Were Boston Marathon bombers followers of Harry Potter-hating Australian sheik and pro-al-Qaeda preacher?

A YouTube page reported owned by one of the Boston Marathon bombers reveals that they may have been followers of two radical Muslim sheiks - one  who preached against the 'corrupting evils of Harry Potter' and another who advocates for al-Qaeda in their native Chechnya.

A user called Tamerlan Tsarnaev - the name of the alleged bomber killed in a shootout with police in Boston last night - has posted several videos of sermons of fundamentalist sheiks.

One video is from Abdel al-Hamid al-Juhani, a Russian sheik who reportedly preaches a form of Salafist Islam that is usually associated with al-Qaeda.

Al-Juhani is 'is an important ideologue for al Qaeda in Chechnya and the Caucases,' Mary Habeck, a professor at Johns Hopkins University who studies radical Islam, told the Daily Beast.

He also posted a video about 'The Black Flags From Khorasan,' which Habeck said is shorthand for al-Qaeda.

The other holy man that Tsarnaev's YouTube page advocates is Sheik Feiz Mohammed - an Australian-born Lebanese preacher whose fundamentalist teachings include condemnations of Harry Potter for teaching paganism.  Tsarnaev posted a video of the sermon on his YouTube page.  He later labels Harry Potter an idolator and an enemy of Allah.

Tsarnaev also posted a video of Sheik Feiz Mohammed teaching that Muslims are not good followers of the faith if they don't adhere to all of the Sunnah - or rulings of Islamic scholars. These rules are not listed in the Koran.

He has also urged his followers to behead the Dutch politician Geert Wilders, for his campaigns against Islam in the Netherlands, according to a Dutch newspaper.

Tsarnaev and his younger brother Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, who are both from the Russian breakaway region of Chechnya, are believed to be behind the bombing that killed thee people and left dozens maimed and at least 170 injured.

SOURCE





Green laws set to jeopardise mining work

MAJOR mining and resource projects could be delayed indefinitely and existing projects seriously impacted if Federal Government environmental laws were passed by Parliament, leading businesses have claimed.

The Federal Government has announced changes to the laws, which will allow it to intervene in developments where there is a significant impact on groundwater like the Great Artesian Basin.

But resource companies complained that the laws were so prohibitive that if they were in force today, they would still be waiting for approvals that were granted for the LNG projects in Gladstone and were approved in 2010.

In a submission to a Senate committee investigating the changes, QGC said the amendments could mean its existing project could be radically amended by future approvals.

It said the changes could even mean the currently lawful exploration for gas could become unlawful and the environmental impact statement process could be delayed by another two years.

It would also mean an "ongoing and unlimited information loop".

"Even though the QCLNG project has already been referred to the Federal Environment Minister and approved, any amendments to the project and any complementary project required to feed the already approved LNG trains will be caught by the Bill," QGC said.

"The Bill does nothing to protect proponents from the risk that conditions may be imposed in the context of an amended approval, which might necessitate changes to how existing production activities are carried out," QGC said.

"Supply planning will now need to factor in the likelihood of substantial delays in approval and the impact of a change from adaptive management."

BHP Billiton said the changes could also impact its existing operations.

"Given the large number of approvals, licences and permits that relate to mining operations and the frequency that these are renewed, amended or extended, the practical outcome will be that current operations will very quickly no longer qualify for prior authorisation exemption," the company said.

Federal Environment Minister Tony Burke said if the resource companies believed that the current processes had captured community confidence "then they have been living under a rock".

"Australia's water resources are among our most vital natural resources and it is important that we ensure they are protected," Mr Burke said.

"The proposed amendments will ensure that coal seam gas and large coal mining developments must be assessed and approved under national environment law, if they are likely to have a significant impact on a water resource.

"Realistically, whenever I have made a decision on coal seam gas, the Australian public would expect that we are taking into account all the impacts on our precious water resources."

SOURCE







The academics who hate free speech

by John Speer

The Labor Government’s recent abandonment of Senator Stephen Conroy’s proposed media-regulation laws has brought an end to the greatest assault on free speech in Australia yet attempted. However, the battle is nowhere near over and it rages on in the most trivial of places.

For an an example of just how determined the left is to silence those with whom it disagrees, consider the  recent experience of the the Melbourne University Liberal Club. The MULC is a conservative student organisation that represents a clear minority in the political ecosystem that prevails on campus. Whilst not being directly affiliated with the Liberal Party, the club has adhered to and promoted the values of liberalism since 1925.

In the University of Melbourne’s Orientation Week in February of 2013, the MULC did as it has always done, and set about promoting itself to attract new members. Orientation Week has traditionally been our biggest recruitment drive of the year. In addition to manning our allocated booth at the Clubs & Societies Expo, we also set up a number of stalls around the Parkville campus. These stalls are generally decorated with various Liberal Party corflutes [plastic signs], publications, stickers, and various other promotional giveaways.

Merv Bendle's submission to a Senate panel looking into academic freedom

This year one of the corflutes, kindly donated to us, originated from the 2001 federal election campaign. This particular corflute pictured then-Prime Minister John Howard and his quote “we will decide who comes to this country and the circumstances in which they come.” On one particular day of O-Week, The Club displayed this corflute proudly at our stall, a reminder of one of the Howard government’s most successful policies.

Within minutes of displaying this corflute, members of the MULC were approached by university academics who believed it to be ‘racist’ and ‘disgusting’. In addition to this, they insisted we had no right whatsoever to display it at our stall. Senior members of The Club explained that whilst they were free to hold those opinions, we were perfectly within our rights to voice our own beliefs and display a piece of official election material.

With the debate ending rather quickly, our stall was soon approached by the University of Melbourne’s security staff, who stated they had received “complaints” about the corflute. They then ordered the MULC booth off campus.

After it was explained that all present were both MULC members and students of the university,  thus having a right to be present on university grounds, the security staff then attempted to remove the corflute from the grounds of the university.

Upon members reminding them that the corflute was the MULC’s private property, they placed it back on the stall.

In a desire not to inflame the situation, MULC members transported the stall off campus and onto public property in order to continue our membership drive.

Whilst this incident may seem trivial, it typifies the difficulties and harassment experienced by conservative and libertarian student organisations. The mentality of the left in the practice of freedom of speech, equating to “I don’t want to see it therefore it can’t be displayed”, is arrogant and abusive. We might also call it absurd, if not for the chilling glimpse of the totalitarian mindset determined to crimp and control all conversation and thought on campus.

And remember, it was not left students who complained about our display but academics, who should be dedicated to the free and unfettered discussion and dissection of ideas.

Not only do such attempts to gag fly in the face of the right to free speech and freedom of expression,  they demonstrate the unwillingness of the left on campus, and generally everywhere, to adhere to the basic principles of democracy. I am drawn to a quote from Voltaire’s biographer, Evelyn Beatrice Hall, and often attributed in error to the philosopher himself. It is this: "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it."

Whilst the fight for freedom of expression and speech may be at a temporary ceasefire in Canberra, it continues to escalate in the tertiary institutions of this nation.

SOURCE






Bureaucratic defamation

A RETIRED Territory cop and sailor was shocked to discover a federal government database had 40-year-old convictions for assault and rape on his rap sheet - despite not having a blemish on his record.

Dallas Graetz, 63, said NT Police documentation proved he had no criminal history.

But the ex-navy petty officer said he received an email from the Australian Electoral Commission - where he works as a casual - asking him why he hadn't disclosed his criminal record.

"I just thought it could have been a speeding fine or something," Mr Graetz said.

"I phoned the commission and they told me that a criminal history check done by CrimTrac had revealed I had been sentenced to three years jail for assault and 10 years for rape.

"I said: 'I must have been a very busy boy' - I was in the navy from 1966 to 1981 and 13 years of that was apparently spent in jail. I then rang my wife and told her to be careful because there was a rapist in the house."

But all jokes aside, Mr Graetz said it was concerning that there was paperwork floating around the government "branding me as a convicted rapist".

CrimTrac is run from the Attorney-General's department in Canberra and collects records from every state and territory to keep in a central database.

Mr Graetz, who was with the police force for more than two decades after his navy service, said CrimTrac had the convictions recorded in Bairnsdale, in eastern Victoria, in 1975 and 1977.

But he said he was working at HMAS Coonawarra, in Darwin, during that time.  "It's a really bad stuff-up," Mr Graetz said.

He said his full name, date of birth and place of birth were correct but the convictions were not his.

Mr Graetz said the AEC called him last night to apologise for the error.

He said CrimTrac had also apologised and amended his record in the database.  But he still wants to know how the error occurred in the first place.

SOURCE





Justice system unfair: poll

QUEENSLANDERS believe the justice system is unfair and inconsistent, and they disagree with criminal matters being settled in secret.

More than 2000 readers of The Courier-Mail responded to an online poll yesterday about the fairness of the state's legal system after two criminal cases were highlighted.

The details about a mother who was fined $400 for a crash that killed her teenage daughter are on the public record but the circumstances behind the criminal charges being dropped against Wallabies star Kurtley Beale will remain confidential because he and his victim underwent mediation.

