Paul Keating: How I told the Queen we did not need her anymore

Posted to Letters to Editor, The Australian (21/10/2011) at 10:28 PM (Not published by Newspaper)
Commenting on "Paul Keating: How I told the Queen we did not need her anymore"

I really find what Paul Keating said to the Queen, as quoted in the article "How I told the Queen we did not need her anymore" (Australian, 21/10/2011), rather naïve, disturbing and insulting to our national pride and independence.

He said, "I reminded her that on our doorstep stood 200 million Indonesians - the largest Islamic country in the world. Australia had to be relevant in these places." I wonder whether any Indonesian President would ever make a statement that Indonesia had to be made relevant to China, which has the world’s largest population of 1.3 billion. It is unthinkable that Indonesia would kowtow to China’s communist regime and put aside their Islamic belief in order to gain favouritism from China.

Paul Keating further remarked, "With a monarch whom a great number of Australians, especially of non-Anglo descent, feel no association with, nor any affection for." Did he really believe that non-Anglo descent migrants could associate with or have any affection for the Australian Prime Minister whose ethnicity and beliefs are so different from theirs?

As long as boundaries of nations are drawn and shown on maps, citizens of those nations are unlikely to form one tight unit. In addition to this problem "individualism and human rights" is the catch phrase of the day.

Australia appears to be racially tolerant, and a promoter of multiculturalism, and yet Paul Keating and many Prime Ministers of Australia forget that we can co-exist as Australians without any pretence with other Asian neighbours. We MUST trade as Australians, live and identify ourselves as Australians.

This is not about soul searching or being arrogant. This is our dignity!

Visa rule reforms give universities a lifeline

Posted to The Australia (23/9/2011) on 23/9/2011 at 3:14 AM (Not published by Newspaper)
Commenting on “Visa rule reforms give universities a lifeline”
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/visa-rule-reforms-give-unversitieis-a-lifeline/story-fn59niix-1226144082762

Previously, some TAFE's and private colleges messed up the international education industry. They issued certificates to undeserving students, and fed sub-standard students to universities. When government polices changed in July 2010, many TAFE’s and private colleges started to offer degree courses.

The change caught many foreign students off-guard, and for those who hoped to apply for permanent residence after graduation had no choice but to enrol in the “high ed”. While the average number of foreign students may have fallen about 10% as reported during the last calendar year, the real figures in the second half was very much higher. After the announcement of the bad news regarding the changed policies, more than half of the potential foreign students mainly from India and China turned to other destinations, creating a big financial blackhole for the states and Australia. USA and UK benefited from another idiotic Labor’s policy-on-the-run, costing billions of dollars of “export income.”

The proofs are in the closure of many colleges and the slashing millions of dollars from the budgets of TAFE’s and universities. Many full time and sessional teachers, (including myself with 16 years of teaching/training experience) and administrative staff have been laid off. The proposed reform is nothing more than just following what UK is offering. It is important that the Government must NOT make another mistake. Overseas IELTS assessment should be treated with great caution, because money can buy good results in some countries.

I have written to newspapers on many occasions regarding prevalence of plagiarism in colleges and universities, but without any luck in getting my comments published. Some students do not have the English skill of a lower secondary student and yet they can get through the system studying Diploma courses.

Many foreign students are no better off than the asylum seekers queue jumpers trying to apply for permanent residence via the Visa loophole. The Government should not provide blanket Visa approvals and the right to two years of work after graduation. In order to be granted such privilege, students must achieve good scores or grades.

For goodness sake, don’t wreck the higher education industry!

Doubts emerge over asylum-seekers' ages

Posted to The Australian (5/8/2011) on 5/8/2011 at 11:36 PM
Commenting on "Doubts emerge over asylum-seekers' ages"
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/kids-test-resolve-on-malaysia-solution/story-fn59niix-1226108915889

Get real Gillard, are you going to put the footage on YouTube? What a joke! Do you think that internet and computers are available in the detention camp in Malaysia? It is not a 4-star hotel where free wifi or free use of computers can be found at the lobby.

Productivity Commission calls for a shake-up in laws governing retailers

Posted to The Australian (4/8/2011) on 4/8/2011 at 10:06 PM (Not published by Newspaper)
Commenting on "Productivity Commission calls for a shake-up in laws governing retailers"
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/productivity-commission-calls-for-a-shake-up-in-laws-governing-retailers/story-fn59niix-1226108247819

If everyone boycotts Harvey Norman, Myers, David Jones, JB Hi-Fi, just to name a few large retail outlets, because they charge more to cover costs in employing people, leasing buildings, using utilities, advertising, etc., this will lead to unemployment for many sales staff, tradespeople, property management, service providers, accountants doing tax returns, chefs, waiters, etc. Those who have made savings buying online, if they are still in employment, will eventually pay more taxes to cover the increasing number of welfare recipients.

