New push for children to start school at the age of three

This push is basically bullshit. Finland does not start kids at school until age 7 and they have famously good results.  Let me quote just a small excerpt from someone who has surveyed the evidence on the question:

"University studies are often quoted to support the perceived academic benefits of preschool. What is not often mentioned is that whilst these studies demonstrate preschool in a favourable light when compared with an impoverished home environment; preschool environments and results do not compare favourably with the average home environment.

Even Professor Edward Zigler, credited as “the father of Head Start” a well-respected American preschool program admits “there is a large body of evidence that there is little to be gained by exposing middle class children to early education…(and) evidence that indicates early schooling is inappropriate for many four-year-olds, and that it may be harmful to their development.”

So what about the long-term academic effects of preschool? The longitudinal studies, often quoted to argue an academic advantage provided by preschool for lower socio-economic groups, actually also show that this “advantage” disappears by grade three.

If preschool were truly beneficial in terms of giving children a head start, those places with some form of compulsory preschool should do demonstrably better academically. The evidence does not bear this out. The two states of America which have compulsory preschool, Georgia and Oklahoma, have the lowest results for fourth grade reading tests in the country."

So why the deception?  The push is in fact just a push for free child-minding


Children should start school at the age of three to give them the best start in life and to stop Australia falling behind Europe and China, leading experts claim.

Lobby groups are urging the Federal Government to boost funding for more children to have access to school earlier.

More and more private schools and early learning centres are offering 'pre-kindy' which exposes children to play-based learning so they are better prepared for when they start school.

Many programs have lengthy waiting lists and now an initiative led by the Early Learning Benefits campaign wants extra funding so more children have access to pre-school education. 

'We have some children already having access to high quality learning, but many are missing out … equity is a big issue,' Early Childhood Australia CEO Samantha Page told The Courier Mail.

Latest statistics show only 58.5 per cent of three-year-olds in Australia are enrolled in pre-school programs, compared to 95-100 per cent of children in France, Denmark, Norway, Israel and Spain.

University of the Sunshine Coast senior lecturer Dr Ali Black, said international research showed children introduced to high quality education earlier were more likely to go to university, gain better jobs and even own their own homes.

They were more resilient, had better social skills and had fewer behavioural issues.

Australian Catholic University early childhood specialist, Laurien Beane, said the push would follow the lead of cutting-edge Scandanavian countries, who have invested huge resources to educating kids from birth to the age of five.

'We invest in the 5-18 age group and it starts too late … that's why as a nation we are languishing so far behind a number of other countries,' Ms Beane said.

Ms Beane said the main objectivity of early education was not about literacy and numeracy but to foster curiosity, creativity, imagination and social development. Children would typically attend two days a week for five-and-a-half hours.

They would have lessons in music, literature, languages, as well as more social-based lessons about respecting others and regulating emotions.

Ms Page said Labor made a commitment in October to extend funding to early education for three-year-olds by 2021.

Some parents say they feel pressured to be in favour of the push as primary schools are likely to give preference to children attending pre-kindergarten programs. Other fears include schools will favour children in those programs to boost rankings and funding.

Childcare and early learning provider C&K is among those leading the way with pre-kindergarten rooms, like Banyo in Brisbane's north.

SOURCE  







Bill Shorten to push through a $2,200 pay rise to 2.3 MILLION Australian workers

This is a good recipe to send a lot of businesses broke and their employees onto the dole

Labor Opposition leader Bill Shorten has attacked 'fat cat' bosses as he throws his support behind a union proposal to increase the minimum wage by $43 a week.

The Fair Work Commission would have to deliver a $2,200 annual pay rise to 2.3 million low-paid workers if Mr Shorten's union-backed plan is successful.

However, small business owners and employer groups are opposed to Shorten's plan, which comes as his party leads the Coalition in polls.

'I love this argument put aside by the bosses of Australia, the fat cats, the top end of town,' Mr Shorten said.

'They say if we pay the poorest workers in Australia a bit more, that's out of control. But how is it that the executives are happy to take more and more in corporate profits?'

The Fair Work Commission, which sets the minimum wage, is an independent body that operates under the Fair Work Act 2009.

Mr Shorten has suggested a Labor government could use 'another tool or mechanism ... to change legislation' to boost the minimum wage instead of relying solely on the commission.  

The Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry is against governments using legislation when the rate of pay rises has been set by an independent body for more than a century.

'No one in Australia should be forced to work below the poverty line but that is exactly what the current minimum wage guarantees,' Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) Secretary Sally McManus said.

The ACTU is pushing for a six per cent rise to the weekly minimum wage equating to $762.20 a week, up from $719.20, this year.  

A living wage is 60 per cent of the average national median wage, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.

The ACTU wants a further 5.5 per cent increase in 2020 to $852 a week to achieve their living wage target. 

Australia's minimum wage is $18.93 an hour or $719.20 per 38 hour week before tax.

Council of Small Business Australia CEO Peter Strong said the idea is 'impractical' for small businesses and would make goods more expensive for consumers. 'We're not against pay rises. This isn't a war between employers and employees. Staff know to have a job the business needs to be profitable,' he said.

'A lot of small businesses would need to retrench by cutting down hours or letting staff go.' 

SOURCE  






Conservative university students seek debate on immigration but just get screamed at

University students boasting a politically incorrect sign at a controversial 'change my mind' event on campus have caused an uproar. Members of University of New South Wales' Conservatives set up a desk at the Kensington campus, in Sydney's Eastern suburbs, with a sign reading 'our immigration level is too high' on Tuesday.

The club encouraged fellow students to approach the desk to debate the provocative issue and change their minds.

The UNSW Education Collective, a campus collective that fights for progressive issues, denounced the message both on campus and on social media.

'We had a good go at them but it seemed like they weren't willing to change their mind?' the collective wrote with a picture of the event.

The collective called the conservatives 'campus incels' and apologised for making their 'small brains hurt'.

'Maybe the government should tax corporations to fund decent public infrastructure and services instead of beating up racist BS about over immigration,' the collective wrote.

The 'change my mind' campus initiative was introduced by American right-wing podcaster Steven Crowder, who suggested male privilege was a myth outside Texas Christian University in February 2018.

Mr Crowder shared the image to twitter, where it became a meme and an incentive for other right-wing students to debate social topics.

The conservatives re-shared the collectives' Facebook post and said their stance on immigration was not linked to their views on race.

'It was a pleasure to be visited by members of the UNSW education collective at our 'Change my mind' event today,' the conservatives said. 'Granted, their screaming in our faces was not as effective at changing our minds as a little calm discussion might have been.'

'We would also like to politely clarify that our position on immigration has absolutely nothing to do with race.'

The group signed off their post by welcoming more 'interesting' discussion at other events later in the year.  

The event has been met with a number of responses on social media, with some questioning how the UNSW Education Collective handled the situation.

'Why do you think it's cool to personally attack people for their political affiliations and opinions, how is it at all useful to anyone to call theses guys 'incles' and collectively mock them online,' responded one person.

'Reasonable political discussion is healthy but all I saw were people attacking them, pretty sure I heard someone get called a racist and now incels,' commented another.

One social media user said: 'It's not conservative to say our immigration level is too high. It's not about race it's about population.'

UNSW, one of Australia's top universities, encourages diversity and inclusion on campus.

'UNSW will be recognised as an international exemplar in equity, diversity and inclusion. Our success will have been built upon embracing the diversity and cultural richness of our communities and ensuring that our staff and students can achieve their full potential regardless of background,' UNSW 2025 vision says.

SOURCE  







Why aren't the politicians listening? Newspoll shows eight in 10 New South Wales residents DON'T want a population increase - as immigration soars to a record high

Residents in Australia's most overcrowded city are skeptical of high immigration with eight in 10 opposed to a faster rate of population growth.

A Newspoll of more than 1,000 voters in Sydney and regional New South Wales found 25 per cent of respondents wanted Australia's immigration pace to be slashed.

Another 55 per cent wanted immigration to stay where it is, meaning 80 per cent of people surveyed in Australia's most populous state didn't want the pace of population growth to accelerate beyond a recent record high.

Just 16 per cent of those participating in the Newspoll survey, published in The Australian, favoured a higher immigration rate.

In 2018, a record 832,560 permanent and long-term migrants decided to call Australia home, marking a 7.1 per cent increase compared with 2017, official statistics released in February showed.

With the number of people leaving Australia for good taken into account, the nation's annual net immigration rate stood at 291,250, the highest in four-and-a-half years.

The vast bulk of new arrivals settled in already overcrowded Sydney and Melbourne.

High population growth from skilled migrants and students has been credited with stopping Australia's economy from slowing down.

Australia's population growth
1881: 2.3 million

1918: 5 million

1959: 10 million

1981: 15 million

1991: 17.4 million

2004: 20 million

2013: 23 million

2016: 24 million

2018: 25 million

Sources: Australian Bureau of Statistics; House of Representatives Standing Committee for Long-Term Strategies, December 1994

When immigration was taken out of the equation, Australia last year fell into a per capita recession for the first time in almost 13 years.

Economic output, or wealth generated by every Australian, shrunk by 0.1 per cent in the September quarter and by another 0.2 per cent during the final three months of 2018, Australian Bureau of Statistics national accounts data released this month showed.

This was the first per-capita recession since 2006, when interest rates rose three times.

NSW Liberal Premier Gladys Berejiklian has called on her federal Coalition government counterparts to reduce Australia's net annual immigration rate.

Over-development in Sydney has been a key issue during the state election campaign, with voters in NSW heading to the polls on March 23.

