Panic! Christian Moral Dilemma!

So Obama got Osama. Wow. Quite the hullabaloo in the papers and such.

The twisted spaghetti of political irony here is so rich, it's hard to know where to start. But I'll leave that alone, mostly. Needless to say, my favourite politcal narrative is making a huge comeback, i.e. "If only the big bad West would stop being nasty to poor Islamic cultures, they would stop attacking us..."

Well, of course. And if only we'd stop spraying water on bushfires, they would leave us alone. Islamic brutality towards others (and itself) began around 1,300 years ago. That's a little while before George Dubya's father was even born (I looked it up).

This particular narrative only seems to be useful when certain people are in power. In 2008 we were told that we were in the grip of conservative evil which must be stopped. Obama will save us from all this horrid warmongering. He's the lightgiver, the peacemaker, the hope bringer.

He will make us cool again. He will bring us free healthcare and pay our mortgage. He will make us popular with Muslims and poets and all the other people who hate us. He will bring racial harmony. He will continue to detain terror suspects without charge. He will carpet-bomb Libya with neither Congressional approval nor any kind of plan. He will order extra-judicial killings via incursions onto sovereign territories...

...oh wait...

So, those various media folks who assured us that Obama would never do those types of things which, personally, I quite respect him for, are now faced with a frustrating irony. Fortunately, they found something with which to distract themselves, and us: The alarming images of 'Murkans celebrating the death of Bin Laden.

You see? Those gun-totin', right wingin' 'Murkans are being evil again. They're celebrating someone's death. That's horrid. Martin Luther King and Jesus told us not to do stuff like that.

Whatever was the personal motivation for those on the fringe who made light of OBL's violent, gory death, I am not able to judge. Who knows, they might have actually been celebrating the countless lives that have been saved by OBL's messy demise.

What I do know is that the media machine will kick back into action- this time to convince us that such bloodthirstiness makes us no different than our enemies. That old narrative must be dusted off, and beefed up.

It must be etched into the hearts and minds of people, especially young people, everywhere. We must lament our own evil and not judge others. Only self-examination and guilt will bring peace (...just ignore all that stuff which proves Obama is not the saint we once said he was)...

One place where this narrative can have a field day is, sadly, the church. Churches can be a veritable smorgasbord of oft-naive compassion, just waiting to be exploited by those with a political agenda.

Christians have a very healthy habit of seeing all people through the prism of the only true equality we have- the equality of sin, and the equality of value in the eyes of God.

We are all forgiven. Osama was God's child, too. Jesus said "turn the other cheek", and "blessed are the peacemakers" and "love thy enemies".Yes. Yes He did say those things.

Osama was one of God's children. He just happened to be one who was responsible for mass murder. Jesus mentioned the word "repent" once or twice, too. Osama didn't repent. So he got shot by some soldiers.

Christians get this, mostly. But then we interprete Western jubilance at OBL's demise as something which renders us no better than the Jihadist brutality we are supposedly fighting. We do this impulsively because we confuse eternal equality with moral equivalence.

A bunch of 'Murkans being jubilant at the death of a mass murderer is as much a Christian non-issue as the cuss word I uttered last week after hitting my finger with a hammer.

It took a 10-year long manhunt to make the USA a little glib at the death of a wanted terrorist. Jihadist glee at the murder of innocents happens every week. Streets and city icons all across the Middle East are named after Islamic murderers and terrorists. Don't get me started on Iran, Syria, Lebanon, Hezbollah, Hamas, Muslim Brotherhood, and a few other places and people including ones currently being bombed by Obama. Here's a tip: Wait two weeks, then google "Bin Laden Street" and see how many hits come up.

You may have missed the murder of the Fogel family at the hands of Palestinian terrorists in the West Bank on March 11th. The media's excuse was the prevalence of the Japanese earthquakes. Fair enough, but I'm going to make the bold assumption that they wouldn't have wasted ink on it anyway. You would therefore also have missed the Palestinian celebration of the murders.

Perhaps you still want to argue that our cultures are equally corrupt and evil and that's the end of it. I've provided a mere snapshot of the evidence. Extremist Islamic cultural celebration of murder has a degree, depth and scope which is wide, far-reaching, and largely unreported by our media. Perhaps you refuse to accept this, and apply God's eternal equality to our harsh moral realities. That's fine. The fact is, we are free to debate this, and that's a good thing.

In the type of society desired by the Bin Ladens of the world, they are not free to do any such thing. Criticism of your own culture and government is the first thing that will get you killed. At the risk of sounding glib, the very fact that we are debating moral equivalence proves that there isn't any.

I'm going to have a risky crack at the Christian dilemma here: God views individuals as made equal by sin, and equal in precious value. Therefore, so should we. Societies and cultures however, are a different issue. In fact the Big Guy Himself was responsible for some capital punishment back in the day, when it came to cultures which celebrated brutality.

Well-meaning Christians might be genuinely struggling with the "correct Christian response" to this violence and counter-violence, as though we have some kind of default obligation to express outrage at whatever cause du jour invades our TV screens, and regardless of how ignorant we are of the important details.

