Camped at Eagle Nest near Sharks Bay WA
You can just see the glow of my laptop where I was working on a clients web sIte in Tassie hosted through Rumcorps.net servers in Dallas Texas. As good an office as any!
Whales off the NW Coast
A pod of about 20 whales come fast from astern and passed either side of the yacht, frightening hell out of us.
Fire on the road
No flames apparent so I hardly slowed down until I had travelled a hundred odd meters with no visibility. About the time I started to panic I came out the other side.
Have a good one
Senate Inquiry stinks
Wow, simply wow!
A Senate public inquiry has been initiated into the Newman government based on the fact that Deputy Premier Jeff Seeney refused to give Clive Palmer preferential treatment and approvals to enable development of Galilee Basin coal assets.
The Greens supported this move and can I say again “Deputy Premier Jeff Seeney refused to give Clive Palmer preferential treatment and approvals to enable development of Galilee Basin coal assets”
That’s funny, I thought one of the Greens major ambitions is to see the coal industry closed down and yet here they are backing a coal baron.
Mmmm… maybe they have other priorities.
The Senate inquiry is due to be released a week or two before the Queensland elections……Gee, I wonder if the whole idea is just to sling mud at Newman in the state election.
Couldn’t be, could it? Pup, the Greens and the ALP wouldn’t stoop that low, would they?
The select committee, which will consist of five members but only one from the Coalition, has a reporting date on or before March 27 next year, very close to the date of the next Queensland election.
Palmer, who isn’t even in the Senate, and coincidently is seldom in the House where he is charged with working in the interests of Australia, not his business interests, had to get his minions, Senator Private Lambie and Senator, The Brick, Lazarus to move the motion for the inquiry.
Senator Lazarus said people were on the phone to him crying about the way [the LNP] are running QLD – sure this warrants investigation?
Yes folks, that is an adult saying that and actually using the sentence in the debate.
As a matter of interest, The Queensland Paliament is accountable to the Queensland people, not the Australian Senate. The whole exercise is setting a dangerous precedence and is obviously a vengence attack on the Queensland LNP by a businessman who has been refused preferential treatment, as he should have been.
I wonder if the Terms of Reference can be broadened to include investigation Clive’s withdrawal of $12 million from a mining development bank account funded by a Chinese partner which Palmer used in his campaign to get the balance of power in the Senate.
A balance shared by Lambie and Lazarus.
God help us.
Subjugation of women not on
Personaly, I think the Niqab, Burka and Chador represent subjugation of women but that’s just me. If the woman is brought up in a 7th century environment I can see how they wouldn’t think of it like that. It’s just life, they would think and that is true from their perspective but the rest of the world has moved on.
In the West we depend a lot on body lanaguage and no way would I have dealings with some one who is hiding their identity for whatever reason. If they choose to hide their faces, then in my opinion they choose not to partake of life in Australia. They can’t enter banks, houses of parliament, shops, Police Stations or any government offices. I’m not allowed to enter any of these institutions wearing a balaclava so why should they get a free pass. They also choose to deny themselves the right to a drivers licence and passport.
They need to move on but in the meatime I think they should be denied services whilst dressed like a bank robber.
New security laws
THE Abbott government’s proposed foreign fighters laws would significantly expand the definition of security and extend ASIO’s powers overseas, an independent watchdog has warned.
She says that like it is a bad thing.
The Inspector General of Intelligence and Security, Vivienne Thom, has raised concerns about the bill to crack down on Australians fighting overseas. People travelling to terrorism hot spots could be jailed for five years.
Under the proposed laws, enforcement agencies will get extra powers to investigate, arrest and prosecute people who support foreign conflicts.
I don’t even want them let back in the country. Cancel their passports and let them stay in the shithole they originally come from. If they truly are Aussie born then jail them by all means, but I’m not sure if five years cuts it.
World’s biggest hoarder
I’m currently cleaning out the back shed. 4 x 3 metres of storage and full, as my wife says, of stuff I keep for no apparent reason (that she can see!)
I think I’ll point her to this guy,. The link sent to me by mate Bob H. shows an auction in the US.
It is unbelievable….go look
Hawkes flogged Swans
The team that has that chap who publically abuses teenage girls has been flogged in the AFL grand final.
Good news.
Terrorist brings knife to gunfight
A MAN shot dead after he stabbed two police officers in Melbourne last night was a known security risk who had used social media to attack Australian law enforcement as “dogs” waging a “war on Islam”.
The 18-year old has been named as Numan Haider in media reports
The Islamic Council of Victoria this morning expressed “deep sorrow” over the incident and called for an “objective” investigation, saying the attack showed the consequences of alienating young Muslim men.
I think it’s more a consequence of a young Muslim men trying to kill policemen and if you want to go deeper you might question where he lives and where he got his radical ideas from. It is this environment that is isolating young muslim men, not Australian society.
Other media reports he was called to the police station to have a discussion about his use of social media and when he arrived he knifed both officers, one severley, and the Victorian policeman killed him with one shot.
