by a Labor report on the 2013 election.
NewsWatch: Sharri Markson,.
Plus a report on the manners of the Greens.
And a question: how come the mud isn’t sticking to Bill Shorten?
The videos of the shows appear here.
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Tingle: rich Jews turning weak Liberals heads with their money

Andrew Bolt June 21 2014 (9:54am)

It’s the kind of nasty accusation so often made when discussing Jews. Gerard Henderson notes that this time it comes from Laura Tingle of the Financial Review:
Laura Tingle effectively accused Prime Minister Tony Abbott, Foreign Minister Julie Bishop and Attorney-General George Brandis of changing the Coalition’s policy on the Middle East following the receipt of money from Jews. That’s it. Here is what the AFR’s political editor wrote this morning – in somewhat jumbled prose: 

As George Brandis, Julie Bishop and Tony Abbott have tied themselves in knots, the fact no one seems clear whether this was just a stuff-up or a deliberate policy move is damning. Many people in politics and business drew a pragmatic line from the shift of position to money, noting the Israel lobby switched its funding allegiance last year from Labor to the Coalition. Others thought Brandis was trying to make up ground with a Jewish community outraged by his declaration that Australians “have the right to be bigots” when he declared at a Senate hearing that references to “occupied East Jerusalem’’ were “neither appropriate nor useful’’, preferring the term “disputed’’.
It’s the old allegation – familiar through the ages – that wealthy Jews pressure non-Jews to implement their agenda as a result of making financial contributions to individuals and/or organisations.
Ms Tingle would never make such a claim about wealthy Muslims or wealthy Hindus. However, a different standard seems to apply to the Jewish community in Australia. Needless to say, Laura Tingle did not provide any evidence of any kind to support her implied conspiracy theory that the Prime Minister, the Foreign Minister and the Attorney-General followed the money trail and changed the Coalition policy on the Middle East to appease Jewish donors. She just seemed to rule out the possibility that senior members of the Coalition would come to a genuinely held position on the Middle East which was contrary to her own without the issue of “money”.
UPDATE
Henderson on the confected outrage over the Abbott Government refusing to call East Jerusalem “occupied” territory:
Following its defensive war in 1967, Israel captured East Jerusalem and the West Bank, which had been occupied by Jordan for some two decades. Jordan never created a Palestinian state and no such nation has ever existed. Clearly in 1967 Israel did not conquer and occupy any territory ruled over by a Palestinian nation… 
Anyone familiar with the topography of Jerusalem would be aware that Israel is not defendable on its 1967 borders.
Former Labor foreign minister Bob Carr is a critic of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his gov­ernment. Yet even Carr concedes in Diary of a Foreign Minister that Israel’s security concerns are real. Carr relates a conversation at the Knesset in Jerusalem when he asked the Israeli Prime Minister to explain his security concerns. An aide pulled aside the curtains and Netanyahu declared: “I don’t want Iran on that hill."… Even beyond the obvious security concerns, East Jerusalem includes the Jewish quarter of the Old City including the Wailing Wall, Judaism’s holiest site.
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Palmer’s lawyers paid with disputed Chinese money

Andrew Bolt June 21 2014 (9:47am)

Clive Palmer could be in some real difficulty:
A LEADING law firm involved in many current and past legal cases for Clive Palmer — including defamation actions against the Queensland Premier, Deputy Premier and The Australian — has been one of the biggest recip­ients of money from more than $12 million in Chinese funds alleg­edly wrongfully siphoned from a bank account.

The Brisbane firm HopgoodGanim figures prominently in Federal Court documents as the recipient of hundreds of thousands of dollars last year from the bank account, into which about $23m had been deposited by ­Chinese company Citic Pacific, for reasonable costs of operating a port at Cape Preston in Western Australia. 
The numerous withdrawals of funds from the bank account, which is ultimately controlled by Mr Palmer, are the subject of an ongoing and secret investigation in closed-door arbitration proceedings being run by retired Queensland Supreme Court judge Richard Chesterman QC.
HopgoodGanim lawyers are representing Mr Palmer and Mineralogy over the disputed funds case, which is likely to be ­referred to police.

