Friday, June 27, 2014

THE POLITICS OF IMMIGRATION

They are the butt of jokes, sick emails and discrimination. But immigrants build nations and make everyone better off

Below is a list of questions that are answered in a new book, The Politics of Immigration by Jane Guskin and David L. Wilson and available from Amazon














There is nothing new about discrimination against immigrants. It has been happening since the beginning of time, and it happens all over the world. Some people become so paranoid about immigrants they organize strikes and political campaigns, and actively try to shut immigrants out of their local community.
But it is all based on false assumptions, misinformation, prejudice and ignorance. Every successful economy and every country with a high standard of living could not have achieved what they have without immigration.
There is one thing that is worse that an expanding population and that can be found in the country, region, city or town that is losing population. That always leads to unemployment, business failure, increasing crime and poverty – the very situation that exists in many countries that immigrants leave behind in their search for a better life.
The Politics of Immigration is available from Amazon: Amazon.com

How immigrants made Australia great



An E-book from Amazon or Smashwords


Monday, June 23, 2014

CLIMATE VOTER

Climate Voters suffering from a bad case of sunstroke
Members of Parliament were asked to leave a public launch meeting of Climate Voter in Auckland, New Zealand yesterday.
The world would be capable of
producing more food, if this
was the average world temperature
This raises the immediate question of how denying entry to the people most able to help a cause, will help that cause. Is this a case of political naivety taken to the extreme? It makes me think that climate change is certainly real, but is localized to the area of political wetness behind Climate Voter ears.
When the un-elected are able to eject the elected, democracy is under threat. Is is just a short step from there to revolution, anarchy, chaos, economic collapse, wholesale poverty and all out war. Then there will be some heat.
The Climate Voters appear to believe in some form of democracy, otherwise they probably would not have ‘Voter’ as part of their name. But they claim that the elected representatives have let them down. Well, that is highly debatable. Many voters will say that Parliament has gone too far on climate change issues.
Perhaps a balanced approach does not suit the Climate Voters. Yesterday they signed up 300 members in 30 minutes and now, as New Zealand’s newest minority, they want everything done 100% their way. To them, the majority should no longer have a say.
Tornadoes did not
start with the twentieth
century
I’m not surprised to see Greenpeace associating themselves with Climate Voter. It all sounds like good old-fashioned green policy. But when they have recovered from their sunstroke they may also come to understand that ‘green’ also means something that has not arrived in perfect condition as well as immature, unskilled, lacking sound judgment, inexperienced, gullible, raw and unrefined.
If the world is getting warmer then a remedy may well found by Climate Voters all taking a quiet lie down with a cup of iced tea.





Available from Amazon or Smashwords

Sunday, June 15, 2014

MALAYSIA AIRLINES MH 370

Missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370: The 13 theories that could explain where the plane is - and what happened to it


