Tuesday, October 20, 2015

Tue Oct 20th Todays News

Australia’s education system is of a high standard. She has deserved her reputation for academic excellence. And she is flawed and needs reform. Both statements are true. But the case for effective reform is stymied by misrepresentations of issues. Cheating by students is a problem everywhere in the world. And new technology is making it very challenging for universities to preserve free and open inquiry while maintaining rigorous standards. Yet, without strong evidence to the contrary, that is being done. Also, it is historical and legendary that students are not competent but prone to alcoholic indulgence and partying. It is hardly likely that Chinese Students are alone in this. Also, the issue of assignments and group work is misunderstood by participants and sometimes the educators themselves. No student graduates based on group work. 

Australia has a growth industry with international students which is independent of the mining boom or internal economic cycle. Their fees help subsidise Australians in higher education. Not all international students are wealthy. Some third world nations send their students to Australia to be educated, but leave it to the students to work and find accommodation, while the government denies those students basic amenities and tax relief. Many turn a blind eye as students are exploited. Maybe some turn to prostitution to fund their studies. Many also work above hours for cash in hand. Many international students can’t party and fraternise with local students, and that could fuel envy on both sides. 

Australia’s higher education system needs reform. She is not biased, but partisan with the left, with senior academic boards over run with ALP favouring appointments that vote in blocks against independent academics. Which is partly why there are so few conservative think tanks in Australia, or conservative media journalists. Students are overly subsidised. No one seriously suggests not subsidising students, but the current levels are unsustainable. So that our children will not be able to enjoy a fair education our students do. Upper tier universities like UNSW, Sydney, Melbourne and a few others would like to do postgraduate duties which they do very well. While universities like UWS and Newcastle could do much better focusing on undergraduates. But the government won’t let them for equity reasons irrelevant to excellence in education. 

Stories of students cheating dates back to the formation of schools in ancient Greece and Ancient China. But universities are resilient to cheating practice and there is no evidence of widespread rooting as is claimed by some. But there is evidence that universities aren’t producing students satisfactory to business. But the international students, anecdotally, are superior to local students in all areas except language. And sometimes they exceed there too. But group work is hell even where there is none of the celebrated diversity. When Joan Kirner was lauded for her second rate secondary education reforms, group work was all the rage. It took reforms introduced by my father, the late Professor Samuel Ball to address those issues, and I’m confident universities employ those techniques today. So that group work assignments get followed by related tests. And students who did not do the assignments would not know how to excel at those tests. The students are not aware of all the things universities do to spot cheating, nor should they know. It is their job to learn their courses, not how to cheat. 

There is no history of most students satisfying with their skills gained through studies. The highest achieving students, however, are a good group to focus on student achievement over time. International students bring Australia credit. 

Turnbull won't push for reform in this election cycle. 

Canada has lost an extremely good PM for the son of an inept one. 

 For some, at the moment, the Sex Party has more credibility.
=== from 2014 ===
Workers pay for union bosses
The ABC and Fairfax press have self censored over the issue, but it is widespread and substantial. The much maligned Work choices had checks in place to prevent union corruption, but Gillard removed those when she put Fair Work in place of Work Choices. Even so, historical corruption regarding slush funds was clearly prevalent in union culture. Slush funds are not harmless. They involve unionists losing money for union chiefs to spend as they will. They also involve unions standing over businesses and extorting money, which is illegal. Some will say it is wrong to do that, and it should be illegal. But the fact is it is illegal to do that according to the statute books, and only legal if the courts choose to ignore the law, which they have no right to do. The very structure of the ALP is called into question over this. Maybe the ALP needs to reform by adopting a Liberal Party structure? 

Ukraine has to answer questions over MH17
Findings of the inquiry into MH17 have suggested the bomb used to take down the aircraft was Ukrainian made, while the device used to fire it was Russian made. It looks like the Russian separatists fired the bomb at the aircraft, but only after Ukraine had presented the aircraft as enemy hostile. Precisely how has not been examined yet and the salient questions have not been asked of Ukraine. It would be good for Mr Abbott or Miss Bishop to discuss this matter with Ukraine. It might excite ABC interest if Mr Abbott says he will shirtfront the Ukrainian leader. 

Green alarmism costs money
Australia under ALP shed some six hundred billion dollars with nothing to show for it. Left behind are costly and inefficient green projects, like desalination camps which aren't used because they aren't needed, house insulation poorly installed, wind farms and solar installations which don't reduce base load as well as crumbling coal power stations needing to be modernised. But had the money been spent wisely, flagship infrastructure which allows substantial growth could have been put in place. At about 1% of the cost of the waste, the Bradfield Scheme could have been realised. A wireless NBN could have been implemented. An NDIS could have been implemented and change sufficient to power innovation in industry would have been left over with surplus budgets. Instead, people have drowned for compassion, no animal has been saved and no forest is safe from environmental dangers. In fact forest fires have reputedly been caused by a failure to prudently back burn. 

Plibersek plays lethal game re Ebola
Shorten has no policy on any thing. Plibersek is filling the vacuum by being stupid and risking the lives of Australian Health workers tasked to go to Africa to fight Ebola by an Australian government without infrastructure to evacuate if that is needed. Thing is there is sufficient aid from those who have the infrastructure and regional responsibility to deliver it. Plibersek's position is partisan and foolish. She is hostile to the action of the defence force tasked to face ISIL and has said so. If Plibersek were compassionate for the suffering of others, she would not try to drown desperate people wanting to come to Australia. 

Poet short changed
Going by headlines this column condemned the poet Barry Spurr and it was wrong. The poet has had comments of his that were personal released out of context. Were they public utterances, they would and should be condemned. However, what has happened is an injustice which seems to have been wilfully perpetrated by a bad journal called New Matilda. New Matilda has form in illegally obtaining data and abusing it for sensational purposes. They appear to have done so here, and one hopes they are sued out of existence if they in fact have. Chillingly Sydney University have acted quickly to stand down the poet without apparent due process. Had the poet been left wing and given his thoughts in a writer's festival, publicly, one feels this entire issue may never have risen. Take as an example the graphic novelist Phillippe Squarzoni who has published an imagined, virtuous, assault with an assault rifle on a shopping mall. 
From 2013
ALP divided, will never be united. Blame games keep dreams alive. Latham can say *anything* at *anytime* which may contradict *something* at *sometime* but will be published regardless without fact checking. Plibersek to make play for leadership? ALP win NSW by-election, but still need reform.
Green policy ignites flames.
Illegal immigrants are not clients. Europeans move to stop murderous folly. 
Crying children need parents.
Australian child brides.
Wikileaks movie bombs despite top actors. 
Education reform needs good educators. 
=== 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.
===
Editorials will appear in the "History in a Year by the Conservative Voice" series, starting with August, September, October, or at Amazon http://www.amazon.com/dp/1482020262/ref=cm_sw_r_tw_dp_dVHPub0MQKDZ4  The kindle version is cheaper, but the soft back version allows the purchase of a kindle version for just $3.99 more. 

