Wednesday, September 02, 2015

Wed Sep 2nd Todays News

The gayby baby issue is based on hateful misleading assertions. The ABC Catalyst infomercial regarding it spread the lies. A lesbian couple was presented from the UK claiming that their marriage was not recognised in Australia and that it was stated that they could not have children. In fact, their civil union is recognised in Australia as are any children. The argument is that churches should be allowed to refuse giving a marriage certificate based on conscience. And that it is not a natural conception which brings forth the baby in strict religious moral terms. But the babies are real. And if the lobby wish to be taken seriously they shouldn't lie about the issues, but address them. Otherwise any success will never be legitimate. 

 The ALP have again been offered an opportunity to reform. They haven't done it. But they need to. No one doubts they will one day win federal office. But they are in danger of losing that office through anti corruption laws they transgress. 
=== from 2014 ===
More testimony from ALP former Ministers about corrupt activity from them regarding building development. Good decisions have come from Liberal run government in NSW, although individuals have been compromised by an industry trying to bribe them. But the ALP are seen to have acted corruptly without such bribes. This disparity might be puzzling to the uninitiated, but a simple explanation is that corrupt unions have acted as a go between using slush funds. Slush funds are not deemed to be illegal. So the ALP members have vast resources for corruption that is prima facie legal. Roozendal has admitted he supported a Buildev option on Tripodi's advice despite independent advice saying he shouldn't. That is corrupt. It highlights why the NSW Government is now tentative regarding Coal Seam Gas approval. Responsible government would approve CSG extraction, but government nervous that it could be accused of collusion can't. And so the double standard regarding the courts addressing corruption within politics is explained. 

The Greens have an advert that could easily be a federal government one. The ending of the ridiculous Mineral Rent Tax is important for Australia. It had made it expensive to mine relative to the rest of the world. It also didn't raise money. And it costed a lot. Some of the ridiculous costs were ended, but not all, after a deal with PUP. If the ALP wanted better, they should have negotiated. Another big win to Abbott government. What are the Greens trying to achieve? It is apparent that Gillard watered down IR laws so as to foster union corruption, but what do the Greens get out of it? 

Australia is punching above her weight when it comes to exporting terrorists to the Middle East. The Anglican Church seems to be on the wrong side of culture in Gosford. We have unions who break IR laws with apparent impunity and hiring people now known to be terrorists. Greens speak out for genocidal maniacs, but that seems to be a broad failing of the left, who excuse genocide in the name of multiculturalism. Meanwhile the federal government is trying her best, and has to compromise on the issue of banning the dole for six months on new recipients who are young. But a delay is a good thing because it limits needless access to welfare, which is hard to remove. But compromise is essential when the Senate is hostile. The ability of PUP to block progress might be limited. It is testimony that one port manager was not supported by the $12 million Palmer claims he spent on that port. 

Greens are desperate and there has been no warming now for 19 years, despite a substantial increase in Carbon Dioxide. Now hysterics are preaching to little children that their pets will be killed by AGW monsters. A lovely Maori woman stands with Israel. There are calls to place science teacher specialists in primary schools, which seems a good idea. 
From 2013
Obama drew the red line, now he dithers. The master ditherer is thinking about asking Congress for direction. If he decides to Do Something, We will keep You informed. Hundreds of thousands of people have left Syria. About a hundred thousand have been estimated dead from the civil war in the last few years. Obama has done nothing to date about the atrocities. A related observation is the terrorist rocket activity into Israel. Obama has demanded Israel release terrorists and killers back into the community as incentive for other terrorists to sign a peace treaty. So we know Obama doesn't merely dither, he can act too, if not wisely. 

In Australia, the polls, which favoured the LNP yesterday 53 to 47, favour the LNP today 54 to 46. At that rate, the actual poll on Saturday will be 59 to 41. This raises the question of why it is that 41% of the nation don't understand how to vote. Rudd is dithering over flying out to the G20 for the last two days and giving the ALP a possible lift in the polls through his absence. It would be Rudd's last junket. Many of his supporters might be feeling he has earned it, and hope he goes soon. 

Maybe by repeating the name "Abbott" Rudd will hit upon a magic formula suggesting the Australian voting population should vote for Rudd. It hasn't happened yet. It didn't work for Gillard, but keep trying Kev. Rudd could copy Wikileaks founder Julian Assange's attempt to acquire office. But it hasn't worked for the incompetent penis either. Sending Rudd to the G20, is like sending Rudd to get a mosquito candle, muses Therese. Tim Blair shows Rudd channeling Nixon badly. Rudd has had some good policies lately .. they involve rejecting previous ALP policies he made. There are many hyper critical commentators taking Abbott to task for calling terrorists bad people. Unlike Rudd, who called people, who spoke Chinese Mandarin, Ratfuckers.
=== 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.
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Happy birthday and many happy returns Deborah Appanna Snedden, Jonathan Lee and Pru Goward. Born on the same day, across the years, along with Georg Böhm (1661), Lucretia Hale (1820), Albert Spalding (1850), Graeme Langlands (1941), Christa McAuliffe (1948), Jimmy Connors (1952), Salma Hayek (1966) and Nikki Taylor Melton (1997). On your day, Paryushana begins (Svetambar Jains, 2013); Labour Day in Canada and Labor Day in the United States (2013); National Day in Vietnam (1945)
47 BC – Caesarion, possibly the son of Julius Caesar, became the last king of the Ptolemaic dynasty of Egypt, ruling jointly with his mother Cleopatra.
1649 – Forces loyal to Pope Innocent X destroyed the ancient Italian city of Castro, ending the Wars of Castro.
1807 – The British Royal Navy began their bombardment of Copenhagen to capture the Dano-Norwegian navy.
1945 – On the deck of the United States Navy battleship Missouri in Tokyo Bay, representatives from the Empire of Japan and several Allied Powers signed the Japanese Instrument of Surrender, formally ending World War II.
1998 – Swissair Flight 111, en route from New York City to Geneva, crashed into the Atlantic Ocean, killing all 229 people on board.Now that the son is co-king, and innocent forces have won. Now the Navy has asserted herself, and the mighty have been brought to heel. Now, when things are up in the air .. now is the time to have fun. Enjoy the day.
Deaths
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Gayby Baby is spreading hate, not love

Miranda Devine – Wednesday, September 02, 2015 (12:30am)

THE Gayby Baby controversy has exposed the intolerant viciousness at the heart of the same sex marriage debate.

Icon Arrow Continue reading 'Gayby Baby is spreading hate, not love'
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Labor had two choices: reform or resist. They chose the latter

Miranda Devine – Wednesday, September 02, 2015 (12:29am)

IT was a performance so cool it would have done Gary Cooper proud.

