Rudd gives advisers bonus despite wages warning

Within two days of Prime Minister Kevin Rudd appealing to Australian workers to hold off wage increase claims, news has emerged that two of his senior advisers received secret bonus payments to bolster their already healthy salaries.

One of the recipients is Mr Rudd's chief of staff, 29-year-old Alister Jordan, who has an annual income of around $250,000 with superannuation and overtime, The Daily Telegraph reports.

Earlier this week, Rudd warned Australian workers not to demand pay rises and to do their bit to help the economy stay afloat.

Speaking at a function at Kiribilli House, Rudd warned that Australians are in for a tough period financially.

"Things will get worse before they get better. I can tell you that 2009 is going to be a tough year," he said. "In these times, employers must do their utmost to protect their workers from dismissal, knowing that these workers will serve them well when times turn good again. Workers, too, must restrain any wage claims."

Opposition politicians branded pay deal a "poke in the eye" to working families.

"Kevin Rudd's secretive pay deal for his senior staff is a poke in the eye to working families at a time when Australians are worried about their own financial security," Liberal Senator Michael Ronaldson told the newspaper.

But support for the payments has come from within Mr Rudd's ministry.

"Approval of personal staff salaries above the band is a mechanism available to governments and oppositions... and should be used in exceptional circumstances," Special Minister of State John Faulkner said.

The annual salary for a principal adviser is paid at a top level of $192,000.

Meanwhile, the PM said yesterday that his government will do whatever it can to assist banks with securing funding amid reports of a $75 billion funding hole.

"In just over one month between September and October the banks’ cost of obtaining credit increased by about five times in Australia, as well as the US," Rudd said. "Since then, credit conditions have eased a little, due to extraordinary measures taken overseas and here. Nevertheless, credit remains restricted."

He added that while Australian banks are in good shape, the poor health of global banks, particularly those in the US and Europe, are causing funding issues.

"Some cash-strapped foreign banks are scaling back their lending in foreign markets such as Australia," he said. "If banks do not allow clients to re-finance as they would in normal conditions, then companies can be forced to sell assets, often at low value. This endangers their financial health and that of the whole economy."

If foreign banks do not re-finance these loans, Rudd said, local banks would find it difficult to fill the gap alone.

ninemsn money 21 Jan 2009

An INSULT to EVERY TAX PAYING AUSTRALIAN by the "KRUD" Government.

Quite simply put a deal where money for mates is misappropriated.

The penalties they oppose upon us, they reward themselves with.

A Law above the commoners.

Cleric endorses beating, rape of wives

An Australian Muslim cleric has come under fire for telling followers they can hit their wives and force them to have sex.

In a 2003 lecture given in either Sydney, Samir Abu Hamza speaks out against forced marriages but cites Koranic verse to justify the claim that it is "impossible" for a husband to rape his partner even if she refuses to have sex — and mocks Australian rape laws that contradict the teaching.

"If the husband was to ask her for a sexual relationship and she is preparing the bread on the stove, she must leave it and come and respond to her husband — she must respond," he says in the sermon Keys to a Successful Marriage.

"In this country if the husband wants to sleep with his wife and she does not want to and she hasn't got a sickness or whatever, there is nothing wrong with her she just does not feel like it, and he ends up sleeping with her by force ... it is known to be as rape.

"Amazing, how can a person rape his wife?"

Hamza also delivers contradictory teachings on domestic violence, initially telling followers not to hit their wives but later instructing them on how to do so.

"First of all advise them [then] you beat them … but this is the last resort," he says.

"After you have advised them for a long, long time then you smack them, you beat them and, please, brothers, calm down — the beating the Mohammed showed is like the toothbrush that you use to brush your teeth.

"You are not allowed to bruise them, you are not allowed to make them bleed."

When questioned about his claims by the Herald Sun, Mr Hamza said male or female partners should be able to demand or receive sex but refused to comment further.

But his interpretations have drawn criticism from prominent Muslim women, who say that no forms of family violence are acceptable under Islam.

ninemsn 22 Jan 2009

When you come to a country you abide ITS LAWS.

It has NOTHING to do with Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism, Scientology or Jedi Knighthood.

Two British Tourists were to be jailed for having sex on the beach in Saudi Arabia.