List of available items at Create Space
The Amazon Author Page for David Ball
===
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.

Happy birthday and many happy returns Kirsten Katz, Johnson Nguyen and Peter Trinh. Born on the same day, across the years as
1463 – Alessandro Achillini, Italian philosopher (d. 1512)
1632 – Christopher Wren, English architect, designed St Paul's Cathedral (d. 1723)
1780 – Pauline Bonaparte, French sister of Napoleon (d. 1825)
1882 – Bela Lugosi, Hungarian-American actor (d. 1956)
1931 – Mickey Mantle, American baseball player (d. 1995)
1950 – Tom Petty, American singer-songwriter and musician (Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Mudcrutch, and Traveling Wilburys)
1970 – Michelle Malkin, American blogger and author
1995 – Zhenwei Wang, Chinese actor and martial artist
October 20: Birth of the Báb, a holy day in the Bahá'í Faith
Douglas MacArthur and staff arrive at Leyte
The eighty year war, where neither would turn on the kettle, is over. The throne has been assumed. You have returned. I can still remember when the music used to make me smile. The evil is gone. Let's party. 
Deaths
===

BABY BOOMERS

Tim Blair – Tuesday, October 20, 2015 (5:24pm)

“Vans, Nike, Chelsea FC, beheading Kafirs.” Those are a few of the favourite things listed by a 16-year-old British schoolgirl now with Islamic State in Syria. As Mary Wakefield notes, however, Syria is so yesterday for trend-conscious jihadi teens: 
Our girls are being lured not to Syria but to Libya now …
Libya is the dream for Isis, the real promised land. There’s oil to be sold and untold zillions to be extorted from migrants hoping to cross the Med, but more importantly, it’s the perfect launch pad for attacks on Europe. One Isis supporter, quoted by the Telegraph’s Ruth Sherlock, put it like this: ‘Libya has a long coast and looks upon the southern crusader states which can be reached with ease by even a rudimentary boat.’
And here’s where our schoolgirls might really make their mark. They’ll get in those rudimentary boats with the refugees, and with their children perhaps for added innocence. They’ll be rescued, make contact with comrades on the ground, then pick their moment to detonate off to paradise, taking the kafir with them. This is Isis’s plan, openly discussed online, to take terror to infidel Europe. The stowaway schoolgirl jihadis of today are tomorrow’s homing missiles. 
No wonder Europe envies Australia’s boat-stopping abilities.
===

ESSENTIAL UNCHANGED

Tim Blair – Tuesday, October 20, 2015 (5:02pm)

The Essential Report’s poll two weeks ago had the Coalition leading Labor by 52 per cent to 48 per cent. One week ago it was 51-49. And today the numbers haven’t shifted: 51-49. The unstoppable Malmentum in Fairfax polling isn’t turning up anywhere else.
===

Pedophillia claims

Andrew Bolt October 20 2015 (7:03pm)

Bill Heffernan has made false accusations of this nature before for which he has had to apologise, but we should be wary of automatically dismissing his new claims after all we’ve learned from the royal commission into child sexual abuse:
A former Australian prime minister is on a list of “alleged paedophiles” that Liberal senator Bill Heffernan claims forms part of a police document.
Senator Heffernan used a Senate estimates committee hearing on Tuesday to discuss the list of 28 people, which he said formed part of police documents that had been “signed off” by Gary Crooke, QC, the former senior counsel assisting NSW’s Wood royal commission into police corruption in the 1990s.
Many of the people on the list and otherwise named in the documents were “prominent”, including a former prime minister, he said: “They were delivered to me by a police agency some time ago because no one seems to want to deal with them.”
I am sceptical, but wish to know more. But no names should be made public until we do know these claims have real substance. 
===

The Mal-bounce exaggerated

Andrew Bolt October 20 2015 (6:21pm)

Fairfax has a problem, tying itself to the Ipsos polling company. It must spruik the polls it’s paid for, but that often leaves it talking up implausible results.
For instance, Ipsos in May recorded a 50-50 result, better for the Abbott Government than any other poll, leaving Abbott-hater Mark Kenny having to write this:
In a stunning reversal of fortunes, the government has now pulled even with the Labor opposition, answering internal critics and increasing the prospect of an early election in the second half of 2015, should Tony Abbott decide to capitalise on the electoral recovery.
I said at the time that Ipsos had probably exaggerated Abbott’s recovery (later sabotaged), and I now think Ipsos has exaggerated Malcolm Turnbull’s bounce:
Enter Mark Kenny again:

Labor’s primary vote has plunged to just 30 per cent as voters flood back to a rejuvenated Coalition government under Malcolm Turnbull’s new leadership style one month after he replaced the unpopular Tony Abbott as Prime Minister.
In what appears to be a clear vindication of that bruising leadership switch, ... [t]he October Fairfax-Ipsos poll has found the Coalition has surged ahead of Labor at 53-47 according to the flow of second preferences as allocated at the 2013 election.
But Essential Report’s survey today has the margin at 51 to 49 per cent for the second consecutive week, while Newspoll last week had it 50-50.
I don’t blame Kenny so much. It’s the failing of newspapers feeling obliged to talk up their own polls. 
===

Conquest - how truth outlived Stalin’s apologists

Andrew Bolt October 20 2015 (6:15pm)