Sydney is already home to more than 5.5million people, making it Australia's most overcrowded city.

Australia's net annual immigration rate averaged 70,000 during the 20th century but soared above 100,000 in 2002.

It climbed above 200,000 in 2012.

SOURCE  






WA govt axes deal with wave power company

The WA government has axed its funding deal for a wave power project in the state's south after the proponent, Carnegie Clean Energy, ran out of cash.

Australian Associated PressMARCH 12, 201912:52PM
The West Australian government has decided to stop subsidising a company that planned a wave power project in the state's south but has run out of cash.

Carnegie Clean Energy was in October handed a $2.625 million payment despite not meeting targets for the Albany project and last week posted a $45 million half-year net loss, revealing it only has $1.68 million left in the bank.

On Tuesday, regional development minister Alannah MacTiernan said the WA government had terminated the funding agreement.

"We have concluded they are unlikely to meet their obligations under the agreement," Ms MacTiernan told reporters.

SOURCE   

 Posted by John J. Ray (M.A.; Ph.D.).    For a daily critique of Leftist activities,  see DISSECTING LEFTISM.  To keep up with attacks on free speech see Tongue Tied. Also, don't forget your daily roundup  of pro-environment but anti-Greenie  news and commentary at GREENIE WATCH .  Email me  here

Another Greenie shriek about the Great Barrier Reef

This piece of research must have been frustrating to its authors.  They found that the presumed evil -- farm runoff -- actually HELPED the barrier reef.  So they had to do a lot of scratching to turn that around.

The big drama about the reef is that it undergoes periodic bleaching  --  when the coral expels its symbiotic algae.  Nobody likes the look of that but the corals mostly recover after a while.  So that is what all good men and true rally to prevent.  STOP the bleaching!  And now we have found something that prevents it to a degree:  Farm runoff!  How big a disappointment can you get? Farm runoff was supposed to KILL the reef!

But by scratching around in their data, the authors found something to warm their pessimistic hearts.  They found that once the coral had been harmed by some "disturbance", farm runoff hindered recovery to some degree.  But if coral amid farm runoff is less damaged in the first place, does that not make the recovery rate of less concern?

Not so fast!  The authors say.  You have got to balance one effect against another to get an overall conclusion and we have got this nifty little model that will do just that!  So we run the model and we find that that a "6–17% improvement in water quality will be necessary to bring recovery rates in line with projected increases in coral bleaching".

So there's the African-American in the woodpile!  It is all based on a "projection", or in layman's terms, a guess. And the projection is heroic.  They ASSUME that global warming will steadily increase and they ASSUME that warming is the main cause of coral bleaching.  There are large scientific arguments against both those assumptions so if we take them away what is left?  Two people can play the projection game so I project that farm runoff is on balance neither helpful nor harmful so that Nothing needs to be done. Nothing!  Horrors!

My comments so far spring just from a reading of the abstract.  I shudder to think what I would find if I studied the whole article.  I taught applied statistics at a major Australian university for a number of years so I know the tricks researchers get up to if their results don't suit them.  There were so many collaborators on this article that something HAD to come out of it.  Re-running their model with more cautious assumptions would be a ball of fun.

I follow the press release below with the journal abstract


Scientific research published today on the impacts of poor water quality on some Great Barrier Reef corals shows why it’s vital the Queensland Government passes new rules on farm pollution, the Australian Marine Conservation Society (AMCS) says.

The study, published in the journal Nature Ecology and Evolution, found corals in the central and southern sections of the reef would need improvements in water quality of between six and 17 per cent to keep their recovery rates in line with projected increases in coral bleaching.

Corals exposed to poor water quality were also more susceptible to disease and outbreaks of Crown of Thorns starfish, the study found.

Proposed Queensland government laws would phase out harmful farming practices that cause pollution and sediment to run into rivers and out into the reef.

Dr Lissa Schindler, AMCS Great Barrier Reef campaign manager, said: “We need to give the Great Barrier Reef the clean water it needs to recover, and this study shows that clearly. The Queensland Government’s proposals to cut farm pollution need to be passed.”

“What this study also says is that these levels of cuts to farm pollution won’t be enough to save corals on outer reefs from the impacts of rising ocean temperatures caused by global warming.

“We have to make sure we are giving the reef the cleanest water we can, while at the same time stopping the digging up and burning of fossil fuels that drive the warming in the reef’s waters.”

Schindler said while the study found that corals in areas with poor water quality were more resistant to coral bleaching, due to the low level of light penetrating the turbid water, these corals had slower recovery rates and were more susceptible to disease and Crown of thorns starfish outbreaks.

The study, acknowledged that any marginal bleaching protection corals might get from poor water quality “are probably overwhelmed by the most extreme warming conditions” already seen during 2016 and 2017.

Schindler said it was also important to note the study did not consider any impacts of coral bleaching in the vast and once pristine northern sections of the reef that were hit hardest by extreme ocean temperatures in 2016 and 2017.

Media release. AMCS communications manager Ingrid Neilson 0421 972 731

Water quality mediates resilience on the Great Barrier Reef

M. Aaron MacNeil et al.

Abstract

Threats from climate change and other human pressures have led to widespread concern for the future of Australia’s Great Barrier Reef (GBR). Resilience of GBR reefs will be determined by their ability to resist disturbances and to recover from coral loss, generating intense interest in management actions that can moderate these processes. Here we quantify the effect of environmental and human drivers on the resilience of southern and central GBR reefs over the past two decades. Using a composite water quality index, we find that while reefs exposed to poor water quality are more resistant to coral bleaching, they recover from disturbance more slowly and are more susceptible to outbreaks of crown-of-thorns starfish and coral disease—with a net negative impact on recovery and long-term hard coral cover. Given these conditions, we find that 6–17% improvement in water quality will be necessary to bring recovery rates in line with projected increases in coral bleaching among contemporary inshore and mid-shelf reefs. However, such reductions are unlikely to buffer projected bleaching effects among outer-shelf GBR reefs dominated by fast-growing, thermally sensitive corals, demonstrating practical limits to local management of the GBR against the effects of global warming.

Nature Ecology & Evolution (2019)






How to lie with statistics:  The BoM are experts at it

"40C heatwave"? The only reading they give for 40C was Gatton, which is quite a way inland and is hence usually hotter.  The temperature in Brisbane on 11th was a touch below normal at 32C.  On Tuesday 12th it was a completely normal 34C. It takes the BoM to make a heatwave out of a single reading at Gatton!

Record-breaking 40C heatwave blasts Queensland as summer rolls on - but a massive thunderstorm is barrelling towards Australia’s east coast

Queenslanders are sweating through the hottest March heatwave in 12 years after the mercury hit 40C on Monday.

As many endure more blistering temperatures on Tuesday meteorologists have also warned that a massive thunderstorm is barrelling towards Australia's east coast.

A severe weather warning was issued on Monday and thunderstorms are expected to hit the Sunshine Coast and Gympie on Tuesday afternoon.

It comes after a slow-moving low-pressure trough directly over Queensland led to the hot air mass hitting the state's southeast yesterday.

According to the Weatherzone website, Warwick also endured a record-breaking 37.4C.

Ipswich also sweltered in highs of 38.6C and Gayndah sweated through 39.8 degrees.

Severe weather warnings were also issued on Monday as Coolangatta and areas north of Noosa Heads were battered by storms, strong winds and hailstones.

On Tuesday, the hot weather is expected to continue in Queensland with temperatures expected to reach 36C.

SOURCE 






Coal war: Barnaby Joyce sparks showdown with Liberal Party

Barnaby Joyce and senior Nationals MPs have warned that the ­Coalition agreement could be severed over energy policy, setting up a showdown with city-based Liberal MPs fearing a voter backlash over coal in affluent blue-ribbon seats in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane.

After Scott Morrison yesterday rejected a push to fund new coal-fired power plants in central Queensland, Mr Joyce, the Prime Minister’s hand-picked drought envoy, told The Australian the termination of the Coalition was an option on the table.

Mr Joyce, who would stand for the Nationals leadership if a spill were called, openly defied the Prime Minister, declaring there was “no law saying the Nationals and Liberals must be together”.

“It is misleading to tell people that we are bound by covenant to always be together,” Mr Joyce said. “The only thing we are bound by is that we must represent our people to the best of our abilities.”

Mr Joyce, who lost the Nationals’ leadership last year after revelations he had an affair with a staffer, described the ­Coalition as a “business arrangement, not a marriage”.

Deputy Prime Minister and Nationals leader Michael McCormack responded with what ­appeared to be a veiled swipe at the breakdown of Mr Joyce’s ­marriage. “I understand what it takes to have a successful marriage, to make sure that we work together to build a better Australia — that’s what I do with the Liberals,” Mr McCormack said.

Rejecting any threat to his leadership, he said: “There is no coal war. There is no war absolutely whatsoever.”

While no move is expected against Mr McCormack’s leadership before the election, Nationals MPs said the future of the Coalition was under pressure and they would defy the Prime Minister by campaigning on a pro-coal platform.

The warning from Mr Joyce — who said he was hurt by Mr McCormack’s comment about ­ marriage — came after Mr Morrison stoked Coalition tensions by ­talking up renewables and slapping down the push by some Nationals MPs for a new clean coal plant in Queensland. The Prime Minister argued that the Queensland Labor government had “no intention of approving any such projects at all”.

“I tend to work in the area of the practical, the things that actually can happen,” Mr Morrison said. “What actually can happen is the investments that we’re making in renewable projects and reliable projects.”

