Newman's changes

Campbell Newman will be leaving Greg Withers, Mr Bligh, assistant director general of the Office of Climate Change, in his position.

Withers is tasked with reversing all the climate change policies which have been brought in.

I love that twist.

Might take him a while, though.

Quite a while!

Bligh resigns from leadership and South Brisbane seat

Reckons they've got the message loud and clear.

Now we hear them bickering about what the message was.

They'll never say that the message involves the lying liar lied and Newman Smear Campaign.

Bye Bye Bligh - update

Today is the day!

******

A slow day at the polls, not a morning hammering like there has been before when I've worked anywhere near the polls.

I'm wondering what's going to happen in my electorate!

Oh, and the ALP holds their supporters in the Lockyer Valley in so much contempt that they didn't even bother to have anyone handing out "how to vote" cards!!

Amazing - the lost seats:
http://www.abc.net.au/elections/qld/2012/guide/changingseats.htm

My Kitchen Rules

MKR used to be a good program to watch because it was a competition to find the best cooks.

Now we have people gaming the competition, with a jury not blind judging dishes amongst other unfair practices, it's no longer a program to find the best cooks in the kitchens.

I don't like this development. Who had this idea? Of the jury, those eliminated earlier in the competition, two couples who I thought deserved to be eliminated early as they were gaming the competition and who have axes to grind with the competitors still left, know who is cooking what and mark the dishes as per who cooks them.

One pair up for elimination tonight have consistently cooked well, and their dish was a hit with the celebrity chef judges, unfortunately the jury decided that they'd not worked hard enough and had enough pressure in the competition so they received a very low mark. There were two other couples who hadn't made very good dishes and they were not chosen for elimination by the judges.

This is not going to find the best cooks.

I suspect that this program has jumped the shark. I wonder what other people who have enjoyed this program in the past think of this current series.

(And four out of six adverts showing are for the ALP, bagging the power that Newman will have with a landslide win in the election, and how dangerous that will be for the state. Well, Ms Bligh et. al., what about the power that the ALP has had in Queenslad for the past 20 years and which they have misused through that time!)

CMC finds nothing to investigate with Newman

TEN announces that  the CMC statement is "a blow to the ALP".

It should be a dirty great sledge hammer to wake up the people who believe the lies from the Queensland ALP.

CMC clears Newman.
The Crime and Misconduct Commission will not conduct investigations into LNP leader Campbell Newman over a raft of allegations involving developer donations, misconduct of council staff and corruption.
In a statement issued this afternoon, the CMC said it not believe Mr Newman was guilty of official misconduct, although it will investigate the developer donations made to the LNP's Forward Brisbane Leadership fund the week before a controversial development was approved by the Brisbane City Council.
In a statement, a CMC spokeswoman said the watchdog had decided the issue of whether there was evidence of administrative deficiency on the part of the council over a $15 million land deal in Tennyson should be referred to the Queensland Ombudsman.

Read more.

Bligh, saviour of Queensland!

Bligh saved Queensland from the effects of the GFC

AND

Led us through the worst natural disasters in Queensland.

Hear it here*!

*If you can stomach it.

QEII and Anna Bligh on the Brisbane River.

During the week Queen  Elizabeth cruised the Brisbane River. Her guide was Anna Bligh. I viewed snippets of video of Her Majesty waving to the crowds gathered on the riversides (not much in the way of a riverbank there, it's all built up!).

The crowds returned the wave to The Queen, and  then Ms Bligh began waving, too. I couldn't believe it. This was real shouting at the TV material.

"What are you doing, waving  at the crowd you failure? They're waving at The Queen, not you!"

I couldn't find any video of this, but I did find this still:

Image found here.

Water in SE Qld -

She didn't protect us from a doubling of our land rates, but she says she'll protect us from a rise in our water costs.

I'm lucky. Last two water bills I've paid zero for water - I have a tank for my reticulated water and there's been a lot of rain. I've had no water from the local water supplier, I've just had to pay the cost of the infrastructure, which is about $60-70 per quarter.

 More links here.

Might write more later... busy, busy, busy.

And still the formatting is stuffed.

Insiders 20FEB11

Sara Helter-Skelter is the guest green lefty.

The intro to the show is about the only thing which happened this week, the funeral and the nine year old orphan.

Boo-feckin'-hoo.