This stubborn government fails to take note of the long term repercussion of great exodus of in-shop purchases, and refuses to tax all items purchased from overseas under $1000. At present, the cost of collection of these taxes may be more than the taxes receivable, but the scenario will change very soon as on-line transactions continue to grow. Who will be paying for the shortfall of tax revenue?

This is a double whammy. Just be careful, it could be the online shoppers’ job on the chopping board if this unfair practice is allowed to go on unchecked.

Cold day for a SlutWalk

Posted to The Australian (28/5/2011) on 28/5/2011 at 8:13 PM
Commenting on "Cold day for a SlutWalk"
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/breaking-news/cold-day-for-a-slutwalk/story-fn3dxiwe-1226064654483

If a man sees a female with a beautiful body wearing low cut, or a woman sees a man with a six-pack physique wearing his buggy smuggler, and yet does not go boom-bang-a-bang, we are talking about people with biological and sexual problems. This should be a natural response, and has nothing to do with perversive behaviour.

However, there is a fine line one must not cross over, and that line is defined by human for human and is known as morality.

Despite the best expert advice, we can’t stop obesity; despite the existence of United Nation, we can’t stop war; and therefore it is not unexpected that despite the declaration of fights against crimes, we can’t stop sexual assault.

Wearing provocative clothing will, whether one likes it or not, attract attention, even from the undesirable elements! It is just like what the doctor says, "Prevention is better than cure".

Bill Hunter dies of liver cancer

Posted to The Australian (27/5/2011) on 27/5/2011 at 1:32 AM
Commenting on “Larrikin actor Bill Hunter ended his life 'talking, drinking, laughing', memorial service is told”
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/arts/larrikin-actor-bill-hunter-ended-his-life-talking-drinking-laughing-memorial-service-is-told/story-e6frg8n6-1226063526077

Bill Hunter ended his life 'talking, drinking, laughing'. While the statement seems innocent, the crux of the matter is Bill dies of liver cancer very likely caused by his drinking. If this is the case, this statement should serve as a reminder for all alcohol drinkers that the ultimate price to pay for drinking is more than a life-long of talking and laughing, it is the painful suffering of liver cancer!

Make carbon tax hurt, Julia Gillard advised

Posted to The Australian (23/5/2011) on 23/5/2011 at 1:28 AM (Not published)
Commenting on “Make carbon tax hurt, Julia Gillard advised”
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/make-carbon-tax-hurt-julia-gillard-advised/story-fn59niix-1226060716218

I challenge Julia Gillard and all those climate scientists to give me an answer to this very simple question - where does the excess heat from the Sun that is not used up each day go to? This is so fundamental and yet these idiots can only come up with the most ridiculous argument that the heat is trapped by greenhouse gases which melt the ice.

The culprit causing global warming is the Sun, and greenhouse gases play an insignificant role in aggravating the process. Even without greenhouse gases, heat absorbed at the lower atmosphere level and by the oceans cannot dissipate fast enough to the almost-freezing upper atmosphere, unless the Earth rotation is slowed down so as to increase the duration of night for more heat to escape.

The melting ice cannot be reversed unless Earth’s temperature drops to sub-zero, which means the Earth has to experience another Ice Age. In short, Julia Gillard and the idiotic scientists expect us to freeze to death so that new icebergs can be formed again. During the new Ice Age, no one is allowed to turn on heaters, because that will increase the air temperature!

Increasing taxes set off a chain reaction in increasing prices of other consumer goods, utilities and other commodities. We can expect more closures of factories and even education institutions, increase in bankruptcies, unemployment, life-style stress, mental illness, homelessness and social unrest. What is the point of having a clean planet if ordinary people cannot enjoy, or in the worst case, without any human around to enjoy?

Julia Gillard must be the love child of Pinocchio and the big bad red-hair wolf which ate Red Riding Hood’s grandma!

Carbon tax to hurt more than ETS

Posted to The Australian (16/5/2011) on 16/5/2011 at 6:50 AM
Commenting on “Carbon tax to hurt more than ETS, warns energy sector”
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/carbon-tax-to-hurt-more-than-ets-warns-energy-sector/story-fn59niix-1226056396835

It is sad that so much time and effort have been spent in talking about ETS and carbon tax that nothing really constructive has been done in nation building. Since Kevin Rudd came to power, one policy after another failed miserably leading to huge financial losses. So what he rectified the Kyoto Protocol, did other countries pay much attention to it? Let's look at Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs; many countries are experiencing natural disasters, and they really want to keep their people fed, and housed. Australia is facing the same problem, and billions of dollars are needed to restore the many lives to normality.