Liberal MPs were furious with Mr Joyce’s pro-coal intervention. Brisbane MP Trevor Evans warned that calls to subsidise coal were coming from a “lonely minority that is whistling dixie”. “They are not speaking for the government or the majority of our colleagues. I want to be really clear and say I won’t vote for that,” Mr Evans said.

Leading NSW moderate Trent Zimmerman said a “Liberal government” should not help fund new coal-fired power stations. “Most voters recognise that we need to be focusing on reliability and our Paris Agreement target, and our existing policies are the best way to do just that,” the North Sydney MP said.

“While existing coal-fired power stations remain cheaper than the alternatives, there are ­serious questions about the economics of building new coal power based on both the cost but also the risk involved in such a long-term investment.”

The party’s candidate in the eastern Sydney seat of Wentworth, Dave Sharma, also joined the protest. Climate change emerged as a key factor in the Liberals’ loss of the seat to Kerryn Phelps after it was vacated by Malcolm Turnbull. “I don’t think the government should be funding new coal-fired power stations. If the market is not prepared to do it I don’t see why the government should be,” Mr Sharma said.

Outgoing LNP senator Barry O’Sullivan said it was imperative for the Nationals to make the ­future of the Coalition conditional on support for a new clean coal plant. “We will fight and we will pledge to the people and deliver a high-efficiency, low-emissions power plant in the future, if ­returned to government, and ­secure a stable environment for the fossil fuel industry and the ­development of the Galilee Basin,” he said. “We need to make it clear that these things are conditions of a ­future Coalition. And the ­Nationals need to remain strong and true to their fundamental ­constituencies.”

Resources Minister Matt Canavan said an effective Coalition partnership offered the “best way to deliver results”, but noted it could not be taken for granted and required “all of us to work together in the future”.

“The Coalition is simply a business relationship, not a personal relationship,” he said. “Our job as Nationals MPs is to stand up for the people we represent.”

Keith Pitt — one of six LNP MPs to sign a letter last week ­demanding the government ­revive its “big stick” energy policy and commit to a new Queensland power plant — said the Coalition was not a “master/servant ­arrangement”. “There will always be differences of opinion between regional people and those who live in the cities,” the Nationals MP for Hinkler said. “Strong Coalition partnership has always been in the best interests of the country, and now and again we disagree on policy.”

Tim Wilson, the Liberal member for the affluent electorate of Goldstein in Melbourne, backed Mr Morrison for rejecting the proposal for a new clean coal plant. The Australian has been told Jason Falinksi, Jane Hume and Julian Leeser have also voiced their concerns about the coal proposal.

SOURCE 





        
Voucher money for better schools and hospitals

David Leyonhjelm, lead candidate for the Liberal Democrats, today called for the introduction of vouchers so all Australians have the option of choosing private schools and hospitals.

“Despite the efforts of many dedicated staff, our public schools and hospitals often underperform compared to their private counterparts,” he said. “This is unacceptable for those Australians who cannot afford private schools and hospitals.

“The Liberal Democrats would introduce a means-tested schooling voucher, at a cost of $33 billion nationwide, so low-income parents and parents of children with a disability can afford better schooling than currently available to them.

“Parents who are happy with their local public school would continue to be able to send their kids there.  But parents who feel their kids would be better off in a non-government school would be able to afford to send their kids there, and the voucher would follow them.

“The Liberal Democrats would also introduce a means-tested medical expenses and insurance voucher, at a cost of $48 billion nationwide, so low income and chronically ill Australians can afford better healthcare and insurance than currently available to them.

“Australians who are happy with their local public hospital would continue to be able to rely on it.  But those suffering long waiting times or poor service could afford a different hospital.

The Liberal Democrats’ voucher plan is part of a fully-costed plan for the Commonwealth and the States to each deliver budget surpluses, tax cuts and cuts to government spending.  This includes massive cuts to education and health bureaucracies and the introduction of user charging at public schools and hospitals.

“With vouchers for low income Australians, and with across-the-board tax cuts, every Australian would benefit from more choice.  The option to go elsewhere would mean public schools and hospitals would be encouraged to improve their performance.  The only losers would be the thousands of back-office bureaucrats who would be out of a job.”

Media release.  More from Kate.Fantinel@aph.gov.au

 Posted by John J. Ray (M.A.; Ph.D.).    For a daily critique of Leftist activities,  see DISSECTING LEFTISM.  To keep up with attacks on free speech see Tongue Tied. Also, don't forget your daily roundup  of pro-environment but anti-Greenie  news and commentary at GREENIE WATCH .  Email me  here

Another "heatwave" in Australia

The BoM are always trying to pretend that global warming is here.  They are not brazen enough these days to say exactly that but constant talk of heatwaves creates that impression. The weather they refer to is in fact fairly normal -- as they admit further down in the story.

A Brisbane summer extends into March and a normal mid-afternoon summer temperature in Brisbane is 34C.  At mid-afternoon on Monday 11th  the temperature was 32C.  The BoM forecast was 36C.  So the "heatwave" impression is entirely false



Look at the graphic they supply as part of their report.  With all the red ink it looks rather terrifying but all it shows is a normal weather pattern.  Western Australia and Western Queensland (the purple bits) are always extraordinarily hot. The graph is a good example of how you can be truthful but deceptive


Parts of the east coast are set to swelter through extreme temperatures this week due to a post-summer heatwave.

The mercury will hit 36C in Brisbane's CBD on Monday and 39C in the western suburb of Ipswich - around 10C above average for this time of year.

The March record stands at 37.9C degrees for Brisbane and 38C for Ipswich.

The forecast has prompted the Bureau of Meteorology to issue a severe heatwave warning for south Queensland.

Meanwhile, Sydney will reach 28C on Monday and top 34 degrees on Tuesday - before three days of showers bringing 10mm of rain.

Perth will also be hot, reaching 30C on Monday, the same temperature as Canberra.

The south coast will be cooler, with Melbourne and Adelaide peaking at 23C while Hobart will reach 22C.   

Brisbane will on Tuesday cool down slightly but still reach 33C and temperatures will remain in the 30s until at least next Saturday.

Further west, the Darling Downs and Lockyer Valley regions will swelter through the high 30s.

'A trough off the south-eastern Queensland coast has been quite persistent in its location, so the northerly winds will bring warm air to the region over the next few days,' Bureau of Meteorology forecaster Michael Gray told Daily Mail Australia.

Mr Gray said the warm weather isn't unusual for this time of the year in south-east Queensland. 'It's only been a few weeks since summer has ended,' he told Daily Mail Australia.

'Stay inside  in the air conditioning, keep water bottles full and don't go outside in the hottest part of the day between 10am and 3pm,' he said.

SOURCE  






Covert brainwashing of our kids is taking its toll

What are our kids actually being taught? It’s almost impossible to know because students won’t usually tell and their teachers will normally reveal only what they think we want to hear.

If the stats are to be believed, Australia is falling down the international league tables of school performance, despite ever higher levels of government funding. And while a couple of our universities figure in the top 50 rankings, there seem to be more and more students doing variants of lifestyle studies and fewer and fewer doing the hard disciplines.

The book "Reclaiming Education: Renewing Schools and Universities in Contemporary Western Culture" doesn’t exactly contain scarifying tales from the chalkface because its contributors’ concerns are about other teachers’ classrooms, as their own would be models of old-fashioned academic rigour. But while what really takes place across the nation’s schoolrooms and lecture theatres will remain largely hidden (at least until all classes and lectures are freely posted on the web), the authors draw back enough of the curtain to justify real concern about ideological force-feeding at every level.

All credit to editors Catherine Runcie and David Brooks for assembling a range of high-quality contributors and contributions. It’s a timely volume because, if education is tending to degenerate into postmodernist brainwashing, as these authors largely suggest, it’s our material wellbeing that’s at risk, as well as our cultural and spiritual wellbeing.

In their own way, all these contributors testify to the long march of the Left through the institutions, a kind of soft Marxist version of the old Jesuit maxim: “Give me the child for the first seven years and I’ll give you the man.” Our youngsters may well be emerging from educational institutions confident, articulate and affirmed in themselves (unless, of course, they betray signs of “toxic masculinity”), but what have they actually learned except that the traditional belief systems of the West should no longer be taken seriously?

You wonder why the traditional notion of marriage received so little public support in the 2017 vote; why hitherto taken-for-granted understandings of gender have suddenly become so fluid; and why even the hallowed idea of free speech now has to accommodate all sorts of politically correct “safe spaces”. This book helps you to understand. It’s because our kids are being deprogrammed by the teachers and by the curriculums that are supposed to impart the best that’s been thought and said.

All of these essays are challenging, and some are gems. One of the best is by David Daintree, who until 2012 was president of Campion College. “Far too many children,” he says, “leave school never having learned to read, write and think straight, before going on to university to become criminologists, sports psychologists — or teachers! The introduction of continuous assessment from the 70s onwards to take the stress out of exams and, as student numbers soared, to make it easier for the less intelligent to get degrees (that of course was never admitted to be the reason) has contributed greatly to the gravity of the situation. Education can now be chopped up into even smaller units or modules for ease of digestion and subsequent oblivion.” As Daintree points out, until a couple of centuries ago, knowledge needed to be collected. Due to the explosion of publishing, it now needs to be culled, so the challenge is knowing what to keep. His plea is for the continued general study of the works that have shaped the Western mind.