Glenn Garvin on the death last month of Robert Conquest, the former communist who became the foremost historian of communism’s crimes:
To understand the moral and literary power with which Robert Conquest wrote, consider the second sentence in his book Harvest of Sorrow: Soviet Collectivization and the Terror-Famine, a study of the 14.5 million deaths that resulted from Joseph Stalin’s murderous takeover of his nation’s agricultural sector: “We may perhaps put this in perspective in the present case by saying that in the actions here recorded about twenty human lives were lost for, not every word, but every letter, in this book."…
He wrote of a town in Byelorussia where a group of peasants stumbled into what may have been the perpetually depressed Soviet economy’s single growth industry: professional informing. They routinely partied after trials with the 15 rubles a head they were paid to denounce neighbors as spies, hoarders, and “wreckers,” as saboteurs were known. They even wrote an epic ballad about some of their most successful denunciations.
He wrote of the urkas, the labor-camp gangs of common criminals so violent and depraved that even the guards feared them and refused to make them work. The hideously tattooed members, sporting names like Hitler or The Louse, instead spent their days plotting mass rapes of female inmates and gambling for the clothing of newly arrived political prisoners; the losers had to strip it from the victims and deliver it to the winners.
He wrote of Stalin’s workdays, which usually began by leafing through hundreds of secret-police-recommended death sentences left in his morning inbox, perhaps with the help of his sycophantic adviser Vyacheslav Molotov. December 12, 1937, was a typical day, Conquest reported: “Stalin and Molotov sanctioned 3,167 death sentences, and then went to the cinema.”
Not that being a bloodthirsty dictator was all work and no play. Conquest described Stalin laughing until he cried as an executioner acted out the final, sobbing moments of his former crony Grigory Zinoviev. “Stalin was overcome with merriment and had to sign to [the performer] to stop,” Conquest wrote....
As skeptics of the Cold War gained the upper hand in American academia, Conquest’s work was dismissed as reactionary fantasy and criminal libel. But in the years after the collapse of the Soviet Union, as Moscow’s archives began dribbling out to the public, his reporting was confirmed and judged by some even a bit too mild.
Conquest was, of course, gratified. Martin Amis reported that, when a publisher asked for a new title for a revised edition of The Great Terror, Conquest suggested: “How about I Told You So, You F...ing Fools?”  
===

SBS: paid activists

Andrew Bolt October 20 2015 (3:46pm)

How can we trust SBS to report impartially on this issue (he asks, as if we ever could):
SBS has been accused of abusing its position as a public broadcaster by joining a corporate campaign in favour of same-sex marriage.
During Senate estimates hearings on Tuesday, Liberal National Party senator Matt Canavan said SBS had taken sides on an issue of “political contention” by joining companies such as Google, Qantas, Optus and the big banks by supporting same-sex marriage.
===

Yet another of those dirty deals made by Shorten’s union

Andrew Bolt October 20 2015 (11:30am)

Bill Shorten is probably finished after this astonishing evidence:

Cleaners working in low-paid jobs were not told of an agreement between a union and their employer that inflated the union’s membership numbers but cut their wages, the trade unions royal commission has heard.
The Australian Workers’ Union (AWU) struck a deal with major cleaning contractor Cleanevent in 2010 to keep casual cleaners on lower rates of pay and save the company $1.5 million in salary costs, the commission heard on Monday. In return, Cleanevent would pay the AWU $25,000 a year as membership fees for casual cleaners.
The Cleanevent senior executive who gave final sign-off on the agreement, Julianne Page, at first told the commission she could not explain why an email from the company’s head of HR said the union would not agree to having a trade-off for lower wages listed in the same document as a payment for membership.
In a May, 2010 email to Ms Page, HR executive Michael Robinson wrote: ‘It would be crazy for the union to put that down on a page and to be honest I wouldn’t feel happy with it being on the same document either.’
Ms Page told the court she supposed it ‘would look bad for the union’.
‘It would look like it was some sort of payoff,’ she said…
Cleanevent employees were not told of the arrangement, the court heard, and it was not explained in a 2010 Memorandum of Understanding that bound workers to the lower rates of pay of a 2006 agreement. They were also not told they had been signed up as union members, the court heard…
Internal Cleanevent emails tendered to the commission also show Mr Robinson discussing structuring pay rises to ‘make the AWU look fantastic to their members’.
‘If we agree to a 0% increase for these casuals and then give them a hit in year 2 and 3 the union can claim that because of their membership they went into bat for them and got them an increase, which will make the AWU look fantastic to their members and won’t hurt your bottom line,’ Mr Robinson wrote to colleagues including Ms Page during discussion of the agreement.
The commission has heard previously that increased membership is an indicator of a successful union and can give it greater influence within the Australian Labor Party.
But this presents a dilemma for the Turnbull Government, which has so far said almost nothing about the evidence unfolding against Shorten. Turnbull wants to project niceness and optimism. But here is a valid and important reason to put in the boot and hold Shorten to account.
He will be hoping the media does that for him.
UPDATE
I note that Howes doesn’t defend the deal:
Former Australian Workers Union boss Paul Howes has claimed he can’t remember signing a 2010 agreement between the union and a cleaning company that failed to pay penalty rates for low-paid workers, adding it was not his “role to personally analyse” the “adequacy” of the deal.
Mr Howes, who succeeded Bill Shorten as National Secretary of the AWU in 2007, gave written testimony to the trade union royal commission today but does not explain why he signed off on the now infamous memorandum of understanding that left Cleanevent cleaners with below-award wages.
The 2010 deal extended a WorkChoices era industrial agreement. Unbenownst to the cleaners under the agreement the AWU also struck a secret side-deal with Cleanevent, who would pay the union $25,000 a year for three years for union membership for its casual workforce.
In his statement, Mr Howes testified he also had no knowledge of the side-deal until it was exposed by the trade union royal commission in May.
===

Who let in these refugees? Why?

Andrew Bolt October 20 2015 (10:20am)

Farhad Jabour, an Iranian “refugee”, killed police accountant Curtis Cheng while shouting “Allah is the greatest”.
Man Monis, an Iranian “refugee” and Islamist, staged the deadly Lindt cafe siege while professing support for the Islamic State..
Numan Haider, an Afghan “refugee” and IS recruit, stabbed two police in Melbourne.
Mohammad Ali Baryalei, an Afghan “refugee”, became a recruiter and fighter for IS.
Saney Edow Aweys, a Somalian “refugee”, plotted to attack the Holsworthy Army base.
Now the ABC interviews another refugee, this one from Afghanistan:
The 19-year-old, who knew Parramatta police HQ killer Farhad Jabar, has been a member of a small group of young Islamic State supporters in western Sydney under the scopes of anti-terrorist officers.
“Everyone wants to die for Allah, we all want to live the best life in the hereafter and want to make it to the top of the seven levels of jannah (paradise),” Hamza told the ABC last night…
In the ABC’s 7.30 program last night, it was also revealed he is close friends with Raban Alou whom police allege gave the gun to teen killer Jabar and who is charged with helping commission the shooting murder of NSW police accountant Curtis Cheng.
Hamza also knew Jabar and the pair studied the Koran together at the mosque, the program revealed…
Hamza says while he supports radical Islam, he does not want to cause harm in Australia.
When asked if he supported Islamic State, he replied: “I’m not going to answer that, because if I say yes, I’ll get in trouble, and if I say no, I’ll be a liar. I accept some of their opinions and I disagree with other opinions.”
Hamza supports beheadings in Syria and Iraq and believes strict sharia law should be implemented across the world.
“What’s happening overseas? Sharia is expanding: people that steal get their hand chopped off; people that kill, they need four witnesses and they die; people that smoke drugs, there’s no cigarette, there’s no alcohol, there’s no brothels.”

