Calling in the Movers

I have been happily blogging here at wordpress.com since 2007 but I thought that I would be staying here forever. however the thought of joining expanding the Ozblogistan family struck me as an opportunity to keep company with some of the more serious Australian political blogs. Which can only be a good thing for the Sandpit and its readers, when you click the link to visit us at the new site I hope that you find there is enough that is familiar to feel as welcome as you have done when visiting here.

That said I’m switching off the commenting here and you will find that you can continue discussion on the most recent posts over there.
For those who have been kind enough to link to the Sandpit please update your links when you get a chance

Cheers Comrades

 

click to visit the new Sandpit

A tax trifecta on the go juice for your wheels

The Greens know that they have Joolia by the short and curlies and now with the announcement of a Carbon tax it is so bloody evident that no one should doubt it:

THE Greens have pushed petrol to the front line in the war over a carbon tax, insisting prices should rise at the bowser as part of the plan to combat pollution.

As alarm grew within Labor ranks about the backlash against Julia Gillard for breaking her election promise not to introduce a carbon tax, Greens deputy leader Christine Milne turned petrol into a flashpoint for Labor by insisting the transport sector should be included in any carbon pricing regime.

Including transport in the carbon tax regime, which is due to start on July 1 next year, is expected to raise petrol prices at a time when rising oil prices — sparked by the instability in the Middle East — are already driving prices higher and adding to cost of living concerns.

Tony Abbott said the carbon tax meant people would pay $300 more a year on their electricity bills and 6.5c a litre extra for petrol, which would add about $3 to the cost of a tank of petrol.

That would make a tax trifecta on the go juice for your wheels. There is already the excise on petrol The GST on the sale and now they are proposing a carbon tax on top of that! Oh and don’t forget that the GST will rise as well once the carbon tax is imposed (just to add insult to Injury) because GST is imposed on the sale price.

But this even more revealing about just what part of the government dog is doing the wagging :

Senator Christine Milne – Climate price agreement 24 Feb 2011

Senator Milne said the climate change committee behind the carbon plan had been the Greens idea and the party had ownership of the scheme “because it’s the one we put on the table ourselves”.

She said while negotiations on the details of the carbon price package had yet to begin, the point of putting a price signal on carbon into the economy was to “drive changes in behaviour”.

“That is why we think transport should be in, and we think the price signal in transport should start to drive that transformation,” she said, adding that funds from the carbon tax could be used to improve public transport in Sydney and Melbourne, the fast train proposed for the eastern states and electric cars.

The thought of having this Climate change zealot anywhere near the levers of power is a truly horrifying prospect and we should all be worried that Gillard lacks the intestinal fortitude to stand up to this OTT zealotry. Ah but that is the result of Joolia wanting power at any price and her hope that she will still have the glory of government

Viva la revolution Comrades!

 

 

 

(Unborn) Human Rights 101

There is a piece at the Punch by Tim Cannon which puts quite a good argument about the issue of abortion. Its good because it suggests that if you are a supporter of  of human rights then you should oppose abortion on the understanding that the unborn are human and therefore deserving as much protection as any other human being:

Dr Shettles is not alone in the medical world in concluding that a human life begins at conception. You might also try pioneering fetologist Sir Albert W Liley. Or geneticist Dr Jerome LeJeune. Keith L Moore? T W Saddler? William J Larsen? These people are experts in the field.

And I agree with them.

But hang on a minute. Can it be? Me – a certified medieval religious pro-life nutter – deferring to the authority of science? God forbid.

I’m particularly interested in Dr Shettles’ comment on humanitarianism. Human rights carry even more sway now that they did when Dr Shettles was penning his outrageous scientific prose.

And when it comes to human rights, I’m going to suggest that it’s the pro-choice view of the foetus that is outdated, not mine. Because to me, the plight of the unborn child is a human rights issue. By contrast, the pro-choice view takes us all the way back to the early 1800s, when slavery was still legal in the United States.