The Chinese are involved in a “searching inquiry’’ that is pres­sing Mr Palmer to show where funds — including sums of $10m, withdrawn in August last year, and $2.167m, taken from the same account in September — went during last year’s federal election campaign, in which the ­resources tycoon is reputed to have spent more than $15m fielding candid­ates.
Lawyers for Citic Pacific have told the Federal Court that these funds could not have been legitimately spent on management of the port, which was built to ship iron ore mined by the Chinese company from tenements controlled by Mineralogy.
The $10m and $2.167m were claimed in a one-line explanation by Mr Palmer’s company, Mineralogy, to be the cost of “port management services”.
However, Mineralogy has not been operating the port and is not in charge of the port. Mr Palmer, who has strenuously denied there has been any wrongful siphoning of money, ­insisted this week in an interview with the Sky TV broadcasters Graham Richardson and Alan Jones that the $12m had been put back into the account, adding that he had not had any contact with police and was unaware of any police interest.
HopgoodGanim also denies any impropriety. 
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Who let these terrorists into our country?

Andrew Bolt June 21 2014 (9:08am)

image
Who let their families into our country, and how did they get out again?

AUSTRALIAN jihadists fighting with the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham are carrying out massacres of captured Iraqi prisoners and participating in some of the most gruesome war crimes committed during the two-week-old Iraq insurgency.

Convicted terrorist Khaled Sharrouf is among a handful of Australian jihadists believed to have carried out bloody, battlefield executions… 
Highly graphic images of the executions have emerged on social media. The Weekend Australian has verified those images.
They show Sharrouf holding a pistol and leaning over the corpse of an Iraqi man who has been executed.

The victim — dressed in civilian, not military, clothing — has died from a massive head wound, far too graphic to reproduce.
The dead bodies of other men, also clad in civilian clothing, lie around the former Sydney man…
Sharrouf and fellow Australian radical Mohamed Elomar, also fighting with ISIS, are understood to have executed several captured Iraqis....
The image of Sharrouf was posted on Facebook by an Australian using the name Abu Hafs, a nom de guerre used by Elomar…
Sharrouf, who served three years and 11 months over his role in the 2005 Pendennis terror plot, left Australia illegally last year, flying out of Sydney Airport on his brother’s passport.
Elomar’s brother, former boxing champion Ahmed Elomar — who in 2009 was arrested in Lebanon for alleged terror links before being released without charge — was jailed this week for assaulting a policeman during the 2012 Hyde Park riot.
Their uncle, also named Mohamed Elomar, was one of the ringleaders of the 2005 Pendennis terror conspiracy. Elomar Sr was also jailed over the plot.
Surely this has implications for our immigration intake.
A Griffith University study of 21 convicted terrorists in Australia - including Khaled Sharrouf, of a Lebanese family, and the Lebanese-born Mohammed Ali Elomar - found at least 11 were born in Lebanon or of Lebanese parents:
Age and gender. The ages of the 21 convicted terrorists range from 20 years to 47 years old at the time of their involvement in the events that led to their conviction.... 
While all of the twenty-one are Australian citizens, only nine were born in Australia: seven to Lebanese immigrant parents, one to Australian parents and one to an Australian mother and Indonesian father. The country of birth was unavailable in the data for three of the men. Four were born in Lebanon, and the remaining in Pakistan, Algeria, former Yugoslavia, Bangladesh and the UK. Those born overseas moved to Australia either as a very young child with their parents (n=3) or in their twenties (n=4). Thus, only four are known to have grown up outside Australia.
The ideology we confront:
Judge Whealy (R. v. Elomar & Ors.) summed this up very clearly with regards the beliefs of the five people convicted of terrorist offences in NSW. He stated that they all shared the following beliefs: 
“First, each was driven by the concept that the world was, in essence, divided between those who adhered strictly and fundamentally to a rigid concept of the Muslim faith, indeed, a medieval view of it, and to those who did not. Secondly, each was driven by the conviction that Islam throughout the world was under attack, particularly at the hands of the United States and its allies. In this context, Australia was plainly included. Thirdly, each offender was convinced that his obligation as a devout Muslim was to come to the defence of Islam and other Muslims overseas. Fourthly, it was the duty of each individual offender, indeed a religious obligation, to respond to the worldwide situation by preparing for violent jihad in this country, here in Australia.” 
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Carlton deceives. Obama tossed away a victory

Andrew Bolt June 21 2014 (8:40am)

