So, Rosie Batty is at it yet again now making accusations against her now-dead ex partner of viewing child pornography.
She goes onto state that she "found out" that he had charges pending against him for view child abuse videos in a public library. Because women in custody battles NEVER make false accusations against their exes.
I'm only skeptical of this new report because in every interview she's ever given her big point that she made that her ex was an otherwise good father and most certainly never mentioned something as serious as allegations of child pornography.
Isn't it just fantastic that these allegations have surfaced just in time for her to be a (presumably paid) speaker at world conference on families of sex offenders. I guess just being a (paid) spokesperson for Domestic Violence doesn't get enough (paid) speaking engagements.
Isn't it also great that her ex isn't alive to defend himself against every accusation she's throwing at him and that the police aren't likely to come out and say her claims are false. The guy either doesn't have any remaining family of his own or they're too afraid to call out the PR juggernaut that is Rosie Batty on what is either something that has never been mentioned in the past, or is a complete fabrication.
This woman has been through a tragedy, but seriously, the next thing she'll be accusing him of is child sex trafficking and scalping AFL Grand Final tickets!
Her previous position on domestic violence was that her ex murdered her son despite not prior history of any violence, which was used as the war cry for women's groups to argue that "lack of history of violence should not be considered a reason not to keep men away from their children". But if what Batty is now claiming is true, then her ex DID have some black marks against his name and can no longer be held up as an example of men killing their children out of nowhere.
Please note, that at the time of writing this it is completely legal for women to make false accusations against men in family court. By legal I mean that there are NO repercussions and no penalties. Obviously they SAY women aren't allowed to do it, but if they're found to be lying, there are no penalties, so effectively it's legal.
There's even a petition on Change.org fort he reformation of Family Law Court that already has almost 1,200 signatures about it. Interestingly enough, it's been started by a woman.
Tuesday, February 28, 2017
Sunday, February 26, 2017
A problem with diversifying assets
I was thinking about how financial people are always telling us to make sure we don't have all of our eggs in one basket and that we should diversify our investments.
Example: if I have $100k in the stock market, I should aim to put a similar amount of money into property.
The problem I have relates to a specific scenario which is that if I purchased a small property about 10 years ago and the value of it has gone up about $50k in that time with me originally putting in $50k of my own money in to purchase, so I'd have a combined equity of $100k tied up in 'property'.
Now, the conventional wisdom of financial investing is that I should aim to invest an equivalent amount of money in the stock market to ensure that, if the price of the property were to collapse, I would be hopefully protected.
The problem I have with that is that the average person would take quite a while to find $100k to invest in order to provide the necessary diversity.
Another point is that I could find that, in the time it takes for me to invest said $100k, the value of the property would have kept rising, which isn't a bad problem to have.
The alternative way to look at it is that I'd be better off aiming to buy a 2nd property (in a different area, for a small bit of diversity) for many reasons, the main one being that I'd be chasing my tail for many years to catch up with the returns that my first property delivered.
To compound that, once I'd 'balanced my diversity' and decided to buy my next property, I'd either have to start saving a separate amount of money to buy a 2nd property, taking many years to enable, or I'd just liquidate a large chunk of shares to buy the 2nd property, thereby reintroducing the imbalance again.
There is always the possibility of borrowing against the 1st property to either buy the 2nd property or even invest in shares, but unless the shares are returning an above interest rate dividend, I'd be going into debt to maintain a false investment portfolio that I'd still have to pay back, even if the share prices collapse.
Overall, I think a balance of the two is good, however at the current growth rates of property prices in Australia, I think I'd be hard pressed to find an equivalent return in stock market without as much risk. The one advantage the stock market has is the low entry and exit costs and the far quick time to liquidate the assets.
The main difference is that there are only a finite number of companies on the stock exchange and, whilst some are overrated and others are underrated, all are under regular scrutiny by many different groups of investors.
Property sees millions of houses being assessed by far fewer potential investors as a percentage of the whole, which means there's a far greater chance of finding a bargain.
Example: if I have $100k in the stock market, I should aim to put a similar amount of money into property.
The problem I have relates to a specific scenario which is that if I purchased a small property about 10 years ago and the value of it has gone up about $50k in that time with me originally putting in $50k of my own money in to purchase, so I'd have a combined equity of $100k tied up in 'property'.
Now, the conventional wisdom of financial investing is that I should aim to invest an equivalent amount of money in the stock market to ensure that, if the price of the property were to collapse, I would be hopefully protected.
The problem I have with that is that the average person would take quite a while to find $100k to invest in order to provide the necessary diversity.
Another point is that I could find that, in the time it takes for me to invest said $100k, the value of the property would have kept rising, which isn't a bad problem to have.
The alternative way to look at it is that I'd be better off aiming to buy a 2nd property (in a different area, for a small bit of diversity) for many reasons, the main one being that I'd be chasing my tail for many years to catch up with the returns that my first property delivered.
To compound that, once I'd 'balanced my diversity' and decided to buy my next property, I'd either have to start saving a separate amount of money to buy a 2nd property, taking many years to enable, or I'd just liquidate a large chunk of shares to buy the 2nd property, thereby reintroducing the imbalance again.
There is always the possibility of borrowing against the 1st property to either buy the 2nd property or even invest in shares, but unless the shares are returning an above interest rate dividend, I'd be going into debt to maintain a false investment portfolio that I'd still have to pay back, even if the share prices collapse.
Overall, I think a balance of the two is good, however at the current growth rates of property prices in Australia, I think I'd be hard pressed to find an equivalent return in stock market without as much risk. The one advantage the stock market has is the low entry and exit costs and the far quick time to liquidate the assets.