Icon Arrow Continue reading 'Labor had two choices: reform or resist. They chose the latter'
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Invading Germany

Andrew Bolt September 02 2015 (6:57pm)

Europe must change or be changed:
Hundreds of angry migrants demonstrated outside Budapest’s Eastern Railway Terminus on Tuesday demanding they be allowed to travel on to Germany, as the biggest ever influx of migrants into the European Union left its asylum policies in tatters…
A refugee crisis rivaling the Balkan wars of the 1990s as Europe’s worst since World War Two has polarized and confounded the European Union, which has no mechanism to cope with the arrival of hundreds of thousands of poor and desperate people.
Germany is likely to accept by far the largest share. In the case of those fleeing the Syrian civil war it has effectively suspended an EU rule that asylum seekers must apply in the first EU country they reach.
But with trainloads of migrants rolling into Munich and Rosenheim from Austria and Hungary, it insisted on Tuesday that the rule was nevertheless still in force and urged other EU countries to abide by it.
UPDATE
Germany is fast realising it can’t keep acting noble in the way approved by most journalists. It may have to close its borders against illegal immigrants:
The German Chancellor said for the first time that the Schengen zone, which allows passport-free travel across mainland Europe, cannot continue in its current form unless other EU countries accept their share of migrants…
Her comments ... signal that European leaders are beginning to question whether the EU can continue to exist with open borders as it struggles to cope with the hundreds of thousands of migrants coming into the continent from Africa and the Middle East…
Germany, Europe’s biggest economy, is set to receive 800,000 asylum seekers this year, four times the total for 2014 and more than any other EU country.
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We’re getting poorer but still not smarter

Andrew Bolt September 02 2015 (6:48pm)

Not good. We are getting poorer:
Gross domestic product (GDP) grew a seasonally adjusted 0.2 per cent in the three months to the end of June, the ABS said.  The result was down from the 0.9 per cent pace of growth recorded in the March quarter.
Economists surveyed by Bloomberg had tipped a 0.4 per cent growth rate for the June quarter.
Over the 12 months to June, seasonally adjusted GDP grew 2 per cent, missing analyst expectations for 2.2 per cent growth, and well below the long-term growth trend rate of around 3.25 per cent.
Given this, how insane would you have to be to oppose the China-Australia Free Trade Agreement? How dangerous would you be to keep pretending we could spend more than we earn, thanks to lavish social services spending? 
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Take it to the police, says Labor. But they don’t

Andrew Bolt September 02 2015 (6:28pm)

No, we don’t need a royal commission into corruption, says deputy Labor leader Tanya Plibersek.
This is what should happen instead:

I think if there is any allegation that anyone’s done something wrong, it should go to the police. We have also got the Crime Commission which is like a standing royal commission. The problem with the royal commission as it stands now is that it’s $80 million of taxpayers’ money used by the Government to pursue their political opponents. I don’t think Australians think that that’s value for money, frankly.
But this is what unions actually do:
Canberra construction union organisers have admitted to hearing rumours and allegations a colleague was being paid bribes but didn’t gather more evidence to take to the police.
Tony Vitler from the CFMEU told a Sydney hearing of the royal commission into trade union corruption he overheard a worker say an organiser was “on the take” early last year.
He didn’t know whether it meant money or free sporting tickets but conceded it could have been bribes.
Mr Vitler didn’t take note of which site he heard it on, or who said it, instead he “just kept walking”.
He reported what he heard to CFMEU secretary Dean Hall at their regular weekly meeting but despite being instructed to follow it up if he heard it again, he did not do so.
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Another axed tax. But what does spend-spend Labor say?

Andrew Bolt September 02 2015 (8:48am)

The Abbott Government says it will not go ahead with the mooted bank deposits tax:
The tax was proposed, but not legislated, by the former Labor government ahead of the 2013 election and would have raised about $1.5 billion over the next four years.
But what does Labor say?
SABRA LANE:  Will you bring it back?
CHRIS BOWEN: Well, I’ve just said, Sabra, it was recommended by the Council of Financial Regulators…
SABRA LANE: A straight yes or no?
CHRIS BOWEN: What we will do is: we will see what the Council of Financial Regulators continue to recommend.
So Labor plans to:
- tax superannuation savings
- tax your electricity with a new carbon tax
- perhaps tax your bank deposits
- perhaps tax capital gains on housing 
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How Labor ripped off taxpayers to win election

Andrew Bolt September 02 2015 (7:56am)

image
What is it with Labor and taxpayers’ money? Now a new scandal hits Victoria’s Socialist Left government:
OPPOSITION Leader Matthew Guy says Premier Daniel Andrews owes Victorians a “very frank explanation” after three Labor MPs and a senior party figure sensationally broke ranks to expose how the ALP rorted the taxpayer to help fund an army of election campaign staff.
The MPs say they and colleagues were told to divert part of their taxpayer-funded budgets, intended for electorate officers, to pay for campaign organisers instead.
The initiative, said to involve at least a dozen Upper House MPs and be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, breaches parliamentary rules that electorate staff mustn’t “support the member’s political or party duties"…

The campaigners were instead co-ordinating Labor’s Community Action Network — a pioneering marginal seats blitz based on grassroots campaigns run by Barack Obama in the United States…
Mr Andrews has said Labor couldn’t have won without the 5500-volunteer network, overseen by about 35 of the paid field organisers.
A spokesman for Mr Andrews said last night ... “Pooling staff is a common and efficient way for political parties to combine resources to support MPs and conduct parliamentary party business....”
To beef up the Community Action Network, the MPs say that in March 2014, most Upper House MPs were ordered by the then Opposition leader to employ casual electorate officers.
These electorate officers were then deployed as field organisers, also referred to as field researchers.
The job of the field organisers was to train and manage the army of Labor volunteers who doorknocked and telephoned voters in the lead up to last November’s poll…
A senior Labor figure familiar with the scheme said the party leadership had been warned against using parliamentary staff to supplement the Community Action Network.  
James Campbell:
Concern about how the party’s leadership has been using parliamentary resources has been growing for some time among Labor MPs, in this new IBAC era.
In the past couple of months, Labor’s Right faction has united itself in a way not seen in many years…
Two weeks ago they voted to withdraw from that pooling arrangement. It doesn’t say much about what they think about their leader.
Neither does the fact the MPs in today’s story are prepared to talk about their fears.
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Heydon defies Labor’s smears and ABC’s jeers to hunt crooks

Andrew Bolt September 02 2015 (7:30am)

Janet Albrechtsen on Dyson Heydon’s refusal to resign and reward the smear campaign by Labor and the unions:
The decision by royal commissioner Dyson Heydon marks a definitive win for law and reason over confected outrage and brute politics. Did the unions really imagine they could exploit a trivial incident to destroy the reputation of a sitting royal commissioner and shut down the royal commission into union corruption? Did they really believe they could pull the strings of a royal commissioner in the same way they pull the strings of Labor politicians? Did they expect they could resort to the kind of intimidation in the royal commission hearing room that they have resorted to in workplaces?
Again, the ABC has sided with the campaign of denigration of Heydon, designed to intimidate and discredit a corruption fighter:
Curiously, you wouldn’t have learned the salient facts from the ABC radio’s premier news program PM [on Monday]. Instead of reporting the real reasons claims by the Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union, ACTU and other unions failed, the ABC’s Mark Colvin and Brendan Trembath spent most of their report ridiculing the fact Heydon said he did not have a computer and did not use email. Sinking to new levels of poor journalism, the national broadcaster chose to report how Heydon’s disclosure was mocked on Twitter.
What Labor, the unions and their many allies in the media Left are helping to cover up:
Their chorus line of confected outrage is meant to distract us from evidence to the royal commission of union thuggery, intimidation, secret deals, secret payments (including an undeclared $40,000 paid to Bill Shorten by construction company Unibuilt when he was a union leader to fund his 2007 political campaign), bogus memberships to boost the power of unions, and deals where employers paid for membership dues.
Heydon’s royal commission yesterday resumed the digging the CFMEU and Labor were so desperate to stop:
The royal commissioner yesterday resumed hearings with counsel assisting, Jeremy Stoljar SC, probing the conduct of a lead organiser with the Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union’s ACT branch, Anthony Vitler…
Mr Vitler ...  admitted hearing rumours up to a year ago that a CFMEU organiser “might be taking money”.
He said nobody had named Halafihi Kivalu, a former organiser for the ACT branch whom it was alleged had extorted at least $150,000. Mr Kivalu was arrested on blackmail charges in July.
Mr Vitler ...  rejected claims by Claw Construction owner Troy Armstrong that he had sought a bribe in return for guaranteeing work.
In July, Mr Armstrong told the commission Mr Vitler had met him at a McDonald’s restaurant in Fyshwick, in Canberra, and canvassed the prospect of donations.
He suggested the union was “leaning towards wanting a bribe” and said ... Mr Vitler had told him to “come to an agreement with us or we will kick you off our sites”.
However, in a statement to the commission, Mr Vitler said: “...I did ask him which jobs the company was on. I did encourage him to sign the EBA. I did not make a statement that I could guarantee his company work. I deny making any statement to Mr Armstrong about ­dona­tions. I did not say anything that would make Mr Armstrong believe I was leaning towards a bribe."…
UPDATE
Paul Kelly on Labor’s shameful protection racket, which it now wants the Governor General to help:
In a squalid stunt Labor has debased any claims to principle in the Dyson Heydon dispute and will now ask the Governor-General to act improperly, trash the principles of responsible government and violate the conventions of his office…
The recommended “address” Labor proposes from the Senate has no legal standing whatsoever. It will be rejected by the Governor-General, Sir Peter Cosgrove. This is a stunt designed to put the Senate’s imprimatur on the campaign to destroy Heydon and the royal commission.
Opposition legal affairs spokesman Mark Dreyfus said that next Monday when the Senate sits Labor will proceed with “a petition to the Governor-General to remove Dyson Heydon from this office”. On what basis? There is no finding against Heydon. There is no illegality or act of impropriety committed by him. The argument is that Labor and the unions and, perhaps a majority of the Senate, think he is biased…
(W)hat is proposed is an abuse of the Senate’s power and an abuse of the Governor-General’s powers.
How desperate is the Labor Party? ... This decision is a serious blunder. It reveals Labor as a party prepared to play with the idea of vice-regal sabotage merely to extract more publicity in its campaign to protect the unions....
Its behaviour is now obsessive in seeking to protect unions from the documented exposure of criminality and in threatening the Australia-China FTA on behalf of a misleading union campaign on the issue of jobs protectionism.
UPDATE
Employment Minister Eric Abetz gets it said:

FRAN KELLY: Minister, Labor is confident that it will have enough support from the cross-bench to pass the motion to have the Governor-General ask the Royal Commissioner to step down… Do you have a sense of how this vote will go?
MINISTER ABETZ: Well what a disgraceful position Labor have got themselves into. Here they are wanting motions, calling on the Governor-General to sack people. I thought it was an article of faith of the Labor Party that the Governor-General should only act on the advice of his or her Ministers.
Here we have a completely unprincipled Labor Party wanting to put through a motion in the Senate in circumstances when they know that if they’ve got a problem with Mr Heydon’s decision they have the right to go to the courts to appeal that decision. The fact that they’re going down that track and seeking to use the Senate as a stunt. Keeping in mind the clerk of the Senate has already acknowledged and indicated that any such motion if carried would be of no legal consequence, one really has to ask what is the would be first law officer of the country, Mark Dreyfus actually doing here? All he is doing is seeking to besmirch the best legal mind of his generation, Dyson Heydon with his commentary that you’ve just played and in the attacks in the Parliament. It is disgraceful, it is beyond belief that the Labor Party has become so unprincipled in their defence of corrupt union activity that they would go down this track and I trust that the independent senators will not fall for the stunt by Labor.
I like Abetz. Tasmania has produced Bob Brown, Christine Milne and Jacqui Lambie, so it’s a relief to know it actually produces sane, steady and responsible politicians of calibre as well. Abetz is a very safe pair of hands with sound instincts, and in this case he can smell a disgrace that too many journalists won’t.
(Thanks to readers Peter of Bellevue Hill, John and ConC.) 
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What jihad?

Andrew Bolt September 02 2015 (6:59am)

The Fairfax Age:
A senior cabinet minister has launched an extraordinary broadside at the media, accusing Fairfax of launching a “jihad” against the government and the ABC of assisting in attempts to “bring the government down”.
“Extraordinary”?
Today’s Age:
image
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How did our cool weather get logged by NOAA as hot?

Andrew Bolt September 02 2015 (12:33am)

image
There is something very odd about the NOAA claim of a very hot July, thanks to global warming:
July was the hottest month on Earth since records began...
Take the NOAA map above. Check Australia, said to have had average or above-average temperatures over much of the continent, apart from the much-warmer-than-average bits around Sydney and parts of Western Australia.
Liberal MP Craig Kelly is curious:
HOW DOES THE COLDEST MONTH IN 20 YEARS BECOME THE HOTTEST MONTH “EVER’’ ?
July in Melbourne was widely reported as the ”Coldest July in 20 years”
It also was reported at the start of August that Sydney had just “notched its longest cold spell in 26 years” and it was also “the coolest July for the city since 2002”
Even our Bureau of Meteorology reported; ”Temperatures were below average across Sydney during July”
However, have close look at the below map produced by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) an Obama Government agency (the same people that assert that July 2015 was the hottest month ever).
NOAA assert that temperatures in Melbourne for July 2015 were “Warmer than Average” and for Sydney they were “Much warmer than average”.
Can anyone explain this ?
Or take Adelaide, which the NOAA map claims had average temperatures.
In fact:
Bureau of Meteorology Senior Forecaster Mark Anolack said ... “July certainly was cooler than average… Generally around Adelaide we have about 15.3 degrees (Celsius) as an average maximum temperature.
“This year, it was a little bit cooler with 14.6 degrees, and that was actually our coldest July since July 1997.”
Brisbane was said by NOAA to be about average. In fact:
Brisbane‘s average monthly maximum in July was 18.1, considerably cooler than the usual 18.9.
NOAA says Perth had a well-above-average temperatures for July. In fact, our Bureau of Meteorology says it was not quite that warm:
Perth was slightly above average with an average maximum of 18.7 as against the usual 18.4
Why is the NOAA map for Australia running so very warm?
UPDATE
Reader Ian notes that NOAA’s map of temperatures for July is very different to the cool one from our own Bureau of Meterology, particularly for south east Australia,Tasmania and the area around Perth:
image
(Thanks to reader Andrew.) 
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Bill Shorten the only leader prepared to wreck the China free trade agreement

Andrew Bolt September 01 2015 (10:42pm)