Beale was charged with allegedly striking a bouncer outside a Brisbane nightclub in June.

Eighty-one per cent of respondents - or 1749 voters - said they did not believe the legal system was fair, transparent and consistent.

Two-thirds of 1778 online readers said the details of mediation should not be confidential and 83 per cent of 1662 voters disagreed with laws that ensured confidentiality if a perpetrator paid a victim after the process of mediation.

Attorney-General Jarrod Bleijie said the Government was considering ways to make the justice system more open and transparent, including naming and shaming laws under the Youth Justice Act.

" Since changes to the legislation in 2002, the publication of identifying information relating to children has occurred only three times," Mr Bleijie said.

Queensland's top judge Paul de Jersey said the majority of the public did not understand how court processes worked but the judiciary strived to increase the public's awareness.

Chief Justice de Jersey defended mediation, especially for minor offences, but acknowledged the importance of the principle of an open court.

"I am not surprised that negative assessments are made where a complaint has effectively been determined behind closed doors with public knowledge of the process withheld," Justice de Jersey told The Courier-Mail.

"If following a mediation the police inform the court that the prosecution offers no evidence, the court proceeding cannot go any further.

"The open-court principle is critically important (and) I expect that if people were asked about their confidence in the justice system by reference to cases which have actually proceeded in court, a much more positive result would arise.

"That would especially be so if those who were surveyed had actually sat in on court proceedings to an appreciable extent," Justice de Jersey said.

SOURCE

Like it or not, capitalism is the best way to help Australia grow and prosper as a nation

It might seem a trifle strange to some that the Labor Party describe people on incomes of $100,000 or more as "fabulously wealthy". Perhaps they have both forgotten that despite each of them earning twice that amount they nonetheless gave themselves a very hefty raise so they now collect about three times that or more. So now they are fabulously, fabulously, fabulously wealthy.

To add insult to injury, they declared moves they were making to shore up an out of control budget were really about making superannuation fairer. That might have been tolerable with some serious changes to superannuation but alas that was not to be.

It is no secret people at the top-income end of town have for some time been delighted - and perhaps even felt a little guilty - they have been able to take advantage of some superannuation opportunities introduced in the latter years of the Howard government. I do not have access to Treasury data, but anecdotally it seems these rules have ended up in practice being far more generous than intended. Quite why Labor hasn't chosen to limit these opportunities prospectively one can only be left to ponder. I think they should have.

I say prospectively because it has long been recognised that retrospective legislation is a bad thing. Instead Labor has, yet again, embarked on a "we'll attack the rich" campaign. This is just dumb, outdated politics. For starters when you keep attacking the truly wealthy they just take their factories, income, capital elsewhere. And the associated jobs disappear.

Like it or not, the capitalist system has been the greatest generator of income to lift people all over the world out of poverty. Under it some will get much richer than others. Without it the only ones who will get richer are the dictators and leaders. Constantly demonising those who end up richer just undermines, indeed attacks, the system itself.

If people make their money out of working harder, taking risks and being smarter we should celebrate their achievement. Attacking them as the hated "rich" is nothing more than the politics of envy.

The range of individuals and groups who survive off the capitalist system, even become enormously wealthy through it, and yet never say anything to defend it is a constant source of fascination to me. As an example of this one might look to the entertainment industry, where rock stars and movie moguls acquire mega wealth and yet all too few would ever defend capitalism.

Opponents of the capitalist system, with all its faults, have struggled to come up with something better. That's why they hang around in capitalist countries being critical rather than migrating to a place where socialism rules and things are much better. Maybe if such a nirvana existed they would head off to enjoy the fruits of their ideology. The trouble is the ideology when put into practice just doesn't bear fruit.

On the other hand, supporters of the system seem all too complacent. Every system needs support, replenishment and renewal. Sadly, every system has internal enemies as well. In the case of capitalism it is the shonks, crooks, cheats and ripoff merchants. Left alone, they will reproduce like a cancer.

Trouble starts brewing when people make money and few, if any, can see the fairness. There's no pretending that a profit means anything other than you are charging more for something than it cost you. Someone is paying more because you are providing what they want, or need, when and where they want or need it, at a price they are willing to pay. That's fair, because to achieve that requires skill, investment, effort and risk. That's the system.

Nonetheless, one can't help but get a sense that the population at large is uneasy at what they perceive to be a growing number of people making gains and even windfall ones, unfairly. The capitalist market place may well have delivered millions from poverty but, more and more, millions see it as the vehicle through which they will be ripped off. Caveat emptor (buyer beware) is as a principle fair enough. Sadly in today's world, people feel they have to exercise much more than normal, reasonable vigilance, otherwise they will be done over.

Let's take just a few examples. Confidence in the financial services sector is not what it could or should be. Product bundles in telecommunications have become so complex many mum-and-dad consumers just give up and stick with their current supplier. There is a growing sense that some chief executives and board members, while improving the shareholders' assets, have disproportionately improved their own positions.

Realistically, we accept that in all walks of life there are bad apples. We understand that the business community is not immune from that.

We should also understand that every time a bad apple gets away with a misdeed another cancer cell is implanted in the capitalist system.

My proposition, then, is this: to attack and undermine the capitalist system by setting "the rich" up as the enemy is dumb. To fail to deal with any cancer within is equally dumb, or dumber.

SOURCE






Council ban clouds Anzac Day memorial

Nillumbik Shire Council has caused fury by demanding Diggers pull down a banner promoting Anzac Day. Source: Supplied

A COUNCIL has caused fury by demanding that Diggers pull down a banner promoting Anzac Day.

The Montmorency-Eltham RSL got permission from a private land owner to erect the banner at the corner of Main Rd and Bridge St in Eltham.

But Nillumbik Shire Council gave the RSL 24 hours to pull it down.

"They told us they don't like signs on the corner," RSL sub-branch spokesman Alan Field said. "It's very disappointing and we are all up in arms over it.

"I was in disbelief when they told us. The council is not there to serve the community but there to punish us."

Victorian RSL branch chief executive Michael Annett said Anzac Day commemorations should be encouraged.

"It's disappointing that the Anzac Day ceremony is not allowed to be promoted, given other events are regularly advertised there," he said.

The dawn service in Nillumbik Shire attracts a crowd of more than 1000.

Mayor Cr Peter Perkins said council encouraged locals to attend by promoting the service on its website.

"Temporary signage and banners ... contravene the existing policy, which aims to protect the special significance of the Eltham gateway and its visual amenity," Cr Perkins said.

He said the decision would not be changed. The RSL had put banners in other areas where signs were permitted.

Nick McGowan, federal Liberal candidate for the seat of Jagajaga, said events had been advertised at the corner for at least 20 years and the council stance was shameful.

"This is what happens when bureaucratic stupidity takes over from common sense," he said. "It is a sign that encourages people to attend Anzac Day and I don't think anyone can object to that."

SOURCE






Queensland branch of the Medical Board of Australia faces axe

About time

THE State Government has taken an axe to the Queensland Board of the Medical Board of Australia, accusing it of putting Queenslanders at risk by allowing incompetent doctors to continue practising.

Health Minister Lawrence Springborg issued the 10 board members with a formal notice to "show cause" why they should be allowed to continue in their role.

They have 14 days to reply to a six-page legal letter which also accuses them of being "much more lenient in relation to medical practitioners than other regulated practitioners".

Mr Springborg said the board also ignored some cases and allowed "untenable" delays in investigating serious complaints.

The show-cause letters went to board members identified as acting chairman Dr Christopher Kennedy, associate professor David Henderson, associate professor Warwick Carter, Professor Richard Hays, Dr Nicola Murdock, Professor Tarun Sen Gupta and "community members" Fiona Chapman, Michael Clare, Peta Frampton and Terence Selva.

Mr Springborg acted after two reports tabled in Parliament revealed a "disturbing picture" of a complaints system that was broken.

A series of articles in The Courier-Mail highlighting the failings of state and federal watchdog agencies prompted two government inquiries.

Mr Springborg said the latest inquiry found that 363 of 596 files examined were not handled in a manner that was timely, appropriate or complied with legislative objectives.

The ousting of the board will be a triumph for former medical board investigator and whistleblower Jo Barber, who raised the alarm in The Courier-Mail last year.

She accused the board of shielding doctors and covering up complaints.

Her accusations sparked an inquiry by the Crime and Misconduct Commission which ended with lawyer Jeffrey Hunter recommending charges against six doctors he believed were criminally negligent.

SOURCE
   




Climythology

by Peter Smith

Nobody with a life outside of “Greensville” cares very much anymore about climate change, earlier known as global warming. Do you even hear it now being discussed over cafe lattes in Balmain? No, you don’t. Only Tim Flannery and his alarmist ilk care. But political parties in Western democracies, as we have learnt to our great cost on the immigration front, have a life of their own, distant from the populace.