The main difference is that there are only a finite number of companies on the stock exchange and, whilst some are overrated and others are underrated, all are under regular scrutiny by many different groups of investors.
Property sees millions of houses being assessed by far fewer potential investors as a percentage of the whole, which means there's a far greater chance of finding a bargain.
Thursday, February 23, 2017
Woman defrauds men for $2 million, gets 18 months minimum
So a woman has defrauded multiple men out of more than $2 million, yet only gets 18 months jail minimum:
http://www.9news.com.au/national/2017/02/23/13/53/sydney-lonely-hearts-fraudster-gets-6-yrs
Contrary to what I normally do, I've posted the full link to the article because, as people will notice, the link itself reads "Sydney lonely hearts fraudster gets 6 years", which isn't even half true as the full sentence is only three and a half years, with a minimum sentence of 18 months.
As usual, the media focused solely on the poor woman, what drove her to doing it (she's a mother of four and takes care of her mother and brother) yet doesn't mention the impact on a single one of the victims, who may never get their money back since this poor woman is supposed to have spent the "money on cocaine, gambling and building a house".
This other 'news' website reports that she also spent the money on plastic surgery and cars.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but only one of those three things even remotely relates to taking care of anyone. Gambling and using cocaine never helped raise children or look after relatives.
She really isn't a victim at all. As usual, the stories of the real victims here, the men, will never be told by the media, who never want to paint men as victims or women as perpetrators, so will avoid it as much as possible.
Compare the 18 month sentence to the four year jail sentence issued to a man who 'only' stole $80,000 from 87 victims on Gumtree. The difference was that this man had no contact with his victims, didn't continually lie to them, only the main lie that he was selling something that he didn't have. So woman steals $2 million and gets 18 months jail, man steals $80,000 and gets 4 years jail.
I guess that's equality. Feminists must be outraged!
http://www.9news.com.au/national/2017/02/23/13/53/sydney-lonely-hearts-fraudster-gets-6-yrs
Contrary to what I normally do, I've posted the full link to the article because, as people will notice, the link itself reads "Sydney lonely hearts fraudster gets 6 years", which isn't even half true as the full sentence is only three and a half years, with a minimum sentence of 18 months.
As usual, the media focused solely on the poor woman, what drove her to doing it (she's a mother of four and takes care of her mother and brother) yet doesn't mention the impact on a single one of the victims, who may never get their money back since this poor woman is supposed to have spent the "money on cocaine, gambling and building a house".
This other 'news' website reports that she also spent the money on plastic surgery and cars.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but only one of those three things even remotely relates to taking care of anyone. Gambling and using cocaine never helped raise children or look after relatives.
She really isn't a victim at all. As usual, the stories of the real victims here, the men, will never be told by the media, who never want to paint men as victims or women as perpetrators, so will avoid it as much as possible.
Compare the 18 month sentence to the four year jail sentence issued to a man who 'only' stole $80,000 from 87 victims on Gumtree. The difference was that this man had no contact with his victims, didn't continually lie to them, only the main lie that he was selling something that he didn't have. So woman steals $2 million and gets 18 months jail, man steals $80,000 and gets 4 years jail.
I guess that's equality. Feminists must be outraged!
Tuesday, February 21, 2017
The Conversation censors even suggestions
So, the (extreme far left) Conversation website has taken down my comment about Tax and dividend: How conservatives can grow to love carbon pricing.
I didn't bother taking a cut and paste of my original comment, but it was pretty tame (for me). It went something like this:
Trying to tell conservatives what they should think (based on what you think they should think) isn't the way to go. If you want conservatives (and indeed skeptics and denialists) on board then the pro-Climate Change scientific community needs to call out their more radical peers for making outrageous claims (like that half the cities of the world are going to be under water within 80 years) rather than simply attacking anyone who questions it.
Scientists who may actually agree with climate change are afraid to challenge some of the more extreme claims out of fear for being labelled a denier or skeptic.
If the scientific community doesn't call them out, then it gives the skeptics ammunition to point at failed predictions as proof the whole thing is wrong.
That was pretty much the gist of it. All I was asking for was for the scientific community to call out its zealots who are making outlandish statements on the grounds that, much like the story of the boy who cried wolf, if we continue to hear outlandish predictions (and spend real money to try to prevent or mitigate against their outcomes) which then prove to be false, then we're going to stop listening to the predictions.
A bit like the priest who says to an atheist that the atheist needs to give half his money to the church lest he go to hell. A better approach would be to tell the atheist that if he gives him 1% of his money that won't go to hell in addition to going to church. The atheist is likely to say "I'm being promised salvation for only 1% of my money and a bit of time, what's the harm?"
Once in church, the priest can then increase the amount of money requested, whereby the (former?) atheist might decide that slow incremental increases aren't too much to bear, especially for eternal salvation, up to a point.
No, the way these climate alarmists work is that you're all in or you're all out, the only difference between the priest and a climate alarmist is that the priest is only saying that if the atheist doesn't go to church (and give some money) that his soul will be lost and the climate alarmist is saying that if a skeptic doesn't join the cause (and give lots of money) that everyone is lost.
It's kind of a self-fulfilling prophecy on all counts:
Notice that there's no scenario in the above where climate change believers will ever admit that they were wrong.
Remember, science is repeatable and must have results and be transparent. When pro-climate change people collating data 'lose' inconvenient data before it has a chance to be backed up or verified by an external source isn't science, it's just crap.
If people who question those actions are then attacked for even questioning the 'word', then it's not science, it's a religion.
Notice the similarities between Islam and Climate Change:
Overall, both groups have honest people who mean well, but both groups have radical groups out to push their cause. Both groups have underlying organisations behind them that stand to profit from their success and people should always be suspicious of a group offering to 'save' you for money, but only if you sell your soul.
