
... personally, for me a year with a lot of challenges, but all in all, made it through more or less okay. And that's a LOT, isn't it?
Thanks for tuning in, have a YUUUUUUGE party if you can, and best wishes for the New Year!!!
MFBB.
"So there will be more empty seats round the Christmas table this year, after an "Australian citizen" mowed down pedestrians at the junction of Flinders Street and Elizabeth Street in Melbourne. The casualties include "a pre-schooler with serious head injuries". The "Australian citizen" (I presume this designation is being used to emphasize that he's entirely eligible to serve in Mr Turnbull's cabinet) did it deliberately, but relax, lighten up, there's no need to worry because, according to Victoria's police commissioner, all this terrifying terror is "not terror-related".~ All the bollards put up after six people were killed in Bourke St Mall in January have not stopped this.
So he's not a crack operative with the Islamic State's Australian branch office, he's just, as The Age's cheery headline writer puts it, "of Afghan descent and mentally ill". A second man, arrested while filming the scene and found to have three knives in his bag, is believed to be nothing to do with the first man. Just another Australian citizen taking his knife collection out for a stroll.
You'll recall there was a previous "vehicle attack" in downtown Melbourne earlier this year, after which the authorities ordered up the bollardization of every pedestrianized precinct in the vicinity. As Andrew Bolt writes:
"On the perpetrator of the attack Naessens has no feelings. "No positive, no negative. At this point, my sorrow is too big yet to leave room for anger and feelings of revenge."
Naessens exhorts the population to not resort now to black-and-white thinking about "certain population groups". "My wife would also have liked it that way. She was a very positive person and gave everybody a second chance. She gave every beggar money, sometimes until it annoyed me."
"And in France, around 400 people gathered at Republique square Saturday, where they cheered when an organiser, wearing a shirt that promotes a boycott of Israel, said: “This demonstration is also about freedom for Hassan Hamouri, Marwan Barghouti and all the Palestinian prisoner.” The crowd shouted back: “Freedom to the Palestinian prisoners.”
"Earlier that day in Vienna, hundreds of participants in rally shouted in Arabic, “Jews, remember Khaybar, the army of Muhammad is returning.” The cry relates to an event in the seventh century when Muslims massacred and expelled Jews from the town of Khaybar, located in modern-day Saudi Arabia."
"A BSCA (Brussels South Charleroi Airport) luggage handler was arrested some ten days ago. The man, also a union chief, had uttered threats against the police on his Facebook page, a source close to the investigation said on Thursday. House searches and wiretaps also revealed that he pressed other personnel to engage North Africans specifically. As a result of the matter, the BSCA management called for Thursday evening for a special meeting of the Board of Directors.
The suspect had drawn attention by making terrorist threats on his Facebook page, the Sudpresse newspapers reported. According to a source close to the investigation he would have declared to be willing to "shoot police officers with a Kalashnikov". A judicial enquiry was immediately opened and the suspect's admittance badge was desactivated on orders of the prosecutor.
Federal Police in Charleroi conducted house searches. There were also wiretaps. The info obtained revealed that the union chief would have exerted pressure on colleagues to engage his family members and persons of a North African background when hiring. The suspect was arrested some ten days ago. The arrest for one month was confirmed by a court in Charleroi.
Possibly new arrests will follow in the coming days."
"This is no time to go wobbly Larry.
It's been about a month since the last of the accusers came out. Properly translated: THAT'S-ALL-THERE-EVER-WAS. Sorry, I read the stories about the girls having the legal age of consent and the one below it. To say that this is small beer vis-à-vis the exploits of a ton of liberal demonrats is an understatement.
Of course I found it a bit creepy that a 30 year old would make sexual advances to a 14-year old. But if I have read it correctly, at the point where things started to get hot, she asked him to stop - and he complied. End of story. NOTHING HAPPENED. Your average liberal? He would have gotten brutal and raped her. If anything, the stories of the plus 16 yo's he dated reveal that Moore was actually perhaps not straightforward enough, which I gather is why the girls broke it off in the first place. Think about it. Dating for a couple of months and all that happened was a chaste kiss? Standard procedure in my book is that after a month or so a guy tries to slip his hand under her shirt and begins tinkering with the bra. And I guess that article of faith in Outlaw Mike's Dating For Dummies still makes me a monk in the eyes of many. The behaviour of Moore in the cases of the girls of legal age of consent reveal a psychological profile that is com-ple-te-ly at odds with the bogus image of a child molester.
I've been pondering it a lot over the past few weeks and while I'm no psychoanalyst I think that Roy Moore was, and still is, a decent man whose carnal instincts were held VERY much in check by his Christian beliefs. A man who like every normal XY felt and feels attracted to the fairer sex. But perhaps to such an extent that it took him a mighty lot of time to muster the courage to make a move towards an attractive female, which might have meant that by the time he turned Cape 30 he had probably gotten afraid of approaching females his age, who he reckoned would be far more experienced and who would have made an utter fool of him. I think that it is entirely possible that Roy Moore thought that with young girls the risk of being humiliated was less (and believe me, women ARE able to humilate men, shockingly so, speaking of experience here). And the 14 year old? She may have looked like a 17 year old. Some girls have amazing breast sizes when barely in puberty.
No, I'm sorry. While I was initially reluctant to continue supporting Moore, I'm now more or less convinced this is just a replay of the peeing Russian prostitutes scenario and all the bruhaha over the President's locker room talk. A big nothingburger, but the latter led to that weasel of a Ryan suspending his (shaky) support of Donald Trump.