They have great moral purposes to pursue. Therefore governments of whatever complexion continue to pour billions of dollars of borrowed funds into schemes and businesses to support the production of inefficient energy. Nothing like this has happened before. We know that because industrial progress has largely been unremitting; built on cheap and progressively cheaper energy. Going backwards has not heretofore been favoured, if for no other reason than nasty nations, insistent on making progress, would have taken advantage, and invaded and subjugated their more primitive neighbours. And we know that because it regularly happened.

Is it possible that governments have collectively lost their senses? Yes, it is, when plagues of locusts or other pests in future years might effectively ground the ethanol-dependent US fleet and Air Force. Ditto here, if the Katter Party, aka, the Ethanol Party, has its way.

The risk to alarmists is that governments will catch up with the climate insouciance of their electorates and stop wasting money. Among other things, money will be saved by sacking people like Flannery and removing all of those research grants directed towards proving the undisprovable, which is that climate change does indeed exist and will eventually engulf our grandchildren in the most horrible of fates. Only research grants based on climate propositions which potentially can be shown to be false, in Popperian fashion, will be left standing; and few in number they will be.

What to do? The answer chosen by the alarmists is to become more alarmist in the hope of panicking the common man and woman or, at least, raising them from their torpor.

Hence we had Mr Flannery spruiking the latest report of the Climate Commission. He spoke of the angry summer; of 123 records broken; of it all taking us into new climate territory; and so on into what the PM might call hyper-bole. I don’t want to comment on this except to say that in Sydney I thought it was a very mild summer. Those who want a less personal, more scientific, debunking of Flannery’s flannelling might care to look at an excellent article in The Australian by Murray Salby, professor of climate at Macquarie University. He shows conclusively, so far as I can tell, as a non-scientist, that the summer just gone was unexceptional.

What does this all mean? In my view it means that alarmists seemingly have little affinity with the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. This doesn’t mean that carbon dioxide is not warming the planet and thereby laying in store future grief. It means that snake-oil salesman are pushing the line and lessening our ability to find the truth. Let me give an instance from Flannery’s performance on the ABC’s 7.30 program.

Leigh Sales referred to figures showing that global temperatures had plateaued for the past 15 years or so. Flannery could have said, as did Dr Rajendra Pachauri when similarly challenged, that 15 years was too short a period to draw a conclusion or he could have tried to give some possible scientific reasons why the effect of CO2 emissions was being offset. Instead he chose to say that temperatures had not plateaued, but had continued to rise, when the temperature of “the oceans, the air and the land” are taken together. This is pure and simply sophistry at its most blatant and disgraceful. How can anything this man says be taken seriously after this?

If I were to suspend a solid body in a pan of water over a fire, the water would gradually heat as the hot air rose and transfer its heat to the surface of the solid body and, in turn, to the innards of the solid body. If I were to extinguish the fire I would expect the temperature of the whole mass of water and the solid body to continue to rise for a while. This is only my schoolboy physics or is it common sense?

In any event, the point at issue is not whether the temperature of the water and land are rising but whether CO2 emissions are materially heating the atmosphere. If the atmosphere cools or remains at a constant temperature for long enough in the face of rising CO2 emissions, it will be difficult to maintain the view that man-made global warming is a problem requiring the expenditure of billions of dollars and a resort to wholesale reliance on inefficient and unreliable green energy.

What is at stake is much too important to be the plaything of vested interests, fools or charlatans on either side of the argument.

According to Professor Salby, who I referred to above, the mean temperature in Australia in January this year was lower than in two previous Januaries during the time since 1979 when (accurate) satellite measurements have been available. And he notes that the summer from December to February “is even less remarkable”. If this is so, and it is surely verifiable, how can this summer be evidenced as being particularly untoward and “angry”?

We need people of objectivity and moderation in the climate arena, not snake-oil salesmen, if we are ever to get at the truth and put in place whatever practical and cost-effective action might possibly be called for; if in fact any such action is required.

SOURCE

They're out to get Tom

Tom is too popular for them



CONTROVERSIAL bookie Tom Waterhouse's firm is the latest gambling giant to face court over strict Victorian laws banning offers of rewards to customers who open a betting account.

The company is accused of offering to match new punters' initial deposits of up to $200 at Caulfield in February last year, the latest in a string of prosecutions by the Victorian Commission for Gambling Regulation.

But the court action has sparked calls for tougher penalties from anti-gambling campaigners, who have likened the current maximum fine per charge of $2817 to "a slap on the wrist with a limp lettuce leaf".

Australian Churches Gambling Taskforce chair Rev Tim Costello said penalties should reflect the serious consequences of problem gambling -- like broken marriages, crime and bankruptcy.  "Because the social impacts are so serious and affect the entire community, the sanctions should be serious," Rev Costello said.

Victorian InterChurch Gambling Taskforce chair Mark Zirnsak said the current maximum penalty was no more than a parking ticket for the thriving gambling firms. He said that due to the jurisdictional difficulties of imposing loss of licence penalties on online agencies, penalties needed to make breaking the law unprofitable.

Independent senator Nick Xenophon called the penalties "pathetic" and said the only dilemma faced by bookmakers would be whether to "laugh all the way to the bank or the commentary panel".

Waterhouse -- the son of champion racehorse trainer Gai Waterhouse -- was recently barred from offering opinions during sports broadcasts after a parliamentary hearing in March found he was blurring the lines between bookmaker and commentator.

Last year, online agency Sportsbet was fined $3000 for offering free bets of between $100 and $200 to new customers upon signing up.

A magistrate found four charges of offering inducements proven against the company and six charges proven against its subsidiary, International All Sports Ltd, which was fined $4500.  But last month, the fines were halved on appeal.

VCGR said prosecutions of Betezy, Betfair and Tom Waterhouse were under way.

SOURCE





Tough luck for those who rely on government for health care

LARA Harris just wants her tonsils out.  But the 12-year-old has been told she must wait until November to have them removed despite having missed more than five months of school in the past 14 months.

Lara has enlarged tonsils which she said had caused her constant head and stomach aches, along with prolonged bouts of tonsillitis.

On Sunday night she was rushed to Flinders Medical Centre by ambulance because she was struggling to breathe and had a major respiratory infection.

"I've just been really sick and I can't really do anything ... it's really painful," Lara said.

Lara was first diagnosed with tonsillitis in November 2011 and has had regular recurring bouts in the months since.

The Huntfield Heights youngster has missed more than five months of school and has had to stop exercising because she gets too exhausted.

"I miss sport. I used to play basketball and other sports and do dance, but I had to stop," she said.

Lara's mother, Kym Harris, said November was too long to wait for her daughter to get her life back.

"I am just really frustrated. Her tonsils have been closed together since January," she said.

Mrs Harris was originally told that it would take a few months before her daughter's tonsils could be removed at the Women's and Children's Hospital.

"I was happy to wait for a while because I didn't realise how much it would affect her health," Ms Harris said.  But she has since been told the earliest time her daughter could have her tonsils out would be November.

The family first contacted former Opposition health spokesman Martin Hamilton-Smith in October last year. He wrote to then Health Minister John Hill, but is yet to receive any response.

Opposition spokesman Rob Lucas said the family should expect a response sooner.  "Clearly Lara is suffering in agony," he said.  "At the very least there should be some sort of response about whether or not something can be done."

In a statement, a spokeswoman for SA Health said Lara would undergo surgery within 12 months because she was classified as non-urgent.

"Sometimes, patient's conditions change in which case the person should be reassessed," the spokeswoman said.

SOURCE





America's National Public Radio visits a Warmist experiment in Australia

And the experiment makes it look like coral reefs will be in trouble if the much-foretold global warming ever arrives. Would Warmists ever get any other result?

In real-life, however, corals survive well in a whole range of temperatures.  Australia's Great Barrier reef stretches over 1600 miles roughly North to South, including temperate zones and near-equatorial zones.  It is one vast natural experiment on the effect of temperature variation on coral growth.  And guess where in those 1600 miles corals grow best?  The warmest part!

So the Warmists on the reef fiddle around with fishtanks and ignore the reality just out the window.  What a joke!  But reality never has suited the Green/Left.  It's a sad commentary on a lot of people but, basically, you have to be a crook to be a Warmist

Scientists have been worried about coral reefs for years, since realizing that rising temperatures and rising ocean acidity are hard on organisms that build their skeletons from calcium carbonate. Researchers on Australia's Great Barrier Reef are conducting an experiment that demonstrates just how much corals could suffer in the coming decades.

As we burn fossil fuels - we're talking about oil, gas and coal - carbon dioxide builds up in the atmosphere. Now, there are debates about how quickly that is changing the global climate, but there is no question that billions of tons of carbon dioxide have soaked into the ocean. That's making waters more acidic, which puts some ocean ecosystems at risk, particularly coral reefs. We sent NPR science correspondent Richard Harris to Australia's Great Barrier Reef to look into these consequences. His first stop was a research station on Heron Island.

RICHARD HARRIS, BYLINE: Heron Island is surrounded by a reef that is home to sea turtles, sharks, rays, brilliantly colored fish, and hundreds of other species. The spectacular scenery draws snorkelers from around the world. The island also hosts one of the world's major coral reef labs, run by the University of Queensland, and research there shows that the reefs are in trouble. Scientist Sophie Dove plunges her arms into a tank the size of a kettle drum.