I didn't bother taking a cut and paste of my original comment, but it was pretty tame (for me). It went something like this:
Trying to tell conservatives what they should think (based on what you think they should think) isn't the way to go. If you want conservatives (and indeed skeptics and denialists) on board then the pro-Climate Change scientific community needs to call out their more radical peers for making outrageous claims (like that half the cities of the world are going to be under water within 80 years) rather than simply attacking anyone who questions it.
Scientists who may actually agree with climate change are afraid to challenge some of the more extreme claims out of fear for being labelled a denier or skeptic.
If the scientific community doesn't call them out, then it gives the skeptics ammunition to point at failed predictions as proof the whole thing is wrong.
That was pretty much the gist of it. All I was asking for was for the scientific community to call out its zealots who are making outlandish statements on the grounds that, much like the story of the boy who cried wolf, if we continue to hear outlandish predictions (and spend real money to try to prevent or mitigate against their outcomes) which then prove to be false, then we're going to stop listening to the predictions.
A bit like the priest who says to an atheist that the atheist needs to give half his money to the church lest he go to hell. A better approach would be to tell the atheist that if he gives him 1% of his money that won't go to hell in addition to going to church. The atheist is likely to say "I'm being promised salvation for only 1% of my money and a bit of time, what's the harm?"
Once in church, the priest can then increase the amount of money requested, whereby the (former?) atheist might decide that slow incremental increases aren't too much to bear, especially for eternal salvation, up to a point.
No, the way these climate alarmists work is that you're all in or you're all out, the only difference between the priest and a climate alarmist is that the priest is only saying that if the atheist doesn't go to church (and give some money) that his soul will be lost and the climate alarmist is saying that if a skeptic doesn't join the cause (and give lots of money) that everyone is lost.
It's kind of a self-fulfilling prophecy on all counts:
- If climate change is man made and we manage to stop it, they'll (rightly) take the credit;
- If climate change isn't man made and it stops (or it didn't exist) regardless of how much money we throw at it, they'll (incorrectly) take the credit;
- If climate change is man made and we don't manage to stop it, they'll blame the people who didn't believe them; and
- If climate change isn't man made and it doesn't stop, they'll blame the people who didn't believe them.
Notice that there's no scenario in the above where climate change believers will ever admit that they were wrong.
Remember, science is repeatable and must have results and be transparent. When pro-climate change people collating data 'lose' inconvenient data before it has a chance to be backed up or verified by an external source isn't science, it's just crap.
If people who question those actions are then attacked for even questioning the 'word', then it's not science, it's a religion.
Notice the similarities between Islam and Climate Change:
- Both believe that it's ok to attack non-believers;
- Both demand more than their fair share of space and representation;
- Both groups are defended unconditionally by the media, despite questionable actions;
- Both groups have radicals who say/do extreme things that connected to their core beliefs, yet are somehow 'disconnected' when they go to far; and
- Both groups have wealthy backers financially supporting their spread (the UN for CC and wealthy sheiks paying to build mosques in Western countries).
Overall, both groups have honest people who mean well, but both groups have radical groups out to push their cause. Both groups have underlying organisations behind them that stand to profit from their success and people should always be suspicious of a group offering to 'save' you for money, but only if you sell your soul.
Sunday, February 19, 2017
How divorce provides disincentives for investment
In Australia, there's a very real imbalance with regards to how finances are dealt with when it comes to divorce and, specifically, child support.
Put simply, the rules are set to cover 95% of the applicable population, with the other 5% expected just to suck it up.
Consider Case A - Unfair to men:
A couple get divorced and they have one child together. The husband, let's call him Harry, has to pay $300 a week in child support, which is based on the fact that his ex-wife, who we'll call Debbie, earns a decent wage.
Harry's ex-wife Debbie then re-marries and has another child to her new husband and decides to cut back on work or quit altogether.
Child Support Australia then re-calculates Harry's child support payments and INCREASES them to account for the fact that Debbie is no longer earning.
The outcome: Harry must pay MORE money to support his child because of the lifestyle decision his ex-wife made in a new relationship. What's worse for Harry is that there currently exist no safeguards in place to ensure that the money that he's paying to his ex-wife for child support is even spent on his own child.
Now consider Case B - Unfair to women:
The same couple get divorced, only this time Harry remarries and has a child with his new wife.
Since Child Support Australia calculates amount payable as a portion of your income, the amount Harry is required to pay in child support to his ex-wife is REDUCED because he's now got two children and the total amount he can reasonably be expected to pay is now divided by two.
The outcome: the ex-wife, who may have been relying on that weekly payment to put food on the table and the lights on, is now going to come up short.
Now consider Case C - Disincentive to invest:
Same couple gets divorced, man decides that he's going to buy an investment property, which is negatively geared to the tune of $10k a year. Since Child Support Australia doesn't allow deductions for negative gearing, the net loss of roughly $200 per week must come out of what money Harry has left after paying child support.
Fast forward 10 years, Harry is still paying child support, only the property is now positively geared and making $200 per week. Since this income is now considered in calculating child support payments, his payments to his ex-wife go up proportionally, despite him taking the hit for the first 10 years.
Fast forward another 2 years, Harry decides to sell the house and walks away with $200k in capital gains, which is first taxed by the ATO for capital gains tax, then taken apart by Child Support Australia as being profit.
The outcome: any man paying child support is going to pay for an investment property out of what he has left after paying taxes and child support, but once that investment turns a profit in either selling for Capital Gains or in increase in rent, he has his child support adjusted.
The alternative would be to allow deductions of child support due to negative gearing, however this would negatively affect women as some men would load themselves up with multiple properties in the interests of avoiding paying child support.
