Investigate, August 2010 by Investigate Magazine

BOMBSHELL SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERY: IS EVERYTHING WE KNOW WRONG?

INVESTIGATE August 2010: Gen-Xterminated • Big Cats Eat Trampers • Rudyard Kipling revisited

Are skyrocketing child abuse rates, teen delinquency and adult violence the result of the Culture Wars?

Eaten Alive

Are big cats eating trampers? New book raises disturbing questions

Bill Gates Q&A

Issue 115

What makes the billionaire tick? ALSO IN THIS ISSUE: Hal Colebatch spends time with Rudyard Kipling, The Feds use NZ crime technique to catch a serial killer, and Another blow to climate change theory

$8.30 August 2010

“Why I choose thermography to monitor my breast health” Allison Roe Breast thermography offers women another tool for monitoring their breast health. It’s completely safe, radiation-free, and doesn’t require your breasts to be compressed (or even touched). Best of all, it can identify changes to breast health before they become visible through other methods of testing. Thermography looks at the physiology (biology) of your breasts, or to be more precise, how hot your breasts are! A heat sensitive infrared camera is used to image both breasts, from several different angles. The camera shows the heat patterns that naturally emanate from the breast tissue. Regular breast thermography allows a woman to keep a close eye on her breast health. Discovering changes earlier provides the opportunity to be proactive about managing breast health. Breast thermography is suitable for women of all ages, including younger women, those with breast implants or denser breast tissue, fibrocystic breast conditions and women with a family history of breast cancer.

$25 OFFER Appointment usually $199. With this voucher pay only $174. Be quick! OfferOffer endsends Saturday 31st July 2010. 31 August 2010 Call 0800 102 888 to make an appointment.

BOOK TODAY

0800 102 888 www.mybreasthealth.co.nz

Auckland (Remuera & Milford), Hamilton, Tauranga, Hawkes Bay, Wellington, Nelson, Christchurch, Dunedin, Invercargill. Allison was one of the leading marathon and road runners in the world in the early 1980s. She won both the Boston and New York marathons in 1981 and was recently inducted into the NZ Sports Hall of Fame.

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM September 2010 51

C ONTENTS Volume 10, Issue 115, ISSN 1175-1290

F EATURES Gen-Xterminated

What is it with all the cop-killing, child abuse, delinquency and everything else afflicting us today? IAN WISHART and MIRANDA DEVINE take a provocative look at what happens when the permissive society meets reality, and tries to sweep the bodies under the carpet

Cat People

An Afternoon With Kipling

Bill Gates: the Interview

Four years ago Investigate brought you the story of big cats on the prowl in the South Island. Now, MICHAEL WILLIAMS and REBECCA LANG take the story even further: that the famed Heaphy Track may be home to man-eaters

What makes the work of Rudyard Kipling enduring, addictive and yet rejected at times? HAL G.P. COLEBATCH goes in search of the magic elixir in Kipling’s writing

Bill Gates discusses global health, electronic privacy and his investments in nuclear technology, with TOM AVRIL

Hunting The Grim Sleeper

The hunt for a US serial killer strikes gold after the FBI consents to using a DNA profiling system popular in New Zealand and Australia. MAURA DOLAN reports

A Science Bombshell

A new discovery threatens to overturn everything we know about the history of Earth and the universe, if it can be replicated. THOMAS MAUGH reports

Cover: Dreamstime

EDITORIAL & OPINION

Focal Point Editorial

Vox-Populi The roar of the crowd

Simply Devine

Miranda Devine on Julia Gillard

Mark Steyn

Obama a walkover

Global Warning Timothy Ball

Eyes Right

Richard Prosser on Chinese money

LIFESTYLE

Line 1

Poetry

Contra Mundum

Money

Chris Carter on ads Matt Flannagan on genocide

Amy Brooke’s poem of the month Peter Hensley on investment

Education Amy Brooke on teachers

Science

A new discovery

Technology iPad launches

Online

Food

Sport

Pages

Health

Music

Alt.Health

Movies

Travel

Cutting Room

Viral implants

Chris Forster on Soccer Claire Francis on steroids Misdiagnosis

A winter treat Michael Morrissey’s winter reads Chris Philpott’s CD reviews

Morocco

Inception

The Director speaks

Chief Executive Officer Heidi Wishart | Group Managing Editor Ian Wishart | NZ EDITION Advertising 09 373-3676, sales@investigatemagazine.com | Contributing Writers: Hal Colebatch, Amy Brooke, Chris Forster, Peter Hensley, Chris Carter, Mark Steyn, Chris Philpott, Michael Morrissey, Miranda Devine, Richard Prosser, Claire Morrow, James Morrow, Len Restall, Laura Wilson, and the worldwide resources of MCTribune Group, UPI and Newscom | Art Direction Heidi Wishart | Design & Layout Bozidar Jokanovic | Tel: +64 9 373 3676 | Fax: +64 9 373 3667 | Investigate Magazine, PO Box 188, Kaukapakapa, Auckland 0843, NEW ZEALAND | AUSTRALIAN EDITION Editor Ian Wishart | Advertising sales@investigatemagazine.com | Tel/Fax: 1-800 123 983 | SUBSCRIPTIONS – Online: www.investigatemagazine.com By Phone: Australia – 1-800 123 983, NZ – 09 373 3676 By Post: To the PO Box NZ Edition: $85; AU Edition: A$96 EMAIL: editorial@investigatemagazine.com, ian@investigatemagazine.com, australia@investigatemagazine.com, sales@investigatemagazine.com, helpdesk@investigatemagazine.tv All content in this magazine is copyright, and may not be reproduced in any form without the written permission of the publisher. The opinions of advertisers or contributors are not necessarily those of the magazine, and no liability is accepted. We take no responsibility for unsolicited material sent to us. Please enclose a stamped, SAE envelope. Inquiries in the first instance should be made via email or fax. Investigate magazine Australasia is published by HATM Magazines Ltd

we protect your digital worlds

BORN IN THE USA, DESTINED FOR ENGLAND BUT SECURED BY NEW ZEALAND FOR THE EXCLUSIVE FEW.

E B B E T T CA DILLA C

204-208 Anglesea Street, Hamilton

TILTING THE PLAYING FIELD AGAIN! In May 2009 the EBBETT Group exclusively acquired 88 3.6 litre Cadillacs, which had been destined for launch in the Australian and New Zealand markets. A further 71 vehicles, a mix of 2.8 and 3.6 models built for the UK market are now available due to the tough trading conditions in the UK. We negotiated to purchase these Cadillacs from General Motors and they will be in New Zealand at the end of January. The initial shipment of Cadillacs was a sellout success. This new shipment is possibly the last opportunity to secure a world icon built in right hand drive. Be one of an exclusive group of New Zealanders to drive a new CTS Cadillac. These Cadillac CTS models are 2009 new vehicles. They will be sold with a three-year, 100,000km warranty. EBBETT Group has trained technicians and will be connected to Cadillac through the GM global computer system for all warranty and service requirements. We have a great stock holding of parts and easy access to uncommon parts. Priced from $55,000 plus on-road costs 2.8 V6 $66,500 plus on-road costs 3.6 V6 This has to be the best value luxury car ever sold in New Zealand. Finance and lease packages are also available. EBBETT Marque of Excellence

EXCEPTIONAL WITHOUT EXCEPTION

204 - 209 Anglesea St, Hamilton ph 07 838 0949 | www.ebbett.co.nz

the Workforce Printers

small footprint

small business

heavyweight performer

A3+, the

Small offices need an Epson Workforce - the Epson Office range has everything. Up to latest 7.8" light touch-screen with LCD display, up to 40ppm, auto-document feeder, fax, duplexer, Wifi and LAN. Increased productivity with a choice of high capacity individual cartridges - you only replace the cartridge you use. Choose a DURABrite Ultra® ink model for document durability and plain paper printing or a Claria® ink model for high definition prints.

AN EPSON STYLUS® OFFICE PRINTER IS A WORKFORCE PRINTER A3+

Epson Stylus® Ofﬁce T1100 Buy Genuine Get Rewards

www.epsongenuinerewards.com.au

Epson Stylus®Ofﬁce T40W

Epson Stylus® Ofﬁce TX300F

Epson Stylus®Ofﬁce TX610FW

www.epson.com.au www.epson.co.nz 47674

FOCAL POINT

Editorial

The wacky world of warming promoters I HAD THE GOOD FORTUNE TO ADDRESS A CONFER ence

on climate change in Auckland this month. It was put together by the Vision Network, a group representing NZ church leaders, and its purpose was to seek clarity on the causes and extent of climate change and what position church leaders should be taking on it. For the most part, it was a genteel summary of the case from sceptics like yours truly, and believers like NIWA’s Jim Renwick, until we came to a panel session featuring Massey University’s Ralph Sims and policy analyst Jonathan Boston. Sims couldn’t hold himself back, blasting yours truly for daring to question the IPCC reports (to which he was a contributor). “I’ve never read your book,” he began, “I’ve never even heard of it,” – which was an odd comment to make publicly when he’d just been overheard privately joking to a colleague that Air Con hadn’t sold very well (it was in fact a #1 bestseller in NZ, and in the climate science category on Amazon US and Amazon UK). “You’re not a climate scientist!” he huffed – to which I responded gently: “Neither is Al Gore, Nicholas Stern or many of the others you like to quote”. “At least they have university degrees,” hissed Jonathan Boston, a policy studies lecturer who’s earned substantial consultancy fees from the global warming scam. You could hear the audience suck their breath in at both the elitist intellectual snobbery and the barely concealed rage from Sims and Boston. NIWA’s Jim Renwick, on the other hand, was a model of decorum. Boston and Sims were proof, to me anyway, that a degree doesn’t guarantee “smarts”. But little wonder the latter two were angry. Ralph Sims, it turns out, was a coordinating lead author on Chapter 4 of the IPCC’s Working Group 3 in its Nobel prize 6 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

winning 2007 report. He wouldn’t have been happy to hear me reveal to the audience in my presentation that far from being a scientific gold standard based on “peer reviewed science”, there were more than 5,000 references in the IPCC report to unscientific articles, many written by students, green lobby groups or just nicked off the internet. The chapter Professor Ralph Sims helped co-ordinate, it turns out, had 300 non peerreviewed citations out of a total of 360 cites in all. In other words, 85% of the claims made in Chapter 4 had no peer-reviewed scientific basis cited. In fact, the level of peerreviewed science in Sims’ chapter was so low it gained an “F” from the auditors, on a scale from A to F. Jonathan Boston, for his part, was arguing that every New Zealander has a responsibility to every single future New Zealander born a hundred years from now, and talked of them as “neighbours in time” whose property rights we are required to protect. He has previously spoken on other occasions of the need for global governance solutions to address this: “The global solutions include a new International Court for the Environment or a Court of Generations, a range of new international agreements and institutions, and new regional institutions like the European Union with powers to impose measures on sovereign states.” So it’s no surprise Boston was offended when I pinged the United Nations and its hangers-on for trying to slip world government ambitions in under the guise of climate change. “That’s just conspiracy theory”, snorted Boston who evidently couldn’t see the wood for the trees. And yet, I’d quoted on screen the words of John Holdren, President Obama’s science ‘czar’, who has said in the past:

“Such a comprehensive Planetary Regime [his words, presumably channelled via ‘Joe 90’ or ‘Thunderbirds’] could control the development, administration, conservation, and distribution of all natural resources, renewable or non-renewable.” That sounds suspiciously close to Boston’s Big Brother utopia where an International Court of Generations rules whether the house you are building today or the LCD TV you want to buy is an offence against your great-great-grandchildren. But Holdren’s vision is even larger. “The Planetary Regime might be given responsibility for determining the optimum population for the world and for each region and for arbitrating various countries’ shares within their regional limits. ... The Regime would have some power to enforce the agreed limits.” It actually doesn’t matter whether you call such powerful new entities a “world government”, an “international alliance”, a “Court of Generations” or “The International Entity for Peace and Love Across The Planet” and have pedantic debates about the precise definition – at the end of the day it’s the amount of bite in the dog that matters, not the dog’s name. If the conference showed me one thing, it’s that NIWA’s climate scientists, for all their faults, can’t hold a candle to the wackier global governance aficionados who are piggy-backing on the climate band-wagon. The latter have been drinking Al Gore’s climate koolaid for so long they may actually be beyond help.

COMING SOON Ian Wishart Arthur Allan Thomas

SPECIAL OFFER Ian Wishart breaks open New Zealand’s ultimate cold case - the murders of Harvey and Jeanette Crewe at Pukekawa 40 years ago.

Arthur Allan Thomas:

THE INSIDE STORY

He was jailed for a crime he didn’t commit, now for the first time in 40 years, he’s decided to reveal full details of what he went through CREWE MURDERS: NEW EVIDENCE

Ian Wishart

#1 bestselling author

HATM Publishing

In this gripping new book, not only does Wishart uncover fresh leads, but Arthur Allan Thomas breaks a 40 year silence to tell his full story, for the first time.

UNMISSABLE (book will be sent out on Sept 24)

Get free delivery and beat the GST increase, pre-order today for Sept delivery OPTIONS:

NAME ADDRESS POST CODE PHONE

FAX

only $105 delivered

E-MAIL CREDIT CARD NUMBER NAME ON CARD AMEX

Yes, send me one copy of Arthur Allan Thomas on Sept 27 for just $39.90 delivered, saving $5 Yes, please send me 2 copies of Arthur Allan Thomas for only $78 delivered Yes, please send me three copies of Arthur Allan Thomas for

DINERS

MASTERCARD

EXPIRES VISA

PLEASE NOTE, THESE PRICES ARE ONLY VALID FOR BOOKS PREORDERED BEFORE THE OCTOBER 1 GST INCREASE

BANKCARD

CHEQUE IS ENCLOSED

Extra shipping charges of $12 per book apply to overseas orders

Photocopy or clip out this coupon and post to Investigate, PO Box 188, Kaukapakapa, Auckland 0843 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 7 or order online at www.ianwishart.com, or fax 09 4204770; offer for a limited time

VOX POPULI

Communiques The roar of the crowd

Robbing migrants

Thank you and Peter Hensley for your article “NZ Govt. steals migrant’s life savings”. I wonder whether Paula Bennett can be interviewed on this and is able to apply common sense and justice. This is a huge problem with migrants in this country and it has been simmering for between 50 to 60 years. Millions if not billions have been misappropriated by the NZ Government over the years. I have lived and worked and paid tax in NZ for over 42 years. I am entitled to full NZ Superannuation. We know NZ Super is not income tested ! But wait, and check the Govt. web site : “How much Super you get depends on any overseas benefit or pension you may get”. “Any other income does not affect your Super”. What is the rationale in all this? I am retired now, living in Auckland, and have a Dutch Superannuation (AOW) entitlement of 20%, which equals 10 years. The Dutch Govt. (SVB) transfers this money to the NZ Govt.(WINZ). Although it’s my entitlement, I am not allowed to have it and bank it in my personal account. Apparently there is an old Dutch/NZ agreement which regulates this transferable pension. It’s unfair to the other pensioners in NZ says WINZ, and I can’t do a thing about it. WINZ tells me the NZ Govt cuts back my NZ Super entitlement and replaces it with my Dutch entitlement. In effect they are taking away part of my NZ entitlement – based on my 42 year tax payments in NZ – and putting this money back into the NZ Govt. coffers. Whether or not this creative accounting is actually happening, who knows. I suspect it doesn’t happen in reality, because it doesn’t make sense as it would need an army of bureaucrats to administer all the 8 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

migrant pensioners’ entitlements living in NZ. Anyhow it shows the misappropriation of many millions of dollars belonging to the migrant pensioner in NZ. In my (our) case the Dutch taxpayer seems to be subsidising the NZ Govt because both my entitlements have been tampered with and been diverted to boost NZ Govt accounts. What’s happening with my entitlement, what is it being used for? Where is the transparency ? I have not the ability nor the means to fight this wrong, but I (and others) are being short changed at high levels. To bring this into the open may change things for the better. This misappropriation of funds should be scrutinised, tested, reviewed and be made to stop. To hide behind an old agreement of 50/60 years ago and unwilling to look at it afresh, is just not good enough. I respectfully ask, if perhaps your excellent magazine Investigate, could have a closer look at this, engage in no-nonsense highlevel interviewing, and publish the outcome to help alleviate some of our bitterness. My sense of justice tells me “this is just not right”. Name supplied, via email

Migrant mugging

Thank you for publicising the plight of immigrants who have chosen New Zealand for a new life, we were promised a full New Zealand pension not a part one. After many letters to the Herald and to politicians, this is the first publicity that we have had with a national magazine. Thank you Peter Hensley. Could I please have a copy of the statement. I would like to post it on the board at the RSA and working men’s clubs etc, to draw attention to this theft of our life’s savings which was paid for by us out of our own money not a tax take. Bill Newbury, via email

Flying cattle class

I agree with Mr Prosser that flying long-distance economy class with Air New Zealand is so uncomfortable that for most travelers it’s a once-only experience: next time they fly they choose another carrier. Mr Prosser is mistaken however as to the dimensions of the new B777 300ER (to be introduced by Air New Zealand later this year) which has a cabin width of 6.19 meters – compared to 6.1 meters for the B747 400. Presumably the airline will do nothing to improve the current narrow, hard and crammed seating which is extremely uncomfortable for long-distance flying. And how will middle-aged and elderly couples, most of whom do not have the slim figures of the models in the carefully posed publicity stills, get comfortable with the new SkyCouch when the seats in front of them are reclined? The frequent flyer would not select Air New Zealand for the high calibre of its cabin crews when the crews of most other long-haul carriers are equally pleasant, courteous and efficient, nor for the quality of its in- flight meals which are only marginally better than Qantas and Air Pacific – but not as good as Singapore, Emirates or Cathay Pacific. Air New Zealand’s rewards program for frequent flyers may satisfy business executives (especially when their travel is taxdeductable) and politicians traveling at the taxpayer’s expense, but for everyone else the Airpoints Dollars scheme is one of the most unrewarding rewards programs in the industry. Excluding points for credit card usage, consider the following: A small-time businessman makes two trips to North America a year. Using the lowest possible economy fares available he earns 160 Airpoints dollars per round trip. It will then take him 5 years to accumulate enough Airpoints for a return award booking (provided the lowest economy airfare has not

increased over the past 5 years) – however after 4 years, 320 of his Airpoints will have expired! It’s a no-win situation. There are other carriers who provide enough reward points for the same journey, using the lowest economy airfare, for a return award booking after only four, at the most five, round trips. And with an airline such as Qantas, rewards points don’t expire. Ultimately the frequent flyer traveling economy will select the airline which offers the best value for money: with its miserly rewards program, how many thousands of customers has Air New Zealand lost? Does the airline care? Even Koru members cannot be assured of preferential treatment. A complaint over the lack of designated check-in counters, the lack of priority baggage labeling, the lack of any food items (not even a bag of peanuts) or wine for Koru members at San Francisco, experienced over a period of six months, did not even merit the courtesy of a response from the airline. Mr Prosser highlights the success of Singapore Airlines, the flag carrier of a nation the size of Lake Taupo. Admittedly Singapore has the advantage of location, but Air New Zealand could have easily matched

the success of Singapore Airlines if only it had been committed to maintaining a continuing reputation for comfort and outstanding service. The accountants may be satisfied that the books have been balanced, but how do you account for the hundreds of New Zealanders who every day board flights to London using Singapore Airlines, Emirates, Qantas, Malaysian, Cathay Pacific – you name it – anything but our national carrier? Chris Arnesen, Christchurch

Open letter to John Key and Nick Smith.

There is good reason to question the true purpose and aim of the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) when it is admitted by scientists on both sides of the global warming debate that its effect on climate will be nil. There is also reason to ask why the National Government pressed ahead with implementation of the ETS in the face of widespread scepticism of the science that gave rise to it in the first place; scepticism by thousands of scientists worldwide, including more than 30,000 in the US alone (http://www.petitionproject.org). The effect of the ETS on every citizen in

this country will be a substantially increased cost of living, rising each year as higher energy costs filter through the entire economy. This tax burden is supposedly in the interests of “combating climate change”, a highly questionable enterprise predicated on the belief that CO2 is a noxious gas capable of driving the planet’s climate system. There is sufficient doubt on this, as yet unproved, assumption to warrant pause, notwithstanding the politically-charged pronouncements of future climate doom from the IPCC. Considering the recent scientific scandals involving widespread data manipulation, faked evidence and obstruction of scientists critical of manmade global warming, it is now apparent the scientific case for the ETS has collapsed. Yet the National Government has insisted on pursuing the ETS as though this was entirely immaterial. It is therefore beholden on the Government to answer the following questions: 1. What effect will the ETS have on global temperatures? 2. What effect will the ETS have on global climate? 3. If the answer to the above two questions is “Nil”, what is the aim and purpose of the ETS? INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 9

4. What are New Zealand tax payers getting in return for a tax on energy of 5-10%? 5. How will the estimated four cent rise in petrol from July 1st, followed by another in 2013, help “fight climate change” and/ or reduce global temperatures if that is indeed the purpose of the ETS? 6. If the ETS is no longer about “saving the planet” (which it can’t be because the science behind it is now in tatters), is it instead about political appearances? After all, “saving the planet” has become today’s fashionable cause célèbre foisted on the citizens of this country, and others, by the environmental movement, among other clamorous lobby groups. 7. In 2007, John Key said New Zealand would not be a world leader but a “fast follower” in the so-called fight against climate change. As we are currently the only country implementing an economy-wide all gasses, all sectors tax, who indeed are we following? 8. The EU has a diluted ETS that excludes 60% of their emitters and only includes carbon dioxide. Why does our ETS include all greenhouse gases and all sectors of our economy and society when our emissions amount to around 0.2% of global emissions? 9. What is the ultimate destination of the billions of dollars to be collected in tax? Precisely how will those billions be divided up and who will benefit? 10. What will be the cost to the tax payer of administering the ETS? 11. Why is electricity included when in this country it is mostly of hydro origin and therefore unrelated to so-called carbon emissions? Hydro power systems by their very nature are “sustainable” because the use stored lake water as opposed to coal, oil or gas. Points for your consideration: 1. Many scientists argue that natural fluctuations in climate are driven by solar activity which has been on the wane for the past few years, thus resulting in gradually declining global temperatures. Based on solar observations, astronomers are predicting another solar minimum leading to intensely cold winters, as experienced in the northern hemisphere for the past few years that will last for decades (http://myweb.wwu.edu/dbunny/ research/global/glocool_articles3.pdf ). 2. In addition to low solar activity bringing lower temperatures, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) has now entered its 10 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

cool phase. Such events usually last 20 to 30 years. Therefore we can expect lower than average temperatures for the next few decades, a situation which may be further exacerbated by increased volcanic activity (http://climaterealists.com/index. php?id=5738). 3. The observed sea levels in Tuvalu have not risen despite unsubstantiated alarmist claims to the contrary. According to world-renowned seal level specialist Dr. Nils-Axel Mörner, sea levels in the Maldives have even declined over the last 30 years, in addition to there being no statistically significant change in sea levels worldwide, either up or down outside the bounds of natural fluctuations (http://www.climatechangefacts.info/ClimateChangeDocuments/ NilsAxelMornerinterview.pdf ). 4. In 2005, Dr. Nick Smith said of the Labour Government’s proposed ETS: The madness of the Government’s new carbon tax is that New Zealanders will be the only people in the world paying it. It will drive up the costs of living and undermine competitiveness of New Zealand business for negligible environmental gain. The Minister now argues the exact opposite. Why? 5. Australia has now postponed the introduction of their emissions trading bill until 2013, while a cap-and-trade bill in the US is lingering in the Senate and may never be approved. 6. The raw temperature data used by NIWA show no temperature change, up or down, since 1850. The average trend line is flat – that is until artificial adjustments are made, nearly all of which result in a warming trend that did not exist to begin with. NIWA is not alone in this regard as other weather monitoring bodies around the world have been similarly accused of data manipulation where early data has been adjusted downward while later data is adjusted upward, thus giving rise to an entirely artificial warming trend. 7. CO2 is a natural but minor atmospheric gas essential to life on earth and amounts to a trivial 0.038% of the atmosphere. Of this fraction, mankind’s contribution is approximately one third. And yet it is supposed by climate alarmists that by reducing this already invisibly small quantity by another few percent, we could somehow drive the planet’s climate in the other direction. The idea is laughably absurd.

In fact UK writer and broadcaster James Dellingpole went so far as to say, “only morons, cheats and liars still believe in manmade global warming”. 8.CO2 is governed by the principle of diminishing returns and at its current level in the atmosphere it is already a spent force. This has been pointed out by many scientists and meteorologists around the world, including Dr. David Bellamy and the late Dr. Augie Auer. 9. Atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations have been hundreds of times higher than today’s relatively low level of 0.038% and at many times in the planet’s history, without any ill-effects whatsoever. This has similarly been pointed out by many scientists critical of the manmade global warming hypothesis. 10. Far from being a noxious gas, carbon dioxide is absolutely essential for life. Indeed, commercial greenhouses routinely operate in atmospheres 2 to 3 times terrestrial levels to enhance growth (http:// wattsupwiththat.com/2008/05/01/morecarbon-dioxide-please). The terrestrial atmospheric level of 385ppm (0.0385%) is considered by many biologists, including Dr. David Bellamy, to be at the low end necessary for healthy plant life which flourishes at around 1000ppm. If anything, the planet needs more CO2, not less! 11. The Roman and Medieval Warm Periods were warmer than today without any ill-effects on the planet’s biosphere. These periods were instead very beneficial to mankind. It is clear that politics has filled the void left by a multitude of scandals in the scientific community involving data manipulation on a large scale, so the original purpose of the ETS is seriously in question. Therefore it is imperative that the Emissions Trading Scheme be discarded or at least delayed until it can be shown that such a scheme will have a clear and demonstrable benefit on the planet’s climate system and/or a clear, demonstrable effect on global temperatures. After all, this was supposedly the basic underlying purpose of any emissions tax being considered by any government, including ours. The ETS should be delayed until the scientific case for it can be demonstrated with clear empirical evidence open to the scrutiny of all interested parties, a situation which has hitherto been lacking. Respectfully yours, Joe Fone, Christchurch.

Comfort is...

simply another name for Stressless® Words like wellbeing, weightlessness and total relaxation come to mind the moment you sit down in a Stressless® recliner. The natural soft leather and cushion ooze cosy comfort. The gentle swing is controlled with effortless ease. And the smoothness of the reclining function reveals the full potential of the superior technology - adding the right body support in any position. Stated succinctly, the comfort offered by a Stressless® recliner from Norway is the key to a more comfortable you. Take our word for it and try one at your local Stressless® studio soon. Because feeling is believing.

STRESSLESS® Kensington

STRESSLESS® Ambassador

STRESSLESS® Reno

STRESSLESS® Taurus

Stressless® recliners are custom made to order in Norway. A wide range of styles, leather & fabric colours and wood ﬁnishes available, allowing you to match the décor in your home.

STRESSLESS® Studios

NZ DISTRIBUTOR

DANSKE MØBLER Auckland 983 Mt Eden Road, Three Kings. Ph 09 625 3900 • 13a Link Drive, Wairau Park. Ph 09 443 3045 501 Ti Rakau Drive, Botany Town Centre. Ph 09 274 1998 • Hamilton 15 Maui Street, Te Rapa. Ph 07 847 0398 Whangarei Fabers Furnishings Tauranga Greerton Furnishings Rotorua Van Dyks Taupo Danske Møbler Taupo Gisborne Fenns Furniture Napier Danks Furnishers New Plymouth Cleggs Wanganui Wanganui Furnishers Palmerston North Turnbull Furniture Masterton Country Life Furniture Wellington Fifth Avenue Blenheim Lynfords Christchurch D.A. Lewis • McKenzie & Willis • McDonald & Hartshorne Timaru Ken Wills Furniture Dunedin McKenzie & Willis Queenstown H & J Smith Invercargill H & J Smith

www.stressless.co.nz

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 11

Errata

In last month’s issue of Investigate, we let a typo (ISSP) contained on page 52 of the Climate Change article by Peter Curson, expand into a fully extended organisational name. It should, obviously, have referred to the UN IPCC, the Intergovernment Panel on Climate Change. We blame our 2am proofing eyes, and hope this sorts out any confusion.

The fossil human debate

I have been following the ongoing debates around evolution from a distance and admire Dr Warwick Don for standing up, whereas the rest of the scientific community couldn’t be bothered with these silly attacks from the creationist camp. This is understandable; we scientists have better things to do. The letter “confirmed: man as old as coal” in the April issue, however, woke me up. My first reaction to this communication by a Jonathan Gray was disbelief, but I did change my mind. The whole story is actually quite entertaining. We hear about human fossils taken by Ed Conrad from a carboniferous stratum, somewhere in Pennsylvania. To cut a long story short, these fossils are about 300 million years old. Well, that should make him instantly the most famous discoverer in all of human history. But were these finding scientifically scrutinised? Yes, of course. We are now introduced to Lin Liangtai, a respected scientist from Taiwan. You won’t be disappointed, just google the name and you will find that he (she?) is the best bet for winning the next Nobel Prize. Lin Liangtai confirmed that the fossils contained bone cells, branching blood vessel remains, Harvesian canals, osteons, red blood cells and many other detail of 300 million year old human anatomy. Mr/Ms Liangtai has a particular fondness for blood. You probably thought that the reddish colour of Mars comes from iron oxides. Well, you are wrong. Lin Liangtai informs us that it comes from red blood cells. Why is there blood on Mars? I quote from wretchfossil.com: ‘God killed us all on Mars three billion years ago. He preserved our bodies down to the 10-nanometer level forever so that future visitors like NASA can recognize that the planet was a graveyard unfit for habitation…’ Apparently, the whole cosmos is full of life - Lin Liangtai regularly finds blood vessels in meteorites. My favourite is a brief, but very effective recipe for exposing blood vessels in iron meteorites: simply immerse the meteorite in tap

water for one week. That should make it a cool research project for primary school kids. The World Wide Web is a great place for distributing crap. Go to edconrad.com, wretchfossil.com and archeologyanswers. com and click on all the links. It guarantees you hours of entertainment. Needless to say, these stories don’t increase the credibility of the anti-evolution crowd. And that brings me to another subject: Richards Dawkins’ recent visit to New Zealand. Ian Wishart proudly informs us that Dr Dawkins withdraw from a radio debate after Wishart’s name was mentioned to him. This is a classical example of wishful thinking. Dawkins must have had hundreds of debates with top celebrities from the creationist and ID camps. I can’t picture him running away from somebody he probably doesn’t even know. I must admit that I didn’t read Wishart’s article on Dawkins. I have read most of Dawkins’ books and admire him as a scientist with a brilliant mind and an excellent command of the English language. Unfortunately, his militant criticism of religion doesn’t do science any good. Scientists are human beings who also have feelings and beliefs. And they are free to express them, but that has nothing to do with science. If a scientist looks up from his research and expresses humble admiration for our Creator, or if he denies the existence of God, because he found the solution to some puzzle which looked impossible to crack, then he has ventured outside the territory of science. There simply is no overlap between science and religion. There is an overlap between science and philosophy and between philosophy and religion, but not between the subjects of science and religion. However, that should not stop us humans looking in both directions for answers, as Einstein said: “Science without religion is lame. Religion without science is blind.” Can we please make it clear to the readers of this Magazine that evolution is NOT anti-religion. It has been around for 150 years and is a theory as solid as the theory of gravity. It does NOT disprove the existence of God. Scientists and ‘evolutionists’ can also be firm believers in a theistic God. Hans Weichselbaum, Doktorandum Chemistry

Editor responds:

I too found the Liangtai story entertaining. Nonetheless, you would do well to read The Divinity Code for a more comprehensive rebuttal of Dawkins et al.