SOPHIE DOVE: OK. We'll start with the plates. Uh-huh.

HARRIS: She and research assistant Annamieke van den Heuvel are weighing chunks of coral.

ANNAMIEKE VAN DEN HEUVEL: Two hundred and forty-six point nine.

DOVE: Do you want to just check the zero when I take this away?

HARRIS: Dove has recreated a simplified version of the coral ecosystem in a dozen large tanks.

DOVE: And so in each tank here we basically - I can lift up the lid - this is one of our - this is our present-day tank, if you like.

HARRIS: The water temperature and the carbon dioxide levels match the conditions on the present-day reef.

DOVE: We've got little mushroom corals, fungia, brain corals, stylophera pistolata there. It's a very common coral around the world. We've got these corals that look like bunches of flowers. They're called lobophelia.

HARRIS: The corals in this tank look healthy. And as she weighs them, she seems that they've been growing since she transplanted them here nearly a year ago. Then she opens the next tank.

DOVE: We'll hop from present day, and the next one along here is the worst of the future with a thing we call business as usual or do nothing tank.

HARRIS: Dove is pumping much warmer water with lots of added carbon dioxide into this tank. This is what the world's oceans are likely to look like later in this century when the schoolchildren visiting this island today reach middle age.

DOVE: And as you look into here, it looks quite different, as you will see.

HARRIS: Oh yeah.

DOVE: OK. So there's lot of this slimy, yucky mess(ph) of cynobacteria.

HARRIS: Clumps of black gunk swirl along the surface of the tank.

DOVE: We find that cynobacterial (unintelligible) tend to do really well in the future. The slippery slope to slime seems to be the way to go.

HARRIS: Not so for the coral. Most of it has either died or turned white, which means the organisms that live inside the coral have moved out.

DOVE: So as you see, the future is not a great place. Here's - the needle(ph) coral is underneath here. It's gone. And there's really not very much left alive.

HARRIS: In all there are four sets of tanks here: the healthiest coral are in a tank that simulates pre-industrial conditions. The present day tank looks almost as good, but the coral looks progressively worse in tanks with increasing carbon dioxide and temperature.

DOVE: We can make this a little bit (unintelligible)...

HARRIS: Now, plenty of small-scale experiments in the lab have shown that corals suffer in hotter waters and in more acidic conditions. This experiment puts those two threats together, since that's what the reefs of the future will face. Dove tries to be dispassionate about her findings, but the site touches the human chord.

DOVE: I feel pretty sad when I look into this. You know, I look at the others, the control tank, and I think, well, that would be nice if we could at least stay like that.

HARRIS: But doing so would mean civilization would have to stop burning fossil fuels immediately. That's not going to happen. Instead, once the carbon dioxide concentrations get high enough in the ocean, the stony structure of the reef actually starts to dissolve. That's bad news for the vibrant life that lives on the reef.

DOVE: There's no reef building going on here. It's reef dismantling that's going on here. Maybe some fish can survive in this type of environment, but I think we're going to lose a lot of the fish capabilities, you know, for fishing and everything. So people who are trying to live off what the reef offers them, this is going to be much harder. From a tourist's point of view, I don't imagine this is something that tourists would feel that attracted to come and see.

HARRIS: And as the reefs erode, they will offer less protection from the storm surges generated by the typhoons that sweep ashore here in Australia and throughout the South Pacific.

ANDREAS ANDERSON: Millions of humans are dependent on the reefs today.

HARRIS: Andreas Anderson is a reef scientist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in San Diego. He says increasing ocean acidity is a big threat to the millions of people who depend on the fish that in turn depend on the reef. He says experiments like the one on Heron Island suggest the reefs face bad times ahead later in this century, but the weakness of studies like this is that they change conditions for the corals in one sudden shock.

ANDERSON: So what we don't really understand is, you know, how quickly will this happen, to what extent will it happen. Will organisms be able to acclimatize or adapt to this over a longer time scale?

HARRIS: The best case is that the change will be slow.

ANDERSON: If it breaks down very rapidly, we are definitely in big problems. But if it takes thousands of years, then, you know, perhaps it's not so bad.

HARRIS: Sophie Dove knows no experiment is perfect, but hers is designed to look for hints that corals can adapt to their new circumstances, and she doesn't see any sign of that. We will have more definitive answers soon enough because this experiment isn't simply confined to tanks at research stations - it's playing out on every coral reef in the world.

SOURCE

This post also up on Coral reef compendium





EU Carbon Collapse Deals Blow To Australian Climate Policy

[Australia's Labor Government] will revise down its carbon tax revenue estimates following a crash in the European carbon market, at a likely multi-billion dollar cost to the federal budget.

The EU’s carbon price sank to 2.55 euros ($A3.24) in trading overnight, as legislators rejected a proposal to save the market from collapse.

The federal budget currently assumes a $29 carbon price in 2015, when Australia’s carbon trading scheme is linked to the EU carbon market.

Climate Change Minister Greg Combet told the ABC: “We will continue with our plans to link with the European emissions trading scheme from 1 July 2015, which is still over two years away.

“But this year’s budget, as is usual practice by Treasury, will include a revised forecast for a carbon price in 2015-16 in Australia.”

He said the carbon revenue slump “is another way the global financial crisis has hit the budget”.

Much of the revenue from the carbon tax is pumped out into the economy in the form of household compensation.

The EU carbon price peaked at nearly 30 euros in 2008, but an abundance of permits and weak demand for electricity as a result of the European recession has pushed down the price down.
Yesterday, the price dropped below 3 euros before recovering partially to 3.20 euros.

Opposition climate action spokesman Greg Hunt said the fluctuating carbon price in Europe showed Australia would be linking its scheme to a “deeply unstable” system.

Australia’s carbon tax was five and a half times higher than the European tax, and completely out of step with the rest of the world, he said.

More HERE

Conservative Qld. government rolls back Greenie tree-clearing laws

THE largest rollback of environmental protection in Australia's history is under way as the State Government waters down vegetation protection laws.

If an amendment Bill passes through Parliament in its current form, it will become legal to clear regrowth habitat for koalas, endangered mahogany gliders and cassowaries.

This is despite a written commitment from Premier Campbell Newman to conservation group World Wildlife Fund before the last election, saying he would "retrain the ... current level of vegetation protection".

WWF spokesman Nick Heath said yesterday there was no record of any government winding back laws to such a degree.  "This is a clear breach of Newman's commitment," he said.

"If the amendments pass, 700,000ha of endangered forest could be cleared. This would accelerate the extinction of animals in regrowth areas."

Mr Cripps, who will make a speech to the Rural Press Club today entitled "Taking the axe to Queensland's tree clearing laws", said amendments supported agricultural growth, while retaining environment protections.

"Twenty years of Labor Government had allowed the pendulum to swing too far towards extreme green policies at the expense of jobs in rural and regional communities," he said.

Before laws were introduced in 1999, more than 750,000ha a year was cleared, mostly for pasture. This was reduced to 77,590ha in 2009-10.

Greens spokeswoman Larissa Waters said amendments weakened rules to allow some farmers to assess their own clearing.

SOURCE





Australia 'most comfortably racist' country, says ignorant British blow-in

If he had talked to police in Sydney's Middle East Crime squad he would have known why Australians are leery of Lebanese Muslims

A BRITISH comedian who will soon host hugely popular program The Daily Show has branded Australia the "most comfortably racist" place he had been.

English reporter John Oliver, who has worked as a correspondent for the influential Comedy Central show created by Jon Stewart, has spent the past few days filming in Australia.

Oliver, who will present the show later this year while regular host Jon Stewart directs a film, says in The Bugle podcast that the country is a "coastal paradise surrounding a rocky hell".

"Australia turns out to be a sensational place, albeit one of the most comfortably racist places I've ever been in. They've really settled into their intolerance like an old resentful slipper," Oliver said.

"You can say what you like about Australian racism, it is undeniably specific. I had a couple of Australians - more than one - complain to me about all the Lebbos in the country, referring apparently to the Lebanese. Who the f-- is annoyed by Lebanese people?

"In a way you have to admire the attention to detail. Not just all those Arabs, but the Lebanese."

However Oliver also lavishes praise on Australia during the undoubtedly tongue-in-cheek podcast.

"Australia is a sensational place and it really begs the question: why the f-- did we make that our penal colony when its nicer than where we live? We should have said to criminals at the time 'you're all staying here, we're off to go live in paradise'."

SOURCE





Attitudes to Australia in India

This journalist must be aware that almost all the attacks on Indian students have been by African refugees.  Telling Indians that would materially alter their perceptions of Australians.  But political correctness is strong in both India and Australia so the Indians will probably never find out

It's nearly four years since a flinty Indian farmer named Kulbhushen Sharma looked me in the eye and asked a probing question: "Why are our people being attacked in Australia?"