Spot the odd man out, echoing the CFMEU lines on the China-Australia Free Trade Agreement.
Victorian Labor Premier Dan Andrews:
The free trade agreement is something that I support, that our government supports.
South Australian Labor Premier Jay Weatherill:
We support the China-Australia free trade agreement ...  There is an extraordinary amount of opportunity that’s ­occurring for South Australian businesses by tapping into the largest single market in the world. This visit is to explore further ­opportunities ... which ultimately means jobs.
NSW Labor Opposition leader Luke Foley:
I agree with Bob Hawke when he says that the China-Australia free-trade agreement should not be torpedoed.
Former Labor Foreign Minister Bob Carr:
The concerns of unions cannot be rejected out of hand but the Chinese FTA doesn’t need to be rewritten.... [O]ur analysis of the FTA is that any incoming Labor government would have all the mechanisms it needs to protect … Australian workers.
Former Labor Prime Minister Bob Hawke:
I am all in favour of it… The party must not go backwards on this issue — the party and the trade union movement. Talk of opposing it is just absolutely against Australia’s best interests.
Liberal Prime Minister Tony Abbott:
The only person standing in the way of jobs and the China-Australia Free Trade Agreement is Bill Shorten — who is taking instructions from his union masters and the CFMEU… Australia has nothing to fear and everything to gain from freer trade.
Labor federal leader Bill Shorten:
This free trade agreement is not one which Labor can simply sign up to with a blank cheque because we do have some concerns. We’re up for negotiations.
UPDATE
Simon Crean used to head the ACTU and Labor. He was a Trade Minister. He now calls out the lies of Labor and the unions:
LINDA MOTTRAM:
Is this a quality agreement especially when it comes to the argument about protecting jobs for Australians?
SIMON CREAN:
It’s a quality agreement, it’s a comprehensive agreement – a much more comprehensive agreement than that with New Zealand and China because it covers services and investment. When you look at the Chinese economy and the major transition it’s going through at the moment from Australia to be positioned in the services spaces, terribly important. That’s why we hung out in government to ensure this was comprehensive.
Now, yes, it will produce job opportunities. Why? Because trade and opening trade is a multiplier of economic growth. You don’t get jobs without expanding growth and the opportunities in China are enormous because China is already our major trading partner. So, this is an agreement that should be supported, it should be owned by the Labor Party because we did much of the negotiations but the opportunities are enormous going forward.
LINDA MOTTRAM:
The issue of jobs, though, continues to come up. Trade union movements or part thereof are running a campaign because of this provision that Chinese companies will be able to bring their own workforce in for projects over $150 million without the kind of usual local tests that apply say with 457 visas. Is that a weakness?
SIMON CREAN:
Well, it’s not true, Linda. In all the material that I’ve read on this and the material that’s been presented so far in the Joint Parliamentary Treaties Committee, existing 457 visas remain. It is true that in terms of the threshold for investment agreements that’s being lowered, but we have in place in government provisions for enterprise migration agreements. All the lower threshold does is to recognise the changing nature away from resources to different sorts of investments in Australia by China. The existing 457 visa arrangements remain as does the requirement for skills requirements to be met. Jobs have to be offered to Australians first. Now, there is either misunderstanding or misrepresentation on this issue, but that’s where the Joint Committee can sort this out and I would urge honesty in the approach on this and I would urge there be a proper identification of the factual basis for it because it is an issue that is causing confusion out there. Now, I always believe that you start with these things with the facts. Let’s get the facts on the table, we’ve got a process to do it, but down the track these are issues capable of being resolved, but most importantly, the agreement needs to be ratified, needs to be signed and it needs to be done this year. 
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THE GREAT KITTEN AND PUPPY EXTINCTION

Tim Blair – Tuesday, September 02, 2014 (7:38pm)

Harvard warmist Naomi Oreskes predicts the deaths of all Australians due to climate change – and even worse, as Tony Thomas observes: 
She prophesises the climate deaths of puppies and kittens. One reader, she says, “started crying when the pets die, so I didn’t mean to upset people too much … I was just trying to come up with something that I thought people wouldn’t forget about, and I thought, well, Americans spend billions of dollars every year taking care of their pets, and I thought if people’s dogs started dying, maybe then they would sit up and take notice.”
I looked up that bit in the book, and found the Great Kitten & Puppy Extinction occurs in 2023, along with the incidental deaths of 500,000 people and $US500b financial damage. Oreskes writes,
“The loss of pet cats and dogs garnered particular attention among wealthy Westerners, but what was anomalous in 2023 soon became the new normal. A shadow of ignorance and denial had fallen over people who considered themselves children of the Enlightenment.”
To make sure no-one misses the pet die-off, she repeats it in a bold-type breakout. 
Naturally, this scored an ABC appearance for Naomi. On the Science Show.
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BENT ROD

Tim Blair – Tuesday, September 02, 2014 (4:32pm)

The tilt is permanent.
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JUST ONE BOOK

Tim Blair – Tuesday, September 02, 2014 (1:49pm)

Most of Guardian cartoonist Andrew Marlton’s latest work is his usual low-cal leftist giggle-chow, but this frame is slightly more sinister:

image

Marlton is very deliberately excusing, almost to the point of dismissal, the distribution and sale in Australia of booksthat celebrate Hitler, describe Jews as animals and baby killers, and assert women are worth only half as much as men. It’s no big deal to Marlton. Move along, people. Nothing to see here.
Just as there was nothing to see in Rotherham.
UPDATE. A British social worker attempted to expose sexual predators in Rotherham more than ten years ago: 
Working as a researcher for the British Home Office in 2002, the female social worker told the BBC that she was intimidated after she turned in a report documenting 270 cases of sexual exploitation involving men of Pakistani or Kashmiri heritage in Rotherham, a town of 250,000 in northern England …
“I was collecting data on who the perpetrators were, what cars they were using, their grooming methods, their offending methods, and what I was also collecting, was information on professional responses,” she said. 
Then she was Marltoned: 
“You must never refer to that again. You must never refer to Asian men,” the social worker was told by a superior, she told the BBC. “And her other response was to book me on a two-day ethnicity and diversity class.” 
(Via Firehand)
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STAND WITH ISRAEL

Tim Blair – Tuesday, September 02, 2014 (12:24pm)

A beautiful speech, in content and delivery, from New Zealand’s Sheree Trotter:



(Via David & Deanne C)
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Mining tax scrapped. Palmer lets through $10 billion of cuts

Andrew Bolt September 02 2014 (4:03pm)

The Abbott Government gets another big item off its agenda thanks to a surprise deal with Clive Palmer. The trouble is not just that the savings now aren’t as big as needed, but that the 2016 election could be in part a referendum on whether to confirm or stop the welfare cuts:
THE mining tax has been scrapped after the Abbott government announced a surprise deal with crossbench senators to overhaul the bill to repeal the impost… 
Senator Cormann said the changes would add $10 billion to the budget bottom line over the next four years by repealing the tax and scaling back some of the spending measures linked to it.
The government’s ideal plan, reintroduced to parliament on Monday, would have added $16.5bn to the budget bottom…
The mining tax was officially repealed in the Senate shortly after 2pm…
Senator Cormann said the changes would means-test the Schoolkids Bonus, in effect giving ground to Mr Palmer, who had insisted on keeping the cash payment to families even though the Coalition promised at the last election to scrap it.
Other changes will keep the income support bonus through to 2016 and the low income super contribution through to 2017…
But the most contentious change is to delay a scheduled increase in the superannuation guarantee levy, due to take place next July and to keep rising over the next few years to reach 12 per cent of wages by 2019. The government’s changes will halt the increase and not restart it until early next decade, so that the target of 12 per cent is not reached until 2026. Senator Cormann thanked the Palmer United Party, Ricky Muir from the Australian Motoring Enthusiast Party, David Leyonjhjelm from the Liberal Democratic Party and Bob Day from Family First as he outlined the new deal to the Senate. 
Still the Medicare co-payment to go, and the parental leave scheme after that. I suspect the first will be ditched and the other severely modified. Clive Palmer says he’s against deregulation of universities. too.
So still things to do and this deal still leaves spending not cut as it should be. Yet there are savings (to add to others already gone through), and the Government can now credibly claim to have fulfilled its big four promises - to scrap the carbon tax, scrap the mining tax, stop the boats and get the Budget back under control. This is a big moment for Abbott.
UPDATE
Indeed, Clive Palmer says voters can choose at the next election to keep the welfare payments or go ahead and scrap them. He’s having a bet both ways, saying he still wants the payments kept even though he’s had had his Senators vote to cut them in three years time. 
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A leading exporter of jihadism

Andrew Bolt September 02 2014 (11:25am)

We seem to have one of the highest proportions of jihadists:
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(Thanks to reader Jason.) 
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Crime figure allegedly paid $2500 a week to CFMEU

Andrew Bolt September 02 2014 (9:37am)

