Introduction

Who is this Vulture?

Please allow me to introduce myself. I’m a man of we–

Okay, “Sympathy for the Vulture” is NOT a good start. Let’s try again.

I discovered Tizona shortly after I discovered Andrew Bolt. I liked it. A lot. I considered it a ‘must read’ for my daily intake of blogs and news sources. While I don’t always agree with everything the individual contributors write, I certainly consider their viewpoints to be well-reasoned…unlike those expressed by Global Warming True Believers, Il Duce (Obama) sycophants, faux conservatives, and other douche bags.

Some time back bingbing asked me if I would be interested in being a contributor to The Tizona Group. I thought about it for about .3 seconds before responding that, yes, I would LOVE to. For various reasons it took a while to get me set up as a contributor. But now it’s on.

Those of you who have read my blog, The Vulture Lurks, know that I am a libertarian (small ‘l’), a Global Warming unbeliever, a hater of police and prosecutorial misconduct, and no fan of Il Duce (so named because, contrary to what others say about him being a Marxist, he governs as a Corporatist, in the style of the original Il Duce, Benito Mussolini).

I hail from Frederick, MD, a bedroom suburb equidistant from Washington DC and Baltimore. I have a lovely wife, Deadeye (so named because of her proficiency with firearms); two sons, ages 24 and 22; and I work as a computer programmer (official title, for what it’s worth: Principal Consultant).

I claim to be a “Health food” expert and a “Pain Management” expert, though a quick glance at those two posts will reveal that I’m nothing of the kind – just a coffee addict with a potty mouth.

I probably won’t post often. That day job thingy cramps my style. But I’ll contribute when I can and I’ll do so happy to have the opportunity to be part of this little community.

Blog Wars Redux

The latest in the Blog Wars (you really have to follow the links & comments to get the gist):

◊ Andrew Bolt

◊ Tim Blair

◊ J.F. Beck

◊ Teh PP-Boyz

◊ Lavatory Rodeo

◊ Skeptic Lawyer

◊ … and even Ned the Bear?!?

spot_the_dog sez: "Wake me up when it's over, m'kay?"

UPDATE:  via Margo’s Maid’s Shadowlands another pup, having trouble maintaining interest, succumbs to sleep

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UPDATE #2: Margo’s Maid’s Shadowlands also has some terrific commentary and link rounds-up on the all-singin’ all-dancin’ Goat Rodeo this blog war is morphing into.  “Circle the wagons“ and “Nerd Wars Update.”

Go.  Read.

The Australian Bushfires: An Ongoing News & Comment Round-Up [Updated]

Yesterday Nilk wrote an excellent post here at Tizona on the recent (ongoing) bushfire disaster here in Australia, and because of the number of hits it’s attracted and because of the still ongoing nature of the disaster, I thought I’d put together a collection of links in chronological order to the many updated reports both the Sydney Daily Telegraph’s Tim Blair and the Melbourne Herald Sun’s Andrew Bolt have been posting on this.

I’ll start with the first piece I saw, which was Andrew Bolt’s from Saturday night (Feb 7th) and continue in chronological order with his subsequent posts, then I’ll move on to Tim Blair’s from Sunday morning (Feb 8th) and similarly continue in chronological order with his subsequent posts.

Please please please, feel free to add via comments any other links you want added, and I’ll check back in the morning and add them in, and generally try to keep this updated as a general resource clearing-house, especially for our friends overseas who are touchingly concerned but are some of them having trouble finding very much news coverage or commentary on the issue.

All of the pieces linked below  have multiple updates, links to other news sources, and vivid if heartbreaking pictures, as well as Tim’s and Andrew’s commentary on many of the issues this disaster has brought up.

**List of links below the fold:

VOTE! ABC Poll on “Global Warming” PASS IT ON! [UPDATE: ABC Spits the Dummy] [UPDATE 2: Evidently, I’m a lying fraudster. Either that, or someone needs a new tin foil hat]

Via Andrew Bolt:

ABC News Radio today is asking listeners the following multiple-choice question on its web site:

Is Global Warming to blame for the current heatwave in Australia?