How did his family get admitted here?
This Western Sydney teenager came to Australia as a 10-year-old Afghan refugee and soon after, his brothers became involved in crime gangs. One brother is serving 24 years in Australia’s highest-security jail, the SuperMax, for a brutal gang murder.
Then there’s this, from this same “refugee”:
SEAN RUBINSZTEIN-DUNLOP: Why are you finding it so hard to say that the murder of Curtis Cheng was a tragedy for him and his family?
ANONYMOUS ISLAMIC STATE SUPPORTER: Because they don’t say anything about the Muslims, so why should I say - why should I please them, you know? Why should I please the kafir - the disbelievers? Why should I show that, oh, yeah, I care about them? Which I don’t.
Which reckless politicians have supervised the “refugee” programs which have admitted such danger to this country? They congratulate themselves on their superior morality and compassion, no doubt, but observe the consequences. 
===

Why is the foul-mouthed Lawler still on the bench?

Andrew Bolt October 20 2015 (7:01am)

There are many reasons I don’t want Michael Lawler to be a vice-president of our Fair Work Commission, determining the fates of bosses and workers with the power of a judge.
There’s the company he keeps - a partner charged with fraud.
There’s the nine months of paid sick leave he’s taken to defend that partner.
There’s the strange relationship with a rich and senile man who’s now rewritten his will in favour of Lawler’s partner.
There’s the attempt to transfer assets on the eve of a court case.
There’s his admission that he secretly recorded his boss, FWA president Iain Ross, probably illegally.
And here’s another reason:

The term “c--t-struck” left the lips of the embattled Vice President of the Fair Work Commission Michael Lawler - a man on a $430,000 taxpayer-funded salary.
Lawler used the phrase to describe how he feared he would be portrayed when his relationship with former head of the Health Services Union, Jackson, was made public. Jackson was found guilty in a civil case that ended in August of misusing her position as head of the union to fraudulently gain financial advantage and was ordered to pay about $1.4 million.
“I’ll be characterised as that scumbag, crook, fraudster, and, at the very best, somebody who’s been bewitched by an evil harridan, namely Kathy [Jackson],” Lawler told ABC journalist Caro Meldrum-Hanna.
“That I’m c-nt-struck and that I have been utterly taken in by somebody who’s a serious crook,” he said.
Why is this man on the bench? 
===

ABC gets its friends to check its bias

Andrew Bolt October 20 2015 (6:41am)

Tony Thomas documents how the ABC has stacked the latest two inquiries into its outrageous bias:

Two inquiries into the ABC’s professionalism are due for release shortly: the Ray Martin report on Q&A and Fiona Stanley’s long-overdue examination of science coverage…
The report on Q&A ...  is led by one-time Q&A panellist and current ABC fan Ray Martin, who has been teamed with former SBS managing director Shaun Brown. It was prompted by the June 22 grandstanding on Q&A by ABC-invited questioner Zaky Mallah, who had earlier been convicted and done hard time for threatening to kill security officers....
Barely one week after Martin’s appointment, he ...  said host Tony Jones was as tough on the previous Labor government as on the Coalition. Some of the “rants and raves” about Q&A had been “crazy”, Martin continued, saying that he hoped his audit would bring some balance to the debate.
Capping off what many will see as a remarkable display of bias, he further suggested the Coalition had been beating up its criticism of Zaky Mallah and Q&A as a pre-election ploy. Any ethical organisation would have replaced Martin to preserve the inquiry’s credibility. Not the ABC, but....
Let’s turn now to Fiona Stanley’s pending report on ABC science, especially climate coverage....People just assumed the inquiry would be independent, but the ABC speedily appointed one of its own board members, Fiona Stanley, to head the inquiry.
What are the chances of Stanley giving the ABC a stern report sheet?… Two of her inquiry panel members – we kid you not – are ex-Media Watch compere and climate alarmist Jonathan Holmes and ex-ABC Triple J comedian Adam Spencer....
Stanley, who has a distinguished background in epidemiology, paediatrics and Aboriginal health, has a new career as a climate doomster and public speaker, for which she charges as much as $15,000 per appearance....
In April last year, mid-way in the ABC inquiry into the impartiality and accuracy of the ABC’s climate coverage, she actually compared climate sceptics with child abusers! “The way we are living on this planet is unsustainable, and that’s why I’m worried for my children, and my grandchildren and their children,” she said. By analogy, our own great-grandparents circa 1900 should have been worrying about threats to you and me in 2015..”.
Meanwhile, the ABC’s green bias continues. Former Labor minister Gary Johns:
ABC national television news last week reported that the Adani-owned Carmichael coalmine, rail and port project in the Galilee Basin, central Queensland, had received environmental clearance from the federal government.
It used visual footage of the site supplied by Greenpeace, including of a most unlikely lily pond. It gave a greenie activist from Mackay a free run to bag the project for its impact on climate change, and it interviewed a “financial analyst” who was an avowed greenie. The news was a sham.
The national broadcaster should have provided viewers with context, perspective and balance. Instead, it framed the story as: big bruising coal versus little defenceless environment…
Using Greenpeace footage shows how far the ABC’s moral compass has strayed.. I wonder whether the ABC actually verified that the lily pond was in the vicinity of the Carmichael mine and proposed rail line… A map of the region also would be essential for perspective to ­enable the viewer to gain an idea of the immense distance from centres of population. There is a reason; the region is virtually uninhabitable....
Then the ABC allowed a greenie from Mackay to slip into the conversation a dig at greenhouse gas emissions as reason alone to stop the mine. The trouble is there is no legal basis on which to do so, and the ABC should know it.... It was not possible to prove, for example, that stopping a mine would reduce greenhouse gas emissions. In fact, depending on the replacement coal sourced, such replacement coal could increase the level of emissions.
As for balance, the ABC wheeled out its preferred “financial analyst” to inform viewers that coal was a bad investment. Tim Buckley once worked for Citi­group. He converted some years ago to the green cause, which is his business, literally.  
===

Abbott shows table manners

Andrew Bolt October 19 2015 (9:56pm)

Whoever actually broke it should pay, but a decent and appropriate offer is made:
Tony Abbott says he will pay for the cost of an Italian marble table that was seriously damaged during a party in the prime ministerial suite on the night he lost the Liberal leadership.
“On the night of the leadership change I hosted drinks in the cabinet ante-room for staff and colleagues. During this event, a coffee table was damaged,” Mr Abbott said in a statement tonight.
“I have asked my office to have the Department of Parliamentary Services invoice me for the value of the table.”
“It was my event so I take responsibility for it.”
Can this ludicrous and vindictive witch-hunt of Abbott now end?
Senior federal bureaucrats have been accused of behaving like characters in the TV comedy Utopia for refusing to reveal what brands of wine and beer former prime minister Tony Abbott selected to supply whilst entertaining guests at personal functions.