Conclusion:
As stated above, the laws are in place to cover 95% of the population, however as I've shown above in Case C, the current system is a massive disincentive for people paying child support (usually men) to invest in property since they get no concessions in payments early in the investment in the loss-making portion, and get stung at either the profit making, be it positive cash flow or capital gains.
Give that child support can last 18 - 21 years, that's a big chunk of what would otherwise be prime capital building years.
I guess the only suggestions I can make are:
Please don't take the above post to mean that I'm advocating to minimise support of your children. I am only pointing out that the whole system is designed for the 95% and that the 5% ends up in circumstances that cost tens of thousands of dollars and are a massive disincentive to bother in the first place.
One of the common complaints I read from ex-husbands is that their respective ex-wives have no accountability for the money: "I pay $500 a week and my wife doesn't work, wears Prada, smokes and drinks". Perhaps things would be better if there was a mechanism whereby the wives were required to account for the money a bit, but knowing how the media loves to just shoot down any suggestion that women be held accountable for anything is "sexist" and could be open to abuse by former spouses (men) whilst simultaneously defending the decision to allow the current laws brought in under the Gillard government making false accusations against men in divorce cases legal, the chances of any changes in this space are minimal.
It really is one law for men and one law for women.
Put simply, the rules are set to cover 95% of the applicable population, with the other 5% expected just to suck it up.
Consider Case A - Unfair to men:
A couple get divorced and they have one child together. The husband, let's call him Harry, has to pay $300 a week in child support, which is based on the fact that his ex-wife, who we'll call Debbie, earns a decent wage.
Harry's ex-wife Debbie then re-marries and has another child to her new husband and decides to cut back on work or quit altogether.
Child Support Australia then re-calculates Harry's child support payments and INCREASES them to account for the fact that Debbie is no longer earning.
The outcome: Harry must pay MORE money to support his child because of the lifestyle decision his ex-wife made in a new relationship. What's worse for Harry is that there currently exist no safeguards in place to ensure that the money that he's paying to his ex-wife for child support is even spent on his own child.
Now consider Case B - Unfair to women:
The same couple get divorced, only this time Harry remarries and has a child with his new wife.
Since Child Support Australia calculates amount payable as a portion of your income, the amount Harry is required to pay in child support to his ex-wife is REDUCED because he's now got two children and the total amount he can reasonably be expected to pay is now divided by two.
The outcome: the ex-wife, who may have been relying on that weekly payment to put food on the table and the lights on, is now going to come up short.
Now consider Case C - Disincentive to invest:
Same couple gets divorced, man decides that he's going to buy an investment property, which is negatively geared to the tune of $10k a year. Since Child Support Australia doesn't allow deductions for negative gearing, the net loss of roughly $200 per week must come out of what money Harry has left after paying child support.
Fast forward 10 years, Harry is still paying child support, only the property is now positively geared and making $200 per week. Since this income is now considered in calculating child support payments, his payments to his ex-wife go up proportionally, despite him taking the hit for the first 10 years.
Fast forward another 2 years, Harry decides to sell the house and walks away with $200k in capital gains, which is first taxed by the ATO for capital gains tax, then taken apart by Child Support Australia as being profit.
The outcome: any man paying child support is going to pay for an investment property out of what he has left after paying taxes and child support, but once that investment turns a profit in either selling for Capital Gains or in increase in rent, he has his child support adjusted.
The alternative would be to allow deductions of child support due to negative gearing, however this would negatively affect women as some men would load themselves up with multiple properties in the interests of avoiding paying child support.
Conclusion:
As stated above, the laws are in place to cover 95% of the population, however as I've shown above in Case C, the current system is a massive disincentive for people paying child support (usually men) to invest in property since they get no concessions in payments early in the investment in the loss-making portion, and get stung at either the profit making, be it positive cash flow or capital gains.
Give that child support can last 18 - 21 years, that's a big chunk of what would otherwise be prime capital building years.
I guess the only suggestions I can make are:
- If planning to purchase property, opt for long-term holdings rather than flipping houses profit method. Making $100k in two years may look good on paper as a side project, but won't look as good when your ex-wife gets a hefty chunk of money from the investment without lifting a finger.
- If you already hold properties and would like to sell, hold off on selling until child support payments have stopped. Simply waiting a couple of years could save you thousands.
- Consider investing in lower cost, lower time investments like shares, bonds and ETFs. You're going to have to pay money to support your child one way or another, but property investment carries a lot more unpaid time cost and capital improvement cost that can only be deducted from your post-child support money. Simply paying that money as a percentage of dividend yield is a far simpler in the short term.
Please don't take the above post to mean that I'm advocating to minimise support of your children. I am only pointing out that the whole system is designed for the 95% and that the 5% ends up in circumstances that cost tens of thousands of dollars and are a massive disincentive to bother in the first place.
One of the common complaints I read from ex-husbands is that their respective ex-wives have no accountability for the money: "I pay $500 a week and my wife doesn't work, wears Prada, smokes and drinks". Perhaps things would be better if there was a mechanism whereby the wives were required to account for the money a bit, but knowing how the media loves to just shoot down any suggestion that women be held accountable for anything is "sexist" and could be open to abuse by former spouses (men) whilst simultaneously defending the decision to allow the current laws brought in under the Gillard government making false accusations against men in divorce cases legal, the chances of any changes in this space are minimal.
It really is one law for men and one law for women.
Tuesday, February 14, 2017
Strange 'extortion' attempt
So here's the story of a poor woman who sent some photos of herself to a guy she was chatting with on the internet whose girlfriend found out and tried to get her fired.
