MIRACLE A PRELUDE TO EVENTUAL RESURRECTION

Fidel Castro performs a "miracle" – according to Hugo Chavez – but the event went unsighted:

Of course he planned it so there would be no record of it.

It's all part of some grand commie plan.

WORDS OF POWER

Note: Update V added. Be sure to click it.

Jeremy Sear only days ago denied he is a journalist. Having thought about it he realises he is now endowed with extra-special Crikey powers: no door will be closed to him; all phone calls will be taken; all questions will be answered; and he will be taken seriously. To activate his super-journalist powers all he need do is utter these four words:

It's Jeremy from Crikey

Who, from where?

Update: Emboldened with new powers, Jeremy can ring up Andrew Bolt to ask for details rather than encourage his readers to engage in the "stalking" he finds so distasteful:

Anyone know anything about Bolt's background?

I'm curious. I had heard rumours that he was originally actually a member of the ALP. Is this true? How did he come to his wacky conservatism? How did he come to be employed as a columnist? What did he do beforehand?

Could be interesting.

Update II: Only days after vowing to “give our subjects an opportunity to respond to our conclusions before we publish them”, Jeremy posts an item making certain conclusions about the source of a Tim Blair item:

Yeah, tim, we got that email forwarded to us, too.

I wonder – did Jeremy contact Blair before publication?

Update III: Under orders from Rupert himself, Herald Sun technical staff preempt Jeremy's use of his magic words:

I have attempted to email Bolt... Unfortunately the Herald Sun email server seems determined to protect Andrew from any contact from ERIC BEECHER’S SITE, so it kept bouncing back.

After several hours the above was amended to read:

Unfortunately the Herald Sun email server seems determined to protect Andrew from any contact from ERIC BEECHER’S SITE (note: I’m kidding; I’m sure it’s just a technical issue), so it kept bouncing back. I’ll post his reply if he gives us one.

Bolt can't answer emails that aren't getting through. Strange.

Update IV: Andrew Bolt – via email – reveals the shocking truth behind Jeremy's bounced query:

My mailbox this morning was full.

Oops!

Update V: Hands up everyone who saw this coming. More here. Ouch!

LUCKY ESCAPE

I've been driving since the age of 10 and have held a driver's license for well over 40 years. I've driven throughout much of the western United States, through the south and up the east coast as far as Massachusetts. I once drove all over southern England and through parts of the continent. I several times drove into Mexico as far south as Mexico City. I've also driven all over the Panama Canal Zone.

In the over 30 years I've been in Western Australia I've driven literally hundreds of thousands of kilometres and have yet to lose a demerit point – stopped twice for speeding but unticketed. Despite my best efforts I was involved in one traffic accident, however: many years aso a fully loaded double-deck cattle truck collected me from behind while I was stopped for a red light – the truck was barely rolling but there's was nowhere for me to go. I admit that I ALWAYS speed, at least a little, but I am without doubt a safe driver.

So, why am I telling you this? Road rage, that's why. Earlier today I drove into the big city. As I drove into a built-up area I got stuck behind a sightseeing rubber-necker – there were lots of big gawkable houses. The guy was going about 45 km/h in a 60 zone on a very wide street – there was plenty of room for cars to park on both sides of the road without impeding traffic but there were no cars parked on either side. An alert driver would have noticed the cars piling up behind him and pulled over to let us by but this guy just kept slowly cruising along in the centre of his lane. I went to overtake at the earliest opportunity. Naturally, the rubber-necker speeded up. No problem; I floored it, clearing oncoming traffic by a wide margin.

As I'm returning to my lane I notice an oncoming car flashing its light and suddenly there's a guy hanging out the window screaming and shaking his fist at me. In my mirror I watched the guy hit his brakes and attempt to turn around to come after me, in the process almost causing an accident. Traffic flow prevented him pulling it off.

I consider myself very lucky: if the guy had one to hand I probably would have eaten a beer bottle as he went past. If he had turned around and followed me I could easily have been involved in a car chase and there's no telling how that might have ended. Is it just me or is this sort of thing becoming a "normal" part of driving?

DIRTY MINDED CONSERVATIVES

An analysis of online porn purchases reveals that conservatives are perhaps hypocrites:

Eight of the top 10 pornography consuming states gave their electoral votes to John McCain in last year's presidential election – Florida and Hawaii were the exceptions. While six out of the lowest 10 favoured Barack Obama.

Maybe porn consumption in these states has something to do with the hotness of McCain's running mate.

TERROR TRAINEES RETURN HOME

Tough new anti-terror laws for Germany:

Should it be passed by parliament as expected, any involvement with suspected terrorist groups, including contacting them, preparing for a terror attack by collecting money, financing terrorist activities, gathering bomb materials, spending time in a terrorist training camp or publishing bomb-building instructions will be punishable by up to 10 years under the new legislation. Building a bomb, even if someone does not detonate it, could mean up to three years in jail, for instance.

If the new law does pass there should be immediate arrests:

Up to 140 people from Germany have attended terrorist training camps and 60 have returned to the country, government officials told Berliner Morgenpost this week.

Terror training camp: a new niche tourism market.

RUMINATIONS ON LIFE AT THE BOTTOM

Helen Dale (skepticlawyer) links to a must-see Theodore Dalrymple interview on Dutch TV.

COWARDLY HYPOCRITE OUTED

Take a look at a random slab of Jeremy's old Boltwatch. Notice anything? Oh, yes – the almost complete absence of links to Bolt's posts! In fact, Sear so rarely linked to Bolt (for YEARS) that on the odd occasion he did, it was cause for comment:

Bolt's column today speaks for itself. I'm even going to directly link to it...

But now Sear complains that Bolt won't link to him – thus depriving him of yummy Crikey ad money:

What kind of newspaper columnist launches attacks on a critical website whilst refusing to name it or link to it and deleting any comments that do? Who directly quotes from it, but deliberately leaves out key parts of the quotes, and then prevents his readers from checking the source and making up their own minds?

A total coward and hypocrite, that's who...

The only people I won't link to are those who've published stalking pieces about my family or private life. Obviously none of the Pure Poison authors have ever done that to Bolt.

Do you think Andy would have ever got the hits he claims if his opponents played his childish game and refused to link to him?

As always, Sear insists on playing by his own rules.

DOOM SELLS

The eco-apocalypse industry.

THE NORMAL RULES DO NOT APPLY

Jeremy Sear describes his role at Pure Poison:

I’m not a journalist. I do not receive a salary as a journalist. I’ll get a cut of the advertising revenue from this site, but for my commentary, not my digging out of stories. I do not have the resources to go hunting down leads etc. And we never pretended we would - this is a secondary resource. The primary resource is supposed to be the actual journalists who go and do the footwork to report the facts on the ground.

That’s not my job.

The "I am not a journalist" line is yet another Sear attempt to write rules favouring him. He is in fact a journalist, albeit one – in the Crikey context – aiming to produce nothing original, relying instead solely on the output of others for inspiration. In this parasitical relationship the primary sources would do well to ignore the attention-seeking sniping from the secondary sources.

Update: Sear characterises a Joe Hildebrand article as a "smear". Nope, this is a smear.

MAJOR OPERATION A BIG SUCCESS

Having repeatedly but unsuccessfully begged Andrew Bolt to link to their site, the Poison Pinhead crew goes into a frenzy after slipping a couple of comments past Bolt's moderators. Everybody needs a purpose in life.