In our enlightened times the very notion that slavery could be legal, let alone widely accepted, seems utterly incomprehensible. But what enabled so many to persist in the abhorrent practice of slavery for so long, was simply that they didn’t think African American slaves were human beings. Beating a slave was like beating a dog – it wasn’t nice, but it wasn’t worth getting upset over.

The cruel subjugation of an entire racial minority was perpetuated not because of widespread malicious intent, but because of genuine indifference to the plight of beings genuinely thought not to be human.

‘What’s the big deal?’ says the slave trader, ‘it’s not like they’re people.’

Tim Cannon

How many times have we heard the “its only a bunch of cells ” argument from pro-abortionists?

While I can’t fault the logic of Tims argument I do tend to think that there are circumstances where abortion can be justified (as I have repeatedly argued ) to my mind this is one of those vexed issues where we have to try to reconcile the competing imperatives. There are no absolutes here but it seems obvious to me that the longer the gestation continues the stronger an anti-abortion argument becomes. The amusing thing is that Tim Cannon , who is a self confessed practising catholic, is arguing his case with out a single reference to the bible or any pronouncement form the pontiff. He is arguing from a scientific and ethical position that would do any atheist proud.

Of course as Tim  is writing for the Australian Family Association so I wonder how long it will be before we see our learned friend writes a reply under his AFL flag of convenience?

Anyway read the Punch piece, its worth the time.

Cheers Comrades

 

Spot removal

What I want to know is why should we trust any promise made by this woman?

Remind me again just how this tax will make any difference to the climate?

Cheers Comrades

Wake up and smell the newly mown grass

I must say that I just  about cackled my self silly when I read dear old George Monbiot’s  latest post at the Guardian.  In essence his whole post was complaining that big business  is using sophisticated technology to have its  positions put forward on internet forums as if those opinions were from “real” people/ He seemed to be suggesting that  up until these corporate agents entered the picture that the net was such a model of personal integrity and that all of the commemorators on blogs and forums  were all what they claimed to be and that they were all examples of what people actually think about the issues.

 

A real person using the internet. Unfortunately we can no longer assume what we are reading is written by one of these creatures. Photograph: Jeff Blackler/Rex Features

Every month more evidence piles up, suggesting that online comment threads and forums are being hijacked by people who aren’t what they seem.

The anonymity of the web gives companies and governments golden opportunities to run astroturf operations: fake grassroots campaigns that create the impression that large numbers of people are demanding or opposing particular policies. This deception is most likely to occur where the interests of companies or governments come into conflict with the interests of the public. For example, there’s a long history of tobacco companies creating astroturf groups to fight attempts to regulate them.

After I wrote about online astroturfing in December, I was contacted by a whistleblower. He was part of a commercial team employed to infest internet forums and comment threads on behalf of corporate clients, promoting their causes and arguing with anyone who opposed them.

Like the other members of the team, he posed as a disinterested member of the public. Or, to be more accurate, as a crowd of disinterested members of the public: he used 70 personas, both to avoid detection and to create the impression there was widespread support for his pro-corporate arguments. I’ll reveal more about what he told me when I’ve finished the investigation I’m working on.

 

Wake up George!!! The   minions of the left have been doing precisely what you  complain about on a less formal basis for all of the time that I have been playing on the Internet. I heard a rather interesting observation the other morning on the ABC ‘s Radio national and in essence it said that rather than being better users of the internet the youngest generation are actually far less discerning than old codgers like yours truly because they are not as sceptical about things they see on the web, the result is that they tend to be more often caught by scammers  and websites designed to con them or feed them false information.

Everyone should be sceptical about anything at all that they find on the web quite simply because anyone can create a page or two claiming anything they please. Heck you could even pretend to be a “family” lobby group with wide spread support and  a broad focus and if your website has the right look and you are a little economical with the truth no one will realise that you are actually a fag hag almost  exclusively promoting Gay marriage on the site.