Many large Tsunamis happened in Japan long before Industrial Revolution. Pompeii was destroyed by fire and Atlantis sunk to the bottom of the ocean. These destructions were inevitable because human beings just cannot tame our planet Earth and Mother Nature. Carbon tax is no panacea, and Julia Gillard is no saviour.

Cabinet told of Malaysia plan hours before launch

Posted to The Australian (9/5/2011) on 10/5/2011 at 12:10 AM (Not published)
Commenting on “Cabinet told of Malaysia plan hours before launch”
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/cabinet-told-of-malaysia-plan-hoursbefore-launch/story-fn59niix-1226052165570

$296 million Australian Dollars is about 1 billion Malaysian Ringgits. Aren't we Australians generous? Only brainless idiotic Primary School Minister can think of such exchange.

Just imagine the scenario: provide 800 Malaysian holiday makers / legal boat people each with a cruise ticket to sail near Australia, put them on a few boats and pretend to be queue jumpers; intentionally allows the Australian government to treat them as illegal refugees, and then send them back by air to Malaysia on Australia expense.

Upon return to Malaysia, the Malaysian government will receive a golden handshake for a job well done. The so-called queue jumpers, for their effort helping the Malaysian government to make the profit, are placed at the front of the queue plus bonus. They probably have the greatest holiday in their lives - travel by sea in cruise ship, by boat in Australian water, then by plane back to Malaysia. Finally they become legal immigrants, welcome to take up citizenship in Australia, and receive social welfare and other benefits from the people you know very well - Us!

Stop whinging; vote me as you next Prime Minister. I can do a better job than this good for nothing.

VET needs funding upgrade

Posted to The Australian (4/5/2011) on 8/5/2011 at 12:12 PM
Commenting on “VET needs funding upgrade”
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/higher-education/opinion-analysis/vet-needs-funding-upgrade/story-e6frgcko-1226049332247>

Skills funding is going to be another humongous news on how service providers ripping-off the system. According to a source, this is already happening, with at least one provider signing off and issuing two to three thousand certificates in a year with hardly any students require attending a class, online or otherwise.

The funding model is a joke, too. Some programs are receiving both state and federal funding at the same time, which was once a cardinal sin known as double dipping.

The demise of international students coming to “study” makes some surviving service providers to become smarter by offering degree courses, in order to accommodate the so called “competent learners” to hang around longer. Hopefully the degrees, some of which are not worth the paper that is written on, will help to these desperate ones achieve their goal in getting permanent residency PR.

Computer technology creates bigger crooks in the education sector, and plagiarism is so widespread and getting more and more difficult to detect. One wonders how many “trained learners” who are deemed competent and become professional, are developing computer programs full of bugs which cost millions of dollars due to downtime or customers going to competitors; providing financial advices causing huge financial write-down of large institutions and livelihood ruin of ordinary mums and dads; building houses that crack or collapse with small earth movement, etc.

In the name of perceived cost saving and following the Jones’ trend, many service providers offer online courses. In reality online learning system is a false economy - it wastes more precious resource known as time, encourages slap-dash assessment and worst of all no one can tell who is really at the other end attending the course or doing the work!

No longer only the VCE examination solutions can be purchased from Victorian market, so the story goes, post graduate thesis are written by professional for a fee. Honest system only works well with honest people.

Tony Abbott keeps Liberals ahead of Labor

Posted to The Australian (3/5/2011) on 3/5/2011 at 4:16 AM
Commenting on “Tony Abbott keeps Liberals ahead of Labor: Newspoll”
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/abbott-keeps-libs-ahead-labor/story-fn59niix-1226048740618

Well done, Tony for your effort. Carbon tax is NOT a goer, and you are right to campaign against it. Carbon tax does not solve global warming, because the sun energy will continue to heat up our planet with the introduction of carbon tax. However, your approach in burying the carbon dioxide is not a good idea, too. When carbon dioxide is formed, one carbon atom combines with two oxygen atoms. This is analogous to oxygen depletion. Locking up the carbon dioxide also means locking up oxygen.

I have better alternatives. One is grow more carbohydrate (polysaccharides) which can be used as carbon sink as well as food for millions of hungry people in the world when harvested. Large carbon emitters and the greenies will not object such proposal, and in fact the former will be seen as environmental friendly global citizens. It also makes their triple bottom line look good.