Anyway, Bolt's moderation obviously isn't perfect, so it's easy to see how the occasional inappropriate comment makes it through.

THE INTERNET BAD FOR YOUR BRAIN?

An interesting article in the Guardian:

Social network sites risk infantilising the mid-21st century mind, leaving it characterised by short attention spans, sensationalism, inability to empathise and a shaky sense of identity, according to a leading neuroscientist.

The startling warning from Lady Greenfield, professor of synaptic pharmacology at Lincoln college, Oxford, and director of the Royal Institution, has led members of the government to admit their work on internet regulation has not extended to broader issues, such as the psychological impact on children.

The same probably applies to reading blogs. There's also this:

She quoted one user saying they had 900 friends, another saying the fact "that you can't see or hear other people makes it easier to reveal yourself in a way that you might not be comfortable with.

Lots of things are best kept to oneself.

WORTH WATCHING

In Bruges, out on DVD. Alternately hilarious (a whining Canadian and his bottle-wielding girlfriend getting punched in the head) and gut-wrenching (suicide to save a friend), it's 107 minutes well spent.

BLOW HARD

Scott Bridges reckons Andrew Bolt is dishonest in noting wind speeds at Wonthaggi, Victoria, site of a wind farm:

Of course, Andy has selectively selected some days this week that show poor wind speeds, during a heatwave that features hot north winds and not the prevailing south-west winds for which the turbines were designed. He has also completely ignored wind data for the rest of January and previous months that show much more robust gusts of wind.

Bridges' linked data actually supports Bolt's argument, with January wind speed means of only 8 km/h at 9 AM and 15 km/h at 3 PM. According to a fact sheet provided by the wind farm, a wind speed of 12 km/h "is too low to justify operation of the machine". So, based on wind speed data from the Bureau of Meteorology, on average the Wonthaggi wind farm generated no power at 9 AM in January. Further, the "south-west winds for which the turbines were designed" blew on only parts of five days throughout the whole of the month. Bolt was essentially correct.

Bridges should more thoroughly research the stuff he posts; he is being paid to debunk dishonesty, after all, not write it.

Update: Rather than admit that Bolt was right, and Bridges wrong, Tobias Ziegler points to an error in my "statistical reasoning". Fair enough.

Bolt's point was that wind speeds at Wonthaggi were, for selected days, quite low. The BOM wind speed data show that for 23 of January's 31 days the 9 AM wind speed was below the wind turbines' stated threshold speed of 12 km/h. If the wind speed data and threshold speed are correct, anyone visiting the Wonthaggi wind farm at 9 AM on any of those 23 days would have seen the turbines standing idle. Further, on 15 occasions in January the 3 PM wind speed was below 12 km/h. Bolt's point is valid.

Update II: Bridges isn't about to admit he's wrong:

The argument seems to be that there is barely a wisp of breeze at this arbitrarily chosen moment each day so therefore the turbines are useless.

So Bridges' argument seems to be that the Bureau of Meteorology wind speed measurements are not representative of wind speed reality. This ignores that BOM does not take a wind speed measurement at "an arbitrarily chosen moment" but rather twice a day takes a ten minute reading each of which is averaged to produce the morning and afternoon wind speeds. Surely BOM scientists deserve some credit for knowing what they're doing.

FOREVER ONYMOUS

The internet’s greatest mystery is solved! It wasn’t me who outed Jeremy. And it wasn’t Andrew Bolt. It was Jeremy himself, back in December 2004, after his then-employer prevailed upon him to close a blog (MelbourneLefty) that was felt to be professionally – how shall we say – awkward. The old site identified the author as "Jeremy" and featured various elements that gave away the author's surname.

Within days, Jeremy launched his new, anonymous site, but he couldn’t bring himself to do so without dropping massive hints to everyone familiar with his previous blog:

My initial notion is to call it "AnonymousLefty", which could bear a passing resemblance to another blog the name of which must never be uttered anywhere near this blog, ever, for certain specific reasons.

If that wasn’t enough of a clue to his identity, he then posted this in a comments section elsewhere:

MrLefty (wjsear@#####.com.au)Says: 
December 26th, 2004 at 6:09 pm e 


Hi Yobbo

You know how M*lbourneLefty is gone?

Strangely enough, there’s a new blog called AnonymousLefty which appeared at just about the same time as ML went offline!

Amazing coincidence.

I’d be happy to take any links over you might previously have been directing to ML…

cheers!

As the years went by, Jeremy disregarded his previous self-exposing antics and convinced himself that he was the victim of “stalkers”. Alcohol only contributed to his delusions, as a drinking partner relates:

I was particularly disappointed to see that, having had numerous beers with Mr Sear where he talked about the nastiness of campaigns to ‘out’ him.

It helps him forget.

Update: TimT in comments: "Isn't this old news?" Yes, it is, which is why I can't understand the Beck-is-a-stalker-who-outed-Jeremy nonsense. Here's Jeremy's description of his stalking and outing:

Christmas 2004: Melbourne Lefty blog exposed to my then employer, deleted, and then hijacked by some nefarious fellow with a business selling chemical cures for impotence. (Whereas under me the blog had just caused impotence.)

Christmas 2005: Having pieced together a reasonable guess at my identity from the revelation that my name was Jeremy and that I'd just gone to the Victorian Bar, certain (then ironically anonymous themselves) bloggers launch a campaign to publicise my full name far and wide, whether I want to use a pseudonym or not.

Christmas 2006: Having spent the previous month pretending to be me around the internet, my new stalker deletes my blogs and steals the URLs.

In March 2006 Jeremy named one of the previously anonymous stalkers:

And finally, of course, the whole context of this is my objecting to my material being used by Iain Hall in his relentless stalking campaign against me.

Gee, Jeremy must think he's the victim of a conspiracy. (Click the link immediately above and read the comments; they're a hoot. And note the number of removed comments as Jeremy tried to collect his thoughts.)

RECYCLING UNECONOMIC

The collapse of commodity prices has destroyed the profitability of many recycling programs. Never fear, there is a government solution:

... raise rates because the cost of recycling is no longer subsidised by the value of the recovered material.

Rate payers might consider putting recyclables in the general rubbish rather than in the recycling bin.

Would you pass the Bullshit Recycling Test?

VICTORIA AGAIN IN DANGER

With high temperatures and strong winds forecast, and a number of fires still burning, much of Victoria will tomorrow experience an extreme fire danger. Here's hoping for the best.

CHOCOLATIER BOYCOTTED

Max Brenner is being targeted by anti-Israel activists. Why Max Brenner? Because it offers chocolate goodies to Israeli soldiers in the field.

There is no Max Brenner outlet out here beyond the black stump but the next time I'm in the big smoke I'm going to buy some Max Brenner products. You should do the same.

CRACKS CONTRIBUTING TO CLIMATE CHANGE?

A possibly important climate change discovery. But this is Jew science and should be ignored.

HISTORY REWRITE

The following post is of no importance whatever in the cosmic scheme of things and will bore most people senseless but there are some things needing to be said so I'm going to say them.