12 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

POETRY

Is it poetry? Then send submissions to Poetry Editor Amy Brooke: amy@investigatemagazine.tv

Ita Deus Dixit My bearded son came calling yesterday Of this and that, and how my household rules Condemn the good in blossoming sinful joy, Rewarding mean and spiteful, shrivelled souls. My son, said I, you know not what you say. You have not seen the death in life of fools Nor breathed the mortal air. Twicefoolish boy, Dare you now to quit my templed walls? The galilee girl is smiling in the wheat. I sense the gabriel whisper in her marrow. My words I would recall, but far too late: I cannot ward nor mend the crossbone sorrow. I see the thongs of flame about his feet, And here I sit, and wait for hell to harrow. © David Greagg 2010

DROP US A LINE Letters to the editor can be emailed to us, faxed or posted. They should not exceed 300 words, and we reserve the right to edit for space or clarity. All correspondence will be presumed for publication unless it is clearly marked to the contrary. Address: INVESTIGATE, PO Box 188, Kaukapakapa, Auckland 0843 or email to: editorial@investigatemagazine.com

LARGE VENUE Powerful Easy Install Dual Lamp High Definition

EDUCATION Teacher Friendly

HOME THEATRE

Reliability Long Lamp Life Ultra Short Throw

Stunning Picture Quality 1080p Resolution 200,000:1 Contrast Ratio

MEETING ROOMS Bright Wide Screen Wide Connectivity

BUSINESS TRAVELER Light Weight Portable Wireless PC Free

RELIABILITY, QUALITY AND RANGE. Whatever your application, Epson provides the perfect solution - a range that IT ALL STACKS UP TOWith MAKE EPSON Whatever your application, provides perfect solution - a of range that soldNUMBER 1. delivers on price,Epson performance andthe reliability. millions projectors delivers on worldwide, price, performance reliability. millions the of projectors sold Epson is and a clear numberWith 1; leading way in technological worldwide, development Epson is aand clear number 1;such leading theshort waythrow, in technological offering features as ultra wireless connectivity, Whatever your application, Epson provides the perfect solution - a range that delivers on price,

superb picture quality and much It all stacks up to is make Epson Number 1. development and offering features such as more. ultrasold short throw,Epson wireless connectivity, performance and reliability. With millions of projectors worldwide, a clear number 1; leading the wayquality in technological development offering features such as ultra short throw, wireless superb picture and much more. and It all stacks up to make Epson Number 1. connectivity, superb picture quality and much more. It all stacks up to make Epson Number 1.

For information on our range of projectors call 0800 EPSON 4 (0800 377 664) or visit epson.co.nz

SUBSCRIBE BEAT THE ETS: Get a climate bestseller for just $5

BOMBSHELL SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERY: IS EVERYTHING WE KNOW WRONG?

INVESTIGATE August 2010:

HURRY, Limited stock

Gen-Xterminated • Big Cats Eat Trampers • Rudyard Kipling revisited Issue 115

When you subscribe to Investigate this month for only $88*, we’ll also give you either Ian Plimer’s new bestseller, Heaven+Earth, or Ian Wishart’s Air Con. Keep for yourself or educate a friend. SAVE $47 (while stocks last)

Are skyrocketing child abuse rates, teen delinquency and adult violence the result of the Culture Wars?

Eaten Alive

Are big cats eating trampers? New book raises disturbing questions

Bill Gates Q&A

$8.30 August 2010

Either

LLER, THAT’S A BESTSE , FOR JUST & THE MAGAZINE UP TO $47 $88 ALL UP, SAVE

Check out our book offers ONLINE at ianwishart.com OPTIONS:

NAME ADDRESS

Yes, send me the special offer of Investigate and either

POST CODE

Heaven+Earth or Air Con (circle one) for just $88

PHONE

FAX

Yes, just send me 12 issues of Investigate for $78

E-MAIL

Yes, send me a two year subscription to Investigate, plus

CREDIT CARD NUMBER

Heaven+Earth or Air Con, for just $166,

NAME ON CARD AMEX

DINERS

MASTERCARD

EXPIRES VISA

Yes, just send me 24 issues of Investigate for $156

BANKCARD

CHEQUE IS ENCLOSED

*$88 offer includes magazine subscription, $5 book and $5 for courier to you

Photocopy or clip out this coupon and post to Investigate, PO Box 188, Kaukapakapa, Auckland 0843 or order online at www.ianwishart.com, or fax 09 3733 667; offer for a limited time

Youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve already been swimming with the dolphins... Our one-stop connection will have you in Phuket same day.

Fly THAI to the world, smooth as silk.

For more information and details of our latest special deals, ask your travel agent.

www.thaiairways.com

publiceye_2290_INVEST

SIMPLY DEVINE

Miranda Devine Gillard’s honeymoon a very short one THE WHEELS SEEM TO HAVE COME OFF OUR SMOOTH new

Prime Minister’s spin machine as she dodges eggs in Western Australia and tries to talk her way out of her spectacularly backfiring “East Timor solution’’ – or “ETS 2’’, as wags have dubbed it. You can almost hear the clunk as the honeymoon wagon lurches to a stop. Legalese can get you only so far. It may be dawning on people that media spin and a few fierce words are no way to run border protection. It took extraordinary arrogance and naivety for the Rudd government to dismantle the policies that had stopped the boats and cost the Howard government so much political capital. The former Howard attorney-general and immigration minister Philip Ruddock, 67, is too much of a gentleman to say he feels vindicated now that Gillard is trying to copy his policies, but he does have useful insights from his experience. “I don’t see it in terms of vindication [although] I’ve certainly been targeted by people who are now prepared to defend policy approaches that Labor [has adopted].’’ (Hello, Julian Burnside. Hello, Malcolm Fraser.) The severity of Ruddock’s policies was designed to be so effective it was needed only temporarily, like “castor oil’’, he says, “something you have to take a dose of to deal with the problem … The first thing to do is to stop the boats. Stopping the boats stopped people losing their lives. Humane decisions along the way are good public policies.’’ Whether Gillard’s East Timor idea gets off the ground, Ruddock says, “there’s not any one measure which will bring people smuggling to an end … You just can’t pluck one measure and think it will do the job.’’ He says measures to tackle people smugglers have been likened to a “menu from which you can pick and choose. But I see

it like a meal and you need all the ingredients because what you are dealing with is expectations.’’ Among Ruddock’s “ingredients’’ was the much-maligned temporary protection visa, which limited family reunion. He sees people smugglers as entrepreneurs selling a product – permanent residency; TPVs lowered the value of that product. Turning the boats back turned out to be a key ingredient. “It can’t always be done. You have to remove the sledge hammers and the sugar tablets [used to disable the boat].’’ But seven boats were towed back to Indonesian waters under Ruddock’s watch. While the numbers were small, the impact on the people smug-

They don’t want the smugglers, and after 2001 they were beside themselves that among [the influx of asylum seekers] there may be people that pose dangers to them. “They used to say to us, ‘What are you doing about the sugar?’ They saw an unwinding of the measures to make us look better had in fact sweetened the end game. The smugglers could go out and say things have changed and they had something to sell.’’ Offshore processing centres were part of the mix “to deal with expectations … Nauru was important. Two-thirds [of asylum seekers there] were found to be refugees and settled in Australia, New Zealand and Europe. Those that weren’t were sent back.’’ The excision of islands from the migra-

They sell off the plan. The first customer pays for the boat, the next one pays for the crew and after that it’s profit gling business was enormous. “When the boats were sent back there were disgruntled customers who wanted their money back. The people smugglers didn’t want to put their heads up.’’ Ruddock likens people smugglers to property developers. “They sell off the plan. The first customer pays for the boat, the next one pays for the crew and after that it’s profit.’’ But after the boats were turned back customers would only pay COD. The smugglers no longer had money to buy boats and hire crew. “The [boats] largely stopped,’’ says Ruddock. “The Indonesians knew we brought people smuggling to an end. From their point of view it was a good result …

16 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

tion zone was an idea that came from one of the many lawyers in Ruddock’s family, as they talked around a dinner table. Ruddock stopped people smuggling in its tracks. Detention centres emptied as the flow of boats fell from 43 in 2001, to an average three a year. But he says the change of government in 2007 raised expectations, and the unwinding of his policies gave a “free go’’ to people smugglers. The figures back him up. According to the parliamentary library, the number of unauthorised arrivals jumped from seven boats containing 161 people in 2008 to 59 boats with 2750 people in 2009, not including 78 people on board the Oceanic Viking. So

far this year 75 boats have been intercepted. Since 2008, 6000 asylum seekers have tried to come here by boat, and 170 have died. Christmas Island is overflowing, and asylum seekers have been relocated to a disused mining camp in outback Western Australia. How is any of that humane? Opposition Leader Tony Abbott is being blamed for forcing Gillard to copy his tough line, though his policies include a dose of compassion, including a sponsorship program on top of our annual refugee intake, allowing private community groups to sponsor refugees. But who knows whether it is even possible to put the genie back in the bottle? There was trial and error to find the right combina-

tion of measures to stop people smuggling, and Ruddock paid heavily. He was vilified to an extent rarely seen in Australian politics, branded child molester, cadaver, monster. His family was involved and even supporters distanced themselves. But history will show his approach was ultimately humane, sending the signal to people smugglers that business was closed, and that Australia would select its annual intake of 13,500 refugees in a fair, orderly way. Those angry, difficult years were behind us when Kevin Rudd and Gillard, the architect of the new arrangements, started tinkering. They should have left well enough alone.

An unidentified Afghan child at the emergency accommodation in Kupang, Indonesia, where her family and other Afghan and Iraqi asylum seekers are living. They had paid smugglers to take them on a perilous voyage to Australia but the Australian navy chased them back to Indonesia./ Ian Timberlake/iPhoto.ca

devinemiranda@hotmail.com INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COMâ&#x20AC;&#x201A; August 2010â&#x20AC;&#x192; 17

STRAIGHT TALK

Mark Steyn

‘Nice’ Obama gets walked over IN 1939, CAPT. PETER SANDERS, SERVING WITH THE

Tochi scouts on the Afghan-Indian border, was blown up by a Waziri booby trap and lost his right arm. Shortly afterwards, he accepted an invitation to lunch from the tribesman who’d planted the bomb. Awfully decent of the chap, and not a bad spread, all things considered. Not everyone cares for the old stiff upper lip: “I spit on your British phlegm!” as the Khazi of Kalabar remarked in what remains the seminal work on Afghanistan, Carry on up the Khyber. But imperialism requires a certain dotty élan. Without it, it’s no fun. You’re just a guy holed up in a Third World dump occasionally venturing out in the full RoboCop to pretend to implement some half-assed multilateral “nation-building” strategy that NATO defence ministers all agreed to at some black-tie banquet in Brussels and then promptly forgot about. Instead of the Tochi scouts – Pathan irregulars commanded by British officers – we now have Afghan units “trained,” or at any rate funded, by Western governments. A headline in the Washington Post captures the general malaise: “Afghan forces’ apathy starts to wear on U.S. platoon in Kandahar.” On a recent patrol through the city, 1st Lieut. James Rathmann stopped at a police checkpoint and found them all asleep in a nearby field. It’s not just the natives who are dozing. In London recently, Robert Gates, the U.S. defence secretary, complained that the allies’ promised 450 “trainers” for the expanded Afghan National Army had failed to materialize. These are not combat roles, so in theory even the less gung-ho NATO members should have no objection. Supposedly, 46 nations are contributing to the allied effort in Afghanistan, so that would work out at 10 “trainers” per country. Yet even that modest commitment is too much. So the

Afghan army will fill up with time-servers and Taliban sympathizers. Colonial administration was always a cynic’s field. In Lisbon last week, I was admiring the beauty of the jacarandas when David Pryce-Jones, the scholar and novelist, reminded me of the words of Lord Lloyd, British high commissioner in Egypt in the twenties: “The jacarandas are in bloom,” he observed. “We shall soon be sending for the gunboats.” When the weather heats up, so do the natives. In Lloyd’s day, we were cynical about the locals. Now we’re starry-eyed about the locals – marvellous chaps, few more trainers and they’ll do splendidly – while they’re utterly cynical about us. Hamid Karzai has

announced that U.S. troop withdrawals will begin in 12 months’ time. Karzai takes him at his word, and is obliged to prepare for a post-American order in Afghanistan, which means reaching his accommodations with those who’ll still be around when the Yanks are over over there. The new government in London takes him at his word, too. Liam Fox, the defence secretary, wants as rapid a British pullout as possible. When Obama announced an Afghan “surge” dependent on such elements as mythical NATO trainers and then added that, however it went, U.S. forces would begin checking out in July 2011, he in effect ruled out the possibility of victory. Over 1,000 American troops

Why would Putin, Ahmadinejad or the ChiComs take Barack Obama seriously when even a footling client such as Hamid Karzai can flip him the finger? just fired his two most pro-American cabinet ministers and is making more and more proTaliban noises. This is a man who for the last nine years has been kept alive only by U.S. military protection. A throne in Kabul may not be much, but, such as it is, he owes it entirely to his patrons in Washington. Why would Putin, Ahmadinejad or the ChiComs take Barack Obama seriously when even a footling client such as Hamid Karzai can flip him the finger? “When people see a strong horse and a weak horse,” said Osama bin Laden many years ago, “by nature they will like the strong horse.” The world does not see President Obama as the strong horse. He has

18 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

have died in Afghanistan, 300 British soldiers, 148 Canadians. What will our soldiers be dying for in the sunset of the West’s Afghan expedition? What is Obama’s characteristically postmodern “surge” intended to achieve? More Afghan police sleeping in fields? Greater opportunities for women? Take Your Child Bride to Work Day in Kandahar? British troops, said Liam Fox, are not in Afghanistan “for the sake of the education policy in a broken 13th-century country.” And, even if they were, in certain provinces “education policy” seems to be returning to something all but indistinguishable from Mullah Omar’s days. The New York Post carried a picture of women

President Barack Obama with Presidents of Afghanistan and Pakistan at a statement in the Grand Foyer of the White House. Left to right : President Hamid Karzai, President Asif Zardari /NEWSCOM

registering to vote in Herat, all in identical top-to-toe bright blue burkas, just as they would have looked on Sept. 10, 2001. Osama bin Laden’s strong horse/weak horse shtick is a matter of perception as much as anything else. On Sept. 12, 2001, the United States of America had just as many cruise missiles and aircraft carriers as it had 48 hours earlier. The only difference is that the world understood that, for once, America was prepared to use them. That’s why Moscow acceded to Washington’s “request” to use its old bases in Central Asia for northern access to Afghanistan. That’s why General Musharraf took seriously the Bush administration’s “shockingly barefaced” threat to bomb Pakistan “back to the Stone Age” if it didn’t get everything it wanted out of Islamabad. By contrast, a couple of days before, Mullah Omar and the Taliban appear to have agreed to let their al-Qa’ida tenants strike America with nary a thought for the consequences to their own country. Let’s suppose that the evacuation of the twin towers had not been quite as efficient and that the death toll was way up over 10,000. Let’s also suppose that Flight 93 had not been stymied by the vagaries of scheduling and the bravery of its passengers and had succeeded in hitting the White House and decapitating the regime. America was the most powerful nation on the planet, yet Mullah Omar evidently was unperturbed by the possibility of total, devastating retaliation against his toxic backwater. The toppling of the Taliban was an operation conducted with extraordinary improvised ingenuity and a very light U.S. footprint. Special forces on horseback rode with the Northern Alliance and used GPS to call in air strikes: they’ll be teaching it in staff colleges for decades to come. But then the Taliban scuttled out of town, and a daring victory settled into a thankless semi-colonial

policing operation, and then corroded further under the pressure of the usual transnational poseurs. After 2003, Afghanistan became the good war, the one everyone claimed to have supported all along, if mostly retrospectively and for the purposes of justifying their “principled moral opposition” to Bush’s illegal adventuring against Saddam. Afghanistan was everything Iraq wasn’t: UN-approved, NATO-backed, EU-compliant. It’d be tough for even the easiest nickel ’n’ dime military incursion to survive that big an overdose of multilateral hogwash, and the Afghan campaign didn’t. Instead of being an operation to kill one of the planet’s most concentrated populations of jihadist terrorists, it decayed into half-hearted nation-building in which a handful of real allies took the casualties while the rest showed up for the group photo. The 2004 NATO summit was hailed as a landmark success after the alliance’s 26 members agreed to put up an extra 600 troops and three helicopters for Afghanistan. That averages out at 23.08 troops per country, plus almost a ninth of a helicopter apiece. As it transpired, the three Black Hawks all came from one country – Turkey – and within a year they’d all gone back. Those 600 troops and three helicopters made no practical difference, but the effort expended on that transnational fig leaf certainly contributed to America’s disastrous reframing of its interests in Afghanistan.

And so here we are, nine years, billions of dollars and many dead soldiers later, watching the guy we’ve propped up with Western blood and treasure make peace overtures to the Taliban’s most virulently anti-American and pro-al-Qa’ida faction in hopes of bringing them back within the government. Being perceived as the weak horse is contagious: today, were Washington to call Moscow for use of those Central Asian bases, Putin would tell Obama to get lost, and then make sneering jokes about it afterwards. Were Washington to call Islamabad as it did on Sept. 12, the Pakistanis would thank them politely and say they’d think it over and get back in 30 days. The leaders of Turkey and Brazil, two supposed American allies assiduously courted and flattered by Obama this past year, flew in to high-five Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The new President wished to reposition his nation by forswearing American power: he thought that made him the nice horse; everyone else looked on it as a self-gelding operation – or, as last week’s U.S. News & World Report headlined it, “World sees Obama as incompetent and amateur.” If the Taliban return to even partial power in Afghanistan, the unctuous State Department spokesmen will make the best of it. But the symbolism will be profound, and devastating in what it says about American will. © 2010 Mark Steyn

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 19

GLOBAL WARNING

Dr. Tim Ball

False in parts, false in totality THERE ARE SO MANY VARIABLES IGNORED, UNDERRE ported or simply not understood in climate

science and especially in the computer models that purport to simulate global climate, that they destroy any pretence we know or understand weather and climate. But don’t take my word for it. Consider the comments from proponents of anthropogenic global warming including the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). In the 2001 report they said, “In climate research and modeling, we should recognize that we are dealing with a coupled non-linear chaotic system, and therefore that longterm prediction of future climate state is not possible.” James Lovelock, Gaia hypothesis speculator said, “It’s almost naive, scientifically speaking, to think that we can give relatively accurate predictions for future climate. There are so many unknowns that it’s wrong to do it.” Ex-pat New Zealander Kevin Trenberth, IPCC author and CRU associate said, “It’s very clear we do not have a climate observing system… This may be a shock to many people who assume that we do know adequately what’s going on with the climate, but we don’t.” Many reports exist on the inadequacy of temperature data. Ross McKitrick asks whether a global temperature exists at all. Anthony Watts shows the serious problems with the weather stations in the US and these are supposedly the best in the world. We also know how the record is ‘adjusted’ to support the warming theory. However, measurement of other variables is worse simply because of the complexity of measurements. Instruments to accurately measure precipitation, especially snowfall, have always been a great challenge. Perhaps the most forgotten variable, yet critical to weather and climate, is wind speed. Ancient Greeks knew the importance of wind direction and how it determined the pattern of

weather in a region. They even built a Tower of the Winds in Athens honouring the eight wind deities. Direction was critical for sailing as well, so mariners developed the ability to read the wind to 32 points of the compass. Speed was a different matter. Early attempts had a flat board on a spring with a pointer attached that was set against a scale. Wind pushed the board and the pointer indicated the force. The big change came with the wind cup or anemometer in 1846. While this provides an accurate measure, recording the information is important because the work the wind does requires detailed almost continuous data.

ple circulation of air rising at the Equator and descending at the Poles would occur, however rotation results in generally easterly winds at the Equator and the Poles with prevailing westerly winds in the middle latitudes. Each region has different land/ water ratios so a shift in these zonal winds will affect the role of the wind in heating the atmosphere. Take, for example, the percentage frequency of south winds at York Factory located on the southwest shore of Hudson Bay for two decades over 100 years apart. In the early decade from 1721 to 1731, which is well within the Little Ice Age (LIA), the data

It’s almost naive, scientifically speaking, to think that we can give relatively accurate predictions for future climate. There are so many unknowns that it’s wrong to do it The atmosphere is heated by air in contact with the ground (conduction) but also by evaporation of moisture that is then released into the atmosphere. In both cases the rate varies with wind speed. Even a small variation in wind speed results in a variation in heat exchange and distribution in the atmosphere. Wind is created by difference in pressure that is created by difference in temperature. High temperature creates low pressure and wind then blows from the high pressure to redress the imbalance. There are general global wind patterns created by differential heating. If the Earth wasn’t rotating a sim-

20 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

shows [warmer] south winds blow less than 7 percent of the time. In the decade from 1841 to 1851, which is outside of the LIA, south winds are occurring over 12 percent of the time with a peak in 1842 of 27 percent. The 2007 IPCC report acknowledges the shifts in some wind patterns and associated weather systems. Based on a variety of measurements at the surface and in the upper troposphere, it is likely that there has been an increase and a poleward shift in NH (Northern Hemisphere) winter storm-track activity over the second half of the 20th century, but there are still significant uncertainties in the magnitude of the increase due to

time-dependent biases in the reanalyses. The word “likely” is defined as greater than 66% chance. The shift is not surprising because the prevailing westerly wind and accompanying storm track would move north as the Earth warms. They acknowledge the “significant uncertainties” in the validity of increased frequency. They don’t even attempt to discuss the significance for heat transfer or any other impact on global weather. We know wind causes shifts of Arctic ice to create open water or increase pack ice, but how does this affect heat exchange or evaporation? It is even worse in the Southern Hemisphere (SH). Analysed decreases in cyclone numbers over the southern extra-

tropics and increases in mean cyclone radius and depth over much of the SH over the last two decades are subject to even larger uncertainties. The degree to which the IPCC and their supporters have fooled the world is amazing. As Jean-Francois Revel said: “How is it possible for a theory, which is false in its component parts, to be true as a whole.” In the case of ‘official’ climate science he could add that many parts of the whole are simply omitted. He explained the mentality that has pervaded the AGW supporters when he wrote, “A human group transforms itself into a crowd when it suddenly responds to a suggestion rather than to reasoning, to an

Windy and wet. Shoppers battle with high winds and rain in centenary square Birmingham, UK. /NEWSCOM

image rather than to an idea, to an affirmation rather than to proof, to the repetition of a phrase rather than to arguments, to prestige rather than to competence” His book titled, The Flight from Truth: The Reign of deceit in the Age of Information” tells it all. This article by climatologist Dr Timothy Ball was first published in Canada Free Press this month

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 21

EYES RIGHT

Richard Prosser Made into China

SOME QUESTIONS IN LIFE FALL VERY EASILY INTO THE

category of “If you have to ask, you’ll never know.” Why foreigners shouldn’t be allowed to buy parts of our country is one of them. They just shouldn’t. Why not? Because this is our country, that’s why not. If we sell it to foreigners, it stops being our country, and then we don’t have a country anymore. Are you with me so far? As far as this writer is concerned, issues don’t get any more basic and simple than this one. This is New Zealand and we are New Zealanders. The land belongs to us and we to it; we are melded, inseparable, one and the same. The nation-state, the people, our identity, national character, personality, values, and worldview, are inextricably intertwined with these islands, the diverse geography and unique ecosystems which have helped to make us who and what we are. If we want a prime example of what happens to a people when they start selling off bits of their land to outlanders, we need look no further than the Maoris. I mean do we really, seriously, never learn anything from the lessons of history? Recent events surrounding the attempted purchase of the Crafar family’s network of dairy farms in the North Island by Chinese interests would make it appear that we do not. It doesn’t matter that the China Jin Hui Mining Corporation has recently changed its name to Natural Dairy (NZ) Holdings. It doesn’t matter that the company is listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange or registered in the Cayman Islands, or that Chinese-born front woman May Wang now has New Zealand citizenship. What matters is that this is Chinese money attempting to procure Chinese ownership of New Zealand farmland, Chinese ownership of New Zealand cows, New Zealand milk production, and the profits from our dairy industry. It wouldn’t matter if the intending buyers

and their money were American, British, Australian, Greek, Dutch, Portuguese or from the moons of Jupiter; what matters is that they’re foreigners, and foreign ownership means foreign control. And foreign control means decisions about what happens in New Zealand being made overseas, by people who do not share our values, and who are not answerable to our laws and conventions, our elected representatives, or our perceptions as to what counts as the national good. It means the rape of our land and the pillage of its profits. I’ll probably be labeled a racist for espousing such views. I really don’t care. I’ve been

and created an –ism with which I can actually identify. Yes folks, you can find out all about it at http://www.culturism.us/ , a site which, for all that it is bound to attract the usual suspect fascists, white supremacists, tinfoil hat-wearers, gun-toting survivalists and other assorted nutters, still has an immense amount of common sense to say about the importance of preserving and protecting our Western culture. Indeed, I say come and live here, by all means, you fine wogs of every hue and visage – in such numbers and with such skills as we determine that we require, of course. But bring only your cookbooks and not your Holy books,

If we allow foreign ownership of our land we not only lose control of our nation, but we put the future out of reach of our children. And if that happens, then as a people and a culture we will cease to exist called worse things than that by better people than my accusers. And in any case I’m not a racist; I couldn’t give a wet slap what race, creed, or colour a man is, so long as he doesn’t demand special treatment on the basis of any of it, or expect me to adopt his culture in preference to my own. Nor am I a xenophobe; I don’t have any fear of foreigners, but neither do I want them coming here and taking over, for which sentiment I feel no need to make any apology. No, in fact your favourite commentator is a Culturist, a term I had coined all for myself before Googling it and happily discovering that someone else had got there long before me

22 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

adopt our tongue, our dress, and our ways, and give your children the names which we give to ours. Demonstrate that you have accepted our culture, which by definition is better than yours – and if it isn’t, what are you doing here – and we will happily accept your place in it. As usual I am straying perilously close to digression territory. Prime Minister John Key’s public support for state-owned Landcorp’s bid for the Crafar farms is encouraging, but the cynic in me wonders how much of it is driven by populist political pragmatism, and how much is the product of genuine nationalist sentiment. Public

opinion appears to be firmly in favour of the SOE purchasing the farms, in spite of whatever the blogosphere might have to say about the finances of the aforementioned organisation. Personally I think the balance sheets which record what State-Owned Enterprises own, spend, and return to the Government as a profit or a dividend are all smoke and mirrors anyway, and if they’re not then they should be. It doesn’t matter to me that we paid too much for Air New Zealand or that we bought back the Railways several times over for more than they are worth; what matters is that we own them, and the same goes for the Crafar farms and any other land purchases which Landcorp might make in the future. The best outcome, of course, would be for Allan Crafar himself to refinance and retain ownership of his family farms, but if that isn’t possible, then the next best thing in this writer’s view is for the State to purchase them and continue to farm them with professional managers, until such time as suitably qualified private buyers can be found. By suitably qualified I mean, of course, real farmers who are also real New Zealanders. If May Wang wants to put on some gumboots and get up at four in the morning to go milking, I for one will salute her. But stitching up billion-dollar land deals from an office in a Hong Kong skyscraper isn’t farming, and I have to confess that I’m not comfortable with the idea of corporate farming at all. Farms should be farmed by farmers. I know I’m a simple country yokel, but some things really don’t need to be any more complicated than that. The ability for a young couple to work their way up from being farm workers, to managers, to sharemilkers, to owning a herd, and then buying their own farm and passing it on to the kids, is part of what has made New Zealand and its people what we are today. It sticks in my craw that any foreigner who isn’t a New Zealand citizen is allowed to buy freehold title to any land in this country at all, from a house in Auckland to a factory in Wellington to an apartment in Queenstown; but there is something particularly repugnant about the Heartland itself passing into the hands of outlanders. It just simply should not and must not be allowed; this is a truth which I hold to be self-evident. If we allow foreign ownership of our land we not only lose control of our nation, but we put the future out of reach of our children. And if that happens, then as a people and a culture we will cease to exist.

The globalists and internationalists, who are the present-day incarnation of the communists of old, leftist wolves in right-wingers’ clothing who masquerade in business suits and bleat about Free Trade and Foreign Investment, will naturally decry such sentiments. Money, power, and control, are the only Gods they serve; they have no loyalty to the nation, its people, or their history. But the sky will not fall if we deny offshore businesses the right to the freehold title to our land, nor will investment capital flood away from our shores. This is blatant scaremongering from people who have all but sold their souls to the broken ideology of the Free Market in return for the baubles offered by foreign moneylenders. Foreign business people are just that, business people, and realists; and they will take a profit wherever they can, in whatever manner and within whatever constraints the laws of any land may allow. If we as a nation had retained the tariffs which once applied to electronics and motor vehicles, the foreign manufacturers of such would have happily continued to supply us with kits to assemble them from, and today we would still have the factories which used to put them together and the employment and wealth which those factories created. Instead we import cheap nasty rubbish from the same nation which today wants to make us tenants on our own farm land, while New Zealanders languish on the dole, or serve burgers and fries to wealthy visitors from other countries which do still have factories and tariffs. Likewise, Chinese companies are not going to forego the profits from supplying our dairy produce to customers in China just because we refuse to sell

them our farms. Get real. They will make do within the boundaries as they are set, just as Fonterra carries on business in China even though it isn’t allowed to buy the land on which its factories sit. The monumental stupidity which is Free Trade doesn’t work, and it wouldn’t work even if New Zealand wasn’t the only country in the world which is actually trying to play it by the rules. America’s FTA with Australia is anything but free and fair, and our agreement with China, with its provision for an open door to New Zealand for migrant Chinese labour, will just as surely see our economy crushed, all the more swiftly if we continue to allow foreigners to buy land here. We could, if we desired, easily create a Crown Leasehold Corporation, which would take ownership of the freehold title to land sold to foreigners and foreign interests, and which would manage their use of both the land itself and any agricultural or industrial production from it; disallowing, of course, such activities as subdivision, land use consent changes, and the export and offshore processing of bulk commodities such as milk, timber, meat, wool, or even oil, coal, and other minerals. Crown Leasehold land sold back to New Zealand citizens would of course include freehold title. Naturally it would require a huge bureaucracy to assess and determine the nature and extent of foreign shareholding, but then we already have a huge and bloated bureaucracy, and it might as well be doing something useful. That is, after all, what Governments are for – isn’t it? At the moment we are at risk of being made into a de facto province of China by stealth.