Firstly, I note how the whole article mentions extortion, yet by all accounts the jilted girlfriend only tried to threaten her off her man and sent photos to her boss to try to get the woman fired. I saw no mention of "give me $20k or else".
Secondly, it's not until the sixth paragraph that we find out the online abuse (or 'extortion') came from the guy's fiancee, NOT the guy himself. In the article's defense, it was written in chronological order, so taking six paragraphs to get to that little detail is somewhat forgivable.
Thirdly, the woman worked in retail, so getting fired from a job in retail because some random stranger wasn't likely to happen, but even if it did it would hardly 'ruin her life'.
True to form, there's only a handful of paragraphs where the gender of the abusive person is mentioned, whereas had the offender been male every other paragraph would have started with "The man then..."
Remember, the media lies by omission and will play down or leave out details they don't want featured. Had it been a man doing those nasty things the headline would have been "Man sends images of woman to her boss".
Firstly, I note how the whole article mentions extortion, yet by all accounts the jilted girlfriend only tried to threaten her off her man and sent photos to her boss to try to get the woman fired. I saw no mention of "give me $20k or else".
Secondly, it's not until the sixth paragraph that we find out the online abuse (or 'extortion') came from the guy's fiancee, NOT the guy himself. In the article's defense, it was written in chronological order, so taking six paragraphs to get to that little detail is somewhat forgivable.
Thirdly, the woman worked in retail, so getting fired from a job in retail because some random stranger wasn't likely to happen, but even if it did it would hardly 'ruin her life'.
True to form, there's only a handful of paragraphs where the gender of the abusive person is mentioned, whereas had the offender been male every other paragraph would have started with "The man then..."
Remember, the media lies by omission and will play down or leave out details they don't want featured. Had it been a man doing those nasty things the headline would have been "Man sends images of woman to her boss".
Media reports on poor Middle Easterners arrested, leaves police's side last
So the media has reported about a couple of Middle Eastern men who have been arrested and charged following a scuffle with police.
As usual, the media tells the whole side of the 'poor misunderstood' Middle Eastern guy's story first, even interviewing him, before then showing the other side of the story.
Most police don't just start dragging people to the ground for no reason.
That area is known for its high Lebanese population and, interestingly enough, a person I was speaking to the other day who is also from Lebanon was telling me, when I asked had they gotten to know the Lebanese community, that the people they saw from Lebanon who now live in Melbourne were not typical of Lebanese and were, for lack of proper translation, the 'bogans' of Lebanon and not middle class or upper class.
I've met a few Lebanese people who were very nice, but the males in the area mentioned above tend to have a big chip on their shoulder, do whatever they want when they want and don't respect other people in their neighbourhood.
I'm aware that we get people like that from all backgrounds and it's the noisy ones who get the most attention, but this is more than that. The Lebanese gentleman who lived next door to me was quiet, however he'd invite his extended family over on occasion (any night of the week!) and there'd be arguments, swearing and yelling until all hours of the morning. It's possible that the quiet ones were trying to calm down the rest of their friends and family by association, but all we saw and heard was large groups hanging out the front of their house until all hours of the morning and even throwing stuff (like eggs) at my house.
Coming back to the original article, it's not hard a hard concept to understand: don't abuse people who have the authority to arrest you for that abuse!
As usual, the media tells the whole side of the 'poor misunderstood' Middle Eastern guy's story first, even interviewing him, before then showing the other side of the story.
Most police don't just start dragging people to the ground for no reason.
That area is known for its high Lebanese population and, interestingly enough, a person I was speaking to the other day who is also from Lebanon was telling me, when I asked had they gotten to know the Lebanese community, that the people they saw from Lebanon who now live in Melbourne were not typical of Lebanese and were, for lack of proper translation, the 'bogans' of Lebanon and not middle class or upper class.
I've met a few Lebanese people who were very nice, but the males in the area mentioned above tend to have a big chip on their shoulder, do whatever they want when they want and don't respect other people in their neighbourhood.
I'm aware that we get people like that from all backgrounds and it's the noisy ones who get the most attention, but this is more than that. The Lebanese gentleman who lived next door to me was quiet, however he'd invite his extended family over on occasion (any night of the week!) and there'd be arguments, swearing and yelling until all hours of the morning. It's possible that the quiet ones were trying to calm down the rest of their friends and family by association, but all we saw and heard was large groups hanging out the front of their house until all hours of the morning and even throwing stuff (like eggs) at my house.
Coming back to the original article, it's not hard a hard concept to understand: don't abuse people who have the authority to arrest you for that abuse!
Wednesday, February 8, 2017
Potential Islamic terrorists charged, Yahoo and Nine quiet
So a couple of aspiring Bonnie and Clyde youngsters looking to go on a rampage against "the kaffir" have been charged and face possible life in prison.
Funny how this doesn't make the headlines of Yahoo or Nine. I guess this doesn't fit with the "all Muslims are peaceful" narrative.
Funny how this doesn't make the headlines of Yahoo or Nine. I guess this doesn't fit with the "all Muslims are peaceful" narrative.
How to potentially reduce your tax while paying your family
Want to know how to potentially reduce your tax whilst giving money to your family and get more money than you started with? Just follow what the CEO of Australia Post did.
Notice that he negotiated a $2 million taxable payment into a $2.8 million, a 40% increase, 'donation' to the Islamic Museum of Australia that his brother runs, which presumably pays his brother a salary, though it's not really a donation if it's technically a payment.
I think I'll look at setting up an organisation that will be run by my wife and will negotiate $50k of my salary into a $70k donation to the organisation, which will ultimately pay her a salary.
It must be legal, because Ahmed Fahour was allowed to do it!
