Tim Blair

Y'see, Terry, your idea only works if the terrorists cooperate in limiting their victims to the people who think they don't need defense.

And let's introduce choice into social programs. Let those who want the government to do charity (social work) take out insurance to pay for those programs.

Thanks to Terry Lane, I have now read the dumbest thing ever written.

Hey Terry! I AM nice to my neighbors, shovel the elderly women across the street driveway after snow storms, bring food after funersls, illnesses,etc; keep an eye on the neighborhood kids, and GUESS WHAT!!!!!! People STILL want to kill me! For being an American! And a Christian American at that!!!! Please give us more insincere, shallow trite advice on how to keep the bad guys away!!!I wait with baited breath!

It looks like you Aussie's could use one or two of America's excess rightwing talk radio hosts.

Baited breath? Eeew.

Debbie, having swallowed cheese,
Directs down holes the scented breeze,
Enticing thus with baited breath
Nice mice to an untimely death.

This was seriously proposed long ago by a sci-fi writer. If you completed the long version of your income tax form, you could select where the money went.

Agencies/programs that did not get funded did not survive. I'd be willing to give it a try.

Isn't it funny how the wanker Left (am I using that right?) is always in favor of choice only for them and the things they don't want to do? Of course, as they keep telling us, they're much smarter than we are and therefore they should get to choose and we should get to be compelled.

Agencies/programs that did not get funded did not survive. I'd be willing to give it a try.

It could work if the choice is given on every program (welfare, social security, medicare...). There would also need to be a mechanism to prevent sudden periods of underfunding, just because we don't like what the EPA is doing today doesn't mean it shoulding exist. The system would need to direct funding and not be absolute. You need to consider historical patterns, have a absolute tax base, and a matching system.

Biggest problem would be placing fair restrictions on advertising/campaigning and enforcing fiducial responsibility.

A journalist who is paid (in part, at least) by the involuntary donations of Australian citizens has just seriously suggested that the military hold a backsale.

I've got nothing.

Bakesale. I don't know what a backsale is, but I want no part of that, either.

Sounds to me like Mr. Lane is asking that age-old question,"Can't we all just get along?"

Unfortunately the answer is, "No, you damn fool, we can't."

> There would also need to be a mechanism to prevent sudden periods of underfunding

Why?

The possibility of "sudden periods of underfunding" is a good thing. There's nothing like sudden periods of underfunding to get the non-recipients of said funding focused and working.

Of course, they can always ask for a multi-year committment, or even refused to accept money unless there's such a committment. The important thing is that there be no mechanism to require such. Somehow I doubt that they're willing to turn down money that isn't so burdened, but if stable funding is actually that important, they'll do so.

Yes, Terry Lane. Only people who are afraid of criminals should pay for police; only sick people should pay for hospitals and doctors; and only people with kids should pay for schools; and only people with cars will pay for roads; and only people with...etc.

Actually, Lane's comments are what I find rather attractive about the looney left. They really are convinced that all of the world's problems are the fault of Western European civilization (obviously now mostly the US, but everybody who once had an Empire gets to share in the blame). They really do believe that everybody else (Muslims, Tamils, inhabitants of Redfern) would all change into model citizens if we apologised nicely and are just 'nice to them'.

What I object to is the fact that my tax dollars are always spent on these people - they tend to inhabit the ABC, universities, schools or other government-funded agencies, rather than actually working for a living.

I remember PJ O'Rourke asking why one only ever saw left-wing demonstrators, not right wing demonstrators.

The answer was that the right wingers were too busy working at real jobs to be able to take time off to go and join demonstrations !

Why is it that laws can jail people who would never vote for those laws.

Don't be idiots. Know I speak plainly of laws of morality. Down the list we go.

Does the country you live in sell beer? Do they make taxes on it's sales? Does the local bar and restaurant establishment make money as well, along with creating jobs for waitstaff. Does your country currently have a BAC level, or alchohal content measure? Can you be jailed for exceeding this measure? Are the machines used to test you scientifically accurate?

Most the answers to the above questions reveal society being bent under pressure from "Right Wing" groups. The agenda could be prohibition, but maybe it won't. Prohibition failed in America. It created more crime. Created more criminals by making more Americans criminals.

Moving along. Prostitution. Victimless unless you count the poor unknowing spouses who may catch a disease by a straying spouses indiscretions. Here again we have a case of the law making things worse. Legal prostitution allows for hookers to be protected by the law rather than a pimp. They don't pay a pimp, but now they pay taxes. Since they are a known sex industry worker they are expected to keep credentialed. Monthly revues or checks with education and disease awareness being a must. Like a trucker taking safety classes.