On the Internet it takes time to build up your gravitas and a readership just as it always has in any other form of the media. The youngest generation need a very serious re-education about the veracity of what they see on the net and a lesson or two about just who they can trust. That is one of the reasons the Sandpit exists.

Cheers Comrades

 

Anyway on that note let me offer our dear readers a little teaser, there are some moves afoot here at the Sandpit that will see some big changes to  what I hope will be  a step up for this humble blog. More on  this soon…

Racism and barely disguised anti Semitism

The thing that I find endlessly amusing about our learned  friend’s criticism of Andrew Bolt is the way that he never  appreciates Andrew’s clear and obvious sarcasm. Its there for all to see if you click through to the original piece that Jezza is attempting to criticise here. Instead our learned friend takes that sarcasm and pretends that it is being said with deadly seriousness.

The very sad thing about Latte-sippers of our learned friend’s ilk is that they have this rather bizarre idea that Islam and the culture it underpins should be immune from any sort of criticism, Or that any criticism of that faith must be both wrong and made from base (racist) motives. Frankly given the way that our Jezza beats the Gay Marriage drum with such vigour I find this surprising. In many Islamic countries our friends of the shirt lifting persuasion face a rather nastier problem than not being able to call their unions a marriage, they face the rope. Yet there is never as much as a squeak out of him about it while he is prepared to pillory any Christian group which merely defends the idea that Marriage is a heterosexual institution.

Isn’t it time that minions of the left like our learned friend admitted that while we should be tolerant of human cultural diversity it is foolish to pretend that templates for  society propagated by people of faith are all equally good?  Especially when those templates are at such odds with the sort of modern secular values that he otherwise argues for with such vigour. Notions like women having equal humanity and the right to retain their clitorises or that we may all love whom so ever we please no matter what their gender may be. Or that we may mock and jeer everyone’s religion without some  nutter blowing us up or other wise threatening us with death  for doing so. Or even that we should not have to be unknowingly complicit in cruel methods of animal slaughter just because some people want to have animals killed as if the last 1300 years have not happened?

This is the problem with that “lets pretend that all cultures are equal” left they end up being strangled with their own contradictions. We all want to see Australian society and its cultural diversity work. I truly love the many types of faces I see every time I stroll through the public places of our cities. It is enriching for all of us to have that diversity but it is ridiculous to pretend that we have change to suit intolerant immigrants. My late father in law once chided his aged mother in my presence because she wanted to speak to him Dutch “this is Australia you speak English here” he said . Now I got where he was coming from, he was enunciating the notion that the onus is upon the newcomer   to fit in, but I also appreciated the way that my wife’s Oma wanted to speak to her son in her mother tongue. You need to have a balance between the different imperatives in play here and isn’t seeking that balance precisely how any culturally diverse society reconciles its differences?

The final “Elsewhere” aside in our learned friend’s post is most amusing because it exposes the the left’s often  ridiculous blind faith  support for the Palestinian cause. There is a sort of irony in this because for those of us who are critical of the left we  see the unwavering  attacks  of the state of Israel under the “anti Zionist” banner as being little more than barely  disguised anti Semitism, sadly for our learned friend he is defending an untenable position because the anti-Semitism of the Palestinians in particular and Muslims in general is very clear and openly enunciated. So accrding to his own logic (if you support racists then you must be racist yourself [paraphrase]) If you support Anti Semites then you must be one yourself…

Cheers Comrades

The earth moves for New Zealand

Reports of the earthquake in Christchurch paint a rather sobering reminder of just how easily the things that we think of as safe secure and solid can crash down around us.

Now nobody enjoys jokes about our Kiwi cousins across the pond more than yours truly but this is no laughing matter :

click for link to source

Donation information courtesy of ScepticLawyer:

Donate online at www.salvationarmy.org.nz
By Post: The Salvation Army , PO Box 27 001 Marion Square, Wellington 6141, New Zealand.
Please specify that your donation is for the Canterbury Earthquake Appeal.

The Red Cross has launched an 0900 Appeal Members of the public can make an automatic $20 donation by phoning 0900 33 200. Telecom is offsetting all charges for Red Cross relating to that number, ensuring 100% of donations go to the fund.