Reports also mentioned the AFP policemen was attacked whilst shaking hands with the man.
I would imagine police forces around the country will be reviewing their handling of terror suspects subsequent to this incident. Maybe the phrases “Don’t shake hands with the bastards” and “treat as dangerous” will be mentioned in the text of emails hitting their inboxes.
Death is never a good outcome but a terrorists death is better than the death of good guys in the war against terrorism.
I trust the policement heal quickly.
Leyonhjelm,Day and ALP can’t read
CROSSBENCH senators David Leyonhjelm and Bob Day are threatening to withdraw support from the Abbott government if it pushes ahead with an element of its national-security laws which they fear will allow ASIO staff to torture suspects.
Senator Brandis denied that the new laws would give ASIO the capacity to torture.
“Under no circumstances has ASIO ever, or would ASIO ever, be authorised to torture,’’ Senator Brandis said. “This is not something that any Australian government agency, no matter what the circumstances, could ever do.
“No operation involving torture could ever be authorised under the ASIO Act.’’
Opposition legal affairs spokesman Mark Dreyfus said Senator Brandis had a duty to make it clear that no Australian law could be interpreted as providing an immunity for the commission of an act of torture.
He just did Doofus.
Scotland forever
Even though I’m a bagpiper Scotland has never featured large in my life, but I’ve taken some interest of late as they look to secede from the UK. I note 16 year olds are allowed to vote and although I like the demographic, the boys I deal with at the local college have little political sense. I personaly would be worried if the future of my nation was dependant on teenagers.
I note also that of the 40 plus seats the Jocks have in the House of Commons only one is held by a conservative. Wikipedia gives a reasonably positive take on their economy but as a stand-alone country with a socialist/Left wing voting record I would be less positive.
Let’s see what happens today.
And no, we don’t have to change our flag if Scotland secedes, as some idiot in todays The Australian’s letter page believes. The Jack in our flag is historical and was the flag in use when we became a nation.
I’ll leave the final word on Scotland to PJ O’Rourke who is quoted a s aying “It is a shit-hole … Cuba with chill-blains”
Personally I like the Jocks but I think, on this occassion, they are playing with fire .
AWU wants RET exemption
THE Australian Workers Union has called for the aluminium industry to be exempted from the renewable energy target, a move that will increase pressure on Labor to negotiate a bipartisan deal with the Coalition on changes to the scheme.
AWU national secretary Scott McDine warned that the RET maintained in its current form would lead to thousands of jobs shifting overseas with no environmental gain.
The closure of smelters at Kurri Kurri in NSW, Point Henry in Victoria and Gove in the Northern Territory have been announced in the past two years.
But….we always knew that. Did they mention this fact to Rudd and Gillard as they beavered away at ridding Australia of its cheap power advantage at the Greens bequest.
No, not a peep as I recall.
The AWU don’t care about the environment, they just care about jobs. But before we get all warm and fuzzy about unions looking after the workers, we are really talking about jobs that translate into membership fees that represent power and money for the union bosses.
So with the aluminium industry in serious decline due partly to the ALP’s insane ‘save the environment’ policies that didn’t and wont save the environment, we are still stalling over what to do with the RET.
Rabid dog Palmer, leader of the PUP pack has no investment in aluminium so has nor reason to vote for reconsidering the RET policies.
He’s no help.
No change there.
Supporters of the RET say look at the figures. Electricity demand is down. Yes it is, but might I suggest that part of the reason for decrease is that people are getting stunned by their power bills and are switching off heating and bar fridges and stumbling around in the dark as they minimize lights.
The closure of three aluminium smelting plants has or will impact on that demand as well.
Mind you, aluminium smelting isn’t the only industry suffering from the ALP/Greens policies. All industry is as we chip away at that useful cheap power advantage.
Insane.
UPDATE: Read Alan Moran’s piece at Catalaxy Files where he asks should we phase down or abolish?
Sleep learning
LISTENING to revision tapes during sleep may sound like a slightly desperate revision tactic, but now scientists have found evidence that it may not be such a bad idea.
The study found that human brains were able to process the meaning of words while we sleep, suggesting that it might be possible to train the mind in particular tasks while we lie slumbering.
Sid Kouider, a neuroscientist who led the work at the Ecole Normale Superieure in Paris, said:
“The sleeping brain can be far more ‘active’ in sleep than one would think. Far from falling into a limbo when we fall asleep, parts of our brain can routinely process what is going on in our surroundings.
In 1966 I was studying Bahasa Indonesia at RAAF Base Point Cook and still remember taking a huge reel to reel tape recorder back to barracks, setting it on ‘play’ before going to bed with a speaker under my pillow.
I qualified so maybe it worked but my experience with sleep learning was 9 years before Sid Kouider was even born proving again that what’s new, isn’t.
I might add one had to be young and fit to carry the old Grundig but it did work in a clunky manner. If the Language School is still using sleep learning I guess there is an app for the students to load in their IPhone.
The more things change……
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