– Global Warming is a myth

– Yes

-No

One of those answers has so far been ticked by 90.4 per cent of respondents. Guess which, and dare hope.

Spot sez … ** Go here to vote, or if that link doesn’t work the poll can also be found here **

*and if you were to clear your cache, you could conceivably vote more than once – the Chicago Way.  Not that you would.  I was just sayin’.

** Screen shots of ABC poll results and updates (and a bit of controversy and more updates!) below the fold:

Fight The Emissions Trading Scheme

In Australia, there are moves to create a tax plan based on carbon emissions, and this plan should be open to intense scrutiny. Via Andrew Bolt, I learned of a campaign to debate the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS).

This campaign is being launched by Jennifer Marohasy, and her plan and premise are clear:

I am the Chair of The Australian Environment Foundation and we are planning an Internet campaign to oppose the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) proposed for Australia on the basis:

1.  An ETS will not change the global temperature;

2.  Will force many clean and green Australian industries overseas; and

3.  Will make Australians poorer; while it is generally richer, not poorer nations that are better able to protect their natural environment.

She’s quite right on all of it. Their aim is to raise $30,000 to create a website and launch a formal campaign to bring more awareness to the debate on the ETS. If you’re able, donate! Donations of more than $2 are tax-deductible, but as always, do your own research into the group before handing over your hard-earned.

The ETS proposed by the Rudd Government, if passed, means that depending on your tax bracket and earnings, there is a chance that you’ll be required to pay up to 90 cents of every dollar you earn in tax.

It’s a fight worth supporting, particularly when you consider how well the environment does do, when there’s enough water to help it grow.

Sherbrooke Forest: Lookin' Good

UPDATE: Slatts highlights just one article that proves that there needs to be a more open debate.

Guess the party: “Look at this, I’m tittie-f..king your mother!”

NSW Police Minister Matt Brown resigned in disgrace last night after it was revealed he had danced semi-naked on a couch and simulated a sex act on a female Labor MP during a drunken party in Parliament House…

A witness told The Australian Mr Brown stripped down to his “very brief” underpants and danced to loud “Oxford Street-style” techno music on a green leather Chesterfield couch he had recently ordered for his office. The witness said Mr Brown “mounted the chest” of Wollongong MP Noreen Hay.

The witness said Mr Brown called out to Ms Hay’s adult daughter during the performance: “Look at this, I’m tittie-f..king your mother!”

–via Andrew Bolt, who has more here.

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UPDATE: BTW, yes – this is the same State government which recently saw another Government Minister jailed for 28 counts of dealing drugs to and buggering young boys…

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Green Awards Poll: Vote Now

Vote below for the candidate who should win News Ltd’s Green Award for the “Could Do Better” category.

Do it Chicago style!

WA Goes To The Polls… And NSW Should

The great Australian State of Western Australia goes to the polls today to either re-elect the current Premier of Western Australia, Mr. Alan Carpenter, or to elect the Opposition into Government.

This election is going to be watched with close attention all across Australia, namely because it’s the first time that a Labor State Government may lose power in more than a decade. This election could result in a shift in political climate if the Liberals win, because they will now hold a position higher than Lord Mayor of Brisbane, the highest position held by a Liberal ever since the Liberals lost federal government in November last year.

The Greens are doing fairly well in the polls, but polls aren’t terribly reliable, and I’m taking the polls in WA with at least a jar of salt. The Greens stand against many of the activities that actually give WA money to run the State, such as mining and drilling, and WA is currently doing enough of both to not only run WA, but to subsidise the less-wealthy States such as Victoria and New South Wales.

WA is the only State wise enough to go to an election, although the only reason it’s going to an election this week is because the previous Liberal leader resigned, due to an overwhelming media campaign after he rather creepily sniffed womens’ seats after they’d gotten up. An election is a good idea, however WA isn’t the State I would have chosen the first election to have been in. I would have chosen NSW.

New South Wales would have been my first choice. I say this because NSW has a government allegedly entrenched in corruption, of which the Treasurer was yesterday fired, the Premier yesterday resigned, the Deputy Premier retires next Monday, and the Education Minister doesn’t look too clean either. All of this, and the NSW electorate doesn’t get to decide who will lead the State from now on, the Australian Labor Party (NSW Division) does, and it’s not looking like they have much to choose from. That’s not a fair and equitable democracy. Bring on an election!