Under Australian Law rape is ILLEGAL.

Hunting aXXo - pirate king of the Torrents, enemy of Hollywood

To Hollywood executives, he's public enemy number one. To film fans around the world, he's a modern-day Robin Hood. As the internet's most prolific pirate makes his 1,000th illegal film download available to the masses, we investigate the mysterious figure known only as aXXo

At 8.40am on Monday 15 December, a new post appeared on an internet forum called the Darkside Release Group. "Darkside_RG" is a clearing house for internet pirates, a site dedicated to the online redistribution of movies, music and videogames. Its members happily spend their days sharing and discussing their ill-begotten booty on the site's many message boards.

The post in question contained a BitTorrent file - the most widespread and efficient filesharing method on the web - containing an illicit copy of a second-rate Kiefer Sutherland horror film called Mirrors.

Though the mainstream media ignored it, this was a landmark moment for millions of filesharers worldwide: the 1,000th movie uploaded by aXXo, the internet's most popular and enduring pirate. If you already know his name, chances are you've been doing something illegal.

This aXXo may be anonymous, but he (or she, or they) is a global brand. His most popular uploads are downloaded illegally by up to a million internet users per week. His files regularly make up more than one-third of all the films trafficked on BitTorrent.

Most of them are mainstream multiplex fare - aXXo's recent posts include Mamma Mia!; the Ricky Gervais black comedy Ghost Town; and Bangkok Dangerous and Eagle Eye, thriller vehicles for Nicolas Cage and Shia LaBeouf.

The list of the Top 100 movie downloads at The Pirate Bay - one of the largest "torrent portal" sites, which aggregate torrent links from around the web - is littered with his work, easily recognisable by the suffix "DVDrip-aXXo" left like a graffiti tag at the end of each filename. Over at The Pirate Bay's most popular competitor, Mininova.org, aXXo's fame is evident in the "search cloud", a page of the most searched terms on the site, their relative popularity denoted by the size of the font in which their names are displayed.

"Today, the largest search terms might be aXXo and Prison Break, if Prison Break aired on US television last night," explains David Price, head of piracy intelligence at the internet consultancy Envisional. "But tomorrow Prison Break will be a lot smaller, whereas aXXo will always be that size. Over the last two years, he's been one of the top five searched terms on Mininova every day."

Whenever aXXo posts a new film (which can be as often as three times a day) his followers fill the comments boards with praise. He is the lowly film-fan's Robin Hood. Last year, one aXXo fan, codenamed the_dwarfer, composed a version of the Lord's Prayer for his idol, which began: "Our ripper, who art on Mininova, aXXo be thy name..."

nzherald.co.nz 5 Jaan 2009

Full story: here

Antarctica 'melting faster than first thought'

Scientists say Antarctica is melting, and much more than initially thought — spelling big trouble for Australia as sea levels rise.

Scientists used to think Antarctica was bucking the trend on global warming by getting cooler.

Now it seems they got it wrong.

US researchers have pored over data from satellites and weather stations in the biggest ever study of the frozen continent's climate and found it's warming after all.

University of Adelaide Research Institute for Climate Change and Sustainability director Barry Brook says the finding is alarming.

"That's bad news if you live near the Australian coast," Prof Brook was quoted by Nature magazine as saying.

"In some areas where you've currently got housing, you'd probably have to abandon those areas."

He said the sea would penetrate up to 1km inland in flat areas like South Australia's lower lakes.

Scientists now estimate the melting of Antarctica's massive ice sheets will cause the world's sea levels to rise by 1 to 2 metres by the end of the century.

The news comes as a Sydney University proposal to produce a plankton bloom in the Tasman Sea as part of a trial to combat global warming has drawn criticism from environmental groups.

Under the proposal, nitrate fertiliser would be sprinkled over a 1,600 square kilometre area of the sea to stimulate the bloom that researchers hope will sequester carbon at the bottom of the ocean for up to a century.

The UN's International Panel for Climate Change has described such a method of carbon sequestration as "speculative and unproven and with the risk of unknown side effects".

"If this experiment proceeds, the Australian Government's credibility as a protector of the oceans is on the line," conservation organisation WWF Australia's Rob Nicoll said in a statement.