Oh wait, the donation came from a Muslim and was paid to a Islamic organisation, so I won't be holding my breath that it'll be audited or investigated in any way, since our media and law enforcement doesn't want to appear to be 'racist'.
On second thoughts, I'm not prepared to convert to Islam just to save a bit on tax.
UPDATE:
Apparently Ahmed has resigned from his position. Interesting things to note that are written in the article is that it was supposedly his decision, he'll still get his multi-million dollar salary and he's just waiting to find out what his bonus (presumably in the millions) will be.
I just hope that Australia Post won't let the guy negotiate any of his salary into a 40% increased amount 'donated' to an organisation run by his family.
Notice that he negotiated a $2 million taxable payment into a $2.8 million, a 40% increase, 'donation' to the Islamic Museum of Australia that his brother runs, which presumably pays his brother a salary, though it's not really a donation if it's technically a payment.
I think I'll look at setting up an organisation that will be run by my wife and will negotiate $50k of my salary into a $70k donation to the organisation, which will ultimately pay her a salary.
It must be legal, because Ahmed Fahour was allowed to do it!
Oh wait, the donation came from a Muslim and was paid to a Islamic organisation, so I won't be holding my breath that it'll be audited or investigated in any way, since our media and law enforcement doesn't want to appear to be 'racist'.
On second thoughts, I'm not prepared to convert to Islam just to save a bit on tax.
UPDATE:
Apparently Ahmed has resigned from his position. Interesting things to note that are written in the article is that it was supposedly his decision, he'll still get his multi-million dollar salary and he's just waiting to find out what his bonus (presumably in the millions) will be.
I just hope that Australia Post won't let the guy negotiate any of his salary into a 40% increased amount 'donated' to an organisation run by his family.
Tuesday, February 7, 2017
Musings on the public vs private school debate
This is a copy and paste of a comment I left on an article about public vs private schools at the Monthly:
Living in a large country town that is crowded out by private (mostly Catholic) schools that apparently poach top performing students from public schools, leaving the public schools with 'the leftovers', I'm caught between a rock and a hard place.
I myself went to what was (and still is) a very good public school (I think we got lucky with where we were living at the right time) whereas both of my parents went to private schools and opted for a lifestyle decision not to send me to a private school, mostly based on the good reputation of the local public school.
I'm in the opposite situation as where I'm living with my family is in an area that has pretty terrible public schools (primary and secondary) for the simple reason that the private schools poach the good students and then parents (like me) decide not to send our beloved children to what is a 'failing school', statistically speaking, in favour of one of the more expensive private schools, which in my area consist of moderately priced Catholic schools (a bit hard to get in if your children aren't baptised) or the exorbitantly over-priced non-Catholic schools.
It almost becomes a self fulfilling prophecy because nothing succeeds like success, so parents climb over and sometimes go into debt to send their children to one of the nearby private schools instead of risking their children's education.
My brother and his family are living in the catchment area of a much better performing public school, but oddly enough, should they decide to send their children to the nearby private school, the fees are very reasonable at about $2k per student per year, as opposed to the 'moderately' priced $5k per student per year I'm looking at.
My brother and his family are living in the catchment area of a much better performing public school, but oddly enough, should they decide to send their children to the nearby private school, the fees are very reasonable at about $2k per student per year, as opposed to the 'moderately' priced $5k per student per year I'm looking at.
So, I've got the choices of:
1. Move into the catchment area of a good school - $$$
2. Get my children Baptized so they can attend - deceptive, but I have seen MANY couples do this
3. Put them into the public system and hope they get poached - not helping the public school
4. Put them into the public system and put full support behind it, even going so far as to resist any possible effort for my children to be poached.
1. Move into the catchment area of a good school - $$$
2. Get my children Baptized so they can attend - deceptive, but I have seen MANY couples do this
3. Put them into the public system and hope they get poached - not helping the public school
4. Put them into the public system and put full support behind it, even going so far as to resist any possible effort for my children to be poached.
It's a hard decision to make and I'll never really know if I've done the right thing (unless all of my children become CEO's or Prime Minister) as I'll always wonder if whatever decision I made could have held them back.
Sorry for the long post, but I'll finish with this one piece of information that the original poster may not have been aware: one of the reasons behind my parents, who were both privately schooled, not sending me to private school was that a study had been completed by Melbourne University on the outcomes of students who went public vs private. The outcome was that if a family could easily afford the money, then the slightly improved outcomes were worth the money. If, however, the parents had to scrimp, work two jobs or struggle to put them through, then it wasn't.
Whether this was because of any pressure or resentment from the parents (ie "I'm paying a fortune for you to attend that school, you should be top of the class") or whether it is because the children from wealthy families bully the 'poorer' students (apparently the children work out very quickly whose family isn't wealthy), the conclusion from the study was that the overall outcomes of children has more to do with the home life of the children than what school they went to.
If parents are always out working (to pay for school fees) then of course the children are at a greater risk of falling into bad crowds.
As a guy once pointed out to me when talking about discussing sending his two girls to private school: "for the amount of money my ex-wife is asking me to pay for our daughters' education, I'd rather buy each of them a rental property that I have to put the same amount towards every year and be able to give them each a rental property when they graduate".
I'm not sure which way that guy went, but often times we like to console ourselves that we 'did our best' when raising our children, and all too often the yard stick we measure how much we put into raising our children is measured by how much we spent on their education instead of by how much time we spent with them.
I know many doctors and lawyers who went to public schools and I know quite a few people who went to private schools only to drop out of university or who never went to university.
Whether this was because of any pressure or resentment from the parents (ie "I'm paying a fortune for you to attend that school, you should be top of the class") or whether it is because the children from wealthy families bully the 'poorer' students (apparently the children work out very quickly whose family isn't wealthy), the conclusion from the study was that the overall outcomes of children has more to do with the home life of the children than what school they went to.