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 23

LINE ONE

Chris Carter

TV: They should pay us to watch their propaganda NEW ZEALAND’S NUMBER ONE LEISURE ACTIVITY,

whether or not we care to admit it, is simply parking the backside on the sofa and gazing fixedly at the one eyed monster lurking away there in the corner of the lounge. This electronic Beelzebub has now gained such sway in our lives that persuasive presenters, combined with government financed propaganda /nag advertisements, have been changing our society’s entire character and belief systems almost completely unnoticed by the us, the target audience. Even taking into account the straight out porn and extreme violence that now forms the greater part of prime time “entertainment” on TV – which most people have come to accept “falls within broadcasting standards” – we still haven’t quite yet figured out why our kids now swear like troopers or why an increasing number of young people seem quite willing to kick or even knife other people as just a matter of course. This recent trend towards mindless violence and moral degeneracy being doggedly transmitted every night on television ends up being a sort of a blueprint for susceptible people wishing to return to the jungle, plus being a major factor in our current battle with crime and violence. But really, is that at all surprising when television, unleashed, has proven to be, for government in recent times, little other than a vehicle for the spreading of political propaganda and so called social engineering to show us how stupid they really think we are? They, using of course ten of millions of our dollars with which to do so. Which is really what I would like to discuss. This enormous and I believe disgraceful waste of money, produces morbid, even psychologically damaging propaganda ads that far from educating the population at large are now more likely to have us all cutting our throats during bouts of advanced depression.

This barrage of televised misery and negativity that Government Departments wish to frighten and punish us all with, this “let’s scare the **** out of everyone” ploy has, of course, been recently embraced by the private sector in their TV ad campaigns as well. Usually right on tea time they introduce such gems as, “is your old willy not doing the job mate? Check with your doctor to see if this piece of welding wire is right for you!” Or, perhaps, a guy dancing around like a nut case dressed up in his girlfriend’s sanitary pads, very couth eh? Or if you piddle yourself when you laugh then try our two of sand and one of cement patches that will surely stop the flow. Various cleaner ads that imply that not only is it likely that your kitchen and bathroom are about to

uninvited are a couple of drunken yobs who then very loudly proceed to die horribly on screen which, apart from being true justice, might well seem nevertheless a completely unwarranted invasion of our families’ need to live peacefully in our own homes without being subjected to the boys own theories on “re education on road safety” being dreamed up by the sick minds within the LTSA. Like the yobs watch Fair Go anyway! The next departmental ad to help enhance your TV enjoyment might well be to tell you to not bash or kill your baby, assuming that’s something you’ve always had on your “to do” list. It’s also very bad to fall about the place pissed as a parrot just in case you didn’t know.

This enormous and I believe disgraceful waste of money, produces morbid, even psychologically damaging propaganda ads breed the 2010 version of the black plague and that if you don’t buy our over-priced ever so green spray on germ killer then you’re more than likely a terrible mum, unlike our slim little chick model here with the borrowed agency cute kids. Let’s, whatever we do, unsettle and even disgust the punters. It works for the Government Departments, why not for us? But back to the people who started all this nonsense – the Heavy Brigade, better known as the LTSA, who have spent millions on some of the most tasteless and ineffective TV ad campaigns ever to pollute our television screens. There you are, as a family, watching the footy or maybe even Fair Go, when crashing into your tranquil home completely

24 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

Then we have the old favourite, smoking, where unless you happen to come from outer space you’d maybe already know it’s really not very good for you at all. Time to upset you a bit more ? That holiday you were going to take the kids on to Disneyland, hope you’ve paid that $100 parking fine or we at Big Brother will bugger it up for you guaranteed, and you’ll have to stay home. This particular threat ad by the way has to be a serious laugh doesn’t it? This, coming from probably the most lazy and incompetent department of all..the so called Justice Department, who with the better part of $800,000,000 in outstanding fines they’re just too tired or disorganized to go out and collect, that they’re now reduced to an ad

campaign like this. Just go ahead and do it, for Heaven’s sake! Non-payers will soon get the message without the rest of us having to listen to all your silly threats. By the way, are you eating the right stuff? Are you too fat or maybe in need of a bit more exercise? Well, being stupid we won’t know any of this so a bit of scare stuff will not go amiss here either will it – like, you will die if you don’t what we tell you! Not worried enough yet? Still a bit more depression needed to tip you right over the edge and get you to book a jumping off point from the harbour bridge? How about we nag you about your likely gambling problems, or maybe you haven’t had your cervical smear test done yet. Perhaps you might take note of our ACC tales of woe, warning that you’re more than likely to fall off a ladder or through the glass coffee table and slice yourself up like a cucumber without our little warnings. Oh, and let us not, not, forget that it’s every mothers duty to become absolutely paranoid now with thoughts of her burning the kids to a crisp every time she’s cooking tea if she doesn’t really watch what she’s doing! Mums, after all, just like the rest of us: really silly people who need to be constantly reminded of just how stupid we really are. It surprises me actually that we can’t, as yet, get a personal, government provided, free trainer to help us through life, although I see that when we do finally fall off the twig, at least one insurance company is doing its best to remind us several times a day about

Death – just in case, I suppose, we might by accident start to enjoy ourselves, relaxing in front of the telly at home and forget about such things. [I think you’ll find, statistically, more people die in front of the telly than on the roads each year or in ladder accidents. – Ed.] But hope is at hand. I am pleased to report I saw a JK ad on the telly a couple of days back. Now you’ll remember that JK was probably one of our best All Black wingers ever, but that later on he swapped over to league which apparently didn’t do the job for him and he got very depressed, even to the point where he says he woke up one

morning and saw in his face in the mirror – someone he really didn’t like very much. Anyway according to this latest JK ad part of the best way to get rid of all this depression is to eat lots of healthy stuff and do a bit of exercise, so I reckon that might be the go, rather than keeping the Deodar busy under the Harbour Bridge. Mind you, with the supermarket charges for veggies these days who knows what’s best for depression? Maybe just toss the telly off the bridge would be a good start! [Just make sure your foot is not entangled in the power cord when you do. Ed.]

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 25

CONTRA MUNDUM

Matthew Flannagan Did God command genocide? PERHAPS THE MOST PERPLEXING ISSUE FACING Christian

believers is a series of jarring texts in the Old Testament. After liberating Israel from slavery in Egypt, the Israelites arrived on the edge of the promised land. The book of Deuteronomy records that God then commanded Israel to “destroy totally” the people occupying these regions (the Canaanites); the Israelites were to “leave alive nothing that breathes.” The book of Joshua records the carrying out of this command. In the sixth chapter it states “they devoted the city to the LORD and destroyed with the sword every living thing in it – men and women, young and old, cattle, sheep and donkeys.” In the tenth and eleventh chapters the text states that Joshua “left no survivors. He totally destroyed all who breathed, just as the LORD, the God of Israel, had commanded.” The text mentions city after city where Joshua, at God’s command, puts every inhabitant “to the sword” and “left no survivors.” If these passages are taken in a strict, literal fashion then it is correct to conclude that they do record the divinely authorised commission of genocide. In light of this critics of Christianity often ask how a good and loving God could command the extermination of the Canaanites? In response, I want to suggest that this strict, literal reading is mistaken. Reading these texts in isolation from the narrative in which they occur risks a distortion of the authors intended meaning. Consider the book of Joshua, critics are quick to point out that in chapters ten and eleven the text states that Joshua “totally destroyed all who breathed”, left “no survivors” in “the entire land”, went through the land “exterminating them without mercy”. The problem is that chapters fifteen to seventeen record that the Canaanites were, in fact, not literally wiped out. Over and

over the text affirms that the land was still occupied by the Canaanites, who remain heavily armed and deeply entrenched in the cities. Astute readers will note that these are the same regions and the same cities that Joshua was said to have “destroyed all who breathed”, left “no survivors” in just a few chapters earlier. This continues through into the next book in the Old Testament. The first two chapters of the book of Judges record that the Canaanites lived in the very same regions and cities that Joshua was said to have put every inhabitant “to the sword” in and “left

The books of Deuteronomy and Exodus, in numerous places, state that the Canaanites are to be slowly driven out and expelled from the land, which is not the same thing as killing them. In fact, legislation is cited in the texts which clearly assumes that the Canaanites will survive Joshua’s the invasion. Immediately after stating that the Israelites should “destroy them totally” the text reads, “make no treaty with them, and show them no mercy. Do not intermarry with them. Do not give your daughters to their sons or take their daughters for your sons.” If they were all supposed to be dead then why bother

Understood in a non-literal sense the phrases probably mean “something like, attack them, defeat them, drive them out; not literally kill every man, woman, child donkey and the like” no survivors” in. Moreover, again we see that they occupied these cities and regions in such numbers and strength that they had to again be driven out by force, which chapter one of Judges declared was very difficult. Read in context then, it is difficult to see how the language of total genocide in chapters ten and eleven of the book of Joshua could have been intended to be taken literally by the authors. This phenomena is not limited to the books of Joshua and Judges. The book of Deuteronomy in chapters seven and twenty contain commands to the Israelites to “destroy them [the Canaanites] totally” and “not leave alive anything that breathes.”

26 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

issuing instructions regarding treaties and intermarriage? When read in context, it is unlikely that the author of these texts intended the language “destroy totally”, “do not leave alive anything that breathes”, destroy “men and women, young and old”, and so on, to be taken literally. How then should these passages be understood? At a recent conference at the University of Notre Dame, Philosopher Alvin Plantinga suggested a possible solution is to take this language hyperbolically. He suggested phrases such as, “destroy with the sword ... men and women ... cattle, sheep and donkeys” are phrases to be understood more like we understand

a person who, in the context of watching David Tua in a boxing match, yells, “Knock his block off! Hand him his head! Take him out!” or hopes that the All Blacks will “annihilate the Springboks” or “totally slaughter the Wallabies.” Now, the sports fan does not actually want David Tua to decapitate his opponent or for the All Blacks to become mass murderers. Plantinga suggests that the same could be true here; understood in a non-literal sense the phrases probably mean “something like, attack them, defeat them, drive them out; not literally kill every man, woman, child donkey and the like.” If this is correct then the differences between the different texts is easily explained and more significantly, the texts do not teach that God commanded genocide or that Joshua carried it out. Interestingly, research into Ancient NearEastern history writings bear Plantinga’s idea out. In a comprehensive comparative study of Ancient Near-Eastern conquest accounts, Old Testament scholar, K. Lawson Younger documents stylistic and literary similarities between Joshua and reports of wars written by the some of these surrounding cultures. He concludes that the Old Testament uses the same literary conventions. He notes, “the composition and rhetoric of the Joshua narratives in chapters 9-12 are compared to the conventions of writing about conquests in Egyptian, Hittite, Akkadian, Moabite, and Aramaic texts, they are revealed to be very similar.” He substantiates with numerous examples in his book. In addition, when one examines the literary conventions of such accounts it is evident that the rhetoric of total conquest, complete annihilation and destruction of the enemy, killing everyone, leaving no survivors, etc, is a common hyperbolic way of describing a victory in the manner Plantinga suggests. Renowned Egyptologist Kenneth Kitchen notes, [T]he type of rhetoric in question was a regular feature of military reports in the second and first millennia, as others have made very clear. … In the later fifteenth century Tuthmosis III could boast “the numerous army of Mitanni, was overthrown within the hour, annihilated totally, like those (now) non-existent” – whereas, in fact, the forces of Mitanni lived to fight many another day, in the fifteenth and fourteenth centuries. Some centuries later, about 840/830, Mesha king of Moab could boast that “Israel has utterly perished for always” – a rather premature judgment at that date, by over a century! And so on, ad libitum.

It is in this frame of reference that the Joshua rhetoric must also be understood. Some examples will illustrate this. The Merneptah Stele states “Yanoam was made nonexistent; Israel is laid waste, its seed is not.” Here the Egyptian Pharoh Merneptah describes a skirmish with Israel in which his armies prevailed, hyperbolically, in terms of the total annihilation of Israel. The Assyrian king Sennacherib uses similar hyperbole, “The soldiers of Hirimme, dangerous enemies, I cut down with the sword; and not one escaped.” Mursili II records making “Mt. Asharpaya empty (of humanity)” and the “mountains of Tarikarimu empty (of humanity).” Similarly, The Bulletin of Ramses II, an historical narrative of Egyptian military campaigns into Syria, narrates Egypt’s considerably less than decisive victory at the battle of Kadesh with the rhetoric, “His majesty slew the entire force of the wretched foe from Hatti, together with his great chiefs and all his brothers, as well as all the chiefs of all the countries that had come with him” [Emphasis added]. The examples could be multiplied but the point is that such language was hyperbolic and not intended to be taken literally.

Consequently, if one does not read the texts in isolation and is sensitive to the genre of Ancient Near-Eastern writings then a literal reading is far from obvious. As Egyptologist James K. Hoffmeier notes, such a reading commits “the fallacy of misplaced literalism ... the misconstruction of a statement-in-evidence so that it carries a literal meaning when a symbolic or hyperbolic or figurative meaning was intended.” This underscores an obvious but often neglected point, the bible is not written in accord with the conventions of 21st century English. It was written in ancient foreign languages and in the conventions that governed historical, legal, epic, etc writings of that time. To understand what it teaches accurately one needs to ask what it teaches given these factors. When one does this, it seems probably that the Old Testament does not teach that God commanded or that Israel carried out, the genocide or extermination of the Canaanites. Dr Matthew Flannagan is an Auckland based philosopher/theologian who researches and publishes in the area of Philosophy of Religion, Theology and Ethics. He blogs at New Zealand’s most read Christian blog www.mandm.org.nz.

Comfort is...

simply another name for Stressless® There is no comparison to the ultimate comfort of a Stressless® recliner from Norway. Take our word for it and try one. Because feeling is believing.

STRESSLESS® Studios

NZ DISTRIBUTOR

DANSKE MØBLER AUCKLAND • HAMILTON • TAUPO STOCKISTS NATIONWIDE www.stressless.co.nz

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 27

Thousands of plastic fetusses are put on the Plein in front of the Dutch Parliament in The Hague. The Christian organisation Scream for Life protests this way against abortion. /ANP ROBIN UTRECHT

28 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

COP KILLINGS, CHILD ABUSE, ABORTION. THE LINKS. For forty years, New Zealand, along with other Western nations, has been on a social experiment that radically overturned millennia of human experience in favour of ‘new’ theories. Suddenly, violent crime is through the roof and shooting cops is something of a recreational sport in some areas. Suddenly, children are boozed out of their brains and having sex as young as ten. Suddenly, we’re lamenting the skyrocketing child abuse rates, like little Nia Glassie – tortured over open flames, flung in a hot clothes dryer and later killed by the family of Labour voters she was born into. Ironic, then, that the local Labour MP, Steve Chadwick, now sees nothing wrong in now pushing for abortion on demand. IAN WISHART looks at the ‘culture of death’ behind the abortion industry INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 29

f you had to think of one of the most bloodthirsty periods in world history, chances are you’d think of the Crusades. I tested this on a couple of people around the office, and hit paydirt every time. On Google, you’ll find something like five and a half million search results on the word “Crusades”. The word is continually thrown back at Christians as a justification for stripping churches of any authority, or to blame the Church for the current state of relations with Islam. If you listen to talk radio on any given night you’ll hear a liberal somewhere mention the “C-word” and perpetuate the myth. So given all of that, prepare to have your eyes opened. According to historical records,1 the death toll from the Crusades was around one million people. Now let’s put that in perspective with figures they don’t teach you in school. The Crusades...........................1,000,000 Spanish Inquisition..................350,000 Witch hunts.............................100,000 That’s pretty gruesome, isn’t it? But what about these mass murders committed by Buddhist/Confucian/Taoist regimes (note, none of the figures below includes battle deaths, they only measure civilian genocide): Mongol Empire.........................29,927,000 Chinese purges (pre Mao).........33,519,000 Or these figures from Islamic regimes, prior to the 19th century: Ottoman Empire.....................2,000,000 Persia (Iran).............................2,000,000 Or these figures from the 20th century alone: Marxist China.............................77,277,000 Soviet Russia...............................61,911,000 Nazi Germany............................20,946,000 The question from all of this: why are we in the West conditioned to feel liberal guilt about the Crusades? You’ll recall how students are compulsorily required to spend ten weeks on a Social Studies unit focusing on “racist” New Zealand treatment of Chinese immigrants in the 1860s, and the then-Prime Minister Helen Clark’s apology to China. Yet there is no mention in the curriculum of China’s own racism to various cultural groups, or the more than 100 million killed as a result of genocide in China. So why are we not all being taught about the much bloodthirstier regimes and religions? Answer, because politically correct left-wingers are firmly entrenched in our universities and school systems and education policy units, and they would prefer attention is not drawn to it.

The ultimate grim irony is that by making your kids take out student loans, the neo-Marxists have figured out how to make young Westerners pay for their own cultural suicide. Are we sending our kids to school to be educated, or indoctrinated? Are we sending our kids to school so the government can mess with their heads while both parents are forced to work for what in the old days was equivalent to one wage? Have we become the proletariat our grandparents warned us about at the height of the Cold War, and we just don’t know it yet? OK, let’s cut to the chase. During the 20th century, an estimated 262 million people died in genocide and a further 40 million as battle deaths in war. More people were slaughtered last century than throughout the whole of human history combined. Forget

30 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

the Crusades: the Nazis and Marxists – both essentially atheistic regimes – accounted for the most blood-filled period in world history. Now, I’ll grant you that history’s single bloodiest battle in one day took place in Roman times when 80,000 men armed with swords, spears, arrows and pitchforks killed each other. But the 300 million genocide/ war toll from last century averages out at 82,000 people dying every single day of last century, 365 days a year for 100 years. But even that pales into insignificance next to the death toll resulting from the dangerous philosophy – Eugenics. As you’ve seen, although Eugenics played a major role in the Holocaust, which is included in the Nazi genocide figures above, the philosophy that Man is the ultimate arbiter of life or death has played a direct role in a much bigger way than you suspect.

Over the past decade, nearly 500,000,000, that’s five hundred million, children have been killed in the womb by abortion. In ten years, that’s nearly double the combined death toll from genocide and war for the past 100 years! It equates to 137,000 children a day, or 95 children killed every minute, around the clock. Based on the best public estimates of abortion, the figure rises to around 800 million deaths over the past 20 years – nearly 20% of the current global population. To put that horrific figure in context, it equates to the entire human population of the world 200 years ago. We have killed off in just 20 years the equivalent of the total planetary population in 1776. A staggering one in three babies conceived in the West will be aborted, every year. As others have noted, who knows whether the next Einstein was among that tally?

While we march in the streets about the injustice of war in Iraq, where the death toll is measured in thousands, we have terminated – in the seven years since Iraq was invaded – somewhere in the region of 350 million infants. One hundred and thirty seven thousand a day. One cannot explore the link between abortion and eugenics, however, without a little history. Charles Darwin’s cousin, Sir Francis Galton, pondered the Theory of Evolution long and hard. Galton believed that if Darwin was right, and humans really were just the animals at the top of the food chain, answerable to no god at all, then Man had a responsibility to take charge of his own genetic destiny. Back in the early 20th century they didn’t know much about genes, and nothing about

Minister Richie Henry (at right) carries a poster depicting graphic photos during an anti abortion rally held outside the annual convention of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, convened inside the Duke Energy Convention Center. / Chris Fitzgerald/CandidatePhotos

DNA, but they did know about inheriting traits. Selective breeding had been used for centuries with livestock and crops to produce better animals and better yields. It was Galton’s belief that you could apply the same techniques to create a super-race of humans. This was called “positive eugenics”. The other side of the coin was “negative eugen-

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 31

“We are failing to segregate morons who are increasing and multiplying … a dead weight of human waste … an ever-increasing spawning class of human beings who never should have been born at all” – Margaret Sanger ics”, which involved actively suppressing the ability of rival races or social classes to breed. The Nazis, for example, adopted both ideas. Men and women exhibiting the best physical and intellectual traits of Aryanism were ordered to breed as part of the project to create “uber-Nazis”. At the same time, gypsies, Jews and other “sub-humans” were gassed.

The Nazi inspiration came direct from Galton’s work, as you can see from this Galton quote:2 “I do not see why any insolence of caste should prevent the gifted class, when they had the power, from treating their compatriots with all kindness, so long as they maintained celibacy. But if these continued to procreate children inferior in moral, intellectual and

32 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

physical qualities, it is easy to believe the time may come when such persons would be considered as enemies to the State, and to have forfeited all claims to kindness.” [emphasis added] One of Galton’s disciples was American feminist Margaret Sanger, who set up America’s first birth control clinic and created the organization Birth Control Federation of America. This organization later changed its name to the Planned Parenthood Federation, and under Sanger’s influence set up branches around the world – New Zealand’s Family Planning Association for example is part of Planned Parenthood and New Zealand’s Dr Gill Greer now runs the international head office of the group in the same role that Sanger once held fifty years ago. Have you ever wondered where the drive for birth control and sex education came from? You probably think it has a lot to do with genuine concern for girls who “get in trouble”. In fact, Family Planning was effectively the eugenics division of the Ku Klux Klan, with a clear and documented agenda to prevent Blacks and the poor from outbreeding whites and the middle classes. “Those least fit to carry on the race are increasing most rapidly,” complained Margaret Sanger in the 1920s. “Funds that should be used to raise the standard of our civilization are diverted to maintenance of those who should never have been born.” Sanger took her cues from both Darwin and Galton, but also from an 18th century cleric named Thomas Malthus who was convinced the “dirty classes” were breeding too fast and the world would be overpopulated. Malthus wanted culling of already-born children:3 “All children born, beyond what would be required to keep up the population to a desired level, must necessarily perish, unless room is made for them by the deaths of grown persons. We should facilitate, instead of foolishly and vainly endeavoring to impede, the operations of nature in producing this mortality.” Malthus argued that the Christian response to third world or domestic poverty – charity, education and a helping hand – only encouraged more Blacks and white trash to breed. To give a New Zealand example of how Malthusian eugenics policy could have changed the course of history here, there would have been no Christian mission outreach to NZ’s Maori community, and instead Malthus would have encouraged epidemic diseases to be spread to decimate the culturally “inferior” natives.

Evil we’re too afraid to confront

ow did we arrive at a circumstance in which a 56-year-old man is convicted in the NSW District Court this month of sexually abusing eight children aged from 12 months to 14 years, videotaping thousands of unspeakable crimes, and barely a comment is made? How did we arrive at a circumstance in which such a story is too dark for the front pages of our newspapers, but is buried inside, a few bloodless words to capture a social epidemic so catastrophic we ignore it? We ignore it because to acknowledge the truth is to acknowledge our collective guilt for the plight in which these children found themselves, for the blind eye of tolerance we turn to the chaotic and increasingly commonplace family arrangements which make protecting children from predators like David Shane Whitby impossible. Whitby was a DJ who ‘’groomed’’ the gullible single mothers he met in the pubs and clubs of outer suburban Sydney where he worked, a police officer who works in child protection says. ‘’They were poor single mothers doing it tough and they were conned by a predator … Whitby will be remembered as the worst paedophile in Australia’s history, in terms of number of victims, number of crimes and the extremely sick nature of the crimes … No one in child protection has ever seen anything like this.’’ But nor do they expect it to be the last. The five little girls and three little boys who are this case’s tragic victims lived with their mothers and a shifting parade of boyfriends, including Whitby. There was GW and her daughter HW; SW and her daughter TW; EK and her daughter JK; KD and her daughter SD; KW and her sons LW3 and NW; and DW and her daughter LW1, and son LW2. It was LW1’s courageous determination at the age of 14, after a lifetime of sexual abuse, not to let the same thing happen to her oneyear-old sister that finally ended Whitby’s sexual rampage. ‘’It was the accused videoing her sister L at her first birthday which prompted her to complain to [her stepmother] about what the accused had been doing to her, and which led, in turn, to this very trial,’’ said Judge Peter Berman, convicting Whitby on all 120 counts. Berman outlined the living arrangements

of the young victims which gave Whitby such easy access. ‘’The accused had access to LW1 and LW2 through his friendship with their mother, DW. DW first met the accused around the time LW1 was born … ‘’She gave evidence that from 2000 to 2008 she had a close friendship with him and that he babysat her children.’’ Another example: ‘’The accused had access to LW3 through his flatmate, GH. GH was in a relationship with KW … KW would visit with her two younger sons, NW and LW3 … Ms KW gave evidence that she would leave LW3 in the accused’s care about once or twice a week, sometimes for six to seven hours at a time and sometimes overnight.’’ Two of the mothers had consensual sex with Whitby, which he filmed on one of his ubiquitous handycams. The videos seized by the police at Whitby’s home were recorded over about 10 years. The horrors of that video evidence, with its graphic depictions of ‘’gross sexual abuse’’, in which a struggling baby screams in pain, in which a little boy is dressed in a pink fairy outfit for his ordeal, in which Whitby wears various masks, wigs, suspenders and high heels, were almost too much for Judge Berman. ‘’The actions depicted on the DVDs were horrible. It was very difficult to watch them.’’ Whitby will be sentenced on September 24. But for the police who toil at the coalface of child protection, the job is never done. They are overworked and powerless to stem the rising tide of child abuse. ‘’It’s a shitfight,’’ said the police officer I spoke to. ‘’The volume of it is a never-ending stream of jobs … It’s a

taboo topic, but the ugly side of society should be spoken about and should be reported on.’’ He operates in a world of family anarchy, absent fathers, and alcohol and drug abuse. ‘’How can mum protect her child if she’s off her face?’’ When families fail to protect children, he says the responsibility should not be offloaded to police and social workers. They can’t keep up and, in any case, much of the damage has been done. It is the community’s responsibility to rebuild social norms destroyed through the social revolution of the past 40 years. Last year in Britain, Sir Paul Coleridge, a Family Court judge, provoked a storm of criticism when he declared family breakdown to be the cause of most social ills. He said marriage, with all its faults, should be restored as the ‘’gold standard’’ and social stigma should be re-applied to those who destroy family life. He described what he sees in court as a ‘’never-ending carnival of human misery … I have witnessed the damage done [to children] by the endless game of ‘musical relationships’, or ‘pass the partner’, in which a significant portion of the population is engaged. ‘’What is a matter of private concern when it is on a small scale becomes a matter of public concern when it reaches epidemic proportions.’’ The insistence that all family arrangements are equally valid, and equally protective of children, has become a sacred shibboleth. This has been a disaster for children of the underclass. Make no mistake, a culture which promotes excessive tolerance of family instability is a culture which turns a blind eye to paedophiles such as David Shane Whitby. Miranda Devine

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 33

“Although Sanger publicly professed that abortion should be a last resort, in practice it was something she and her organization worked hard to achieve, not for any altruistic purpose but purely because she didn’t like poor people and coloured people, referring at times to “inferior races” and “human weeds”

Family Planning’s Margaret Sanger picked up on the anti-charity theme herself: “Organized charity itself is the symptom of a malignant social disease. Those vast, complex, interrelated organizations aiming to control and to diminish the spread of misery and destitution and all the menacing evils that spring out of this sinisterly fertile soil, are the surest sign that our civilization has bred, is breeding and perpetuating constantly increasing numbers of defectives, delinquents and dependents. “We are failing to segregate morons who are increasing and multiplying . . . a dead weight of human waste . . .an ever-increasing spawning class of human beings who never should have been born at all. “To breed out of the race the scourges of transmissible disease, mental defect, poverty, lawlessness, crime … since these classes would be decreasing in number instead of breeding like weeds ... such a plan would … reduce the birthrate among the diseased, the sickly, the poverty stricken and anti-social classes, elements unable to provide for themselves, and the burden of which we are all forced to carry.” These, then, are the documented views,

Other factors

he abortion debate, naturally, is not the only factor in why we’re becoming more savage. It’s a complex picture where nuanced influences spread ripples, and it’s often where those ripples intersect with other influences that real fireworks begin. On their own, any one of the influences might not be significant. Cumulatively, it’s a different story. As the accompanying article points out, pregnancy termination is the single biggest cause of death anywhere in the world. In New Zealand, eighteen thousand children are killed in the womb each year. By way of comparison, in the year to March 2008, 28,000 people officially died of any cause in NZ (excluding abortion). The biggest single cause of death was heart disease (around 11,000 deaths), followed by various cancers. For every baby that grows up to be killed in a car crash in New Zealand, another 45 babies don’t make it out of the womb alive. Yet of those children who do get chosen to live, they now have to navigate a world full of threats to their mental health. Studies by the US Department of Health and Human Services in 2001 found a number of fac-

tors in childhood could predict violent behaviour later on. They included low IQ (often a result of maternal drinking or smoking during pregnancy), abusive parents, mixing with antisocial peers, and coming from a broken home. Thanks to New Zealand’s experiment with ‘no fault’ divorce, a massive number of families have split, with children often in the care of solo mums trying to juggle the dual roles of father and mother and not always succeeding. But by far the largest indicator in the US study of future violent behaviour in children, was their exposure to violent TV or video games from an early age, often encouraged by parents or older brothers and sisters. On its own, perhaps insignificant, but in combination with a culture that devalues life at every subconscious level, the effects can be devastating. Often, studies on the links between TV or game violence and later behaviour are misinterpreted by the news media. They’ll report a study didn’t find strong links between the two, forgetting that no-one is claiming that every child who watches violent fare will become a wandering psychopath. But if even one in a

