New Zealand Conservative

Britain and America pledged to spearhead a worldwide hunt for “tens of billions” stolen from Ukraine by its former president and his cronies on Tuesday at a London summit called to beef-up the country’s anti-corruption efforts. Theresa May, the Home Secretary, said an order to freeze £23 million of suspect funds as part of a Serious Fraud Office investigation was a demonstration to the people of Ukraine that foreign governments “stand behind” Kiev as it attempts to recover looted funds. The Crown Prosecution Service and National Crime Agency has already sent officials to Ukraine following the flight of Viktor Yanukovych, the former president who left the country bankrupt and divided between pro-Revolutionaries and Russian sympathisers. Oleh Makhnitskyi, Ukraine’s general prosecutor, said his country has already identified some £1.8 billion of stolen assets and expects to find tens of billions taken by an “organised criminal group” headed by former president Viktor Yanukovych. He ...

There's been a bit of debate in the blogosphere about whether or not what Russia is up to in Ukraine is justified or not. The debates I've been involved in have been mostly at KiwiBlog in the General Debates there. It's been too hard to post here for me, as I think the media have been doing a good job of keeping track of what is going on, and this is an emotional subject for me. Emotional because I have read a lot of what happened to Poland with regards to Russian propaganda ahead of the Teheran and Yalta agreements that basically gave large chunks of Poland to the Soviet Union without much protest or effort on behalf of Poland's supposed allies who just thought it was better to placate Russia, than do what was right. Coupled with the lies back then about who was really responsible for the Katyn Massacres (the allies and the Soviets pinned it on the Nazis, even though the Poles were adamant that it was the Russians, but no one was listening to them at that point)....

Colin Espiner blames Christianity for the laws of the land: If you’re desperate for a pint, you could always sign up to a chartered club, because that’s less offensive to Christianity. Or check into a hotel. Or head to a gastro pub or a restaurant that serves alcohol, as long as you purchase a meal as well. Jesus loves those with a full stomach. The article highlights the desirability to sort out the inconsistencies in the law, but strangely enough Colin Espiner, after mocking Christians and Jesus, doesn't draw the obvious conclusions behind his statements: That the government doesn't make laws according to the whims of parliamentarians, but instead are completely in the pocket of a small evangelical church somewhere in Utah. Or perhaps all laws in NZ were passed according to a couple of notes direct from the Pope? Or perhaps he could lambast the Unions and Labour organisations for trying to minimise the number of people forced to work on public holidays? Nope, it'...

Two Russian tankmen are sitting in a Parisian café, drinking coffee, and eating croissants. Several columns of Russian tanks are parked outside. A stream of troops is passing by, headed westward. One tankman says to the other, “There is one thing I do regret: that we lost the information war over Ukraine.” The above joke is quoted in one of the New Republic's latest articles, The U.S. Is Being Routed by Russia in the Information War Over Ukraine The author says: How can the U.S. be expected to win the hearts and minds of a people capable of a joke like that? Yeah, I can relate to that.

Almighty God and Creator, You are the Father of all people on the earth. Guide, I pray, all the nations and their leaders in the ways of justice and peace. Protect us from the evils of injustice, prejudice, exploitation, conflict and war. Help us to put away mistrust, bitterness and hatred. Teach us to cease the storing and using of implements of war. Lead us to find peace, respect and freedom. Unite us in the making and sharing of tools of peace against ignorance, poverty, disease and oppression. Grant that we may grow in harmony and friendship as brothers and sisters created in Your image, to Your honor and praise. Amen.

In 2008 President Bush gave Vladimir Putin a lesson on democracy And now democracy Iraq style has come to Ukraine courtesy of the USA. Its amazing that people get so upset that the Government they voted for has been replaced and their current "prime minister" actually got less than 7% of the vote at the ballot box last elections. But the current Prime minister does have the approval of the American State Department, who engineered a coup to install him so they should just accept it.

I read an interesting story today about a woman who says that reading atheist author Richard Dawkins' book The God Delusion led her to becoming Catholic. I doubt that Dawkins would be very happy with that! After she began reading the book, at the insistence of her daughter, she found that it contained "no cogent arguments" and afterward, read Pope benedict's book Jesus of Nazareth which led to her conversion. Truthfully, I found the [ The God Delusion ] a waste of my time as it afforded me no cogent arguments concerning the existence or non-existence of God. In fact, not only was Dawkins disrespectful of opinions other than his own, I found his statements about Jesus to be so ill-informed (and, mind you, I was no fount of scholarly information myself) that I resolved to actually learn something about Jesus Christ. Reading Dawkins challenged me to go beyond my comfort zone and honestly confront the issues holding me back from a full commitment to faith. My sens...

I read a very good article on Darren Aronofsky’s new film 'Noah' that is in cinemas at the moment. From what I've read the film is weird - very weird; with walking 'fallen angels' covered in molten rock that help Noah build the Ark etc. In the article (which has gone viral and is stirring up much controversy), the author has an opinion that the film is not based on the Bible at all, rather a Gnostic version based on  Kabbalah. In this tradition, basically The Creator is bad, and the snake (Sophia, or Wisdom) is good. Except that when Gnostics speak about “The Creator” they are not talking about God. Oh, here in an affluent world living off the fruits of Christendom the term “Creator” generally denotes the true and living God. But here’s a little “Gnosticism 101” for you: the Creator of the material world is an ignorant, arrogant, jealous, exclusive, violent, low-level, bastard son of a low level deity. He’s responsible for creating the “unspiritual” world of ...

UPDATE: Daylight Saving officially ends at 3am on Sunday morning when the clocks go back to 2am, so the picture is not totally accurate, but, I liked it, so it's here with the post. The end of Daylight Saving cannot come soon enough. As I have been posting every year now, Daylight Saving lasts too long on the tail end. Easily by two weeks, maybe more, but the last two weeks of it are physically painful. This morning my body did not want to wake up. I was groggy and wooden, like when I wake up really early to go to the airport. Both my boys were the same, in that their internal body clocks refused to acknowledge the time that politicians have told us we have to live by until Sunday. Unfortunately, every working person so far that I've mentioned the length of Daylight Saving to really enjoys the extra hour of sunlight in the evening. All women, without teenage boys at home who have trouble winding down at night because of the heat. Why not, on that basis, wind our ...

Operation Urgent Fury : a 1983 United States-led invasion of Grenada, a Caribbean island nation with a population of about 91,000 Casualties USA 19 killed Grenada 45 killed Cuba 25 killed Civilians 24 killed Operation Just Cause : the invasion of Panama by the United States in December 1989 Casualties: USA 23 killed Panama 205–314 killed Civilians 250-500 killed Russian takeover of Crimea : the invasion of Crimea by the Russia in February 2014 Casualties: Russia 0 killed Ukraine 0 killed Civilians 0 killed And when you recall what the costs of historical attempts to take this particular peninsular have been....