I was Fairfax Media's correspondent in India at the time and had just finished interviewing Sharma about a water supply crisis in north India. In the big Indian cities, television news bulletins were awash with reports about students being assaulted in Australia. But Sharma's question proved the issue was resonating in remote villages as well. Like tens of millions across the subcontinent, he had watched dramatic reports about the attacks. His question illustrated how deeply the negative perceptions of Australia, created by the attacks, had infiltrated Indian society.

Most Australians don't realise the scale of the Indian media's reaction to the student attacks.

The issue featured in the news for months and many reports implied the attacks were racially motivated. Things changed for Australians, like me, who lived in India during that period. Previously cricket had been the first thing routinely discussed when I met a local. But after the media blitz it was the "racist attacks."

The crisis strained relations between the two governments and had a profound effect on Australia's image in India. Bloggers even started calling for tit-for-tat attacks on Australians in India.

So are Indian suspicions of Australia starting to fade?

A new opinion poll of Indian attitudes to Australia, released on Wednesday, presents a mixed response to that question. Overall, Australia is well-liked in India despite all the bad press. The survey, conducted for the Australia-India Institute and the Lowy Institute for International Policy, found Australia ranked in the top four countries towards which Indians felt most warmly. Only the United States, Japan and Singapore ranked higher among the 22 nations surveyed.

Indians feel warmer towards Australia than towards European countries or big developing nations like China, Brazil and South Africa. Australia's political and social systems provided a much more popular model for the Indians surveyed than those in Britain.

Despite occasional tensions on the cricket field (it seems the game does help) three-quarters of the Indians surveyed said cricket helps the two countries grow closer. There's no doubt India - home to 17 per cent of the world's population - would not be nearly as interested in Australia - with 0.32 per cent of the global population - if not for our mutual interest in cricket.

But when respondents were asked about how safe they thought Australia is for Indians, the findings were much more negative. Indians are not convinced Australia is a safe and welcoming place for them. An extraordinary 62 per cent said Australia was a dangerous place for Indian students. Also, most Indians apparently accepted those media reports that suggested the violence against students in Australia was motivated by prejudice - 61 per cent of respondents believe that attacks on Indian students were mostly caused by racism.

A number of well-informed Indians I know linked the student crisis to the White Australia policy, the anti-immigration rhetoric of the One Nation party, the wrongful imprisonment of Indian-born doctor Mohammad Haneef, and political controversies over asylum seekers and unauthorised arrivals. This may be contributing to the pessimistic view of Australia as a welcoming country.

The survey results are in keeping with a dramatic slump in the number of Indian students coming to Australia in the wake of the attacks. Higher education visas issued to Indian students plunged by 71 per cent between 2007-08 and 2011-12, a report by the Australian Council for Educational Research found. The high dollar, stricter visa conditions and competition from education offerings in other countries also contributed to the fall. The slump has cost our universities and colleges hundreds of millions of dollars in lost student fees. But the survey showed a significant majority of Indians still believe Australia is a good place to be educated and a narrow majority think the security of Indian students here is better than it was a few years ago. Given the chronic shortage of Indian university places, the number of Indians studying in Australia is likely to gradually rebuild.

The opinion poll suggests Indian attitudes towards Australia are complex. Fears about the safety of Indians in Australia, and lingering concerns about racism, are balanced by an array of positives.

Australia and India should be the best of friends. We share Westminster-style democracy, the English language and, of course, cricket. Add to that fast-growing trade ties, and the nations have the foundations for a relationship unique in Asia.

But the damage inflicted on Australia's reputation by the student crisis lingers.

Indian perceptions of Australia are still dogged by the events that prompted Sharma to ask me those tough questions four years ago.

SOURCE





Swiftian satire hits the ALP

An article published by a Liberal Party-aligned think tank that advocates killing off the poorest 20 per cent of Australians as a way to get the budget back on track has been described as a "disgraceful rant" by Treasurer Wayne Swan.

A "modest cull of the enormously poor" has been suggested by right-wing business lobbyist Toby Ralph in a tongue-in-cheek opinion piece written in reaction to the federal government's attack on the "fabulously wealthy" through superannuation taxes.

"In contrast to the fabulously rich, the enormously poor make little useful contribution to society," wrote Mr Ralph, a long-time Liberal Party campaign strategist.

"They consume more than they contribute, putting tremendous strain on the national budget.

"A modest cull would strike at the root of our fiscal dilemma. If the least productive 20 per cent of citizens were decommissioned it would directly release a recurrent $25 billion, which would almost cover overspending by the Gillard government between now and September 14th, assuming Mr Swan maintains his long-term average rate of profligacy.

"This bold initiative would rid us of indolent students, hapless single mums, lower-order drug dealers, social workers, performance artists, Greenpeace supporters and the remaining processing personnel in our collapsing yet heavily subsidised manufacturing industries."

Mr Ralph's bloody prescription for national economic recovery was written strictly as satire, he told Fairfax Media, saying "some people want to be offended".

The article ends with a suggestion that the government could recoup the $900 million it will gouge from the rich in super taxes by simply spending within its means for six days - but "that's clearly just daft", he wrote.

That has not stopped critics, including Mr Swan, questioning the wisdom of Menzies House publishing the article.

Menzies House was founded by Liberal senator Cory Bernardi, recently sent to the backbench over his comments on same-sex marriage leading to legalised bestiality.

Menzies House stemmed from Senator Bernardi's Conservative Leadership Foundation but he has since insisted he has no active role or editorial influence over it.

Chris Browne, a long-time employee of Senator Bernardi, resigned as editor-in-chief of Menzies House after an anonymous article was posted describing Joe Hockey as incompetent and a stain on the Coalition's reputation as a good economic manager.

Mr Browne was replaced by Tim Andrews, executive director of the Australian Taxpayers' Alliance and a former vice-president of the NSW Young Liberals.

Mr Andrews said of the article: "It's a satire in the tradition of Jonathan Swift's 'A Modest Proposal' and, as such, I do not see any cause for persons to be offended."

The 1729 essay suggested the impoverished Irish could ease their economic troubles by selling their children as food for the rich.

SOURCE

Gillard is a heartless bitch

By diverting billions into her NBN white elephant she has condemned to death hundreds of people who might have been saved had the money been spent on upgrading our dangerous roads

The death of Margaret Thatcher demonstrates the double standards among sections of the left. In Britain, Thatcher-haters are running an online campaign to push the song Ding Dong! The Witch Is Dead to the top of the charts. Apparently it's acceptable to brand Britain's first female prime minister, and its longest-serving leader in the 20th century, as a "witch".

In Australia the word usage has been even more offensive. Last Wednesday The Age ran an opinion piece by Michael Lynch. He wrote that "for everyone who painted her [Thatcher] as a dynamic moderniser … there was another who regarded her as a heartless bitch". Lynch made it clear that he was in the latter category.

So it seems it's OK to use the "b" word with respect to the conservative Thatcher. This would be unacceptable - and properly so - if such a term of abuse was used against a leading social democratic politician like Julia Gillard.

And then there is the act of celebration. When Q&A presenter Tony Jones announced on the program last week that Thatcher had died, visiting academic Brooke Magnanti immediately interjected: "And me with no champagne". It is understandable why the likes of Magnanti want to criticise Thatcher and her legacy. However, it is scarcely a triumph when a political enemy dies at the advanced age of 87.

Thatcher's death has ushered in a moment of fool-headedness among the left. Eco-catastrophists, who warn about global warming, have condemned Thatcher for presiding over the closing of dirty and inefficient coal mines in northern England and Wales in the 1980s. Yet it was these closures which made it possible for Britain to meet its emission targets under the Kyoto agreement.

Then there are the leftists who have depicted Thatcher as a war-monger because in 1982 she refused to accept the invasion of the Falkland Islands, which is British territory, by Argentina. This despite the fact that, at the time, Argentina was ruled by a corrupt right-wing junta.

Glenda Jackson, former actor and now left-wing Labour parliamentarian, used the time allocated in the House of Commons for tributes to Thatcher to declare: "The first prime minister denoted by female gender. OK. But a woman? Not on my terms." So, according to Jackson, Thatcher was not a woman because she did not fit a leftist feminist stereotype.

Thatcher was admired by many because she stood up to the communist totalitarian dictators in the Soviet Union, to General Galtieri in Argentina, to Colonel Gaddafi in Libya, to the violence-prone thugs who ran the Provisional Irish Republican Army at the time and job-destroying militant union leaders.

On Insiders last Sunday, David Marr referred to Thatcher as a "notorious racist". There is no evidence for this. She was a strong supporter of the rights of Asians in Hong Kong and of Muslim Bosnians in the former Yugoslavia. Thatcher may have been right or wrong on the efficacy of imposing sanctions on South Africa during the apartheid regime. But she worked hard privately to get Nelson Mandela out of prison and he visited Thatcher at 10 Downing Street to express thanks for her efforts on his behalf.

SOURCE





Welfare tragic for aborigines, says black activist


And he really is black. unlike the white "Aborigines" that the Australian media usually favour

ABORIGINAL leader Noel Pearson says welfare entitlement has been "a tragic disability" for his people.