"This action is little more than an attempt to find a shortcut for carbon polluting industries to gain carbon credits on the cheap, rather than through reducing their emissions."

Mr Nicoll said the proposal may breach global conventions and be harmful to marine ecosystems.

"There are no clear international guidelines for large-scale trials of ocean fertilisation and other forms of so-called geo-engineering," Mr Nicoll said.

He added that the experiment "is likely" to contravene the London Protocol for the Prevention of Marine Pollution by Dumping Waste and Other Matter, which will this year establish rules for such activity.

"Until these rules have been enacted we should refrain from attempting ocean fertilisation experiments," Mr Nicoll said.

A similar experiment in the Southern Ocean, which dropped 20 tonnes of iron sulphate, has been put on hold by the German government amid fears over its environmental impact.

AAP 22 Jan 2009

Car washing – illegal, Air Conditioning NOT!

In an attempt to restrict water usage, the Victorian government has implement laws to police such matters. A current law that exists is that it is illegal to wash your vehicle with tap (fresh/drinking) water. If convicted hefty fines follow.

A new business venture that sprung up approximately 15 years ago, was that of ‘car washing’ facilities. The business case defies logic for success, given the then current conditions regarding water usage, although a ‘drought’ was always looming in one form or another, but not to such a publicised extent as it is today. In order for these businesses to flourish the government introduced laws to ban washing your car at home, but NOT at the washing businesses, at an ENOURMOUS cost to the user.

Evaporative Air conditioners are sold, and operated extensively in Victoria. They are connected to the mains (i.e fresh) water supply.

A domestic evaporative cooling system can use 20 – 75 litres (4.4 – 16.5 gallons) PER HOUR !!!50 litres / hour average. This water goes to waste.

A car can be washed at home with approximately 20 litres of water. It is illegal to wash your car at home, BUT NOT illegal to waste 1000 litres (220 gallons) per day (50lit/hr – average x 20 hrs of air conditioning time).

The government has failed to supply enough water for the current population.

NWO - Monetary System

Codex Alimentarius

A must see video.

Toyota’s TuRD down the gurgler

Toyota’s Japan Racing program, against Ford’s FPV, Holden’s HSV, Toyota Racing Development’s affectionately know in Australia as a TURD, with reference to excrement (but more

appropriately the extra vowel can signify Unrelated), as there is no relation to it’s Japanese arm, and this is where the trouble begins.

Toyota ‘outsourced’ it engine developments to a company called Prodrive. In a cost cutting exercise, Prodrive ‘cut corners’ and produced an inferior product.

The whole point of ‘outsourcing’ is to denounce liability once things go ‘boom’, and that’s what Toyota did. BUT it was too late, since the customers bought the product from Toyota, and they BLAMED Toyota, and rightly so.

Although in this particular example this (outsourcing) pertains to the Motoring industry, the same applies to all others, especially Information Technology.

Toyota ‘outsourced’ their I.T services to IBM GSA, but as a result paid many times more for the services that if they were done in-house. BUT the politics of globalization is to ‘outsource’.

Toyota’s marketing department could have chosen an acronym with a more promising future, than a TuRD.

The ‘fish & chip*’ shop managers that were responsible for the ‘outsourcing’ of TRD should be sacked and put on the rice fields.

*- incompetent managers that could barely run a fish and chip shop.

IBM GSA has been known to employ substandard / unqualified personnel as they are cheaper that the qualified one with more experience.

Coke sued for VitaminWater fraud

The Coca-Cola Company is being sued for making "deceptive and unsubstantiated claims" about its VitaminWater line of beverages, which it touts as healthy alternatives to sodas, lawyers for the plaintiff said on Thursday.

Coca-Cola is misleading consumers by using words such as "energy" and "endurance" on VitaminWater bottles and claiming that the drinks reduce the risk of illness and boost health, said the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI), which is co-counsel to the San Francisco man who filed the suit in a California court.

"In fact, according to CSPI nutritionists, the 33 grams of sugar in each bottle of VitaminWater do more to promote obesity, diabetes and other health problems than the vitamins in the drinks do to perform the advertised benefits listed on the bottles," the health advocacy group said in a statement.

"VitaminWater is Coke's attempt to dress up soda in a physician's white coat. Underneath, it's still sugar water, although sugar water that costs about 10 bucks a gallon," said CSPI litigation director Steve Gardner.