Andrew Bolt, as usual, has a concise analysis.

Alarmists ‘R’ Us

Andrew Bolt‘s column today in the Herald Sun, “Palin Spooks the Castrated Critics,” is seriously worth a read.  It starts off,

“IF only Sarah Palin were just some famous guy’s wife.

“Then, as with Hillary Clinton, the women’s groups and activists could love and pet her like a victim.

“But the Governor of Alaska has torn up the script. Confounded the simpering stereotype.

“Here is a caribou-hunting, moose-gutting, corruption-busting, oil-drilling, anti-abortion, beauty-pageant queen whose husband’s greatest claim to fame is to win the world’s most famous race for snow machines.

“Her power is entirely her own. And it’s the equal of any man’s.”

Equally worth a read, purely for amusement value,  are some of the comments, like this one from reader Brette Steep:

Bette Streep replied to afl
Wed 03 Sep 08 (02:52pm)

I can just imagine Pailin being President in 2009 (a 99% likelihood if McCain wins in November – sick much?)

She’ll overturn Roe vs Wade and subject millions of young girls – like her own daughter – to either have a backyard abortion, keep the baby and resent the child for life , or even dump the baby on the steps of a church!

She’ll happily destroy the environment for oil and kill endangered species for – dinner? – all because she doesn’t believe climate change is a threat – very similar to AB’s philosophy!!!

And no doubt she will send the world into a full blown World War 3 – she won’t be able to PEACEFULLY NEGOTIATE with other countries because she will be too busy with her 5 children and her bastard grandchild! Just simpler to put “invade “insert muslim country here” on her to do list. You know in between decapitating a caribou and attending a PTA meeting!

To even imagine for one moment that some people actually think this poor excuse of a human being is more experienced to run a country of 300 million and have a huge influence on the world affairs is breathtakingly MORONIC!

Funny, but when Biden was nominated to the Dems’ ticket, mostly what I heard was laughter from my fellow travellers on the Right.  What I’m hearing from the Lefties ever since the nomination of Palin is pure panic, at its moonbatty best.

Lovin’ it.

Andrew Bolt watches Kevin Rudd

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Watching Rudd Do Little

Andrew Bolt today has one of the best assessments of Kevin “I Like to Watch” Rudd’s performance I’ve read to date — an absolute must-read.   I’ve pinched one of the best lines for my caption below…

Stupid AFL Suggestion

Ok, here’s the back story. The Australian Football League wants another two teams in the league to bring in more revenue and generate more support for the game, which is for the most part, based in Victoria with ten Victorian-based teams, two in WA, two in SA, one in Sydney, and one in Brisbane.

The interstate teams (WA, SA, NSW, QLD) have always had their successes on the field, and all teams involved have had some great talent. So Andrew Demetriou, the head of the AFL, is entertaining a proposal for a new team based in Sydney’s Western suburbs.

Now, this is amongst the stupidest ideas I’ve ever read. Demetriou is considering having a faith-based team. Yep, he wants to launch an Irish-based team, which would mostly consist of Protestants.

The problems I see with the proposal are these:

1. Where does one find some Irish Protestants in Sydney’s western suburbs? It’s an area with a lot of people who believe in God, certainly, but they’re sure not Protestants.
2. AFL is very much an equalized game. You leave your religion/politics/family heritage/whatever off the ground. On the ground, you play for your team. This idea would mean that now you bring those things onto the ground. Old rivalries will be brought back into the game, and those rivalries are stronger than Everyone vs Collingwood (as hard as that is to believe)…
3. It sets a precedent. What can the AFL then do if there’s a team of Irish-Catholics who want to play, and then a team of Roman-Catholics, and then a team of Buddhists, a team of Muslims, a team of Pagans and so on down the line? If they’ve got the requisite number of players and the start-up cash, the AFL would have a lot of trouble saying no. Then it turns into a religious game.
4. Australians don’t much care about other people’s religions, unless they’re attempting to kill us or force them on us. By turning the AFL into something faith-based, they’re ensuring that it makes it harder for the non-religious to give a crap about the game. And for many, their football team is their religion.