Mr Pearson has backed comments by indigenous academic Marcia Langton that a sense of entitlement had poisoned Aboriginal society.  "It's been a tragic disability," he told ABC TV on Monday.

"The flipside of the opening up of the doors of citizenship to our people, was the provision of welfare. What should have been provided was opportunities to engage in ... the mainstream economy."  Australia was now "reaping that tragedy".

He also echoed Professor Langton's statements about mining being a quiet revolution for indigenous people.

"The revolution she is talking about is one that is absolutely tectonically happening," he said, adding that it was a strange irony.

Mr Pearson reflected on his "bitter" negotiations with Rio Tinto in his early years of work in the Cape York and how the changed paradigm was now creating a new Aboriginal middle class.

"We've got to embrace Aboriginal success," he said.  "Money and materialism shouldn't be an anathema to Aboriginal people."

He said indigenous people needed to be striving for a better life.

"We still haven't gotten out of the mindset of Aboriginal people being the poor, benighted victims in Australian society," Mr Pearson said.

Mr Pearson is frustrated his far north Queensland Cape York welfare reform trials had not been able to achieve home ownership for any indigenous people in the trial communities.

"There are complexities of home ownership on Aboriginal land involving tenure," he said.

"Many of the Aboriginal people in these communities earn full-time wages, work for adjacent mining companies, but they can't own a home on their own land."

The federal government was yet to heed his message that the focus on social housing should move to home ownership, Mr Pearson said.

The trials, under way in Coen, Aurukun, Mossman Gorge and Hope Vale, aim to restore local indigenous authority and improve living conditions and the local economy.

SOURCE






Going, going... Gonski?

NOT one state has committed to the Federal Government's plan for education reform.

While some states have indicated in principal agreement to the national plan, noe of the premiers hve said they would sign up at Friday's Council of Australian Government's meeting.

This is despite the Commonwealth's offer to double every dollar spent by the states to reach a targeted increase of $14.5 billion over the next six years.

Labor premiers have joined a chorus of criticism over how the Gonski reforms are being implemented, as Western Australia insists it will reject the proposed changes.

With no national agreement, the Government will negotiate with individual states to implement the reforms, a situation the Federal Opposition describes as a fiasco.

"The idea that we would have different states being treated differently by the Commonwealth is anathema to anyone in education sector and to the coalition and if the Prime Minister continues down that track she will demonstrate that she has finally lost the plot," said opposition education spokesman Christopher Pyne.

Mr Pyne also confirmed that if agreement were reached at COAG, the Coalition would not repeal any changes to education funding should it win Government.

A national agreement is increasingly unlikely, however, Labor Premier Jay Weatherill saying yesterday that he believed South Australia deserved a bigger share of the funding and that "there's been no deal done".

"This negotiation about Gonski and whole range of other issues is a very substantial discussion and it is not concluded," Mr Weatherill said.

"There is a long way to travel and we will be protecting South Australia's interests in those negotiations."

The premiers of Queensland, NSW and Victoria remained uncommitted and said any increase in education funding would mean cuts to their state budgets.

Outspoken Liberal Premier Colin Barnett said the "grossly unfair" proposal would see a reduction in spending on schools in Western Australia.

Dr Ken Boston, former director general of the NSW Department of Education and one of the five member Gonski Review panel, said even if Western Australia opted out of the agreement, the state would be able to sign up to it later.

"We never envisaged that every state had to adopt it at the same time," Dr Boston told News Ltd.

Meanwhile, universities have continued their criticism of Government plans to move $2.3 billion from tertiary education and $500 million in tax breaks for education expenses into schools funding.

Universities Australia Chief Executive Officer Belinda Robinson warned the deep cuts would likely deter disadvantaged students - those whom the Gonski review is seeking to support - from taking up tertiary studies.

"It will make it more difficult for some students," Ms Robinson said of the cuts which include scrapping scholarships for poorer students.

"It's going to affect those students who are probably most needy of having some support of being able to take themselves on this higher education path."

SOURCE



Another triumph of multiculturalism

The article that originally appeared here under the heading above is no longer appearing in its original source at the Daily Telegraph. I have now deleted it here also. 

South Australian stores Foodland, IGA to get troubled food maker Spring Gully out of a pickle

Makers of Beerenberg tomato sauce, Bickford's lime cordial, Spring Gully mustard pickles etc. 

Coles and Woolworths are the oligopolists of the Australian grocery trade so largely have monopsony powers.  It may therefore not be economically irrational to support products not offered by them



FOODLAND and IGA are mobilising to support troubled Spring Gully Foods as independent grocers operating under "The Mighty South Aussies" banner rally to help the family-owned SA company in its hour of need.

The brands, which represent more than 200 stores in South Australia, will dramatically increase their volume of Spring Gully products to help boost the fortunes of the 67-year-old SA firm which has gone into voluntary administration.

Foodland chairman Roger Drake told the Sunday Mail the independent chain will also flex its promotional muscle by putting Spring Gully products on the cover of their latest catalogue.

"Spring Gully products are walking off the shelves and I like to think it is because the public is supporting a quality South Australian company," Mr Drake said.

"As chairman of Foodland I have taken the onus to increase our volume of product and we will also put it on the front of our catalogue.

"We are owned by South Australian families and want to help another South Australian family company. We will buy whatever stock they need to help them out and won't be increasing margins."

IGA committee chairman Joseph Romeo said the stores would help with displays and specials to try to help Spring Gully survive.

"A lot of our customers say they shop with us because we are South Aussies, and I believe people will get behind Spring Gully because they are a quality SA company," he said.

Wholesalers Metcash which supplies the Foodland and IGA has also swung its support behind the community rescue.

In a bonus for shoppers and Spring Gully, Metcash will cut its margins so Spring Gully receives the usual price for its products, but the retail price will be cheaper.

The Foodland/IGA move comes as the public floods social media urging fellow shoppers to buy Spring Gully.

Spring Gully, the award-winning family-owned company - founded in 1946 - entered voluntary administration on Thursday with debts estimated at more than $3 million after losing contracts with Coles and Woolworths that saw turnover plummet.

Managing director Kevin Webb thanked Foodland and IGA for their support and said the fate of the company and its 43 staff is largely in the hands of shoppers.

SOURCE





Gillard is missing the point about class warfare

Today's poll confirms that the Gillard government remains on track to lose the election due in 153 days. It also shows that one of its main escape plans is not working.

The government thought it was onto a winner when it decided to pitch the old concept of "soaking the rich". It turns out to be wrong.

In a striking finding in the latest Fairfax-Nielsen poll, most voters oppose the government's proposal to increase the tax on superannuation earnings of the people the government called "the very wealthiest".

Specifically, 1400 respondents were asked: "Do you support or oppose increasing taxation on personal superannuation accounts holding $2 million or more?" Fifty-two per cent opposed the policy; 45 per cent supported it. Why?

Pollster John Stirton suggested: "It's the aspirational idea - 'I might have $2 million in my super one day'." One instructive detail was that the idea was not only opposed by older people. Former Labor leader and Gillard cabinet minister Simon Crean said last week of Gillard's election strategy that "she's gone the class warfare".

If so, the Nielsen poll finding strongly suggests that it's failing. This suggests that former prime ministers, Labor and Liberal alike, Bob Hawke, Paul Keating and John Howard were more politically astute than the current prime minister. These former leaders, who collectively presided over a generation of economic reform, all have said that class warfare, or envy-based politics, is dead in Australia.

Under the old economic structure half the workforce was fated to forever remain as employees in manual labour. Under the new structure, blue collar workers are much freer to follow trades as independent contractors.

That is, blue collar workers are no longer limited by union-negotiated wage rates but free to become small business people.

The old barriers have dissolved and the Hawke-Keating changes took Australia "very much in the direction of a classless society", as Crean remarked. Only 18 per cent of Australia's workforce is now unionised; 19 per cent is self-employed.

The Gillard government has missed the point. As Keating said in 2005: "The Labor Party has given up the middle-class, middle-ground, sole-employer, self-employed, small-business voter that Bob Hawke and I generated for it." We see the newest example in Gillard's education plan, increasing funding for schools by taking it from universities. This again plays on the old class concept, that the "working class" will support more school funding while seething with resentment at the pretentious elitists in universities.

But the "working class" family is as keen as any other that the kids get a university education.

The evidence is that Gillard is playing a losing game on an outmoded construct.

SOURCE






Women "having it all"

If boozing and marriage breakdowns is part of "all"

In a seismic shift from a decade ago, family lawyers say more men are pointing to their wives' excessive drinking and drug use when filing for divorce, with an increasing number of husbands being awarded sole custody of their children because of it.

Senior family lawyer at Slater & Gordon, Heather McKinnon, said about 30 per cent of the firm's cases before the Family Court involved substance abuse.

Of these, about half now related to the female partner, something that was "practically non-existent" 10 years ago.

"That's a really huge shift in my lifetime in the job," she said.

"Dads that have applied to have children living with them are now succeeding in about half the cases, and that's because there's deficits in the mother. I think this is a very serious shift."