Real conservatives should not make the same mistake here. Roy Moore is by all accounts a decent man and a far, far better choice for Alabama than that immoral libturd he's running against."
In fact, social progress is less gay than bi: It swings both ways. After the vote, many of our Aussie readers wrote to draw my attention to the fact that the areas most fiercely opposed to the joys of same-sex marriage were not the dusty rural backwaters but the western half of Sydney. In Blaxland, for example, 73.9 per cent voted against "marriage equality".~ What makes their attitude so different to that of the rest of the nation? Census data goes some way to addressing that question. Marriage rates in Blaxland are higher but so is the proportion of couples separated.
How could that be? In The Sydney Morning Herald, Western Sydney University professor Andy Marks decided to examine the question:
"Luckily, just a couple of days ago, lest the Belgian muslim community feel excluded, the Belgian King himself, Philippe I, visited a muslim family in Ghent to participate in an iftar ceremony. Via a Flemish gossip magazine, Story:"KING PHILIP BREAKS RAMADAN BREAD TOGETHER.
GHENT - As a young soldier in the Algerian Army he received life-threatening wounds and was maimed for life. Now Embarek Tebbi can call no one else than Queen Mathilde the godmother of his seventh and youngest daughter Zaineb (6 months). "It's a miracle I can live to enjoy this."
It's long been a tradition in Belgium that the King becomes godfather of the seventh son in a family, and the Queen the godmother of the seventh daughter. When on October 20 number seven, Zaineb, was born, the family, living in Ghent, on the recommendation of friends and family, sent a letter to Queen Mathilde. Now that she accepted to become godmother, papa Embarek Tebbi (46) and mama Hadjira Sadki (42) are glowing with pride.
Especially Tebbi is overjoyed. He speaks of a 'miracle'. With his family he lives now safe and sound in an apartment in Ghent, but his face tells of the horror he lived through. "Actually I should have died as a young soldier in an attack in the nineties in Algeria", says Tebbi. "Terrorists carried out a gas attack in our base, with tens of killed as a result. But I survived, against all odds."
"Rifleman Hugh Spence, 12/6848, 12th Battalion Royal Irish Rifles, Son of Hugh and Elizabeth Spence nee McCormack, Coolkenny, Ballycastle, Co Antrim. Aprox. 19 years of age, deceased is buried in Lone Tree Cemetery, France [sic]. (Image No.7)"
"SCHOOLS SHUN FATHERS TO LURE IMMIGRANT MOTHERS
Schools try to lower treshold for parents with migration background
19-10-17, 20.23 - Sara Vandekerckhove
"Gym, cooking, parties... in several schools, only the mothers are welcome. This way, the schools want to succeed in attracting mothers of foreign extraction.
In a school in Antwerp only the mothers are allowed to come to help cutting fruit. And in a school in Ghent only mothers are welcome for gym. Although the schools let it be known right away that dads shouldn't worry. "The fathers' turn will come yet."
Yet it seems strange that fathers should be shunned from the get-go. Shouldn't children learn in school that dads can just as well cut fruit. And why can't fathers and mothers simply have gym together? Do we really have to teach children that men and women should do certain things apart?
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"For a number of mothers it really couldn't be mixed. They only wanted to come if the activity in question was purely for women."
"The Air Force has punished a highly-decorated and respected colonel after he refused to publicly affirm the same-sex spouse of a retiring subordinate. Col. Leland Bohannon, who was on the verge of being promoted to a one-star general, was suspended from command and orders were handed down recommending he not be promoted. “His career is likely over and he will likely have to retire as a colonel instead of as a general,” First Liberty Institute attorney Michael Berry told the Todd Starnes Show.
First Liberty Institute, one of the nation’s most prominent religious liberty law firms, is representing the distinguished military officer.
“This sends a clear message - if you do not have the politically correct viewpoint, you are not welcome in the military,” Berry said. “The military is no longer a place of diversity and inclusion if you are a person who holds to a traditional belief on marriage.”
Col. Bohannon has flown combat missions in Iraq and Afghanistan and he is the recipient of the Bronze Star, the Defense Meritorious Service Medal and the Air Medal.
Last May the colonel declined to sign a certificate of spouse appreciation for a retiring master sergeant’s same-sex spouse.
He was unable to do so because it would have caused him to affirm a definition of marriage contrary to his sincerely held religious beliefs.
Col. Bohannon sought the advice of his Command Chaplain as well as the Staff Judge Advocate. He was advised to request a religious accommodation. However, that request was returned six weeks later “without action.”
So, the colonel asked the Air Force Deputy IG to sign the certificate in his place.
“He went out of his way to make sure his Airman was accommodated,” Berry told the Todd Starnes Show.
But when the master sergeant learned Col. Bohannon did not personally sign the spouse certificate, the Airman filed an Equal Opportunity complaint.
The Airman alleged the devout Christian colonel had “unlawfully discriminated against him on the basis of his sexual orientation.”
The EO investigator determined the colonel had discriminated against the gay Airman – and went on to say that “even had the accommodation been granted, Col. Bohannon would nonetheless be guilty of unlawful discrimination.”
“You have a case where a decorated officer like Col. Bohannon demonstrates integrity and character to go out of his way to accommodate one of his Airmen and the Air Force will not do the same for him,” Berry told the Todd Starnes Show.
First Liberty Institute is urging the Air Force to reverse its decision – charging the military violated their client’s Constitutional rights."