With no trace of the missing Boeing 777 in the "ping" search area, conspiracy theorists have tried to fill in the gaps of what we know
Officials today confirmed what we have feared for some time - that a relatively tiny search zone in the southern Indian Ocean is not the final resting place of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370.
From an underwater mission covering 850 sq km (320 sq mile) where acoustic "pings" were heard, the area being searched has now been extended to around a 60,000 sq km (23,100 sq mile) zone based on satellite data which remains disputed in some quarters.
The Australia-led search control team estimate it could be August - next year - before this region has been covered, and hopes of finding the Boeing 777's flight recorders are becoming increasingly dim.
With so much uncertainty surrounding the circumstances of MH370's bizarre disappearance, it has become rich territory for aviation experts, bloggers and conspiracy theorists alike.
Here we round up 13 of the most prominent theories as to where the plane ended up, and what went wrong in the first place.
Shot down in a military training exercise
While the Australian officials leading the search for MH370 say they remain “absolutely convinced” it ended up in the southern Indian Ocean, some passengers’ families – and theorists – distrust the unprecedented satellite data analysis involved.
Among those who support this view are the British journalist and author Nigel Cawthorne, who has controversially already published the first book on the plane’s disappearance.
At the time there was a series of war games taking place in the South China Sea involving Thailand, the US and personnel from China, Japan, Indonesia and others, and Cawthorne has linked this to Mr McKay’s claims to have seen a burning plane going down in the Gulf of Thailand.
Flown north and shot down deliberately, prompting cover-up
At a stage in the investigation when it was believed the plane could have flown for some time from where it disappeared along either a northern or southern corridor, many posted on forums suggesting that if it had been the former we would never hear about what happened.
Some still support this view, and former RAF navigator Sean Maffett told the BBC that after 9/11, any unidentified airliner entering the airspace of another country would lead to fighter jets being scrambled.
“If the plane is in the northern arc it could easily have been shot down,” he said. This theory also involves a national – or possibly international – cover-up, based on the premise that no country would want to admit to shooting down an airliner full of passengers from all over the world.
Flown north in the ‘shadow’ of another plane
Another theory suggests that instead of flying south, the plane flew north in the “shadow” of another airliner around half an hour to an hour after dropping off civilian radar.
The aviation blogger Keith Ledgerwood argued that MH370 and Singapore Airlines flight 68 were in the same vicinity at the time, and said: “It became apparent as I inspected SIA68's flight path history that MH370 had manoeuvred itself directly behind SIA68 at approximately 18:00UTC and over the next 15 minutes had been following SIA68.”
By flying a short distance behind and most likely a little above the altitude of SIA68, also a Boeing 777, Ledgerwood said that it would be able to appear as a single blip on radar screens.
Experts have said that the idea sounds “feasible”, and that even if higher-resolution military radar was monitoring SIA68 operators might have dismissed the fact that there were two objects as an technical glitch or echo.
Tried to land on a desert island beach
After reports that the plane had turned left shortly following its disappearance from civilian radar screens, speculation grew that it could have landed on a remote beach somewhere like the Andaman Islands, which lie between Indonesia and the coast of Thailand.
Though CNN reported that locals dismissed the idea a Boeing 777 could land on an airstrip there undetected, the archipelago consists of hundreds of remote islands with some long stretches of sand.
Former BA pilot Steve Buzdygan said it would be difficult – but not impossible – to bring a 777 down on a long deserted beach.
Landed at a US military base
One of the more outlandish conspiracy theories that has gained some traction online is the idea that MH370 could have been “captured” and flown to a military base on the UK-owned tropical atoll of Diego Garcia, in the middle of the Indian Ocean.
Such is the strength of belief in this theory that the US government has been forced to issue a denial. A spokesperson for the US embassy in Malaysia told the local Star newspaper that there was “no indication that MH370 flew anywhere near the Maldives or Diego Garcia”. “MH370 did not land in Diego Garcia,” he added.
Headed for a remote airport in Langkawi, Malaysia
One theory, put forward by another aviation blogger named Chris Goodfellow, has it that the sudden left turn came after major catastrophe knocked out a range of the plane’s electronics, from transponders to communications equipment.
In this scenario and in the middle of the night, Goodfellow argued, the pilot would redirect towards the nearest safe airport.
“This pilot did all the right things,” he said. “Actually he was taking a direct route to Palau Langkawi, a 13,000ft (4,000m) strip with an approach over water at night with no obstacles. He did not turn back to Kuala Lumpur because he knew he had 8,000ft ridges to cross. He knew the terrain was friendlier towards Langkawi and also a shorter distance.”
This theory assumes that the plane was in fact controlled manually once it disappeared – and that it did not make it to Langkawi.
A fire throughout the plane
Many theories accept that the Inmarsat satellite analysis is accurate – that the plane headed south into the Indian Ocean and flew on for hours before a final, partial “handshake” in a remote location thousands of miles off the west coast of Australia.
One suggestion is that a fire broke out, not just in the cockpit but throughout the interior of the plane. The implication is that this resulted in the attempt to turn back, after which the fire killed those on board.
This theory would then have it that the fire went out before damaging the exterior of the plane, which flew on autopilot until its fuel ran out.
Yet such a fire would be expected to spread with at least some warning – and that surely would have given the pilots time to issue a mayday distress signal.
An explosion in the cockpit
The theory of a sudden explosion within the cockpit before the turn left could explain why there was no attempt to signal for help.
Since 9/11 cockpits doors have been fortified to become extremely difficult to bypass, and such a sudden incident could perhaps have incapacitated both pilots while keeping out the rest of the crew.
This explanation does not seem to tally with the claims of some Malaysian officials, however, that the change in direction was the result of “seven or eight keystrokes into a computer on a knee-high pedestal between the captain and the first officer”.
A struggle at altitude
Though Malaysian officials believe that the plane was deliberately diverted, and that its communications systems were turned off one after the other, a detailed background check into all 227 passengers has cleared all of suspicion.
If, however, we do accept that the plane was the subject of a passenger hijacking, it remains to be explained why the hijackers did not try to do more than fly the plane into the middle of the southern Indian Ocean.
Angus Houston is leading the search for missing Malaysian aircraft One theory suggests that there was some kind of struggle for control of the plane that ultimately ended with mutual destruction.
Further analysis of data by Malaysian officials suggests that the plane was flown erratically once it left civilian radar, climbing to 45,000ft before dropping very low. Buzdygan told the BBC he would resort to this sort of flying if faced with would-be hijackers. “I’d try to disorientate and confuse the hijackers by throwing them around,” he said.
A botched hijack attempt
The climb to 45,000ft could also have been carried out by the hijackers once they had taken control – in a bid to kill the passengers on board.
At such an altitude it could be possible to depressurise the cabin, causing oxygen supplies to be deployed. These run out after 12-15 minutes and, if those flying the plane had access to another oxygen supply, could have been an attempt to prevent anyone intervening.
Under this theory the suggestion is clearly that the attempt failed, killing the hijackers as well.
Pilot suicide
As part of the ongoing criminal investigation in Malaysia, police are looking into the state of mind and possible motives of the captain Zaharie Ahmad Shah and co-pilot Fariq Abdul Hamid.
The Malaysian police chief Khalid Abu Bakar has said that “all possibilities” will be looked into, and there have been reports that Shah was going through a difficult marriage break-up.
Hugh Dunleavy, the commercial director of Malaysia Airlines, described Shah as a seasoned pilot with an excellent record.
“There have been absolutely no implications that we are aware of that there was anything untoward in either his behaviour or attitude,” he told Reuters. “We have no reason to believe that there was anything, any actions, internally by the crew that caused the disappearance of this aircraft.”
Sabotage – for a life insurance scam or corporate attack
One of the other strands of the criminal investigation regards whether the plane was subject to some form of sabotage – either as part of a life insurance scam or over industrial espionage.
Bakar said that when passengers and crew were being investigated, police were looking for “Maybe somebody on the flight has bought a huge sum of insurance, who wants family to gain from it or somebody who has owed somebody so much money, you know, we are looking at all possibilities.”
There were also 20 employees of the US silicon chip company Freescale Semiconductor on board the plane at the time, and a retired Delta Airlines pilot has suggested the plane’s disappearance was an attempt to steal technology the engineers had applied – but not yet received – a patent for.
A CIA cover-up
Finally, the former prime minister of Malaysia Mahathir Mohamad has waded in with his own theory – suggesting that, one way or another, the CIA is definitely hiding something.
In a blog entry posted on 18 May entitled ‘Boeing Technology – What goes up must come down’, Dr Mahathir Mohamad makes ten claims including that the plane was taken over remotely by officials working for Boeing and the CIA.
Malaysian Prime Minister Dr. Mahathir Mohamad (L) shakes hands with UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan (R) before their meeting in Annan's office at the UN in New York 25 September, 2003. “The plane is somewhere, maybe without MAS markings,” reads Dr Mohamad’s post on chedet.
“Someone is hiding something. It is not fair that MAS and Malaysia should take the blame,” 88-year-old Dr Mahathir, who was Malaysia's prime minister between 1981 and 2003, alleges.
“Airplanes don’t just disappear,” he said, concluding: “For some reason the media will not print anything that involves Boeing or the CIA. I hope my readers will read this.”
Boeing have denied Dr Mohamed’s theory.