Ms McKinnon points the finger at so-called "Sex and the City syndrome" - the normalisation of binge drinking among teenage girls and young women that carries through to adulthood.

"If you go to any social setting in a capital city or a large regional town on a Friday or Saturday night you will see young women at the bar downing shots - that is a generational change," Ms McKinnon said.

"Girls are at an early age starting to abuse alcohol, they drink heavily through their twenties and by their early thirties they've become fully-fledged alcoholics. They don't stop drinking when adolescent experimentation is finished."

Neither is the problem restricted to the poorer classes as it once was; two of the four cases Ms McKinnon currently has before the Family Court involve professional women from middle to upper class families.

Head of family law at Armstrong Legal, Peter Magee, agreed there was a growing problem and said court cases may only be scratching the surface.

"Allegations of mums abusing substances is on the rise, but only a fraction of the allegations would ever play out in court," he said.

"You need to have a case that is so strong to say 'I need the kids to live with me', before we will raise it."

The 2010 National Drug and Alcohol Household Survey shows that while men overwhelmingly drink more than women, the number of women aged 20 to 29 drinking at risky levels increased between 2007 and 2010, while girls aged 12 to 17 outdrink boys by one-and-a-half per cent.

Relationships Australia counsellor Denise Reichenbach said drinking was becoming a more common way for women to deal with stress.

"What we often hear about is people who drink get more aggressive so anger can come into it, violence can come into it," she said.

"The children often feel quite responsible for the parent who is drinking as well, and the level of concern for that person gets really high."

There were 48,935 divorces granted in Australia in 2011, with the average age of divorcees falling between 40 and 44.

The number of divorces across the country has fallen nearly 12 per cent in the past decade.

Hit US TV comedy-drama Sex and the City ran from 1998 until 2004 and followed the very social lives of a group of four women - three in their mid-thirties and one in her forties - in New York.

It was widely popular in Australia and re-runs still air on pay-TV.

SOURCE





More multiculturalism at work



DISGUSTED comedy fans stormed out of Melbourne's Hamer Hall when visiting American comedian Tracy Morgan let fly with a sexist rant on stage at the weekend.

An outpouring of anger hit social media after Morgan's two sold-out shows on Saturday night, with guests urging others to boycott future performances citing extreme misogyny and lack of humour.

The controversial comedian has a huge following as the star of hit TV show 30 Rock and was performing at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival as part of a national tour.

His expletive-riddled show was saturated with offensive material about women and graphic sexual references, leading to about 50 people walking out and many more to express their revulsion and demand refunds.

Sue, who was at the show, said the performance "went beyond the gutter".

"It was all sexually related. He said he was a pervert and this is the sort of stuff he liked and then it went on from there,” Sue told 3AW radio.

"It was like a horrible experience.

"He went everywhere, he discussed disabled people having sex, what his experiences were, everything he discussed was just disgusting."

Leading women's rights campaigner Melinda Tankard Reist said she was appalled degradation of women was still considered entertainment.

She said her action group, Collective Shout, would campaign against Morgan's remaining shows in Australia.

"We have government-funded campaigns to stop violence against women and yet this behaviour continues in mainstream popular culture," she said.

"What message is he sending to other men?"

Herald Sun journalist and comedy reviewer Megan Miller, who was at the show, said it was "truly awful" and full of "old lazy jokes".

"I'm up for crass and non-politically correct, but this was just disgusting and not at all funny," she said.

UK comedy guide Chortle has described Morgan as a "pathetic dinosaur with ideas (and jokes) that the civilised world has left behind".

Many international comedians are paid to perform in Melbourne as "guests" of the festival.

But Morgan was here with independent entertainment company Live Nation.

Festival director Susan Provan said she was not aware of the outrage surrounding Morgan's Melbourne shows.

But she defended his inclusion in the festival.

"Tracy Morgan is a very high-profile comic with a huge fan base so is an appropriate participant in a broad-based international comedy festival," she said.

"His solo stand-up is very different from the character we see on TV in 30 Rock and his controversial material has been widely reported on," Provan said.

Morgan's Melbourne publicist, Hannah Watkins, said ticket sales to Morgan's show came with clear warnings about language and subject matter.

After performing in Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne, Morgan's only remaining shows are in Perth today and tomorrow.

SOURCE

Short arse

But not short of bull



The rifle the Chinese navy honour guard is carrying is an SKS



A corrupt organization

Two more reports below about crookedness at  Australia's largest scientific research organization, the CSIRO.  An earlier report was covered on this blog on 11th.   The Green/Left have no committment to truth and honesty.  "There is no such thing as right and wrong" is their gospel.  So they eventually destroy anything they get control of.  And given their support for global warming and persecution of any kind of dissent, it is clear that the Green/Left now run the CSIRO.  See here and here and here and here and here

CSIRO faked documents, whistleblower tells court

A senior CSIRO manager who blew the whistle on the alleged illegal use of intellectual property by CSIRO was forced out of the country's peak scientific body after senior staff convened "sham" job selection panels and faked an official document in an attempt to mislead him, a court has heard.

The Administrative Appeals Tribunal made a damning assessment of the internal workings of the national science institute and criticised two senior executives for giving unreliable evidence in court. One of those men is group executive Calum Drummond, whose position sits one rung below CSIRO's chief executive.

But despite the tribunal's dramatic castigation, the boss of CSIRO, Megan Clark, told a Senate estimates committee in February there would be no internal investigation of the matter, nor any disciplinary action taken against the two senior staff.

CSIRO's treatment of Martin Williams, a highly successful former business manager, may not have been unique. An investigation by the Herald has found that in some sections of the organisation, bullying is rife. In February, the CSIRO announced an independent inquiry would review claims of bullying and harassment, chaired by the former Commonwealth ombudsman Dennis Pearce.

In the case of Mr Williams, whose job "was to keep scientists out of jail" by ensuring contracts were legally vetted, things began to unravel in mid 2008 when the CSIRO division he worked for merged with two others and he found himself without a position.

But instead of following normal procedures to redeploy Mr Williams - a deputy of the former Textile and Fibre Technology division who brought in more than $53 million of research funding over a decade - senior staff gave him conflicting advice, disregarded company policy and convened "sham" selection panels, the tribunal heard.

In one instance, a senior manager, Damien Thomas, sent an email to Mr Williams that the tribunal's Deputy President James Constance concluded was "deliberately false".

The affair left Mr Williams with a severe mental illness and unable to work: "The bullying completely destroyed my health," Mr Williams said.

In a 10-day hearing last year, his case against the Commonwealth's workplace insurer, Comcare, exposed CSIRO's woeful redundancy process.

Deputy President Constance found the "inconsistent and at times ill-considered" advice given to Mr Williams by senior staff a significant contributor to his illness. He made no findings on the panel selection process.

"I am satisfied that the conflicting advice was a result of insufficient care being taken in the management of Mr Williams' situation or of a deliberate intention to mislead Mr Williams," he said.

He also found Dr Drummond, the former head of the merged division, now group executive of manufacturing, materials and minerals, an unreliable witness.

A spokesman for the CSIRO, Huw Morgan, said the tribunal's findings related to the witnesses' poor memory of the events and were not a reflection of their professional conduct.

Mr Williams' duty to authorise CSIRO partnerships could put him at odds with the organisation's scientists, including several researchers he alleges "fell into contract" with the Victorian government using intellectual property not owned by CSIRO.

Mr Morgan said while a funding proposal was submitted to the government, a partnership was never approved or agreed to.

Mr Williams, who has not been able to work since September 2008, said the CSIRO had transformed from a benevolent organisation into a ruthlessly competitive workplace, that was burdened by pressure to generate income.

"I got nothing. I got worse than nothing."

SOURCE

CSIRO accused of more shabby tactics



In late 2004, Sylwester Chyb was teaching at the prestigious Imperial College in England when the award-winning entomologist was presented with an exciting opportunity - becoming a molecular cell biologist at Australia's peak scientific body.

Urged by CSIRO to accept the position and promised he would lead a team working towards discoveries in the area of his specialty - insect neurobiology - Dr Chyb saw a bright future in Australia.

But within days of uprooting his family in 2005 and moving to Canberra, things began to fall apart. Now the eminent scientist is taking the CSIRO to court, accusing it of bullying, deception and breach of contract.  "It was the biggest mistake of my life," Dr Chyb said.

His experience is the latest revelation in a Fairfax Media investigation into the workings of Australia's peak science organisation, which has revealed evidence of serious mismanagement and questionable practices.

There were clear warning signs even as Dr Chyb negotiated his contract. According to his statement of claim, shortly after his final interview, Dr Stephen Trowell, an official in the same division, invited him for a coffee at the CSIRO Discovery Centre at Black Mountain.

"I had never heard of Stephen Trowell, but he claimed to be working in my area," Dr Chyb recalled. "He said, 'Don't worry, if you're unsuccessful, then you can work for me."'

It was only years later Dr Chyb discovered that his appointment had been recommended by external reviewers to the CSIRO to overcome Dr Trowell's perceived shortcomings.