The "correct Christian response" is, if you'll excuse the bluntness, to mind your own business. Literally. You see, when Jesus said all that stuff, he told YOU to do it. He didn't mean for you to go and tell someone else to do it. I think this bit here, from 2 Chronicles 7, is very interesting:

"if My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land.

Note the wording: if MY people...humble THEMselves...turn from THEIR wicked ways. That's us. Not them, out there. Us. OUR job is to testify God's grace through Christ. OUR job is to turn the other cheek. OUR job is to love our enemies.

On the other hand, the job of the US State Department, the CIA, the Marines, Mossad, Shin Bet, the Israeli Defence Forces, the SAS, our Diggers, and all those folks, is to protect our various backsides from terrorists and other existential threats. I'm not going to get into a Christian flap about how they achieve that.

In fact I'm rather grateful for those who are prepared to do unpleasant things on my behalf to keep me safe.

If you want to argue that ... go for it. Let's debate. Until we no longer have the freedom to do so, where's the dilemma?

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Zionist Talking Witch Pants

I couldn't help noticing, while walking past Dymocks the other day, that David Hicks has an autobiography. How utterly unsurprising. I must have missed the big release and the signing.

Do I even need to ask whether the masses would consider a Guantanamo detainee credible?

I give you Anti-Jewish Conspiracy Theory number 3,765,481...

behold, the ZIONIST TALKING WITCH PANTS.

(Released detainee) Walid Muhammad Hajj: "The most common method to wear down the brothers was witchcraft... there were, of course, Jews among the [staff of] Guantanamo..."

"we knew that (a fellow detainee) was under a spell. ... he said to me: '...The birds on the barbed wire would talk to me, and tell me to urinate in the milk. When the guards pass by my cell, the sound made by their pants talks to me.'"

Daily Telegraph's Tim Blair: "When Jewish pants talk to me, they usually just pass on a few investment tips and tell me not to buy retail..."


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Those aren't cross-hairs...

After the Fort Hood shootings in 2009 , it was almost tragically comical to watch as the media found different ways to avoid mentioning the religion and painfully obvious motivations of the killer.

Let's not jump to conclusions, said everbody from CBS to the US President.

"What could it have been?" they implored to ask. of the man with the Muslim name, Muslim faith, who gave powerpoint presentations on the merits of Islamic Jihad, and who yelled "Allahu Akbar" moments before killing unarmed people. Yes, what indeed, geniuses.

Down here, "our" ABC spend eight minutes reporting the murders, without mentioning the M word once.

That same ABC, in the wake of the recent boat tragedy, so desperately tried to hide the painfully obvious fact that "compassionate" laws such as the scrapping of offshore processing, lured these people to their deaths. Instead, they chose to condemn conservative columnist Andrew Bolt for "politicising the tragedy", barely minutes after the bodies washed ashore. Bolt had, indeed, politicised the tragedy...before it happened. He was concerned, rightly, that people might die.

Then we arrive at the shooting of, among others, Democrat congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords in Arizona on Saturday.

How warm, still, were the bodies, including that of a 9-year old girl, before the media was awash with guilt-by-association stories, pointing the finger at Sarah Palin and her "crosshairs" map from a year earlier, and lamenting her "incitement" and that of the conservative Tea Party movement? All, by their own admission, without the slightest piece of evidence other than their feelings?

How soon before our ABC ran a web poll asking (preaching) Is America’s right-wing political ‘hate speak’ responsible for the Arizona massacre? Less than two days.

I'm not even going to dignify the bleeding-heart, vacuous, empty and fact-free emotionalism of associating tough political analogy with the actions of a lone, crazed gunman, who in fact held the political views of someone far from conservative.

Do these Democrat town criers and Leftist intelligentsia even bother with the pretense of logic, consistency or balance any more?

But since these commentators insist that any strong disagreement with their ideals is "hate speech" or "creating a climate of hate", I would like to quote the following:

"I need you to go out and talk to your friends and talk to your neighbours. I want you to talk to them... whether they are independent or whether they are Republican. I want you to argue with them and get in their face."
Sen. Barack Obama, September 18, 2008

“If they bring a knife to the fight, we bring a gun,”
Sen. Barack Obama Radnor Middle School in Wayne, PA, June 14, 2008
Oh dear. A gun reference. Were there some shootings immediately after June 2008 which we can blame on Obama?

“A Republican majority in Congress would mean “hand-to-hand combat” on Capitol Hill for the next two years, threatening policies Democrats have enacted to stabilize the economy,”
President Barack Obama, October 6, 2010
So we're agreed. Taking a stand on political issue can be talked about in combat terms.

“We’re gonna punish our enemies* and we’re gonna reward our friends who stand with us on issues that are important to us.”
President Barack Obama to Latinos, October 2010
Now, this one is particularly interesting. He was not talking about state enemies, he was referring to those who would vote against his healthcare reform or immigration policies. In other words, not only do we want to pass our bills, we want to punish those who didn't help. See the problem there, kiddies?