ASB Donations can be made at any ASB branch, via internet banking direct to the appeal account or through ASBs Contact Centre (0800 803 804). Merchant fees for credit card transactions have been waived for these donations. Account details are: Canterbury Earthquake Appeal 2010, 12-3192-0015998-01

ANZ and National Bank branches nationwide.
ANZ branch (account number: 01-1839-0188939-00) or at any National Bank (account number: 06-0869-0548507-00).

Kiwibank
The account number is 38-9009-0759479-00 and the account name is Red Cross.

BNZ Donations can be made at any BNZ branch or online to:
Canterbury Mayoral Relief Fund Appeal Account: 02-0800-0840040-000
BNZ Salvation Army Canterbury Earthquake Appeal Account: 02-0500-0989994-000
BNZ Red Cross Canterbury Earthquake Appeal Account:
02-0500-0982004-000

 

Shocked by this Comrades

 

 

Gaddafi ducks

Just to reiterate the sentiment that I expressed in the Egyptian Rabbit holes post we have the fine example being set by everyone’s favourite Arabic despot Muammar Gaddafi reports of his air force being ordered to fire on the people and some defecting with their planes to Malta yesterday suggest that his regime is all but finished.

Click picture for link

The thing is that I don’t expect that things will really change in states like Libya any time soon; sure there will be different faces in the shiney big chairs of these countries but those Latte sippers who are loudly cheering on the protesters are going to be rather disappointed by this time next year. I’ll tell you why. These country have absolutely no tradition or tendency to democracy or any sort of parliamentary government. What will most likely happen is that there will be the rise of new autocratic dynasties in countries like Libya or there will be a decent into ongoing civil war.
Yesterday I listened with a sort of sad cynicism to the sound grabs played on the Radio National news reports of Libyan protesters begging that “something be done” to protect the people who are being killed by Gaddafi loyalists and thought that sadly these people are on their own. The UN is so often touted as a solution to events like these but that stripey big cat is rather gummy these days and there may well be resolutions but they will amount to nowt. the countries of the west will not risk their troops or their treasure to fight for the people of Libya because they know that they will wear all of the cost and end up being vilified by their own minions of the left as soon as the first caskets come home or they will be accused of “doing it for the oil”. It took Britain hundreds of years to develop a workable democracy where all sides will respect the result and anyone who thinks that countries like Libya can achieve it over night or even in a generation are deluding themselves.

Cheers Comrades

 

 

Did Tricky Dicky Nixon bonk the lying tart?

The tart 'at work'

And should we really care?

Just who the hell can you believe in this saga about 47 yearold AFL player manager Ricky Nixon and the 17 yearold lying tart (hey sorry for calling her that but like shes pretty upfront about that herself) and should we really care anymore?

This has gone beyond controversy and outrage and the treatment of young girls by AFL players. Now it looks like we even have the HeraldSun involved in a sting to set Tricky Dicky up by paying for the girls hotel, getting her to call him early in the morning all distressed like so that he comes around and then the paper films him as he leaves her hotel.

Not that I think Nixon is any innocent here. He doesn’t come across all that believable himself. And if you read between the lines in Caroline Wilsons story from The Age  she seems to be saying that Nixon is a cokehead or something like that and that his lifestyle is out of control.

One thing is for sure – the girl at the centre of all this is a liar and a schemer who admits to stealing others property (including Nixons credit card details and using them to buy airline tickets) illegal filming and setting Nixon and other people up to look like arseholes:

Police had taken her to a city police station, where she was questioned about possible offences including drug possession and secretly filming AFL player manager Ricky Nixon.

She also stole photos of the naked footballers and said she took the photos later admitting she didnt take them but lied to ‘get even’ – after showing photos of their c*cks to the world! This was after she said she was pregnant to a footballer and miscarried but theres no proof of it. And she admits to trying to ’sell’ photos to Nixon (read blackmail) last year when she wanted $20,000 off him otherwise she would release the photos of the naked Saints players he manages – you know, the ones that she stole. She tried to sell them to the media too.