Another fine contribution is from Karl Schmude, the former long-serving librarian at the University of New England. Schmude points out the importance of a common educational tradition as the foundation for the moral and intellectual values that are required for a culture to endure. Like Daintree, he’s scathing of the modern tendency to premature specialisation, which not only produces narrow and unimaginative “experts” but makes any general public conversation hard to maintain.

“The concentration on vocational knowledge,” he says, “does not fully equip students for the experience of life. It does not supply a cultural breadth and depth, nor does it nurture the intellectual flexibility needed in the workplace and beyond, in the way that an educational grounding in the liberal arts can do. A professional degree has no time or capacity to deal with the ultimate realities that affect human beings — love and beauty, adventure, struggle, suffering and death — which inspire or haunt their lives. It focuses on the ‘how’ questions … rather than the ‘why’ questions”, which, of course, are the ones that matter most. “The person who knows ‘how’,” he points out, “will always have a job (but) the person who knows ‘why’ will always be his boss”.

Another contributor, David Furse-Roberts (disclosure: he’s helping to edit a collection of my speeches), cites Sir Robert Menzies’ affirmation that “history and literature must enter into any education; for they are the chief record of man and his ways”. Sir Winston Churchill, likewise, thought that a knowledge of history was essential because “in history lie all the secrets of statecraft”. Yet the study of literature has all too often become the treatment of “identity”; while history is invariably episodic rather than narrative and similarly suffused with identity studies.

What can be done? Politicians don’t get to appoint university and school heads, let alone academics and teachers, or to set curriculums. Our education system is more a reflection of our society than a product of political decision making. All that elected leaders can do is speak up for common sense at every opportunity and be ready for the inevitable push-back from the academic establishments that have let it go.

Recently, some Liberal students asked me what might they do to armour themselves against their left-wing lecturers. My response: familiarise yourselves with the bigger story of which we Australians are but part. And a good place to begin is to read and regularly re-read the New Testament (it’s our core document) and to read cover to cover Churchill’s History of the English-Speaking Peoples,because you can’t understand us without knowing that.

SOURCE  






The #MeToo movement’s demand for instant belief is a threat to the ideals of justice

One of they key slogans of the #MeToo movement has been ‘believe women’. It is a challenge to the traditional ideals of justice. It effectively says, ‘You must believe all allegations, even those that are untested and unproven’. The dangers of this mantra were highlighted during a recent court case in Canberra.

In 2014, a former prison guard found himself the target of a false rape allegation. Sarah-Jane Parkinson had been in a relationship with the man she accused of rape for two years. She was engaged to him. She then broke it off and proceeded to stage a violent rape scene, fabricating evidence and accusing her former fiancé of raping her in her home.

The accused was arrested. He spent four months on remand at Goulburn Correctional Centre, a maximum-security prison. He lost his job, his financial security and his reputation. As a former prison officer he was at daily risk of assault while he was incarcerated. Parkinson’s lies were eventually exposed and she was charged with making a false rape allegation. She’s now serving three years in jail.

This isn’t the only questionable case that has played out in the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) recently. There have been trials of Australian Defence Force cadets, in 2017 and 2018, that have raised serious questions about how rape allegations are handled. Again, two men had their lives, careers and futures put on the line, only to be acquitted later on. The acquittals made the #MeToo crowd angry. They seem to believe that every allegation of sexual assault should be taken as true.

The ACT police and courts have had serious questions to answer in relation to these cases. Yet politicians seem keen to keep on watering down the legal definition of sexual consent, which means that more men could find themselves falsely accused of serious crimes.

Consider Caroline Le Couteur, the Greens’ member of the legislative assembly in the ACT. Le Couteur is a vocal advocate of reforming the criminal law around consent. Her proposal, made to the ACT assembly, is for a ‘more affirmative definition of consent’, in order to ‘shift the focus from no means no to yes means yes’. Sexual encounters would require ‘enthusiastic consent’. In short, it wouldn’t be enough for men to say that the woman they slept with did not say ‘no’ and actually consented – they would have to show that she consented enthusiastically. How many sexual encounters could be swept up in this new definition of sexual crime?

The ACT’s director of public prosecutions dismissed Le Couteur’s proposal. It was a very welcome dismissal, because the proposal, if enacted, would effectively have institutionalised ‘believe women’ into law. Undeterred, Le Couteur continues her crusade to bring the patriarchy to heel, as she sees it.

Not content with using social media and public forums to trash men’s reputations, now some supporters of #MeToo want to bend the law itself to the insistence that we believe all women who make accusations. We have to resist this. The right to a fair trial must be defended.

SOURCE  






Australians claiming to be Aboriginal will be forced to undergo DNA testing to prove it under a One Nation proposal to crack down on welfare fraud

One Nation's New South Wales leader Mark Latham has taken aim at people who identify as indigenous, when they are not of Aboriginal heritage. 'Everybody hates a welfare rorter, especially in Aboriginal affairs,' he said.

'Australians are sick and tired of seeing people with blonde hair and blue eyes declaring themselves to be indigenous, when clearly they have no recognisable Aboriginal background and are doing it solely to qualify for extra money.'

In Australia, people can identify as indigenous to be given special treatment when applying for jobs in the public service or the ABC, as part of an affirmative action policy designed to promote one minority group.

They also qualify for special benefits, including Abstudy to fund university study or an apprenticeship, and can join an Aboriginal land council.

Mr Latham has proposed a law which would require Aboriginality to be determined by a DNA test showing someone has at least one full-blood Aboriginal grandparent, ending a system where Australians can self-identify as indigenous.

'The system of indigenous self-identification, declaring Aboriginality without any bloodline or DNA proof, has been open to widespread abuse,' he said. 'It is being used as a fraudulent way of cashing in on welfare benefits, special Aboriginal programs and land council largesse.'

Mr Latham said genuine indigenous people continue to live in poverty. 'Any waste of taxpayer funds in this area is highly disrespectful to genuine indigenous,' he said. 'It weakens the integrity of their racial group and takes money away from people in genuine need.

'We believe in an honest and fair welfare system. 'First Australians deserve the respect of stopping rorters and opportunists from masquerading as indigenous.'

While indigenous recognition is largely a federal issue, the NSW public service has an Aboriginal employment strategy and administers indigenous land councils.

As federal Labor leader in 2004, Mr Latham backed then Prime Minister John Howard's dismantling of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission.

Almost 15 years later, as One Nation's leader upper house candidate in the NSW election, he has savaged his former party for failing to tackle fraudulent claims of being Aboriginal. 'It's surprising that Labor and The Greens, who pretend to respect Aboriginality, have not introduced this policy already,' Mr Latham said.

Indigenous people were not counted in the Census or even regarded as citizens with voting rights until a 1967 referendum passed with 90.77 per cent support. A few years later during the early 1970s, Gough Whitlam's Labor government introduced a policy of indigenous self-determination.

Indigenous land rights activist Noel Pearson has criticised the prevailing system of 'passive welfare' which originated under Mr Whitlam, who Mr Latham worked for as a former prime minister during the 1980s.

SOURCE  

 Posted by John J. Ray (M.A.; Ph.D.).    For a daily critique of Leftist activities,  see DISSECTING LEFTISM.  To keep up with attacks on free speech see Tongue Tied. Also, don't forget your daily roundup  of pro-environment but anti-Greenie  news and commentary at GREENIE WATCH .  Email me  here

Tony Abbott backflips on Paris climate agreement stance

He has lost my respect over this

Tony Abbott has made an epic turnaround on a climate change agreement that has left his colleagues shaking their heads. Mr Abbott has abruptly announced: We will always have Paris.

That’s a reference to the 2015 UN sponsored agreement by more than 100 nations to reduce carbon emissions to 26-28 per cent by 2030.

It was the emissions target he approved as Prime Minister but then fought bitterly against during the prime ministership of Malcolm Turnbull. But suddenly it is acceptable again.

This will be interpreted only one way: The member for Warringah has made the latest Abbott-backtrack after chatting to locals and gathering they were a carbon molecule away from ditching him after 25 years.

It was a stark and telling example of how rupturing electoral support might alter your whole approach to climate change. Mr Abbott is living up to his self-applied description as a climate change weathervane — he goes with the electoral breezes.

Although, Mr Abbott would disagree. On Friday he attempted to make the argument that other factors had changed and that he alone had been consistent. Some will struggle with the case he makes.

“I think the Government has lost its emissions obsession now that Angus Taylor is the energy minister. So I don’t think (opposition to the Paris target) is now necessary but I certainly think it’s important we get more baseload power into the system as quickly as possible,” he said on Sky News. “I’m not calling for us to pull out [of Paris] … We’ve got a new Prime Minister and a new energy minister. “We had an emissions obsession that needed to be broken, and it has now changed.”

Some might translate this as: “Malcolm Turnbull isn’t Prime Minister any more.”

The Abbott army spear carriers were so quick in following the leader there must be some serious bouts of political whiplash.

This was Liberal back bencher Craig Kelly back in August when the party factional drums were beating about Turnbull’s leadership.

“I’m not the prime minister, but I think we should pull out of Paris,” Mr Kelly, who had to be rescued by Scott Morrison from Liberals in his seat of Hughes who didn’t want him as candidate, told 2GB. “I think it’s damaging to the economy and I think it achieves nothing. There’s no environmental advantage of it.”

But on Friday, Mr Kelly — who once with careful use of redundancy condemned “moronic climate stupidity” — suddenly found cause for a truce on emissions. And with admirable frankness, he said he was changing his mind because an election was approaching.