“I don’t want to quell anger. I think people are right to be angry! I’m angry!”
President Barack Obama March 2010
Fair enough. But when Republicans get angry, they must keep it to themselves. Check.

“We talk to these folks… so I know whose *** to kick.“
President Barack Obama June 2010
Ah, nothing like a good purge.

“Punish your enemies”
President Barack Obama October 26, 2010
See above.

"I’m itching for a fight"
President Barack Obama December 7, 2010

“It’s time to fight for it.”
President Barack Obama October 19, 2010

Here's another pearler from a slightly less prominent source:

"That (Republican Rick) Scott down there that's running for governor of Florida. Instead of running for governor of Florida, they ought to have him and shoot him. Put him against the wall and shoot him...He’s no hero. He’s a damn crook."
Democrat Congressman Paul E. Kanjorski, October 2010

The same Kanjorski now says, in light of the Tucson murders;
"it is incumbent on all Americans to create an atmosphere of civility and respect in which political discourse can flow freely, without fear of violent confrontation..."

In other words "conservatives should play nice and agree with us, so we'll always be in power". Well, that must be what it means. He can't possibly be condemning strong political rhetoric, surely. That would condemn him.

Democrat campaigners used militant target graphics against Republicans. They targeted images of people, as well as district maps. Democrat activists overtly called for the assassination of George W Bush. Prominent TV commentators on CBS, MSNBC and CNN openly wished for the death of their conservative counterparts. Actors called for the violent rape of Sarah Palin, while unfunny talk shows joked about raping her 14 year old daughter. Violent rhetoric? Uncivilised discourse? The list is endless.

But that's different...right? Of course it is. Because their cause is just. And when your cause is just, you can ignore your own rules. Heck, you don't even have to make sense. You can politicise tragedy, providing your politics belongs in the correct group.



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Top Gear Does Jesus

Ah, the bittersweet aroma that is "freedom of speech".

As I was attempting to grow up, I would generally fall into lockstep with the Christian outrage generated by the entertainment industry's increasing tendency to slag off at Christianity, Jesus, us, and our faith in general. More recently, however, I have learned that while we must speak up for the truth, we must also accept that we live in a free society. This means people are free to be irresponsible. A symptom of this is that people will bash easy targets to make themselves famous. Targets like Jesus.

Okay, lets get one thing out of the way for any secular readers unfortunate enough to stumble across this blog. So you don't believe that a) He existed b) He was the Son of God or c) He rose from the dead? No probs. It's a free country. In fact, that would qualify you to be a Uniting Church Minister.

But one would have to assume from a pragmatic review of the evidence that Jesus/ Yeshua/ Issa was a peaceful man whose life was extremely constructive, and inspirational to countless millions. Yet when it comes to scoring cheap laughs or publicity from religious icons, the entertainment elites deride, ridicule, mock, scorn and put down this man, and this man only, with His followers next in line.

This man. Not the "Prophet" of Islam, no. Which is strange, because it's not as if Mohammed didn't give the elites enough comedy material. What with, among other things, him divinely claiming to know where the sun sets (in muddy pools, apparently) and claiming to be virtuous while fiddling with nine-year-old girls. The man whose name is used as a fashionable expletive did nothing as ridiculous. Not even close.

No, and we all know why this man, and not the other. I will spell it out in meticulous detail:

Because the entertainment industry are, collectively, a bunch of cowards. I'm generalising, of course, for the sake of brevity. Not all of them are cowards, just most of them.

Well, no. All of them.

For me, watching TV these days constitutes little more than adding to The List of yet another hitherto-admired comedian, writer, author, entertainer or production who/ which has sold their creative talent by taking cheap, easy shots at targets which don't fight back. All to soak up the adulation of The Crowd, who will laugh and fawn at pretty much whatever they are told to. Comedians like Kitty Flanagan, for example. Such a shame. I loved her in The Sketch Show.

Then, the very same elites apologise for, and even defend, the most unbelievable and dangerous belief system in the world. Because they are petrified of it. They are shaking in their narcissistic little boots.

Let 'em, I say.

You see, when they're done creating the illusion of their own brilliance and fame (and believing it), these elites then attempt to create the impression that by being cowards, they are actually being brave. They will attempt to tell you that by attacking "religious icons" (i.e. Jesus), they face the wrath of those "Christian fundamentalists".

Those Christian what now...? Is this a relative term?

Let's have a look: Recently my beloved Top Gear travelled through the Middle East and ended up at Bethlehem, where they did a parody of the Christmas story. It included a manger, not with a baby Jesus, but a baby Stig.

Personally...? Well, I don't feel offended. Perhaps it's because I don't think Jesus of Nazareth was born in an animal stall, so I only see a parody of Roman/Pagan-influenced human traditions. Or perhaps it's because I've learned to stop being offended, because it's my choice. Either or both.

But now, see the headlines: "Top Gear... sparks anger from (Christian) viewers ", and Top Gear...incurs wrath of Christians...

