Tim's Bits and Pieces

I was rather shocked too find out just how much the government spends on welfare payments, from the Commonwealth Budget for 2007-2008 we learn the government receives $119,560 million in income tax and pays $96,450 million in "Social security and welfare". Gee so, %80 of income tax goes to welfare payments. According to the ABS the average weekly income for full time employees is $1,103.60 as of August last year. Using this figure, the cost to maintain the welfare system costs the equivalent of 87 ($96,450 / $1,103.60) million weeks of work a year. From the 2006 census we find that the employed labour force consists of about 9.1 (9.6 total labour force - 0.5 unemployed) million people. Therefore to maintain the welfare system each and every employed person is doing the equivalent of 9.5 (87 million / 9.1 million) weeks of basically forced, unpaid labour* for people who either can't or won't get a job, or you spend %18 of your life on this.

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A couple more interesting links on gun control:

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While Jeffrey R. Snyder's " A Nation of Cowards" may be a bit extreme in some areas, it is well worth a read and careful consideration for it's general applicability to self-defense and not just gun control.

I recently decided to install Kazehakase 0.5.1 on my computer. As with any software installation of Slackware my first step was to check for a SlackBuild on SlackBuilds.org. There is one but it is for version 0.4.7. OK, that's often not a problem, you just change the $VERSION variable to the version you actually want. So I tried that, the SlackBuild printed out the usual range of progress reports, etc, then gave me this:

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I finished C.S. Lewis' "The Screwtape Letters" last night, I read it straight through in two sittings and was disappointed when it was over. You should go straight to the library and get it out, or buy if you want, I've got the library's copy, but I'll be keeping my eye out for a copy I can add to my bookcase. This book would have to be one of the best books I've read in the last couple of years. (Admittedly if your not a Christian you may not enjoy it as much, but it is still probably worth a read)

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This blog is not tested on animals. :-)

Merry Christmas all!!! :-)

It's kind of strange in Tassie, they often seem to think of themselves as kind of a distinct nation from the mainland. For example in QLD or NSW it's the federal and state governments while in Tasmania it's the Australian and Tasmanian governments. I'm sure intellectually at least the majority of them do realise that they are actually part of Australia, but it doesn't seem to have fully sunk into their collective sub-conscious yet. For example I'm sure the majority of them think of themselves as Tasmanians, while I think of myself as an Australian not a Queenslander or a New South Welshman.

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This is well worth a read. It makes the claim that the main representatives of the so-called "Stolen Generation" where actual fact abandoned by their families and than taken in by orphanages, [white] foster families and the like. If these claims are true, and I have no reason to doubt them, it puts the Labour governments plans to issue an apology in a different light.

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Just a quick note too let you know I'm back. I've been away in Tasmania for about a month now, which should explain the lack of posts :-). I'll do a write-up on my holidays in the next couple of days.

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