Whatever principle had been involved in his original anti-Paris position apparently had been relegated. “I support the policies that the Liberal Party has taken to this election,” he told reporters. “I have an obligation as a member of the Liberal Party to get behind and support the policies we are taking to this election.”

The persistent bickering over the Paris targets was damaging to the Government, and not just because it might be seen as a reactionary attack on the task of lowering carbon emissions.

Prime Minister Morrison and Energy Minister Taylor still insist — contentiously — the 26-38 per cent emission reduction targets for 2030 will be me “in a canter” on existing settings, so what’s the problem?

Further, the Government wants to concentrate on sounding the alarm over Labor’s propose 50 per cent reduction and the harm it says this would cause industry. The internal Paris brawl would distract from that political debate and weaken Government authority on the issue.

There also is the broader matter of internal instability and complaints from business and industry there is little energy policy certainty.

But what emerges is the sense the dust-up over the Paris D mission targets was more about leadership than policy.

Malcolm Turnbull noted this in a tweet today quoting a 1919 poem by WB Yeats, The Second Coming. He certainly was not referring to himself returning but perhaps saw something of Liberal Party internal warfare in the poem’s final lines: “The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity.”

SOURCE  






Julian Burnside has tough ask to win over Greens faithful

Greens readily put out their hands for billionaire money but having a rich establishment lawyer actually represent them in parliament might not be the desired image

The federal seat of Kooyong in Melbourne’s eastern suburbs is the bluest of blue-ribbon seats. It has existed since Federation and is one of only two original electorates in Victoria never to have been held by the Labor Party. Seven representatives have served there, all white males who were on average 43 years old when first elected to the seat.

To the Greens, the seat symbolises everything the party supposedly despises — a white patriarchal gerontocracy, the accumulation of wealth to the detriment of the masses, and the absence of diversity. The last thing you would expect of a party that thrives on identity politics would be to nominate an affluent, ageing, white Anglo-Saxon male. But that is exactly what it did this week when it announced Julian Burnside AO QC as its candidate. That’s right, a man who turns 70 this year and was born when Ben Chifley was Prime Minister and the White Australia Policy still operated. Who came second in preselection, Sam Newman?

Burnside is a long-time resident of Hawthorn, where the median house price is around $2.3 million. The suburb features grand mansions, old money, and Scotch College, one of the most prestigious and wealthiest private schools in the country. He was born into privilege, the son of a prominent Melbourne surgeon, and educated at Melbourne Grammar. As a barrister, he grew rich from representing wealthy clients such as corporate fraudster Alan Bond.

But according to the Greens’ website, the party speaks “on behalf of those who wouldn’t otherwise get much of a say inside parliament: children, refugees, students, individuals and families living in poverty…” Honestly, it is almost as if the party’s constituency was not society’s marginalised, but instead those insufferable types who publicly wail for the wretched in the hope it shifts attention from their bourgeois lifestyle.

Perhaps Burnside, in order to counter the perception he is just another pious toff, will highlight that, if elected, he would be foregoing the millions he earns as a barrister for the relatively paltry parliamentary base salary of $207,100. All very well, but he still carries elitist baggage. Commenting in 2007 on judicial appointments in Victoria, he said one of the problems in attracting suitable candidates was that the “pay is not great”. To put that in perspective, a lowly magistrate in Victoria has a base salary of $317,930, while a Supreme Court judge is paid $458,840 a year. If that is an example of what constitutes hardship, Burnside has much work to do if he is to give the appearance of empathising with the great unwashed.

Having long professed no interest in entering politics, he was asked this week on Sky News to explain his turnaround.

“Because,” he began theatrically, gazing upwards as if expecting celestial endorsement, “the situation is desperate”. Climate change is Burnside’s burning issue. “I think if we are worried about our children and our grandchildren, let’s save the planet for them,” he added, sounding very much like the environmental messiah. You could be excused for thinking ‘QC’ stands for quixotic clichés.

Given Hawthorn’s elevation is around 42 metres above sea level and not about to be flooded soon, I’m not sure Burnside is making the right pitch to his would-be constituents. Perhaps he would be better off stressing their coastal weekenders are threatened, or at least they will be in 100 or so years if the alarmists’ predictions are correct.

For the party he now represents, belief in man-made climate change is not so much an affirmation of science as it is an article of faith, and Burnside’s pronouncements on that subject have not always accorded. For example, in 2011, he stated: “I’m prepared to say that I accept as fairly accurate the science of global warming. But I’m prepared to start from the assumption that the science may be wrong. We don’t know.”

Only fairly accurate? Operate from the premise that the science may be wrong? This leaves him open to charges of denialism, and even if he recants the anti-rightists of the party will closely examine his historical utterances for signs of deviationism.

However, there is one tenet of Greens ideology in which Burnside has always maintained the faith, and that is the party’s ludicrous open borders policy in respect to asylum-seekers.

“The idea that we’re going to be flooded with boat people is one of the boogies that ... [shadow immigration minister] Scott Morrison tries to bring out, but it’s never happened in the past,” Burnside told ABC in 2011.

“Now I don’t see any reason why it will happen in the future. It’s a dangerous voyage.” This was both naïve and obtuse. Less than a year before in one incident alone, 48 asylum-seekers died in the Christmas Island boat tragedy.

In July 2010 — two years after the Howard government’s Pacific Solution had been dismantled, resulting in the arrival of nearly 200 illegal boats — Burnside denied there was a problem. “It is absurd to suggest that we have ‘lost control’ of our borders,” he wrote in the Sydney Morning Herald. “Our borders are close to watertight”. In the years following Burnside’s assurance, the flow of illegal boats would turn into a flood, resulting in the unauthorised arrivals of 800 vessels, 50,000 asylum-seekers, and the deaths of around 1200 people.

Just as Burnside cannot acknowledge the Pacific Solution was an effective deterrent to the people-smuggling trade, neither can he admit the Coalition’s success with Operation Sovereign Borders. His ‘nothing to see here’ tactic during the chaotic period when people smuggling resumed between 2008-13 later shifted to maintaining the problem can be easily managed.

In 2013, pressed by Sky News host and Associate Editor of The Australian Chris Kenny, he claimed that Australia could cope with 50,000 boat people per year.

Later that year he proposed the entire state of Tasmania should be an open detention centre for asylum-seekers while their claims were processed. And this is the man who, if elected, will likely hold the party’s immigration portfolio.

As one who carefully cultivates a goody two shoes image, Burnside argued in 2009 that politicians who mislead or deceive the public in their official capacities should be subject to sanctions, including imprisonment. Presumably he would say that he himself maintains these high standards. With that in mind, let’s examine his reaction to the shrill and uncorroborated reports by the ABC in January 2014 that members of the Navy had beaten asylum-seekers and inflicted severe burns by forcing them to hold on to engine pipes.

These reports were false. Host Paul Barry of ABC’s Media Watch said the organisation’s news service had “over-reached by essentially endorsing the allegations of Navy mistreatment on radio, TV and online throughout the day”. A mealy-mouthed media release from the ABC later conceded “the initial reporting needed to be more precise”.

So how did Burnside react? “Notice that reports of navy abuse of refugees came just after govt said military personnel would not be personally liable for misconduct,” he tweeted.

This was a vile and slanderous insinuation against the Navy made even worse by the fact that it came days after the ABC’s mea culpa. That tweet remains online. And just this week he tweeted his prediction that Prime Minister Scott Morrison would “send a whisper to the Navy to let a couple of asylum seeker boats through before the election”.

"Prediction:#Scomo will send a whisper to the Navy to let a couple of asylum seeker boats through before the election. Then he will try to terrify the nation that we are under attack. Could he be that dishonest?"

Who was the pompous windbag decrying those who mislead and deceive the public?

In deciding to enter the political race, Burnside may have taken too much comfort from the fawning receptions given by Melbourne’s bien-pensants. Outside the bubble his patience is tested when ill-bred and impertinent types question the wisdom of St Julian.

Last August, during a question and answer session for high school students, he told Simon Breheny of the Institute of Public Affairs to “’shove your freedom of speech up your arse, and f**k off”.

Last year I wrote of his nasty disposition when attacking Coalition members, including his comparing them with Nazis and retweeting an image of Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton’s face superimposed on the uniform of a German SS officer. Yet Burnside constantly tweets homilies about the importance of good manners.

Get used to the intense scrutiny that campaigning entails, Mr Burnside. You might want to reflect on the words of the great Benjamin Franklin when he observed “A learned blockhead is a greater blockhead than an ignorant one”.

SOURCE  






Taxpayers fork out $300,000 to fly an asylum seeker from Nauru to Taiwan by PRIVATE JET to remove kidney stones - and he spent a week going to the zoo and dining at top restaurants

An asylum seeker on Nauru was sent to Taiwan to have kidney stones removed last year on a private jet - costing the Australian taxpayer $300,000. Nisar Haji stayed for three months on the island for the operation - and was flown there and back on a privately chartered Gulfstream plane.

The Indian refugee's Facebook account shows him relaxing on board the luxurious aircraft on both legs of his trip. 

On the return flight, he could be seen enjoying full access to the jet's mini-bar.

At the end of Mr Haji's time in Taiwan, he enjoyed holiday-like adventures around some of the island's top sights, according to The Courier Mail.

He was pictured at a famous rock formation in Yeh Liu Geo Park near the capital Taipei and at a zoo, and was seen taking in other tourist attractions.

The hospital where Mr Haji was put up for his surgery costs between $300-$400 a day, according to its International Priority Care Centre's rates.