The second alternative is to dehumidify moisture in the atmosphere. Water vapour is a bigger greenhouse culprit, worse than carbon dioxide. Atmospheric dehumidification may one day become just as popular as collection of rain water.

Read related articles in SinFongChanEnvironment.blogspot.com

Coalition warns of 'record' budget deficit amid revenue slump

Posted to The Australian (29/4/2011) on 29/4/2011 at 6:48 PM
Commenting on “Coalition warns of 'record' budget deficit amid revenue slump”
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/coalition-warns-of-record-50bn-budget-deficit/story-e6frg6nf-1226046962406

Anyone still supports these three stooges, “Gillard, Swan and Rudd”, is a stooge too. $50 billion or $54.8 billion are not just numbers; these translate into pain and suffering for most Australians now and a generation or more to come. Government does not have money; the money comes from your pocket, my pocket, and pockets of many fellow Australians.

Government run by stooges who are inept to manage our hard-earned money should be sacked as soon as possible. It was not because these stooges were handed a debt burdened economy; they had more than $20 billion in the kitty when baby face Rudd of the Labor Party snatched the prime ministership from Howard. Rudd and his fellow stooges spent the money recklessly and behaved as though there was no tomorrow.

Imagine if you were filling an Olympic-size pool with bottled water of 1 litre each, you will need 2.5 million bottles. If you pay $1 for a bottle of water, the amount of money Australia owes the world will buy you 189.9 billion bottles, enough to fill 76,000 Olympic-size pools. Honestly, the way these three stooges spend our money like water must have beaten any Guinness World Record.

From SinFongChanNextElection.blogspot.com

Millions behind on basic skills, threatens Australia's international competitiveness

Posted to The Australian (4/4/2011) on 4/4/2011 at 3:36 AM (Not published)

Commenting on “Millions behind on basic skills, threatens Australia's international competitiveness”

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/millions-behind-on-basic-skills-threatens-australias-international-competitiveness/story-fn59niix-1226032957469

The education system fails Australia! Too much emphasis is placed on training instead of teaching, and competency instead of quality.

In the name of being a developed, affluent English speaking country, we have a misconception that we are more superior than our neighbouring Asian countries - poor, underdeveloped or developing.

Whatever we do in Australia, we do it the most expensive way, because we are bound by many legislative requirements such as equal opportunity, anti-discrimination acts. Our system produces half-baked Rolls Royce instead of quality T-Ford learners.

From early childhood days, children are brainwashed to take things easy, not to be overloaded with knowledge - the key to future success. Instead of building solid foundation based on language, literacy and numeracy LLN skills, children are forced to learn things that even adults have problem in grasping such as social responsibility, global warming, bullying, etc. Children are encouraged to think and debate without the underpinning knowledge, and hence grow up to be unreasonable and arrogant - Jack of all trades, and master of none.

My motto is "being good is not good enough, my minimum standard is excellence!"

Millions go missing from Australia's overseas aid program

Posted to Adelaide Now (24/3/2011) on 24/3/2011 at 8:42 AM
Commenting on “Millions go missing from Australia's overseas aid program”
http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/millions-go-missing-from-australias-overseas-aid-program/story-e6frea6u-1226027066436

AusAID Director-General Peter Baxter, will you accept errors made to your own bank account, and brush it off to say that it was just a percentage or so compared with last period? If your answer is no, then don't ever again be so contemptuous to allow the hard earned money of good Australian public to go astray!

PM Julia Gillard under attack over carbon copy

Posted to The Australian on 3/3/2011 at 1:21 AM

Commenting on “PM Julia Gillard under attack over carbon copy”
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/pm-julia-gillard-under-attack-over-carbon-copy/story-fn59niix-1226014993171

Labor Government, led by Julia Gillard MUST BE sacked, the soon the better, for its incompetence in governing Australia. The many Labor's political blunders costing Australia billions of dollars could be used to provide more equitable funding to hospital, education and social services.

Julia Gillard came to power by lying about NO carbon tax, and now she plagiarises Rudd's carbon policy and claims it her own. She should resign like the German minister Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg who did so after admitting that he plagiarised his PhD dissertation.

How many people realise that having Smart meters is not a very smart move for employment? Usages recorded by Smart meters can be read remotely, which means meter readers will be made redundant.

Can we trust her to spend the carbon tax money for the right reason, or just for her indulgence in funding projects to buy votes? If she could so mercilessly back-stab Kevin Rudd, who else can't she back-stab to cement herself to the throne of Prime Ministership?