Dr Trowell's comment was troubling because it would have been a significant demotion for the Oxford and Cambridge-educated scientist. After he raised his concerns, the contract Dr Chyb signed had another scientist identified as his line manager. Despite this, Dr Chyb's statement of claim in the Federal Court says that on his first day of work he discovered that Dr Trowell was indeed his boss and would remain so until midway through the following year.

It was a portent of what was to come. He became increasingly upset at what he perceived to be a campaign against him and he contributed to the tension with what he acknowledges was direct language. The funding promised for long-term research into insect chemoreception he says largely never materialised.

In mid-2009 his division bosses refused him permission to accept a publishing deal for a groundbreaking book on the Drosophila, or fruit fly, which is a widely used laboratory model organism. He was not allowed to work on it even in his own time.

In the end it was the breakdown of Dr Chyb's relationship with Dr Trowell that led to his departure. It was only years later that he discovered an external review by international science leaders had made a frank assessment of Dr Trowell's scientific standing.

"The committee considers that although the leader has a track record of patenting and as a CEO of a start-up company … he does not have as much credibility as the committee feels necessary," the document said.

"The addition to this group of Dr S. Chyb, a researcher with a good publication record and interest in insect gustatory receptors is seen as a positive development."

In April 2009 Dr Trowell accused Dr Chyb of intimidating a younger scientist; he was forced to formally apologise a few days later for an email he circulated containing the allegation.

At the end of the year a misconduct investigation was sparked, which led to Dr Chyb's departure. He had been accused of trying to profit from the accommodation allowance CSIRO gave a recruit - he had moved into a studio flat Dr Chyb and his wife owned - but Dr Chyb had expressly sought permission for the transaction. Now CSIRO is relying on this allegation as part of its defence against Dr Chyb's legal claim.

While he was defending that accusation Dr Chyb discovered a discrepancy in the money budgeted for his researcher's relocation on a document which carried his signature. Dr Chyb was sure he had never signed it.

And he was right. An external investigation commissioned by CSIRO found his signature had been electronically forged on to the page.

The investigation against Dr Chyb over the researcher's stay never eventuated. Instead, CSIRO made Dr Chyb's position redundant.

"They painted a picture of no-compromise, blue-sky science," he said. "But [I] ended up working … on very applied projects. There would be no way I would give up my permanent job for that."

Dr Chyb's court hearing is set down for later this year.

SOURCE





Great Green fallacy revealed

Opposition to the proposed natural gas processing hub near James Price Point  in Northern West Australia,  was NOT widespread in the area concerned. 

A DAY after Woodside's decision to abandon its $40 billion Kimberley gas plan and a month after Colin Barnett's emphatic win in the west, a key tenet of an extraordinary environmental campaign can be exposed for what it always was - a great Green lie.

The battle over Woodside's facility at James Price Point was turned into middle Australia's cause celebre by rock stars and Green royalty such as Missy Higgins, John Butler and Bob Brown.

While environmentalists will today be celebrating news that Woodside has all but walked away from the proposal, they can't escape the election result that should finally kill the false notion that the majority of Kimberley residents - including thousands of indigenous Australians - did not want the project to go ahead.

Consider this: in the lead-up to the March 9 election the Greens threw everything they had at the remote seat vacated by Labor's retiring Carol Martin, the first indigenous woman to be elected to an Australian parliament.

Martin, along with the Kimberley Land Council, the Kimberley Aboriginal Law and Cultural Centre, and the Kimberley Language and Resource Centre, which represents the 29 tribal groups across the region, backed the project because they believed it would break the cycle of indigenous welfare dependency, particularly in tourist town Broome, and create jobs.

Year after year organisations and identities such as Environs Kimberley, WWF Australia, the Wilderness Society and the Australian Conservation Foundation claimed the majority of locals did not want the project in their backyard (despite it being 60km north of Broome) and that the original consenting vote among traditional owners was somehow corrupt. However, three of the four parties - the Liberals, the Nationals and Labor - supported James Price Point. The Greens, standing alone, made no apologies for their stance.

Liberal Jenny Bloom picked up 25.7 per cent of the primary vote, Michele Pucci of the Nationals 18.4 per cent, Labor's Josie Farrer 26.7 per cent and the Greens' Chris Maher secured 23.5 per cent. So seven out of 10 people eligible to vote supported a party that wanted the project to go ahead. That is about as comprehensive a vote of support as any proponent of the development could wish for.

The green rhetoric that worked so effectively in the faraway east had the complete opposite effect closer to the action in the west.

According to Newspoll, Green support slowly evaporated, from 12 to 8 per cent, as their Kimberley campaign evolved in the six months to March. On election day they were punished and now hold just one (upper house) seat in the WA parliament, down from five a few years ago.

While Woodside says the green campaign had little to do with its latest announcement, it's hard not to think that in some way it did.

As for the Greens, they must decide whether their role was worth their current political irrelevancy. And the wishes of the local indigenous population for a brighter future have again been shattered.

SOURCE





Wood heater link to heart, lung diseases

But it's "sustainable"

Hundreds of thousands of Australians are endangering their health by the regular use of wood heaters at home.

About 1 million homes regularly use wood-burning heaters, despite links to heart and lung disease. Health and environment experts are calling on the federal government to better regulate their use.

In a submission to a Senate inquiry into the impact of air quality on health, a Launceston lung specialist, James Markos, said there was no safe threshold for the fine particle pollution that resulted from wood-burning heaters, just as there was no safe threshold for exposure to tobacco smoke.

Along with irritating existing conditions such as asthma and emphysema, studies had found that prolonged exposure to wood smoke was an "important environmental risk factor" in fatal heart or lung disease or lung cancer, he said.

At particular risk were those with lung disease, children, older people and those who lived in valleys, where smoke could get trapped.

The inquiry, which holds its first hearing on Tuesday, comes as the Council of Australian Governments environment council released a discussion paper on national action to reduce emissions from wood heaters.

According to the paper, wood heater emissions are a "significant" contributor to particle pollution in Australia during winter. The Australian Bureau of Statistics has found 10 per cent of homes used wood heaters as the main source of heat. This adds up to about 1.1 million wood heaters around the country, with about 25,000 new ones sold each year.

While state governments and local councils have introduced schemes to reduce wood heater emissions and a review of the Australian standards for emissions is now under way, an Edith Cowan University adjunct professor, John Todd, has told the inquiry a national taskforce was needed.

The environment consultant argued that there had been little change in wood heater technology for 30 years, and the government should invest in research to produce cleaner-burning heaters. "This is a national problem," Dr Todd said.

The Australian Medical Association said the "big issue" was that the exact impact of wood smoke on health was not being measured. Its president, Steve Hambleton, said that even though average air quality was monitored in Australia, it needed to be checked in specific pockets.

The Australian Home Heating Association already has a proposal to change the national standard for wood heaters, to reduce the particulate matter per kilogram of wood burnt, from 4 grams to 2.5 grams. General manager Demi Brown said owners could also minimise smoke if they used their heaters correctly.

Ms Brown said that governments needed to better enforce compliance standards for wood heaters. She said her organisation had notified state environmental protection authorities several times about heaters for sale that were not certified, or that differed from their certified design. They received no reply or follow-up, she said.

But she noted that wood heating emitted fewer greenhouse gases than other forms of home heating, and provided a warmth no other energy source could rival.

Parliamentary secretary for sustainability Amanda Rishworth said the government was participating in the inquiry and would respond to its findings.

SOURCE







Time for next generation Disability Benefits reform

The recent reforms in the United Kingdom’s welfare system have so far led to 878,000 people being taken off the British equivalent of Australia’s Disability Support Pension (DSP). Hundreds of thousands of people are now off welfare because they chose not to have their eligibility reassessed after the Cameron government decided to reassess the eligibility for everyone on disability benefits.

Australia’s government introduced tougher eligibility requirements in early 2012, resulting in the total number of people on DSP drop from 831,000 in December 2011 to 824,000 in February 2013. The DSP costs around $15 billion a year to fund.

Australia’s relatively modest fall, while welcome, is largely the result of reducing the number of new entrants to the DSP rather than moving people off it.

When the Gillard government introduced the tougher eligibility criteria last year, it chose not to reassess existing recipients en masse – unlike the UK government.

Mission Australia chief Toby Hall said about 350,000 to 400,000 people on DSP are capable of re-joining the workforce. Most of these people can work at least 8 hours a week; however, because there are no participation requirements for the DSP, these DSP recipients don’t even have to look for work.

There is enormous untapped potential here. Already, 75% of the economic benefits of the NDIS are contingent on DSP reform, and we need to start looking at the next generation of DSP reform now.

Some of the more ambitious reform proposals suggest carving out those people on DSP who have a partial capacity to work and placing them on a new benefit similar to Newstart. Reforms along these lines would include modest participation requirements and provide a number of incentives to make it easier for more people to move off welfare and into work.

Over the last few years, the government has made it substantially tougher to get onto the DSP. To ensure future prosperity, it is essential to make it easier to get off the DSP.

SOURCE