During heated exchanges during a Senate estimates hearing, Labor’s Penny Wong became exasperated with members of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet, claiming it was “one of the worst standards I have ever seen” from public officials in her 10 years in Parliament. 
===

Why is Lawler still on the bench?

Andrew Bolt October 19 2015 (9:55pm)

I have no idea why this bloke is still a Fair Work commissioner or even why he thinks he’s entitled to be:
Michael Lawler, the Fair Work Commission vice president and partner of former HSU union boss Kathy Jackson, secretly and potentially illegally recorded his own boss to protect his “name” against future accusations of wrongdoing.
ABC’s Four Corners tonight revealed Mr Lawler recorded Iain Ross, the Fair Work Commission president, discussing Ms Jackson’s wellbeing… They also discuss Mr Lawler’s extended sick leave [of nine months in less than two years], during which he was paid.
“I think, um, your health is the first priority and there’s no, um, I mean I’ll take responsibility for any amounts of sick leave you, you seek, there’s no cap or anything like that.”
It is illegal to record a person without their knowledge in NSW, according to the Surveillance Devices Act.
About time:

Employment Minister Michaelia Cash has appointed former Federal Court Judge Peter Heerey to investigate complaints against Fair Work Commission Vice President, Michael Lawler.
The official investigation follows a months-long investigation by The Australian that revealed in June that Mr Lawler had taken ­almost a year of sick leave while on full pay of $435,000 a year. The formal investigation is a first step in a process that ulti­mately could see Mr Lawler removed from his position on the basis of incapacity or misconduct…
Mr Lawler is the subject of investigation following alleged misconduct and allegations he inappropriately conducted demanding work for his partner and disgraced Health Services Union leader, Kathy Jackson, while he took the nine months paid sick leave.
In August, the Federal Court ruled that Ms Jackson pay to the HSU the $1.4 million she misappropriated over a decade.
===

SHOOTING SANTA

Tim Blair – Monday, October 20, 2014 (1:28pm)

Tony Thomas reviews the latest example of warmy bloodlust: 
If you have ever doubted that warmism endorses a preening, totalitarian disdain for the lives and rights of others, take up a copy of “Climate Change” by graphic novelist Philippe Squarzoni, who imagines how virtuous it would be to go berserk with an assault rifle in a shopping mall. And yes, he’s not joking. 
It’s all part of a continuing theme.
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Dickhead insult

Andrew Bolt October 20 2014 (5:46pm)

Brendan O’Connor’s pretence at being offended by a gendered insult is exposed by his own gendered insult, and a far more offensive one:
Labor frontbenchers have attacked Finance Minister Mathias Cormann over his use of the insult “economic girly man” against Opposition Leader Bill Shorten, with one accusing him of ”sounding like a dickhead”. 
Opposition employment spokesman Brendan O’Connor said the joke was on Senator Cormann, who had been left looking like a “bit of a dill” in his attempt to get a headline.
===

Clive Palmer to go to court over missing $10 billion

Andrew Bolt October 20 2014 (5:14pm)

Clive Palmer’s run of legal reverses continues - and this is one of the most serious:
CLIVE Palmer has lost his bid to have Chinese-owned Sino Iron’s $10m fraud lawsuit against him tossed out of court. 
Queensland Supreme Court judge David Jackson this morning announced he was dismissing the Palmer United Party’s leader’s strike-out application, meaning the high-profile matter will go to trial.
Disgruntled business partner Sino is suing Mr Palmer over the alleged dishonest payment of more than $10m in Chinese funds to Media Circus, an advertising company, and Cosmo Developments, a company associated with Mr Palmer. The resources businessman has denied all wrongdoing.
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Thanks to The Book Searchers

Andrew Bolt October 20 2014 (9:19am)

I want to give The Book Searchers, an on-line bookseller in Sydney, a big rap.
I ordered two books on artist John Peter Russell through Abebooks, and The Book Searchers popped them in the mail. They never arrived.
I offered to pay half the cost of finding replacements, since I didn’t want to rip off a small business. Instead, The Book Searchers tracked down two other copies and mailed them out without charge or complaint Thanks very much indeed.
And the books? Great reads on a truly remarkable Australian, a friend of Van Gogh and many other great artists. 
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Claim: MH17 shot down by pro-Russian militias with Ukrainian missile

Andrew Bolt October 20 2014 (7:13am)

Russia supplied the military support but did it actually supply the missile?
Germany’s BND foreign intelligence agency has concluded that pro-Russian rebels are to blame for the downing of Malaysia Airline MH17 in Ukraine in July, Der Spiegel weekly reported on Sunday, the first European agency to say so…

Gerhard Schindler, president of the BND, told a secret parliamentary committee on security affairs earlier this month that separatists had used a Russian Buk missile defense system from a Ukrainian base to fire a rocket that exploded directly next to the Malyasia Air plane, Der Spiegel reported. 
“It was pro-Russian separatists,” the magazine quoted him as saying. The BND concluded the rebels were to blame after a detailed analysis based on satellite and other photos, Der Spiegel said.  
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The high price of green alarmism

Andrew Bolt October 20 2014 (6:12am)

HEAR that rain on the roof last week? That’s nature telling us our politicians have been idiots. I’m talking about the politicians who let themselves be fooled into thinking it never would rain like this again.
I’m talking about politicians who listened to the likes of Tim Flannery, the 2007 Australian of the Year and then head of the Climate Commission.
From 2005 to 2008, Flannery, the global warming guru, made a string of outlandish claims like these:
“So even the rain that falls isn’t actually going to fill our dams and our river systems ...
“In Adelaide, Sydney and Brisbane, water supplies are so low they need desalinated water urgently, possibly in as little as 18 months ...
“There is a fair chance Perth will be the 21st century’s first ghost metropolis.”
Flannery wasn’t alone, of course.
(Read full article here.) 
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Plibersek plays lethal politics with ebola

Andrew Bolt October 20 2014 (6:04am)