Plaintiff James Koh said he used to drink VitaminWater after a workout, thinking he was doing himself good.

"I was attracted by the prospect of getting extra vitamins, but I had no idea that I was actually getting almost a Coke's worth of sugar and calories," Koh said in a statement.

"There's no way I would have spent money on that, had I known," he said.

VitaminWater sells in the United States for about $US1.50 ($A2.27) for a 20-ounce (590ml) bottle.

Twenty-ounce bottles of Coca-Cola, which are sold in vending machines and convenience stores, cost about $US1.40 ($A2.12).

AFP 16 Jan 2009

Nothing about any drink from Coca Cola is healthy. It causes tooth decay and stomach ulcers.

In its original formula it contained cocaine. It was marketed in Australia in 2008 as a natural (healthy?) drink.

It should be taken off the market.

Cocla Cola obtains water for $1.40 per 1,000,000 litres, whilst the public pay 570 times MORE for the same water from their tap.

Bush lost money in meltdown

US President George W Bush says it's likely he lost money in the financial meltdown but he won't find out for sure until he leaves office.

(Illustration : depicts Bush with an Intelligence Quotient of a bonobo chimpanzee with Downs Syndrome)

In an interview with CNN's Larry King on Tuesday, the president said his money was in a blind trust and he last spoke with the trustees eight years ago.

Bush said he had "no earthly idea" how much he and first lady Laura Bush had lost in the market slump, but said he was confident they had lost money.

Asked what part of the responsibility for the financial meltdown rested on his shoulders, Bush defended his decisions on the financial system rescue plan and bailouts.

AP 14 Jan 2009.

Is this story for real or a joke ??

In this time where the American Recession is a manufactured event are we supposed to believe that Bush:

1). likely lost money (to make the peseants feel better?),

2). He nas no earthly idea of his financial investments (highly unlikely).

Here is a person who is supposed to be in charge of a nation, and has no charge of his own finances. The story seem more and more credible as the sentences are formed.

Bush is merely a front man (puppet) for the decision makers and policy holders, and the financiers who really govern America.

This holds true to such an extent that Obama's men behind the scenes are the same ones as Bush's.

Bush fraudulently obtained office.

Speed control could be the absolute limit

Big Brother looks like becoming an even bigger threat to personal freedom on the world’s roads.

A new British program is approaching on-road tests of a system that could prevent cars from exceeding a posted speed limit at any time for any reason.

The system is called Intelligent Speed Adaption ISA. Using the same type of GPS tracking employed in satellite navigation systems, it can match a cars speed to the limit on any road.

ISA is being proposed with three levels of control:
A warning to the driver,
An optional system to limit the cars speed,
Full automatic control to prevent speeding.

Britain is a heavy user of speed cameras, despite research that shows many have no effect on the road toll in areas which they are installed.

ISA is backed by Britain’s Institute of Advanced Motorists, which says the system could (not will) reduce road toll deaths and injuries 29 per cent. But it expects resistance.

“ISA maybe able to ensure all cars observe speed limits provided critical safety conditions are met,” IAM Director of research and policy Neil Greig says “However, even with thses assurances, a deep-rooted concern about Big Brother will have to be overcome.”

He believes one ways towards ISA acceptance would be to promise no speeding fines for drivers who used them.

Herald Sun, 9 Jan 2009 carsguide.com.au section of the newspaper.

What seems as fiction only a few years ago can become a reality today.

An article posted in the UK publication of the Mobile Gazette, titled : UK Government to Shut Down GSM Networks was intended to be an April Fools joke.

It contained information that seemed like science fiction, but is becoming a reality today.

A film titled The Island (2005) : (ref: IMDB http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0399201/ ) is about human beings, been harvested for organ replacement in a 'Utopian Facility' today the real world example is
Prisoners in China, who's organs are being sold on the black market to the highest overseas bidder. A move that IS SUPPORTED by governments.

Fact: The Australian Labour Government of the 80's said that if it were up to them, they would BAN CARS, as it gives the population too much freedom.

At the end of the day, it's all about the control of population movement.

Here we have this realisation coming in by force, under the quite palatable banner,
"to save lives" or "for our own good".