34 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

in her own books, of the woman hailed as the hero and founder of the Family Planning movement worldwide. And if you’ve ever wondered why Family Planning in NZ has been so active in promoting abortion, take one look at the attitude to children Sanger held: “The most merciful thing that a family does to one of its infant members is to kill it.” Although Sanger publicly professed that abortion should be a last resort, in practice it was something she and her organization worked hard to achieve, not for any altruistic purpose but purely because she didn’t like poor people and coloured people, referring at times to “inferior races” and “human weeds”. If you think this was simply the view of one loon in the Family Planning movement, think again. British scientist Marie Stopes married a prominent eugenicist, then set up Birth Control Clinics in Britain, as one online biography recounts:4 Dr Marie Stopes and her fellow family planning pioneers around the globe played a major role in breaking down taboos about sex and increasing knowledge, pleasure and improved

thousand children are affected in that way, that’s still 4,000 potential timebombs waiting to occupy a New Zealand prison cell at some point. A recent 2007 study on the subject found a much higher rate of desensitisation to violence, however, among those who play violent video games. Why is this a concern? Study authors Nick Carnagey, Craig Anderson and Brad Bushman note that governments pay a lot of money to desensitise people to certain things: “Systematic desensitization – a set of procedures designed to reduce unwanted negative emotional reactions to stimuli that initially produce fear or anxiety – has been successfully used to treat fear of such things as spiders, snakes, and blood. It has been used to treat anxiety-related disorders such as posttraumatic stress, rape trauma, and nightmares. There is also evidence that the US military has used video games for a variety of training missions, including desensitizing soldiers to violence. “Whether induced intentionally (e.g., therapeutic systematic desensitization) or unintentionally, desensitization can be adaptive, allowing individuals to ignore irrelevant stimuli and attend to relevant stimuli. For example,

reproductive health. Marie Stopes was also a prominent campaigner for the implementation of policies inspired by eugenics. In her Radiant Motherhood (1920) she called for the “sterilization of those totally unfit for parenthood (to) be made an immediate possibility, indeed made compulsory.” Even more controversially, her The Control of Parenthood (1920) declared that “utopia could be reached in my life time had I the power to issue inviolable edicts... (I would legislate compulsory sterilization of the insane, feebleminded)... revolutionaries... half-castes.” ice woman, and another fine example of how being a Darwinist (her main career was in paleobotany) wrecks your moral compass. Who needed Hitler’s gas chambers when Stopes, Sanger and crew were pushing for a much larger genocide against people they didn’t like, carefully cloaked in the name of “women’s rights”? When Stopes died, incidentally, she left her fortune to the Eugenics Society. Meanwhile, back across the pond in the US, Margaret Sanger’s Family Planning

organisation began publishing a regular journal, and many of the articles were written by eugenicists on the need to breed for racial and class superiority. One of her regular contributors was Dr Ernst Rudin, one of Adolf Hitler’s key advisors:5 Recognized as one of the fathers of Nazi ideology, his work was endorsed officially by the Nazi Party. He wrote the official commentary for the racial policy of Nazi Germany: “Law for the Prevention of Hereditarily Diseased Offspring”; and was awarded medals from the Nazis and Adolf Hitler personally. In 1933, Ernst Rüdin, Alfred Ploetz, and several other experts on racial hygiene were brought together to form the Expert Committee on Questions of Population and Racial Policy under Reich Interior Minister Wilhelm Frick. The committee’s ideas were used as a scientific basis to justify the actions of the Nazi’s racial policies. The “Law for the Prevention of Genetically Diseased Offspring” was passed by the German government on January 1, 1934. Margaret Sanger’s Birth Control Federation paid tribute to Adolf Hitler and his vision:6

“We, too, [like Hitler’s regime] recognize the problem of race building, but our concern is with the quality of our people, not with their quantity alone ... “It is entirely fitting that ‘Race Building in a Democracy’ should have been chosen as the theme of the annual meeting of the Birth Control Federation of America.” Margaret Sanger also played an instrumental part in the Voyage of the Damned, a shipload of Jews fleeing Germany that arrived off the American coast. The incident was documented in William Tucker’s book, The Science and Politics of Racial Research: The American eugenicists even made their own modest contribution to the plight of Jews in the Reich. In the late 1930s there were lastditch attempts to waive some of the restrictions in the 1924 Immigration Act in order to grant asylum to a few eventual victims of the Holocaust. These efforts were vigorously opposed by eugenicists...who submitted a new report, Immigration and Conquest, reiterating the biological warnings against the “human dross” that would produce a “breakdown in race purity of the ...superior stocks.” The Jews were sent back to Germany. You

desensitization to distressing sights, sounds, and smells of surgery is necessary for medical students to become effective surgeons. “Desensitization to battlefield horrors is necessary for troops to be effective in combat. However, desensitization of children and other civilians to violent stimuli may be detrimental for both the individual and society.” It may be detrimental, they say, because a person desensitised to violence is statistically less likely to assist someone being attacked, and more likely to be more violent themselves because of a lowering of inhibitions. To test whether this desensitisation was happening through video games, two hundred and fifty seven university students in the US were given either a violent video game or a non-violent game to play for 20 minutes, while hooked up to heart rate and skin tension monitors. After the video games, the participants were then shown a 10 minute video of real, not Hollywood, violence from a range of sources, including security cameras capturing the repeated brutal stabbing of a prison inmate by two others. The study found the heart rates of violent game players rose during their video games, signifying arousal to the violence, but then lowered when they saw real violence, indicating

a reduced sensitivity to the real thing in the wake of playing fantasy violence. More importantly, in light of the “one in a thousand” argument, the study found that most of the participants, in fact, were affected by desensitisation. “The results demonstrate that playing a violent video game, even for just 20 min, can cause people to become less physiologically aroused by real violence. Participants randomly assigned to play a violent video game had relatively lower HR (heart response) and GSR (galvanic skin response) while watching actual footage of people being beaten, stabbed, and shot than did those randomly assigned to play a nonviolent video game. “One issue that arises frequently in the media violence literature concerns individual differences in susceptibility to media violence effects. If there are large individual differences in susceptibility to short term desensitization effects, they would be revealed in the present study as significant interactions between the individual difference variables (violent video game preference; trait aggressiveness; gender) and the experimental manipulation of game violence. We found no such interactions, sug-

gesting that the results are quite robust across individuals.” In other words, while only one in a thousand or fewer may go on to become a stand-out offender, there’s almost an across-the-board increase in tolerance of higher violence caused by the media we’ve fed our kids as entertainment. A clear case of boiling frog syndrome, if ever there was one. Ian Wishart

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 35

can guess the rest. The heavily racist ideology behind birth control led Sanger and other eugenicists to believe that different races were closer to apes in terms of social behaviour and intelligence:7 It is said that a fish as large as a man has a brain no larger than the kernel of an almond. In all fish and reptiles where there is no great brain development, there is also no conscious sexual control. The lower down in the scale of human development we go the less sexual control we find. It is said that the aboriginal Australian, the lowest known species of the human family, just a step higher than the chimpanzee in brain development, has so little sexual control that police authority alone prevents him from obtaining sexual satisfaction on the streets. [emphasis added] One wonders how Sanger’s supporters, who set up Family Planning in New Zealand in the 1920s, viewed Maori. In 1926, Margaret Sanger called for voluntary sterilization of the lower classes: “It now remains for the U.S. government to set a sensible example to the world by offering a bonus or yearly pension to all obviously unfit parents who allow themselves to be sterilized by harmless and scientific means. In this way the moron and the diseased would have no posterity to inherit their unhappy condition. The number of the feeble-minded would decrease and a heavy burden would be lifted from the shoulders of the fit.”

ne outcome of the eugenics PR campaign was that many US states adopted compulsory sterilisation of people deemed to be of mental defect or poor character. Frontpage magazine featured the case of one woman:8 In the mid 1920’s, Carrie Buck, at the ripe old age of 17, fought the state of Virginia’s mandatory sterilization statute. She was classified as a socially inferior woman, having borne a child out of wedlock and her foster parents stated that she was “a handful”. Carrie’s mother had also been incarcerated in a state institution as a ‘promiscuous woman’. And at the age of 7 months, Carrie’s child, Vivian, was ‘certified’ as being ‘deficient,’ based on the ‘history’ of Carrie and her mother. Carrie lost her case at the state court level, and it wound up in front of the Supreme Court in 1927. The prominent Supreme Court jurist, Oliver Wendell Holmes, wrote the opinion in Buck v. Bell. The decision was 8-1, Justice Butler dissenting. Here’s what the majority opinion boiled down to: “In order to prevent our being swamped with

incompetents... society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from continuing their kind. The principle that sustains compulsory vaccination is broad enough to cover cutting the Fallopian tubes.” ... “It is better for all the world, if instead of waiting to execute degenerate offspring for crime, or to let them starve for their imbecility, society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from continuing their kind…Three generations of imbeciles are enough.” – Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. (Buck v. Bell, 1927)

“In New Zealand, it is hard to ignore the reality that we wring our hands over the death of a toddler, yet treat the murder of a child in the womb as the legitimate removal of an “inconvenience”. It sends a subconscious message to society that people who inconvenience us can be done away with, whether our own children or somebody else’s”

Five months after this decision, Carrie was forcibly sterilized. It later came out that her promiscuity was nothing of the sort. She’d been raped by the nephew of her foster parents, himself a violent (unsterilized) little scumbag. And her daughter’s school records show that Vivian was a B student, receiving an A in deportment (behavior), and she was on the honor roll. Genetic tests later showed that neither Carrie nor her daughter had any genetic defects. In 1930, Sanger’s magazine featured this suggestion from correspondent Norman Haire:9

36 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

“For those who cannot be educated, sterilization or legalized abortion seems to be the only remedy, for we certainly do not want such stupid people to pollute the race with stupid offspring. The defective conditions of life call urgently for improvement.” In 1939, her Family Planning organization set up what it called “The Negro Project”, with a view to dramatically cull the Black birth rates via birth control which, in many cases, led to secret sterilizations of African-American women without their consent or knowledge. It is important to note that secret sterilizations were not a policy of Sanger’s and she was unaware of them – however the culture that she created encouraged doctors to take the law into their own hands. Aiding her in the task of selling birth control to Blacks was Clarence Gamble, founder of the pure soap company Proctor and Gamble, who suggested that token Blacks, including a charismatic reverend, be paid to front the campaign so as not to arouse suspicions about the real Family Planning agenda. Sanger agreed: “We do not want the word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population, and the minister is the man who can straighten that idea out if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members.” While Family Planning successfully pitched birth control, it had the reverse effect to the one they intended, as Citizen magazine reports:10 In 1940, nonwhite women aged 18 to 19 experienced 61 births per 1,000 unmarried women. In 1968, the corresponding figure was 112 per 1,000, a 100 percent jump. What other factor could account for the increased rate of sexual activity than wider access to birth control, with its promise of sex without tears and consequences? This, of course, has been the outcome right throughout the Western world. Access to contraception heightened promiscuity, and if there was more sex taking place and people – being only human – failed to take proper precautions every time, then naturally the birthrates in the “inferior races” and among “human weeds” were going to rise. In a bitter irony, however, that is directly relevant to the wider threat facing Europe and the West, the so-called “superior” races and classes took to contraception like ducks to water, and largely used it properly. As a consequence, birth rates in New Zealand, Britain, Canada, Japan and the whole of Europe have fallen well below population replacement, meaning our civilization is dying out. It was the last thing Sanger and Galton wanted to

achieve, but a direct result of their policies. African-Americans, likewise, are increasingly angry at the myth they were sold, with Black pro-lifer Clenard Howard Childress, Jr comparing it unfavourably to the worst excesses of the Ku Klux Klan: “Between 1882 and 1968, 3,446 Blacks were lynched in the U.S. That number is surpassed in less than 3 days by abortion.”11 Like all of these seductive and dangerous ideologies, at face value eugenics probably attracts some sympathy with many people as we look at crime, child abuse and poverty in our society. Yet eugenics assumes – like Marxism and Darwinism – that it has all the answers: if you stop the poor and the stupid from breeding eventually these problems will disappear. Additionally, eugenics takes a fatalistic view that an unwanted child can never achieve success or happiness. But would the world be a better place without famous orphans like actress Ingrid Bergman, singer Faith Hill, writer James Michener, couturist CoCo Chanel, jazz musician Louis Armstrong, NZ Maori judge

Mick Brown, opera singer Kiri te Kanawa, former All Black Grahame Thorne, actor Pierce Brosnan, actor Richard Burton, actor Charlie Chaplin, actor Ted Danson, James Dean, Nelson Mandela, or Bill Clinton? Then there’s the eugenics policy against large families, but Celine Dion was the 11th child in her family, and don’t forget the Osmonds or the Jackson Five or even the Bee Gees from a family of five. There are thousands of other high achievers on the world stage who come from large families. And what of those born into abject poverty? Again, the list could go forever, but a handful of names include Oprah Winfrey, Elvis Presley, Marilyn Monroe, Hilary Swank. So again, does the stereotyping and generalization of eugenics justify the kind of population control they seek, or are their arguments simply hollow and racist? In New Zealand, it is hard to ignore the reality that we wring our hands over the death of a toddler, yet treat the murder of a child in the womb as the legitimate removal of an “inconvenience”. It sends a subconscious

message to society that people who inconvenience us can be done away with, whether our own children or somebody else’s. If we truly want to find out why society is well and truly slipping down a savage slope, we don’t have very far to look. FOOTNOTE: Ian Wishart’s article first appeared in his bestselling book, Eve’s Bite REFERENCES: 1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democide 2. Fraser’s Magazine 7 [1873] quoted in Aristotle to Zoos, Peter and Jean Medawar, 1983 p87 3. http://www.blackgenocide.org/negro.html 4. http://marie.c.stopes.en.wikivx.biz/ 5. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernst_R%C3%BCdin 6. Birth Control Review, vol. XXIV, January 1940, quoted at http://www.all.org/abac/contents.txt 7. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Sanger 8. http://frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle. asp?ID=10004 9. Birth Control Review, July, 1930, as quoted at http:// en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Abortion 10. January 20, 1992 edition of Citizen magazine 11. http://www.blackgenocide.org/ q

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 37

38 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

CAT PEOPLE The search for NZ’s black panthers

Are some of New Zealand’s missing trampers victims of leopard or cougar attacks in the South Island? A new book by big cat investigators MICHAEL WILLIAMS and REBECCA LANG raises disturbing new evidence, some of which is detailed in this exclusive extract:

ew Zealand, like Australia, has no indigenous big cats. In fact, the two islands that make up the landmass of the country – approximately 29 times smaller than that of Australia, and 2000km from its neighbour’s shores – can boast of only two native mammals, both bats. The only other noteworthy possible native is the fabled waitoreke, an otter-like creature, the existence of which has been fiercely debated but never substantiated.1 Since the first British settlers arrived in the 1830s, deer, wallabies, possums, quolls, foxes, and domestic cats and dogs have all been introduced to New Zealand, as well as livestock such as sheep, cattle and pigs. However, like the waitoreke, the odds remain stacked against the existence of an apex predator such as a leopard or lion – nevertheless, reports of a big cat presence have steadily increased since the early 1900s. Has some deadly new predator been introduced to the wilds of New Zealand? Such a plan was reportedly mooted at one time – cougars were openly discussed within the letters pages of newspapers as a possible biological control for the booming deer population in the Canterbury foothills of the south island. Lynx and Bobcats were reportedly used to tackle the skyrocketing rodent and rabbit population in the 1900s – the wild cats were so fearsome that even dogs were reluctant to challenge them.2 Reckless as the idea now seems, what would it mean for New Zealand’s thriving wilderness-based tourism if it was proven that big cats – specifically cougars, predators with a history of attacking humans – were roaming the bush? INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 39

Tigers in the garden

In the late 1970s and early ‘80s, a spate of lioness and tiger sightings were reported. The first of those sightings was in 1977. Although it was by no means New Zealand’s first big cat encounter, which occurred much earlier – it was the beginning of a wave of modern reports that would grab the media’s attention and the country’s imagination. Security guard Graham Stevens was doing his rounds in Mangere, Auckland, in the country’s north island, when he was shocked to see a large ‘lion’ with yellow eyes in front of his van. A search by the Otahuhu police found nothing, and a visiting circus denied the animal was an escapee from its travelling menagerie.3 Almost two weeks later, reports of a tiger sighting in Kaiapoi in the south island dominated headlines around New Zealand. Mrs F.M. Clark was adamant that she had seen the biggest of all ‘big cats’, a tiger, in her garden on a Monday morning, July 18, at 4am. “I know a pig when I see one, and I know an Alsatian as well. It was definitely a tiger,” she told Wellington’s Evening Post newspaper.4 “I looked once and couldn’t believe my eyes...I couldn’t make out its stripes but it was a fairish colour, had a long tail and was definitely a tiger.” Or perhaps a lioness or cougar? Police searched the area and checked in with the only known owners of tigers – a wildlife establishment, Orana Park, and Isherwoods Circus – but turned up nothing. However, reports of a large felid roaming the area a week later, and the discovery of “six-inch feline paw marks” and droppings, sparked a police hunt of the sand hills along Kairaki and Pines Beaches, north of Christchurch. Christchurch veterinarian Lindsay Fraser examined the droppings, saying at the time the “physical appearance and characteristics (are) consistent with the equivalent (tiger) species at Orana Park”. The Evening Post quoted Orana Park administrator Adrian Johnstone as saying the paw prints were “definitely those of a big cat”.5 Police used pig dogs to comb the dunes but once again came up empty-handed. One newspaper aired speculation that the mystery animal was a private pet being taken for “secret exercise”. There was also talk that the animal could have come from a passing ship – tigers being excellent swimmers.6 Whatever the truth of it, no tiger was ever found.

Lions on the loose

Three years later, sightings of an animal in Wellington dubbed the ‘Newlands Lioness’ revived interest in the big cat mystery. On October 9, 1980, Colin Gardener and neighbour Helena Bradley were watching sheep grazing on a property bordering their suburban street when a strange animal caught their attention. “It walked across the hill like a large marmalade cat, then sat down and scratched

40 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

itself,” Mr Gardener said.7 “You can tell it is a lioness. It wouldn’t be a lion, because it has no mane. But it is definitely not a dog or ordinary cat. It is too big and walks like a lioness.” A police vigil was held on the property ‘Meadowcrofts’, set in a valley in the Horokiwi Hills, but again nothing was found – until Mr Gardner had another sighting a few days later. “My neighbour, Maurice Bradley, and

“It was a very large cat that was not your domestic variety. It was the same colour as a golden labrador but definitely not a dog.” This lion too slipped under the police radar and disappeared.

Fearsome ferals

myself were able to catch a very good look at it this morning and it is definitely an exdomestic cat that is going wild. It is at least twice the size of an ordinary cat,” he told the Evening Post.8 He informed police and the hunt for the ‘lioness’ was called off. Fourteen years later, a ‘lion’ sighting in Tawa, an outer suburb of Wellington, sparked an armed response from police. Ten officers and a helicopter carrying a sharp-

A large black cat photographed by hunter Allan Kircher. / ALLAN KIRCHER

shooter swooped on the suburb after Ross Pedder saw a big cat. “I was safely inside the house – it was a bit like being on an African safari – and looking out the window,” he said.

In August 1998, Invercargill man Jim Walton saw what he described as a large cat-like animal in the Dunstan Ranges near Cromwell. 9 “It certainly appeared larger than our Labrador dog, dark-orange mustard in colour. I had it in my sights for 25 minutes,” he stated. “Its movements, its style were pure cat.” His testimony impressed Department of Conservation Central Otago manager Dave Murphy, who was aware of several big cat sightings in the area. “I took him seriously because the sighting was obviously spectacular enough for him to report it,” Mr Murphy told The Southland Times.10 The conservation official went on to point the finger at feral cats, saying hunters had been reporting “impressive-sized” feral cats for some time. A year later in July 1999, English tourists Mark and Deb Greening photographed what they believed was “a very large black creature” resembling a mountain lion at Lindis Pass in Central Otago. Several months later, Canadian tourist Professor Terry Chattington reported seeing a golden-coloured ‘mountain lion-like’ cat three metres long roaming near Moeraki, 33km south-west of Oamaru in December – something the locals laughed off at the time. But Chattington remained resolute: “I know what these things look like – I’ve seen them before.” “This is a safety hazard all right,” he told The Southland Times. “These things can move 30km in a day, no trouble. They would take sheep, cattle or even children.” In October 2003, stock-truck driver Chad Stewart noticed a large black animal sitting beside the stockyards at Blair and Sarah Gallagher’s farm at Mayfield, 35km northwest of Ashburton. “Initially I thought I was seeing things. It’s not every day you see a big black cat running up a hill,” he told the New Zealand Herald.11 “It definitely wasn’t a dog.” A subsequent helicopter search found nothing, but perhaps significantly, Mr Gallagher said he had noticed some strange behaviour among the stock at the time: “It seemed very unusual that there were

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 41

quite a lot of sheep moving up behind the woolshed.” The sighting unearthed another nearby report from two years earlier. A big black cat had been seen in Mid-Canterbury in 2001 but went unreported because Alford Forest resident David Wightman feared he would not be believed. A further search of the area by wildlife officials and residents failed to turn up any supporting evidence of a large felid. More reports of the elusive moggy poured forth, and it was quickly christened the ‘Canterbury Cat’ by the media. New Zealand’s Ministry of Agriculture (MAF) didn’t dismiss the sightings out of hand; rather it conceded some of the reports were highly credible, including a sighting made by two hunters. “The two hunters with a high power telescopic sight saw this cat for about two minutes, so there was two people seeing it. They went so far next day as to take their dog to the same site to make sure that it, you know, to try and get some idea of the size, and they realised that this black cat was at least the size of their hunting dog,” MAF spokesman Rob Thornton told TVNZ in a May 2005 television special. Peter May, who along with his wife Toni saw a large black cat by the side of the road in the same area in September 2003, offered up his own theory: “My view is that maybe it’s some kind of giant feral cat and there may well be more of them around,” he told TVNZ. Interest was further fuelled by Timaru man Mark Brosnahan’s photograph of a large black cat near Lake Clearwater in May 2005, which at first glance seems to have more in common with your garden variety house cat than a leopard, jaguar or puma – lending further weight to the feral cat theory.12 A second search of the wider Ashburton area was conducted by Biosecurity New Zealand in 2005 after a couple and their grandson saw an animal much larger than a domestic cat. Once again, nothing was found. Wildlife establishment Orana Park’s head keeper Graeme Petrie told TVNZ that natural selection in the wild resulted in the survival of the strongest and biggest animals. “Whether it is a large domestic cat we just don’t know,” he said. One of the better sightings to surface was by Mount Somers resident Andrea Thompson, who was in her garden one evening in October 2006 when she heard

“Dunedin documentary makers Mark Orton and Pip Walls were so intrigued by the raft of sightings in New Zealand in the past six years alone that they decided to explore the big cat legend on film, and in June 2007 their film Prints of Darkness was released” a lamb bleating and saw a large black cat dragging it across a nearby paddock. The cat dropped the lamb and ran off when Ms Thompson screamed. The lamb later died from its injuries. “It flew over the fence. I’ve never seen anything like it in my life,” she told a local newspaper. The former UK animal welfare worker also believed the cat was a feral. Local publicans have cashed in on the proliferation of big cat sightings, with the Mayfield Tavern adopting the moniker ‘Panthers Rock’. The staff keeps an evergrowing file of big cat stories behind the bar.

Cats on film

Dunedin documentary makers Mark Orton and Pip Walls were so intrigued by the raft of sightings in New Zealand in the past six years alone that they decided to explore the big cat legend on film, and in June 2007 their film Prints of Darkness was released. “We did a lot of research into the possi-

42 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

bility that an exotic could be alive and well in this part of the world,” Orton told the authors. “While we have some good leads that throw up suspicion regarding border control and harbouring exotic animals it would seem from all our research that it is more likely that something quite remarkable in relation to size is happening amongst the feral population. “I think that a breed of large, superstealthy feral cats have evolved through natural selection in the back blocks. After consulting genetics experts and looking at the history of cats used in New Zealand to control other introduced species, there is definitely potential for some form of gigantism to have occurred.” Orton isn’t alone in his speculation, nor is he the first to moot the feral cat theory. The film, which included an interview with author Mike Williams, catalogued the human side of a mystery that has captivated

people around the world. They also revisited some of the witnesses mentioned above, whose stories have not diminished with the passage of time. One interviewee, Ben Bull, of Oxford, a small farming town in north Canterbury, recollects newspaper articles mentioning a proposal to release cougars into the foothills to control the deer population – the ill-conceived introduction of one feral species to control another. “Somebody wanted to introduce cougars into the foothills of Canterbury to eradicate the deer. The talk about it went on for some time in the paper, about the pros and cons of introducing it,” Bull told the filmmakers. His comments were later backed up by an archive search of Christchurch newspapers by Orton and Walls. The documentary showed that sightings have not dwindled, and that whatever is happening in the New Zealand countryside is by no means confined to that country alone. After the documentary aired in New Zealand, the Whinwray family provided Orton with the unpublished big cat manuscript and personal scrapbook of the late David Whinwray,14 BEM, an outdoorsman and retired Royal New Zealand Air Force pilot, which he has kindly shared with the authors. Whinwray was positive that a breeding population of pumas had somehow become established on the South Island. “The fact is, mounting evidence points to the presence of the puma in rural and indeed suburban areas,” he wrote in his unpublished manuscript ‘Tracking the Big Cat: The New Zealand Experience’. The retired airman was actively pursuing reports in the Waimakariri Gorge area, a place renowned for its steep rock walls – a perfect cat habitat. Like Grose Vale’s Chris Coffey in Chapter 3, Whinwray also had his own sighting and believed a public warning needed to be issued to create awareness about the big cat threat. An active field researcher, Whinwray interviewed witnesses, collected reports, bought and modified a vehicle for the specific purpose of staking out farmland, hunted with baits and rifles in an attempt to lure the animal(s) out into the open, and collected numerous missing persons reports – disappearances he believed were linked to big cat sightings. He took part in the Police-run ground search for the ‘Kaiapoi Tiger’ in 1977, and wrote: “I am convinced that the woman reporting that sighting saw the animal

alright, but mistook the roaming puma for a tiger. This is understandable considering the conditions of the sighting. The official police explanation of the incident left me appalled as I have had involvement with the search and know the extent of it.” He refers to a similar 1921 incident in the same area in his notes, apparently documented by newspapers at the time, which he was never able to locate. The sighting resulted in a full-scale ‘lion hunt’ 25 years before he was to come face to face with his own feline enigma.

Mystery solved?

In July, 1946, David Whinwray’s life was altered forevermore by a chance encounter. Married and living with his in-laws, Whinwray had found himself a job and life that while respectable, was no doubt lacking the same kind of adrenalin-charged purpose of his former career as a fighter pilot. That is, until he came face-to-face with a puma in downtown Christchurch – a sighting that would affect him so deeply it would set him on a life-long quest for answers. In recalling the incident, he wrote: “I arrived in Christchurch from north Auckland after discharge from war service to take up night shift employment at Theatre Royal Café, Gloucester St. I finished work at 2.30am and was riding my pushcycle (sic) home to No. 23 Sinclair St, New Brighton, where I lived with my first wife’s parents. I was riding into a light northeast wind with light drizzle and had reached the straight section of Pages Road. “At about where No 125 now stands, I saw a tawny-greyish animal emerging from the lupins and stop short of fully exposing itself –

NZ big cat researcher David Whinwray during one of his expeditions. /WHINWRAY FAMILY

right under a street light 30ft ahead of me – its head, shoulders and front legs were clearly visible. It had a black orpington hen clenched in its mouth. “As it stopped, it padded its front feet up and down quickly (possibly to shake damp sand off its feet), and turned its head to look at me approaching – almost petrified and freewheeling towards it, only 20ft away. “When I was about 18ft from it, the animal bounded across the road. It took four bounds to reach and clear the barbed wire fence on the south side of the road and disappear into the lupins and pine trees. It appeared to balance itself with its tail as it leapt the fence. I had a clear unobstructed close-up view of the animal as it crossed the road. “It appeared to be as frightened of me as I was of it. My immediate thoughts were that the animal was a mountain lion, probably female about 3-4 years old, the legs were thickset, the head rounded with small rounded ears, the body about the size of a very large dog, the tail quite thick-set and about 3-4ft long, and approximately 150-160lbs, and in no way could have been mistaken for a dog. “My reaction after overcoming the fright was to pedal like hell, until I came to the Aranui intersection of Breezes Rd, where a taxi was sitting opposite the old petrol station on Breezes Rd, south side of the intersection. “I stopped and asked the driver to call the police as I had just seen a mountain lion. His

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 43

To read more of what searchers found, and other big cat sightings, support the work of the investigators of big cat sightings by purchasing a copy of their gripping, 400 page new book, Australian Big Cats: An Unnatural History of Panthers by Michael Williams and Rebecca Lang, which explores 150 years’ worth of big cat sightings around Australia and New Zealand

reply: ‘go home, you must be pissed’. I was offended by his attitude as I was then and still am a non-drinker, and certainly had not consumed alcohol that night. I decided then and there that if that was a sample of public reaction, I would keep quiet about it. I was very shaken by the experience and thought a lot about it, and finally decided to discuss the matter with my father-in-law about three weeks later. (Incidentally, I got rid of the bike and bought an old car the day after the sighting). “The reply from Robert James Sutton, my father-in-law, was surprising and reassuring. His first words: ‘why the hell didn’t you tell me about it at the time, we could have done something about it?’. “He then told me during the 1914-18 war he had worked as a wharfie at Lyttleton and recalled unloading a ship carrying a small consignment of zoo animals [later mentioned in the manuscript as occurring in 1915, according to the Christchurch Press]. The ship had been diverted to Lyttleton from its journey from the west coast of America to Sydney, Australia. “The animals were being unloaded, and a case containing a pregnant female puma had been dropped from the sling. The cage broke and the animal escaped and ran off the wharf and disappeared up the Port Hills. The incident was kept quiet because it was thought the animal would not survive the South Island winter. “I have since learned that the incident rated a small mention in the Christchurch Press among the war news. Should the wharf incident be confirmed, it would explain more than 60 reported sightings of a lion-like animal that have been made from a wide section of the South Island, and other unexplained happenings like the 19 people that have disappeared

without a trace from the Heaphy Track, and others, over the past 70 years.” It seems an extraordinary coincidence that the answer to Whinwray’s experience could be found within his own home. But even if the story was true, a puma’s lifespan is, on average, only between 15 and 20 years at most. Could one – albeit pregnant – puma conceivably be behind New Zealand’s big cat legend? It would seem highly unlikely. However, for the young Whinwray, it was another intriguing twist in the tale.

Missing, presumed eaten

One interesting anecdotal report collected by Whinwray no doubt further fuelled his belief that large felids were picking off trampers (bushwalkers or hikers) along the picturesque 82km-long Heaphy Track, which winds its way through the extremely rugged north western corner of the South Island now covered by Kahurangi National Park. Maoris and gold miners to reach the island’s greenstone deposits and the lucrative gold fields of the west coast once used this track. According to the tale, which he heard in 1983 from a member of the Royal New Zealand Air Force (RNZAF) search party, one of these victims was a schoolteacher who went horse riding many years earlier, possibly in the 1940s. The teacher was soon reported missing and a subsequent search – he was last seen on the Karamea side of the Heaphy Track – failed to find him. However, the carcass of his horse was soon located on the banks of a river, its “ribcage stripped of meat, skeleton and hide only left”. His pack lay nearby...

44 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

REFERENCES: 1. Heuvelmans, B., On The Track of Unknown Animals (Rupert Hart-Davis, 1958). 2. Orton, M., ‘The Beast of Benmore’, Investigate Magazine, December 31, 2007. 3. Partial news clipping, New Zealand Herald, July 8, 1977. 4. ‘Tiger Tale a Puzzle to Police’, Evening Post, July 18, 1977. 5. ‘Kaiapoi Tiger Hunt Has Ended in Doubt’, Evening Post, July 25, 1977. 6. ‘Tiger Tracks Keep Town on Tenterhooks’, The Dominion, July 25, 1977. 7. ‘Couple Sight Lioness Loose in Newlands’, The Dominion, October 9, 1980. 8. ‘Sighting!...And Updating’, Evening Post, October 11, 1980. 9. ‘Big, Big Cat’, The Southland Times, July 22, 1999. 10. ‘DOC Says Wild Moggies Roaming Otago’, July 23, 1999. 11. ‘Report puts big cat among sheep’, New Zealand Herald, October 7, 2003. 12. ‘Photos rekindle Canterbury panther search’, NZPA, May 3, 2005. 13. ‘Big Cat Experts Can’t Rule Out Anything’, TVNZ, August 11, 2006. 14. Tracking the Big Cat: The New Zealand Experience by David Whinwray, 1991, unpublished manuscript. q

A new book exploring Australia and New Zealand’s greatest wildlife mystery – the mysterious black ‘panther’ – has just hit the shelves.