His situation is not a one-off, with other refugees taken overseas for medical treatment instead of to the Australian mainland.

It is understood the man is still on Nauru and does not want to go back to India.

A Home Affairs spokesperson said they would not comment on an individual case.

The revelations come less than a month after Labor's medevac bill passed through parliament, allowing asylum seekers on Nauru and Manus Island to be medically evacuated to the Australian mainland on the advice of two doctors.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison revealed those asylum seekers needing medical treatment but who were deemed a threat to Australia would be sent to Christmas Island rather than the mainland.

That category is believed to apply to a group that includes 57 men, of which some have allegedly been charged with murder, inappropriate behaviour or terrorist activity.

SOURCE  






Identity obsession makes its way from the campus into mainstream politics

Since the turn of the century, universities in the Anglo-American world have been riddled with the bitter controversies that surround the weaponisation of identity.

Identity politics has become institutionalised to the point that some universities have acquiesced to the demand for racially segregated dormitories. Higher education ­institutes have adopted censorious language codes, supposedly to protect the sensibilities of ethnic minorities and gender and sexual minorities. Students have been warned not to wear clothes that might offend ethnic groups. Never-ending accusations of “cultural appropriation” almost always lead to a humiliating apology by the accused.

Until recently, the controversies and conflicts that surround the ­politicisation of identities tended to be confined to university campuses. But now identity politics has gone totally mainstream. In the US, the battle lines between different factions in congress are often drawn according to the dictates of rival identity activists. It seems every identity group has its own congressional caucus. What ­divides them is not ideology or political principle but the aim to gain influence for one’s identity group.

Identity activists jealously guard their patch. That they are unwilling to share their territory was discovered by Elizabeth Warren, a leading contender for the Democratic Party’s presidential candidacy. Warren took the decision to ­enhance her identity ­appeal by claiming to be part Cherokee in the belief her association with a Native American identity would prove to be a vital political asset and widen her support among Democrats. To demonstrate this, she published a DNA test that suggested she may have had some genetic links with the Cherokee nation.

Unfortunately for Warren, the very public announcement of the results of her DNA test provoked an immediate backlash from ­Native Americans who were not prepared to accept this white woman as one of their own. Chuck Hoskin, the secretary of state of the Cherokee Nation, reminded Warren that it is the tribal authorities, and not a DNA test, that ­decide who can claim to be part of that nation. He denounced the carpetbaggers who seek to hijack Cherokee identity for their own benefit.

He wrote that every day “people make claims of native heritage and Cherokee ancestry across the country” and added that these claims, “made for personal advancements by profiteers, are like a guest at my table saying they’ve had a seat there all along”. Predictably, Warren had no choice but to issue a grovelling apology for her shortsighted behaviour.

Hoskins’ response to Warren illustrates the absence of the generosity of the human spirit that characterises identity politics. Its petty and possessive impulse was clearly articulated last October by Jacqueline Maley in The Sydney Morning Herald. In her column, she took exception to the behaviour of NSW Corrections Minister David Elliott for using parliamentary privilege to make allegations of sexual harassment against then opposition leader Luke Foley.

What angered her was not so much the misuse of parliamentary privilege but that a man took it upon himself to raise an allegation of sexual harassment against a woman.

Pointing her finger at men who “cloak themselves in care for women while throwing them under the bus”, she declared that “they take on the mantle of the #MeToo movement while missing its main point: women get to tell their own stories. No one else.” ­

Apparently, women own a patent on their stories and no one else can have a piece of the action.

Possessiveness of an identity is paralleled by a disposition ­towards cultural tribalism. One feature of identity politics that is often overlooked is that not all identities ­depicted are worthy of celebration. In the US, the identity of white men, especially older heterosexual ones, is regarded with disdain. According to the prevailing ideology of identity politics, a white man must defer to the sensibilities of other identity groups and “watch their privilege”. From this perspective, men may be seen but should not be heard.

In more ­recent times, Asian-Americans and white females have lost some of the prestige attached to their identity status. Jewish identity is just about acceptable as long as those who embody it distance themselves from any form of support for Israel. Australian iden­tity has also lost out in the identity stakes. From the standpoint of identity advocates, the role assigned to Australians is to apologise and continue to apologise for the misdeeds of their ancestors centuries ago.

For the moment trans identity enjoys top spot in the identity stakes. It has even succeeded in silencing those feminists who have questioned or criticised gender self-identification.

That identity politics has gone mainstream is vividly demonstrated by the speed with which all the main British parliamentary party leaders, from the Conservatives to the Greens, have united to silence critics of gender self-identification. Women officials, activists and party members have been investigated, denounced and, in some ­instances, expelled for their supposed bigotry. Leading parliamentarians have adopted the intol­erant language of campus culture warriors. A prominent member of the Liberal Democratic hierarchy, Lynne Featherstone, condemned critics of gender self-identification and warned: “You are not feminists. Your views are not welcome in the Liberal Democrats.”

One of the most corrosive ­dimensions of identity politics is its insistence that the personal is political. Identitarians contend that since what matters is identity, people’s personal and private behaviour is of political import, no less than their actions in public life. From this standpoint, people’s private behaviour is a legitimate target of public scrutiny and of political criticism.

Savvy politicians understand that a culturally sensitive or “inappropriate” remark or act of misbehaviour, even in their youth, will come back to bite them. Take the case of Tulsi Gabbard. She is a Democratic Party member of congress from Hawaii who is a potential candidate in the coming presidential elections. An Iraq War veteran, she made history in 2012 when she became the first Hindu elected to congress. A powerful communicator, she seemed to tick all the right identity boxes — except that her past ­became weaponised. She has had to apologise for working with her father in his anti-gay rights organisation when she was a teenager.

Identity activists are not prepared to excuse youthful misbehaviour. On the contrary, they regard the sins of youth as a rightful target of political condemnation. Ralph Nor­tham, the Democratic Governor of Virginia, should have known what to ­expect. He is fighting calls for his resignation after a photo of him sporting blackface at a college party went viral.

A person’s entire life can be turned upside down when the personal becomes political. The mere allegation of personal impropriety can have devastating consequences for the individual concerned. Carl Sargeant, a former Welsh communities secretary, committed suicide after he was suspended from the Labour Party following allegations of improper personal conduct. Acting on the assumption that there is no smoke without fire, an allegation of personal ­impropriety unleashed a chain of events that ended in a tragedy.

Far too many politicians are prepared to embrace and legitimise the politics of identity. Some actually believe that there is something positive about the politicisation of identity. Unfortunately, they confuse the positive struggles for equality by feminists and civil rights activists in the past with the narrow-minded practices of contemporary identity politics.

Identity activists constantly claim to be fighting for justice but they seem to devote most of their energy towards gaining cultural authority. Whereas previously activists campaigned against ­racism, today they are in the business of discrediting and marginalising what they call “whiteness”.

Just being white or the display of “white attitudes” is condemned as a secular equivalent of original sin. In a similar way, women’s inequality, which used to be the target of feminist activists, is frequently displaced by a campaign against masculinity.

Regrettably, mainstream political life has proved a fertile terrain for the flourishing of identity politics. No doubt there are many sensible political figures who are disturbed by this development. However, they have opted to keep their opinions to themselves in the hope it will all go away. It will not. Unless the politicisation of identity is actively challenged, prepare for a perpetual war of identities.

SOURCE  

 Posted by John J. Ray (M.A.; Ph.D.).    For a daily critique of Leftist activities,  see DISSECTING LEFTISM.  To keep up with attacks on free speech see Tongue Tied. Also, don't forget your daily roundup  of pro-environment but anti-Greenie  news and commentary at GREENIE WATCH .  Email me  here

Horror! PM rejects affirmative action for women

He thinks women can advance without holding men back. It doesn't show much confidence in women to deny that.  But the Left who are always up in arms against discrimination encourage  discrimination against men

Mr Morrison said while he supported women's empowerment, he didn't believe men should have to make way for their female counterparts to succeed.

'We want to see women rise. But we don't want to see women rise only on the basis of others doing worse,' Mr Morrison said.

The PM also said Australians shouldn't be setting people against each other so they lift some people up to feel empowered, while pushing others down.

Shortly after making the unusual remark, the PM took to social media to share a follow-up message for International Women's Day.

'Today is about appreciating all the women in our lives and our nation - celebrating their value and achievements,' Mr Morrison wrote on Twitter.

Despite his inspirational Tweet, the PM's speech still made headlines across the globe, with many media outlets taking to social media to share their thoughts.

American news network CNN was one of the first outlets to slam the PM for his so-called female empowering comments.

'Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison has provoked outrage on International Women's Day by saying that men should not have to make way for women's empowerment,' the media outlet Tweeted.

Several politicians, journalists and media personalities also took to social media to take a swipe at Mr Morrision's controversial speech.

Earlier on in the week, Mr Morrison addressed the subject of getting more women into parliament, saying his party was 'just getting on with it,' news.com.au reported.

Former Liberal deputy leader Julie Bishop also stated at a separate International Women's Day event there had been renewed effort to get more women elected. 'Unless there is a pool of talented women to choose from, women don't put themselves forward in the same way as men,' she said

SOURCE  






Right-wing firebrand Milo Yiannopoulos is set to be granted an Australian visa with the Immigration Minister about to rule there's no reason he can't come here

Right-wing poster boy Milo Yiannopoulos is set to be granted an Australian visa with the Immigration Minister saying there's no reason he should be banned.

Minister David Coleman is understood to not be convinced by the Department of Home Affairs' reasons for denying Yiannopoulos a visa, The Australian reported.

