Tuesday, September 29, 2009

Headlines Tuesday 29th September 2009

Please Explain puts Pauline's life on film

THE hunt will soon be on to find an actress to play controversial politician Pauline Hanson in the upcoming biopic tentatively titled Please Explain. - no problem, Cate, all you have to do is act, playing the role of an opinionated person who doesn't understand the issues .. you may not even need to act. -ed.

'It's only because she's a girl'
AS pressure mounts on teen sailor to abandon round-world bid, mum comes out swinging. - ALP do not have a proud history on equal opportunity, except in their mythology - ed.

Angry response to McGurk murder question
PROPERTY developer Ron Medich has responded angrily when asked in a NSW parliamentary inquiry whether he was involved in a Sydney murder.

Leigh Robinson guilty of chasing, murdering young mum

A KILLER sentenced to death 40 years ago has been found guilty of the murder of Melbourne mum Tracey Greenbury.

Soaring house prices 'not helping us'
RISING house prices and rents are not making the country any richer, the Reserve Bank says.

Family mourn 'murdered' Aussie porn star
CATHOLIC schoolgirl had dreams of making it in Hollywood but drifted into adult films.

Mum's hug for man who 'destroyed' son
MOTHER hugs drink-driver who "gunned it" before he faces court for destroying her only son's life.

Chris cheated on Masterchef, claims ex
CHRIS Badenoch's ex-girlfriend claims he asked her to order meat to help him win MasterChef.

Premium pirates fuel ripoff concerns
IF you thought you were saving money by buying higher octane fuel, think again, says the NRMA.

Beatles lose their Lucy in the Sky

THE woman said to have inspired the iconic Beatles song Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds has died.

Dark cloud over 'kids who never smile'
BOY found with "battle plan" showing where to plant bombs at his school part of a growing problem, say teachers.
=== Journalists Corner ===

Bobby Jindal Speaks Out!
The La. Governor is up in arms over health care reform! What has him so fired up? Find out!
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A Mother's Challenge
Moms across America are concerned more than ever about their kid's future. Beck is here to help! Don't miss the 9-12 project!
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Showdown With Iran
As tension builds, could military action be closer than you think? Bill has answers!
=== Comments ===
The haste to waste in a spending frenzy
Piers Akerman
JEREMY Travers, a Year 12 student at Eagle Vale High in Sydney’s southwest, knows an education revolution when he sees one. In his opinion, a recording studio and an upgraded kitchen don’t make the cut. - The ghetto schools which are part and parcel with ALP social policy are expensive to run and maintain and do not achieve good results. However, the students are better off in those schools than in general public as unemployed. Those desks have been damaged by students, as have those textbooks. Go to a school that is not disadvantaged and you will find the textbooks are older, and the furniture is older, but in markedly better condition. Not as much money is spent on good students. Under Rudd's revolution, good students will still be ignored. In some schools, a million dollars will be spent on building two empty shell classrooms when the same money may have funded a block of classrooms were less haste required. The money isn't going to schools, although it is being spent on schools. It is going to developers and ALP hucksters.
The computers are useful. However, a more effective programme would have been to delay implementing them for a few years. Every dollar spent now will be worthless in two years, and in that time we will still be struggling to make something meaningful result from their use. Lots of things are possible, like loading textbooks onto the computers, but the department has left it to the class teachers to negotiate copyright issues instead of addressing that corporately. It might have been kinder to provide every school child with a brick for their bag. - ed

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Former NSW ICAC Commissioner on Heiner
Piers Akerman
This is an important interview with Barry O’Keefe, a former NSW Commissioner of ICAC on the Heiner Affair.
I just had a listen - The old “deeds weeds” saying, I like it. A better one is “Money talks and BS walks”

Rule of Law is the most important thing in our civilisation. Without it our society would disappear into an orgy of slaughter. One thing I did notice during the interview was the word “former.” Perhaps the bad guys in this matter are hoping to win this through attrition? Most of the torch carriers in this matter have a few miles on the clock and most likely wont be around when the coalition gains office in QLD. From where I stand even a coalition victory would not deliver an inquiry - As I have said all along MAD Theorem is at work.

Party on

Tim
DD Ball replied to Tim
A Coalition victiory won’t change much because the issue is not parliamentary (although the abuse originated there) but belonging to the watchdogs. The problem is that the watchdogs can only address an issue, not an individual and so the only hope of justice for the victim is an ex gratia payment. However, the corruption itself needs to be addressed and parliament will not be able to do that, but parliament acting with civil service. The civil service won’t get voted out. The entrenched corruption must be weeded out. That will require the compromised press to be on board, but they will be barracking for the new ALP when the election is over.