Australian Big Cats: An Unnatural History of Panthers by Michael Williams and Rebecca Lang explores 150 years’ worth of bigcat sightings around Australia and New Zealand. These large cats leave carnage and bewilderment in their wake. What are they? And how did they get here? Flesh-andblood or flight of fancy? Exotic pest, mutant feral or ‘extinct’ marsupial lion? Join the authors in more than 400 pages of big cat photos, history, sightings, reports and analysis dealing with one of this region's most enduring mysteries.

Read more at www.australianbigcats.com.au INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 45

RUDYARD KIPLING HIS MAGIC RECONSIDERED

“Oh! The blazing tropic night Where the wake’s a welt of white That holds the hot sky tame; Where the steady forefoot snores Through the planet-powdered floors Where the scarred whale flukes in flame …” I have just recovered from a bout of Kipling. This happens to me from time to time, and at its worst I feel acutely deprived if I do not have a volume of Kipling to hand. I am now, however, recuperating, and can make an attempt to analyse, in part, this strange addiction. It goes as suddenly as it comes, and can absent itself for quite a while. Others tell me they have similar experiences. Kipling was, first, the escapist’s escapist. He had an extraordinary gift for not only making exotic scenes alive, but making them intimate as well. Look at this description of an Indian river at sunset: “… [T]he boats creaked on through the twilight. The broad Indian river, that looked more like a chain of little lakes than a stream, was as smooth as glass, reflecting the sandyred sky in mid-channel, but splashed with patches of yellow and dusky-purple near and under the low banks. Little creeks ran into the river into the wet season, but now

What makes the work of Kipling enduring, addictive, and yet rejected at times? HAL G. P. COLEBATCH goes in search of the elixir in Kipling’s writing their dry mouths hung clear above the waterline. On the left shore, and almost under the railway bridge, stood a mud-and-brick and thatch-and-stick village, whose main street, full of cattle going back to their byres, ran straight to the river and ended in a sort of rude brick pier-head, where people who wanted to wash could wade in step-by-step. That was the Ghaut of Mugger-Ghaut. “Night was falling fast over the fields of lentils and rice and cotton in the low-lying ground yearly flooded by the river; over the reeds that fringed the elbow of the bend, and the tangled jungle of the grazing-grounds behind the still reeds. The parrots and crows, who had been chattering and shouting over their evening drink, had flown inland to roost, crossing the out-going battalions of flying-foxes, and cloud upon cloud of waterbirds came whistling and “honking” to the cover of the reed-beds. There were geese, barrel-headed and black-backed, teal, wid-

46 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

geon, mallard and sheldrakes, with curlews, and here and there a flamingo. “A lumbering Adjutant-crane brought up the rear, flying as though each slow stroke would be his last …” Of course Kipling could pack exotic picturesqueness (George Orwell calls it “cheap picturesqueness” – Orwell, in one sense a Kipling hero, had presumably been permanently cured of the thirst for the exotic in the Burma police) into a much smaller compass than this: “The road to Mandalay/Where the flying fishes play ….” Or “We’ve ratched beyond the Crozets/ that tusk the Southern Pole …” – how could words be used better than that last? Kipling wrote for a class which had not existed in any great size before, and would not continue to exist in quite the same way after his hey-day: the three crucial characteristics about this class were that its members tended to be educated, powerless, and bored.

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 47

By “Powerless” I do not mean they were necessarily without commercial or some other kinds of power, but they tended not to be the sort of people who would ever be in a position to do things. Of course the odd explorer or engineer might well admire Kipling also, but such do not make up an adequate market for a best-selling author.

he thing about Kipling’s characters – human, animal or even machine – was that they had some sort of power to do things – to administer a district in India, for example. They could do things others could not do, and were masters of their various crafts. Further, to make them even more powerful, they were generally part of some sort of team or institution, with a place in a heirarchy. Thus, in “Kim”, Kipling makes the Catholic priest more attractive than the Protestant, perhaps because the Catholic Church had a discipleined hierarchical order in which everyone had earned his or her place, and orders were obeyed, though the Imperialist Kipling hated the Fenians and penned some of his bitterest verses about them (In his own religious beliefs Kipling seemed more attracted to the Old Testament than to the New, though he had a good knowledge of both). In one of innumerable stories he wrote on these themes, the beast-fable “Her Majesty’s Servants” the narrator hears animals of the Indian Army talking together of their different duties in battle. There is a glamorous, heroic troop-horse, but one feels Kipling’s real favourite among them is the clever and capable screw-gun mule, “Billy,” to whom the younger mule looks for moral support and instruction (screw-guns were small mountain-guns carried in pieces by mules and screwed together for action). There is a beautiful subtlety in the way Billy, though plainly far socially superior to the ugly, neurotic and stupid camels, maintains a precarious social equality with the horse (though the two almost come to blows when the horse reminds Billy that his father was a donkey). In “The Undertakers” the characters are, on the other hand, not part of any hierarchy, but scavengers, brought together only in common criminality. They are all – in a state which C. S. Lewis describes in “Voyage to Venus” as “horribly close to innocence” – principally concerned with a chance to eat one another, a fact each takes for granted. The crocodile attempts to grab the jackal twice. The crocodile also claims kinship to the jackal, meaning that he has eaten his rela-

tives, and the jackal, who appears to swallow the ugly jest without outward resentment, some time later has his revenge by failing to warn the crocodile of approaching hunters. In the stories in which tigers appear they are depicted as vermin to be shot and their death-agonies described in some detail.1 Yet their fellow-feline Bagheera the black panther, is one of the nicest animals in all beast-literature. Is this because, by becoming man-eaters, the tigers have also become something even worse – rebels against hierarchy? One is reminded of the story of the medieval king who hanged two of the dogs in his menagerie for having attacked a lion, on the grounds that they had rebelled against

“Many a London clerk who had never been out of sight of a made road in his life might wish at his office stool for a crocodile watching the village ford, or even for cobras in a big neglected garden with summerhouses and tailorbirds in the trees” the King of Beasts. He also committed what was for him a rare technical blunder when he affirmed “and it is true” that man-eaters become mangy and lose their teeth, perhaps to deter any tiger who read the story from anthropophagy. There is another characteristic point about “The Undertakers” reinforcing my point that Kipling wrote for the bored: once the crocodile has been shot the villagers can cross the river in safety, but one gets a feeling that life will be duller without the old monster. Many a London clerk who had never been out of sight of a made road in his life (an image that occurs several times in Kipling) might wish at his office stool for a croco-

48 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

dile watching the village ford, or even for cobras in a big neglected garden with summer-houses and tailor-birds in the trees. This indeed is spelt out in the beast-story “How Fear Came” in The Second Jungle Book: during a drought there is a truce in which animals may drink at the river without being attacked by predators. “In good seasons, when water is plentiful, those who came down to drink at the Waingunga … did so at the risk of their lives, and that risk made no small part of the fascination of the night’s doings. To move down so cunningly that never a leaf stirred, to wade knee-deep on the roaring shallows that drown all noise from behind, to drink, looking backward over one shoulder, every muscle ready for the first desperate bound of keen terror; to roll on the sandy margin and return, wet-muzzled and well plumped out, to the admiring herd, was a thing that all tallantlered young bucks took a delight in, precisely because they knew that at any moment Bagheera [the panther] or Shere Khan [the tiger] might leap upon them and bear them down. But now all that life-and-death fun was ended, and the animals came up, starved and weary, to the shrunken river …” This is, apparently, not understood at all by the authors of some children’s books today, who have eliminated all elements of danger from their stories (and all elements of courage along with it. I recently saw a quite nauseating fairy-story in which the Fairy King leads his people in hiding from a passing dragon, itself quite wussy-looking as dragons go). Walt Whitman makes an interesting contrast to Kipling. Like Kipling, Whitman celebrated people – and machinery – who did things, as in “Leaves of Grass”: See, steamers steaming through my poems … See, in my poems, cities, solid, vast, inland, with paved streets, with iron and stone edifices, ceaseless vehicles, and commerce, See, the many-cylinder’d steam printingpress–see, the electric telegraph stretching across the continent, See, through Atlantica’s depths pulses America, Europe reaching, pulses of Europe duly return’d, See, the strong and quick locomotive … Similarly, in “A Song for Occupations” Whitman hailed:

[T]the labor of engines and trades … The pump, the pile-driver, the great derrick, the coal-kiln and brick-kiln, Coal-mines … Iron-works, forge-fires in the mountains or by river-banks, men around feeling the melt with huge crowbars, lumps of ore, the due combining of ore, limestone, coal, The blast-furnace and the puddling-furnace …, the strong, clean-shaped T-rail for railroads, Oil-works, silk-works, white-lead-works, the sugar-house, steam-saws, the great mills and factories … The difference however is as obvious as the similarities. Whitman was joyously, exhuberantly and deliberately undisciplined, both in thought and poetic technique contrast this semi-anarchism with Kipling’s evocation of ship’s machinery in “McAndrew’s Hymn”: Lord, send a man like Robbie Burns to sing the Song o’ Steam! To match wi’ Scotia’s noblest speech yon orchestra sublime Whaurto – uplifted like the Just – the tailrods mark the time. The crank-throws give the double-bass; the INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 49

feed-pump sobs an’ heaves: An’ now the main eccentrics start their quarrel on the sheaves. Her time, her own appointed time, the rocking link-head bides, Till – hear that note? – the rod’s return whings glimmerin’ through the guides. They’re all awa! True beat, full power, the clangin’ chorus goes Clear to the tunnel where they sit, my purrin’ dynamoes. Interdependence absolute, foreseen, ordained, decreed, To work, Ye’ll note, at any tilt an’ every rate o’ speed. Fra skylight-lift to furnace-bars, backed, bolted, braced an’ stayed, An’ singin’ like the Mornin’ Stars for joy that they are made;

f the two, I think it is Kipling who succeeds the better, because style and subject matter match. In Whitman here there is a fundamental confusion, a disjunction of style and subject. It is not only disciplined, it is polished in every detail. Kipling places himself, often enough, in an odd position, reflecting his training as a journalist: he is an outsider (it seems strange that this man who cherished so much the idea of being an insider, refused all manner of official honours and recognition), but he is an outsider who all the insiders, even sometimes the animals, talk to – a kind of honourary insider who shows off all sorts of esoteric knowledge about soldiering, and engines, and famine relief, and the joy of an Indian infant given a old polo ball, the pigments used by medieval monks to illuminate manuscripts, and the markings on snakes. It is as if Kipling has, as an Outsider, paradoxically made himself an insider but, as a good and professional journalist should, cultivating his sources. Many of his stories are allegedly told to him by soldiers etc., and there is a delightful pseudo-scholarly acknowledgement in The Jungle Book of the elephants, mongooses etc. who allegedly helped him. During the Boer War Kipling seemed reasonably fond for the Boer soldiers, though disapproving of their “primitive lust for racial domination” in very strong terms which the many who have only second-hand knowledge of his work might find very surprising indeed. His reasons for approving of them probably included their co-operative clannishness, the fact that they did things and were clever capable fighters, and also that they made peace with the British and

kept it honourably (Winston Churchill, who was briefly a Boer prisoner, also made the point that they behaved chivalrously towards white men, though if he had not managed to get rid of the dum-dum bullets he admitted carrying when captured they might not have been quite so pleasant to him). Max Beerbohm in “A Christmas Garland” sent all this up in a cruel but brilliant sketch of a Kipling full of admiration and delight at being admitted into the confidences of a brutal and corrupt policeman who represents power and authority and who gives Beerbohm’s cowardly, weak, sadistic Kipling an opportunity to indulge in vicarious violence as a privileged spectator with Kipling egging him on to greater brutality. “Many were the night-beats I had been privileged to walk with Judlip, imbibing curious lore that made glad the civilian heart of me. Seven whole 8x5 inch note-books had I pitmanised to the brim with Judlip. And now to be repulsed as one of the uninitiated! It hurt horrid.” Yet, brilliant a pastiche as this is, it is unfair. Much of Kipling very tender, as his children’s stories in particular bear witness. Possibly Beerbohm, a kindly, gentle, urban, archetypal literary man, who like most successful writers spent most of his time at a desk, and who actually did so little there is hardly material for a biography about him, was not only appalled by Kipling’s values but in some unadmitted way made ashamed by them. Is there a risk that this set of observations contains so many complexities and qualifications that it ends up saying nothing? I think the fact remains that when all is said and done Kipling is different, he is unlike any other writer including his many imitators (such as Lawson and Paterson in Australia). • It is as if he has taken his mongoose, RikkiTikki-Tavi’s motto, “Run and find out” for his own. One cannot imagine any other modern literary or psychological novelist doing so much research – a Frederick Forsyth or a C. S. Forester would, but one feels a Henry James or E. M. Forster, even a Martin Amis, would somehow find it vulgar and a distraction from the all-important exploration of relationships. As for psychology, it is easy enough to argue that Kipling’s young Roman Centurions on Hadrian’s Wall and the Antioch police are nothing but the British subalterns he knew in India dressd up in armour. However I argue that Kipling pulled off a brilliant psychological and liter-

50 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

“In fact, by being an outsider, owing loyalty to no-one, he is doing his job as a journalist within the hierarchy: the odd paradox is that it is his duty in the hierarchy to know his subject well but not to be involved with it” ary trick in the short story “Mary Postgate” which has fooled generations of critics and which depends on an intimate understanding of psychology: Set in the First World War, it tells how an ugly, useless and frustrated old spinster allows a crashed and wounded German airman to die without attempting to help him. Yet, as I pointed out previously2 there is, on close reading, absolutely no evidence that the crashed airman is German (the only words he is reported as speaking are French) or even that he exists at all. He may be entirely a projection of the neurotic, sexually-warped woman’s mind. In fact, any real evidence of his existence has been carefully removed from the narrative. Yet Kipling has got inside this mind too, and can be utterly convincing. In fact, by being an outsider, owing loyalty to no-one, he is doing his job as a journalist within the hierarchy: the odd paradox is that it is his duty in the hierarchy to know his subject well but not to be involved with it. This produces an odd effect: because Kipling lets us know that the insiders treat him as if he is one of the people in the know, and have a peculiar intimacy with him, he can treat us, the readers, as in the know also and have a peculiar intimacy with us. We feel often that someone we know is addressing us. When he describes in strictly technical terms the damage to a ship’s engine when it has been hit by a shell, he seems to take it for granted that we also know what the parts he lists are. The effect can be very beguiling, until suddenly the bout comes to an end and one feels one has had enough. It is, as C. S. Lewis said, like the state of a man

was blaspheming his own Art, and would be sorry for this in the morning.” The words ”I don’t think I’ve been to the Empire in my life” are of course very ambiguous. The Henry Jameses and the E. M. Forsters had no idea what “The Empire” meant (despite Forster having been to India). Their type had never felt that: “Oh, the days are sick and old And the skies are grey and cold, And the twice-breathed airs blow damp; And I’d sell my tired soul For t he bucking sea-beam roll Of a black Bilbao tramp . With her load-line over her hatch, dear lass, And a drunken Dago crew …”

who has been swilling liqueurs as though they were beer. In The Jungle Books each of the creatures of the jungle knows their place, generally within some sort of hierarchy, and, as C. S. Lewis pointed out in his excellent essay on Kipling, with access to some kind of esoteric knowledge. When the Seeonee wolf pack breaks up, the individual wolves come to bad ends. Meanwhile, the people who don’t do things are categorized at one point as “brittle intellectuals/Who crack beneath the strain …” and in The Jungle Books are portrayed as the monkeys, the bandar-log, useless and despised dreamers of futile projects. Then there is the heroine in “William The Conquerer”: “’I like men who do things,’ she had confided to a man in the Educational Department, who was teaching the sons of cloth-merchants and dyers the beauty of Wordsworth’s ‘Excursion’ in annotated cram-books; and when he grew poetical, William explained that she ‘didn’t understand poetry very much; it made her head ache,’ and another broken heart took refuge at the Club.” We see the same thing in “A conference of the powers” – a famous writer hears some young soldiers yarning and finally denounces the meaninglessness of his own life: “We’re thinking of dining out somewhere – the lot of us – and going on to the Empire afterwards,” said Nevin, with hesitation. He

did not like to ask Cleever to come too. The invitation might be regarded as perilously near to “cheek.” And Cleever, anxious not to wag a grey beard unbidden among boys at large, said nothing on his side. Boileau solved the little difficulty by blurting out: “Won’t you come too, sir?” Cleever almost shouted “Yes,” and while he was being helped into his coat continued to murmur “Good Heavens!” at intervals in a way that the boys could not understand. “I don’t think I’ve been to the Empire in my life,” said he; “but – what is my life after all? Let us go. … At midnight they returned, announcing that they were “highly respectable gondoliers,” and that oysters and stout were what they chiefly needed. The eminent novelist was still with them, and I think he was calling them by their shorter names. I am certain that he said he had been moving in worlds not realised, and that they had shown him the Empire in a new light. Still sore at recent neglect, I answered shortly, “Thank Heaven we have within the land ten thousand as good as they,” and when he departed, asked him what he thought of things generally. He replied with another quotation, to the effect that though singing was a remarkably fine performance, I was to be quite sure that few lips would be moved to song if they could find a sufficiency of kissing. Whereby I understood that Eustace Cleever, decorator and colourman in words,

In “The Finest Story Ever Told” a sailor from the ancient world is reincarnated as a clerk. While he still has memories of his past lives he writes movingly about them, but when he meets a girl it is all over and he turns to bad poetry. “The Rhyme of the Three Sealers” is a puzzle – a long narrative poem about seal-pirates fighting among the icy fogs of the far north Pacific. Like all Kipling, it is written with skill and swing, the details minutely realized,3 and can be splendid to recite (“A dog-tooth laugh laughed Reuben Paine, and bared his flensing knife”), but it is hard to see why exactly it was written. It has no particular point or insight. Written in prose it has the bones of a possible story, but as a poem there seems to be nothing to justify the expenditure of so much energy and skill. “Kim” is on one hand a tribute to Kipling’s powers of original invention. It is widely agreed that the old Tibetean Lama is

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 51

one of the most delightful characters in fiction, an astonishing invention for a writer who often seemed determined to prove how tough his vision was. As for Kim, there must have been plenty of brats fathered by British soldiers running round the Indian bazaars, but it took Kipling to notice them. Further, of course, Kim is redeemed by joining the British Secret Service, as Mowgli eventually joins the forestry service.

hile Kipling wrote with fascination about soldiers and ships’ engineers (not much about actual battles, and at sea about engineers rather than seamen), my own guess is that his faithful reading public were clerks who would like in some mood to be soldiers or ships’ engineers, or at any rate would like to do things, for with Britain’s industrial development, and parallel to the Empire-builders major and minor, a class was expanding rapidly of young men who totted up ledgers and who were, in Gilbert’s words, “fettered to an office stool.” Alfred Noyes in poems about “The Old Grey Squirrel” wrote of a boy who spent much of his youth fascinated by ships in harbour, but as an old grey accountant could find consolation only in collecting stamps from the letters arising from his employers’ international activities. This group was not wealthy enough to travel but they were part of the newly literate middle-class who could vicariously take part in adventures – and this was also a time when adventures, if improbable and out of the reach of most clerks, were at least possible: they did happen to some people, the kind of people Kipling wrote about: elephant-trappers, bridge-builders, soldiers, forest rangers, engineers of every kind, cooks, people who knew things that other people did not know. People without whom the machine would stop. In “The Drums of the Fore and Aft” a new English regiment is routed in Afghanistan because there are no experienced old soldiers among its ranks to tell them that an Afghan attacked is much less terrifying than an Afghan attacking. Such people really did exist somewhere else. Even the historical characters plainly had their modern equivalents. The young soldiers and administrators in the ancient Roman Empire are plainly meant to stand for their modern British counterparts. It was as if the readers of Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings knew that somewhere else there really were elves and dragons and though they were not easy to

reach (there would be no magic or mystery about them then) a lucky or determined few might find their way to them. Kipling seems to have admired Jews for the very reason some people disliked them: it appears that, as he saw them, they did seem to have some secret esoteric knowledge of their own, which they might just possibly be moved to share by the right investigative journalist, such as himself. This was also probably why he was so keen also on Masonry and even on Boy Scouts, which he saw as a military organization (this was not so far-fetched at the time: even the Church Lads’ Brigade sometimes drilled with rifles, and in the First World War the Boy Scouts – who had taken the names of their office-bearers, like Akela, from Kipling’s Jungle Book characters – undertook various military duties such as guarding bridges. Technology helps solve age-old problems. The old monk in Kim is rejuvenated by a gift of modern spectacles. The brave mongoose “Rikki-Tikki-Tavi” is about to be battered to death by the cobra Nag when a man turns up with a shotgun. In “The Undertakers” we are told “The biggest sort of elephant gun is not very different to some artillery” and that a Martini rifle’s “long bullet makes nothing of a crocodile’s plates.” Yet, when a bout of Kipling is coming to an end, this fascination with technology loses its charm. “Below the Mill Dam” apparently celebrating the end of an ancient water-mill that has worked since Domesday Book, suddenly seems rather horrible. This, however, may be because we live in an age surfeited with technology. Then there is the tour de force in which he builds up an antitechnological pastoral scene with immense skill before kicking it down like a small boy kicking down a sand-castle:

52 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

The drowsy carrier sways To the drowsy horses’ tramp. His axles winnow the sprays Of the hedge where the rabbit plays In the light of his single lamp. He hears a roar behind, A howl, a hoot, and a yell A headlight strikes him blind And a stench o’erpowers the wind Like a blast from the mouth of Hell. He mends his swingle-bar, And loud his curses ring; But a mother watching afar Hears the hum of the doctor’s car Like the beat of an angel’s wing …

In a sense Kipling was caught in a dilemma summed up, perhaps unconsciously, in his poem, “The Explorer.” The explorer in the poem suffers and endures to discover new country, driven by a mystical impulse, but in the end the only result is that it is industrialized and the magic and mystery of the unknown is gone. In “Letting in the Jungle” the wild has a victory, and an Indian village reverts to jungle, and the forester in “In the Rukh” conserves the jungle, but these are untypical. The typical Kipling hero tends to exert himself to tame, organize and homogenize – to destroy the very things which gave Kipling’s world its colour and magic. Kipling did show some awareness of this in “the King” in which he argued that “romance” was always to be found in the past. Even a steam-locomotive would seem romantic one day – as, of course, it now does. Whether he himself was entirely satisfied by this argument I am not sure. Kipling, of course, lived during the last great age of exploration, when Burke and Wills perished in the Australian outback and Scott in the Antarctic, but it was plain to the foresighted that this was all finishing. In America Theodore Roosevelt was establishing the first great National Parks to preserve a little of the wild. Air travel would soon make most of the world available to the average person – the thought on which Kipling chooses to abruptly close his autobiography, “Something of Myself.” Further, though he was the poet of Empire and Empire-building, Kipling’s work is full stories of the end of Empire. His gallant young Roman Centurions are doomed, or at least their cause is. In “The White Man’s Burden” he exhorts America to build “The ports ye shall not enter/the roads ye shall not tread …” He appears to have foreseen that India would become independent one day, although he felt no great optimism or enthusiasm at the prospect. This dependence on adventure and knowingness might also account in part for the fall in Kipling’s popularity after the First World War. Despite the heart-break of losing his only son he had written, among a collection of epitaphs for that war, one for an ex-clerk, beginning: “Pity not! The Army gave/Freedom to a timid slave …” In other words, for all its horrors, of which Kipling was well aware, and wrote about eloquently, he had found it possible to see the war as a liberating experience. For this fictional clerk, it had been an experience worth dying for. Being put into a uniform and

becoming the subject of a corporal’s orders can be seen as an odd sort of freedom, but it gave those two great things: adventure and a place in a hierarchy. Douglas Reed wrote in Lest We Regret: “I remember with what glee I welcomed the hope of adventure that 1914 brought …” But the war had also tended to remove a part of Kipling’s audience. The bored clerks who had dreamed at their office stools of uniforms and guns and envied the Soldiers Three of Kipling’s stories had now had a feast – nay, a surfeit – of the real thing. In “A Conference of the Powers” the writer Eustace Cleever is first brought up short by the realisation that all three of the young officers he meets have shot and killed men. It is the beginning of his own feeling of inadequacy. The book-buying public after 1918 were not like that. The edge of the appetite for tales of soldiers and machinery and being part of a large, powerful important organization – the appetite for the sort of adventure which had brought Kipling fame and fortune – was gone. In “The Janeites,” Kipling told of Great War soldiers bound together by – of all things! – a fascination for the works of Jane Austen. In “The Changeling’s, he wrote of Naval reservists after the war: ‘Ere ever the battered liners sank With their passengers in the dark, I was the head of a London bank And you were a grocer’s clerk. I was a dealer in stocks and shares, Any you in butters and teas; And we both abandoned our own affairts And took to the dreadful seas … It concludes: Now there is nothing, not even our rank To witness what we have been; And I am returned to my London bank And you to your margarine. In the late story “A Friend of the Family” ex-soldiers look back on the Great War with nostalgia: “Well, I’ll run you out home before sun-up. I’m a haulage-contractor now – London and Oxford. There’s an empty of mine ordered to Oxford. We can go round by your place as easy as not. She’s lyin’ out Vauxhall-way.’ ‘My Gord! An’ see the sun rise again! ’Haven’t seen him since I can’t remember when,’ said Bevin, chuckling. ‘Oh, there was fun sometimes in Hell, wasn’t

“Our whole historical consciousness might well be quite different – if he had lived just five more years to write of Dunkirk and the Battle of Britain”

of 1890 of the adventures of British soldiers in Afghanistan. Douglas Reed, after recalling his “glee” at the hope of adventure in 1914, continued: “[I] cannot honestly expect the 19-year-olds of today or tomorrow to feel differently. And there will always be some people who are simply bored by a soft, familiar, predictable and sedentary life, and those who yearn for:

there …” But by then Kipling was fading. I think this also explains in part why, though Kipling suffered a huge fall in popularity, his books never became quite extinct. For one thing, his writing is simply too good. For another, there is the nature of the Old Adam. Gerald Kersh wrote how, in 1939, after 20 years of peace propaganda and all the gruesome stories and memories of the past, some men dyed their hair, some, all dignity forgotten, begged and wept, or besieged the doctors who could write medical certificates, all desperate for the only two things that had come to matter in life: guns and uniforms. Kipling would still have had an audience – indeed our whole historical consciousness might well be quite different – if he had lived just five more years to write of Dunkirk and the Battle of Britain. A Kipling in 2010 might write like the Kipling

“The trumpet flowers and the moon beyond, And the tree-toad’s chorus drowning all And the lisp of the split banana-frond That talked us to sleep when we were small …” REFERENCES: 1.The charge made by Max Beerbohm and others that Kipling reveled in sadism and cruelty cannot simply be dismissed out of hand, yet it sits uneasily with the great compassion to be found in much of his work, including for example “The Gardener” and the end of “The Spring Running.” He was also deeply indignant at the shameful treatment of the poor in Victorian England, especially his beloved soldiers and Empire-builders. The final, inevitable line of “The Last of the Light Brigade” must rank as one of the bitterest in English poetry. To claim as George Orwell does, that Kipling is “morally insensitive and aesthetically disgusting” is sheer nonsense, though it would be easier to sustain a claim that he is morally inconsistent. 2. Hal Colebatch, “Kipling’s ‘Mary Postgate’ Reconsidered”, Quadrant, September, 2001, pp. 62-66. 3. However, it contains an odd mistake: “Where northward look they to St. George, and westward to St. Paul’s.” St. Paul’s Island in the Bering Sea is north of St. George Island. q

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 53

INTERVIEW

THE WORLD ACCORDING TO BILL BILL GATES discusses global health, electronic privacy and his investment in nuclear energy, with TOM AVRIL

ill Gates, 54, co-founded the software giant Microsoft in 1975. He remains chairman of the massive corporation but now spends the bulk of his time on philanthropic work at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, spending billions to fight disease and poverty in developing countries and to improve schools in the United States. AVRIL: At Microsoft, you were known as a demanding, some would say relentless, leader. Now that you’ve embarked on finding solutions in fields where you are NOT

an expert, is your management approach any different? GATES: Basically, no. Even at Microsoft, you have people who know databases, people who know artificial intelligence, so you’re deciding how to back those teams with great people. ... The nice thing about the foundation is, we’re working on problems that the world wants to solve, like malaria. We can call in all the experts and get a diversity of opinion about, OK, which vaccine constructs should we go after, is this diagnostic worth

54 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

doing? And the competitor is the disease, so that all the people who are smart about the disease are to some degree on the same side, working together. ... In education, it just amazes me how little, essentially, R&D is done about great teaching. So the number of people you can pull in who have ideas on how you transfer skills to improve teachers, that’s even less people today than if you get together on malaria. It’s surprising but over time hopefully it will change, particularly as people are willing to try out new things. AVRIL: There seems to be a robust scepticism toward science among certain quarters, with various factions questioning such things as vaccine safety, climate change and the theory of evolution. Do you think such views are on the rise? Why do they persist? GATES: It’s tricky because science has gotten complicated and scientists have to describe what they know, their level of agreement, what their disagreements are on complex topics, and it has to be made interesting to the public. And at least significant people, including politicians, need to pay attention and get involved, because avoiding problems and

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 55

having long-term prosperity – a lot of that will come from scientific insight. Not that scientists will always be right, but in terms of knowing what the possibilities are, and what you might have to guard for. And so overall scientific literacy, whether it’s the general population or the politicians or whatever group you pick, it is a concern that sometimes it doesn’t seem that strong. Now perhaps with the Internet, putting better material out there, making things clearer, perhaps science can do its part to make it more digestible, more understandable ... Sometimes the raw numbers on scientific awareness make you wonder if the wrong policies will get picked because of that. The vaccines – we’re [the US] the only country who’s got a declining vaccine rate. And you do get measles deaths that warn people about this. And the anti-vaccine crowd is able to take even weak allegations and get a lot of visibility and drive a lot of fear. And we went 20 years with this notion of, “Did vaccines cause autism?” which there never really was any data that suggested that was true, and it took 20 years to make that clear. And still, if you surveyed the public at large, that negative impression is pretty widespread even to this day. AVRIL: One of your foundation’s education programs aims to encourage students to finish college. There’s a certain irony there. (Gates dropped out of Harvard to focus on Microsoft.) GATES: True. ... Even though I don’t have a real degree – I have a lot of fake degrees – I’m as much of a student as you’re likely to meet. ... AVRIL: You may have heard of the school district in Philadelphia where officials were accused of inappropriately activating the webcams on computers that students took home. That’s a pretty unusual case. But more generally, with data mining and social media sites sharing their information with third parties, do you feel that society has adequate protections of personal privacy in place? GATES: Privacy used to come by default, because you had to be there to see something, and information wasn’t easy to find. Take, for example, that court cases are public. Well, if you had to go down and dig into the records to find them, they were semi-private. Now, where you can type in somebody’s name, and see the lurid testimony on their divorce case from 15 years ago, actually you’re forced to think, OK, what should the rules be? If I hire a bus driver, should I be able to see his history of traffic violations? ... 56 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 57

LEFT: Bill Gates visits a family farm in Chura Village, Kenya, where he examines Cassava farming production. RIGHT: Bill and Melinda Gates visit a young patient suffering from malaria in the Manhica Research Center and hospital in Manhica, Mozambique. Their foundation was funding three grants totaling $168 million to fight malaria, a disease that is epidemic, and kills more than one million people annually. /Jeff Christensen/ Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation/RAPPORT

Cameras are an example of this. London has chosen to warn people that they use a lot of cameras, and they’ve cut crime a lot. ... We actually are in discussions with teachers about, are they willing to have webcams in the classroom and, so that passively you can visit the classroom, or that they can take part in the teaching where they want advice on how to calm their class down or deal with violence. ... We’re talking to teachers about, are they OK with that? How can we make that positive for everybody involved? When you get into somebody’s home, then I don’t think anybody’s suggesting that’s an appropriate thing. AVRIL: You have invested in TerraPower, a company that seeks to build nuclear reactors

that run on depleted uranium. Could you explain the pros and cons of such a design compared to a traditional reactor? (Gates says he has invested tens of millions personally, not through his foundation.) GATES: There are many concepts (for next-generation nuclear power). Modular reactors, so-called liquid reactors. high-temperature reactors. The one I’m backing with TerraPower is very interesting because we can use the uranium. Ninety-seven percent of uranium we don’t use (in traditional reactors), and we use that 97 percent. So our fuel is free. In fact, we can even use waste from normal reactors and burn it up. So we can actually take what to them is

58 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

a problem, which is, what do they do with their used fuel rods that are sitting there – either in cooling pools or in dry casks on site – because there’s no long-term storage? We can actually take that and use it as the fuel in this new type of reactor. So we’ve solved the waste problem. ... And the big issue is, is our reactor cheaper to build? Which we say it is, but how do you prove that? You have to build one. That’s a financial problem, that’s a regulatory problem. So this is a design that on paper is phenomenal. But the challenge to actually get it built, prove the economics – doing it is a high-risk activity, and so we’re talking to all sorts of people all over the world about partnering to actually build one of these things.