 EBOLA is ghastly enough. But must we also suffer the moral posturing of politicians such as Tanya Plibersek?
Plibersek, Labor’s deputy leader, has fallen sick to the disease of the modern Left, wanting to seem good by demanding fine-sounding things that, oops, won’t actually work.
Or in this case could kill.
Plibersek is berating the Abbott Government for not doing even more to help fight the latest Ebola outbreak and contain it to the three African countries — Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone — where most of the 4500 deaths have occurred.
“Australia must significantly increase its efforts, immediately,” she insisted.
If Plibersek just meant increasing the $18 million offered so far by the Government, she’d probably be right.
But she wants doctors, nurses and paramedics sent, too.
“We’ve got skilled Australians, who’ve trained for many years to provide exactly the kind of assistance that West Africa is crying out for and our government is saying they won’t assist them to go there.”
In fact, 20 to 30 Australian volunteers are already in Africa, courageously fighting Ebola, and non-government organisations would welcome more.
But there’s a risk. Doctors Without Borders, for instance, say nine of its staff are already dead from Ebola. More than 230 health workers, in all, have died.
(Read full article here.) 
===

The workers, united, will pay for their bosses

Andrew Bolt October 20 2014 (6:03am)

More from the union whose members just paid and paid for perks:
WHISTLEBLOWER Kathy Jackson made a secret deal with the now jailed fraudster Michael Williamson to pay $240,000 over two years to one of her union allies — with a requirement that the recipient of the money do no work. 
Under the confidential arrangement, Jackson ally and friend Jamie Martorana agreed to resign from his position as assistant divisional secretary of the Health Services Union in October 2010. For the next two years, however, he remained on the union’s payroll, with pay-as-you-go tax deducted from his gross weekly “wages” of $2307.69 as though he was still a regular full-time employee turning up for work.
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Whose private thoughts wouldn’t be a scandal? The real disgrace in the Barry Spurr affair

Andrew Bolt October 20 2014 (6:03am)

Henry Ergas on a gross invasion of privacy that exposes some hypocrites:
THE Barry Spurr affair is terrifying in the shoddy treatment of Spurr; in what it says about our universities; and in the lack of outrage that either has evoked. 
What is certain is that there was a gross invasion of Spurr’s privacy. To that must be added the likelihood that his emails were obtained illegally and used when it was known, or should have been known, that that is how they had been obtained.
Moreover, that use was by a publication, New Matilda, that had only recently committed the same offence; and whose journalists hypocritically denounced the wrongdoing at the News of the World and, since then, have attacked the government’s metadata proposals, with all their checks and balances, as an assault on privacy.
Of course, one expects nothing better from Wendy Bacon, who demands a moral right to invade the private emails of others without providing public access to her own. But it is disappointing that Bill Shorten, who repeatedly invoked the presumption of innocence to shield Craig Thomson and Peter Slipper, failed to show the same concern for Spurr.
And it is a scandal that the University of Sydney has suspended Spurr despite there being no claim, much less evidence, that his teaching, supervision and research have been anything but exemplary. To make matters worse, the university has set aside Spurr’s explanation that the emails were parodies without according Spurr the prior opportunity to have that explanation tested. 
 ===
Cotton Candy Sunrise

After pulling an all nighter along the Marin Headlands, I was rewarded with this fantastic foggy sunrise over San Francisco and it's bridges. I was also rewarded by seeing so many of the awesome local photographers I have grown to know so well and who I delight in seeing and talking to. There was far too little time to socialize however with this pastel scene unfolding before us. It was good seeing you; John Louie, and his brother Andrew, Steve-Maxx Landeros, Toby Harriman, David Yu, Wilson Lam, Amy Heiden, and so many others! I look forward to seeing what you came away with on this beautiful morning.

Cheers!

~M@ — at Hawk Hill.
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http://www.theage.com.au/national/defence-all-at-sea-on-new-submarines-20131018-2vsd6.html
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Resettlement and Recompense Little notice has been paid to the fate of the 850,000 Jewish refugees from the Arab states, about 550,000 of whom were resettled in Israel. Similarly, the resettlement of most of the Palestinian refugees in the host Arab countries, creating a de facto population exchange, has been overlooked.

The Palestinian Refugee Problem Resolved :: Middle East Quarterly
http://www.meforum.org/3643/palestinian-refugee-problem
During the 1948 war, some 600,000 Palestinian Arabs fled their homes to the neighboring Arab states or to parts of mandatory Palestine occupied by Arab states (the West Bank and Gaza).[1] Likewise, within a few years after the establishment of the State
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Emancipation and colonialism
http://www.israpundit.com/archives/57990
By ELI KAVON, JPOST The idea that young Jews do not support Israel because of Israeli policy in “the occupied territories” is ridiculous. On May 30, 1806, Napoleon Bonaparte issued an imperial decree calling for an “Assembly of Jewish Notables” to a
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FEMA Camp Round Up Has Begun: The Homeless First! | Humans Are Free
http://humansarefree.com/2013/10...
This is subhuman, is this history repeating its self, but in different ways but in the same in nanny way. Like before most didn't believe that they would do such a thing, but they're so blind they done this before.
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Islamic terror, murder and mayhem :: Michael Freund
http://www.michaelfreund.org/13827/islamic-terror-murder-mayhem
For several days last week, the world watched in horror as Somali fanatics slaughtered shoppers in a Nairobi mall. The chilling video footage from security cameras, along with the terrifying witness accounts of the carnage perpetrated by the terrorists,
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Novelist, Playwright and Journalist
http://www.naomiragen.com/womens-issues/joys-grown-life/
Naomi Ragen is an American-born novelist, playwright and journalist who has lived in Jerusalem since 1971 and who writes regularly in the Jerusalem Post and to her mailing list about Israel and Jewish issues. Naomi has published nine internationally best selling novels, and is the author of a hit pl...
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CAIR’s Islamophobia Meltdown | FrontPage Magazine
http://frontpagemag.com/2013/dgreenfield/cairs-islamophobia-meltdown/#.UmNLsJW2D04.facebook
A terrorist organization attacks its critics.
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http://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/antisemitism-back-europe-9256
http://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/antisemitism-back-europe-9256

Is Antisemitism Back in Europe? The rise of Muslim antisemitism in Europe is well documented—and widely ignored. 
John Allen Gay | October 18, 2013
===

Charles Krauthammer: Deal with an Iranian moderate? The search has been never-ending for good reason
http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/krauthammer093013.php3#.UmNJeEb_1ik.facebook
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | The search, now 30 years old, for Iranian “moderates” goes on. Amid the enthusiasm of the latest sighting, it’s worth remembering that the highlight of the Iran-contra arms-for-hostages debacle was thesecret trip to Tehran taken by Robert McFarlane, President Reagan’s former national security adviser. He brought a key-shaped cake symbolizing the new relations he was opening with the “moderates.”

We know how that ended.