Drugs. Again we have created our own black market. They attest how they catch billions of dollars worth a year, and still billions of dollars are getting through. They say they can protect our borders from terrorism, but next time you here mention of pounds of this, or kilos of that being found, had, or recieved, think how easy uranium would be to get in anywhere. We created a new pop culture of gangster thug drug dealer. Much like the glamorization of old time moonshine runners, and even back then illegallity shows issue with how many people went blind drinking bad stuff.

The money spent curing a drug addict is less than it takes to confine them, and does less societal harm. But our Democracies are geared now towards a police state mentality. It is obviously there when one takes into account the need for new and improved passive assualt weapons. Ones designed to pacify and not kill. They plan on riots happening, and don't want the bad publicity of killing people possibly in thier own countries.

Before any country rushes off to fix whats wrong in another country they should dedicate some time to fixing their own.

IXLNXS--

You're absolutely correct that there are right wingers who are opposed to alcohol, prostitution, and drugs but there are also left wingers who are just as opposed albeit for (supposedly) different reasons. I say supposedly because it is essentially an issue of social control.

Do you remember the arguments in the 1980's over pornography and the strange coalition of right wingers like Reagan's Attorney General Ed Meese with Lesbian Feminist Andrea Dworkin? ("Porn=Rape", etc.) There was even a left wing anarchist group in Vancouver, BC, Canada that fire bombed a peep show/bookstore to "protest" porn. They went to prison.

So remember: Not all enemies of your freedom are on the right.

As my friend in Minneapolis, Minnesota replied to a question regarding his health:

"Between the Lutherans and the Liberals here, I'm well protected from myself!"

With ya up till the last sentence. Nice strawman, we aren't trying to fix Iraq, we're killing snakes in the grass, the incidential benefit to the Iraqis is a side benefit.

It's gotta be done.

Then theres this.

"the incidential benefit to the Iraqis is a side benefit."

It's biblical. You must kill them all or they will just breed. Sorry if thats not politically correct, or a statement people willingly agree with, but it is true. As long as one mullah is still teaching that jihad is the way there will be more terrorist.

As long as nations support Israel and many of the autrocities they are guilty of there will be no mideast peace. This does not forgive those who blow up Israelis, just places some blame upon Israel for it's part, as well as Americas.

Stand back and think of another corollary of Lane's idea.

The armed forces will be beholden only to those who pay for them.

And as only Evil Right Wing Death Beasts would WANT to fund them, rather than spend the money on post-modern art museums......

So now I find I live in a nation whose public discourse is dominated by quizlings and terrorist apeasers.

The ALP bears substantial responsibilty for dragging public debate down so low, as well as the US Democrats and the antiwar British 'Left'.

Absolutely disgusting.

I want to see not only the terrorists punished but also the irresponsible public figures who are stirring up irrational anarchistic hysteria against sensible governments responding to the terrorist threat.

You can stuff your anti-Israel views back up the disgusting hole where they came from too! Keep your diarrhoea to yourself, please!

Blame Israel for what? I would like to see the list. A few things many years ago come to mind but only a few. What are yours? The Palestinians are 1) stupid terrorist lovers and 2) a pawn being used by the rest of the Arabs in their fight against Israel and 3) being destroyed by the payments from the EU that give legitimacy to Arafat and his cronies, who are not remotely interested in the well being of the Palestinian people.

We already have a voluntary system for funding of collective defence needs. It's called Government Terry.

Whoa! I hit a nerve mentioning that Israel shares some blame. While I didn't explain further what things they may have done or be doing to further aggravate a bad situation, I did but mention they could be partially to blame, and the hordes come massing.

Maybe America should stop defending Israel all together. Being an American does not mean I wish to support the killing done in the name of religion by both sides.

While I am sure you will pull out the litany of crimes against Israelis to support any action they make, I refuse to accept they deserve any protection from the US, nor any of the money and Armed services sent there to crux up their failings as a Government.

The need of the poor person is no less that that of the plutocrat. Indeed, the rich live longer and healthier lives than the poor, so you might argue that the latter should take precedence.

It already does take precedence, idiot leftie. The 'rich' Australian (i.e, earning $65,000+ p.a.) has half his earnings compulsorily annexed by the government to feed, clothe and house the smack addicts, social misfits and the unwilling-to-work of the welfare state. Even Bill Clinton understood that.