AVRIL: The foundation has invested billions in tackling malaria, AIDS and other specific diseases. Recently the world’s effort to eradicate polio seems to have stalled a bit. How do you feel about this concept of focusing instead on broader health measures such as hygiene and sanitation, rather than specific diseases? Or does it have to be an either-or? GATES: Well, we do both, and what you want to do is save lives for as low a cost as possible. And for many things, vaccines are the answer because they are very cheap and you don’t need trained personnel. ... There’s a lot we do in sanitation, and it’s not an area where many people invest money in. The rich world has gotten used to “flush,” where you have all this water, which is very

expensive, and you’re using up lots of clean water. So the world needs something that’s as attractive as flush but isn’t flush. So we’re the biggest investor in new types of sanitation systems. ... Water is scarce, energy is scarce, building pipes is expensive. Our model, and this happens a lot – the rich world does it in a way that just doesn’t work for the developing world. But we want something that’s as good. Cheap, doesn’t smell, convenient. ... (With polio) we’re down a lot, and we only have a small number of countries left. So it’s one of these things where, with a little luck, we’ll get this thing done. ... I’m a big believer that we need to get polio done. AVRIL: A couple of years ago, Brian

Roberts of Comcast said that you encouraged him to take a bigger role in philanthropy. What did you tell him? What do you think are the responsibilities of those who can afford to give back? GATES: Well, the main thing I do is tell people I’m having fun giving money. And if you pick a cause and get involved, you can have a huge impact. And though the U.S. is the most philanthropic country in the world, it could be a lot more philanthropic. It’s nowhere near the limit. So I hope just by saying that it’s fun, and sharing whatever has worked or not worked for us, if that encourages other people, great. You know, they deserve the credit for whatever they do. q

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 59

H Theunting Grim Sleeper How the FBI used NZ DNA technique to catch killer One of California’s worst serial killers was only caught after the FBI decided to use a DNA profiling system long permitted in New Zealand. MAURA DOLAN of the Los Angeles Times reports

60 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 61

rustrated by their inability to find the notorious killer known as the Grim Sleeper, whose DNA was not in a law enforcement database, Los Angeles police this spring asked the state to look for a DNA profile similar enough to be a possible relative of the killer. In April, state computers produced a list of 200 genetic profiles of people in the database who might be related to the alleged serial killer. Among the top five ranked as the most likely relatives was a profile that shared a common genetic marker with the crime-scene DNA at each of 15 locations that the crime lab examined. Scientists knew that a profile with that sort of matching pattern indicated a parentchild relationship. To winnow the candidates further, and knowing that their suspect had to be a man, they tested the DNA of the 200 offenders whose profiles resembled the crime-scene DNA to determine if any appeared to share the Y chromosome, which boys inherit from their fathers. There was one match, and it was the same profile that had shared all 15 markers on the first round of testing. Excitement swept the room at the state DNA laboratory in Richmond where the match was made. Jill Spriggs, chief of the state’s Bureau of Forensic Services, recalls a feeling of “amazement” when she learned of the breakthrough: The two rounds of tests almost certainly had located a son of the suspect – the first high-profile U.S. case cracked by a technique known as familial DNA searching. Even then, though, state scientists moved gingerly, anxiously trying to ensure that nothing would go wrong. They did more tests, then called a meeting of the scientists and lawyers who oversee such searches. “We were all very businesslike,” Spriggs says. “We made very sure we were following all the procedures, kind of like a checklist approach.” Although each step was made with caution, Spriggs says the group knew it was a part of something “revolutionary.” “We were very excited.” Familial searching has been done for years in New Zealand, Australia and Europe, but technical, legal and ethical concerns have kept the FBI from pursuing it in the United States, where California and Colorado are now the only two states that have embraced it fully. Pressed by prosecutors, California Attorney General Jerry Brown approved familial

“Familial searching has been done for years in New Zealand, Australia and Europe, but technical, legal and ethical concerns have kept the FBI from pursuing it in the United States, where California and Colorado are now the only two states that have embraced it fully” searching two years ago, and Colorado began using special software to track relatives of suspects at about the same time. State lawyers had warned Brown that a bungled familial search could lead defence lawyers to challenge the state’s entire DNA testing program. Instead, the ability of the technique to identify a suspect in the Grim Sleeper case,

62 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

Lonnie David Franklin Jr., who was charged July 8 with 10 counts of murder, has emboldened and thrilled advocates of further DNA testing. They hope to see familial DNA searching quickly spread to additional states. “This case is the poster child we have been waiting for,” declares Harvard geneticist Frederick Bieber. “We have been waiting for a case like this to hit a home run.”

Studies show that prison inmates tend to have family members who also have been behind bars. When the source of DNA from a crime scene cannot be identified, there are “even odds” that the unknown suspect will have a relative with DNA in the database, Bieber says. Unrelated people can share the same genetic markers, but siblings and parents and their offspring usually share a greater number. Once a relative is identified, authorities can use that person as a lead to trace a suspect. The success rate is estimated at 10 percent to 14 percent. Sceptics have argued that familial searches invade the privacy of people who happen to have a relative in the database and may violate constitutional guarantees against unwarranted searches. So far, however, no one has challenged the use of familial searching in California, and an attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union says that the state’s handling of the Grim Sleeper case made the group “more comfortable” with the process. “From our perspective, if you are going to use familial DNA searching, this is the kind of case you should use it for, and the kind of precautions they took in this case are the kind that should be taken,” says Peter Bibring, staff attorney for the ACLU of Southern California. He says state law should require the procedures used in the Grim Sleeper case to be followed in all familial searches. At each step of the way in the forensic investigation, the familial search committee met and voted. After verifying the DNA results, the group voted unanimously to give to the intelligence division of the Department of Justice the name of the offender who had been identified as the likely relative of the suspect. After an examination of birth records and geographical data showed the offender’s father was the right age and lived in the right place to have committed the killings, the committee met again to decide whether to give the information to the LAPD. Again, the vote was a unanimous yes. Spriggs says no one raised objections. She flew to Los Angeles with Craig Buehler, chief of the Bureau of Investigations and Intelligence, and met LAPD officials in a conference room at Cal State Los Angeles. “They made sure there was no ‘t’ that wasn’t crossed and no ‘i’ that wasn’t dotted,” says LAPD laboratory director Greg Matheson, who attended the meeting. “But we were obviously excited about this being their first hit, and it was a very good one.” The familial search cost the state $40,000, with much of the work done on overtime, Spriggs says. She said she and other scientists never doubted they could nab a criminal suspect this way, and that statistically they were due for a breakthrough. Brown, who is running for governor, was jubilant. He recalled that some members of his staff had been reluctant to embrace familial searching, fearing litigation could threaten the entire DNA database. “One doesn’t go against them lightly,” Brown says. “I pushed them.” Retired Alameda County prosecutor Rockne Harmon, now a DNA consultant, had been the driving force behind the approval of familial testing in California, lobbying Brown’s staff and working with District Attorney Steve Cooley and others to push for the new technology. Harmon had predicted that it was just a matter of time before a big hit would come as a result of a familial search. He was on vacation in Hawaii when he got word of the Grim Sleeper suspect’s arrest. “Wow,” he wrote in a message sent from his iPhone. q

Using relatives’ DNA If the DNA left at a crime scene does not precisely match a profile in a criminal database, California authorities may look for similar profiles to find relatives of the perpetrator.

Heredity Children inherit one genetic marker, or allele, from each parent at every location on a chromosome; in forensic DNA tests, each allele is assigned a number to designate its type

Location

Father

First allele

Child A

Second allele First allele

Child B

Mother

Second allele First allele

19 18 19

17 11 17

28 24 27

13 13 15

16 11 13

14 11 14

12 10 12

Second allele

California’s strategy If a crime is serious and all other leads are exhausted, authorities allow one of two approaches to finding relatives via a DNA search: Partial match Profiles that don’t match exactly but share at least 15 alleles; partial matches can occur by chance, however, and this kind of search often fails

Location Suspect First allele profile Second allele Possible First allele parent Second allele

16 18 16 16

10 14 10 14

24 28 28 28

12 15 12 12

16 16 16 19

9 11 9 11

8 10 8 8

Targeted search Takes into account the rarity of each allele; it produces a list of 100 candidates ranked by the odds that they are related; this more effective method still generates many false hits

Candidate 1 More likely

100 Less likely

Further investigation After potential relatives have been identified, additional steps are taken to eliminate false leads; state investigators must: Look for more shared genetic markers on the Y-chromosome to indicate possible paternal or fraternal ties

Use public records to identify family members who could have committed the crime Possible relative

Genetic marker

Child A Possible relative’s Y-chromosome

Suspect’s Y-chromosome

Brother

(Dead at the time of the crime)

Child B

(in prison at the time of the crime)

Local follow-up Once vetted, the lead is passed to local investigators who can compare DNA from child A to DNA found at the crime scene Source: California Department of Justice Graphic: Doug Stevens, Los Angeles Times

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 63

n THINK LIFE

money

As shaky as a Spanish banker, eh Bill? Peter Hensley finds Bill English causing a ripple of ‘consternation’

im could see that Moira was musing about the state of the nation’s finances. He thought it was likely caused by Mr English’s throw away comment at one of the many breakfast addresses that he had given recently when he said that there were similarities between Spain’s banking system and our own domestic banks. The comment was sufficiently unclear as to detail that it was generally ignored by main stream media. Jim knew that Moira was keen to keep abreast and informed about the various scenarios that could potentially play out in global financial markets. She was firmly of the belief that one could not borrow their way out of debt. She knew that this basic law applied equally to individuals as it did

to countries. She was concerned that in the aftermath of the GFC (global financial crash), governments of developed nations spent money they did not have, in order to support their country’s banking system. No-one can deny that this action provided stability for a financial system on the brink of an abyss, however at the same time it pushed many countries balance sheets further into the red. This concerned Moira as she recognised that when it came to Government or Sovereign debt levels, more than several nations were now close to or past the point of no return. When this happened in the olden days a country would simply default on its obligations, its currency would be

64 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

spurned, its economy would go into recession. Give enough time they would then work their way through the crisis. Time and tighter monetary policy would generally remedy the issues which in turn would see them slowly emerge and re-introduce themselves into world trade and affairs. The new millennium saw the implementation of a new world order in finance. The Euro Zone was introduced and the Maastricht Treaty came with its own set of rules. The treaty designers purposely did not include an exit clause, which is now proving to be a huge obstacle for the European Union. Almost a third of the 16 member countries are facing glaring fiscal imbalances. Greece’s problems are well documented and now Standard and Poors are downgrading Spain’s sovereign debt. Hungary has requested a pre-emptive bailout package. This is why Mr English’s off handed comment about the similarities between the banks in Spain balance sheets and banks resident in the land of the long white cloud made Moira sit up and take notice. At least one media representative took notice and reported that the connection he was referring to was the lopsided exposure to mortgage lending on land and housing. To be fair, Mr English was right to acknowledge the risk that our banking system is exposed to. The GFC has not dimmed our nation’s love affair with property. The majority of the population still believes that property values tend to rise with time as the only corresponding variable. This has assisted us, along with Australia into the deluded belief that we have somehow escaped the global financial crisis unscathed. Moira was of the belief that over the past decade valuers and budding property moguls appear to have forgotten basic math. History has always dictated that the value of an asset is typically directly related to the cash flow that the asset generates. New age spruikers and marketers appear to have succeeded in their quest to convince wannabe entrepreneurs to base property buying decisions on future capital gain. The US experience of the sub-prime mortgage fiasco is an excellent lesson that such a strategy will, in time, end in tears. During the good times both New Zealand and Australia experienced a huge run up in property values, this in turn led to the expansion of a non bank deposit sector which was effectively built on straw. The sad part is that we have not yet participated in the declines in property values that have

hit similar western nations. Moira was not looking forward to that experience. Apart from keeping up to date with world markets Moira made sure she was active in her community, and in keeping with her gregarious nature she and Jim continued to host a wide section of the community as guests in their home. One of their neighbours, Colin had dropped in that morning when Jim was out for his regular constitutional walk. When he returned she recited to him the story that had been related to her that morning. Apparently their neighbour’s brother had called around to check on their elderly father. It was a task they enjoyed and took it in turns to drop in every second day to assist with basic chores and basically just to see that he was OK as he was closer to 90 than 80. He had been on his own since mum had passed away suddenly about seven years ago. As they were enjoying a cup of tea, Joe become aware of his father’s bank statement which was open on the kitchen table. He noticed a withdrawal of $30,000 from the account and queried him about it. His dad was reluctant to talk about, but as only family can do, the son found out that the neighbours had been on to him about

a short term loan to help tide them over. Apparently the home business they ran was having some cash flow problems and they needed some assistance to pay the tax man. Colin and Joe were obviously concerned as they had consequently discovered that their dad’s neighbours had not offered a receipt or any kind of loan agreement. Colin had subsequently dropped in to see if Moira could assist them in their plight. Moira had both good and bad news for the boys. She was more than aware that if their dad was of sound mind then he was entitled to do what he wanted with his money and they should not interfere. However if they suspected that he was in some way coerced into lending the money, then the boys could approach a relatively new service called Elder Abuse and Neglect Prevention Service. Jim and Moira had heard about the service at a recent Probus meeting where the guest speaker told them that the practical and confidential service was available nationwide through Age Concern. She directed Colin to the ageconcern.org.nz web site and told him to type in Elder Abuse in the search box. The knowledgeable guest speaker said that the service offered a no cost, confidential support, advocacy and information service

for people facing elder abuse. Jim was a bit shocked to hear that Colin’s dad could have been taken advantage of, however he believed that, within reason, his affairs were his own business. He recalled that he had enjoyed the talk from the Elder Abuse person and was impressed with the processes that she had outlined which related to sensitivity and privacy. Moira summed the situation up saying that it pays to be vigilant and it was comforting to know that appropriate support is now available. A copy of Peter Hensley’s disclosure statement is available on request and is free of charge. Copyright © Peter J Hensley July 2010

EVE’S BITE

THE DIVINITY CODE

“…the most politically incorrect book” in New Zealand. He is absolutely right…Prepare to be surprised and shocked. Wishart may ruﬀle a few feathers but his arguments are fair as his evidence proves. If you are looking for a stimulating mental challenge, or a cause to fight for, Eve’s Bite will definitely satisfy. – Wairarapa Times-Age

Wishart takes up the gauntlet laid down by Richard Dawkins in The God Delusion, and in fact, uses Dawkins own logic and methodology to launch a counter-attack against unbelief. Challenging…thought provoking…compelling – keepingstock.blogspot.com

Discover the truth for yourself. Get these two books today from Whitcoulls, Borders, PaperPlus, Dymocks, Take Note, and all good independent booksellers, or online at

I’m having a cracking good read of another cracking good read – The Divinity Code by Ian Wishart, his follow-up book to Eve’s Bite which was also a cracking good read – comment on “Being Frank”

www.evesbite.com INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 65

n THINK LIFE

education

Teachers who never learn Amy Brooke counts the costs

hree generations of New Zealanders have been raised to be stupid…” The fact that this comment was recently made to me not by a literate individual from a senior generation which recognizes what young have been deprived of, but by a keenly intelligent thirty year-old shaken by the ignorance of his metro-male peers, is possibly one of the reasons it stays with me. That, and because he is right. We are losing not just a work-hungry middle generation. Some of our younger people who are literate and knowledgeable are now leaving too, because, in their own words, they “can’t stand what is happening to the country”. Our uncouth MPs, trading silly derogatory put-downs, abandoning standards of civility in parliament, pulling faces, making

fatuous comments, playing to the camera, name-calling, and selling us out to gain radicalised votes, are supposed to pretty much represent us as a people. Perhaps they do. And what about those yobbos recently standing by and, together with passing motorists, jeering at a young motorcyclist dying in great pain under a van in Wellington, while they mocked him? Is this New Zealand today – the assaults and murders on a daily scale, the widespread drunkenness, the drug underworld, the sad ignorance of so many? A chill now into creeps into good conservative parents’ thinking at the prospect of their little ones eventually having to face a school system centre-staging a now debased world of topsy-turvy values – a crude permissiveness; the rowdy, empty-headed pop cult;

66 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

compulsory and destabilizing “sex education” classes possibly run by lesbian and homosexual teachers by no means averse to recruiting; the politicization of any subject areas that can be hijacked by left-wing propaganda; the lack of quality teaching in subject areas important for genuinely educating our young; gullible do-gooders persuaded by the government bureaucracy to be “facilitators”- rather than teachers… The schools are subverting what was once a far healthier democracy. Compulsion has now penetrated into so many areas of our life through both central and local government edicts. In Nelson, incredibly enough, it is forbidden to install fireplaces or even clean-burning wood burners in new houses – an essentially fascist demand pandering to the virtual fanaticism

of those who insist, against all real evidence, that anthropogenic global warming is a reality – rather than a carbon credit con for purposes of multi-billion profits and taxation. Too bad about the escalating price and unreliability of electricity. Too bad about the shivering elderly and poor. Ideology rules, ok? No, it’s not okay, and New Zealanders who don’t now vigorously oppose such moves to shackle us all with more and more edicts, constrictions, compliance costs and compulsions have only themselves to blame – including parents putting up with the intellectual under-extending and virtual emotional abuse of their children – a quasimind control. We see the consequences in so many drifting, aimless, hedonistic, aggressive school leavers drunk, drugged and/or tearing around our city streets on Saturday nights. What a wonderful advertisement for our much-vaunted education system. Knowledge brings wisdom...But what happens when the knowledge is not passed on? Catch-22 is when the teachers themselves don’t have it, and are themselves products of a mis-education system going back these three generations. I often recall, because of its importance, Professor Margaret Dalziel’s 1961 Landfall article pointing out that the teachers she was teaching were unfit, because of their own level of ignorance, to teach the subject that has become one of the prime sources of indoctrinating our young – the language and heritage of English. Most English teachers are not teaching the competent use of the language because

they can’t – as we’ll explore in a future column. We see the results everywhere, as can far better-educated visitors and arrivals from overseas. It should be a source of national embarrassment – the slack, ignorant use of the language from the Prime Minister and parliamentarians downwards – from even professional media employees who torture the pronunciation of reasonably anglicized Maori words in their desire to achieve absurd standards of political correctness, while butchering English. Both the English Curriculum and its Social Studies twin – as always couched in sheer educobabble – serve up politicized junk food which has ensured these three generations of New Zealanders have been denied a deep knowledge of our history, literature, real poetry, foundation myths and legends, philosophy – all those vital areas which underpin a civilization. Teachers in particular have been an easy group to propagandize. With some noble exceptions, our top graduates have not gone into secondary teaching, and the standard of selection for primary school teachers some decades ago became not so much academically under-demanding as disgraceful. I recall when four sixth form passes in UE (university entrance), the minimum standard for entry into primary teacher training, was reduced to achieving a single pass of 30% in English. So much for keeping standards high. Even in the 90s, that highly radicalized organization, The Association of Teachers of English, while deciding to boycott the teaching of grammar and syntax (tools essential

to gain competence in language use, and to train young minds to achieve clarity and coherence in thinking) acknowledged that among its members there was “an institutional loss of learning”. This was their euphemism for the unpalatable fact Professor Dalziel recorded so many years previously. What is the result when most so-called English teachers are too ignorant of the structure of our language to be able to teach it? Instead their focus is on ill-thought, radicalized and politicized issues based on carefully selected “literature” fitting the criteria of indoctrination. Why pay them as English teachers? Their danger is that, as shown in the history of the 20th and evolving 21st century, those who can manipulate language can radically affect, even control the directions of a society, of a country – our country. The fight against the misuse of language is the fight against both small and large tyrannies. Hence the concerted attack by some of the long-familiar left-wing names in education campaigning against teaching young children measurable, minimum standards to be sure they will in future succeed at least in learning to read well, spell, write, multiply and divide. These same individuals, education advisers lecturing, setting curricula, running in-service courses, are themselves products of what is regarded as the least intellectually demanding department within the universities. The most telling factor about their influence is that so many teachers are so intellectually illequipped that they fall into line behind them. The only real remedy is the disestablishment of our system. Now in Britain, too, as within Australia, primary and secondary schools are being invited to cut loose from local authorities and become academies. Parents can choose to combine to take advantage of relaxed bureaucratic and building regulations to set up their own schools. Over 700 groups have already expressed an interest in running new schools similar to the Swedish model. Taxpayer funded, with groups excluded whose ideology runs counter to the UK’s democratic values, they are non-fee-paying, independent of state control What we now need is this same parental demand. Predictably, the British National Union of Teachers is boycotting the move. But as here, the writing is on the wall for the destructive teacher unions. © Copyright Amy Brooke www.amybrooke.co.nz www.100days.co.nz www.summersounds..co.nz http://www.livejournal.com/users/brookeonline/

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 67

n THINK LIFE

science

Is our scientific knowledge wrong? A bombshell discovery in physics is threatening to re-write the history of the world, if confirmed, reports Thomas H. Maugh

hysicists might have to rethink what they know about, well, everything. European researchers dropped a potential bombshell on their colleagues around the world this month by reporting that sophisticated new measurements indi-

cate the radius of the proton is 4 percent smaller than previously believed. In a world where measurements out to a dozen or more decimal places are routine, a 4 percent difference in this subatomic particle – found in every atom’s nucleus – is

68 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

phenomenally large, and the finding has left theoreticians scratching their heads in wonderment and confusion. If the startling results are confirmed, a possibility that at least some physicists think is unlikely because the calculations involved are so difficult, they could have major ramifications for the so-called standard model on which most modern physics is based. In an editorial accompanying the report in the journal Nature, physicist Jeff Flowers of the National Physical Laboratory in Teddington, England, said that there are three possibilities: Either the experimenters have made a mistake, the calculations used in determining the size of the proton are wrong or, potentially most exciting and disturbing, the standard model has some kind of problem. If the theory turns out to be wrong, “it would be quite revolutionary. It would mean that we know a lot less than we thought we knew,” said physicist Peter J. Mohr of the National Institute of Standards and Technology in Gaithersburg, Md., who was not involved in the research. “If it is a fundamental problem, we don’t know what the consequences are yet.” Whatever the explanation, however, it will have far more import for physicists than for anyone else, he added. The standard model “works pretty well in most cases,” explaining lasers, telephones, magnetic resonance scanning and a host of other modern-day miracles. The standard model, which defines the structure and behaviour of matter, radioactivity, electricity – pretty much everything other than gravity – is based upon the hydrogen atom. That atom, composed of a single proton orbited by a single electron, is the most thoroughly studied atom in physics, primarily because of its simplicity. “To understand hydrogen is to understand all of physics,” said physicist Aldo Antognini of the Paul Scherrer Institute in Villigen, Switzerland, a co-author of the report. The newfound lack, or potential lack, of understanding of hydrogen is disconcerting, to say the least. First some background: Electrons circling

the nucleus of an atom can occupy many discrete energy levels, separated by characteristic frequencies that can be observed by spectroscopy when the atom is excited by light or other radiation. The foundation for the current work was laid in the late 1940s by Willis Lamb and R.C. Retherford, who discovered that two energy levels of the electron in a hydrogen atom, previously thought to be identical, were actually different. That difference, known as the Lamb shift, forced a rethinking of previous physics theories and led to the development of quantum electrodynamics, which explains all interactions between light and electromagnetism. Most electronic devices, for example, are defined by QED, as it is commonly called. But the mathematical foundations of the QED theory are still incomplete, and researchers are constantly trying to improve them. The Lamb shift has been used to calculate the radius of the proton to an accuracy of about 1 percent, yielding a value of 0.8768 femtometers (1 femtometer equals 0.000 000 000 000 001 meter). That is roughly equal to the value obtained by other experiments, such as shooting electrons at the nucleus and measuring their scatter.

Researchers have long known that accuracy of the calculation could be improved by a factor of 10 by replacing the electron in a hydrogen atom with a muon, a particle that is also negatively charged but is 200 times as heavy as an electron. It thus orbits closer to

If the theory turns out to be wrong, “it would be quite revolutionary. It would mean that we know a lot less than we thought we knew

the proton, giving a larger and more readily measurable Lamb shift. But muons exist for only about 2 millionths of a second, so performing the experiment is exceptionally difficult. The

international team at the Scherrer Institute has been working on it for 12 years. In essence, researchers aim a beam of muons at hydrogen atoms. Some atoms capture the muons. Before the newly formed muonhydrogens can decompose, the team flashes a laser at them to measure the Lamb shift. They report that the value they calculated in this manner is 0.84184 femtometers. “We are confident in the experimental results,” Antognini said. The precision of the measurement “is equivalent to measuring the distance from here to the moon with one micrometer precision,” he said. “It seems everything (experimentally) is correct, but something is wrong. We cannot say what is wrong.” The team is busy rechecking all its calculations, as will be physicists around the world. Meanwhile, the Scherrer team plans to repeat the experiment using helium atoms, which have two protons and two electrons, instead of hydrogen. That should either confirm or refute their findings. For now, it’s unclear whether the result will be confirmed as an experimental mistake or a revolution in physics. “I wouldn’t bet on anything now,” Mohr said. “It’s not at all clear.”

Can’t get the right people for your project or team? Have you asked us? • Reliable • Dependable • Affordable Temporary & Permanent staffing solutions 10 years experience in Civil Construction, Timber Processing, Engineering, Manufacturing, Transport and Logistics and Associated Administration Personnel. We’’ve got the experience and know how to find the right person for you.

NT HEAD OFFICE: 09 430 8846, Vine Street, Whangarei E L P Our website www.jobsnorth.co.nz or e-mail to admin@jobsnorth.co.nz OF E Y A N Alastair Goodland (Managing Director) 0274597433 G B KATA E N I or 0800JOBSNORTH - 0800 562 766 EN HA UN OP

W ID J 0 M 01 2

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 69

n THINK LIFE

technology

The traveller’s guide to iPad The new iPad has just hit NZ, but based on international experience, you might think twice about travelling with it

hould I or should I not? Owners of the Apple iPad are faced with the question of whether it is worth their while taking the gadget with them when every time they decide to go on holiday. The iPad can be a useful friend on the road but it is limited in what it can do for globetrotters. You are sure to be the target of envious looks if you pull an iPad out of your bag at the airport and while you kill time by watching a movie or reading an online newspaper. Your neighbour with a smart phone can do the same but it is not quite as good as on an iPad. “The best thing about the iPad is its large screen,” says Michael Jarugski from Giata, a content provider for the tourist industry. The screen has a resolution of 1024x768 pixels which means it provides a great way to display information compared to smaller smart phones. “Looking at the screen is quite like reading a book.” A few publishers are providing iPad versions of their newspapers and magazines. Project Gutenberg has thousands of copyright-free books to download and Apple’s iBook store has all of the latest publications. According to Apple spokesman Georg Albrecht, there are over 15,000 books in the store right now. Joerg Wirtgen has learned to appreciate the iPad as a useful companion on the road. Wirtgen is a journalist at the German computer magazine “c’t” and lists the iPad’s plus sides as its light weight, its compact size and its low noise level. The iPad also does not heat up like a laptop and its battery can store a charge big enough to get you to your destination on an intercontinental flight. It also fits nicely onto the small seat tray on a plane. “It’s a very good gadget for the 10 hours you spend on a plane flying to the US,” says Heike Scholz. “It’s also good for keeping kids quiet in the back seat of a car.” Scholz publishes a blog on mobile phones and views the iPad as something to lean back with and enjoy. But on journeys she says it only makes “some sense” to bring one along.