Three decades later, the mirage reappears in the form of Hassan Rouhani. Strange résumé for a moderate: 35 years of unswervingly loyal service to the Islamic Republic as a close aide to Ayatollahs Khomeini and Khamenei. Moreover, Rouhani was one of only six presidential candidates, another 678 having been disqualified by the regime as ideologically unsound. That puts him in the 99th centile for fealty.

Rouhani is Khamenei’s agent but, with a smile and style, he’s now hailed as the face of Iranian moderation. Why? Because Rouhani wants better relations with the West.
Well, what leader would not want relief from Western sanctions that have sunk Iran’s economy, devalued its currency and caused widespread hardship? The test of moderation is not what you want but what you’re willing to give. After all, sanctions were not slapped on Iran for amusement. It was to enforce multiple U.N. Security Council resolutions demanding a halt to uranium enrichment.

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Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News: The bar for being a "moderate" is pretty low for Muslims (poster)
http://elderofziyon.blogspot.com.au/2013/09/the-bar-for-being-moderate-is-pretty.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%253A+blogspot%252FPDbq+%2528Elder+of+Ziyon%2529#.UmOl5RZlpa8

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Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News: "The Rabbits Who Caused All the Trouble" - and a sequel
http://elderofziyon.blogspot.com.au/2013/09/the-rabbits-who-caused-all-trouble-and.html#.UmOmThZlpa8

By James Thurber, first published in The New Yorker on August 26, 1939:

Within the memory of the youngest child there was a family of rabbits who lived near a pack of wolves. The wolves announced that they did not like the way the rabbits were living. (The wolves were crazy about the way they themselves were living, because it was the only way to live.) One night several wolves were killed in an earthquake and this was blamed on the rabbits, for it is well known that rabbits pound on the ground with their hind legs and cause earthquakes. On another night one of the wolves was killed by a bolt of lightning and this was also blamed on the rabbits, for it is well known that lettuce-eaters cause lightning. The wolves threatened to civilize the rabbits if they didn't behave, and the rabbits decided to run away to a desert island. But the other animals, who lived at a great distance, shamed them saying, "You must stay where you are and be brave. This is no world for escapists. If the wolves attack you, we will come to your aid in all probability." So the rabbits continued to live near the wolves and one day there was a terrible flood which drowned a great many wolves. This was blamed on the rabbits, for it is well known that carrot-nibblers with long ears cause floods. The wolves descended on the rabbits, for their own good, and imprisoned them in a dark cave, for their own protection.

When nothing was heard about the rabbits for some weeks, the other animals demanded to know what had happened to them. The wolves replied that the rabbits had been eaten and since they had been eaten the affair was a purely internal matter. But the other animals warned that they might possibly unite against the wolves unless some reason was given for the destruction of the rabbits. So the wolves gave them one. "They were trying to escape," said the wolves, "and, as you know, this is no world for escapists."

Moral: Run, don't walk, to the nearest desert island.

===
Candidly Speaking from Jerusalem
http://wordfromjerusalem.com/?p=4827
One might have hoped that Obama’s calamitous mishandling of recent Middle East crises, climaxing with his disastrous response to the Syrian use of chemical weapons, would have taught him a few lessons on regional politics.
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Sultan Knish: The Church of Victimology
http://sultanknish.blogspot.co.il/2013/09/the-church-of-victimology.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+FromNyToIsraelSultanRevealsTheStoriesBehindTheNews+%28from+NY+to+Israel+Sultan+Reveals+The+Stories+Behind+the+News%29

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Why should Israel allow it, when Europe most certainly wouldn't?
http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.co.il/2013/09/why-should-israel-allow-it-when-europe.html

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Faces of the Israeli settlements
http://slideshow.nbcnews.com/slideshow/news/faces-of-the-israeli-settlements-53116133/
Explore the slideshow 'Faces of the Israeli settlements' on NBCNews.com
===
I oppose a Palestinian state that is not open to all peoples everywhere to live with standards of justice that are high and compassionate - ed===

Do I Not Criticize Israeli Policies? :: Daniel Pipes
http://www.danielpipes.org/blog/2013/09/do-i-not-criticize-israeli-policies
David C. Speedie, a senior fellow and director of U.S. Global Engagement Program at the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs, recently wrote how he follows me "quite closely" and that my work is of no value because I don't "in any way
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WHEN THE LEGAL BECOMES ILLEGAL
Israpundit
SEPTEMBER 29, 2013, , By Charles Abelsohn, TOI The following article was sent to the spokesman for Baroness Catherine Ashton. It was not acknowledged. BARONESS ASHTON: PLEASE ENLIGHTEN WHY, WHEN ISRAEL IS INVOLVED, THE EU CHANGES THE LEGAL TO ILLEGAL AND THE ILLEGAL TO LEGAL. Sometimes one wonders exactly what the European Union [EU] wants from and expects of …
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Pastor Rick Warren
The more I focus on me,
the more unhappy I'll be.
See Philippians 2:4
=
EVERY HOUR ONLINE I'm teaching "Happiness Can Be Learned" Phil.2:19-30. JOIN ME NOW. Notes and study app are online too: http://bit.ly/ZvjGI9
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This Is [Nearly] 30: 8 things you need to know before you're all grown up
http://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/real-life/this-is-nearly-30-8-things-you-need-to-know-before-youre-all-grown-up/story-fnixwvgh-1226743342533
THREE years ago I lived with my parents.
Hold a baby .. great skill! - ed
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Borded snipers in Syria targeting pregnant women for fun, says UK surgeon
http://www.news.com.au/world-news/borded-snipers-targeting-pregnant-women-for-fun-says-surgeon/story-fndir2ev-1226743209994
SYRIAN snipers appear to be targeting pregnant women, a British surgeon says after returning from the conflict zone.

*bored (sp) .. I like to think that the shooters aren't Islamic .. but they claim to be, and those who know seem to agree.
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< Disappointment as Richmond brothel fails to arouse winning bid

When this Melbourne brothel opened on Saturday it was the first time in its long and colourful history that nobody came.

Well - some people came. To the auction. But not many. There was only one bid of a tickle over $1.4 million, but it was not nearly enough to sell the property, which until July was trading as Ladies For Gentlemen.>

http://theage.domain.com.au/real-estate-news/disappointment-as-richmond-brothel-fails-to-arouse-winning-bid-20131019-2vtxs.html
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Holly Sarah Nguyen
TRUTH for the day: Life is too short for dead in jobs, people, places and things. If there is no peace, fulfillment, appreciation, love, happiness, uplifting, laughter or passion then it needs to change or go. Have a fabulous day!
Harsh wisdom .. it is wise .. patience can sometimes be taken advantage of. But it is good not to give up on *everything* .. prioritise ;) ed

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Bob Carr is back, living on the NSW taxpayer
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/nsw/bob-carr-is-back-living-on-the-nsw-taxpayer/story-fni0cx12-1226741287221?sv=6acdd51628bada6584e3b24491c11084
FORMER Foreign Affairs Minister Bob Carr's impending exit from the Senate is set to cost NSW taxpayers $300,000-plus a year because that is how much his former Premier's entitlements of an office, car and driver cost the taxpayer prior to his entry into federal parliament.