Sometimes lefties don't realise they are already living in their own nirvana.

I would be quite happy with Lane's proposal, with a small modification. We will take all those who refuse to spend on defence and send them to East Timor. Any East Timorese who are willing to fund defence can come here.

Then we will institute strict border control and maintain a credible defence force. Meanwhile, we will make public pronouncement to the effect that anyone is welcome to attack East Timor; we won't try to stop them. We will also tow any boats of asylum seekers up to their waters and send them sailing towards East Timor for the lefties to look after.

Enjoy your dream country, Terry; you won't have long to do so.

A slide aside: Lane calls his Radio National spot "The National Intererst", but if you ever listen to it you'll soon realise that its really about sectional interests, such as sugar cane farmers, cannery factory workers, Australian call centres, and the televisual and arts sectors. "How is Australia meant to maintain a [insert your favourite sectional interest here] industry in Australia in the face cheaper imports, particularly given the third world labour rates that the workers who make some of them receive?", asks Terry, persistently. Why we should bother to maintain such industries never appears to occur to Terry as a question worth asking.

I've been promoting voluntary taxation for years; I know several dingbats who work in the welfare industry, who invariably start snorking on about the wonders of government intervention, how taxes are too low, more spending needed etc; they immediately shut up when asked "if taxation was voluntary, would YOU pay it?" No-one could honestly answer yes. We seem to accept the legitimacy of taxation without question, yet in the past wars were fought and revolutions staged over just such legislated extortion. Let the caring and sharing pay for welfare mothers with seven half-wit sprogs to seven different fathers (none of whom work) and fat lazy turds who sprawl on the couch all day listening to Oprah telling them that it's all someone else's fault; I'll happily kick in for another couple of FA18s ad some AEGIS equipped destroyers that can put a cruise missile through Abu Bakir Bashir's dunny window. I'll have change, but the touchy-feely set will have to get a second job (that's if they have a first one).

IXLTITZ: "It's biblical. You must kill them all or they will just breed. Sorry if thats not politically correct, or a statement people willingly agree with, but it is true. As long as one mullah is still teaching that jihad is the way there will be more terrorist.

As long as nations support Israel and many of the autrocities they are guilty of there will be no mideast peace. This does not forgive those who blow up Israelis, just places some blame upon Israel for it's part, as well as Americas."

This is why you are wrong. This is why you are morally repugnant. This is why you disgust people at best, and annoy us with your drooling idiocy at worst. Read carefully, I am going to try and type slowly and in simple words:

If we can establish an open, represenative and free society in the Middle East it will not matter how many mullahs preach jihad. Their ideas will fail to compete, just as our own constiutionally protected hate groups in the United States fail to sway public opinion each and every day. Once that happens, any stupid and ignorant evil nitwit can be dealt with as a matter of law enforcement, but ONLY once the root cause has been dealt with. No more oppressive, hate-spewing regimes that coerce their peoples by directing their anger at Isreal, no more state-sponsored terrorist cabals. No more worries that someday a group like Al Qaeda will get their hands on a nuke.

That you buy into any of their anti-Israel propoganda, even for a second, is little more than anti-semitism with a side of moral equivilence on your part. Even though you are allowed to be the biggest, stupidest, angriest little freak you want to be, it doesn't make a difference to those of us with brains, spines and souls. If there were not people willing to strap bombs on themselves to carry out the actions you are willing to justify, you would silently fester in your own ignoble insignifigance, angry at a world that does not operate in the way you would like it to be and completely ignored by the rest of the human race. It's sad that current events can bring you out of your ignorant little shell.

Hmm, voluntary defence insurance seems like a very very poor idea. He is obviously trying to make some kind of rhetorical point, but it's unnecessary: the system already has provisions for this. If a candidate wishes to run on a platform of decreased defence spending they can, but they are unlikely to win many votes in the current political climate.

It's not that I mind paying for a number things that we truly need. Defense is one item, but others come to mind -- roads, schools, etc.

My problem is that self-serving bureaucrats take over the system, and suck the money out for their own personal empires. You see this in any branch of the government, but is rampant in the social services side. Welfare becomes a lifestyle because there's a career field in making sure some lazy slob gets free food, housing, and medical care instead of working. Drug users are semi-forgiven if they but use officially sanctioned services.

So a voluntary taxation appeals to me. Come on you lazy bastards, convince me that you need my taxes! Show me your overhead, your productivity, and your effectiveness. What will I get for my contribution? A better park? Cleaner water? Safer borders? Just don't ask me to build a new office complex named after some dead person. And don't stand there and whine when you don't get a bigger slice of the pie!