Enough is enough Demetriou. You’ve tried to push the “Super-Goal” idea and it failed. You’ve tried to overhaul the AFL Tribunal, and it’s failed for the most part. You’ve tried to discourage drugs from the game, but in paying 21-28 year olds well over $200,000 a year you’ve made that hard because what else are they going to spend their dough on?

But this, this is your stupidest idea yet, and I hope it backfires on you spectacularly. I do hope the HREOC (Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission) gets involved, because that would raise this from a farce to a comedy.

UPDATE: Further details have come to light, and the team will not be made up of Irish descendants currently playing AFL in Sydney’s western suburbs. It will be made up of a team of Irish players being brought in from Ireland to boost the game’s international appeal. That puts this in a very different light.

Guide to Pink Dots for Observer of Wodonga

How to place a pink dot into a BBCoded blog (such as Bolt’s):  Cut and paste the coding below for a bright pink dot:

[size=6][color=#ff1cef][b]•[/b][/color][/size]

Or the coding below for a bubblegum-coloured pink dot:

[size=6][color=#ff99ff][b]•[/b][/color][/size]

The [size] tag makes the bullet (dot) bigger; the [color] tag gives the colour; the [b] tag makes it bold; then comes the text you want to format (a bullet in this case); then you “close” all of the tags with the forward-slashes.  Easy-peasy.

(A propos Andrew Bolt’s column “Strike Me Pink”)

Strike Me Pink

Limbaugh quotes Bolt on “Climate Delusion”

From the Herald Sun:

A TOP-rating US radio host and political commentator has joined the Herald Sun‘s Andrew Bolt in lamenting the “global climate change delusion”.

Rush Limbaugh, an influential voice in US conservative circles through his nationally-syndicated radio talk show, today quoted Bolt‘s recent column on climate change entitled ‘Doomed to a fatal delusion’.

After quoting the article at length, Limbaugh echoed Bolt’s sentiments, criticising “fraudulent polar bear pictures”, and quoting graphs and charts that claim temperatures have fallen and Arctic ice has remained constant.

Limbaugh has been credited with reviving AM radio in the United States through his radio show, and was described by Ronald Reagan as “the number one voice for conservatism in our country”.

. . .

Hear Limbaugh let rip. On warming and on Kevin Rude. Transcript included. More from Bolt.

Of course this is not the first time one of Andrew Bolt’s columns has captured the attention of American talk-radio guys.  Neal Boortz discussed his column on global warming and other assorted predicted catastrophes, “Welcome to my nightmare,” and Limbaugh discussed another one of Bolt’s other columns back in July ’07 as well (transcript).

Well worth a look & a listen.

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UPDATE: Now Australian talk-radio guy Darryn Hinch has now announced that he has “joined the ‘Andrew Bolt School’ of climate change” (audio).  Who’ll be next to distance themselves from the Catastrophic Man Made Global Warming Hysteria Mob, I wonder.

UPDATE #2: And as reader The Dean of Doonside in comments points out to a Bolt detractor, Limbaugh’s listenership (approx 20 million) is about the same as the entire population of Australia – not to mention that he has just signed a nice new $400 million deal.

UPDATE #3: Bolt is also quoted extensively in a piece on a US Senate Committee on Environment & Public Works site.

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A Column About A Boy And His Dad

This article from Andrew Bolt is uniquely moving.

SNIP! The Bolt Moderators

I love the Bolt Moderators.

They have such a sense of humour. Such a whack of smartiness.

They’re TOPS!

Bolta on ‘Clever’ Kev

On 3AW this morning, Andrew Bolt had a bit of a go at clarifying a statement from one of Kevin Rudd’s latest speeches in the US.

Have a listen here, right at the beginning, especially you furriners who may not have ever had the pleasure of hearing what our new show-pony PM sounds like.

For the record, I’m with AB in that it brought to mind an Orwell quote, but here’s the one that came to my mind:

“The great enemy of clear language is insincerity. When there is a gap between one’s real and one’s declared aims, one turns, as it were, instinctively to long words and exhausted idioms, like a cuttlefish squirting out ink.” (George Orwell)

[L]ong words and exhausted idioms, like a cuttlefish squirting out ink … That’s Rudd-Speak in a nutshell.