Okay I realise that if Nixon did bonk her then at worst he has taken advantage of a vulnerable mixed up girl. Or at best hes a fool and a real sleazebag who should have been more responsible and kept his johnson in his pants. And if he gave her alcohol and cocaine hes even worse. But … I mean, this girl …. go figure!

I am beyond caring about her and him and the whole thing. What about you?

Im blaming the HeraldSun!

Conception deception

I must say that its nice to see a piece in the paper that reinforces a point that I have been making for some time about the distress that exists for the children made by donor conception, especially if there is either a great deal of secrecy or worse still deception about just how a child has been created.

In fact, the kind of resistance Australia can expect to the regulation of these practices has already begun in Britain where, due to a decline in the numbers donating, there is even a movement, backed by the IVF industry, to introduce anonymity.

Prospective parents place great weight on donor anonymity. The majority of donor-origin children born into heterosexual families do not know of their origins. Most parents pretend that the biological origins of the child don’t matter.

That is understandable; it must be very difficult to give birth to a child within a family where the father has the usual emotional and psychological input and then possibly run the risk of damaging that bond with the revelation that half the child’s physical self, its other 23 chromosomes, really came from someone else.

But it is amazing how many such children feel that something is not quite right.

On such person is Alana S., a 24-year-old writer and musician from San Francisco who has launched a website called anonymousus.org.

She is the child of an anonymous sperm donor and she is inviting parents and children to contribute their stories, positive and negative.

This forum is a first. There are many forums where IVF mums can swap stories about their pregnancies, online discussions on how to get sperm and inseminate oneself (complete with e-hand-books), but until now there have been none about the children born from these techniques.

Why? Well one reason is that for the past 20 years the biotech industry has conspired with the “new family” agenda underscored by manipulative emotionalism beloved of the media, to create the dubious notion of a right to a child, and suppress the rights of the child, even the obvious right to a mother and a father.

Nevertheless, most of today’s donor-conceived young adults not only want a mother and a father, but the right to the knowledge of those other 23 chromosomes, their genetic forebears.

Once nurture was considered everything for children and nature was given very little credit.

Now through genetics we are beginning to understand the fundamental pull of our physical nature and what binds most of us to our parents.

As the piece suggests there needs to be more balance in the way that this issue is considered , at present the whole issue has been framed in terms of the “right to have a child” especially for lesbians and homosexuals, well to be entirely frank I think that no “right” exists without there being some fundamental responsibilities involved as well. On this issue there is an overriding responsibility for the parents of these children to ensure that they are dealt with honesty and given the truth about their heritage.

Its not a dichotomy between nature and nurture when it comes to the children we make its a combination of the two and until we all acknowledge that there are going to be a long line of people who resent the egoism and lies of those who claim to love them.

Children are our future but we don’t have a right to conceal their past to make our present more comfortable

Cheers Comrades

 

 

Jeremy Sear wrong on RSPT mining tax

Jeremy Sear does not understand the mining tax he so strongly supported last year

I’m afraid my not so learned colleague has made a fundamental error on his latest post on the mining tax. According to Jeremy, the RSPT would only result in an effective tax rate of less than 40% on their ‘super-profits’:

If you look at their enormous profits and then subtract 40% of the part of those profits over a particular absurd amount, then they’d only have their full profits plus 60% of the unprecedented extra. Only 60% of a huge amount of money? What would be the point of going on? What kind of investor would participate in such an industry?

 

Jeremy is of course completely wrong: when you factor in the fact that the mining companies would continue to pay company tax, their real rate of profit tax would be up to 56.8% after the mining ‘super profits’ (profits of more than 7%) tax kicked in, as confirmed by Treasury Secretary Ken Henry.

So it appears that Jeremy has completely misunderstood the entire effect of the mining tax. (I assume that he was not being deliberately misleading) In line with his preferred political party The Greens, Jeremy has previously strongly supported the mining tax.