Some fear his controversial views would spark violent protests during his planned speaking tour across five Australian cities.

The Department of Home Affairs warned the 33-year-old it was likely to deny him entry following riots during his 2017 Australian tour and an unpaid $50,000 bill issued by Victoria police.

The claim Yiannopoulos is about to be granted a visa comes after weeks of pressure from conservative MPs such as One Nation's Pauline Hanson.

The conservative provocateur's supporters clashed with protesters who chanted 'f*** off Nazi', which led to seven arrests during his 2017 Sydney tour.

His Melbourne leg of the tour was even more violent, with police forced to use sticks to keep the demonstrators at bay.

The 33-year-old had initially organised a 'Deplorables' speaking tour with convicted criminal Tommy Robinson and self-described 'western chauvinist' Gavin McInnes in December.

The tour was rescheduled to February 2019 but was cancelled for the second time because visa applications were still being considered by government authorities.

Yiannopoulos intends to tour before the expected May federal election, although there isn't a clear date when he will arrive

Victorian MP and former human rights commissioner Tim Wilson said Yiannopoulos was 'self-absorbed' and was an 'attention-seeker'.

'But free speech is for everyone, hence I was surprised by the news and have raised it with the minister,' he said.

Pauline Hanson said she had contacted Mr Coleman through numerous letters, texts and phone calls – urging the government to grant Yiannopoulos a visiting visa in the past few weeks.

Yiannopoulos is known for his commentaries mocking left-wing political correctness and feminists.

SOURCE  






Rebel Nationals ignite energy war over ‘big stick’ laws, power prices

Six Queensland Nationals MPs have reignited the Coalition’s civil war on energy policy, demanding that Scott Morrison put his shelved “big stick” laws to a vote in budget week and fast-track a decis­ion on the underwriting of a new cleaner coal plant.

The energy rebels have signed a letter to Deputy Prime Minister Michael McCormack, challenging his authority with written demands calling for “immediate” ­action to address “unsustainable Queensland electricity costs”, after he failed to avert the deferral of the legislation to bring energy companies to heel.

In the letter, obtained by The Australian, the MPs called on the “Coalition executive” to revive the legislation that would allow the government to seek orders divesting an energy company of its power generation assets.

The MPs have also called on the government to underwrite a new power generation project in regional Queensland before the May election is called, raising the stakes in the push by conser­vatives for contracts to be signed backing a new cleaner coal plant.

The letter does not identify a preferred power generation source but Queensland Nationals said yesterday they would support “whatever is the cheapest option”, although some indicated their first preference would be for a cleaner coal plant.

The six Nationals who signed the letter include frontbencher Michelle Landry — an outspoken advocate for a new cleaner coal plant — as well as Keith Pitt, Llew O’Brien, George Christensen, Ken O’Dowd and outgoing senat­or Barry O’Sullivan.

“We the undersigned call on the Coalition executive to take immediate action to legislate the big stick bill in the next parliamentary sitting and to underwrite new gener­ating capacity (power station­) construction for regional Queensland,” the letter said. It warned that voters in the MPs’ regional Queensland seats were at their “wit’s end”.

“Since our government’s election in 2013, our constituents have consistently raised with us the cost of energy in our electorate and our state,’’ the letter said.

“The combination of drought, other natural disasters and a recalcitrant Labor state government has our local industries, small businesses and everyday consumers at their wit’s end. They simply cannot continue to pay such exorbitant energy costs.”

Regional Queensland will be a key battleground in the federal election campaign, with the ­Coalition defending a string of marginal seats and hoping to wrest the Townsville-based seat of Herbert from Labor.

The MPs said the cost of electricity in regional Queensland was governed by the Labor state government, which “owns the only retailer, all of the poles and wires and 70 per cent of the generation ­capacity. Without divestiture powers, in our view, no action can be taken which would cause Queensland Labor to reduce power prices”.

The letter follows the announcement by Scott Morrison of a $2 billion top-up for Tony ­Abbott’s direct­ action fund to tackle climate change, and a further $1.4bn equity injection in the Snowy 2.0 pumped hydro project.

The government has also announced $86 million towards a new Tasmanian hydro power project, Battery of the Nation, and a new Bass Strait transmission link.

The letter, copied in to Energy Minister Angus Taylor, was sent after Nationals were denied a party­room meeting last month to discuss deferral of the “big stick” laws aimed at cracking down on energy market misconduct.

The proposed divestiture shake-up — opposed by Labor and big business and initially attacked by energy companies as unconstitutional — is seen as a major initiative of the minor Coalition partner, with some Nationals ­arguing for a broader divestment power to be enshrined in law to capture supermarkets and banks.

The government deferred the legislation last month after the Greens threatened to move an amendment that would prevent public money being used to underwrite coal-fired power stations.

Mr Pitt and Mr O’Brien yesterday urged the government to put the “big stick” laws to a vote, even if Labor and the Greens tried to sabotage or defeat the bill in the house.

“If the Labor Party want to vote against lowering energy ­prices and cost of living in this country, then we should let them,” Mr Pitt said.

“I want to be able to look every one of my constituents in the eye and tell them we have done everything we possibly can to deliver lower energy costs.”

When asked today if the big stick policy was a test of Mr McCormack’s leadership, Mr Pitt told ABC radio: “That’s a question for Michael. We are asking for action and I suspect he will have the horsepower to get it done.”

Mr O’Brien said the “big stick” was a “matter of priority” that meant “putting the legislation to a vote at the first opportunity”.

Asked whether he would broach the issues raised in the letter with the Prime Minister, Mr McCormack said the government would “consider these matters again when the parliament resumes in April”.

“I speak with the Prime Minister regularly on matters of importance to regional Australia, such as power prices that are hurting households and small businesses at the moment,” he told The Australian. “That’s why the Australian government has introduced legislation into the parliament to help set up permanent ways to reduce power prices for all consumers.”

A spokesman for Mr Morrison told The Australian: “Every Liberal and Nationals member wants to see lower energy prices, which is why our legislation is so important and why we want it to pass un­amended through the parliament.

“It’s a stark contrast to Labor who … refuse to back any mechanism to ensure we have reliable, ­affordable power for Australian families and businesses.”

Opposition treasury spokesman Chris Bowen said this morning he agreed with the rebel National MPs about bringing on a vote on the “Venezuelan-style” big stick bill in the budget sitting week.

“I’m happy for it to come to a vote because Labor will be voting against it,” he told ABC radio.

“The National Party are right to say parliament should have a say … this is an anti-business, anti-investment, Venezuelan-style, socialist intervention from a government that believes in nothing.

“This is a piece of populist gimmickry on the part of Josh Frydenberg … it is appalling policy.”

SOURCE  







Council apologises after branding an Aboriginal worker with a racist slur in his funeral notice and insisting it was his nickname

It probably WAS his nickname in certain circles

A regional council has issued a formal apology after publishing a racial slur in a funeral notice and insisting it was a nickname.

Aboriginal man and father John Hagan was a dedicated employee of Paroo Shire Council in south-west Queensland before he died.

However, his 20 years of service seemed to have been belittled when the council published a funeral notice saying Mr Hagan was 'known to all as 'N****r Rat','  The Australian reported.

'Relatives and Friends of the late John Hagan known to all as 'N****r Rat' are respectfully invited to attend his funeral service,' said the post made on November 8.

Paroo Shire Council took down the notice from its Facebook page after severe backlash and the threat of legal action from Mr Hagan's family.

SOURCE  

 Posted by John J. Ray (M.A.; Ph.D.).    For a daily critique of Leftist activities,  see DISSECTING LEFTISM.  To keep up with attacks on free speech see Tongue Tied. Also, don't forget your daily roundup  of pro-environment but anti-Greenie  news and commentary at GREENIE WATCH .  Email me  here

A controversial hat




My daughter in law is a great traveller and when she was last in NYC she bought me a hat.  Above is an image of it.  She even bought it from Trump Tower.  It is not actually a true Trump hat. A Trump hat says: "Make America great again".  The one above says something slightly different.  But very few people would notice the difference.

I wore it on my morning shopping trip a couple of days ago in suburban Brisbane.  Brisbane is a long way from the USA so I wondered if it would get a reaction.  Consistent with their aggressive nature, American Leftists do sometimes attack the wearers of such hats.  Would that hatred spread to Brisbane?

It did, sort of.  When I had finished my shopping around about 10am, I stopped off where I usually do for a morning cup of coffee.  The girl on the counter took my money for it but then went out the back.  She came back and told me they had run out of coffee! 

I didn't argue. In the best libertarian style, I just left for another place a few doors down that had plenty of coffee!  What do you think?  Do you think a coffee joint would really run out of coffee?

There's a famous Australian Country and Western song called "The pub with no beer".  So I did one better. I encountered a coffee joint with no coffee!  I am not going to name the shop concerned as the people there are usually pleasant and I like their coffee.  They served me as usual yesterday.  We conservastives are forgiving people.  We have a lot to forgive -- JR






Domestic violence propaganda

Bettina Arndt

Across Australia school kids are being fed the most dreadful, misleading propaganda claiming that men’s misogynist attitudes to women are the cause of domestic violence.  I was contacting recently by Anthony, a maths teacher in a Victorian school, who sat through one of these programmes and was appalled by the damaging images being taught to the children.

The OurWatch video being inflicted on staff and students at his schooI consisted of endless portrayals of nasty boys being mean to girls, women receiving unfair treatment and discrimination, dominating males using their patriarchal power to control society, women as pathetic, powerless victims cowering from aggressive men. Ironically this was couched as a ‘Respectful Relationships’ programme which actually teaches children to respect girls and denigrate boys.