The story behind the headline? That hordes of angry Christians (two of them, to be precise) have taken to (wait for it...) writing on internet forums to voice their outrage! Not bishops, military leaders, politicians, people of influence baying for blood and igniting the fervour of a willing army of activists...but two people, writing on their computers, at home..

Internet forums!

Two!

Writing!

Using words!

Breaking News!!

Is everybody okay??

When the same entertainers wore burkas, of course, Muslims were insulted, and their reactions were (and I wager will continue to be) a little more...um...tangible. Yes- the fact that Top Gear reminded us of the existence of this insulting piece of barbaric clothing...well, that's insulting to Muslims, you understand.

Kudos to Top Gear for being consistent. They have stayed off The List for one more episode. Which is good, because I'm running out of things to watch on TV.

Now, I won't detail the countless other incidents of violent, deadly Muslim outrage to the most innocuous, insignificant infidel references to their faith. Nor will I mention the more-than 16,500 deadly terror attacks (and counting) in the name of Islam since 2001.

No, I won't mention them, and neither will the people on your telly.

Yes Virginia, the bittersweet aroma of free speech; they are free to bash Jesus and cower from Mohammed, and we are free to call them what they are- cowards. Not out of spite, but out of pity. You see, those who bash the things which mean no harm, and cower from the things which threaten, soon become insignificant and irrelevant. Best to steer clear of them.

Next time they kick Jesus (probably in around five seconds from now) you can protest, write letters, and be offended if you like, but I think it's a waste of time. Because tomorrow, they will still be cowards. Best to focus your attention on those brave enough to listen to truth.

Such a furor! Letters were written, I tell you...!

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Impeach God ! (or Gaia)

Ah, the religious zeal of the Greens.

David Spratt, who authored one of the zillions of preachy climate alarmism books, has written a letter to the Melbourne Age. Being the Age, I'm surprised it's not being presented as an article, written by an "expert".

In any case, he's rejoicing that a volcano is doing what evil humans should have done a long time ago; grounded aircraft.

Eyjafjallajokull may be Gaia's revenge. At the least, we should be thankful for a practical demonstration as to how dependent we have become on industries and patterns of mass consumption such as aviation, which are simply incompatible with a safe climate.

First of all, kudos for writing out Eyjafjallajokull. I admit, I simply copied and pasted it. So sue me. I have yet to hear someone pronounce it easily in any context.

Now, to take his typical Green logic further, another thing which is "simply incompatible with a safe climate" is breathing.

But I hope he realises what the implications are when he fawns over the beloved deity Gaia. After all, Eyjafk, Eyyhjah, Elaj...that volcano in Iceland has spewed out more greenhouse gas in the last week than humanity could in a year. Straight into the sky.

Clearly, Gaia is guilty of a little self-abuse here.


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How to not be called an anti-semite when you actually are

Worship at the altar of....

"We are Palestinian before we are Christian"

- Marwan Toubasi, chairman of the Arab Orthodox Council in Palestine.

Just in case we had any doubts about the true idols of the Orthodox Christian leaders in Palestine.

This comment was made during an uproar about Greek Orthodox leaders being accused of land sales to (gasp) Jews.


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I'd rather be an illogical President than...

Following Obama's quote to ABC news...

"I'd rather be a really good one-term president than a mediocre two-term president"

...Fox's Charles Krauthammer delivers a scathingly obvious piece of logic:

Well there’s a third option he didn’t consider, which is that he could be a mediocre one-term president. ...because mediocrity does not usually encourage the electorate to re-elect you, that might account for being a one-termer.

You know, I would never had thought of that (if I'd kept listening to nobody except Obama...)


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Ramming awareness

Since when did Batman have a garage sale? And since when would arch-capitalist Bruce Wayne sell to a bunch of eco-terrorist clowns?



Sea Shepherd are an anti-whaling group so extreme they are even shunned by Greenpeace. Their founder Paul Watson is a true human-hater. Even worse, he doesn't have a boat licence.

Neither, it appears, do his volunteers.






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Listen to Greenpeace!

No, I haven't turned. I was, however, challenged to an email debate/ exchange with a young AGW believer (and a Christian) who was pleasant, rational, friendly and accommodating, a welcome relief from the shrill green-left preachers. He probably feels the same way about conservatives.

As a result I decided that, on my personal journey, it was time to face the boogey man of "Big Oil payouts drive Climate Change scepticism". All in the interests of fair play, since I finally met an AGW supporter who can talk without cussing and isn't wearing a hemp shirt.

So, I stopped by Greenpeace's website exxonsecrets.org to see what they say, just in case I'm accused of listening to my own conservative echo-chamber. Good ol' Greenpeace. Fair play to them, they've done a lot of work. It's a site to "document Exxon-Mobil's funding of climate change sceptics".

You assume, therefore, that the long list of over 130 institutions, ranging from commerce groups, policy analysts, media watchdogs, thinktanks and science departments, are all recipients of EM's billions. And, naturally, that they are all enviro-trashing, Gore-hating, Poley-Bear murdering Climate denialists.