Perhaps Jeremy may now admit that the original mining tax was a bit much, and that the adverse effect on investment for future mining projects was likely inevitable with such a massive tax grab. Such a view was expressed by Access Economics director Chris Richardson, someone who knows a lot more about the effect of taxation on companies, industries and investment than would Jeremy and his cadre of Greens supporters.

If Jeremy still supports the RSPT mining tax, then to be consistent, perhaps he should also support a barrister’s super profits tax. Let’s say, a super profits tax which applies once barristers earn over a certain amount. Unfortunately, Jeremy appears to be opposed to any such notion. It’s easy to advocate that others should be taxed more when it’s not you. 

A little less recently, Jeremy Sear published an article along the lines of “I support free speech BUT not those which are opposed to gay marriage:

I’d argue that publishing an argument from someone like Muehlenberg which amounts to little more than an ad-hominem attack on gay people via insulting some prominent gay political figures is an editorial choice which is not required just because you’re trying to give reasonable space to both sides

That’s a nice way to de-legitimise an article which exposes some of the radical voices behind the move towards gay marriage, and which is a valid contribution to the gay marriage debate.

Jeremy Sear wants to be considered a serious commentator, as his mission to debunk “intellectual dishonesty” on Pure Poison shows. But in order for Jeremy to be respected as a commentator, he will have to gain a superior command of the facts and a more intellectually rigorous approach than his current lazy efforts.

Sperm drought

Well according to the Age there is a sperm drought in Victoria, especially if you are a single  or a lesbian woman who wants to get pregnant.

Frankly I think that this is not such a bad thing when you consider that most of these women probably  want to exclude the men whose sperm they desire from the lives of the children that will be thus created. If they really want children that much then perhaps they should do it the old fashioned way and form enduring relationships with the men who they will need to make the children…

To do otherwise is never fair on the children.

Cheers Comrades

 

Bursting balloons when you don’t have to

I find the idea of anything supernatural at once amusing, fascinating and totally unconvincing. But as many studies have also  found that belief in a higher power are also often efficacious and beneficial to believers. Which is why I am no longer so  militant in my atheism

click for link to source

Its a bit like a grown up belief in Santa Claus; it generally does no harm for children to believe in the man in a red suit and, as any parent will appreciate, when  the joy that comes from belief brings much comfort. So  do the realists who don’t need a deity to validate our existence really  need to use that pin in our hands to burst the balloons of those who need their faith?

Cheers Comrades

 

*BROADMEADOWS BY-ELECTION QUESTIONNAIRE 2011*

There is something against which all of those who seek to find the truth must guard  and that is biasing the questions so that you get a particular result. Of course if you want that particular result rather than having a dispassionate desire for the truth you may deliberately slant the question to achieve your desired result. Frankly I think that our learned friend falls into the later category with his *BROADMEADOWS BY-ELECTION QUESTIONNAIRE 2011* sent out to the candidates.

Anyhow lest look at the questions he asks and see what they tell us about just what the AFL is focused on shall we?

Oh and just to be clear I did email him to confirm that he is in fact the author of this questionnaire and the most that he would admit to is this:

“I was one of the people who worked on the questionnaire, for what it matters.”

Strangely I am unconvinced that anyone else had much input into the scope, the wording or the order of the questions.

Make no mistake the ordering of the questions is significant because it demonstrates the relative importance of the issues raised so with out further ado lets look at each in turn:

 

 

1. Do you support ending discrimination – both by state law and permitted by state law – that harms gay and lesbian constituents and their families?

This is a rather vague start and quite  tellingly that  the first question is about homosexuals and frankly after the reforms passed by the government of Brother Number One  there are are no practical discriminations against homosexuals in Australian law.  However just look at the way that our learned friend has worded his question, he talks about ” ending discrimination” and suggests that harm is caused by it without being at all specific about just what he is meaning here.

2. Although it is presently viewed as a federal issue (depending on how the High Court interprets s51 xxi), do you support marriage being available to same-sex couples?

