ELSEWHERE

The Proposition 13 tax revolt has just had it’s 25th anniversary. The 'World Socialist Web Site' tells us that tax revolts are underway in China too. Tax revolts have had enormous impacts in history. We all know of the Boston tea party and the English Parliament's struggles against King Charles and his unauthorized taxes but the French Revolution too was largely driven by countrywide discontent over sky-high taxes levied by the idle and spendthrift aristocracy and church. So Proposition 13 was a great step forward in that it cut taxes by peaceful means. We need a continuing flow of such propositions.

Leftists want immigrants to stay different: "[Massachusetts] Governor Mitt Romney yesterday chastised the Legislature for loosening the state's new voter-approved English immersion law, branding it an act of 'unfathomable arrogance' and vowing to oust legislators who backed the move. ... About 68 percent of Massachusetts voters last year approved the ballot initiative, Question 2, which required that immigrant students be placed in all- English classes instead of bilingual programs."

Alarming: "Former United States Defence Secretary William Perry has warned that the US and North Korea are drifting towards war, with an 'imminent danger' of nuclear explosions in American cities. His chilling assessment of the communist state's nuclear program came as an increasingly worried China intervened, revealing a push for talks and sending a special envoy to meet North Korean leader Kim Jong-il."

In the shape of Britain’s House of Lords,
a conservative institution once again defends people’s rights and liberties: "The government's hopes of a trouble-free week before Westminster's summer break were dashed last night when peers delivered a thumping defeat on already-modified plans to reduce the right to trial by jury. The 210-136 vote against David Blunkett's blueprint for restricting trial by jury in cases of complex fraud or likely jury tampering amounted to another rebuff to Labour's modernising ambitions on what peers declared is a fundamental point of principle - - 'this very touchstone of our liberty.'"

Amusing that NBC are going to “embed” their TV reporters with Democrat candidates for the election campaign. No news of them “embedding” with GOP candidates, though! I wonder why? (Don’t tell me).

The government of my home State Queensland has shown some common-sense after Australia’s High Court showed a conspicuous lack of it. The High Court said a couple must be paid the cost of raising a child that was born after a contraceptive procedure failed. The State of Queensland will legislate to prevent any further such awards.

Wow! Australia’s Uniting Church (the former Methodists plus some Presbyterians) has cut its own throat. They have voted to allow homosexual clergy. Lots of their congregations will now go over to the more scripturally-oriented Continuing Presbyterians. A revived Methodist Church might even emerge.

Amusing: Bill Clinton is now being quoted in the case of the former Marine who ran off with the 12 year old British girl.

The Wicked one has a VERY naughty joke about Rev. Jesse Jackson.

My latest academic upload here or here looks at the distinctions that psychologists make between assertiveness and authoritarianism and shows that the two things are in fact pretty much the same.

*********************************

Comments? Email me here or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.

**********************************