Writing via his Victorian Bar email account Jeremy Sear has demanded that I provide my personal details so he can serve me with an undefined legal document. Presumably this has something to do with Jeremy thinking me "a shameless liar, smearer, and stalker" who writes "filth". (He doesn't say so but he's probably also upset about some unflattering comments at my blog about his girl friend – more on that later.) Sear refuses to back up his allegations, however.

Sear mate John Surname jumps on the bandwagon:

You’ve blogged constantly about Jeremy’s personal relationships (despite the fact they have nothing to do with his arguments) and frequently hinted that Scott is unsuitable to be a teacher. Of course, you’re far too cowardly to actually come out and say that, beyond making snide hints.

Constantly? No. And I'm on the record as saying Scott – who might be the best teacher ever – is putting himself at risk with some of the material he blogs about: I really do not think parents would understand. Anyway, here's the clincher from Sear mate Ant Rogenous:

As far as bottom-feeders go, little-known blogger J.F. Beck was the most unctuous to weigh in to yesterday’s Pure Poison attack. Beck’s blog has for years been little more than an exercise in ingratiating himself to Tim Blair with creepy personal pot-shots Jeremy Sear and ham-fisted attacks on Antony Lowenstein. Not surprisingly for someone of Blair’s ego, it seems to have worked — the two exchange links (and cuddly emails) with almost the same loving frequency as Blair and Bolt.

I won’t bother posting a link to Beck’s site because it (like the man himself, who all those years ago stalked Jeremy until he’d uncovered his identity) truly is a steaming pile of shit. But if you really must have a look at it, you can find a link in Legal Eagle’s blogroll at (gasp!) anti-bullying-humour-authority Helen Dale’s site.

Now I am getting on and probably do have the beginnings of that old-person smell (do old people realise they tend to have a distinctive aroma?) but "steaming pile of shit" is maybe just a bit strong. The "stalked Jeremy until he'd uncovered his identity" stuff is a total rewrite of history, however. Jeremy was actually outed by........... drum roll.......... Andrew Bolt.

Now I'm wondering where Rogenous got the idea I stalked and outed Jeremy? I mean, surely that whopping great slug of misinformation couldn't have come from Jeremy? But even if the information didn't come from Jeremy, why hasn't he warned good mate Rogenous it's incorrect?

Will the Poison Pinhead post above be corrected? I'm guessing it will be.

Regardless, I have never pried into Jeremy's private life, simply linking to stuff readily available online, much of it put there by Jeremy himself. If he doesn't want people like me blogging about him he should stop distributing the ammo.

* The unflattering comments about Keri James were left up because they say more about the nature of some right-wing blog readers than they do about Keri. The blogosphere does have its dark side.

Update: The unflattering comments about Keri James (here and here) prompted her to respond (respectively):

Gee, Anonymous. I am so wounded in my "large" hide by your cruel and witty barb.

And I'm no damn lady, thanks all the same.

And:

Seriously? Fat jokes are the best you can do?

Incomptent as well as cowardly.

Having thought about it, Keri now reckons I attacked her:

I’ve never seen any of the Grods lot go after the partners of people they disagree with. Which Beck has been more than happy to do to me, and to let stand in his comments.

And that I'm way nastier than the Grods crew:

Point out one post on Grods that worse that the comments in Beck’s blog about me recently. You’ll struggle, trust me.

Jeremy concurs that the comments are offensive and would not be allowed to remain at his blog. Scott chimes in by berating skepticlawyer and Legal Eagle for linking to me:

If you guys are so disgusted by personal attacks on the internets then why do you have a person in your blogroll who routinely writes this sort of stuff and lets these sort of comments stand?

Gee, imagine the lefties' reaction if I had written this little effort from Scott:

Penis fever

When a lesbian experiences strong and uncontrollable urges for penis.

Gretchen: “I’ve got penis fever.”

Carol: “But we’re lesbians!”

Gretchen: “I know. But years ago I had a taste of the penis, and despite now preferring the puss I just really want some penis.”

Carol: “But why?”

Gretchen: “Because fists don’t ejaculate.

For comparison, here's my post Keri alleges attacks her:

LUCKY LAWYER LOCATES LEFTY LOVER

There's romance in leftyland with Jeremy Sear hooking up with fellow blogger Keri James. Their relationship is now in the open, but was previously hinted at in some of the cutest, most aww-inspiring comments ever posted:

Jeremy: “Glad you're happy, Keri. Your lad's very lucky.”

And Keri replies: “Jeremy - I'd beg to differ. I think I'm the lucky one.”

Yep, love is a wonderful thing; let's hope it lasts longer than Jeremy's relationship with the enticingly talented MIss Politics. All the best, young lovers!

As for nasty personal comments, Keri seems to have forgotten her rather salty description of Andrew Bolt:

Cuuuuuuuunt.

And Jeremy (and co-bloggers Scott Bridges and Ant Rogenous) certainly wouldn't allow an offensive personal comment to remain:

If Ramsey knew who Bolt was he’d shove a rolling pin up his arse and yell out : “How do you fucking like this you fuckin fucked up racist Dutch cunt”.
At least that’s what I hope he’d do and say.

Anyone with a few minutes to spare can Google-up numerous such examples of nastiness from this crew of lefties, who keep talking about how nasty I am but fail to provide examples.

Update II: The more she thinks about my post the more upset Keri gets:

Not one of the Grods crew - anonymous or otherwise - has EVER said the things about your partner or anyone elses partner that Becks commenters said about me, Iain.

And Beck doesn't know me from a bar of fucking soap. He just used me as a cheap shot. How would you feel if I started in on your wife and her supposed sex life? Would that be an "invetable consequence"?

You link to Beck. Does that mean your wife is fair game?

No, it doesn't. Because unlike Beck and his anonymous, gutless cronies, I've got a shred of human decency in me.

It's very simple Keri, you shouldn't blog about your relationships if you don't want other people to blog about them.

POISONOUS PREVARICATION

Crikey's version of Blair/Bolt Watch puts the two journalists in the interesting position where they can either ignore the sniping and thus be accused of hiding, or responding, thereby giving the PPers existence-sustaining traffic. For example, it must be difficult for Blair and Bolt to know what to do in relation to this post from Scott Bridges which morphs the following announcement from Bolt (my bold):

We have detected in past two days a number of new readers - or old readers using new fake names - posing as racists and claiming to be my keenest supporters.

Into this:

Announce that regular commenters at your blog have had their names stolen by trolls, with racist comments posted in those names.

Now maybe Bolt says somewhere in the thread that racist comments were posted using the stolen names of existing commenters but, if so, I didn't see it. Anyway, existing readers known to be Bolt supports making racist comments and new commenters making racist comments are very different.

It seems to me that Bridge's post is blatantly dishonest and that this destroys his credibility as someone tasked with exposing the "intellectual dishonesty" of others.

BEST READ BLOG'S FIGURES A SECRET

Mark Bahnisch, who enabled a counter at Tim Blair's recommendation but later disabled it, thus hiding his site's figures:

I’m open to correction on this, but if I’m not mistaken, Tim - who used to place so much stock on stats comparisons - no longer tells anyone anything about the size of his readership.

And what are Larvatus Prodeo's fabulous figures?

Correction: Mark Bahnisch presumably disabled the counter whereas Kim wrote the linked post. My error.

Correction II: Blogging after a long day at work isn't a good idea; I've had to make a second correction to this post – the title was mangled, reading "BEST READS BLOG'S FIGURES A SECRET". Corrected. Time for a long sleep.