There are nine year old Australian orphans who get bugger all from the government, there are plenty of kids in care of grandparents who get bugger all fromthe government.

There were some people interviewed/recorded who seem quite close to the edge of sanity in their defence of the boat people "Haven't they suffered enough?". Well, how about you pay for the funeral flights etc.? None so blind. As the old saying is, they bought their tickets....

They're going to hang Morrison, and the Libs, and elevate the ALP.

I hate the MSM in Aus. They're pointless and useless. They don't report the facts, they aren't impartial.


I'm going to read the papers...

Headline on today's Courier Mail makes me sick. Bligh at 60% popularity.

I'm going to be sick.

Update:
For Merilyn

A Galaxy poll, conducted exclusively for The Sunday Mail, reveals the Premier's satisfaction rating has soared from a perilous 25 per cent at the depths of the controversial asset sell-off before Christmas to 60 per cent now.

Read it and weep... at the stupid!

Means testing for flood aid from the Queensland Premier's Appeal Fund

The Queensland Premier's Flood Appeal fund recipients will be means tested to determine whether they are worthy of receiving funds from this pool which has largely been donated by generous people and businesses Australia wide and, indeed, from around the world. Of course the Premier of Queensland says means testing is fair.

For example, a $5000 grant to help uninsured home owners to restore essential utilities will not be available to couples with a combined annual income of more than $48,400 or for singles who earn more than $36,600.

Ms Bligh said the payments were modelled on state-federal arrangements and were to ensure the "neediest get the most".

The line must be drawn somewhere, but why reward the uninsured and not help those who are insured? The donations were to help all people affected by the floods. I don't think that those who are uninsured are more deserving than those who are insured.

Read more on the means testing here.

Like my mother I believe that everyone should get the same amount of funds, I think that it is fair that the damage to property be determined and the amount of funding be determined by the level of inundation/damage/material loss suffered by each flood victim/family/home. For example, if the whole house has gone under the amount should be X, if the water only covered the floor the amount should by less than X. I'm not sure how to determine how much each case should get, but there should be guidelines which are applied to everyone equally.

Just because a family may earn more than another doesn't mean that they are in a better position to afford to replace/repair/rebuild. I also think that people who are insured should not be punished by not receiving funds from the pool, and those intentionally uninsured should not be rewarded for their lack of preparation.

Even God's not happy!

A narrow escape from a lightning strike for Qld Premier Anna Bligh...

I can hear him now....

"Oh, shit. I missed!"

Qld Government considers mothballing water projects

Sounds like a great idea to me.

Anna Bligh says:

"We're looking at every possible option and if that means mothballing some of the facilities we don't need because our dams are full, then that's what we'll be doing."

"I want to bring water bill downs as much as we possibly can, even if it's only by a few dollars, because every dollar counts."

Ms Bligh said several money-saving options are available.

"One is operating these facilities at a significantly reduced rate to keep them ticking over but without producing very much water; [another] is to close them down entirely for a period of time."

and

The government's $9 billion southeast water grid features more than 450km of pipeline and eight facilities including the Tugun plant, the Western Corridor recycled water project and the Cedar Grove Weir.

Furthermore, the Wyaralong Dam near Beaudesert and the Northern Pipeline Interconnector are under construction.

Once complete, the grid is expected to deliver about 350,000 megalitres of additional water a year.

Additional water? That much? Is it that much? Additional water? Are they going to make water, surely the desal plant won't make that much water...

Build a bloody dam or several instead.

Update:
I'm sure I saw a headline about the Victorian desalination plant which said that the union was ensuring certain union members were getting jobs on the site... but all I can find is this and this.

Oh, wait. Here we are:

Unionists 'forced desal hirings'

UNIONISTS at Victoria's desalination plant have been using strong-arm tactics on job recruiters to force the hiring of preferred union members.

This is according to intelligence from operatives who conducted a spying operation code-named Pluto Project.

The extraordinarily generous wages and conditions on offer, the forcefulness of union figures and the pressure on builders to meet tight construction deadlines for the Brumby government's $5 billion-plus plant had led to numerous unacceptable hirings, sources said yesterday.

"A number of people hired on that site have never even worked in construction or on a site before," said one senior source.

"Managers have been giving in to compulsory unionism because the union dictates who will work on the site. Supervisors go through the induction office and say 'to keep sweet with the unions, put these people on'.

More here.