Death of an Australian Millionaire

What is it with men who have lots of money, first Tiger Woods, now Australian millionaire Herman Rockefeller. This quiet, respectable businessman led a bizarre double life and surprise, surprise, it's all about sex. He had a steady girlfriend/girlfriends and advertised for partners through "swingers" networks. He also had 5 mobile phones.

Mr Rockefeller 51 had an arranged sexual liaison meeting with Mario Schembri 57, and Bernadette Denney 41 on the 21st of January. Something happened and the pair killed him, chopped him up and tried to burn his dismembered body in a 44-gallon drum in an acquaintance's backyard.

Like most men who put their sexual needs before everything else, his wife and two children are left to suffer not only the loss of a husband and father, but the humiliation of knowing that the whole country now knows what type of man he really was.

Abortion on Trial

Dr Tiller's widow

Scott Roeder bought a gun, learnt how to shoot it, stalked his victim, went to his church, pressed a gun to his forehead and pulled the trigger.


George R Tiller was one of the few doctors in America prepared to perform late-term abortions. The Defense lawyers are pleading extenuating circumstances because of Roeder's strong belief that the doctor was a murderer but Judge Warren Wilbert ruled that he would not instruct the jury to consider a lesser charge than first-degree murder when they begin deliberations tomorrow.


Mr Roeder 51, of Kansas City told jurers that he had watched Evangalist Pat Robertson's talk show in the 1990's and had thought about killing the doctor as early as 1993. A year ago, he went to his church with a gun but he wasn't there that day.


Seated on the witness stand, Roeder faced a tiny gallery including Dr Tiller's widow, Anti-Abortionists - some who had served time in jail for violence - and Abortion Rights supporters.
"It should send a message that there is no justification for this" said Vicki Saporta, President of the National Abortion Federation who wants a first-degree murder conviction.


Mr Roeder described the morning of the murder. After killing his victim, he drove to a small country town and hid the gun. A few days later Dr Tiller's family closed the clinic. It was the only one in Wichita.

Scott Roeder

The Prosecutor asked "Have you successfully completed your mission?"

"He's been stopped" he said.

"Have you successfully completed your mission?" she asked again.

"Yes".

News just in, the jury took just 37 minutes to reach a guilty verdict of first-degree murder.

Chinese to ban eating dog and cat

This post will make you sick, it's hard to believe that our two cultures are so far apart. Thanks to the hard work of animal rights activists within China, they are drafting a new law which will stop stray dogs and cats from being eaten. What seems abhorant to us is normal Chinese tradition which has been going on for thousands of years.

The first draft will be raised for legislation in April and it will have real teeth. People caught eating dog or cat meat will be jailed for up to fifteen days and fined 5,000 yuan ($1000) and restaurants fined up to $100,000.

And here's the sickening part, in some parts of China, they beat dogs to death to release the blood into the meat.

Naturally, there is a lot of resistance to the new law, many insisting that a ban on dog and cat meat is unrealistic, they argue that a dog meat recipe is a part of Chinese cultural heritage.

'Cooking them alive must be punished but what meat to eat should be a personal choice. Some people in China still can't afford meat, we should not blindly copy western values' a Chinese spokesman said.

But one on-line protestor Yuxiang999 posted on Xinhuanet.com said 'Eating cats and dogs is a shameless barbarian thing. Anyone with humanity would not kill these loyal friends of ours'.

Lord Monckton

If you have ever heard or seen Lord Monckton speak, you will find he's very convincing. When he wants to, he has a powerful presence, a fantastic knowledge of his subject and the clever ability to get his point across. I heard him on the Alan Jones radio show (2GB) Sydney one morning last week and Alan couldn't get a word in, and everyone knows that Alan Jones has verbal diarrhea. He's come to Australia to prove that Kevin Rudd is wrong about climate change and that the Emission Trading Scheme is just a waste of money.


He's here after being invited by two retirees from Noosa in Queensland, Case Smit and John Smeed who have asked for donations to help pay for the $100,000 needed to pay for the Lord's stipend, accommodation and travel expenses.


When Australia's richest woman Gina Rinehard announced she would back the tour which will be made into a documetary by the BBC, they were amazed and delighted. They coudn't believe the BBC would do a documentary about climate change because they had been so anti the sceptic movement in the past.

Mr Smit wrote to Ms Rinehard saying that the original organiser of the Perth event wasn't available any more and could she suggest someone else to help. To date, Ms Rinehard has not returned calls from the media confirming her intentions regarding the Lord's visit.