Peter’s Piece

There’s some pretty wild speculation above, but the theorists (conspiracy and otherwise) will try to justify their claims with, “Airliners don’t just vanish without trace.”

Wrong!

Airliners from time to time do vanish without trace.. See my post from 31 May 2014: The Search for MH370 http://peterblakeboroughsblog.blogspot.co.nz/2014/05/the-search-for-mh-370.html However, MH370 was the largest civil aircraft to vanish to date and it was the first disappearance involving more that 200 passengers and crew.

So what really is the most likely scenario, if one puts aside some of the illogical and fanatical theories above?


I support the scenario presented by Chris Goodfellow as the most likely course of events and I have developed his theory with a simulation exercise of the MH 370 flight path. You can read about this exercise in ‘What Happened to MH370’ by going to this post from 29 March 2014: http://peterblakeboroughsblog.blogspot.co.nz/2014/03/missing-flight-mh-370.html

Commercial aviation is a very safe business these days, but not perfect. Although it is now looking less likely, if the Flight Data Recorder is recovered, my belief is that it will indicate another accident.

But now that the conspiracy, cover-up and terrorist proponents are in full flight, they will never be silenced, regardless of conclusive evidence to disprove their version of events. In the end, they will only believe what they want to believe.

People who genuinely want the truth should let the authorities do their work without the pressure and hype and accusations that we have been witnessing. That could be detrimental to the final outcome. Air accident investigators are very thorough and dedicated people and they should be allowed to continue their investigations without the distraction of sideshows and hysteria.