Something very ugly in the CFMEU:
COMPANIES owned by Sydney crime figure George Alex made regular illicit payments every week running to thousands of ­dollars to officials of the militant construction union as “the cost of doing business”. 
The royal commission into union corruption heard yesterday about the close relationship between Mr Alex and two officials from the Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union — NSW branch secretary Brian Parker and NSW organiser Darren Greenfield…
Another name to feature prominently was Khaled Sharrouf, employed as “muscle-for-hire” by Mr Alex before he fled to Syria in December to fight for the Islamic State and gained inter­national notoriety for a photo of one of his young sons holding the severed head of a Syrian fighter. In evidence to the commission yesterday, Karen Nettleton, the mother-in-law of Sharrouf and grandmother of the boy in the photograph, said she just did what she was told when working for Mr Alex as a bookkeeper processing $2500 payments.
Ms Nettleton was hired by Mr Alex after Sharrouf introduced her to him.
Two executives who worked with Mr Alex admitted under pressure in evidence yesterday that regular weekly payments of $2500 were siphoned from his companies to pay CFMEU officials.
The commission heard how Mr Alex ... shut down labour hire and scaffolding companies when they ran short of cash as funds were shifted to Mr Alex, Mr Antoun and other “investors”.
According to evidence, Mr Alex reopened his businesses and continued trading by starting companies with slightly different names.
Workers who were union members lost their jobs and were denied owed entitlements and superannuation, but the regular $2500 secret commissions continued to CFMEU officials in NSW… 
We’d probably know more if witnesses were not so scared:
Another witness, cage wrestler Jimmy Kendrovski, refused to co-operate after being brought from Parklea jail where he is serving nine months for firearms offences. 
Asked if someone spoke to him about his looming evidence when he was bashed in jail on Friday night, Mr Kendrovski said: “I can’t comment on it ... because I have a wife and three kids outside on their own.” 
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Government folding on six-month dole bans

Andrew Bolt September 02 2014 (9:29am)

A very big backdown, but one forced on the Abbott Government:
UNEMPLOYED people under 30 would face a shorter wait for the Newstart Allowance payment than the six-month proposal unveiled in the budget, as the Abbott government prepares to compromise in order to get its controversial welfare reforms through the Senate. 
The Australian understands that senior members of the ­Coalition have conceded that getting the proposal for a full six months off the dole through the Senate is extremely difficult, or even impossible, and are prepared to accept a shorter waiting period. The government is expected to be able to get the radical measure through if it settles for a waiting period of one month, as operates in New Zealand.
Senate crossbenchers have so far been unwilling to accept any waiting period for the dole but given New Zealand has had success with its one-month waiting period, the Abbott government hopes to convince them that this is a useful policy for deterring people from living on the dole.
I’ve said before that this line yesterday from Social Services Minister Kevin Andrews should have been pushed much harder - and from the start:
This is not an earn-or-starve provision; this is an earn-or-learn provision. If you engage in education and training, there is ­support for you to do so. 
But can that be guaranteed? That’s where the compromise should have been.
Still, that battle is over. Now the Government seems to be coming to the conclusion it should cut its losses. 
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McKitrick paper: no warming for 19 years

Andrew Bolt September 02 2014 (9:17am)

The Guardian in 2009 predicted five years of rapid warming:
The world faces record-breaking temperatures as the sun’s activity increases, leading the planet to heat up significantly faster than scientists had predicted for the next five years, according to a study. 
The hottest year on record was 1998, and the relatively cool years since have led to some global warming sceptics claiming that temperatures have levelled off or started to decline. But new research firmly rejects that argument. The research, to be published in Geophysical Research Letters, was carried out by Judith Lean, of the US Naval Research Laboratory, and David Rind, of Nasa’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies.
Fail. Five more years of no warming followed.
Professsor Ross McKitrick says in a new paper that the warming pause has now lasted an astonishing 19 years at the surface and 16-26 years in the lower troposphere:

image 
The IPCC has drawn attention to an apparent leveling-off of globally-averaged temperatures over the past 15 years or so.... Here, I propose a method for estimating the duration of the hiatus that is robust to unknown forms of heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation (HAC) in the temperature series and to cherry-picking of endpoints… Application of the method shows that there is now a trendless interval of 19 years duration at the end of the HadCRUT4 surface temperature series, and of 16 – 26 years in the lower troposphere. Use of a simple AR1 trend model suggests a shorter hiatus of 14 – 20 years but is likely unreliable…
While the HadCRUT4 record clearly shows numerous pauses and dips amid the overall upward trend, the ending hiatus is of particular note because climate models project continuing warming over the period. Since 1990, atmospheric carbon dioxide levels rose from 354 ppm to just under 400 ppm, a 13% increase… In the surface data we compute a hiatus length of 19 years, and in the lower tropospheric data we compute a hiatus length of 16 years in the UAH series and 26 years in the RSS series.  
This is “the science”. Why do warmists keep ignoring it?
(Via the ever-excellent Watts Up With That.)
UPDATE
With the science against the faith it has so frantically promoted, the UN searches for someone who will turn the debate. Note well: it’s looking for someone who isn’t a scientist but who can play on guilt, racial politics, gender politics and victimhood:

The United Nations is looking for a young woman to, as BBC put it, be the ‘Malala’ of the climate change movement, serving as a voice that will energize this September’s climate change conference. 
The organization has put out a call for a woman under 30 to speak at the opening session of the 2014 Climate Summit, which is being held on September 23 in New York City. The woman has to be from a developing country and must have a background that includes advocacy on climate change or work on implementing climate mitigation or adaptation solutions. So far, the call for applicants has drawn 544 women, who emailed short videos of themselves persuading world leaders to act on climate change to the Secretary-General’s office. 
The UN has outed itself with this stunt.  Its criteria ensure no leading climate scientists need apply. See, this is no longer about science at all.
(Thanks to readers Luke, Rocky and Old Fellah.) 
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Cruelty denounced

Andrew Bolt September 02 2014 (9:16am)

Reader Bobbi:
I noticed Richmond F.C. got a bit of a mention in the Herald Sun over the weekend. Did anybody at the Herald Sun bother to think about your poor friend, Tim Blair? Collingwood supporters have feelings too, you know.
You’re wrong, Bobbi. I have indeed been thinking of poor Tim. Nothing surer these days to bring a smile to my face. 
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Palmer didn’t run port, says man who did

Andrew Bolt September 02 2014 (9:10am)

It’s not surprising to see Clive Palmer looking much grimmer these days. Hedley Thomas on the further unravelling of Palmer’s affairs: 

CLIVE Palmer could not have spent more than $12 million in Chinese funds on “port management services” because his people were not at the port nor doing such work, according to a master mariner and a China-owned company.
Ralph Larbey, who ran the remote West Australian port of Cape Preston, makes the claims in a fresh Supreme Court affidavit…
Mr Larbey ... said he worked for the Chinese side as managing director of the Cape Preston Port Company between September 2012 and February this year, and dealt with all operational and regulatory matters for the port.
He oversaw three managers based at the port and four managers in the Perth office as part of his responsibility to operate and maintain the infrastructure and marine assets at the port and meet all regulatory needs.
“At no time during my tenure as managing director for Cape Preston Port Company did any representative of Cosmo Developments Pty Ltd initiate contact, verbally or in writing, directly or through (Mr Palmer’s company) Mineralogy Pty Ltd to seek access to the port,’’ he said in his August 18 affidavit… Mr Palmer’s top executives, including his own manager, Paul Robinson, have acknowledged they were not running the port.
(Thanks to reader Peter of Bellevue Hill.) 
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Get the gas out of the ground before industry is destroyed

Andrew Bolt September 02 2014 (8:38am)

Craig Emerson and Greg Combet warn that the anti-fracking hype in NSW and Victoria could cost a lot of workers their jobs:

While a moratorium on coal seam gas extraction continues in Victoria, the NSW government has tentatively resumed issuing permits. Any development in NSW and Victoria needs to meet high hydrological and other environmental standards. But environmental issues should be determined on the basis of science, research and empirical evidence, not on political grounds…
NSW imports 95 per cent of its gas from other states..., but gas supplies are tightening as the LNG industry trebles demand for eastern Australian gas in just three years....
Gas from the Cooper Basin and Gippsland that has been readily available to supply NSW and Victorian households and commercial users can now be diverted to the LNG export plants at Gladstone, where it will fetch up to three times the price that domestic consumers have been accustomed to paying.
Most of the long-term supply contracts for eastern Australian gas users expire over the period 2015 to 2017. With an eye to the lucrative export market, gas suppliers are unwilling to commit to new long-term contracts with users at the historical low prices…
[T]he east coast LNG export industry is raising costs for Australian gas-intensive manufacturing as previously low domestic gas prices move towards export parity. Deloitte Access forecasts serious declines in Australian east-coast manufacturing to the year 2021, with an income loss of up to $118 billion and more than 14,000 jobs lost.
With gas prices rising towards export parity and supply tightening, it is exceptionally difficult to make a business case for new investment in gas-intensive manufacturing in eastern Australia. Increasing the supply of gas is the only answer. And that means addressing any legitimate environmental issues and unlocking gas in NSW in particular… Gas-intensive manufacturing is already migrating from Australia to the United States to take advantage of cheap American shale gas… Withholding the development of coal seam gas reserves in NSW and Victoria would make the job losses worse. 
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The case for stopping genocide in Iraq

Andrew Bolt September 02 2014 (8:10am)

Former foreign minister Gareth Evans is far too damning of the 2003 liberation of Iraq and too kind to Barack Obama now. But he is surely right about this:
The current Western military intervention in Iraq is not 2003 revisited, and Australia is right to be part of it. The action is being taken at the request of the Iraqi government, to support its own and Kurdish Peshmerga forces, so no question arises of any breach of international law even in the absence of express UN Security Council authorisation. Its objective is explicitly humanitarian, to protect civilian populations immediately at risk of genocide or other mass atrocity crimes from the marauding Islamic State militant forces, who in their march across Iraq have already perpetrated atrocities unrivalled in their savagery. And there is a reasonable prospect that it will be successful in meeting at least this immediate aim. 
So why are the Greens against it? 
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What are our multicultural commissars doing to protect us?

Andrew Bolt September 02 2014 (8:03am)

Nick Cater on a multiculturalism industry that’s fiddling while Australia smoulders:
[T]he evolution of Australian jihadis — migrants or their offspring who have decided they want to kill us — suggests the multicultural voyage has hit a rocky spot. 
It’s a pity because in almost every other respect multiculturalism has been brilliant… Yet the intercultural tension between Islam and mainstream Australian values should not be ignored, least of all by institutions such as, say, the Ethnic Communities’ Council of NSW, which receives about $1 million a year in grants to help maintain the social fabric.
So how are the rainbow nation warriors at the ECC occupying their time? Well, they’ve got the Asian Dry Cleaner Electricity Saving Project to run for a start. They are employing “bilingual environmental educators” to lecture Vietnamese and Chinese business owners on the frugal use of energy… There’s the Saving Water in Asian Restaurants program, which, as the name suggests, offers “multilingual information on actions that can be taken to reduce water use in kitchens”. It is tempting to think that meddling institutions such as the ECC (and there are many of them) have outlived their purpose, if indeed they ever had one.
The worst of such fiddling is that even the tune is wrong:
The multicultural institutions have decided that integration is not their thing. They have chosen to specialise in diversity, social justice and the assertion of rights… They lead, in fact, to the opposite of integration, which is segregation.
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Rudd’s dumb idea, Arbib’s reckless implementation

Andrew Bolt September 02 2014 (7:55am)

The royal commission does not accuse Kevin Rudd directly, reserving its worst criticisms for Mark Arbib:

FORMER ministers Mark Arbib and Peter Garrett have been slammed over the deaths of four young workers during Labor’s $1.5 billion home insulation scheme in a scathing report on the “serious failure” of the Rudd government… 
Mr Hanger finds serial failures from the moment Kevin Rudd launched the idea without full examination by federal cabinet and with key ministers — including Mr Garrett — left out of the loop on major decisions.
“The reality is that the Australian government conceived of, ­devised, designed and implemented a program that enabled very large numbers of inexperienced workers — often engaged by unscrupulous and avaricious employers or head contractors, who were themselves inexperienced in insulation installation — to undertake potentially dangerous work,” the commissioner writes. “It should have done more to protect them."…
Mr Hanger is especially critical of Mr Arbib, who was the parliamentary secretary and later the minister overseeing the Office of the Co-ordinator General, the central authority within Mr Rudd’s department for monitoring the stimulus. The report finds that in March 2009, a month after the program was announced but a few months before its start, co-ordinator-general Mike Mrdak told Mr Arbib that the deadlines were “very tight” and suggested a delay. This was rejected.
The report also finds that Mr Arbib received a risk assessment about the program in March 2009 but was more concerned about fraud by installers rather than the danger to workers…
A “turning point” came on March 31, 2009, when Mr Arbib and officers from the prime minister’s department overhauled the plan to quicken the pace of the rollout while easing the restrictions and training requirements. Mr Garrett was not at this meeting...
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Why did Labor not see this coming?

Andrew Bolt September 02 2014 (7:41am)

Simon Benson on Labor’s past blindness to the threat in Syria and Iraq:

THE opposition’s shadow attorney-general Mark Dreyfus claims the last Labor government had been warning of the threats posed by terrorism in Syria and Iraq for years. 
But who it is that he claims was being warned still remains a mystery.
It can’t have been the then prime minister Julia Gillard.
In her landmark national security speech last year she failed to mention the emerging crisis at all.
Not a single sentence did she devote to the issue.
This is more than a little surprising. It is alarming. At the time, the estimate of the number of Australians having joined the jihadists in Syria was close to 200…
The funding figures speak for themselves.
Under Labor the level of funding provided to the agencies with key counterterrorism roles was cut by $292 million — from $790 million in 2007-08 to $498.
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Now the ABC tells sex joke about Tony Abbott’s mother

Andrew Bolt September 02 2014 (8:42pm)

Has the ABC learned nothing? Are there no bounds to its malice to conservatives?
ABC television late last year broadcast a show calling conservative critic Chris Kenny a “dog f...er” and showing a doctored photograph of him sodomising a dog. It had to apologise. It then called be a racist on air and made a number of false claims about my alleged bullying of a woman. It had to apologise.
Now it shows a cartoon with no wit, no real point, showing the Prime Minister’s mother in bed with an animated solar panel that’s just been having sex with her.
Juvenile doesn’t even cover it. Most juveniles I know would think this stupid and nasty. The only message that comes through in this witless skit is that vile abuse of conservatives - and even their parents - is OK by the ABC, and rather fashionable in ABC circles.
The ABC is out of control. When will the board order Mark Scott to reform it? 
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Therese Rein with husband Kevin Rudd at 10 Downing Street

Thérèse Rein, once again Australia's first lady, is facing questions - both in Australia and in Britain - about her company.


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Warfare is a very serious business whose first imperative is to deploy force to win – rather than topunish, make a statement, establish a symbolic point, or preen about one's morality.

Bashar al-Assad, strongman of Syria.
Yet, these latter are precisely what several Western states will accomplish if they respond to the Syrian government's apparent use of chemical weapons against civilians with "limited" strikeslasting one or two days against fewer than fifty sites. Briefly lobbing American, British, and other missiles against the regime without a concomitant readiness todeploy ground troops will neither overthrow the government nor change the course of the war. It will, however, allow Westerners to feel good about themselves.