“Travellers don’t want to bring lots of luggage with them on a journey,” says Scholz. Most tourists already pack a mobile phone, a camera and a video camera with them when they visit the sights. But the iPad cannot replace those three items as it does not take photos and you can’t use it to make a phone call. Scholz also says the iPad is not great as a tour guide. “I don’t think anyone will pull out their iPad in front of Cologne cathedral to read about the building.” And no-one would take one to the beach as the display might get scratched by sand. Joerg Wirtgen, however, believes the iPad is less vulnerable than a laptop or netbook. The iPad does not have a hard drive that can break with one jolt as information on the iPad is stored on a flash memory chip. But the iPad does have a few major disadvantages compared to conventional mobile computers. It cannot display Flash-based programs, thus making it incompatible with many internet websites and applications. It does not have a USB port and if its memory is full while you’re abroad you cannot download information to a stick and free up space. If you plan to spend your evenings on the hotel balcony admiring your snapshots of the day you will need to buy an extra photo adapter in addition to the cost of buying the iPad. The adapter allows you to transfer still images and videos onto the iPad. Another potential source of extra costs for holidaymakers is surfing the internet with the iPad using its UMTS card. Roaming charges can be very costly abroad. As of July 1st the EU has limited the amount phone customers can be charged while surfing the

70 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

internet away from their home countries but beyond the EU’s borders there are no such rules. To protect yourself from the surprise of receiving an enormous telephone bill when you return home limit yourself to using the iPad’s WLAN function or buy a micro SIM card for the country you are visiting. These cards are usually much cheaper than paying roaming charges. Wirtgen also advises using prepaid flat rates to avoid large bills. Micro SIM cards are available in every country where the iPad is sold but conventional SIM cards can be cut down with a scissors to fit. Some iPad applications work without an internet connection such as the navigation app, which according to Apple spokesman Albrecht, works in conjunction with GPS. There is also the iPad’s mirror function: just turn it off and hold it up to your face.

7SPOTL_INSTGE

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 71

n THINK LIFE

online

with Chillisoft

Homo electronicus Jeff Debrosse takes a whole new look at viral implants

ust when you were getting used to the idea of embedding an RFID (Radio Frequency ID) chip into Fido, a blogger, Amal Graafstra (blog.amal.net/?cat=3) has decided to take it one step further and has implanted two RFID chips into his hand. This really isn’t news… he first did it in 2005 (http://spectrum.ieee.org/computing/hardware/hands-on) and now can open doors and start up his motorcycle without a key. While interesting, it’s nothing special. What’s the difference between an embedded RFID chip and a nose stud? You could have a bunch of studs with embedded RFID chips as fashion accessories. You could even change identities depending on your moods! But what is interesting about embedded RFID chips is that they can potentially be used to spread viruses, and we’re not talking about a skin infection. Blogger Jeff Debrosse, Sr. Research Director at ESET, explains. “There was a bit of a stir, (he writes), around a British scientist,

Dr. Mark Gasson. In the BBC article (news. bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/10158517.stm) Dr. Gasson was touted as the “First Human ‘Infected With a Computer Virus’”. I let this one stew around for a few seconds and I have to say that this isn’t what it’s cracked up to be – it’s more like “Bytes of Malware Sample Stored in RFID Chip Memory”. Let’s decompose this into its basic parts so that everyone understands what this news really means. RFID (Radio Frequency ID) is exactly what its name implies – namely, it is a system where you have the following: • Intelligent system to take action on IDs obtained from RFID chips (PC, embedded processor, etc) • RFID reader • Antenna • Transponder (chip) Here’s a quick-and-dirty “RFID 101”. RFID chips may be passive or active. Passive chips become energised at set frequencies when they are within the range of the

72 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

antenna. The range varies with the frequency that the chip is attuned to. Active chips are battery-powered and can transmit at farther distances (think of toll passes). Once a chip is read, the stream of data is received and matched against a database of stored IDs. Once a match is made some action is taken – i.e. deduct money from the account for toll passes, open doors, deduct an item from inventory, et cetera. The bottom line is that you can store the raw bytes of a small executable as values in the RFID chip – and you can do the same thing in notepad. The real fact is that you cannot simply copy those bytes out of the RFID reader, into the PC and run them as an executable program on any control system. As a former developer of RFID systems, I’ve had my share of reading and writing to various chips and decoding the embedded data. You would have to literally create a new system to take advantage of the store bytes of malcode being carried around in the transponders. The malware wasn’t integrated into his biological system, its code had to reside on another system in order for this to work. It was that system, implanted into his body, not any organ or tissue in his body, that provided the platform to transport the malcode. More devices (including implantable ones) are sporting embedded processors, communications channels and data storage (even the storage of small amounts of data is enough for someone to “poison the well”). I recall at DefCon 2008 researchers discussed the vulnerabilities associated with remotely disabling pacemakers. A colleague and Security researcher, Gadi Everon, addressed this topic in a 2007 Wired article entitled, “Will the Bionic Man Have Virus Protection?” (www.wired.com/ threatlevel/2007/08/will-the-bionic/) While the importance of the implications should not be ignored, the story was a little over the top. Regardless, this is going to touch more areas of our world, personal and otherwise, as we hurtle toward “The Internet of Things” (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Internet_of_Things). Are we all going to be connected? Maybe. Is it a good thing? Maybe again. Should we be aware of the processes and implications? Absolutely! Hacked together by Chillisoft NZ from various sources, blogs and ramblings by Jeff Debrosse, Sr. Research Director at ESET (developers of ESET NOD32 antivirus software)

GENUINE LONG RANGE PHONE

XDECT R055 + 1

XDECT Technology Cordless Phone System with Integrated Answering Machine & Repeater Station (2 Handsets Included).

XDECT R055 + 2

XDECT Technology Cordless Phone System with Integrated Answering Machine & Repeater Stations (3 Handsets Included).

XDECT R005

Optional Repeater Station & Handset for Uniden XDECT R Series Phones

Uniden’s XDECT R Series Digital Cordless Phones offer Long Range and Outstanding Coverage by utilising a: • Repeater Station built into each additional handset charging base, allowing you to extend the range and coverage from the main base by daisy chaining the signal to each additional repeater station. • Diversity Antenna System for Optimal Reception and Clarity – by mitigating multi-path errors. • High Gain Antenna for greater range and to eliminate drop areas in your home.

Visit Uniden at www.uniden.co.nz for full range details or call 09 273 8383 today.

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 73

FEEL LIFE SPORT

Simon Bellis/Sportimage/Cal Sport Media

Cup runneth over Spanish elation, Dutch disgrace, the Brazilian bomb, German precision, a French farce, Italian ignominy and a good old fashioned English humbling. The big guns suffered mixed fates on the world’s greatest sporting stage, while the All Whites defied all predictions to emerge as the only unbeaten side in South Africa. Chris Forster looks at the road ahead for football in New Zealand and analyses a tournament which surprised and confounded on so many levels

f you had to pick a defining moment in the New Zealand campaign, look no further than that last gasp header from Winston Reid, against Slovakia in their opening Group F match at Rustenberg. A sweetly struck cross from Shane Smeltz and Reid’s glancing blow off the post galvanised a nation into football fever. A first World Cup point when an honourable 1-0 defeat seemed inevitable, eclipsed the famous Bahrain qualifying victory 7 months earlier, and the three matches from the legendary bunch of part time footballers (including coach Ricki Herbert and his assistant Brian Turner) in Spain, 28 years earlier. That one moment of inspiration from a Maori boy who makes his living in Denmark set the tone for a marvellous ride. Reid became an instant hero, and a household

name, with the defining image of a bare chested 21 year old flinging his shirt over his head in uninhibited joy. Five days later in Nelspruit, their 1-all draw against an ageing Italian team – who were then the reigning world champions – was even more incredible. Super sniper Smeltz popped up on the end of a Simon Elliott free kick to toe poke the All Whites to an early lead. The Italians managed a debateable penalty midway through the first half then captain Ryan Nelsen marshalled the defences superbly. They produced their best football of the tournament. They didn’t just hang on against the fading giants. They almost produced a late winner through teenage reserve striker Chris Wood. New Zealand started to believe their

74 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

over-achieving heroes could actually do the impossible and beat Paraguay to clinch a top 2 finish in Group F to qualify for the second round. But they ran out of attacking ideas against the well-organised South Americans, who were content to keep a clean sheet and ensure they qualified top of the Group. It was almost an anti-climax but New Zealand still finished 3rd, ahead of Italy and tucked in behind Paraguay and Slovakia. There was almost an indecent haste to the way the African safari ended. The players headed straight back to their luxurious gated community of Serengeti on the north-eastern outskirts of Johannesburg, shared beers and incredible memories and then packed their kit for a variety of destinations around the planet after a few hours sleep. That was it. There was no time to gently mull over their success, lounging on an Indian Ocean beach. It was a FIFA directive to shuffle out the professionals as soon as they were eliminated. There was no ticker tape parade on their homecoming for the New Zealand-based players as they drifted back to their day jobs with the Wellington Phoenix, and other destinations, but they were greeted by warm airport welcomes and a flurry of media attention to mirror the mood of the nation. Life moves on pretty quickly in the football world. Shane Smeltz seems set to bid farewell to the Gold Coast and the A-League to take up a lucrative offer to play in the Chinese league. The Phoenix are in training for their next campaign, and Ricki Herbert’s getting his arm twisted to stay in the dual role as coach of club and country. Now it’s to the future and capitalisation. How can New Zealand Football stay on a roll? Keeping Herbert and their top players on the roster is a priority along with regular games against top quality opposition. They have to work within the convoluted international calendar and special “windows” created by FIFA where clubs are obliged to release their players. A rematch against the Socceroos – after that ill-tempered 2-1 defeat in Melbourne ahead of the World Cup – would be juicy. Maybe more practical is another European jaunt to relive the ground-breaking 1-0 victory over fellow finalists Serbia. You can’t blame NZ Football CEO Michael Glading for keeping his cards close to his chest. It’s all about timing and fittingin with cash-rich organisations and handsomely rewarded players.

Retaining Ryan Nelsen as an international player must also be a pivotal part of the next campaign. The Blackburn Rovers captain is in the form of his life, but age will be a factor. He’s 32 in November, and the father of two will be 34 come the next Confederations Cup in Brazil. His immense value earned him a slot in American sport’s network ESPN’s tournament 11, alongside Spanish star Carles Puyol in the central defence. But the game’s getting faster, and the talent’s getting younger, more cynical and even more handsomely rewarded. It’ll be a tough call for Nelsen, while he plays out the rest of his Premier League contract. His country may need him if they’re to relive the famed campaign of 2010.

Winston Reid and Tommy Smith looked world class prospects flanking Ryan Nelsen in the heart of a damned fine defence, that only conceded two goals. Shane Smeltz prove he was more than just a goal poacher, goalkeeper Mark Paston batted away the threats and 36 year old midfield general Simon Elliott was in the form of his life. URUGUAY. Hard to believe a country of just 3.5 million people can produce such good footballers, and the tournament’s best player – Diego Forlan. Maxi Periera was brilliant in defence and you could almost forgive Luis Suarez for the deliberate handball that denied Ghana a winner in the memorable quarter-final. Featured in three of the best games of the knockout stages.

FIFA WORLD CUP IN REVIEW. Highs, Lows and Desperados

Ryan Nelsen. Made in New Zealand and world class. Carles Puyol. A huge heart to match his men of curly hair and tremendous skills. Scored a thumping header to clinch the semi-final. Giovanni Van Bronckhorst. Classy Dutch defender even at the age of 35, influential captain and scored a brilliant long range goal in their semi-final victory over Uruguay. Bastion Schwiensteiger. Midfield general and playmaker for the enterprising Germans, featured in nearly all the razor sharp counter-attacks. Justo Villar. Paraguay captain and one of a bunch of goalkeepers who stood out, including Eduardo for Portugal and the peerless Iker Casillas for the Spanish champions. Asamoah Gyan. Standout striker from the best African team, Ghana. Scored a brilliant solo goal to eliminate the USA in the second round, and blasted a last second penalty against the crossbar, after the infamous Suarez handball, that cost his country an historic place in the semi-finals. Carlos Tevez. Workaholic striker in the exciting but dysfunctional Argentina team. Scored a great long range goal. David Villa. Spanish saviour in their string of 1-0 victories through to the final. World class in every department of the striker’s game. Andres Iniesta. Ultra-gifted playmaker, a genius with the ball at his feet and forever remembered for the composed strike to seal Spain’s triumph at Soccer City on July 12. Diego Forlan. Scored five classy goals, and always posed a threat. Best player at

BEST TEAMS

SPAIN. Proved their class and technical ability with a string of impressive 1-0 victories, leading to the title showdown against the Netherlands. Were clearly the better team in the final and suffered a hacking from the desperate Dutch. Andres Iniesta’s matchwinning strike deep into extra time avoided the injustice of a penalty shootout lottery. Brilliant technically, full of stars and easy on the eye – a Spanish stroll was the purists’ dream. GERMANY. An exciting young team that slammed 4 goals past Australia, hapless England and then Diego Maradona’s Argentina before coming unstuck against the eventual World Champions. Full of exciting talent in their early 20s like standout midfielders Mesut Ozil and Thomas Muller, who was awarded the Golden Boot for his 5 goals, as well as being named Young Player of the Tournament. THE NETHERLANDS. Seemed to have the right blend of youth and experience with the likes of Wesley Sneijder, Robin van Persie, Mark von Bommel and Arjen Robben. There was no shortage of skill in knocking out Brazil and then the South Americas best team, Uruguay. But they let down the famed orange shirt with brutish tackling and brattish protests in their attempts to shake Spain out of the final.

OVER-ACHIEVERS

NEW ZEALAND. Ricki Herbert had a plan and he stuck to it, and it worked a treat. The players performed out of their skins,

BEST PLAYERS

the World Cup’s pretty good for a 31 year old Uruguayan.

FLOPS Teams/Players/Managers

FRANCE. Temper tantrums, player walkouts, a coach who lost the plot and the 2006 finalists finished dead last in a group they were expected to dominate. Unloveable. ENGLAND. Barely scraped out of the easiest Group. Thrashed 4-1 by Germany in the second round. Frank Lampard’s “goal that wasn’t” was the highlight of their jaded campaign. BRAZIL. The talented team everyone thought would go onto win, fell apart in the second half of their quarterfinal against the Netherlands. If they don’t win, it’s a failure. Wayne Rooney, Cristiano Ronaldo, Samuel Eto’o – the three front-runners out of a host of superstars of the game who barely caused a ripple in South Africa. French coach Raymond Domenech. Refused to shake the South African coach’s hand after they lost their final Group match. Enough said.

THE VERDICT

South Africa’s triumphant hosting of the continent’s first World Cup will be fondly remembered, but some of the football will not. Their sparkling new stadiums were first rate, packed with colourful fans and security wasn’t as big an issue as it was trumped up to be. Even the drone of vuvezelas will become a fuzzy soundtrack in the old memory banks. The crazy Adidas ball with balloon-like qualities didn’t help the standard of football and the second lowest goal haul in Cup history. Spain and Germany were class acts, as were the Dutch until they tried to hack their way to glory in the final. Ghana flew the flag valiantly for Africa and teams like Chile, Japan, Korea, the United States, Slovakia and New Zealand provided the sparks and upsets to draw in a wider audience. The chronic over-acting, diving and writhing around in agony, better known as “simulation” was a blight on the tournament that FIFA seems loathe to stamp out. It’s a huge turnoff. The tournament was a flawed diamond. It will be forever remember by New Zealanders for their team’s terrific deeds, and for the quality of football the champion Spaniards delivered in the knockout stages.

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 75

FEEL LIFE HEALTH

A bitter pill

What do we really know about steroids, asks Claire Francis

hen I sit down to work, I often start out with an idea of what I want to write about, and change my mind in the course of research. Research is a funny thing; it’s not always clear whether you can trust it, if it’s good research or bad

research, if it’s limited or inconclusive, or simply wrong. Research is important, of course, but it isn’t always right, or if it is, it often isn’t the whole story. It’s important to remember that research doesn’t “prove” things – it can only provide evidence for or

76 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

against an idea; sometimes overwhelming evidence, but no certainty. That’s science. Sometimes I discover in the course of research that my knowledge of a subject is incomplete or outdated, and sometimes that there is limited research of any kind on a subject. Sometimes that the obvious isn’t actually so obvious. And sometimes all of the above. Researching anabolic steroids, I found it was such a case. Testosterone is a steroid hormone which occurs naturally in the body, secreted by the testes in men and, in much smaller amounts, the adrenal gland, and women’s ovaries. Testosterone is responsible for the developing secondary sex characteristics in men (it’s adrenergic effects), as well as building bone density and muscle mass (it’s anabolic effects). Anabolic-androgenic steroids (AAS) are drugs which mimic the effect of the testosterone, and it is these steroids that are notorious as drugs of abuse amongst bodybuilders. It is easy to make fun of the modern phenomenon of the “gym junkie”, but fitness and strength have always been important for some members of society; for the well to do Athenian boy, as much as in warrior cultures such as the Maoris and the Spartans. Virility, or the appearance of it, is prized in men while the eunuch – however valued – has been regarded historically as a separate species to man. So it seems surprising that there was little scientific understanding of the role of testosterone until quite recent times. In the 19th century Arnold Berthhold demonstrated a physical change in castrated roosters when testicles were transplanted into their abdominal cavities, and in 1889 Professor Brown-Sequard reported a short lived “rejuvenating effect” when he injected himself with an elixir of dog testes. But it wasn’t until 1927 that a chemistry Professor could prove the effect, painstaking extracting 20mg of useable chemical from 40 pounds of bull testes. Testosterone itself wasn’t isolated and named until 1935, and was chemically synthesized the same year, for which both teams involved – Butenandt and Ruzicka – received the 1939 Nobel Prize. The magical new drug was almost immediately used by athletes, particularly body builders, to enhance performance. Of course, it eventually became illegal to do so, and research into medical uses continued, but a peculiar thing happened to the science of steroids. As illegal users developed their knowledge about steroid use through a process of trial and error, and refined –

if that is the word – their use of steroids accordingly, scientific studies found – until recently – that they were completely wrong. A number of studies showed that steroids are next to useless in building muscle in people with normal testosterone levels, such that this was the received scientific viewpoint for some time. If bodybuilders thought steroids worked to improve their results, scientists thought it was psychological. Everyone agreed that there were significant health risks and mood changes, but otherwise there was a massive disconnect between the athletes’ beliefs, and the scientists. Of course, masses of people will believe in things for which there is no evidence. Take astrology. Athletes are notorious for their superstitions. And scientists are no exception. We all believe things that are common knowledge, for which we lack adequate evidence; it’s quicker. But when there is a significant mismatch of views, it must indicate an error on one side. On the evidence, perhaps the research on steroids wasn’t very good. Indeed, more recent studies, have come closer into line with the “common knowledge” of the bodybuilders. Earlier studies were sometimes poorly designed but most significantly, they used quite low doses of steroids, rather than the high doses favoured by bodybuilders. A further fallacy is suggested by research into the effect of steroids on mood. ‘Roid rage, the colloquial term for the aggressive mania that can be caused by steroids, is an ugly, ugly thing to see. But research indicates that aggression, depression, and mania may not be caused by steroids as often as was thought; the fragile, moody temperament seen in steroid users may be linked not to the drug, but to the personality of the user. And example of the “post hoc ergo propter hoc” fallacy (correlation is not causation), there is some evidence that the effect of the steroids is exaggerated because people who are moody histrionic, and aggressive in the first place may be more likely to use steroids. One study showed that largish doses of steroids given to normal individuals did not cause mood symptoms in most of the cohort. Although for the few who were affected, it was doubtless an unpleasant, and potentially dangerous, experience. While those in the study recovered, there is always the possibility that someone else may not. Certainly steroids have unwanted side effects and significant health risks including changes to the reproductive organs, and liver damage. These are not the kind of con-

sequences anyone should risk for the sake of appearances, or the ability to bench-press a few more kilos. But there is also new interest in the medical use of steroids; potentially of benefit in wasting illnesses, and some types of age related cognitive decline. There may be other practical and important uses, of course, and there may be risks and side effects which are as yet undiscovered. The beauty of science, perhaps, is that change and innovation is always possible. There are new hypotheses to research, and discoveries to be made, mistakes to unearth, and vast unchartered regions. Common medical knowledge and new research is ever interesting and informative, but it can only offer probabilities; science progresses in likelihoods and offers no guarantees.

Certainly steroids have unwanted side effects and significant health risks including changes to the reproductive organs, and liver damage

HEALTHBRIEFS BIG HEADS HELP PATIENTS WITHSTAND RAVAGES OF ALZHEIMER’S. For patients with Alzheimer’s disease, it helps to have a big head. That’s the conclusion of a new study that examined the head circumferences of 270 participants in the Multi-Institutional Research in Alzheimer’s Genetic Epidemiology study (or MIRAGE for short). Apparently, the extra cranial capacity affords patients some cognitive reserve, resulting in better brain function at any given level of cerebral atrophy. Researchers had previously noted an inverse relationship between cognitive performance and head circumference. But whether one’s “maximum attained brain size” affected the relationship between brain pathology and Alzheimer’s symptoms remained unknown, according to the new report. To find out, German researchers working on the MIRAGE study gathered all sorts of data on 270 patients, whose average age was 75. They measured their heads (as a proxy for brain volume). They gave them MRI scans to ascertain their degree of cerebral atrophy (as a proxy for the damage wrought by Alzheimer’s). They took blood to see which variant of the APOE gene was in their DNA (having one or two copies of the e4 version of APOE is thought to increase one’s risk of Alzheimer’s). They looked up the results of each patient’s most recent mini-mental state examination (MMSE) to measure cognitive function. They also took into account each patient’s age and ethnicity, how long they’d had Alzheimer’s and whether they had diabetes, hypertension or major depression. Not surprisingly, the researchers found that patients with higher MMSE scores had less severe brain atrophy and had been diagnosed more recently. But head circumference seemed to have no bearing on it. Then they adjusted their equations to look specifically for a relationship between brain atrophy and head circumference. At all levels of atrophy, patients with bigger heads were able to get higher MMSE scores than their smaller-headed counterparts. “Our results support the concept of BR (brain reserve) and underline the importance of optimal neurological development in early life,” the researchers wrote. How early? If you can read this, it’s probably too late for you. Studies show that brains reach 93 percent of their maximum size when they are only six years old. Bigger brains have more neurons, as well as more connections between them. Genetics play a role, but so do external factors such as nutrition, central nervous system infections and brain injury early in life. The upshot is that Alzheimer’s prevention efforts should be geared toward the preschool set, the German researchers suggested. The results are in Tuesday’s edition of the journal Neurology.

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 77

FEEL LIFE ALT.HEALTH

Holistic diagnosis needed

‘Contextual errors’ common in medical care, reports Judith Graham

he elderly man was emaciated and hospital physicians were running a series of tests for cancer, a common cause of weight loss in older patients. Dr. Saul Weiner suspected something else might be going on. “Where are you living?” he remembers inquiring. “I move around a lot,” the haggard man responded. Weiner then asked if his patient was eating regularly. Sometimes, but not every day, the man admitted. A diagnosis snapped into focus: The dishevelled patient was homeless and starving. Weiner cancelled the tests and called in a social worker. The experience at a hospital several years ago inspired Weiner to study what he calls “contextual errors”: the failure by doctors to consider an individual’s social or economic circumstances when diagnosing illness or prescribing treatment. His research found that these errors occur in 78 percent of cases involving patients with socioeconomic concerns, according to a paper published this month in the Annals of Internal Medicine. That’s worrisome because care delivered without regard to someone’s personal situation can fail to achieve its intended effect, said Weiner, an associate professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago Medical Center and staff physician at Jesse Brown Veterans Administration Medical Center. But Weiner’s suggestion that contextual errors need more attention is likely to be controversial. “A lot of doctors are going to say, ‘God almighty, it’s not enough to be a brilliant clinician? You’re telling me I’ve got to be a financial counsellor or social worker on top of that or I’m doing something wrong? Give me a break!’ “ said John Banja, a medical errors expert at Emory University. The new study, spearheaded by researchers at six Chicago medical centres, is the largest on record to use “mystery patients” (actors trained to behave like patients) to investigate how physicians operate in practice. One hundred eleven doctors participated between 2007 and 2009. The physicians knew only that they were part of a study about medical decision-making. Each actor presented a well-rehearsed case and made an audiotape of interactions with

Care delivered without regard to someone’s personal situation can fail to achieve its intended effect physicians. In one case, the patient is a middle-aged man complaining of uncontrolled asthma. In another, a woman comes in for a blood-pressure check before surgery. In a third, a diabetic man reports almost fainting twice after taking a higher dose of insulin. A fourth revolves around a patient similar to the older man described above. For each case, there were four carefully scripted variations: the introduction of a socalled “contextual” complication involving the patient’s personal circumstances, a bio-

78 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

medical complication involving the patient’s physical condition, simultaneous contextual and biomedical complications, or no complications at all. Based on the audio recordings and medical records, researchers calculated how often physicians picked up on red flags signifying possible complications and consequently adjusted their plan of care. The failure to do both counted as an error. In contextually complicated encounters, error-free care was provided only 22 percent of the time; in biomedically complicated encounters, the error-free rate was 38 percent. For Weiner, the critical issue is how physicians are trained. While doctors learn in medical school how to thoroughly investigate patients’ biomedical concerns, no similar training exists for contextual issues, he said. What’s needed, Weiner argues, is a systematic way to find out the issues patients confront, such as the loss of a job or the inability to understand verbal or written medical instructions. Weiner says such a “contextual history” should accompany the physical history that doctors routinely take from new patients.

Kaloba® EPs® 7630 ADVERTORIAL

Family and children’s health is always a concern over winter Worldwide Authorities are concerned about the overuse of antibiotics, development of resistant strains of bugs and the appropriateness of over-the-counter pharmaceuticals for children.

Kaloba® the plant-based solution for helping the whole family feel better. Naturally! ● Scientifically shown as suitable for children one year and over ● Natural support of the body’s defences against attack of winter ills & chills ● Supports the immune system ● Assists in maintaining optimum health & supports normal recovery ● Naturally soothes the throat, airways and sinuses ● Helps to keep the airways clear and healthy ● Is a TGA listable product in over 20 countries ● Sales in Europe last year exceeded 6,000,000 units

Why Is Kaloba® Effective? 1. It is a natural plant-based solution 2. It is grown naturally under GAP, not chemically manufactured. 3. Supports the body’s defences and does not merely mask the discomfort. 4. Made under pharmaceutical GMP. Efficacy, stability and safety profile assurances on each batch. 5. Contains the active ingredients in a scientifically tested and established solution. 6. Helps adults and children over one year old feel better naturally.

Kaloba®’s History Pelargonium sidoides (PS) grows naturally in various areas of South Africa. Its use for helping clear airways and assist healthy breathing originated in various cultures administering it in traditional preparations. In 1897 an Englishman Charles Henry

Stevens was in South Africa where a local gave him daily doses of a boiled root preparation of PS. He found it beneficial and on returning to England he introduced the extract to Europe. With an interesting history it maintained a presence in Europe until Schwabe Pharmaceuticals analysed the product in the late 20th century and were able to isolate the active ingredients and launch the extract as Umckaloabo in Germany.

Kaloba® Today In recent years, Kaloba®, an alcohol extract made from P. sidoides, has become a highly popular product in Germany and Europe for winter ailments, helping to support normal and healthy airways function. In Germany Kaloba now ranks as the most popular formulation for winter ailments and its sales are just behind aspirin. Kaloba® has been available in New Zealand since May 2008.

Available from Pharmacies and selected Health Stores. For more information phone 0800 657 876 Mon-Fri 9am-5pm or email info@phealth.co.nz Distributed by Pharma Health NZ Ltd Your Health. Nature’s Power. PO Box 15 185, Auckland 0640. www.pharmahealth.co.nz Supplementary to and not a replacement for a balanced diet. Use only as directed and if symptoms persist, see your health professional. TAPS NZ6898

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 79

TASTE LIFE TRAVEL

Here’s lookin’ at you, kid Morocco’s Essaouira lures visitors with desert walks, sea air and camel couscous writes Carol Pucci

aybe it was the kebabs smoking on sidewalk grills, or the layer of fog that coloured the afternoon sky a pale gray, but when I walked through a stone archway into the walled city of Essaouira, being in Morocco began to feel as mysterious and unfamiliar as I had hoped. It was a feeling that had eluded me in better known Marrakech, where boutiques and luxury guesthouses are transforming the ancient medina into a chic resort town popular with European tourists. Rougher around the edges but more authentic is Essaouira, a weathered and windy port city on the Atlantic coast, three hours by bus through the desert from Marrakech. With its whitewashed ramparts and

buildings set off by blue doors and shutters, Essaouira could be a seaside town in Greece or Brittany. Brittany probably makes more sense since it was a French architect who was hired by the sultan to lay out the town’s 18th-century medina. Beaches and cheap hotels lured hippies travelling the North African bohemian trail in the 1960s. Now stalls stocked with leather bags and carpets open early for day-tripping vacationers arriving on the morning buses from Marrakech. The rewards come to those who linger. Check into a guesthouse and wander the streets in late afternoon, and Essaouira begins to feel less like a shopping mall and more like the small-town fishing village it once was.

80 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

At Cafe de France on the Place Moulay Hassan, European expatriates in shorts and Muslim men wearing knitted skull caps share tables on the terrace and talk over glasses of mint tea. Women in flowing robes walk arm in arm. The air smells of sea salt, spices and grilled fish. Rolling our suitcases along bumpy alleys, my husband, Tom, and I found our guesthouse, Les Matins Bleus, off a street lined with carpet shops, bakeries and small restaurants. The Maboul family – brothers Abdell and Samir and their cousin Youssef – cater mostly to windsurfers who keep the atmosphere in Essaouira relaxed and prices low. We paid about US$50 a night, including breakfast, for a double room built in traditional Moroccan style around an open

courtyard. The hotel was a school in the mid-1800s, and later was converted into the Maboul family home. Guests awaken to the sound of seagulls and the Muslim call to prayer sung from the mosque next door. Nearly every guidebook recommends a meal at one of the outdoor seafood restaurants near the docks. Icy displays of fresh crabs, oysters and sardines were tempting, but prices seemed steep and the sales pitches a little too hard-sell. We wandered instead to the “fish souk,” the fresh fish market that takes place each day inside the medina. Sardines are the specialty, grilled on the spot and served with olives, bread and salad for about US$4. Dinner was at a little white-tablecloth restaurant called La Decouverte, where we INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 81

found couscous with camel on the menu and a lentil salad sprinkled with oil from the argan-nut trees that thrive in this part of Morocco. The restaurant’s owners, Frederique Thevenet and Edouard Pottier, also run Ecotourisme et Randonnee, an ecotourism company that specializes in walking tours in the desert countryside. Olive trees grow here, but it’s the hearty and heat-resistant argan tree that’s most treasured. Unique to southwestern Morocco, the trees produce a hard wood, called ironwood, used for fuel. The leaves provide food for goats that climb into the spiny branches. But the argan tree is most valued for its nuts, from which the oil is extracted by hand by women working in cooperatives. Working with a government-run foundation promoting argan conservation, Ecotourisme et Randonnee developed walking tours through the argan forests and Berber villages where locals depend on the tree for their livelihoods. Our tour started out at a country market where villagers arrived by donkey. We joined a group of French tourists and an Englishspeaking guide, Todd Casson, a British expat living in Essaouira. Mingling among the locals was easier than it had been in Marrakech, where a request to take a photo was often met with a request to be paid. Here, permission was usually granted with a nod or a smile. We watched as a barber set up shop in a tent. Other men sat on the ground, using metal scales to weigh piles of apples, onions and potatoes.