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THEY’RE SPECIAL
Tim Blair
“Flying is the single worst thing an ordinary individual can do to cause climate change,” according to warmy movie The Age of Stupid. But that rule doesn’t apply to celebs:

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CLIMATE SHARKS!
Tim Blair
Warming guru Ross Garnaut – one of many warming gurus who speak in a zombie monotone, for some reason – mourns rural doubt over climate change:
That’s a sad thing. There you’ve got climate sharks preying on the vulnerability of people who aren’t in a position to be well informed themselves. That’s a tragedy, the exploitation of people who would benefit from greater knowledge. I’m afraid that what’s going to happen in rural Australia is that the well-informed will make a lot of money out of the ignorant, and the ignorant include a lot of people who can’t afford to be skinned in that way.
Professor Garnaut seems to define money-making warming doubters as “well-informed”. Interesting. (He also says: “It’s the sort of denial we see in relation to a lot of tragic circumstances.” Care to name those circumstances, Prof?) Their well-informedness aside, I’m not aware of too many warming doubters who’ve turned their scepticism into massive dollars. Warming alarmists, on the other hand …

UPDATE. Rural voters – tragic, exploited rural voters – speak out.
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CRUSH THE ETS
Tim Blair
A couple of points made during The Insiders – possible electoral popularity of an anti-ETS stance; more widespread ETS/warming scepticism within conservative ranks than is generally known – are echoed in the Australian:
Malcolm Turnbull will be forced to stare down more than two-thirds of the Liberal back bench if he proceeds with his plan to negotiate with the government over amendments to the emissions trading scheme before December’s Copenhagen climate change conference …

The Australian’s survey proves that the so-called maverick Liberal parliamentarians Wilson Tuckey and Cory Bernardi are reflecting the views of an overwhelming majority of their colleagues when they publicly criticise the shadow cabinet for endorsing Mr Turnbull to negotiate with the government over the ETS.
And:
A split has emerged in Coalition ranks over the risk of a climate change election, with Nationals leader Warren Truss declaring an outright rejection of an emissions trading scheme could prove a vote winner.
There’s only one way to find out.
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WAR IS SWELL
Tim Blair
According to a news report this week: “If the world fails to reach agreement on tackling climate change soon then it could end in war, climate scientist Tim Flannery has warned.”

A climate change war! This sounds like the finest lark in combat history. But war is hell even when it involves global warming activists, as this computer model of one soldier’s future war diary accurately predicts:
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TOUGH CHOICE
Tim Blair
“If you’re not going to the Punch party,” emails The Punch‘s Paul Colgan, “here’s something fun to do on Wednesday.”
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FERVOUR DEMONSTRATED
Tim Blair
Phillip Adams, 2006:
And it seemed to me that not only did this demonstrate that there was a quasi-religious fervour in the environmental movement, but people were actually willing the end, they wanted the end.
Phillip Adams, 2009:
The planet is effectively on fire …

James Lovelock, whose credentials include formulating the Gaia theory and discovering the hole in the ozone layer, calculates that billions (repeat billions) of humans will be killed one way or another by global warming in the next 40 years. In his view, the survival of our species, and countless others, is in great doubt. Yet it’s business as usual on Planet Earth …
To date, AGW hasn’t killed a single person, animal or plant. It’s the least deadly mass killer in planetary history. Adams—possibly craving attention of late—continues:
As the problem intensifies not even politicians who retreat to their underground bunkers will survive.
He wants the end. By the way, someone whose ”credentials include formulating the Gaia theory”? Those are some serious credentials. Right up there with the guy whose credentials include formulating the theory of pet rocks.
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DELICATE MUTILATION
Tim Blair
A South Australian child protection worker, quoted in this report:
I might just add that the thing that throws a real spanner across the board for everybody, and it’s just such a delicate subject, is female genital mutilation. While some staff see that as very wrong, we need to be very sensitive how we deal with that issue.
Only some see it as wrong? The issue is sensitive? Child protection expert Professor Freda Briggs isn’t buying it:
Professor Briggs said this attitude was unacceptable. “This is an offence against Australian law and they should throw the book at them – there is no shade of grey in this,” she said …

Briggs has criticised the views of departmental officials in the report, saying the practice is illegal torture and the perpetrators should be charged immediately by police, without any sensitivity.
Prof Briggs is from an era (and an area) not inclined to cultural hand-wringing. Worryingly, some of those mutilating perps may be outside the communities involved:
Professor Briggs said a tolerance of the practice had even led to mainstream doctors carrying out the practice for fear that it would otherwise be done by family members.
If this is so, certain mainstream doctors require mainstream investigation and mainstream imprisonment.

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