Anthony wrote to me to say he has had enough and is planning  to speak out at his school’s next programme. I thought it might be helpful to interview Anthony about his experiences and see if we can create a grassroots movement bringing everyone who would like to take action regarding this indoctrination of our children.

I’m hoping Anthony will run this show (I have enough on my plate!) But my video inspires you to come on board, write to me and I’ll pass your email on to Anthony and he can bring you all together and make plans for action. Please use this email address - http://www.bettinaarndt.com.au/contact so your letter can be forwarded directly to Anthony.

So here’s my video with Anthony. I hope he inspires more of you to stand up and be counted rather than just wishing someone would do something about all the male-bashing going on in our society. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7rpCa7qeqo

From Bettina Arndt, bettina@bettinaarndt.com.au






The 'misleading' oil spill map shared by environmental activists which could cost Australia 5,000 jobs and billions of dollars

A map showing the predicted result of 100 different oil spills at once has been hijacked by environmental activists in a bid to shut down a new drilling which could bring billions of dollars and thousands of jobs to Australia.  

Last month Norwegian oil company Equinor publicly released its plans for exploratory oil drilling 370 kilometres off the South Australian coast.

The company calculated which areas could be affected in 100 different scenarios of an oil spill left unattended for 129 days.

A map in the plans details the amalgamation of all these areas, showing that anywhere along the length of the south coast and up the east coast as far as Sydney may be affected by a spill.

The map was shared by Greenpeace and other environmental activists in a bid to drum up support for stopping the project.

The group tweeted the map with the caption: 'BREAKING: Oil giant Equinor has released its so-called 'Environmental Plan' for oil drilling in the Great Australian Bight. 'This map from Equinor's own prior modelling shows a spill could hit anywhere from SA to NSW.'

This week a right-wing think tank slammed the protesters, insisting they are misleading the public by sharing the map. Fred Pawle of the Menzies Research Centre wrote an article in the Spectator calling the map an 'illusion'.

He said: 'The response from the perpetually outraged has been to misinterpret a map of the area that would be affected by a spill, share it extensively on social media and invite people to send their objections.

'The illustration looks scary but thankfully it is an illusion,' he added, pointing out that the map did not show one spill but 'areas that could be affected by any one of 100 scenarios.'

Pawle went on to back the drilling project, citing research that oil in the Bight could produce up to six billion barrels by 2060 and create up to 5,000 jobs in Australia. He said this activity would 'increase Australia's GDP by $6billion to $19billion per year.'

Equinor, which has two permits for exploratory drilling in the Bight, outlined plans to start a large testing operation as early as late 2019.

Drilling the Bight is not new - 13 wells have been drilled since 1972, the most recent in 2006.

But activists are outraged about the prospect of a new project, especially after the Deep Water Horizon disaster in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010 which pumped 3.19 million barrels of oil into the ocean, killing 10 people and thousands of animals in the world's worst oil spill which had a clean up bill of $25billion.

Greenpeace released a statement outlining which animals could be under threat from an oil spill in the region. It read: 'The bight's waters hold 36 species of whales and dolphins, including the world's most important southern right whale nursery, and many humpback, sperm, blue and beak whales.

'Australian sea lions swim freely throughout the Bight, one of the only places in the world they can be found in large communities… Imagine a place so unique that over three-quarters of the species living there existed nowhere else on the planet. That's the Bight.'

It encouraged activists to send objections to the National Offshore Petroleum Safety and Environmental Management Authority, which is assessing Equinor's application.

Several other groups have also been protesting against the plan, including a group of surfers headed by Aussie legend Mick Fanning who wrote an open letter.

It read: 'Formal plans have been lodged to turn the Great Australian Bight into a deep water oil field. The drilling, planned by Norwegian oil giant Equinor for later this year, would be deep, remote and risky. If it failed, Equinor's own spill modelling shows the potential for oil on beaches across thousands of kilometres.

'An oil spill in the Bight would be catastrophic, and the southern coastline of Australia would never be the same. The Bight is wild and pristine and should remain that way.

'The surfers below stand with the coastal communities of the Bight and beyond and call for the Great Australian Bight to be kept free from all deep water oil drilling.'

Equinor has insisted that 'drilling can be done safely'.

But opponents point out that the 2km depth of the ocean - 750m deeper than the Gulf of Mexico - and notoriously stormy conditions make the project potentially extremely dangerous.

These factors, as well as 'economic reasons' led BP to abandon plans to drill in the Bight in 2013.

SOURCE  







Double standards? Right-wing poster boy Milo Yiannopoulos is banned from Australia only DAYS after Muslim sheik who described September 11 as a 'comedy film' toured the nation

Right-wing activist Milo Yiannopoulos has been banned from Australia only days after a visiting Muslim cleric who described September 11 as a 'comedy film' toured the nation.

The 34-year-old British-born campaigner against radical Islam, feminism and political correctness had his visa rejected by the Department of Home Affairs on 'character grounds'.

Yiannopolous learnt earlier this week he had been barred from entering Australia, only days after Egyptian Muslim cleric Dr Omar Abdelkafy had toured Adelaide, Melbourne and Sydney.

In 2015, Dr Abdelkafy described the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in the United States as comedy. 'This play to which Muslims are subjected to ad nauseum across the world is the sequel to the comedy film of 9/11,' he said in a video translated from Arabic by the Middle East Media Research Institute.

'The first part took place in New York and the sequel is taking place in Paris.'

He made the comments in January 2015 shortly after 12 staff of the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo were killed in Paris after it published a front-page cartoon mocking the Prophet Mohammad.

The 67-year-old sheikh with ties to the Muslim Brotherhood had described the French terrorist attack four years ago, by Muslim extremist brothers Saïd and Chérif Kouachi, as a sequel to September 11.

Controversial figures banned from Australia

English right-wing commentator Tommy Robinson denied a visa to enter Australia in January 2019

Canadian right-wing agitator Gavin McInnes, the founder of the Proud Boys and Vice Media, denied a visa in November 2018

American singer and songwriter Chris Brown barred in September 2015 over his 2009 conviction for assaulting his then girlfriend Rihanna, another singer

World champion boxer Floyd Mayweather banned in February 2015 over his history of domestic violence

American pick-up artist Julien Blanc forced to leave Australia in November 2014 following complaints he had advocated abusive behaviour towards women

U.S. rapper Snoop Dogg was banned from Australia in April 2007 because of drug and firearms convictions

Extremist Muslim sheikh Bilal Philips, a Canadian citizen based in Qatar, banned in April 2007 on the grounds he was linked to the 1993 World Trade Centre bombing in New York

English Holocaust denier David Irving denied a visa multiple times since 1993

Czech-born anti-fascist campaigner Egon Kisch prevented from disembarking from a ship in 1934 because of his communist views. He won a High Court appeal presided over by judge Herbert Evatt, who later became federal Labor leader

Despite that, he toured Adelaide, Melbourne and Sydney between February 22 and March 1, and was a guest of the Australian Egyptian Society.

The Department of Home Affairs declined to comment on his individual case but said it respected free speech.

'Any application lodged with the Department by visitors who may hold controversial views will be considered, balancing any risk they may pose with Australia's well-established freedom of speech and freedom of beliefs,' it said in a statement.

'All applicants are required to be assessed against and to meet identity, security, character and health requirements.' 

The 'well-established freedom of speech and freedom of beliefs' did not appear to apply to Yiannopoulos, who received a Notice of Intention to Consider Refusal in regard to his visa application, and was given 28 days to appeal.

His ban on entering Australia followed violent protests in Melbourne in 2017, as he embarked on a national speaking tour which required a significant police presence.

Disgruntled Liberal voters have expressed their displeasure on the party's Facebook page. 'For refusing Milo Yiannopoulos, my whole family will never vote Liberal Party again,' one woman said.  'NEVER. We will not forgive and forget. We wanted you to win the election, but now, will do a lot to prevent it.'

A self-described 'lifelong Liberal voter' and party member was also outraged at Prime Minister Scott Morrison. 'I cannot believe that you have denied Milo Yiannopoulos entry into Australia,' one man said. 'I truly though ScoMo had the goods but apparently not. I am disappointed and outraged beyond belief.'

One Nation leader Pauline Hanson was also outraged at Yiannopoulos being banned from Australia and has asked Immigration Minister David Coleman to reconsider.

'You may not agree with everything that they say as long as they don't go out there and advocate violence,' Senator Hanson told on Sky News Australia on Tuesday.

'If you actually want to stop someone, stop the protesters with their violence.'

Adelaide-based Shia imam Mohammad  Tawhidi, who campaigns against Islamic extremism, said he condemned the double standard of Yiannopoulos being banned as Dr Abdelkafy was allowed to preach in Australia.

'Extremist Pro-Jihad and 9/11 preacher Omar AbdelKafi banned from entering Australia? Nope, he’s still on tour,' he told his 171,000 Facebook supporters.

'Milo got the ban. I disagree with Milo on many, many issues, but this is very wrong. 'This country is called Australia, not Saudi Arabia.'

SOURCE  

 Posted by John J. Ray (M.A.; Ph.D.).    For a daily critique of Leftist activities,  see DISSECTING LEFTISM.  To keep up with attacks on free speech see Tongue Tied. Also, don't forget your daily roundup  of pro-environment but anti-Greenie  news and commentary at GREENIE WATCH .  Email me  here