It will also entail real dangers. Bashar al-Assad's notorious incompetence means his response cannot be anticipated. Western strikes could, among other possibilities, inadvertently lead to increased regime attacks on civilians, violence against Israel, an activation of sleeper cells in Western countries, or heightened dependence on Tehran. Surviving the strikes also permits Assad to boast that he defeated the United States.
In other words, the imminent attack entails few potential benefits but many potential drawbacks. As such, it neatly encapsulates the Obama administration's failed foreign policy. (August 28, 2013)
August 29, 2013 update: A satiric piece by Andy Borowitz in the New Yorker, "Obama Promises Syria Strike Will Have No Objective," nicely captures the absurdity of what's being proposed against the Assad government.
Attempting to quell criticism of his proposal for a limited military mission in Syria, President Obama floated a more modest strategy today, saying that any U.S. action in Syria would have "no objective whatsoever." "Let me be clear," he said in an interview on CNN. "Our goal will not be to effect régime change, or alter the balance of power in Syria, or bring the civil war there to an end. We will simply do something random there for one or two days and then leave."
When U.S. allies responded with howls of protest, saying that two days was too open-ended, White House spokesman Jay Carney responded with assurances
that the President was willing to scale down the U.S. mission to "twenty-four hours, thirty-six tops." "It may take twenty-four hours, but it could also take twelve," Mr. Carney said. "Maybe we get in there, take a look around, and get out right away. But however long it takes, one thing will not change: this mission will have no point. The President is resolute about that."

It is difficult to know how to be proportionate when Obama has turned a blind eye previously ed
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Goudie blew a .341. That's a lot.

SHE tried to run onto the field during a football game, was hauled off to jail and gave an incredibly high blood-alcohol reading. Then she tweeted about her experience.
Samantha Goudie is potentially - "allegedly" - the drunkest girl on the planet. And judging by her Twitter timeline, possibly the funniest.
According to Deadspin , who labelled Goudie an "Idiot on the Field", the 22-year-old student tried to run onto the field during a game between her college, the University of Iowa, and Northern Illinois.
Goudie was "unsteady on her feet" (reads: blind) and taken to jail. Which, as you're about to learn, is an experience she seemed to enjoy.

World's drunkest uni student blows .341
Read more: http://www.news.com.au/technology/world8217s-drunkest-uni-student-blows-341/story-e6frfrnr-1226709012378#ixzz2djXVOPKe

34.1% of her blood stream was alcohol? ed
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Zaya Toma
Im surprised the Christian Democrats are giving their second preference to Labor, the same as the Greens. The Christian Democrats want three more years of the Labor-Greens aliance?
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JERUSALEM, Sept. 1 (UPI) -- Israeli authorities said Sunday they broke up an alleged Hamas plot to launch terrorist attacks inside Israel, including bombing a popular shopping mall.
Two West Bank residents were indicted by the Jerusalem District Attorney's Office on charges that included recruiting maintenance workers at the Mamilla open-air mall to smuggle in a bomb during the busy Jewish High Holidays shopping season.
"During questioning, members of the terror cell mentioned other initial plans to carry out additional attacks, including harming IDF (Israeli Defense Forces) soldiers by booby trapping homes in Ramallah, manufacturing and firing rockets at Israeli communities near Ramallah, and attempts to get hold of handguns to fire on IDF soldiers at the Hezma roadblock, northeast of Jerusalem," the Israeli security service Shin Bet said in a written statement.
The two men who were indicted were allegedly led by another Ramallah resident, Hamdi Romana, 22, who was expected to be indicted separately. The timing of the charges was not indicated, the Jerusalem Post said.
Romana was and the other suspects were arrested in August. A search of his home by Israeli agents turned up bomb-making materials and instructions plus evidence Romana had been in communication with a reputed Hamas explosives expert.
The bomb plot was described as being near its final phases. The goal was to detonate the bomb during the period that includes Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur.
Shin Bet said Romana recruited two Arab residents of Jerusalem who worked at the Mamilla mall and carried Israeli identification cards, which Israeli broadcaster Arutz Shiva said would presumably allow them freer movement around town.
The bomb was to be wrapped like a present and stashed in one of the maintenance workers' lockers until the holidays were in full swing. It would then be planted in a restaurant or some other area where large numbers of shoppers would be present.
Shin Bet added that the arrests showed Hamas was still anxious to launch attacks inside Israel and was keen to recruit Arab residents of Israel to help them carry out their plots.

Read more: http://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-News/2013/09/01/Israel-thwarts-Hamas-plot-to-bomb-Jerusalem-mall/UPI-75861378044421/#ixzz2djYWn7VL
Part of the Peace Process? ed
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I feel the criticism of Abbott hyper. He called terrorists 'bad.' By way of contrast, Rudd called Chinese Ratfuckers for their language. I know which I feel is more diplomatic. ed
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"You are far too valuable to sell yourself so cheaply." –Kim Keller wrote in a letter to her daughter.
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Pastor Rick Warren
Teaching 6,000 Next Generation young leaders of Rwanda how to be purpose-driven leaders!
Co-sponsored by the government and PEACE Plan churches in Rwanda, this was also broadcast nationally. 4000 churches in Rwanda have adopted the PEACE plan in the past 9 years. — inKigali, Rwanda.
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Rep. Peter King (R-NY) criticized President Obama’s decision to let Congress vote on using military action in Syria. On Fox News Sunday, he stated that under the Constitution, that the president is authorized to use military force without Congress’s approval.

Read more: http://foxnewsinsider.com/2013/09/01/rep-peter-king-clear-failure-leadership-obama-ask-congress-authorize-military-action#ixzz2djSYwvBy
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"Curtis Sinclair, Co-Chairman of the Ashraf Campaign (ASHCAM) condemned the Iraqi government for caving under Iranian pressure to commit an "obscene abuse of power."

"We’re hearing details of unarmed refugees being bound, gagged and machine-gunned at close quarters; of anti-tank weapons being used on people’s homes; of a massacre supervised by police chiefs and army commanders," claimed Sinclair.
"Not since the days of Saddam [Hussein] have we seen this kind of blatant and obscene abuse of power by an Iraqi leader. Last night’s attack just goes to show the lengths to which [Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-]Maliki will go to assist... [Iranian Supreme Leader] Ali Khameini in [his] quest to stamp out the presence of Iranian dissidents in Iraq."
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"Egyptian officials announced their intention to create a buffer zone around Gaza, 500 meters wide and ten kilometers long. The buffer zone is designed to keep Gazan Arabs, many of whom are sympathetic to the Muslim Brotherhood, out of the Sinai Peninsula, as the Egyptian Army continues its military campaign to root-out Islamist terrorist groups who have taken refuge there, mounting sporadic deadly attacks against security forces and civilians.

On Sunday, the army evicted residents of the 13 homes and demolished them. Egyptian officials said that smuggling tunnels were found under the homes."
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While Israel has said repeatedly it’s not a party to the Syria conflict, Israeli lawmakers and analysts are voicing concern that President Barack Obama’s hesitation in making a decision about a military strike and sticking with it is sending a loud and “dangerous” message to Iran.
Politicians from the right and left in Israel are questioning Obama’s decision-making one day after the president announced that he was deferring to Congress on the question of use of force.
Obama Blinked: Why Israelis Are Concerned Obama’s Change of Heart on Syria Strike Will Embolden Iran and Other Foes

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NFL quarterback Tim Tebow said on Saturday he prays “for nothing but the best” for the Patriots after the team released him early Saturday.
“I would like to thank Mr. Kraft, Coach Belichick, Coach McDaniels and the entire Patriots organization for giving me the opportunity…to be a part of such a classy organization,” Tebow tweeted.
“I pray for nothing but the best for you all. I will remain in relentless pursuit… of continuing my lifelong dream of being an NFL quarterback,” he added.