Friday, March 14, 2014

BLAME THE TRUCK DRIVER

Mandatory speed limiters coming for US truckers
According to a report from the US Department of Transport, October 1 could see a new motor carrier rule requiring all heavy vehicles to use speed limiters. This is in spite of a recent court ruling declaring speed limiters unsafe.
But a study of traffic flows in America, and most other civilized countries, would quickly show that average truck speeds are considerable less than the average for other vehicles. Truck speed problems are imaginary only.
Trucks travel slower for two reasons: In many places the speed limit is lower for trucks and trucks are incapable of traveling faster on hills, or accelerating rapidly after a slow-down. But most truck drivers would feel safer if they were allowed to go with the flow, complying with uniform speed limits for all vehicle types.
In the USA a truck driver is five times more likely to be killed on the job compared to the average worker and this fact may be unduly influencing the lawmakers. But let’s look at how these truck drivers are killed.
Firstly, they are rarely killed in single vehicle accidents. Most fatal truck crashes include one or more cars. For many years the truck/car crash statistics have shown a 70/30% apportionment of fault against the car driver. But this ratio is not clear-cut because sometimes there may be more than one driver at fault.
Typically, the car drivers in these crashes fall into two categories: First, a confused or inexperienced car driver who, unaware of the danger, just drives inappropriately while close to a truck. Second, is the driver with “small man” syndrome who deliberately drives inappropriately near a truck, or just drives at high speed to prove to one and all that he’s a real man.
In many crashes the truck driver has died trying to avoid an accident created by someone else. But a big rig does not respond well to abrupt changes of direction.
The latest statistics from the USA show that the 70/30 apportionment is now out of date. Rule changes and training have lifted the bar for truckers and they can now claim  80/20 as the norm. Meanwhile, many car drivers still fail to understand the risks they are taking with their own lives and the lives of others.
In many truck/car crashes the car was being driven erratically and even at exceptionally high speed for the conditions. What chance would a trucker have of avoiding a collision with such a vehicle, either going the same way, or in the opposite direction?
All over the world speeding cars have always been a major factor in road crashes. The younger the driver, the worse the problem; they know so much when they know so little. When they are young they can react in a split-second (they believe), so for them it is safe to drive like a bullet (they believe).
Therefore, I propose to throw a spoke in the wheel of the US legislators, who are influenced by voters, who incidentally are mostly car drivers. My suggestion is that speed limiters should only be mandatory in cars driven by inexperienced, young drivers.
I further suggest that compelling a truck driver to travel slower than the limit for other vehicles is a breach of his human rights because it exposes him to unnecessary and avoidable danger.

But my 50 years of professional driving won’t count for anything unless others endorse what I am saying.

DO NOT GO DRIVING!
It's safer to stay home with a good book
Available now from Amazon  or Smashwords

Tuesday, December 24, 2013

SANTA'S WINGS

The night before Christmas -
Air New Zealand style

Sent in by Dave Findlay


Twas the night before Christmas, and all round the stands,
Not an aircraft was stirring, and no Caravans.
The aircraft were shivering quite stiff on their spots,
With gusts from two-forty at 39 knots.

Operations, had nightmares back home in their beds,
While pilots and broken planes danced round their heads.
And AOC stacking the paperwork up,
Were just about ready to close and lock up.

When the radio lit up with noise and with chatter,
They turned up the volume to find what was the matter.
A voice clearly heard over static and snow,
Called for clearance to land down at Auckland below.

He barked his transmission so lively and quick,
I'd have sworn that the call sign he used was "St. Nick"
He called his position, not too close or far,
"St. Nicholas One cleared via the STAR."

While controllers were sittin', and scratchin' their head,
They phoned AOC, who then wrote down with dread,
A message that was very urgent and dour:
"When Santa pulls in, have him please call the tower."

He landed like silk, and then took Alpha six,
Down Bravo and over to men waving sticks,
He called out to ramp as he came onto blocks,
And ground crew came placing the cones and the chocks.

His put on his hat and then without a sound,
He zipped up his high vis and did his walk round.
He was merry and jolly in his suit of pride,
And he called out “please add in, three twenty a side."

They spoke not a word, but went straight to their work,
Then they closed up the doors, which locked with a jerk.
And all thought as he silently scribed his log,
These reindeer could land in a four hundred fog.

And laying a finger on his push-to-talk,
He called up the tower for clearance and squawk.
“Clark one alpha departure, the southbound direction,
Turn left three-two-zero at pilot's discretion"

He sped down the runway, the best of the best,
"Your traffic's an Airbus, inbound from the west."
Then I heard him proclaim, as he climbed through the night,
"Merry Christmas to all! Go Beyond Tonight!"

Best wishes for the festive season to all who read Peter Blakeborough’s Blog. More posts coming in 2014. Have a good one.



BEYOND THE SEAS

This is my latest historical novel  Beyond the Seas When twelve-year-old orphan Nathaniel Asker is shipped from the back alleys of London to...