EDITING HISTORY

Melbourne lawyer Jeremy Sear recently experienced one of his periodic blogging disasters (as noted in his sidebar):

Why are there no comments on older posts? Because the previous commenting system died in mid-November 2008 and lost them all. Send your hate mail/voodoo curses to JS-Kit, the company that killed Haloscan.

The mysteriously disappeared comments may not be available to the public but are there for Jeremy's mates, however, with Poison Pinhead co-blogger Ant Rogenous earlier today linking to this supposedly gone comment. Oddly Ant's link (second in the post) is now to a Sear post sans comments. Oops! It's almost like the guy has something he's trying to hide. A slimier bunch of history rewriters would be hard to find.

GUTLESS WONDERS

One of Crikey's star recruits, Scott Bridges, yesterday threatened to devastate me by releasing an email exchange from late last year. The post hasn't appeared so he's obviously decided releasing the emails isn't in his best interest so I'll do it for him.

Scott emails:

Dear J.F. Beck,

I wish I knew your real name for the purposes of this correspondence, but in the absence of that information I hope you don't mind if I call you Beck. I'm writing in regards to a post that appeared yesterday on your website (http://rwdb.blogspot.co /2008/10/filthy-minded.html), in which you quite clearly imply that I have paedophilic thoughts.

FILTHY MINDED

School teacher Scott Bridges, who found sexual innuendo in a brochure for school children, now sees a penis in a soft drink bottle. Gee, I wonder what goes through his mind when he sees a child drinking from one of the supposedly phallic containers? Yep, it's a worry.

Not only is this implication completely false, it is offensive, insulting and has the potential to be extremely damaging to my reputation and career. Especially given that your use of my full name makes it more likely that this post will appear in a Google search for my name.

This is not the first time that you have made such an accusation about me. Two weeks ago you wrote (http://rwdb.blogspot.com/2008/10/editor-has-head-arse-as-usual.html):

Update III: The Editor, apparently a Victorian school teacher, finds double entendres in the contents pages of a 1994 booklet, co-authored by the University of Technology Sydney's Janette Griffin, one in a series published jointly by the Science Teachers' Association of NSW and ICI:
Exploratory activities p.12
What does my body look like? p.12
What's inside your mouth? p.13
Swallowing hard p.14
That a school teacher finds sexual humour in the innocent entries of a 14 year old booklet is, well, disturbing.

In the comments to that post I indicated (writing as "The Editor") that I found the suggestion unacceptable and asked you to be more careful.

The Editor said...
By the way, Beck, I enthusiastically support name-calling on the internet, but I'd be very careful with what you're implying in this sentence: "That a school teacher finds sexual humour in the innocent entries of a 14 year old booklet is, well, disturbing."

The 'P' word is a very serious one, and I'm sure you understand that it crosses a line of sorts.

You have ignored my first request, Beck, so I am now formally asking you to remove these two extremely defamatory and damaging statements from your website immediately, and to never make such statements about me again. Political name-calling is one thing, but accusing a school teacher of having paedophilic thoughts is different territory altogether.

I look forward to your prompt reply.

Regards,
Scott Bridges

My response:

Mr Bridges,

I do not think you are a paedophile or that you have paedophilic thoughts. If you like, I will update my post to reflect this.

In your post on the brochure for students did you not describe yourself as having a "filthy mind"? What would any "normal" person (a parent, for example) likely conclude about your thought preocesses on reading your post? Is it a good idea for a school teacher to write such things on a public forum?


Regards,

JF

Scott:

JF,

I appreciate your quick reply and your assertion that you don't believe me to be a paedophile or have paedophilic thoughts.

In relation to your first post, I did describe myself as having a "filthy mind", but I did not describe myself as having a filthy mind in the context of school students or other underage people. Your use (twice) of the words "school teacher" in the first post make that suggestion. I would be satisfied in this case if you removed "apparently a Victorian school teacher" and "school teacher", adding "person" so that the update read:

Update III: The Editor finds double entendres in the contents pages of a 1994 booklet, co-authored by the University of Technology Sydney's Janette Griffin, one in a series published jointly by the Science Teachers' Association of NSW and ICI:
Exploratory activities p.12
What does my body look like? p.12
What's inside your mouth? p.13
Swallowing hard p.14

That a person finds sexual humour in the innocent entries of a 14 year old booklet is, well, disturbing.

In relation to your second post, I find it difficult to see how anything other than complete removal would be satisfactory. Even if you add a disclaimer to the post as you suggest, a person who Googled my name and came across the post would be left with a very negative impression of my character, despite the disclaimer. The only acceptable revision would read:

Scott Bridges, who found sexual innuendo in a brochure for school children, now sees a penis in a soft drink bottle.

Both of my proposed revisions state facts only, and don't contain an implied suggestion of paedophilic thought. I'm happy to own my words, but not when they've been twisted.

I appreciate your willingness to discuss this matter with me in a civil fashion. Of course, I would be more than happy to listen to any concerns you have about anything I've written about you.

Regards,
Scott

My response:

Mr Bridges,

How about this for a compromise? In my second post I replace "children" with "people".

Scott:

I think that's a fair compromise, JF. Let's also make a gentlemen's agreement to both be careful when writing about each other. As I said before, I'm all for name-calling but only as long as it's not going to affect lives outside the blogosphere.

Regards,
Scott

My response:

Mr Bridges,

Just to clarify a few points. I have no interest in prying into your life or in extending this little stoush into the real world. Thus I couldn't care less where you work, where you live, what or how much you drink, who you hang out with, etc.

A while back Irfan Yusuf got all hot and bothered because I posted his phone number and address. I posted the information simply because i felt Yusuf was trying to intimidate Daniel Lewis by repeatedly referring to the suburb in which Lewis supposedly lives � I was trying to make a point. In any event, Yusuf's details were readily available online.

Anyway, please be assured that I am not about to nose around in your life.

My posts on you were intentionally vague in order to allow readers to draw their own conclusions. That you feel readers might conclude you have paedophilic thoughts perhaps indicates that it is you who crossed some imaginary line.

Now whereas I don't think you are sexually attracted to children I do think your posts - especially the first - were perhaps inappropriate coming from a school teacher. But in the cosmic scheme of things, my thoughts are irrelevant. What would your students' parents think if they read your posts?


Regards,

JF

Scott:

I see your point, JF, but ultimately that's my problem to sort out. However, I genuinely appreciate your willingness to alter the post. Thanks again.

Cheers,
Scott

Scott Bridges didn't post this exchange because it's obvious I made a very minor change to one of my posts out of pity for a school teacher who was exercising poor judgment in repeatedly posting sexual content that, on reflection, he thought might adversely affect his career.

Interestingly, Scott's Grods.com colleague Ant Rogenous thinks I'm the nasty one:

As far as bottom-feeders go, little-known blogger J.F. Beck was the most unctuous to weigh in to yesterday’s Pure Poison attack. Beck’s blog has for years been little more than an exercise in ingratiating himself to Tim Blair with creepy personal pot-shots Jeremy Sear and ham-fisted attacks on Antony Lowenstein. Not surprisingly for someone of Blair’s ego, it seems to have worked — the two exchange links (and cuddly emails) with almost the same loving frequency as Blair and Bolt.