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Egyptian soldiers in the Sinai Peninsula

Egyptian forces on Saturday arrested the commander of an Al-Qaeda-linked group in the Sinai peninsula, officials told the Bethlehem-based Ma’an news agency.
A senior Egyptian official said that Muhammad Ibrahim, 40, was appointed as the leader of Al-Qaeda in Sinai after escaping from prison following the 2011 Egyptian revolution.
Ibrahim, also known as Adel Habbara, was driving a truck from Rafiah to El-Arish when he was ambushed by Egyptian security forces, according toMa’an.
"He tried to reach for two grenades in his pocket, but an officer jumped at him and bowled him over before other officers controlled him and grabbed the grenades," the official said.
Ibrahim was traveling with two other gunmen at the time of his arrest.
Egyptian authorities accuse Ibrahim of masterminding the 2005 attack on the resort city of Sharm el-Sheikh, which killed some 88 people.
He is also accused of planning the August 2012 attack which killed 16 Egyptian soldiers in Rafiah, and is believed to have personally executed soldiers in an attack earlier this month in which 25 soldiers were killed.
The Sinai has become increasingly lawless since the fall of former president Hosni Mubarak in February 2011, and the terror attacks have only increased since the removal of Muslim Brotherhood PresidentMohammed Morsi in July. Egypt's army is currently engaged in an offensive in Sinai to curtail the surge in violence.
Since Morsi was ousted, Muslim Brotherhood-linked Gaza terrorists have been infiltrating the Sinai to attack Egyptian army outposts.
The army has been sealing the smuggling tunnels which are used to transfer goods, weapons and terrorists between the Sinai and Gaza. Hundreds of tunnels, however, remain open and active under the border between Egypt and Gaza.
On Sunday, Egyptian forces destroyed 13 homes next to the border with Gaza, in order to prevent the use of the houses as cover for smugglers into and out of the region.
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An Iranian filmmaker, Bahram Sadeghi, uploaded a video Thursday of himself calling the National Security Agency (NSA) hotline in a sarcastic attempt to retrieve an email he told the operator he accidentally deleted.
“A couple of days ago I received an email and by mistake I deleted it, the email… permanently,” Sadeghi can be seen explaining to an NSA employee over the phone.
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Pastor Rick Warren
Josh For President! My son waves to everyone at the National Stadium in Rwanda where I'm speaking. He has the wave!
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September 2: National Day in Vietnam (1945)
Jawaharlal Nehru
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“Start children off on the way they should go, and even when they are old they will not turn from it.”Proverbs 22:6 NIV
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Morning and Evening by Charles Spurgeon

Morning

"Thou shalt guide me with thy counsel, and afterward receive me to glory."
Psalm 73:24
The Psalmist felt his need of divine guidance. He had just been discovering the foolishness of his own heart, and lest he should be constantly led astray by it, he resolved that God's counsel should henceforth guide him. A sense of our own folly is a great step towards being wise, when it leads us to rely on the wisdom of the Lord. The blind man leans on his friend's arm and reaches home in safety, and so would we give ourselves up implicitly to divine guidance, nothing doubting; assured that though we cannot see, it is always safe to trust the all-seeing God. "Thou shalt," is a blessed expression of confidence. He was sure that the Lord would not decline the condescending task. There is a word for thee, O believer; rest thou in it. Be assured that thy God will be thy counsellor and friend; he shall guide thee; he will direct all thy ways. In his written Word thou hast this assurance in part fulfilled, for holy Scripture is his counsel to thee. Happy are we to have God's Word always to guide us! What were the mariner without his compass? And what were the Christian without the Bible? This is the unerring chart, the map in which every shoal is described, and all the channels from the quicksands of destruction to the haven of salvation mapped and marked by one who knows all the way. Blessed be thou, O God, that we may trust thee to guide us now, and guide us even to the end! After this guidance through life, the Psalmist anticipates a divine reception at last--"and afterward receive me to glory." What a thought for thee, believer! God himself will receive thee to glory--thee! Wandering, erring, straying, yet he will bring thee safe at last to glory! This is thy portion; live on it this day, and if perplexities should surround thee, go in the strength of this text straight to the throne.

Evening

"Trust in him at all times."
Psalm 62:8
Faith is as much the rule of temporal as of spiritual life; we ought to have faith in God for our earthly affairs as well as for our heavenly business. It is only as we learn to trust in God for the supply of all our daily need that we shall live above the world. We are not to be idle, that would show we did not trust in God, who worketh hitherto, but in the devil, who is the father of idleness. We are not to be imprudent or rash; that were to trust chance, and not the living God, who is a God of economy and order. Acting in all prudence and uprightness, we are to rely simply and entirely upon the Lord at all times.
Let me commend to you a life of trust in God in temporal things. Trusting in God, you will not be compelled to mourn because you have used sinful means to grow rich. Serve God with integrity, and if you achieve no success, at least no sin will lie upon your conscience. Trusting God, you will not be guilty of self-contradiction. He who trusts in craft, sails this way today, and that way the next, like a vessel tossed about by the fickle wind; but he that trusteth in the Lord is like a vessel propelled by steam, she cuts through the waves, defies the wind, and makes one bright silvery straightforward track to her destined haven. Be you a man with living principles within; never bow to the varying customs of worldly wisdom. Walk in your path of integrity with steadfast steps, and show that you are invincibly strong in the strength which confidence in God alone can confer. Thus you will be delivered from anxious care, you will not be troubled with evil tidings, your heart will be fixed, trusting in the Lord. How pleasant to float along the stream of providence! There is no more blessed way of living than a life of dependence upon a covenant-keeping God. We have no care, for he careth for us; we have no troubles, because we cast our burdens upon the Lord.
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Today's reading: Psalm 135-136, 1 Corinthians 12 (NIV)

View today's reading on Bible Gateway

Today's Old Testament reading: Psalm 125-136

1 Praise the LORD.
Praise the name of the LORD;
praise him, you servants of the LORD,
2 you who minister in the house of the LORD,
in the courts of the house of our God.
3 Praise the LORD, for the LORD is good;
sing praise to his name, for that is pleasant.
4 For the LORD has chosen Jacob to be his own,
Israel to be his treasured possession.
5 I know that the LORD is great,
that our Lord is greater than all gods.
6 The LORD does whatever pleases him,
in the heavens and on the earth,
in the seas and all their depths.
7 He makes clouds rise from the ends of the earth;
he sends lightning with the rain
and brings out the wind from his storehouses.

Today's New Testament reading: 1 Corinthians 12

Concerning Spiritual Gifts
1 Now about the gifts of the Spirit, brothers and sisters, I do not want you to be uninformed. 2 You know that when you were pagans, somehow or other you were influenced and led astray to mute idols. 3 Therefore I want you to know that no one who is speaking by the Spirit of God says, "Jesus be cursed," and no one can say, "Jesus is Lord," except by the Holy Spirit.
4 There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit distributes them. 5 There are different kinds of service, but the same Lord. 6 There are different kinds of working, but in all of them and in everyone it is the same God at work....
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Og

[ÅŽg] - long-necked or bread baked in ashes. The giant king of Bashan. This man of huge stature, the last of the Rephaim, was slain at Edrei. The only big things of any note about this massive man, whose conquests lingered long in the imagination of the people (Ps. 135:11; 136:20), were his big body and his big bed (Num. 21:33; 32:33; Deut. 3:1-13).
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