In 2007 I said the battle for Iraq had been won, after the Sunni insurgency had been crushed. I added these caveats:
Now the task is one familiar to every democracy, and especially any in the Middle East: eternal vigilance.... 
Iraq is nowhere near safe, and our help is still needed to make it so.... In any case, whatever you may think of the arguments put in 2003, the argument today is whether Iraq will survive as a democracy, and whether we should help it. The answers must be yes, and yes. Mustn’t they? ... Iraq remains an ugly place, with lethal hatreds… Iraq has plenty of problems. Which Arab country does not? But it will solve them better without Saddam than with. And perfection is nowhere. 
Today, Mike Carlton quotes at length my 2007 article but  deliberately omits every single one of those caveats. He wants to give the impression that I thought Iraq was safe ever after and nothing more need be done.
He also omits to add that this was more like Barack Obama’s position - not mine - when the US president declared victory in 2011 and pulled out all US combat forces. Obama failed to defend a victory I said needed defending.
This is an important point to make, not just to demonstrate Carlton is a dishonest writer. We need to understand just why Iraq was tossed back into the fires, because Obama has declared he will withdraw from Afghanistan, too, in 2016.
The same mistake cannot be made again.  
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Bill Shorten should be more like Bill Hayden

Andrew Bolt June 21 2014 (8:13am)

Laurie Oakes is right to quote the great Labor leader Bill Hayden at the not-so-great Bill Shorten:
Shorten needs to start demonstrating a similar approach to Hayden’s, and soon. 
Hayden also moved steadily on the development of a new policy framework. To quote his autobiography again: “For the first time careful costings were made, credible revenue measures were adopted and policies selected on the basis of economic and social priorities.”
Every policy that had been an Achilles heel under Whitlam was abandoned or modified. At party conferences, Hayden fought tooth and nail against outdated policies pushed by sections of the union movement, warning that “we are, as too often happens with the Labor Party, in danger of confusing the politics of the warm inner glow with the inspiration of the light on the hill”.
Of course, Shorten faces one hurdle Hayden didn’t. He must confront a Labor policy icon that is actually a religious faith. Dumping Labor’s insane global warming policies will seem to many on the Left as blasphemy. 
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Frightbat report

Andrew Bolt June 20 2014 (8:32pm)

Astonishing. Tim Blair asks readers to vote for the wost Left-wing frightbat - and gets a news item on the ABC devoted to it.
Typical ABC: it doesn’t even mention the winner. 
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How does Obama's government handle the scandal-plagued IRS that discriminates against Conservatives?

By giving their employees $70 million in bonuses.
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JULIA OFF TO JAKARTA... Larry Pickering
but maybe as a tourist

Is Julia’s heart breaking for the thousands drowned or is her neck breaking to discredit Abbott’s plans to stop the boats? The latter is the obvious but Julia will not be welcome in Indonesia and she may not even be PM.

Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono will not be keen to embroil himself in a crass attempt to politicise an Australian crisis to Gillard’s electoral advantage.

He knows the boats must stop.

Shortly he will have to thrash out a solution with Abbott and will not allow Gillard to pollute that.

Gillard’s sudden concern for illegal immigration will not be allayed by these proposed talks but there is no doubt Gillard will seek to imply “a breakthrough”.

Abbott, Bishop and Morrison’s talks with Indonesia have remained confidential, as they should, but Julia’s talks, if they occur, will be megaphoned in a display of blatant misconstruction aimed at discrediting the Coalition.

Yudhoyono will anticipate Gillard’s tactic and it will blow up in her face if she attempts to misrepresent any “done deal”. But she will do exactly that, just watch.

Pickering Post has consistently forecast illegal immigration as the developing and overarching election issue, due to a predictable explosion of arrivals in a frantic pre-Abbott rush.

The rush (and deaths) is happening and Gillard’s belated lurch at a diplomatic solution is far too little and far too late.

Numbers have ballooned because of a clear international consensus that our borders will remain open under Gillard and will be closed under Abbott.

If her planned trip to Indonesia eventuates, Gillard will be guilty of trashing sensitive channels of diplomacy in exchange for vulgar electoral advantage.

But we are witnessing another real Julia now... the desperate, unprincipled one
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Zaya Toma Reminds me of a quote by Benjamin Franklin, 'Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both'. The TSA is notorious and a prime example of why people need to be more worried about big Government than terrorism.
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Allyson Christy.
Lebanese president urges Hezbollah to pull out of Syria - Reuters
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Aloese Seumanutafa
"Ladies: Place your heart in the hands of God and He will place it in the hands of a man who He believes deserves it"
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Mo Gelber
Have you ever paid for something that didn't work and went back to the store and asked for a refund? Of course you have. That is what you are supposed to do.