I won’t bother posting a link to Beck’s site because it (like the man himself, who all those years ago stalked Jeremy until he’d uncovered his identity) truly is a steaming pile of shit.

And these clowns are going to critique the commentary of others. Antony Loewenstein looks a genius by comparison.

Update: Yet more disappointment form Scott who yesterday offered to forward screenshots but is yet to deliver.

CATS CONTROLLED

Joondalup, a suburb of Perth, has just passed a law requiring cats to be registered and sterilised. Owners whose cats enter prohibited areas such as parks, or private property, can be fined up to $1,000. Anyone who's watched the neighbour's cat back up to the windsreen and have a good spray into the air intakes will be appreciative.

UP IS DOWN; BLACK IS WHITE

Despite being at best quasi-literate Antony Loewenstein is deemed a "public intellectual".

Update: Mr Intellect reckons Israel's assault on Gaza "decimated an already suffering people". The deaths of something like 0.09% of the Gaza population has gotta be the smallest decimation in history.

POISON PINHEADS

The powers that be at Crikey obviously didn't bother to research the credentials of their new Pure Poison bloggers; if they had they never would have taken on this particular group of hyper-sensitive no-talents. Melbourne barrister Jeremy Sear is a notorious cry baby with so little confidence in his writing he arranged with Google that his blog would not be cached. And look what happens when Tim Blair gets stuck into judgment-deficient Jeremy: co-poison-penner Scott Bridges steps in to fight Jeremy's battles for him.

Scott, a primary school teacher, has Jeremy's glass chin. Back in October he sent me an overtly threatening email (subject line: defamatory statements on your website) demanding the removal of "defamatory and damaging statements from your website immediately, and to never make such statements about me again." To cut a long story short, my posts remain online, as does every post I've ever written.

The same can't be said for Scott, who disappeared the archive (if they're still available online I can't find them) of the live cutting-edge irrevrent humour Grodscasts, including those featuring Jeremy Sear. Yep, Crikey is on a winner with these guys.

Update: Scott again goes all threatening (in comments):

I can post our email conversation, along with before and after screenshots of the posts if you want.

Please do. In the interest of full disclosure here's an email exchange between brave Scott and Tim Blair – Bridges went crying to Blair about me being a meany:

Hi Tim,

I know we're not the best of Internet mates, but I was hoping we might be able to put that aside for a few minutes. A blogger who I assume you have had dealings with from time to time, J.F. Beck, has written a post about me that is quite clearly defamatory by suggesting that I have paedophilic thoughts. This is in addition to a previous post where he makes a similar suggestion. Now, I'm all for political name-calling on the blogosphere, but this has the potential to seriously damage my name, reputation and career. The word "paedophile" is about as bad as it gets.

I have emailed Beck and asked him to remove the posts. I would like, if possible, to avoid having to take the matter further. I'm sure that you can see that these posts cross a line and perhaps you might have a quick word to Beck for me and encourage him to take the posts down.

Tim Blair:

Hi Scott,

Considering that your site has labelled me a racist male prostitute who fucks dogs, I'm probably not the right person to ask about this. I have difficulty finding the "line" you believe has been crossed.

Cheers,

Tim

Scott Bridges:

I have certainly never called you a "male prostitute" or somebody who "fucks dogs". I can't recall calling you racist, although I'm prepared to be proven wrong on that. I can't recall any of the other authors calling you those names either, although I can't speak for them.

If those accusations have appeared in the comments at Grods, and you want me to take responsibility for things other people have written, then I expect you'll take responsibility for everything that's appeared in your comment threads -- something you've previously declined to do.

Tim Blair:

My position on comments is that publication doesn't indicate support or endorsement. Responsibility is another matter. That's why -- at my new site, where I'm exposed to increased legal danger for defamatory content -- comments must be moderated.

You ARE responsible for comments at your site, because they've been published at your site. It's simple. In legal terms, bloggers have no choice but to take responsibility: you're the publisher. Again, this doesn't mean you agree with those comments, but that's beside this particular point.

A defamation case against Beck would be interesting. You'd have to establish damage to reputation, which might be difficult given the nature of material you've published (the post in question would be problematic, for a start).

In short, if you're going to write (and publish) as though defamation laws don't exist, it's a bit rich to turn all worried and middle-class when you believe you've been defamed. A jury would be directed to look at the standards you've applied in your own work.

Oh, racism: http://www.grods.com/post/1617/

Cheers,

Tim

Scott, the big girl, then had a cry in my direction.

Update II: Apparently thinking his comment above (see original update) lacks intimidatory oomph Scott this evening emails:

Hi, Beck.

I'll post the screenshots and the emails if you want me to.

Let me know.

Cheers,
Scott

I told him to go ahead but he's dragging his feet, subsequently commenting:

I'll send you the screenshots if you don't have copies yourself.

Go for it Scott; show everyone how you forced me to back down.

Update III: Scott never did post the exchange so I had to do it. It's here. By the way, I did not, and do not, acknowledge that I ever implied he has improper thoughts regarding children.

Editing Note: I chronically transpose letters in certain words, poison, for example. Misspelling of poison in the post's title corrected.

SHORT BREAK

Houseguests.

INTERNET ROMANCE GONE WRONG

Maja, a 36-year-old musician from Leipzig, flew to New Zealand to hook up with a man she met on the internet. It was apparently a horrible experience for Maja, who lived for a week with a creepy guy in a house full of chickens and cats. The New Zealand Herald reports that Maja didn't flee because "part of her also wanted to stay because she was a part-time social worker and she was fascinated to learn how a person became that way, she said. She also did not have enough money to stay in accommodation for the whole visit." Maja was ultimately rescued by police but no charges will be laid. Maja is a part-time drama teacher. Maja is full-time idiot.

DODGY WRITER OFFERS DODGY OPINION

According to Wikipedia 0.227% of the world's population is Jewish. Jews are, however, way overrepresented in the sciences, winning over 20% of Nobel science based prizes. It is therefore in everyone's best interest to encourage the extraordinary productivity of Jewish scientists.

But failed Fairfax intern Antony Loewenstein reckons the UK's Israel Day of Science, covering cancer research, nano-technology, solar energy, water desalination and other highly relevant topics, is a celebration of "dodgy science". This from a meathead who struggles to write an intelligible sentence and until recently thought Columbia is both a university and a country.

Loewenstein and like-minded lefties are worried attending students will come away from the exhibition with an unduly favourable impression of Israel. Perhaps the solution is to balance things out by making all attendees watch a Hamas physics video – inertia can be a bitch.

ROUGH PLAY PROMPTS RULE CHANGE

Following his recent abuse directed at bushfire survivor Liam Sheahan, Melbourne lawyer Jeremy Sear was contacted by a woman who is apparently Sheahan’s sister.

Colleen wanted Jeremy to justify his abuse (“git”, “not one of Saturday’s heroes”, “arrogant twat”). Jeremy responded, as he usually does when cornered, by inventing a rule of acceptable behaviour:

I disagreed with him, and with those who are declaring that the fires prove him “right" in what he did. He's putting himself out there as a political figure now, making demands - such as getting his fine returned - and trying to get his own back on the people who opposed his campaign.

At which point he lost the victim shield of immunity from criticism.