Indeed, there's a lot of money. I provisionally calculated over $12-15 million in contributions over a minimum 10 year period. That's around 0.00025% of EM's global yearly profit. One could rightly suggest that this figure doesn't exactly betray a sense of urgency on their part, to spread this allegedly corrupt gospel. You'd also have to ignore the fact that Climate Alarmism actually gives them an alibi to raise oil prices. Those poor oil execs, how torn they must be.

But sure, that's a scandallous amount of money. If you also ignore the fact that private enterprise has been funding research or political institutions since time began.

However, there's a couple of real problems. Firstly, half of the listed groups receive no money at all, which makes me wonder why they're on a site dedicated to documenting Exxon-Mobil's funding of climate change sceptics.

Also, thanks to the site's detail, you can find several of these groups with nary a smatter of the wicked climate denialism which Greenpeace are so gallantly proclaiming (I suspected this when, amongst the institutions listed, I often spotted the word university).

It seems Greenpeace are flagging some of these naughty institutions for any associated conservative crime which could be linked to the dire transgression of climate scepticism. Among them are media watchdog groups, legal foundation groups dedicated to protection of property rights, a Racial Equality Congress which has, in the past, been "critical of environmental groups", and some medical gang concerned with malaria vaccinations in Africa.

Malaria vaccinations.

In fact, amongst the donations was $100,000 given to an Environmental program "dedicated to researching new options...which have the capability to substantially reduce greenhouse emissions". For some reason I included that in my above approximate. I wonder how many others I perhaps should have excluded but didn't.

But let's just assume the worst, like you do with capitalism, and that it really is around $15 million bucks. Possibly more, if the Greenpeace researchers occasionally had to return to their day jobs and missed something.

So we get it. Climate sceptics are not driven by a genuine desire for truth and transparency, nosiree. They are all greedy money grabbers. The Green Warriors, on the other hand, are as pure as the driven snow which keeps popping up every time Al Gore is in town to tell us how hot we're all going to get.

Which makes this following episode of follow-the-money, as summarised by the Wall Street Journal, a very inconvenient truth:

Firstly, our friend at the centre of the CRU email scandal, alarmist Phil Jones received, between 2000 and 2006, around $19 million in public grants.

The EU Commission's most recent pass-the-hat-around-for-climate change netted almost $3 billion, and that doesn't include the funds donated by EU member states. They were private donations. Yes, private enterprise has funded AGW.

The US Gov is donating almost $2 billion to AGW-friendly NASA (when don't they need funding??) and two other Climate institutes.

The louder you cry doom, whilst flashing your PhD, the more money flows in. Yours and mine, not the profits of some evil oil cabal.

Meanwhile, the HSBC Bank calculates that over $90 billion (that's billion, with a B) has been raised for (for, not by) "green energy" interests. These are the stimulus funds which will make the green energy divestment/ investment brokerage firm Kleiner Perkins, among others, ridiculously rich.

And the CEO of Kleiner Perkins is..? Al Gore. Just sayin', is all.

Then there's the whole spin-off franchise boom; universities, advocacy groups, and lobbyists. Greenpeace, Climate Action Now, Clean Air Cool Planet, Alternative Energy goups, the entire Australian Department of Climate Change...all hanging out for a piece of that multi-billion dollar pool. Some of it was possibly spent on a website telling us how Exxon-Mobil has funded sceptics.

That's what's been spent. Of course, it will all be a drop in the ocean compared to what can be extorted by Cap And Tax / ETS / Copenhagen deals and the rest.

$15 million vs $93 Billion. Mathematics is certainly a more exacting science than Climatology.

Thanks for the info, Greenpeace.

UPDATE: Another take on who's-in-the-pay-of-big-oil by James Delingpole.

How dare they

I heard an interesting theory recently that one of the effects of the Climate Change craze was that children were being turned against their parents. Subliminally, at least, they would be made to look at their parents and say "YOUR industry, your pollution, your cars, did this to MY future".

I genuinely believed that no reasonable person who supports man-made GW would ever consciously do that. I really, really wish I was right. As if we needed any more proof of the delusional, deranged, divisive, humanity-hating intent of the Green Left:

Recently defeated Greens candidate Clive Hamilton, on an ABC website, writes a mock letter to a child who's father works for, well, just about any industry. This disgusting exploitation of childhood naivete and parental disrespect is downright chilling.

Hi there,

There's something you need to know about your father.

Your dad's job is to try to stop the government making laws to reduce Australia's carbon pollution. He is paid a lot of money to do that by big companies who do not want to own up to the fact that their pollution is changing the world's climate in very harmful ways.

...Deep down your dad knows all this, although he probably pretends he doesn't. ...He has to tell himself these things because otherwise he would feel too guilty and could not sleep very well at night.

...So your dad is not really a bad person. He is not deliberately making the world a worse place for you and all the other kids. But he is telling lies to himself so he does not have to face up to the truth about what he does at work.

I am sure it's hard for you to hear these words, but there is something you can do to help. Why not sit your dad down and have a good talk to him.