If parents are always out working (to pay for school fees) then of course the children are at a greater risk of falling into bad crowds.
As a guy once pointed out to me when talking about discussing sending his two girls to private school: "for the amount of money my ex-wife is asking me to pay for our daughters' education, I'd rather buy each of them a rental property that I have to put the same amount towards every year and be able to give them each a rental property when they graduate".
I'm not sure which way that guy went, but often times we like to console ourselves that we 'did our best' when raising our children, and all too often the yard stick we measure how much we put into raising our children is measured by how much we spent on their education instead of by how much time we spent with them.
I know many doctors and lawyers who went to public schools and I know quite a few people who went to private schools only to drop out of university or who never went to university.
END OF COMMENT:
Further to the above comment, when I look across the people my age who I know went to private schools, not that many of them completed university (some had trouble going from a system that held their hand right through to a self-driven model), so I imagine a few people would be a little annoyed if you'd spent $50k on your child's education for them to end up as a waiter/waitress.
Conversely, I know quite a few people who went public school, who work as real estate agents, supermarkets and as mechanics and who are very happy with their lives, not that the private school people aren't happy, and perhaps they could have done more, but their parents are at least not disappointed in the lost opportunity cost.
I think giving any children I have a (partially paid off) house each in a market that will arguably be very much harder to buy into in 20 years time will provide a much bigger advantage than a $50k education that they may choose to take or leave. The house will probably be worth more than the education would have cost and it would be theirs to do as they wish, removing the need for them to spend the first 5 to 10 years of their working lives scraping together a deposit on a small starter home.
Media and mother of slain girl slams Trump
So the media is at it again bagging out Trump, this time doing exactly what they're accusing Trump of doing: using an emotional event to make a political point.
The final sentence is an attack on the writer of the list, stating that it was obviously hastily put together as it had even misspelled the word "attacker", yet the same media that attacks Trump's cabinet's spelling can't even edit a simple sentence:
I think what they MEANT was "Allahu akbar" - an Arabic phrase meaning "God is great" - during the attack. If the media can pick on the US government for spelling errors, which isn't one of their core points - then I can pick the media up on their bad editing, which IS one of their core points.
So, a Muslim man can do whatever he wants whilst yelling the war cry of a Jihad soldier and it's not considered a terrorist attack. When is it a terrorist attack? How many people have to die in an attack by a man yelling "Allahu akbar" before it's deemed a terrorist attack? More than two? Because one death is too many to me.
As usual, the media is only too happy to give coverage to stories like this, but far less likely to give stories like the Angel mums, mothers who have lost their children to the criminal activities of illegal immigrants. Or to the pro-life march that took place in Washington.
Of course, that's not the narrative the media wants to spread.
Which is why public trust in the media is at the lowest point in history and they're showing no sign of doing anything different to try to turn that around.
We are very rapidly heading towards a post-media world, where no one trusts anything that comes out of the media unless it confirms what they know to be fact.
Well done media, you've only go yourself to be blamed.
The final sentence is an attack on the writer of the list, stating that it was obviously hastily put together as it had even misspelled the word "attacker", yet the same media that attacks Trump's cabinet's spelling can't even edit a simple sentence:
I think what they MEANT was "Allahu akbar" - an Arabic phrase meaning "God is great" - during the attack. If the media can pick on the US government for spelling errors, which isn't one of their core points - then I can pick the media up on their bad editing, which IS one of their core points.
So, a Muslim man can do whatever he wants whilst yelling the war cry of a Jihad soldier and it's not considered a terrorist attack. When is it a terrorist attack? How many people have to die in an attack by a man yelling "Allahu akbar" before it's deemed a terrorist attack? More than two? Because one death is too many to me.
As usual, the media is only too happy to give coverage to stories like this, but far less likely to give stories like the Angel mums, mothers who have lost their children to the criminal activities of illegal immigrants. Or to the pro-life march that took place in Washington.
Of course, that's not the narrative the media wants to spread.
Which is why public trust in the media is at the lowest point in history and they're showing no sign of doing anything different to try to turn that around.
We are very rapidly heading towards a post-media world, where no one trusts anything that comes out of the media unless it confirms what they know to be fact.
Well done media, you've only go yourself to be blamed.
Islamic school in Adelaide facing closure
An Islamic school in Adelaide faces closure after having $4.5 million of government funding pulled.
Does the completely fair and impartial media describe at all where the $4.5 million of South Australian government money (there also more Federal money going there too) is really going, if it's not going towards the education of the students? No.
We're left to believe that the government of South Australia is targeting a poor innocent Muslim school. They also contain a quote from a person (presumably the parent of a student) that has NOTHING to do with the fact that the money being given to the school to EDUCATE THE STUDENTS isn't being used for that purpose! They're trying to claim to be victims of some kind of threat against their safety, but are supposedly taking MILLIONS of dollars of government money in the name of education but aren't spending where they're supposed to.
If the money isn't being used correctly, why isn't the media investigating where the money is supposedly going? Oh wait, can't be shining any light on anything associated with THAT religion!
Does the completely fair and impartial media describe at all where the $4.5 million of South Australian government money (there also more Federal money going there too) is really going, if it's not going towards the education of the students? No.
We're left to believe that the government of South Australia is targeting a poor innocent Muslim school. They also contain a quote from a person (presumably the parent of a student) that has NOTHING to do with the fact that the money being given to the school to EDUCATE THE STUDENTS isn't being used for that purpose! They're trying to claim to be victims of some kind of threat against their safety, but are supposedly taking MILLIONS of dollars of government money in the name of education but aren't spending where they're supposed to.