Second question and once again its about “gay issues”  why he could not just make the question a simple “do you support same sex  marriage” eludes me.

3. Do you support allowing women (including single women) and couples (including same-sex couples) who struggle to have children to have access to IVF?

This is a rather disingenuous question because under the current law there is nothing to stop single women or lesbians accessing IVF treatment if they pay for it themselves. So the subtext here is a desire to see more money from the public purse spent on helping lesbians and single women make children. Further to that our learned friend is mistaken in his suggestion that it is IVF (in-vitro fertilisation) that is at issue here, the more desired service is actually  the provision of donor sperm.

4. Do you support ending the incarceration of children, the mentally ill and those with medical and/or addiction problems?

WTF??? The courts are incredibly reluctant to give any miscreant a custodial sentence or to lock up minors so what is the purpose of this question? It is stupid in the extreme to suggest that  removing the option of detaining any of the above would be a good idea.

5. If yes to 4, do you support measures that will minimise the impact of drugs on families, such as drug injection rooms and the decriminalisation of marijuana?

Here is where the weakness in the design of the questions is very clear indeed. Because there may well be a lot of people who support the decriminalisation of marijuana but object to the concept of drug injecting rooms (and visa versa). The question is therefore biased towards those who are entirely in the “anything goes” on drug use rather than seeking a nuanced response.

6. Do you support giving those who are suffering from terminal illness the right to decide to end their pain through euthanasia?

So he is back to wanting to kill the sick does any one else think that this too is a leading question?

7. Do you support improving public health and education through increased funding?

Hmm its all about spending more public money for our learned friend isn’t it?

8. Do you support an education curriculum that educates children on the subject of religion neutrally, not endorsing one religious view over another, so that children are able to make up their own minds?

The religious faith of any individual comes more from their family and home life and only a militant atheist would pose such a naive question

9. Do you support banning the sale of violent video-games to children by implementing an R18+ rating?

10. If yes to 9, if the nation’s attorneys-general fail to do so, do you support the state undertaking this approach (given that there is no  Constitutional barrier to doing so)?

If ever there was any doubt that this whole questionnaire is our learned friend’s composition then the inclusion of these two  questions should put paid to it.

11. In a housing environment where increasing numbers of Australians are compelled to rent indefinitely because they cannot afford to buy a home, do you support improving the rights of tenants to give them greater protections and stability?

Can any one imagine a more clumsy way to ask a question? Further the question is based upon some rather faulty assumptions, firstly it assumes that all tenants are victims who are exploited by evil landlords and secondly it assumes that tenants never do the wrong thing (like failing to pay the rent or trashing the place). Any laws that pertain to residential tenancies have to balance the needs  of all parties.

An honest questioner would acknowledge this.

12. Do you oppose the Liberals’ plan to reduce stamp duty and thereby in practice inflate house prices even further?

Another loaded question which makes the unbelievably  stupid argument that reducing the cost of buying a house will make them more expensive.

13. Do you support ensuring fair access to decent public transport services for people who live in outer suburbs?

Public transport is only of value to the outer suburbs if it takes people where they want to go when they want to travel so while it is fair enough to ask the question the devil is in the detail and who would have to pay

14. Do you support Parliament reforming the opening to each parliamentary day so that it does not alienate the many Australians who are not Christians, by removing the specifically-Christian prayer?

What is it with militant atheists and wanting to impose their views on the whole community? Sincere prayer  at the beginning of a parliamentary day offends no one.

15. Do you support schools having access to non-denominational counselling services?

Do such services actually exist? Come on there must be some atheists out there dedicated to counsel those who need advice? No ? well what is the point of this question again?

16. Do you support the State Government ending its reliance on religious-based service provision in areas like looking after the homeless providing drug-support services in courts, and providing these services properly itself?

Some thing very similar to my response to question 15 applies here  just what should the government create an instrumentality to do what someone is already doing for the community?