GST not on the tax summit agenda, says Julia Gillard

Posted to The Australian on 11/1/2011 at 4:11 AM (Not published)

Commenting on “GST not on the tax summit agenda, says Julia Gillard”

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/gst-not-on-the-tax-summit-agenda-says-gillard/comments-fn59niix-1225985226619

Julia Gillard and the Labor Party have lost the plot. They are the most unfair Australians to give their fellow Australians a fair go. I wonder at times whether they are Australians at all.

If we have to pay GST for a processed / manufactured item or a service, for more than zero dollars, why shouldn’t an imported item for less than a thousand dollars be taxed? The recent outcry by some well known big retailers calling for online purchase under a thousand dollars from overseas be taxed created big divides in the community. It seems that most Australians are unfair and selfish, and bark up the wrong tree, that is, they interpret naively that the tax goes to the large retailers instead of the government.

Shame on those who argue so strongly opposing the tax and advocating purchasing from overseas; not only do they help to create employment overseas and improve their economy, but also unknowingly putting the nails to the small business operators’ coffins. China is truly the factory of the world, but now the rest of the world becomes the retail outlets.

As from 1 January 2011, an eligible person will receive taxable Paid Parental Leave (PPL) payments at the level of the Federal Minimum Wage, currently $543.78 a week, for a maximum period of 18 weeks. Bad luck to those child carers who are not engaged in continuous work - underemployed, causal workers. Many of these unfortunate Australians want to work fulltime to supplement their income, but jobs aren’t available. The most unfortunate underclass Australians are those who don’t even have a job. This does not apply only to the blue-collar workers, but also professionals like teachers.

It is disgraceful that Julia Gillard sides the online shoppers; even worse than that is the PPL scheme, which favours the have’s and is unfair to the “less privileged”.

Australians are getting more and more hypocritical. There were campaigns to buy Australian products – well, since we don’t have much to offer the “Buy Australian” is a bit of a joke. However, even with this flop, how about at least give the Australian small businesses a chance to survive, and allow them continue employing those ungrateful people. May be it’s time to change the slogan “Buy Australian” to “Buy from Australian”.

Cabling for NBN rollout cut back

Posted to The Australian (10/12/2010) on 10/12/2010 at 2:47 AM

Commenting on “Cabling for NBN rollout cut back”

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/industry-sectors/cabling-for-nbn-rollout-cut-back/story-e6frg97o-1225968560255

What a nonsensical statement that "...how many people will be out of a job because of this". NBN has not been implemented yet, and no one has been employed to date to roll out the fibre optics. Whether copper wire or fibre optics is laid in those greenfield areas, it still requires people to do the job. The difference is likely to be their skill requirement.

Ted Baillieu in feud on health reforms

Posted to The Australian (1/12/2010) on 1/12/2010 at 2:05 AM as SphericalThinker (Not published)

Commenting on “Ted Baillieu in feud on health reforms”

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/victorian-election-2010/ted-baillieu-in-feud-on-health-reforms/story-fn6wlyrv-1225963572854

Deals must be broken. Ted Baillieu has a tough job ahead, not only on health reform, but also on hospital culture reform.

There are wards in some hospitals not open, tying up many beds. There are no doctors and nursing staff to service them due to lack of funding. If remains status quo, these wards will never be opened.

When Brumby opened "additional" new beds in hospitals, old beds were shut down, and the staff were reshuffled. In fact, there were hardly additional beds opened during election time.

New wings or buildings of hospitals were not well thought out and lack accommodation. In addition, some hospitals placed unnecessary emphasis on certain racial needs, wasting valuable funding resource.

Like many public services, unused monies before end of financial years are squandered on unnecessary renovation or replacement of furniture.

Former shadow health minister did not want to know many of things mentioned above before. I hope Ted Baillieu will look into these matters with the greatest urgency, before promising any more new hospitals or additional new beds!

Rudd is facing a Great wall

Posted as SphericalThinker of Melbourne to The Australian on 11/8/2009 at 10:28 AM

Commenting on “Rudd is facing a Great wall"

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/opinion/rudd-is-facing-a-great-wall/comments-e6frg7a6-1225760001652

Kevin Rudd is a "Jack of all trades, Master of none". His unexpected rise to the highest position in Australia makes him over confident and autocratic. He being a workaholic is nothing more than an affirmation that he neither knows how to delegate nor trust his fellow ministers and subordinates. Understanding Chinese language is not synonymous to understanding Chinese culture. Culture is more than textbook material; it requires many years of interaction with wide cross-section of people. Constant headline criticism of Chinese internal politics and external policies are not the right ways to build relationship. Publicity brings short term fame and satisfaction, but may cause irreparable damage to long-term friendship.