...Tell him that you know he will feel much happier inside if he is doing something to make Australia and the world a better place, instead of going to work every day to make it a worse one.

Absolutely reprehensible. Inexcusable.

Read it all here.


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Tony, meet Sarah...

The parallels between the US and Australia are remarkable.

In the "elected" corner: We have two leaders who are smooth talking, have more spin than substance, got elected by appearing centrist but are ultimately left, and who think that apologising for what other people have allegedly done somehow constitutes courage on their part.

In the "opposing" corner: We have two figures who are maligned and even sexually vilified by a mass media who throw away their own rulebook on tolerance in the process. They apologise for their own shortcomings rather than others', don't apologise for speaking the truth, and take a stand on issues rather than skirt around them in constant campaign mode.

The rather savvy Lloyd Marcus sums it up at American Thinker:

We the people are so sick of namby pamby "middle of the road speak" focus group-tested candidates. "Don't say this because you will offend this crowd and don't say that because you will offend the other." For crying out loud, just say what you mean and mean what you say. Show us voters who you are. These are the kind of candidates we voters are longing and tea partying for. And this is why Sarah "what you see is what you get" Palin is a rock star.

We The People. I love those words.

When previously dormant voters see someone of true character, in begins to show up in those not-conclusive-but-compelling approval ratings. It's started happening to Obama. Up to now, Rudd has been shielded by the clear absence of a formidable opponent, or more accurately, by an opposition leader who was actually his clone.

I expect to see that change now. Watch those annoying-but-interesting polls.


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Is that an ETS in your pocket or are you just pleased to see us?

The papers are making a big thing about a couple who scammed their way into the White House and caused concerns about national security.

But enough about the 2008 US election. Closer to home it's all climate Change, climate change, climate...guh... I'm so sick of those two words I am, for the rest of this article, going to replace them with something similar but different.

Time to 'fess up, people. Cubic Centimeters is starting to smell a little dubious. I have been suspicious ever since Al Gore, in his Oscar-winning An Inconvenient Truth, uttered those famous quotes:

This is NOT a political issue,
and
The debate is OVER!

My first thought was; since when did the Academy Awards have a category for "best Microsoft Powerpoint Presentation"?

My second thought was that, when a failed politician says those words, you can be sure of at least two things. Firstly, it's a political issue, and secondly, there should be more debate.

There is actually one thing more alarming than the recent expose of agenda-driven scientists fudging core figures central to the debate on Cletus's Chevvy: The state-run and mainstream media's denial of it.

The ABC and SBS have gone out of their way to avoid mentioning it, other than in passing and amongst the words "popular with deniers", just in case we need reminding that only the fringe of society would dare question the science of Clunker Cashing. They've even made these criminally negligent and corrupt scientists-with-massive-grants out to be the victims.

Well, that fringe is getting bigger. And bigger. And bigger. And it isn't all cashed up by "Big Oil Money". In fact, if you must play follow-the-money, it doesn't bode well for the Crazy Critter Alarmists...

Oh, there is another thing as alarming as those previous two: Our Prime Minister's readiness to put his personal ambitions ahead of the nations' interest. Sure, pollies have done this kind of thing since time immemorial. But the narcissistic fervour which has accompanied our PM's environmental-saviour complex is downright disturbing.

Firstly, there was his messianic rant to the Lowy Institute where he isolated and marginalised anyone who questions Chinese Checkers. So much for ..."those of you who didn't vote for me, I'm your Prime Minister too..." He even named a handful of "deniers", including the (two or so) conservative journalists in our nation's media.

So, if you're like me and don't accept the so-called "consensus", and think that TV and movie stars should just stick to the acting and stay away from the preaching, your Prime Minister just insulted you. He called you a "radical" and accused you of being a danger to your children. And your children's children, and your children's children's...

...etc. I wonder if we'll ever receive an apology for being the "insulted generation".

Secondly, as I have long believed, this PM's real ambition is to be SecGen of the UN. What better way to throw his resume into the ring than to "lead the world" in tackling Charlie Chaplin. To stroll into the Hopenchangen summit as the Pioneer of Pointlessly Taxing the Crap Out of People For the Greater Good.

If the problem was really man-made, our ETS will do N*O*T*H*I*N*G, repeat, N*O*T*H*I*N*G to affect it. Since Captain Crunch is most probably not man-made, then the ETS will simply do a different kind of nothing: Rather than just destroy us economically for no tangible improvement to the problem, it will simply destroy us economically for no tangible reason at all.

Now to expand the conspiracy theories: There are plenty of people who will tell you that Complex Carbohydrates is just a brilliantly co-ordinated alibi to repackage that century-old chestnut of worldwide socialism. They will tell you that socialism has been weighed and found wanting, citing annoyingly accurate reasons such as socialism's 100 years of miserable, abject failure to produce a coherent, functioning society. And the small matter of over 100 million people murdered by it's adherents.

Instead of decrying "Global Governance" theories as being of the crackpot religious right, how about looking to the claims of the global governance cabal themselves? It seems they don't have any inhibitions in laying out these fringe ideas. For the Greater Good, of course. More true confessions here.