Monckton played a role in a legal challenge in the UK High Court of Justice in October 2007 in a bid to stop "An Inconvenient Truth" being shown in English schools. It is also rumoured that he helped fund the documentary "The Great Global Warming Swindle" which was also shown in Enlgish schools. I remember seeing this documentary and it had a huge impact on my thinking about climate change, suddenly I wasn't baffled or intimidated by the superior knowledge of scientists.


Considered to be 'eccentric' because in 1987 he said "There is only one way to stop AIDS and that is to screen the entire population regularly and quarantine all carriers of the disease for life". Hardly a feasible argument, but then it was a long time ago.


Lunches held in Sydney and Melbourne have sold out along with tickets to his lunchtime debate with the Brisbane Institute. After hearing him speak, I wish I could be there, it's said that he thrives on hecklers and loves fielding difficult questions. A very interesting man who hopefully will have an impact on Australians and leave them to think again about the costly tax which will need to be imposed to get the Emissions Trading Scheme off the ground.

Australia Day 2010

What do the stars on our flag represent? The constellation of stars on the right is the Southern Cross and the large star with seven points is the Federation star. Each point represents one of the six states and the seventh is for the Australian Territories (Canberra and the Northern Territory). And we all know that the Union Jack depicts our history and connection to the British.


Federation was a vital part of our past, we finally became a united country on the 1st January 1901 when the Commonwealth of Australia was born. Until then, we were 6 different colonies, fiercely fighting for our own rights and extremely jealous of each other. It must have been a difficult job getting the colony leaders to finally agree to unite the country as one. But finally common sense prevailed and the people realised that things like the economy, immigration and defence should be tackled on a national level and the papers were signed. So on 1st January 1901 the Colonies became the States, a Federal Parliament was formed and Edmond Barton became our first Prime Minister. It wasn't until 9th May 1927 that the Commonwealth Parliament first sat in Canberra in the 'Old Government House'.


Little is known about our Constitution. The smaller Colonies were afraid that the larger ones would have more say in the Federal Government so the conference adopted the practice of the United States - in the House of Representatives, each state would be represented according to the number of residents and in the Senate, each state has an equal number of representatives.


It's hard to say what Australia Day means to everyone, but I think for the majority in the workforce, it's a bit like the Telstra ad, a great day off to relax and watch the cricket and the tennis. I usually go into the city to watch the ferry races and all the activities in Sydney Harbour but it's too hot so I'll be having a fresh seafood lunch and a glass of bubbly to celebrate living in the greatest country in the world.

Happy Australia Day to everyone.

Is the Mona Lisa really Leonardo da Vinci?

Art historians are going to dig up Leonardo da Vinci's bones and see if they match the facial structure of the Mona Lisa. The theory is that because he was homosexual and loved riddles, he could have painted himself as a woman. Scientists will reconstuct his face to find out if the painting is in fact a self-portrait in disguise.

But they don't know if they can find the real bones. He was originally buried in a church destroyed in the French Revolution of 1789 and then reburied and now lies under an inscription which reads "Presumed to be the Master's remains". They will use carbon dating and compare DNA samples from bones and teeth from male descendants who live in Botogna, Italy. Many Leonardo scholars are angry and want his bones left alone and believe that the identity of the Mona Lisa should remain one of the greatest art mysteries of the world.

Australia Day and our Convict Past

Ned Kelly

The British Government are releasing details of convicts sent to Australia more than 200 years ago to coincide with Australia Day, tomorrow the 26th January. We'll be able to search through a data base to see if we have convict blood running through our veins. The British website Ancestry.co.uk will be free until the 30th January.

Twenty one thousand convicts were set free in New South Wales and were lucky enough to be granted plots of land, many of whom went on to establish successful businesses. There were also 34,000 Certificates of Freedom handed out to convicts after their sentences were completed.

More than 2 millions Brittons and an estimated 4 million Australians are related to convicts deported to Australia in the 18th and 19th century, genealogists say. Both Kevin Rudd and John Howard are descended from convicts, as are many other prominent Australians.

For some reason, there doesn't seem to be a problem with having a convict ancestor, in fact many people will jump on the website hoping to find a long lost distant relative. We are indeed a strange mob and the thought crossed my mind that if a man is poor and desperate and he's given a decent chance in life, he might just surprise you.