I once bought a ticket on the long island railroad for $8. after waiting on the platform for 2 hours, an announcement came over the speaker that there would be no trains because of a broken power switch. I went home in a taxi.

The next day I was near the railroad Office and went to return my unused ticket for a refund.they said the railroad policy is to charge a $10 dollar fee to process refunds so it would have cost me $10 to get my $8 back. I felt the easier way to get justice was to sneak on the train for free the next time I used that train.

Then I upped the ante by instituting a policy of charging a $500 inconvenience fee for any time I rode public transport and the trains were late or overcrowded and I couldn't get a seat.

So anytime I am on the subway and hear "we are delayed due to train traffic ahead", it means I will ride the subway for free 200 times until I collect my $500 inconvenience fee
#mtasucks
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NOT ‘THE AUSTRALIAN’, SURELY! 

“Shorten left out of the Gillard loop”, screamed ‘The Australian’ this morning. “Hmmm”, I thought, “Gillard’s loop? What the hell would Shorten be doing in Gillard’s loop anyway?” He’s an ambitious little loner with a blue tie!

"She isn't getting advice from the right people," wrote Onselin, quoting a source close to Mr Shorten. 

Golly, an anonymous source close to Shorten really said that? Well I’ll be stuffed! You could have knocked me over with a feather.

‘The Australian’ is blessed with too many incisive journos to mention, so why did Editor Mathieson allow Peter van (well, I believe you Prime Minister) Onselin’s concocted nonsense on Page One?

Onselin is an affable enough bloke but a seasoned political animal he is not, and it shows.

A short lifetime amassing university credentials does not replace the street-smarts necessary to interpret politics.

Onselin went on, “The Prime Minister has not sought his (Shorten’s) advice in recent weeks because she fears that he may have switched sides and can no longer be trusted”. Blimey teddy!

So Julia fears he can’t be trusted and hasn’t asked his advice because she believes he may have switched sides? What sort of nonsense journalism is that?

It’s the sort that begs a retraction, and of course it was retracted. The Australian’s on-line version was thankfully replaced with, “Shorten still the man in the middle” by Ben Packham.

Bill Shorten has never graced Gillard’s inner circle. He is certainly not on the outer, but a Gillard confidante? No, never.

He has been very busy counting faction numbers and, as I have said before, the counting may well be in regard to his leadership ambitions and not Rudd’s... and at least I don’t quote “sources close to” saying that!

Peter, if you have something stupid to say, then YOU say it and YOU own it! Leave the “sources close to” garbage to the tabloids.

Write that sort of drivel as an opinion piece not a news story we should be able to rely on.

Journalists who suspiciously quote these anonymous sources should ensure the info is near to correct or ask those concerned to confirm or deny.

But if Onselin had picked up the phone, his silly Page One story would have flown out the window where it belonged.

Come on ‘Oz’ you are about the only paper left we can trust, so please don’t allow ambitious schoolkids dodgy Page One leads when you have the likes of Shanahan, Kelly and Sheridan.

That said, I quite like Peter.
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Unbelievable facts
McDonalds doesn't sell hot dogs because, according to founder Ray Kroc, "there's no telling what's inside a hot dog's skin, and our standard of quality just wouldn't permit that kind of item."
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SpaceShipOne
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“What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul?”Mark 8:36 NIV
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Morning and Evening by Charles Spurgeon

Morning

"For, lo, I will command, and I will sift the house of Israel among all nations, like as corn is sifted in a sieve, yet shall not the least grain fall upon the earth."
Amos 9:9
Every sifting comes by divine command and permission. Satan must ask leave before he can lay a finger upon Job. Nay, more, in some sense our siftings are directly the work of heaven, for the text says, "I will sift the house of Israel." Satan, like a drudge, may hold the sieve, hoping to destroy the corn; but the overruling hand of the Master is accomplishing the purity of the grain by the very process which the enemy intended to be destructive. Precious, but much sifted corn of the Lord's floor, be comforted by the blessed fact that the Lord directeth both flail and sieve to his own glory, and to thine eternal profit.
The Lord Jesus will surely use the fan which is in his hand, and will divide the precious from the vile. All are not Israel that are of Israel; the heap on the barn floor is not clean provender, and hence the winnowing process must be performed. In the sieve true weight alone has power. Husks and chaff being devoid of substance must fly before the wind, and only solid corn will remain.
Observe the complete safety of the Lord's wheat; even the least grain has a promise of preservation. God himself sifts, and therefore it is stern and terrible work; he sifts them in all places, "among all nations"; he sifts them in the most effectual manner, "like as corn is sifted in a sieve"; and yet for all this, not the smallest, lightest, or most shrivelled grain, is permitted to fall to the ground. Every individual believer is precious in the sight of the Lord, a shepherd would not lose one sheep, nor a jeweller one diamond, nor a mother one child, nor a man one limb of his body, nor will the Lord lose one of his redeemed people. However little we may be, if we are the Lord's, we may rejoice that we are preserved in Christ Jesus.