Just in case it’s not clear, Jeremy restates his rule:

And, as I said, once you start pushing a political barrow - which he is - and attacking other people - which he is - you lose your victim's shield of immunity. You are a fair target.

The people Sheahan “attacked” were bureaucrats who cost him $100,000 for removing trees from his land in a bid to safeguard his family and property. The “political barrow” he pushed was to mention council wimpishness in the face of Green pressures. For this – remember, he’s just one week on from fighting a blaze that could have killed his whole family – Jeremy calls him a “git” (before deleting that slur).

Jeremy invents rules of behaviour all the time, and the strange thing is that they always end up justifying… Jeremy. He has rules that justify breaching copyright (for videogames, comedy programs and music that he wants for free) while at the same time he threatens people who publish his copyrighted cat pictures.

He has rules that justify him attacking the professional life of others while maintaining that his own professional life should be off-limits.

He has rules that condemn others for expressing opinions anonymously while being for a long time anonymous himself.

It’s sad that so many of Jeremy’s rules – he has more rules than the Koran – have been lost due to the mysterious erasing of all of his comments a few weeks ago. That’s where self-justifying Jeremy was at his peak.

But look at this. After outlining his latest rule, that people who push political barrows have lost their “shield of immunity” and are “fair targets”, here's how Jeremy – who pushes political barrows all the time – responds to Colleen’s criticism:

What's with the "little man" shit, Colleen?

Oh dear. Jeremy has been insulted. It just isn’t fair.

Update: When a rule change won't fix the problem Jeremy denies saying what he said, and keeps denying it. Do they teach that at lawyer school?

Update II: Lawyer Jeremy reacts to a ticket from an airport parking officer by "naming the chap, identifying him by photograph, and describing him as a 'miserable bastard', a 'vindictive twerp', a 'petty tyrant', a 'prick. and an 'arsehole''. (Thanks to reader pogria for reminding us of this moment from Jeremy's rich history.)

ANTONY LOEWENSTEIN, MINOR CELEBRITY

Australian wordsmith Antony Loewenstein is in Indonesia having been invited to attend the Ubud Writers and Readers Festival. Actually, he invited himself (and isn't listed as an attending author):

Just as the UWRF staff began the task of planning this year’s Festival around the theme of Suka Duka: Compassion and Solidarity, Janet was contacted by Antony Loewenstein, Australian freelance journalist, author and blogger, who is visiting the Bali in February.

Examples of the "incisive" and "masterful" writing (currently appearing on the front page of his blog) that convinced Ubud organisers to include him:

• At this stage, we’re years away from even contemplating such a reality.
• The idea that literary figures would visit Sri Lanka at such a time is morally questionable.
• Israel is becoming apartheid South Africa and the world response, after the recent Gaza war, is only set to increase.
• Sri Lanka is currently in the middle of military and civil chaos, with the regime causing untold civilian misery.
  

Anyway, Loewenstein will tonight appear at a fund-raising dinner where it's claimed he will give a "first hand account of the life in Occupied Territories". No he won't: he visited the West Bank for only a few days in 2005 and has never been to Gaza. Just about everything he knows about Israel and Palestine comes not from first hand knowledge but rather from what he reads.

Loewenstein is muddle-headed, writes at a high school level and is an uninspiring speaker but continues to trade on his novelty status as an anti-Israel Jew, emerging as something of a minor celebrity. He is (as he himself describes Israel) at once both "fascinating and repulsive": fascinating in that he singlemindedly pursues the goal of international celebrity; and repugnant in that he plays fast and loose with the truth.

A recent Loewenstein interview by Helen Caldicott provides double the fascinating repulsiveness. Knowing there will be no hardball questions from his lefty interlocutor he is glib and supremely self-confident. Perhaps too confident, chuckling freakishly (at 3:27) while discussing Hitler's sincere desire to eliminate Jews from Europe.

Now no one in his right mind is going to listen to the whole of a 59 minute audio clip in which Caldicott repeatedly mentions Loewenstein's best-selling-author status and Loewenstein repeatedly agrees with Caldicott by saying "indeed", and keeps saying "in reality" when he actually means "in my alternate reality", so I've listened to the whole interview for you. Here are the highlights (rather, the lowlights):

• Loewenstein again says that for Israel's 60th anniversary western media has suddenly taken interest in the plight of Palestinians. He says, for example, that for Israel's 50th birthday the plight of Palestinians was "virtually ignored", specifically mentioning the New York Times. In fact, the NYT published literally hundreds of such articles around the time of Israel's 50th (1998). This 1998 article in particular relates to the Nakba.
• His 2005 visit to Israel causing him to reflect on his Jewishness: "I didn't feel particularly Jewish being there." [When does he feel particularly Jewish? Perhaps when soliciting media appearances such as this - ed.]
  
• He didn't visit the Wailing Wall despite its significance in "modern history".
• A separate Palestinian state has only been discussed in the past 20 years.
• Palestinians are "by definition... pretty pissed off to actually being ruled over by Israel."
• "Israeli settlements in the West Bank are the Achilles' heel of this conflict."
• The U.S. supports Israel because:

The Israel lobby is powerful;

Financial support provided to Democrats;

Criticism of Israel can affect your career;

Israel offers a "great deal of base" [sic] for U.S. infrastructure and weapons;

Israel tests U.S. weapons (as in Gaza).

• Israel's armaments industry is the world's fifth largest and growing every year.
• "Study after study have shown that the people of Jordan and Egypt do not want to be at peace with Israel." [So Jewish paranoia is justified - ed.]
• North Korean nukes are the only thing preventing a U.S. invasion. [WTF? - ed.]
  

Actually, I was wrong about "fascinating".

Update: Loewenstein deplores journalists reporting on Iraq from their hotel rooms while pretty much everything he reports come from his lounge room.

Update II: His hit-count surged during Israel's Gaza assault but is rapidly returning to his natural level of unpopularity – this despite massive media hype for the best-selling author.

UpdateIII: According to Loewenstein, Hampshire University (it's actually a college) has created a "firestorm" by supporting Israeli divestment. Organsiers of the “Voices of Hampshire, Voices of Divestment” blog at the centre of the firestorm have asked him to promote their blog. Gee, I hope they can handle the increased traffic. And, considering their persuasive arguments, it's hard to imagine the Hampshire students needing assistance in getting their message out.

SAY IT WITH LATEX

A gift of flowers is "passe and generic"; impress the one you love by giving a condom.

GIT GONE

Considering how loudly he screams whenever he feels he’s been insulted, Melbourne lawyer Jeremy Sear is remarkably inclined to deal out the insults himself. The latest to face Jeremy’s squeaky wrath is Liam Sheahan, who removed trees on his country property so that his family would be safer in the event of fire.

For this, Jeremy labels Sheahan a “git”. Or he did, in a headline he’s since removed (to cover such errors in judgment Jeremy a while back arranged that Google would not cache his site but the headline lives on in his post’s URL). Perhaps Jeremy thought it best not to so directly insult a bloke who lives within easy driving distance and could – by the look of him – snap weedy Jeremy like a twig.

Anyway, Jeremy’s re-thought headline is “Liam Sheahan’s not one of Saturday’s heroes.” Lowering his yet-to-fully-descend testicles as far as they’ll go, Jeremy launches his attack:

There were plenty of real heroes on Saturday whose brave deeds deserve celebrating. Who put their lives on the line to save others. Who helped those who needed it most.