They say you must keep your friends close, and enemies closer. Apply the same rule to your government.



UPDATE: The ETS is dead. Kevin will have nothing to take to Copenhagen but his charm.

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Wall bad. West good.

I almost let the 20th anniversary of the removal of the Berlin Wall pass without noticing.

One of the reasons it slips the notice of many is because we've been numbed to the significance of it. With articles like this in the UK's Guardian it's no wonder.

And, with creeping socialism throughout our mainstream politics and media, it's no wonder.

I'm almost bemused to see some influential people reflecting on the euphoria of the Berlin Wall's destruction. These same intelligentsia who constantly champion the very things which put it up in the first place.

Let's break it down into two often-quoted expressions of socialist romanticism (I have actually heard these very things first hand, from "East German" friends):

There was no poverty in the GDR.

There was no crime in the GDR (former East Germany).

Indeed. Poverty is relative. There was no poverty in the GDR because everyone was poor.
And correct- there was no crime amongst the citizens of the GDR. All the crime was being committed by the government.

I was also once told this: Secret State Police? Everyone has them! Australia has ASIO, no?

Difference? Here, our "secret" police protect us from terrorism. In the GDR, they protected the regime from criticism. Using whatever brutal means necessary.

Happy little socialists. A wall mural in Berlin.

If you're like me and you never paid attention when the wall actually fell, and the true significance was lost...perhaps now might be a good time to start paying attention. Better late than never.


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Who can bear terrorism?

If only western society had the such moral clarity: A Kashmiri bear dealt decisively with some terrorists hiding in his cave (and possibly eating his porridge).

I'm expecting the Greens to condemn this act of oppression towards a freedom fighting religious minority group.

Perhaps not.


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Bold Boris

It's official. If a left-wing activist is ever mugged, they'd much rather be rescued by a conservative.


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Who needs God with an ego like this

Off the political rants for now.

Normally my daily drive up Melbourne's western ring road only causes me traffic-related stress. However on this particular morning, I had a whole new reason to laugh, cry and cringe all at the same time.

But first, a preamble: Doctor Francis Macnab, a qualified psychologist, is a revolutionary in post-modernism. When it comes to Christianity, he is full of opinions. The narrative runs to an age-old theme: Only raving fundamentalists would believe in a virgin giving birth, God becoming a human being for a spell, and a guy walking out of his grave after being dead for three days. We all know those things don't happen because, well, I didn't see them.

In fact, Dr. Macnab was behind a $120,000 newsprint and billboard campaign back in late 2008 stating that the Ten Commandments was "the most negative document ever written". It was to promote his views that, among other things, Abraham is a concoction, and Moses was a mass murderer. Free invites to the Jewish community, then.

Plus, Jesus obviously wasn't deity, didn't die for our sins and certainly didn't walk out of the grave. In fact, I think Macnab is ambivalent as to whether he even existed or not, because it's nice to be flexible. God, by the way, is not a distinguishable personal entity but a concept we can find within ourselves through personal reflection and...so on...

This is all fine. It's a free country. The thing is, Dr McNab is a Uniting Church minister. He's the UCA version of John Shelby Spong.

As one commentor on a Macnab article wrote "Just WHAT does it take to get someone de-frocked these days?"

That's a good question, and I don't know. Believing in absolute truth, perhaps? That certainly isn't a great career move for men-in-frocks these days. But, being a "Christian" leader who re-defines what being a "Christian" really is, by tearing up the original instruction manual...well, that makes you a revolutionary. A hero. An agent of change. It means book sales, book signings, the public speaking circuit at smug, academic humanist universities and, if you're really controversial, a spot on the telly.

On that logic, I should be able to advertise as a brothel, and when clients arrive, put them through a course of Valiant Man. Viva la revolucion.

There's a more detailed look at Dr. Macnab here in the Melbourne Anglican.

Back to my fateful trip on the western ring road on this particular day- Doctor Macnab has a new advertising campaign. While the UCA are trying to offload property and send the proceeds to the needy, Macnab has spent (presumably around another $120,000) on these:


Three people listed in order; NIGHTINGALE, KING, MACNAB.

Good to see Macnab has found his inner god.



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Life Panels

The outrage against Citizen Sarah Palin's use of the term "death panels" to describe a provision in Obamacare, continues in the US.

Call the words what you like- a monumental benefit of her using them was that it actually sparked national debate. Not bad for a private citizen posting on Facebook.

Otherwise, the 1000+ page Obamaplan, which hardly any Democrat Congressperson even read, was to be thrust through Congress without consultation with the American people.

What Palin said, paraphrased: " 'Death Panels' we be deciding on eligibility for end-of-life care for your loved ones, and those not considered to be conventionally useful to society". (Note Palin used quotes in her original statement, indicating she was clearly being tongue-in-cheek with the term, using it metaphorically to make a clear political point).

What Obama said, paraphrased: "There won't be 'death panels'. This is scaremongering. There will simply be an independent, arbitrary group, appointed by the government, who will provide consultancy and guidance on critical health care issues..."

