Feb 2 - 2010

Front Page

Water prices going up, "to cover the full cost of supply." This is the default position for a Labor government because it maxes out all spending, including any future fund, then reacts to every bump with a tax increase. No sympathy for all of those who voted for this government with so many examples in the last few years as to how they do things.

Page 2

For some reason the Australian authorities still haven't figured out how things in other countries work. It doesn't matter with the UN High Commissioner says and far less so what we say they will do exactly what they want to do to meet their own  aims. This includes the non-acceptance of returning asylum seekers.

The even greater idiocy of departments involved in this process is highlighted by the case of Abdul Kadeem. Deported in 2003, was then recently arrested for overstaying on a tourist visa. Has recently been arrested for running a people smuggling business. There are so many questions here not the least of which is how did he get a tourist visa? The ineptitude of our authorities is to stunning for words.

In the same report it says that he and his group sent seven boats to Christmas Island, one of which was intercepted. Again so many questions. Did the other six sink? Did they reach Christmas Island offloaded and vanish? Did they drop their passengers somewhere else? Or did the Navy simply fail to spot and "intercept" the other six?

Page 3

Excellent article by Julie Hare on the state of the universities.

The details on the truckie who missed the turn and later died don't seem to add up. These are not the actions of an experienced truck driver.

Page 4

No surprise that a council would not let their staff finish training. The ineptitude of councils is only exceeded by that of our government.

Page 8

To quote the youth ROTFL. Julia Gillard is going to demand audited financial statements on the flood levy funds. The Australian published audited financial statements on the BER. These showed special payments that ended up in union coffers and were never challenged by the government. An audited statement only works if someone is actually following up on it. Why anybody would trust Julia on this subject is beyond belief.

Page 9

Limits on the use of poker machines would "affect the viability of rural pubs and clubs and be expensive to implement." The implication here is that the only thing keeping rural clubs and pubs going other poker machines. These operations used to run just fine without them but now they can't. Either the owner operators are now all hopeless business people or they just don't want to let go of all that nice profit.

Interesting article on the use of dogs to sniff out early cancer.

Page 10

Excellent article by Brett Stephens, not written in Australia, which perhaps explains such a balanced view of the issue.

The comment about the USA looking to implement an Internet kill Switch under the Obama government highlights just where the man, his supporters and the government sits on the political spectrum.

Page 13

While desperately trying not to the authors indicate that there is no link between climate change and cyclone activity. The graph clearly shows a downward trend but there are so many people we hear in media still trying to link cyclones to man made climate change. Unfortunately for them all the science, all of the data, and all the graphs show the opposite.

Strewth finally raises some excellent points. The Sunday Age example is that one of the normal trend that blindly accepts a piece of information without checking. In this case a massive difference in reality compared to what was reported. The main point and one I have raised on many occasions is why the editor and her staff did not make a simple phone call to check. This is the age of unverified news. It now falls on the reader to do their own investigation to confirm.

Page 14

Daniel Pipes is a historian with great knowledge of all things Middle Eastern. that Barack Obama is seen to be siding with the Islamists is of no surprise to those that have been following this issue for some time.

Page 15

The Australian newspaper was the only one monitoring the Gillard BER scheme. As they correctly point out Treasurer Wayne Swan has ignored the waste as has the Gillard government. Linking the stimulus to this project has also been shown to be inaccurate.

Lots of good letters today. One mandatory one slamming Tony Abbott and one completely inaccurate one about climate change deniers. They probably the part about letters being written but the number published pales in comparison to those published from those supporting global warming.