So why is Liam Sheahan being treated as one?

Answer: he isn’t, although his family probably regards him as a hero. Sheahan’s far-sighted move to bulldoze 250 trees cost him $100,000 in fines and legal fees, but it helped save his family and their house. Some might think this worthy of celebrating, but not Jeremy:

His bloody-minded I OWN THIS PART OF THE FOREST SO I CAN DO WITH IT WHAT I LIKE position, in which he obliterated any of the natural landscape unfortunate enough to be within 100m of where his house had been built, apparently saved it - in much the same way as the house having NOT been built in the middle of the bush would've done.

How many native gums surround the Sear/James love nest in Melbourne’s suburbs? Are there any within 100m or did “bloody-minded” people cut them down to build roads and houses? Jeremy then describes Sheahan’s removal of trees as “nuking the local landscape”. It’d look a lot more nuked if Sheahan’s house had burned down – like all the others nearby. Keep going, Jeremy:

Liam is like a man who buys a houseboat and then demands that the lake it floats on be drained because his family might drown. Or some arrogant twat who buys a unit next to a major concert venue and then demands that they stop making noise.

Nope, Sheahan is like a man who removed trees from around his property to ensure the safety of his wife and children. And it worked, even though it cost him one hundred grand. Who’s the arrogant twat here: Sheahan or the chinless girly-armed urban nancy who dyes his hair?

Seriously - if Mr Sheahan wanted to live in a desolate moonscape, why didn't he just move to one of those treeless plains north or west of Melbourne?

He’s cleared 250 trees. Jeremy thinks this turns the place into a “desolate moonscape”. Think about this, Jeremy: if those trees had remained in place, they’d likely be incinerated now. So would another house.

*For further amusement, read Jeremy’s cranky responses in comments following his post. Or just turn up here later, because Jeremy can never, ever let criticism be. He’s sensitive like that.

Update: Jeremy has visited a couple of times but is yet to comment. Hey, maybe he's finally maturing.

Update II: Poor little Jeremy is copping aggression from readers.

COMPUTING TEACHER SAYS DDT CAUSES MALARIA

With Tim Lambert recently adding his old posts to his Scienceblogs archive I decided to have a look at his older stuff. Here's an oldie but goodie from the self-proclaimed polymath:

The agricultural use of DDT has caused hundreds of millions of cases of malaria.

Where's the peer reviewed research supporting this claim?

ORBITAL SURPRISE

Iran's insertion into orbit of its first satellite suggests the existence of a secret rocket development program. If so, a secret nuclear weapons program could mean Ahmadinejad is closer to getting the bomb than previously thought. It's a worry.

A FEW MILLION DEAD JEWS NO BIG DEAL; GET OVER IT

Some minor historical revision at Antony Loewenstein's blog:

Finkelsteins book “The Holocaust Industry” and Giles MacDonogh’s “After the Reich” make it clear that nowhere near 6 million jews were killed and in fact MacDonogh points out time and again that most of the victims were common criminals or Polish catholics.

He also points out that 65% of jews escaped before the death camps ever got started.

Over it. The world is over it.

Yep, them Nazis is just way misunderstood.

LARVATUS PRODEO: BIGGER THAN BIG, IT'S GIGANTIC

Tim Blair, undoubtedly envious, takes a swipe at journalistic juggernaut Larvatus Prodeo, Australia's "best read political blog" and media agenda setter. Certainly no one can blame Blair for feeling, well, inadequate when contemplating LP's huge readership (much bigger than Andrew Bolt's!) and obvious influence (Michelle Grattan is swiping Mark Bahnisch's ideas!). With LP effectively controlling Australia's media Mark Bahnisch has now assumed the position formerly held by lefty intellectual Chris Sheil as the most prominent lefty blogger in the known universe.

Now I haven't visited LP much of late – the intellectual commentary and wit are way beyond me – so I don't know if the information has been posted but I can't recall seeing anything recently on the site's amazing stats, and their counter seems to be broken. So, I reckon it's time for someone at LP – maybe Kim, who keeps telling us about their astonishing numbers and influence – to post the site's stats. I am prepared to be awed.

FREAK WINTER

A fascinating article at New Scientist on the devastating winter of 1709. Scientists are unable to explain why this particular winter was so cold. If past events are unexplainable, how accurate are climate change predictions?

THIS WEEK'S LOEW

Work was especially trying this week so it's time to take a look at what Antony Loewenstein has posted that can be ridiculed with minimal effort.

Loewy links to a report by Jonathan Miller indicating that the United Nations need not retract allegations that the IDF attacked a Gaza school because the UN never claimed the school was attacked. Well, it somehow became common knowledge that the IDF shelled the school with Loewenstein himself writing in the Courier-Mail:

The Western media has been bombarded with Israeli disinformation. Take the Jewish state's bombing of a UN school in Gaza last week that killed 40 people...

Will he correct some of his bombardment of disinformation? Don't hold your breath.

Loewy is much impressed by pro-Palestinian basketball fans' "stunning chant": “Boycott Israel - Viva Palestine!” Hey, it is kinda catchy.

Loewy is not much impressed by London's peaceful pro-Tamil marchers, recommending that they should have chased police through the street while yelling "you fucking pooftah cowards". Yep, lefties are partial to political violence.

In a post titled How to breed hatred in children Angry Ant links to a video of 10 year-old Palestinian Mona Samouni retelling the much-covered, heart-rending story of her family's "massacre" by the IDF. As is typical of the Ant-man he hasn't researched this; if he had he'd know this story has gone through several evolutions – other versions here and here.

Like my dear departed father forever reminded me, "you can tell a lot about a person by the company he keeps". What then to make of Sheik Taj women-invite-rape Din the-Holocaust-is-a-lie al-Hilali inviting Loewy to travel with him to Gaza? A Middle East visit by these two bright sparks would lower the region's collective IQ by at least 10 points.

Not a word from Loewy on the suspension by the UN of all aid to Gaza following two aid thefts in the past week by Hamas, the "legitimate, democratically elected political party that controls the government". It's like, you know, a form of taxation.

In a rare lucid moment Loewy damns both himself and the media pinheads who publish his ravings:

At what point will the liberal media realise that my shameless media construction of deliberate ignorance appeals to nobody except those who love to celebrate ignorance?

Probably never. I took some liberties with the quote above, by the way.

Update: A plea for GITMO's continued use as a prison for terror suspects prompts a post titled Can we skin them alive and watch? Well, skinning a squirming person would be pretty hard to do with your eyes closed, now wouldn't it?

Update II: Some of the guy's stuff is so strange it's hard to know where to start:

Victoria is currently experiencing shocking bushfires that have claimed countless lives.

Er no, deaths are not too numerous to be counted.

One fire-fighter told Melbourne’s Herald Sun newspaper that the scenes were like a “Holocaust”.

The firefighter correctly described the scene as "a holocaust", as in "a thorough destruction involving extensive loss of life especially through fire". The firefighter was not comparing fire damage to the Holocaust.

A leading Muslim leader recently said that the Holocaust was being used by Israel to justify Israeli violence against Palestinians, which is “just as ugly as the Holocaust”.

Jewish leaders condemned the Muslim leader for daring to use the term “Holocaust” and minimising the trauma of the Jewish Holocaust in World War II.