If the money isn't being used correctly, why isn't the media investigating where the money is supposedly going? Oh wait, can't be shining any light on anything associated with THAT religion!
Wednesday, February 1, 2017
I don't often agree with lawyers, but...
So a talk show host has been chatting with the lawyer of the man accused of killing his spouse and the talk show host was surprised when his lawyer commented that the man wasn't bailed soon enough.
Here's what we know so far:
His lawyer is correct in that:
Now, I'm not stating one way or another who did what, but to hold a person for 44 days before granting them bail is a sure-fire way to get someone pretty angry.
Imagine how you feel if someone just came along one day out of the blue, put you in a holding cell and told you that you couldn't even apply for bail for a month and a half. Would your employer be happy to hold your job for you? Would you even have a job? Who would feed you pets, pay your bills, clean out your fridge, etc? Remember, this isn't a man who went overseas for six weeks who could plan for this, this was a person who should be considered to be innocent until proven guilty.
Like I said, I may consider the outcome from this situation appalling (assuming he's guilty), but to assume we should just keep all men accused of domestic violence, INCLUDING THOSE WHO HAVE NO CRIMINAL HISTORY, is completely doing away with the system of innocent until proven guilty for men (but leaving it in place for women).
A bit like how the justice system has let a female socialite and daughter of a politician out of jail after serving only 2 years for her part in a murder, when her accomplice, a man, was sentenced to 11 years jail.
Here's what we know so far:
- The 52 year old man with no criminal history had been in custody for 44 days before he was bailed; and
- His wife, who said she feared for her life, was later murdered after his release.
His lawyer is correct in that:
- The 52 year old man hasn't been found guilty of murder (yet), so should be presumed innocent (so the headline that reads "DV Killer Lawyer" is technically overstepping and would be open to a libel lawsuit should the man be found innocent; and
- The man has no criminal history and had been held for 44 days before being bailed.
Now, I'm not stating one way or another who did what, but to hold a person for 44 days before granting them bail is a sure-fire way to get someone pretty angry.
Imagine how you feel if someone just came along one day out of the blue, put you in a holding cell and told you that you couldn't even apply for bail for a month and a half. Would your employer be happy to hold your job for you? Would you even have a job? Who would feed you pets, pay your bills, clean out your fridge, etc? Remember, this isn't a man who went overseas for six weeks who could plan for this, this was a person who should be considered to be innocent until proven guilty.
Like I said, I may consider the outcome from this situation appalling (assuming he's guilty), but to assume we should just keep all men accused of domestic violence, INCLUDING THOSE WHO HAVE NO CRIMINAL HISTORY, is completely doing away with the system of innocent until proven guilty for men (but leaving it in place for women).
A bit like how the justice system has let a female socialite and daughter of a politician out of jail after serving only 2 years for her part in a murder, when her accomplice, a man, was sentenced to 11 years jail.
Governments seizing money from inactive banks
So, this is a bit of a trip down memory lane, which is the time the Labor government reduced the inactivity period of a bank account from seven years down to two.
My story comes when I actually knew about the upcoming deadline for inactivity, but the government had obviously already earmarked my money in two different savings accounts and seized it anyway. What's worse is that neither bank did ANYTHING to warn me of the impending action!
I had gone to the trouble a couple of weeks before the cutoff date and deposited $20 into each account which, in my mind would have been sufficient to prevent it being seized.
I was wrong. They not only seized the original amounts in the accounts, but also the additional $40 I had just deposited too!
I contacted the banks, who both claimed they'd done their best to contact me in the lead up to the seizure, They hadn't. So I then had to fill out a form to get the money returned.
So I did the intelligent thing and pulled all of the money out and left the two respective bank accounts empty. One of the banks advised me after about 6 months that, since it was empty, they were going to close the account.
The other bank, however, still insists on emailing me statement updates on a bank account with $0 in it.
Like I'd trust either of them again to look after my money after the last time they let the government stroll in a take it when my accounts had clearly been used prior to the inactivity cutoff!
The story behind this is that our last Labor government, strapped for cash, changed the original seven year inactivity policy so it was only two years, which netted them $360 million. This act may have made that financial year budget look better (or less bad), but it's effectively robbing the next four years of money because they just brought forward the seizures which would have resulted in very few seizures in the years following. Of course they didn't win the next election (not because of this issue) so they didn't have to deal with the mess they'd made.
My story comes when I actually knew about the upcoming deadline for inactivity, but the government had obviously already earmarked my money in two different savings accounts and seized it anyway. What's worse is that neither bank did ANYTHING to warn me of the impending action!
I had gone to the trouble a couple of weeks before the cutoff date and deposited $20 into each account which, in my mind would have been sufficient to prevent it being seized.
I was wrong. They not only seized the original amounts in the accounts, but also the additional $40 I had just deposited too!
I contacted the banks, who both claimed they'd done their best to contact me in the lead up to the seizure, They hadn't. So I then had to fill out a form to get the money returned.
So I did the intelligent thing and pulled all of the money out and left the two respective bank accounts empty. One of the banks advised me after about 6 months that, since it was empty, they were going to close the account.
The other bank, however, still insists on emailing me statement updates on a bank account with $0 in it.
Like I'd trust either of them again to look after my money after the last time they let the government stroll in a take it when my accounts had clearly been used prior to the inactivity cutoff!
The story behind this is that our last Labor government, strapped for cash, changed the original seven year inactivity policy so it was only two years, which netted them $360 million. This act may have made that financial year budget look better (or less bad), but it's effectively robbing the next four years of money because they just brought forward the seizures which would have resulted in very few seizures in the years following. Of course they didn't win the next election (not because of this issue) so they didn't have to deal with the mess they'd made.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)