Right. In other words, death panels. But spoken with more Ivy League smoothness.

After Obama accused the naysayers of "scaremongering", he then suggested that if we don't adopt Obamacare, "more people will die".

Here's a quote from a supporter of Obamacare:

"Sarah Palin said "death panels". Well I got news for you honey. If we were gonna get rid of useless people, you'd be the first to know" - CNN political commentator Bill Maher.

Charming. The concern for human life oozes from every word. Here's a quote from an opponent of Obamacare.

"(Down Sydnrome child Trig Palin) has proven to me that every innocent life does have purpose, and there is no accident. And I’m gonna choose the creator’s idea of perfection over society’s definition of perfection any day." - Sarah Palin.

OBAMACARE UPDATE: A very salient quote from Dr. Russell Blaylock, a "respected medical professional" (I haven't vetted this source and don't count on the veracity of that description, but it is a widely agreed point):

"One of the things that concerns the legal minds of this country is that any bill that contains arbitrary language can be interpreted after it's passed any way they want to. And in this bill (Obamacare/ HR 3200), virtually every page gives arbitrary powers to the Secretary of Health and Human Services."

As if they needed more czars.


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The Goldstone Echo Chamber

The "Goldstone Report" is out, accusing Israel of war crimes in Gaza, riddled with anecdotal claims, systematically debunked by the evidence, but being gobbled up by the West in a predictable flurry of anti-Israel hysteria.

Sure, one day it will be exposed as the biased, stacked, pro-Palestinian echo chamber that it is. In fact, this has already been done. But nobody will care by then. In honour of this auspicious occasion, I will simply post this cartoon.



It's official, You may now accuse Jews of harvesting organs, drinking the blood of Christian children, or planning to take over the world, and you may do so with impunity, regardless of how many Islamic fascists and their friends in the left use your words to excuse themselves as they murder Jews. Welcome back to the 1930's!


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Wishful vs Lateral Thinking

My disdain for the mainstream info-tainment media is based on a very rational set of concerns.

One of them is that normal everyday people will never truly have the opportunity to consider or debate a relevant public issue, because they will never truly have all the information.

The healthcare debate in the US is a case in point. Following current pop culture trends, it seems that to oppose the Obama Administration's 1,000+ page healthcare reform package, means that you obviously oppose health care reform, want poor people to die, and are a scaremonger.

Oh, I almost forgot: And you're probably racist. Since November 2008, there seems to be a bit more of that going around.

In the real world, as opposed to that whacky alternate dimension to which the media are an effective portal, it doesn't mean any of that. For starters, and unlike the hordes of Democrats trying to sell it, it means you've actually read the healthcare package.

Is this plan to provide more care for more people, or to save money, or both? It can't be both. That's not possible. You can't simply say you're going to provide more people with more health care, and it's going to be cheaper.

While there is much back and forth between the parties on the details, none of which are particularly clear anyway, someone has thought outside the circle.

Someone has suggested that you cannot have health care reform without tort reform.
Medical Liability leads to more insurance. More insurance leads to more cost.

”The medical liability crisis has had many unintended consequences, most notably a decrease in access to care in a growing number of states and an increase in healthcare costs. .." says Dr. Stuart Weinstein, of the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons.

Quite simply, it is too easy to sue a doctor, particularly with pro-bono allowances which make for more ambulance-chasing lawyers. Then, practitioners will move to states where liability laws are less severe, but even then, will shy away from high-risk practices.

Apart from more costs and less services, less people then want to become doctors and surgeons. Logically, now they want to become attorneys. And as I've always said, attorneys are like Idol winners. We love them, really we do. We just don't need any more.

Care standards drop, and therefore the potential for malpractice increases. These costs are spun to the consumer as "high health care costs" when really, they are legal and insurance costs.

To cut a long and litigious story short, the current tort system is estimated to cost the US health system around $200 billion per year.

Talk about thinking outside the circle. Before you can genuinely reform health care, you must reform the tort system. Less pro-bono, more loser-pays. Less frivolous lawsuits. More caps on lawsuit payouts. More rule-of-law deciding genuine malpractice cases, less ankle-biters trying to profit off someone else, for their own lack of responsibility.

I don't doubt that many people have expressed this idea. But when Sarah Palin expresses it, it actually gets heard.

How does a housewife from Wasilla, Alaska, get the White House to remove a major section of the bill pertaining to end-of-life-care and rationing, merely by posting on Facebook? .

But of course, Palin is just parroting. She's just a pretty neo-con reading hate speech from someone else's script, right? Well, sure, if that rocks your prejudice boat. Except she was governor of a state which had caps on lawsuit awards against health care providers, pioneered the “loser pays” system to deter frivolous law suits, and inhibited "quack" court testimonies against real doctors. That's walking the walk.

Using facebook is a stroke of pure genius. It won't stop the delusional hatred of her by the Obamabots, but it will make sure her words arrive at the ears of her millions of listeners complete, pure, unfiltered and unaltered by a delusionally biased media.



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