I'd rather support a soldier and dependents, buy precision guided munitions and the intelligence network to place them on the enemy, *effectively* protect our environment, or fund basic R&D, than pay some fat oinker to breed more children as her basic source of income. And I would certainly donate to charities to support the needy......as I do now.

How the Government is throwing away 50% of your money on arts grants:

Wongabeena Association: Renovation of the Rosebud Motor Boat Squadron Building to provide a permanent base for arts programs for people with disabilities. $30,000.

Where are the fucking motor boats going to go?

Benalla and District Historical Society. Conservation work to repair insect and other damage and extend the life and public display of Ned Kelly's cummerbund. $7,000.

Ned Kelly does not need a fucking cummerbund, moth-eaten or not, any more. He's been dead for over a hundred fucking years.

There's more, but I can't go on. I have to go and do some work to pay for it.

Sortelli you said litle person.

I said what would or should happen if we followed a biblical interpretation.

Let me show you a sick irony.

GOD, the big guy, told this Hebrew guy, to kill a people. All of them. Every last one of them. They were marched into the ovens at sword point. Kinda like Jews in Auschwitz. The were forced to lay before the wheel as it turned. The wheel being a grinding wheel used by the people to grind grain. This loving religion of all encompassing acceptance? Well they were Jewish. The dictrine preached by them gave birth so to speak to Christianity, as well as Islam if you care to study theology as well as you day the daily headlines.

Many Muslims believe they are going to die, and go to hell. The "only" way for them to be forgiven by Allah is Jihad. As long as one Mullah is alive there will be terrorist. Heck after we kill all the mullahs I am sure some other country will pop up with their version of terrorist. But as to an Islamic threat to world peace there is only one answer or death.

Geonocide. They have the bomb. It will be used. As long as some like you steps forward with "Oh no, thats too severe." We, as in those who wish to not die at the hands of religious fanatics will loose. Your kind supports them by limiting the response to their actions. You tie the hands of those who would fix things, then decry things not being fixed fast enough.

Heres a little human nature. If you as a terrorist find out that terrorist families are being held responsible for the actions of their family. That they are being killed. Fathers, mothers, daughters, sons, would you still go happily to Islamic heaven knowing you brought a quick sudden death to those you loved? But people like you can't stomach true terror. The kind that makes fanatics like this stand up and take notice.

Go sound off on some pinko, commie, poofter web page about how tough the Jews have it, and how it's all someone elses fault. I know who's fault it is. I would start correcting the problem now, but some nelly man such as yourself would start screaming at how the rights of poor innocent terrorist families are being stepped on.

Either grow a pair of balls or stop pretending to have em.

Interestingly, on a national scale, what Terry Lane is suggesting is already the status quo. Those nations that choose to spend on defense do, and those that choose not to, don't. And so, many of the countries that prefer to spend their taxes on other things have been getting a free ride on defense for generations. Same thing would happen on an individual level of course. Like the whole town showing up at Neddie's bomb shelter.

But here we have a total inversion of the concept of government's responsibility. What the govt is required to do, defend the nation, would become a personal choice; add-on social programs would of course remain mandatory. What a lefty wet dream that would be.

"I know who's fault it is. I would start correcting the problem now, but some nelly man such as yourself would start screaming at how the rights of poor innocent terrorist families are being stepped on.

"Either grow a pair of balls or stop pretending to have em."

Ooooh -- bad scary man! You so scary! You know, IXISHIT, if you're so tough why don't you go do what you are threatening to do? My guess as to the real reason why not (you have made it clear that you are a Real Man so why do you care what "nelly" men think?) is because you are really some sixteen-year-old pimple-faced fat kid who can't make it onto the school bus without a crane.

I'm more than happy for my 8 cents a day (or whatever the ABC costs every Australian) to go somewhere more useful like 5.56mm Steyr ammunition . . . .

if you're so tough why don't you go do what you are threatening to do?

'Coz he's just building another idiotic strawman out of himself, this time a retarded hawkish racist one as opposed to his old retarded faux-cannibal hippie terrorist-sympathizing persona. Beyond the fact that he can't spell many three-letter words correctly he can't even keep his wanna-be provacative trolling straight, we really wouldn't be losing anything if he, say, got blocked or something.