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Update: Here’s what Kev actually said – “Therefore, there is, in my argument, on the face of it, a natural complementarity between these two philosophical approaches and a complementarity that could be developed further in the direction of some form of conceptual synthesis.”

Complementarity? Definition from Macquarie dictionary: “. . . a concept which acknowledges that different pieces of evidence relating to atomic systems, obtained under different conditions, cannot necessarily be understood by a single model, thus the concept of complementarity is necessary in order to accept the wave and particle models of an electron”.

Clearer now? Clear as cuttlefish ink…

Bolta For Parliament?

I’m quite intrigued by this.

If Andrew Bolt’s running for Parliament, I better move down to the seat of Higgins, because let’s face it, we need men (or women) like him in Parliament, representing the views of a fair few people and helping to re-energise the Liberal Party with fresh blood.

Andrew Bolt would certainly be a great asset to the Liberals, for a few reasons:

• He’s got a good head on his shoulders;
• He represents a view that has been lost to the Liberals over the past 4 years;
• He keeps himself informed;
• He has pretty good research skills;
• He doesn’t swallow bullshit easily;
• He has a high public profile: “Love him or hate him, you all know him”;
• He has a good sense of humour;
• He has media contacts; and
• He can speak WeaselTalk.

And if this is an April Fool’s Day joke, it’s a bloody good one!

I’m Not Even Going To Tell You…

…what the hell is wrong with this, posted over at Bolta’s.

Its appalling how the US treats its veterans after they are of no further use. The are forgotten. According to U.S. media reports, there are well below 5,000 U.S. soldiers who have been killed in Iraq. However, this data appears to be very misleading. Why? Because many tens of thousands of American soldiers have apparently been killed to-date, as a result of being exposed to radiation poisoning from the indiscriminate killing machines of U.S. military weaponry.
U.S. investigative researchers have discovered an official U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs official, but not well publicized count, of 73,846 U.S. soldiers who have perished as an apparent result of Depleted Uranium based bio-chemical warfare exposure. This exceeds an estimate of 58,000 U.S. soldiers who had been killed in relation to the Vietnam War.
Well over 200,000 American soldiers could be killed by 2010, as a result of the after effects of exposure to U.S. dirty bombs.
Over One million U.S. soldiers have apparently been disabled from Depleted Uranium based biochemical exposure.

april of Katherine (Reply)
Mon 31 Mar 08 (09:17am)

What utter, utter nonsense.

Andrew Bolt
Mon 31 Mar 08 (10:21am)

Once again, Mr Bolt is quite correct.

Pay Attention

This thread at Andrew Bolt’s is soon going to be full of “Sure, Moore twisted the truth, but that’s not lying!” comments.

It has the potential to be either nauseating or hilarious.

A bad day for Inane J. 1, 2, 3… Awwww

At Bolt’s.

Bolt:

Another green does some Garretting of the facts on plastic bags:

Clean Up Australia chief executive Kerrie-Ann Johnson yesterday insisted the impact of plastic bags on marine life had not been exaggerated. “It is a very big issue,” Ms Johnson said.

Asked to identify studies supporting her claim, Ms Johnson said one by the Australian Marine Conservation Society had concluded that 90 per cent of albatross chicks had bag remnants in their gullets.

AMCS national campaign manager Craig Bohan said his organisation had not conducted any such study.

A reader response:

( – image fixed by fairies.)

‘Worse than Hitler’

Just as an update to this post from the other day, ‘Stolen Generations’ listed as ‘genocide’, here are links to two interesting pieces published today on the subject.

Guilt merchants make us out to be worse than Hitler, by Mervyn Bendle in The Australian

Column – Truth murdered instead, by Andrew Bolt in the Herald-Sun

In other matters to do with Aboriginal affairs, Lorenzo over at Thinking-Out-Aloud has two excellent pieces today as well: The Self-Satisfaction of the Epistemically Broken and The social collapse in indigenous communities (which is focused on this publication).