Conclusion

The questionnaire produced by our learned friend’s creature always was a dodgy instrument lacking in any semblance of honesty; for those of his preferred persuasion it provides an opportunity to cheer “right on” and for those who disagree with its position it is a tool for the “gotcha” of politics Just look at the way Jezza score’s the responses  from the one independent candidate when was foolish enough to respond. He is given a -1 even if he fails to answer a question.

Now I fully expect that we shall see a version of this crock of crap sent to NSW candidates and that they will be similarly under whelmed by the naivety of the questions and the way that they are all  so deceptively put and loaded with leftist clap trap.

Cheers Comrades

PS I wonder how the AFL membership drive is going? Have they hit 50 yet? Hmm I doubt it

Soccer ‘the beautiful game’ my arse

Theres more action in the crowd than on the field at a boring Soccer game.

Good news – and bad – comes in threes. Take Soccer.

The bad news for the supporters of the wogball game just got worse. But for us true Aussie AFL supporters – with the season soon to kick off - this is really good news … and tells us what we already knew – Soccer is shit.  

Good news/Bad news #1: Australia loses bid to host 2022 World Soccer Cup. To bloody Qatar!

Good news/Bad news #2: Australia loses Asian Soccer Cup Final. To bloody Iraq! Update & errection*, we lost to bloody Japan!

(*an errection is an ‘error correction’ – new word)

Good news/Bad news #3:  Soccer fans are the most violent says Victoria Police Superintendent

Superintendent Rod Wilson told the Herald Sun that police were reluctant to cover Melbourne Victory games after being assaulted by fans.

Supt Wilson said local soccer fans were the worst behaved because of their violence, anti-social behaviour and lighting of flares.

[...] Supt Wilson said the problems experienced at Melbourne’s soccer games were worse than any other code.

“We are concerned about the attitude of some supporters towards police, they’re certainly showing violent tendencies,” he said.

“Police are being assaulted, police are being reluctant to work the venues because of the behaviour of some elements – and I stress some elements – of the crowd.

“There is resisting arrest, there is generally just a belligerent and poor attitude towards police, and police have been assaulted by fans and there are charges pending in those cases.”

But its the cops fault according to soccer peoples:

Supporters have also rejected Supt Wilson’s allegations, saying they were the victims of over-zealous policing … Adam Tennenini, leader of Melbourne Victory supporter group the Blue and White Brigade, accused police and security staff of being heavy-handed.

“We have seen some very unsavoury incidents on behalf of the police,” he said. “Ultimately we just want what is fair, and to simply support our club.

“Football fans are not poorly behaved but will stand up for themselves when something unjust is being perpetrated upon them.

“Fans do not want to feel like they are being monitored and watched by a firm that has anti-terrorism links.”

Yeah right, the police are causing the trouble and the club employing a security firm to watch over you (like they do in AFL too) is making you paranoid and causing more violence? Give me a break Adam.

Look I do not like to state the bloody obvious but it is pretty bloody obvious to me that there are 3 main reasons why soccer crowds are the worst behaved:

1. Boredom: In what other game in the world can you have a 0 – 0 result? There is not a lot of action out there on the pitch and when and if someone kicks a goal its like “how the hell did that happen?” and the crowd goes nuts.

2. Prissy poofy rules: In soccer you can not even touch your opponent. Thats because its played by a bunch of metrosexual Beckham types who are not real men. This lack of contact and violence on the field means the supporters have to take there frustrations out on the opposition supporters. And they do.

3. Migrants: There I have said it. Lets face it, Soccer is a game that is enjoyed by violent people from violent countries. So what else would you expect? How many times have we seen Serbs & Croatian fans belting the shit out of each other? And Greeks and Macedonians? Imagine if we let the Jews & Arabs play each other – there would be war in Melbourne. They should keep there differences back in there homelamds and not bring there arguments over here. 

Stuff Soccer and bring on the AFL. There is no crowd violence at an AFL game. Unless its a Collingwood one and Collingwood loses. Then we are in big trouble.