Evening

"Straightway they forsook their nets, and followed him."
Mark 1:18
When they heard the call of Jesus, Simon and Andrew obeyed at once without demur. If we would always, punctually and with resolute zeal, put in practice what we hear upon the spot, or at the first fit occasion, our attendance at the means of grace, and our reading of good books, could not fail to enrich us spiritually. He will not lose his loaf who has taken care at once to eat it, neither can he be deprived of the benefit of the doctrine who has already acted upon it. Most readers and hearers become moved so far as to purpose to amend; but, alas! the proposal is a blossom which has not been knit, and therefore no fruit comes of it; they wait, they waver, and then they forget, till, like the ponds in nights of frost, when the sun shines by day, they are only thawed in time to be frozen again. That fatal to-morrow is blood-red with the murder of fair resolutions; it is the slaughter-house of the innocents. We are very concerned that our little book of "Evening Readings" should not be fruitless, and therefore we pray that readers may not be readers only, but doers, of the word. The practice of truth is the most profitable reading of it. Should the reader be impressed with any duty while perusing these pages, let him hasten to fulfil it before the holy glow has departed from his soul, and let him leave his nets, and all that he has, sooner than be found rebellious to the Master's call. Do not give place to the devil by delay! Haste while opportunity and quickening are in happy conjunction. Do not be caught in your own nets, but break the meshes of worldliness, and away where glory calls you. Happy is the writer who shall meet with readers resolved to carry out his teachings: his harvest shall be a hundredfold, and his Master shall have great honour. Would to God that such might be our reward upon these brief meditations and hurried hints. Grant it, O Lord, unto thy servant!
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Leah