Just sayin'. :)

inxs or whatever your nome de rant is--

The U.S., conditionally if you think about it for a second, supports Israel because it is a parlimentary democracy in a part of the world where generally bringing the idea of political freedom up will get you imprisoned. There are (some) cultural ties and (some) religous ties between the two nations, but mostly, we back the free guys. See: Taiwan.

Im 35, seen a few politcal elections in these parts and your old testament-new testament thing, well, that's just not how we really work out issues around here.

There's really not much to say
to people like you, other than to reduce it to a military contest. I back Israel, you back the Palistinians...and by default, their Islamic nihilist paymasters.

My team wins, the Islamic nihilist paymasters die and the Palis get their own nation with some sort of embryonic democracy.to be fair, Arafat dies too, but that'll be just another paid holiday for the Pali's, as they hate him too.

Your team wins, Dachau. More realistically, Babi Yar or Katyn.

by any moral standard, who has the better team?

You don't hit a nerve when you mention legitimate complaints of Israeli statecraft, but when you say "many" and then follow up with all I meant was they share some blame, you are an ass. If you don't know what is going on, fine. I hope the PLO gets you first, along with their Islamic cousins, then maybe you would have a better appreciation of what parents must feel when they are not sure their kids will come home from school alive because they were on the wrong bus. I'll say it again for all the blog to hear - anyone who sympathizes with the Palestinian power structure and political movement's grievances is guilty of agreeing with Hitler and Stalin and Pol Pot. You are a waste of oxygen. The Palestinian people are being used by the Arabs to continue Islam's war against the Jews. The Arabs do not care one iota how many poverty stricken Palestinians they create and subsequently kill in their "jihad" and travel to the land of 72 virgins. Trying to find moral equivalence between these two sides is immoral.

"Trying to find moral equivalence between these two sides is immoral."

It's immoral to question why no one ever ask the questions of violence perpetrated by Israelis?

I believe it is more immoral to not ask those questions.

Hmm, the US didn't support Taiwan because it was a democracy, it supported Taiwan because it wasn't communist. When the US supported Taiwan, it *wasn't* democratic, it stayed in a "state of emergency" until the '80s, by which time the US had already recognised the PRC. Didn't you see the recent smackdown Bush handed to Taiwan? He refused to even refer to Chen as the President, instead calling him the "leader" of Taiwan, which is the PRC's preferred term, to deemphasise his legitimacy. The US won't rock the boat where Taiwanese democracy is concerned, for fear of screwing up the relationship with the PRC.

IXITXACHITL, you are a lying sack of shit.

First piece I picked up tonight to sub-edit deserves a place in this thread. Read it and weep for your taxes:

COLAC residents will benefit from a $845,000 Neighbourhood Renewal project launched yesterday.
Minister for Housing Candy Broad said the project would lead to improvements in public housing, job opportunities and community safety.
The project includes $495,000 for upgrades to 46 homes, $80,000 for community development activities and $75,000 to fund an employment and learning co-ordinator.
``This project will see an immediate increase in employment and training opportunities in the area _ eight residents will receive work training to tie in with immediate improvements to 28 Office of Housing properties,'' Ms Broad said.
``In addition to that, $8000 in extra office of housing funding has been allocated for supervision and co-ordination of the jobs and
training participants.
``By addressing some of the root causes of disadvantage, this program will enhance employment and training opportunities, increase
resident's access to health and community services, reduce crime and improve public housing.''

"It's immoral to question why no one ever ask the questions of violence perpetrated by Israelis?"

Yes, because that is asked only as a way to undermine their ability to defend themselves, thus aiding their attackers. Between the Israelis and the Palestinians, only one side actively tries to kill AND hide behind civilians. The other side possesses the ability to utterly exterminate their enemy but does not. Guess which is which.

watching michael.......another o' osama's bitches
make me a sandwich bitch

IXLNXS:

Since I believe in recycling, please see here.

Lane's absurdity is almost identical to the philosophies of the appeasement movement in the UK in the mid 1930s. There are a couple of propaganda films made by the appeasers, one of which shows a farmer leaning on a spade saying, "If my neighbour asks for my spade, instead of fighting him for it, why don't I just give it to him?" Or similar to that. The goverment listened and responded. Result: Britain was critically under-armed at the start of WWII and it was due to good luck and tenacity that they're not speaking German now.

Yeah, beautiful response, IX. By the way, nine, you asked the question, would you provide some answers, you obviously feel that they (the Israelis) are more complicent in this matter than is generally agreed to around here. Please offer some evidence, instead of cute little statements that suggest you know nothing.

And by the way - to admin - if he won't comply, then yes, ban him.