The "leading Muslim leader" is Loewenstein's new pal, the infamous Sheik Taj Din al-Hilali, who now compares Gaza to the Holocaust having earlier called the Holocaust a "Zionist lie".

Personally speaking, I don’t apply the term “Holocaust” to describe Israel’s barbarity in Palestine, but I’m willing to bet that no Jewish leaders will complain about the fire-fighter’s use of the word.

But he has referred to Israelis as "the modern descendants of Hitler".

KITTY CONTROL COCOON

Got a cat that's exhibiting problematic behaviour? Maybe your little friend won't stay away from your feet when you're in the kitchen or seeks your attention by clawing at the couch when your watching TV. If so, the Kitty Control Cocoon is for you. Simply insert your cat, zip tightly and get on with your life. (Should the meowing become annoying place cocooned cat in nearest body of water.)

Editing note: "your" appeared way too many times so I changed one of them to "you're".

SUMMARY JUSTICE

According to the Washington Post, Don Ayala was on patrol in Afghanistan when a female colleague was mortally burned when doused with flaming gasoline. Ayala soon after shot the detained Afghan culprit in the head, killing him instantly. Ayala has now copped to a plea of manslaughter and faces a possible 15 years in jail. Wapo commenters overwhelmingly think Ayala should not be punished. Giving the guy a medal and sending him on his way ain't gonna happen. Shame.

JUST YOUR TYPICAL VICTORIAN SCHOOL TEACHER'S BLOG

Primary school teacher Scott Bridges in the category "weird shit":

Penis fever

When a lesbian experiences strong and uncontrollable urges for penis.

Gretchen: “I’ve got penis fever.”

Carol: “But we’re lesbians!”

Gretchen: “I know. But years ago I had a taste of the penis, and despite now preferring the puss I just really want some penis.”

Carol: “But why?”

Gretchen: “Because fists don’t ejaculate.”

Clearly the guy has an aptitude for sex education.

LOEWENSTEIN WRONG AGAIN

Antony Loewenstein wrongly accuses Israel of violating the Convention on Cluster Munitions by using cluster explosive dispersing artillery shells when the treaty applies "to explosive bomblets that are specifically designed to be dispersed or released from dispensers affixed to aircraft". The guy grabs every piece of anti-Israel crap and posts it without researching the facts.

PIRATES SOUNDLY DEFEATED

Ruthless Japanese whalers, who last year shot Sea Shepherd head pirate Paul Watson in the chest (wink, wink), are now resorting to less lethal weapons to keep lunatic lefties at bay:

The Sea Shepherd crew also discovered that the Japanese whaling fleet is deploying a new weapon in defence of their illegal whaling activities.

The factory ship the Nisshin Maru and the two harpoon vessels in the fleet are equipped with Long Range Acoustical Devices (LRAD). This is a military grade weapon system that sends out mid to high frequency sound waves designed to disorient and possibly incapacitate personnel. It is basically an anti-personnel weapons system.

The whining from Watson and his crew renders the LRAD noise inaudible.

DUMB AND DUMBER

Antony Loewenstein is interviewed by the podcast network's Cameron Reilly for the third time. Why? Because Reilly wanted to invite someone on the show who could talk about Gaza "with some direct knowledge":

"Anthony [sic] has written a book about Israel. He's a Jew, he's an atheist Jew. His first book he wrote a couple of years ago was called "My Israel Question". And he has been over to that part of the world on a number of occasions. And so he has some direct experience and it's also good that he's a Jew. It's I think somewhat harder to accuse a Jew of being anti-semitic alhthough I do know he does get accused of that."

Loewenstein, in his mid-30s, visited Israel once a few years ago for a couple of weeks, at most, and he has no direct knowledge of recent events in Gaza. Loewenstein gives his version of the background to Israel's recent Gaza action but mentions nothing about his lack of direct knowledge.

Click that link to listen to Cameron Reilly's insane 9 1/2 minute introductory anti-Israel monologue. He compares the formation of Israel to Queensland being given to the Jews and suggests that Israel must follow United Nations' dictates or face the wrath of NATO forces. Dumbass.

ISRAEL'S NANOTECH CHAINSAW BOMBS

Global Voices, a citizen journalism initiative of Harvard University's Berkman Center for Internet and Society, links to bloggers reporting recent events in Gaza. Included is a post by Australian activist Sharyn Lock on Israel's alleged use of a magical new type of bomb:

When I saw Dr Halid the other day, on the request of a journalist, I asked him about evidence of the weapon called gbu39 or “dime” (dense inert metal explosive) bomb. This is believed to have been used by Israel for the first time in Lebanon in 2006, and now here as well. Dr Halid said the ICU doctors were seeing something new to them: what appeared to be mild external shrapnel injuries coupled with disproportionate massive internal damage.

“There will be small chest wounds, but then the lungs will be destroyed. Or minor abdominal entry wounds but then kidneys and liver destroyed.” I heard today that it seems that the dense metal shrapnel splinters into tiny particles upon entry to the body, which are then carried by the bloodstream, swiftly shredding everywhere they reach. So many patients appear to stabilize, and then die shortly afterwards. As if that wasn’t enough, Lebanon experience suggests that those who do survive experience quick onset of cancer. What kind of mind dreams this stuff up?

This crap dreamed up by the overactive imagination of Australian lefty activist Sharyn Lock.

DIME bombs have evolved from mystery weapons with "their roots in depleted uranium (DU) research " to flingers of a leg-mangling "blade of charged tungsten dust that burns and destroys everything within a four-metre radius" to bloodstream-invading, overnight-cancer-causing hordes of micro-chainsaws. You'd have to be nuts to believe crap like this.

IGNORANT AUDIENCE NOW DUMBER

The other day Antony Loewenstein spoke to a full house at the Imam Husain Islamic Centre. It was an interesting crowd:

The centre was gender-separated, with men sitting on the left hand side of the room and women on the right, all wearing hijabs.

Loewenstein was there to use his superior articulation skills to enlighten his audience:

Profound ignorance certainly exists in the Muslim community towards Jews and Israel, and I believe it’s important that such confusions are discussed and resolved.

But maybe his audience was smarter than he thinks:

Before I started, a couple of kids looked at me directly and asked, “Are you really Jewish?"

Well, maybe, sort of.

COMPACT FLUORESCENTS NOT SO BRIGHT

Compact fluorescent globes have many drawbacks: expensive; fragile; mercury content; colour distortion; low light output at start-up; and so on. Now an LED developer states the obvious:

Humphreys reckons that the UK government encouraged consumers to drop tungsten bulbs too soon. "We should have stayed with tungsten for another five years and then switched to LEDs," he says.

LUCKY LAWYER LOCATES LEFTY LOVER

There's romance in leftyland with Jeremy Sear hooking up with fellow blogger Keri James. Their relationship is now in the open, but was previously hinted at in some of the cutest, most aww-inspiring comments ever posted:

Jeremy: “Glad you're happy, Keri. Your lad's very lucky.”

And Keri replies: “Jeremy - I'd beg to differ. I think I'm the lucky one.”

Yep, love is a wonderful thing; let's hope it lasts longer than Jeremy's relationship with the enticingly talented MIss Politics. All the best, young lovers!

VICIOUS DOG HUMBLED