The Woman Lacking Loveliness Was Yet Loyal
Scripture References - Genesis 29; 30; 49:31; Ruth 4:11
Name Meaning - Leah as a name has been explained in many ways. "Wearied" or "Faint from Sickness" with a possible reference to her precarious condition at the time of birth, is Wilkinson's suggestion. Others say the name means "married" or "mistress." The narrative tells us that she was "tender eyed" (Genesis 29:17), which can mean that her sight was weak or that her eyes lacked that luster reckoned a conspicuous part of female beauty which Rachel her sister "beautiful and well-favoured" evidently had.
Family Connections - Because Jacob was Rebekah's son he was related to Leah by marriage. Leah was the elder daughter of Laban who, by deception, married her to Jacob, to whom she bore six sons and a daughter. By her maid, Zilpah, Leah added two more sons to her family.
The romantic story of Jacob and his two wives never loses its appeal. After fleeing from and meeting God at Bethel, Jacob reached Haran and at Laban's well he met his cousin Rachel drawing water for the sheep. It was love at first sight for Jacob, and his love remained firm until Rachel's death in giving birth to her second child. Going to work for his Uncle Laban, Jacob was offered wages in return for service rendered, but he agreed to serve Laban for seven years on the condition that at the end of the period Rachel should be his wife. Because of his love for Rachel those years seemed but a few days.
At the end of the specified period however, Jacob was cruelly deceived by his uncle. As it was a custom of the time to conduct the bride to the bedchamber of her husband in silence and darkness, it was only with the morning light that Jacob discovered that he had been deceived by Laban as he saw Leah and not Rachel at his side. Laban condoned his unrighteous act by saying that the younger girl could not be given in marriage before the first-born, and Jacob covenanted to serve another seven years for Rachel, his true love inspiring him to be patient and persevering. Perhaps Jacob treated the deception as a retributive providence, for he had previously deceived his blind and dying father.
Whether Leah participated in the deceit to win Jacob from her more beautiful sister we do not know. The moral tone of the home was low, and Leah may have been a child of environment. This much is evident, that although she knew that the love of her husband's heart was not for her but for Rachel, Leah genuinely loved Jacob and was true to him until he buried her in the cave of Machpelah. While Jacob was infatuated with Rachel's beauty, and loved her, there is no indication that she loved him in the same way. "Rachel remains one of those women with nothing to recommend her but beauty," says H. V. Morton. "She is bitter, envious, quarrelsome and petulant. The full force of her hatred is directed against her sister, Leah."
The names Leah gave her children testified to the miraculous faith God had planted in her heart. Somewhat despised by Jacob, she was yet remembered by the Lord. In spite of the polygamous marriage, she became the mother of six sons who were to become the representatives of six of the twelve tribes of Israel. The names Leah chose revealed her piety and sense of obligation to the Lord.
Reuben, her first-born, means "Behold a son," and Leah praised God for looking favorably upon her. Thus, divine compassion was carefully treasured in such a name which also the holder tarnished.
Simeon, the second son, means "Hearing," so given by Leah since God had heard her cry because of Rachel's hatred. Such a name as Simeon is a lasting monument of answered prayer.
Levi, the next to be born implies, "Joined" and Leah rejoices feeling that her husband would now love her, and that through Levi's birth she would be more closely united to her husband.
Judah was the fourth son to be born to Leah, and she gave him a name meaning "Praise." Perhaps by now Jacob had become a little more affectionate. Certainly the Lord had been good to both Leah and Jacob, and with the selfishness in her heart defeated, Leah utters a sincere Soli Deo Gloria - "I will praise the Lord." Leah had two other sons named Issachar and Zebulun, and a daughter, Dinah. Leah was uncomely when compared to her lovely sister, but what she lacked in beauty she made up for in loyalty to Jacob as a wife, and as a good mother to his children. "It seems that homely Leah was a person of deep-rooted piety and therefore better suited to become instrumental in carrying out the plans of Jehovah than her handsome, but worldly-minded, sister, Rachel."
One evident lesson we can learn from the triangle of love in that ancient Israelite home is that solemn choices should not be based upon mere external appearances. Rachel was beautiful, and as soon as Jacob saw her he fell for her. But it was Leah, not Rachel, who bore Judah through whose line the Saviour came. The unattractive Leah might have repelled others, but God was attracted toward her because of an inner beauty which the lovely Rachel lacked. "There are two kinds of beauty," Kuyper reminds us. "There is a beauty which God gives at birth, and which withers as a flower. And there is a beauty which God grants when by His grace men are born again. That kind of beauty never vanishes but blooms eternally." Behind many a plain or ugly face there is a most lovely disposition. Also God does not look upon the outward appearance, but upon the heart.
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Tubal-Cain

 [To̅o̅'bal-cāin] - production of forged work or flowing forth of cain. The son of Zillah, one of Lamech's wives, of the race of Cain (Gen. 4:22).

The Man Who Invented Metal Tools

Tubal (or the Tibureni, noted for production of bronze articles, Ezek. 27:13) and Cain meaning "smith" marks Tubal-cain as "the father of every forger of copper and iron." In Ezekiel 27:13, Tubal is found bringing brass to the market of Tyre, and in Persian the word means copper. The alloy we call brass was absolutely unknown to the ancients. From the world's first coppersmith we learn that "metals and their use were kept a guarded secret in the possession of a single family, or clan, for many generations."
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Today's reading: Esther 1-2, Acts 5:1-21 (NIV)

View today's reading on Bible Gateway

Today's Old Testament reading: Esther 1-2

Priests and Levites
Queen Vashti Deposed
1 This is what happened during the time of Xerxes, the Xerxes who ruled over 127 provinces stretching from India to Cush: 2 At that time King Xerxes reigned from his royal throne in the citadel of Susa, 3 and in the third year of his reign he gave a banquet for all his nobles and officials. The military leaders of Persia and Media, the princes, and the nobles of the provinces were present.
4 For a full 180 days he displayed the vast wealth of his kingdom and the splendor and glory of his majesty. 5 When these days were over, the king gave a banquet, lasting seven days, in the enclosed garden of the king's palace, for all the people from the least to the greatest who were in the citadel of Susa....

Today's New Testament reading: Acts 5:1-21

Ananias and Sapphira
1 Now a man named Ananias, together with his wife Sapphira, also sold a piece of property. 2 With his wife's full knowledge he kept back part of the money for himself, but brought the rest and put it at the apostles' feet.
3 Then Peter said, "Ananias, how is it that Satan has so filled your heart that you have lied to the Holy Spirit and have kept for yourself some of the money you received for the land? 4Didn't it belong to you before it was sold? And after it was sold, wasn't the money at your disposal? What made you think of doing such a thing? You have not lied just to human beings but to God...."
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