<.. I just wish Carr would fcuk off and drop dead. He makes me more sick than all of the ALP put together. A do-nothing premier and still being paid for doing even less.>
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Romsey Australia: Bushfires in Victoria 1851 Black Thursday
http://home.iprimus.com.au/foo7/fire1851.html

Romsey Australia: Bushfires in Victoria 1851 Black Thursday
===

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Eric Kalemen
Training time!! — at Scare-Ric Circuit Session
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“Take delight in the LORD, and he will give you the desires of your heart.”Psalm 37:4NIV
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Morning and Evening by Charles Spurgeon

Morning


"Babes in Christ."
1 Corinthians 3:1
Are you mourning, believer, because you are so weak in the divine life: because your faith is so little, your love so feeble? Cheer up, for you have cause for gratitude. Remember that in some things you are equal to the greatest and most full-grown Christian. You are as much bought with blood as he is. You are as much an adopted child of God as any other believer. An infant is as truly a child of its parents as is the full-grown man. You are as completely justified, for your justification is not a thing of degrees: your little faith has made you clean every whit. You have as much right to the precious things of the covenant as the most advanced believers, for your right to covenant mercies lies not in your growth, but in the covenant itself; and your faith in Jesus is not the measure, but the token of your inheritance in him. You are as rich as the richest, if not in enjoyment, yet in real possession. The smallest star that gleams is set in heaven; the faintest ray of light has affinity with the great orb of day. In the family register of glory the small and the great are written with the same pen. You are as dear to your Father's heart as the greatest in the family. Jesus is very tender over you. You are like the smoking flax; a rougher spirit would say, "put out that smoking flax, it fills the room with an offensive odour!" but the smoking flax he will not quench. You are like a bruised reed; and any less tender hand than that of the Chief Musician would tread upon you or throw you away, but he will never break the bruised reed. Instead of being downcast by reason of what you are, you should triumph in Christ. Am I but little in Israel? Yet in Christ I am made to sit in heavenly places. Am I poor in faith? Still in Jesus I am heir of all things. Though "less than nothing I can boast, and vanity confess." Yet, if the root of the matter be in me I will rejoice in the Lord, and glory in the God of my salvation.

Evening

"God, my maker, who giveth songs in the night."
Job 35:10
Any man can sing in the day. When the cup is full, man draws inspiration from it. When wealth rolls in abundance around him, any man can praise the God who gives a plenteous harvest or sends home a loaded argosy. It is easy enough for an Aeolian harp to whisper music when the winds blow--the difficulty is for music to swell forth when no wind is stirring. It is easy to sing when we can read the notes by daylight; but he is skilful who sings when there is not a ray of light to read by--who sings from his heart. No man can make a song in the night of himself; he may attempt it, but he will find that a song in the night must be divinely inspired. Let all things go well, I can weave songs, fashioning them wherever I go out of the flowers that grow upon my path; but put me in a desert, where no green thing grows, and wherewith shall I frame a hymn of praise to God? How shall a mortal man make a crown for the Lord where no jewels are? Let but this voice be clear, and this body full of health, and I can sing God's praise: silence my tongue, lay me upon the bed of languishing, and how shall I then chant God's high praises, unless he himself give me the song? No, it is not in man's power to sing when all is adverse, unless an altar-coal shall touch his lip. It was a divine song, which Habakkuk sang, when in the night he said, "Although the fig-tree shall not blossom, neither shall fruit be in the vines; the labour of the olive shall fail, and the fields shall yield no meat; the flock shall be cut off from the fold, and there shall be no herd in the stalls: yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will joy in the God of my salvation." Then, since our Maker gives songs in the night, let us wait upon him for the music. O thou chief musician, let us not remain songless because affliction is upon us, but tune thou our lips to the melody of thanksgiving.
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Today's reading: Isaiah 56-58, 2 Thessalonians 2 (NIV)

View today's reading on Bible Gateway

Today's Old Testament reading: Isaiah 56-58

Salvation for Others
1 This is what the LORD says:
"Maintain justice
and do what is right,
for my salvation is close at hand
and my righteousness will soon be revealed.
2 Blessed is the one who does this-
the person who holds it fast,
who keeps the Sabbath without desecrating it,
and keeps their hands from doing any evil."
3 Let no foreigner who is bound to the LORD say,
"The LORD will surely exclude me from his people."
And let no eunuch complain,
"I am only a dry tree."
4 For this is what the LORD says:
"To the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths,
who choose what pleases me
and hold fast to my covenant-
5 to them I will give within my temple and its walls
a memorial and a name
better than sons and daughters;
I will give them an everlasting name
that will endure forever....

Today's New Testament reading: 2 Thessalonians 2

The Man of Lawlessness
1 Concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered to him, we ask you, brothers and sisters, 2 not to become easily unsettled or alarmed by the teaching allegedly from us-whether by a prophecy or by word of mouth or by letter-asserting that the day of the Lord has already come. 3 Don't let anyone deceive you in any way, for that day will not come until the rebellion occurs and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the man doomed to destruction. 4 He will oppose and will exalt himself over everything that is called God or is worshiped, so that he sets himself up in God's temple, proclaiming himself to be God.
5 Don't you remember that when I was with you I used to tell you these things? 6 And now you know what is holding him back, so that he may be revealed at the proper time. 7 For the secret power of lawlessness is already at work; but the one who now holds it back will continue to do so till he is taken out of the way. 8 And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will overthrow with the breath of his mouth and destroy by the splendor of his coming. 9The coming of the lawless one will be in accordance with how Satan works. He will use all sorts of displays of power through signs and wonders that serve the lie, 10 and all the ways that wickedness deceives those who are perishing. They perish because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. 11 For this reason God sends them a powerful delusion so that they will believe the lie 12 and so that all will be condemned who have not believed the truth but have delighted in wickedness....
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Potiphar

[Pŏt'ĭphar] - who is of the sun or a fat bull. The captain of Pharaoh's guardto whom Joseph was sold by the Midianites. It was his wife who tried to seduce Joseph (Gen. 37:36; 39:1).
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