A snack of tea and bread dipped in oil fortified us for several miles of walking along flat, desert donkey paths. Eventually we reached the Marijana Cooperative. There we talked with women working assemblyline style, cracking argan nuts between two stones, removing the seeds, roasting them and grinding them into a paste which they then squeeze to extract the oil. Marketing the oil as a healthy source of vitamins and antioxidants has been an economic boost for desert dwellers such as Fadna Bella and her family, who hosted our group for lunch in their house surrounded by argan groves.

82 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

Fadna met us in her courtyard, and led us into a windowless room decorated with pillows and carpets. We sat cross-legged on the floor, sharing a tomato salad, chunks of bread and her homemade tagine, a traditional Moroccan stew made with potatoes, carrots and lamb. When we finished, she passed around a bowl of pomegranates and glasses of mint tea. She smiled. We smiled. Our appetites make up for our lack of Arabic words to express what a treat it had been to experience authentic Moroccan hospitality. She knew no English or French, but it mattered little. When we left, she blew us a kiss goodbye.

IF YOU GO Essaouira is 170 km west of Marrakech on Morocco’s Atlantic coast. Getting There: Supratours (www.supratours.ma) runs comfortable, air-conditioned buses between Marrakech and Essaouira several times a day. The trip takes about three hours, including a stop for tea. Tickets are 65 dirham, about US$7 at current exchange rates. Buses leave from Supratours’ offices near Marrakech’s new train station. Lodging/Tours: Essaouira has many nice hotels and guesthouses in restored riads, traditional Moroccan homes built around an interior courtyard. Prices are less than in Marrakech and usually include breakfast. See www.tripadvisor.com for riads that rate highly with guests who have stayed there. I liked Les Matin Bleus because it was Moroccan-owned (many riads are owned by French, Spanish or Italian expatriates) and well-located within the walled medina. Doubles with private bath cost 430-470 dirham (US$52-$57). See www.les-matins-bleus.com/home.htm Ecotourisme et Randonnee (www.essaouira-randonnees.com) offers half and fullday walks through the argan woods, nearby dunes and villages. Prices range from 200-400 dirham (US$24-$48) per person, including transport and a snack or lunch. More Information: See www.visitmorocco.com

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 83

TASTE LIFE FOOD

/CLASSIC/

Fit to be fried

James Morrow writes that cooking is just like defending a besieged castle: sometimes, it’s done best with boiling oil

ity the carnivore in love with the vegetarian. All of a sudden one of his most cherished loves – all things meaty and on a plate – is called into question by the new love in his (or occasionally her) life. Can a relationship last when two parties disagree on something as fundamental as whether or not the children’s song ‘Baa, Baa, Black Sheep’ is cause for hunger pangs? Or if tempeh is actually yummy, or something sent up to torture us from the depths of hell? Samuel Jackson’s hit man in Pulp Fiction summed up the dilemma perfectly when he chowed down on one of his more hapless victims’ fast food order: ‘That is a tastyburger! Me, I can’t usually eat ‘em ‘cause my girlfriend’s avegetarian. Which pretty much makes me a vegetarian.’ Now my wife is a vegetarian, but nowhere near as doctrinaire as Jackson’s movie girlfriend – the most flack I ever cop for frying up a load of bacon and slapping it on

some toasted bread with good mayonnaise is caused by health concerns, rather than moral ones (‘are you sure one packet is meant to be eaten by just one person?’). Hey, it’s not like I actually toast the bread in the bacon fat, ElvisPresley-style, right? Still, though, I know men whose vegetarian partners would leave them if they found out they regularly went to steakhouses for lunch. One friend’s vegetarian girlfriend even uses meat as aweapon: if things are going well, and she’s happy with the way she’s being treated, beef is on the menu. If not,the poor man is sent packing to the salad bar while she announces to the table, ‘Alex doesn’t eat meat’. Ouch. Since we set up housekeeping together a few yearsago, I’ve had to figure out ways to cook dishes thatsatisfy both my wife’s moral code (apparently pancetta isnot allowed, even if it’s pretty much dissolved in thefinal product; the sam goes for anchovies) and my loveof rich food.

84 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

And in truth, cutting out meat has made me a better cook in a lot of ways: I’m much more conscious of the quality of ingredients, and have learned that vegetables have more of a role than as a creative garnish to a really good piece of meat. No longer do I believe a meal is balanced if it has been sprinkled with parsley. In terms of technique, this newfound emphasis on cooking with things that grow on the ground ratherthan run around on it has taught me a renewed love for deep-frying. Perhaps it’s an atavistic masculine thing buried somewhere deep in the cerebral cortex: If I can’t cook manly things like ribeye steaks, at least I can cook in a manly (i.e., dangerous) way that involves high temperatures and the potential for serious injury and a trip to the hospital. Sort of like the way some guys cloak their creativity by expressing it through the medium of power tools. And unlike those wimps on the home improvement shows, I don’t even wear safety goggles. Back in the days before I left my butcher for my wife, I still enjoyed the whole frying process – but never to the point where I would put a bench-top Fry-o-lator at the top of my Christmas list. But with a vegetarian to keep happy, deep frying preservesdomestic harmony while also horrifying the health police. Frying is also a great way to handle leftovers: golf balls of the previous night’s mushroom risotto can be coated in an egg and parmasean mix and fried in olive oil for a particularly decadent, if loose, re-interpretationof the Sicilian classic arancini. But two of my favourite deep-fried treats these days involve that late-summer treat, the zucchini flower, and that winter delight, the artichoke heart. The former is my go-to, make-ahead starter course whenever the things come up in the local farmers market (good food retailers also stock them – keep an eye out when the time is right); the latter, a fun way to bang and clatter around the kitchen and wind up with something that is, almost literally, heart-stoppingly good.

Artichoke heart fritters Adapted from Julie Rosso and Sheila Lukins’ New Basics Cookbook, this recipe hails from Chicago’s celebrated Gordon Restaurant. Apparently this was aclassic from the day the eatery opened in 1976, and the whole thing does have a bit of a wonderfully haut-1970s feel to it. You’ll need: For the béarnaise sauce: 2 tablespoons white wine vinegar 2 tablespoons dry white wine 1 tablespoon chopped eschallots 1 teaspoon dried tarragon leaves 125 g room-temperature unsalted butter 3 egg yolks Salt and pepper

Stuffed, beer-battered, deep-fried zucchini flowers Three flowers makes for a good firstcourse serving; my supplier sells in packets of ten, so we generally tend to have five per person at my house. Waste not, wantnot, right? The goal here is to make the lightly-battered, delicate zucchini flower the perfect vehicle for an incredibly rich packet of warm, melted cheese and herbs. You’ll need: 12 zucchini flowers, preferably with zucchini stems attached 150 grams mozzarella cheese 150 grams fresh parmagiano reggiano or grana padano 1 bunch chives, finely chopped 150 grams flour 200 ml beer Cayenne pepper Good sea salt Black pepper Olive oil Butter Lemon (optional) 1. First, make the batter: a good flourbased batter needs at least half an hour to rest and come together. In a wide bowl (you’ll be dipping in here later) mix the beer and the flour together, adding a dash of cayenne pepper, salt, and fresh-ground black pepper. What you’re looking for isa

lightish consistency, not a heavy, gloppy batter. 2. Then, make the stuffing. Mix up the two cheeses, most of the chives, and some salt and pepper in a bowl (taste to make sure the balance is to your liking). Take the zucchini flowers and, being careful not to tear the leaves, open from the top and with your little finger ora small spoon pop out the stamen from inside the flower. Fill with stuffing, and twist shut, laying aside on a plate. These can sit in the fridge until you are ready to cook. 3. Get a good, heavy-bottomed pan out and fill with a centimetre’s worth of olive oil, and a good whack of butter to boot. Allow this toget quite hot – test it by dripping some batter into it; if it doesn’t immediately set to sizzling, the oil is too cold. Working in batches, dip the flowers into the batter using a turning motion that works with the direction in which you closed them, to help keep them sealed during frying. Place in the oil, and, turning occasionally, fry until golden brown. Set aside on paper towel, sprinkling with salt, until all the flowers arecooked. Place three on each plate, sprinkle with some of the leftover chives, and a squeeze of lemon juice (optional). Serve immediately. Serves four.

For the fritters: 1 cup flour 1 teaspoon baking powder 1 cup milk 1 egg 1 teaspoon olive oil 3 cups corn or peanut oil 10 artichoke hearts, halved, rinsed, and dried 1. Make a batter by mixing the flour, baking powder, salt and pepper together in a bowl, and then combining with the milk, egg, and olive oil. Let this rest for at least a half-hour. 2. Knock up a quick béarnaise by boiling down the vinegar, wine, eschallots, and tarragon until reduced by half, and then allow to cool. Then, get some water to near-boiling in a double-boiler (or just use a steel bowl over a pot like I do), and in the top part, combine the vinegar mixture with the egg yolks, giving it a good whisk. Bit by bit, add the butter until the sauce thickens, season with salt and pepper, and set aside. 3. Working in batches, dip the artichokes in the batter and then fry in hot oil. Drain on paper towels, and serve on plates with a daub of béarnaise on each fritter. Serves four.

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 85

TOUCH LIFE TOYBOX CANON LEGRIA HF M32 The LEGRIA HF M32 features the same premium Canon technologies as the other models within the LEGRIA HF M series, including a highly intuitive Touch-screen LCD screen that offers greater user control over content. Perfect for users looking for exceptional video quality, the new camcorder allows users to capture even more HD video, offering enough capacity to shoot up to 24 hours of footage. It’s also the first LEGRIA model to support SDXC memory cards, providing increased shooting time with up to 2TB capacity. The LEGRIA HF M32 features a 3.3 Megapixel Full HD CMOS sensor, 18x Advanced Zoom, Canon HD Video Lens and DIGIC DV III processing technology. Advanced Face Detection Technology identifies up to 35 faces in a frame, ensuring that friends and family remain in focus and well-exposed at all times. www.canon.co.uk

NOKIA C6 With a 3.2-inch HD touchscreen display and a slide out four-row QWERTY keyboard, the new C6 brings the best of messaging together with instant access to your favourite contacts and communications. Not to mention a five-megapixel camera and a very respectable seven hours of talktime (in GSM mode). The Nokia C6 boasts a customisable homescreen which will also play host to your favourite contacts, your latest emails and your friends’ Facebook updates. With Nokia Messaging on board, you have support for up to 10 email accounts from your favourite email hosts including Yahoo! Mail, Gmail, Windows Live Hotmail and Ovi Mail. The Nokia C6 supports up to 16GB of storage on microSD and an FM stereo radio. Not one to leave you stranded, the C6 also comes toting Ovi Maps with free walk and drive navigation. The Nokia C6 is expected to be available in the second quarter of 2010 for an estimated price of NZ$400 before taxes. www.nokia.com

HUB-TO-GO This design gives you two ultrafast USB hubs in one: a stable base and a travel hub. The 3-port base can connect your larger more stationary equipment, such as printers and hard drives. The detachable, 4-port travel hub offers a great connection point for your mouse, MP3 player, camera, and fl ash drives. It’s easy to take on the road, and simply plugs into a USB port on your laptop when you need it. Its rotating connector keeps adjacent ports free. www.belkin.com

TRANSFORMER SE - T502 The Clickfree Transformer SE (Special Edition) turns any USB hard drive, iPod, or iPhone into a simple automatic backup solution for your computer. Just connect the Transformer SE to your computer, then connect the USB hard drive, or iPod/iPhone via USB into the Transformer SE, and backup will start automatically onto the available free space of the connected product, whether it is a 3rd party hard drive, or an iPod/iPhone. The Transformer SE also helps you to import music from your iPod to any computer. The automatic backup will find and store hundreds of file types, and backup only what has changed, the next time you connect. www.clickfree.com

CYBER-SHOT WX5 Pictures that you could only imagine are now possible with the Cyber–shot DSC–WX5 digital camera. It starts with the outstanding low–light performance of an “Exmor R” CMOS sensor. Plus, amazing features like Superior Auto and Background Defocus make it easy to get the best shot. There’s even 3D Sweep Panorama and Full HD 1080/60i AVCHD movies. The DSC-WX5 features a 12.2 megapixel “Exmor R” CMOS image sensor that brings out the full resolving power of the camera’s Sony G Lens F2.4 bright lens to deliver extremely fast speed, high resolution, and stunning low-light sensitivity with improved image clarity and drastically reduced grain. www.sonystyle.com

SEE LIFE / PAGES

The Devil is in the detail Michael Morrissey confronts the spiritual, and the historical, sometimes in the same book THE INVENTION OF NEW ZEALAND: Art & National Identity 1930-1970 By Francis Pound Auckland University Press, $75

The idea that New Zealand, having been discovered a mere 700 years ago – making it the most newly encountered landmass of any size in world history – had also to be invented has been a notion that has haunted intellectuals and serious artists and writers for some time. The phrase was heavily underscored – with italics no less – by our greatest poet Curnow, in 1945, and was also mooted by our greatest painter Colin McCahon, in 1966. Also, as Pound acknowledges, it was the name of a series of lectures given at the University of Canterbury in 1978 and the title of an essay by Roger Horrocks in 1983. So the path has already been conceptually blazed, but none of these predecessors, I would surmise, have examined the notion in such detail and thoroughness as Pound, in this monumental book of ten essays, most of which are 50 pages long. A pleasing aspect is footnotes on the page instead of at the conclusion; conversely, some of the illustrations are disappointingly small. The book itself –

an invention too, no doubt – has a cool formal elegance and features a reproduction of Colin McCahon’s painting, Walk. No trace of Kiwiana or hard light here! In Pound’s evaluation, the major figures apart from the dominant McCahon, are Rita Angus, and Toss Woollaston (these three have been bracketed as the leading trio more than once), and, moving more closely to the present, Gordon Walters, who is to be the subject of a further monograph by Pound. Other painters who figure prominently include Richard Killeen, Milan Murkusich and Theo Schoon, the latter because of his being inspired by Maori rock drawings and his European adaption of Maori patterns. The aforementioned trio spearhead Pound’s extended examination of the Nationalist art movement which, appropriately, is interwoven throughout the text. The aloneness/ loneliness and the silence of the land – a Pakeha-European-Colonial perception haunts the psyches of Curnow, Holcroft and Brasch (writers all) even more darkly than the painters. Indeed, Pound reechoes the notion that this is a South Island perspective, prompted no doubt in part by slender population, a reaction against the overly confident colonisation and a relative

88 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

lack of Maori culture which has no such misgivings. If McCahon is perceived as the dominant force in New Zealand art, then Cezanne is inescapably referred to as the European father of many of our leading painters. Woollaston and Angus were enthusiastic, even worshipful acolytes, and I recall McCahon in a talk saying,”The big problem in modern painting was what to do after Cezanne”. Indeed, a few reproductions of Cezanne might have been of interest to show his neo-Cubist influence on Angus’s work and arguably McCahon’s. Always acute in his distinctions, Pound writes, “Woollaston, in contrast to Angus’s Cubist-inflected reading, stressed Cezanne’s ‘brushworky’ aspect.” In comparable manner, McCahon’s visit to America had an enormously liberating impact on him from the late 1950s onwards and, in measure, prompted his shift from oil to house paint. These are but two references from hundreds where Pound, the wellread art historian, constantly reminds us of powerful historic forces operating on our artistic culture. Thus, the much commented on isolation of New Zealand, is nothing like, say, the isolation of a small locale like Easter Island or the interior of New Guinea.

In my view, this colonisation, as it were, of our artistic psyche, has never really left us, in spite of the muscular efforts of the Nationalists to shuck it off. Pound renews his attack, which he made at an earlier time, on what he calls meteorological determinism (here shrewdly rephrased as, “Harsh clarity as an alibi for style”) – the notion that the hard/harsh clear light perceived in New Zealand skies, particularly in the North Island, prompts a corresponding style of painting – a theory vigorously contended by Hamish Keith and Gordon Brown in their important earlier work, New Zealand Painting: An Introduction. While Pound tellingly makes the point that Binney – one of its main practitioners, could only draw thus between noon and 3.30 pm – one could add to it a remark made to me by such an important artist as Pat Hanly (perhaps not given so much emphasis in Pound’s account as might be expected) on the intense clarity of New Zealand light. As an Aucklander, I find it a frequent phenomenon, despite frequent cloudy days or “magic hour” soft luminosity caused by cloud-filtered sunlight usually after or before rain on mornings or late afternoons. The darker aspects of McCahon could also be partially traced to looking at hilly landscapes just as dawn was about to break or examining the light at dusk, not to mention the man’s broody temperament. In chapter nine, Pound recognises the Borgesian principle of writers cre-

ating their predecessors as having a parallel effect when the Nationalists invented their predecessors by imitating them. Might not the same logic be applied to the Regional Realists (significantly an American and, originally, a literary term) who having noticed the light, make it a precursor, as it were, of their style? In chapter five “God in New Zealand Nature”, Pound meditates (as it were) unflinchingly on the prominence of Christian imagery and symbolism in McCahon’s work. In the luminous work of Angus, on the other hand, God becomes a Buddhist / Polynesian goddess and the cold land a warm mother, rather than a somewhat severe father, as in McCahon’s work. Indeed, McCahon’s obsessive use of words in painterly imagery might be seen as biblically influenced – “In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God” thus does St John begin his gospel with sublime mystery. Pound’s book is so compendious I can only quickly mention a few aspects that resonated. Among them, his examination of decayed trees in the work of Eric LeeJohnson; his wide ranging look at primitivism, his full recognition of Theo Schoon’s use of Maori art and the more abstract Mondrian-esque deployment of the same imagery by Walters. In my heretical personal view, Angus, who at present is more or less a distant second

to McCahon’s overwhelming first, will continue to rise in importance as the feminine and feminist qualities of her work are more greatly valued – not to mention her mythic power and the blazingly warm appeal of her colours. Move over gloomy Colin, here comes smartly modern Rita! Post Pound, future art historians may meditate less on our landscape and more on portraiture (the self portraits of Angus and Mary McIntyre, for instance), the nude or the half neglected wild child of surrealism. I also predict that – and here friendship makes amiable prompt – that Philip Clairmont (psychedelically prompted expressionism), Tony Fomison (more sepia angst but more dramatically playful than McCahon’s) and Jacqui Fahey (family vibrancy rendered with painterly warmth) will also rise to a prominence even more than that which they currently enjoy. Meanwhile, before these cheeky prophecies are put to the test, we have Pound’s exhaustive and deeply learned book – probably our grandest work of art history and analysis thus far.

The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ By Philip Pullman Text Publishing, $39

If ever there was a title to make Christian blood boil, this is it. And a reading won’t overly lower the temperature either. So let’s

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 89

look at some rebuttals for the novel’s premise. As I recall, Occam’s Razor was a scientific principle enunciated in the fourteenth century by William of Ockam which states that if you have a perfectly adequate explanation for something, you don’t need a more complex one. His actual maxim was “Entities should not be multiplied unnecessarily”. History has it that Jesus Christ was a single individual, so why does he have to be doubled? The belief was apparently suggested by some Muslim scholars, and also had wide circulation in early Christian Spain but remains strictly a minority view. It can be used – and is so used in Pullman’s novel – to back up a denial of the Resurrection. The scenario goes – once Jesus was dead the body was removed and then up pops the twin brother to convince naive people that the dead Christ still lives. Obviously, there are some practical problems – why would people be fooled? A variation of the notion is that the twin was a secret, kept out of sight. How likely is that? Not very. In Pullman’s account, the alleged twin Christ is observed copying down Jesus’s words, so how then could he hope to pass himself off as the dead Jesus’s twin? He – the surviving twin – would have to disappear, to fake his own death. This does not happen so the premise of the novel as written, is implausible. Philip Pullman is an extremely successful and highly regarded writer of children’s fiction. This is his first foray into writing for adults, though hopefully it may be his last. The style, rather than aimed at adults, reads like a book aimed at 12-year olds. Stylistically, it is like a primer when compared to books like The Day that Christ Died by Jim Bishop or The Last Temptation by Nikos Kazantzakis. While this makes for an easy quick read, its modernised neoBiblical style of language becomes irritating. Better to read the Bible itself. The book explores a moral contradiction of character. When Jesus is young, he is portrayed as tending to careless mischief compared to the more cautious and pious Christ. As Jesus matures into an adult and a compelling preacher, and eventual worker of miracles (though some are explained away in natural terms), Christ becomes his furtive chronicler – and thus a fictitious amalgam of the gospel writers. Then, Christ is visited by a stranger who offers pungent though ultimately corrupting advice, and is later regarded as an angel, though in fact, he may be a devil – the text doesn’t clarify this

question. Eventually, it is this mysterious personage who persuades Christ to betray his twin brother Jesus. Thus Christ is now Judas! Confused – or even outraged? Again, it must be noted that these conflicting ideas have not been concocted by Pullman. Like other such notions, they have been suggested before – which, of course, doesn’t lend them any veracity. After Pullman’s mishmash, I decided it was time to re-read the original gospels. They’re better written and more straightforward.

The Widow’s Daughter By Nicholas Edlin Penguin, $40

New young literary male New Zealand novelists have become relatively scarce. Why? No doubt, for a plurality of reasons – one might be that more women read fiction than men, and nowadays, since they tend to favour reading women authors, this makes the publishing climate more congenial for the emergence of women writers. Many of the new younger female novelists come into print via Bill Manhire’s famous creative writing course and the Victoria University Press. My impression is the classes contain more females than males. In Auckland, if not elsewhere, film making and rock stardom may beckon more brightly. So, welcome Nicholas Edlin, to the literary stage. He is a great find. The Widow’s Daughter – set in Auckland during the “invasion” of allied America troops – is an excellent novel with strong characterisations (the take-no-prisoners ego-crushing Mrs Walters became one of my firm favourites) plus taut yet vibrant dialogue and gorgeous descriptions of the moody Auckland weather together with more than a mention of the magically clear light (much commented on in Francis Pound’s book on New Zealand painting). Here is a sample sentence of Edlin’s luscious but controlled prose: “The sky looked leathery under the bruised sky, the grey of which was now flecked with highlights of lemon yellow and alizarin crimson.” The story is told skillfully and unobtrusively in the first person by American surgeon Peter Sokel, who, as the name might indicate, is also Jewish. He is a sympathetic character and we are kept enthralled by his tussle with the more well-connected and richer Cartwright for the favours of the stunningly beautiful Emily Walters aka Wassermann who is also of distinguished social stock, though latterly, the family has

90 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

fallen on hard times. The ancient, decrepit butler – who, like so many members of the family isn’t quite what he seems to be – provides some quiet deadpan humour. The novel makes it clear that, despite a media blackout on the presence of the American Third Marine Division, fights occur with the feisty locals. And – in Edlin’s (or maybe Sokol’s) version – it is often the New Zealanders who pre-emptively demonstrate provocative contempt towards the Americans. Not belaboured is the oft stated reason for resentment was probably the Americans’ old fashioned style of chivalry, plus gifts of stockings, taxi rides and flowers, not to mention the local girls’ liking for exotic foreigners. Much of the action occurs on a very lively Ponsonby Road which also provides a seeming subplot (later, part of the main storyline) that has a mysterious giant Chinese who turns out to be a pimp for a brothel inhabited by women variously described as either Chinese or, less plausibly, Japanese. The novel is related in the “present” of 1942-3 and the “future” of the 1960s by which time Sokel’s buddy, Sturges, has written an excellent novel of wartime emotional drama with the central character being a doctor, clearly based on Sokel and his romance with Emily. As the story unfolds, I became less interested in the “flash forwards” and much more interested in the flashbacks. A criticism of the book might be that the crisis for the central character – a false accusation of murdering his Emily’s nasty brother, Oscar – comes rather late in the narration as does further revelations of family skeletons (which I will dutifully not spoil, by revealing). The only flaw in the novel is this feeling of undue narrative haste towards the end. Despite this reservation and a couple of anachronisms (eg, ‘beatnik’ was coined post-Sputnik in 1958 and didn’t exist in 1943), I wholeheartedly recommend this novel as an excellent read, with a warm, sophisticated style that has, alas, become a rare quality in contemporary New Zealand novel writing.

The Lucifer Code By Charles Brokaw Michael Joseph, $40

If you suppose that The Lucifer Code is at least title-derived from The Da Vinci Code, you would not be wrong. The pace is just as frenetic and also deploys the corny but reader-hooking cliffhanger chapter end-

ings that I first encountered in Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Tarzan books, though the device is said to have originated in silent films and continues to this day in TV serials. I suspect this nonstop violence and crawling through numerous hidden tunnels is partially aimed at an anticipated film version. Then again, it may be the novelist’s attempt simply to rival the massive adrenalin surge we have come to expect from cinematic thrillers. Dr Thomas Lourds, the world’s most skilled ancient languages scholar, is the hero (just as he was of Brokaw’s previous rollicking thriller, The Atlantis Code). Though Lourds occasionally kicks a bad guy in the sewers of Istanbul if he has to, he is more often than not bested by the villains in physical combat. Enter a gun-toting Amazon, equally skilled in unarmed combat, who takes no prisoners, in the tall form of Irish terrorist, Cleena MacKenna. Cleena quickly demonstrates that she takes bad guys to the cleaners in no time flat, and in the case of nasty CIA enforcer Dawson, gives him an extra orifice above his right eye. Modern film goers, spoiled rotten by films like Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, expect their heroines to be tall, beautiful, resourceful, swift, and sport a pair of guns slung low on each elegant hip and maybe a touch of collagen to make their killer-thin lips look invitingly ripe. Cleena has it all – minus the collagen. Needless to say, there is a secret scroll which contains historic civilisation-shattering but encrypted dynamite, guarded by a group of not very monk-like monks who haven’t succeeded in cracking the code even after 800 years of trying, which naturally Lourds manages to decipher in no time at all – the world’s best, remember? But does he tell us – well no, not right away – that’s a few cliff hangers away. Apart from Lourds, most of the Yankees are bad guys including the ruthlessly evil Colonel Eckhart and the even more evil Elliot Webster, Vice President of the United States, secretly bent on stirring the Middle East pot to boiling point. Without wishing to spoil the plot, if you Internet search “Obama – the Anti-Christ?” you might get half a clue. With this kind of novel, you keep reading at more than the speed of sound to find out what the hell is in that secret scroll and, in an odd way, when you find out just a few pages from the end, it’s almost an anticlimax – even though it may mean the end of the world as we know it. As with The Atlantis Code, the novel’s final unravelling

may seem a trifle hurried – much I suspect in the style of a James Bond movie when our suave hero deftly reverses the odds just as the situation looks hopeless. I guess Connery is getting a tad senior to play Lourds and Brad Pitt might have to step in but I’m sure Angelina Jolie could do a reprise of her Lara Croft role. Better still would be tennis ace Maria Sharipova who has the height and the killer instinct. Brad Pitt would have to don pumps. From hints at the end of Lucifer, I suspect the next book in the whirl of Lourds’ Indiana Jones lifestyle will be entitled The Alexandria Code (referring to the lost library of Alexandria), but I could be wrong. It may well be called The Morse Code.

Reach For The Skies By Richard Branson Virgin Books, $42

I’ve tried to dislike Richard Branson – after all, he is good-looking, successful, rich, famous, dashing, adventurous, owns his own Caribbean island (where Pamela Anderson has been observed taking the teal-blue waters of his lagoon-sized swimming pool) and has a knighthood – but I’ve failed. He is so damn likable, I find myself wanting to break out into an Irish jig whenever his immaculate pearly whites gash the air – especially the thin air in the ionosphere. He even looks happy – unlike the thoroughly miserable had-it-all other billionaire aviator pioneer, Howard Hughes. But I have an ace up my sleeve – he’s not the world’s greatest writer. But then he doesn’t aspire to be. His book is chatty and informal, as is no doubt, the man in person. In fact, I wish his editor (that is, if he has one) would have edited out some of his chatty off the cuff asides added on in heroicsized brackets (and, I suspect, that for all the companies Sir Richard has founded affixed with the adjective virgin, our dashing knight is no longer to be found in that pristine condition – you see what I mean about extra bits in brackets?). This book is an exciting romp through the history of manned flight and also of Branson’s own often hair-raising and liferisking forays into the upper atmosphere. Branson begins his epic tales by honouring Steve Fossett who set some 130 (!) flying records, then quickly moves to remind us that though Icarus, mythology’s first flyer, perished, Daedalus made it. Thus, perhaps unconsciously, Branson is comparing

Fossett to Icarus and himself to Daedalus. Back in 1987, Branson nearly perished after Per Lindstrand and he crossed the Atlantic Ocean for the first time in an air balloon. Lindstrand leapt out at the right instant and Branson lingered – but eventually managed to jump into the ocean. Like many, I had heard of the Montgolfier brothers but not of their immediate successors like Jacques Charles or Jean de Rozier. This multiplicity of pioneers makes the point – reinforced throughout Branson’s wellresearched account – that at any one time, there are usually several inventors running neck and neck. And they all depend on work that went before. For instance, he devotes plenty of space to the early English glider George Cayley and notes that the systematic Wright brothers spent much time studying his notebooks before beginning their own meticulously planned experiments. This two hundred year-long chronicle is filled with innumerable names and inventions many of whom (or which) I have previously heard, but many items of which I was ignorant. Among the unknowns for this reviewer were that Jules Verne’s famous novel Five Weeks In A Balloon was inspired by the gigantic Le Geant which had a twostorey passenger cabin and epically crashed; Zeppelins bombed London; in 1910, France had three times as many pilots as America; several famous “barnstormers” were women; the Soviets invented a strange missile-like contraption called the ekranoplan that was over 300 feet long and carried 531 tons of cargo and flew only metres above the water; Boeing are planning a cargo craft with a 500foot wing span. And so it goes on. Branson’s Virgin Galactic will take you to the edge of space for a mere $200,000 which is a bargain compared to the Soviet asking price of 20 million! Mind you, the latter trip gives you several days aboard a space station. Sorry Rick, here come the critiques. There’s a tendency to break into ugly large print repeats to make a point. And, sadly, there is no mention of Jean Batten or of Pearse (but then Pearse never flew in the technical sense) nor reference to the numerous weird craft mooted by the Third Reich. Back to the positive. Nearing the end, Branson is unsurprisingly talking about flying over Mars, Venus, and beyond, to Titan, Saturn’s largest moon. The last word in the text proper is – appropriately – stars. But here’s the most mind-blowing fact of all – Sir Richard Branson, intrepid balloonist – doesn’t even have a pilot’s licence!

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 91

SEE LIFE / MUSIC

The classic shoot-off Chris Philpott finds the new Tom Petty outguns an admirable effort from Crowded House Crowded House

Kele

Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers

It’s not hard to argue that Neil Finn – brother of Tim and former member of legendary band Split Enz – is one of Kiwi music’s shining lights, as well as one of our finest songwriters. With more than 20 albums under his belt, collaborations with international stars happening more and more frequently, and even the adoration of Pearl Jam singer Eddie Vedder to boast about, the boy from Te Awamutu is truly a legend. Despite all of this, I was truly surprised that Crowded House reformed in 2006, and even more surprised when they released Time On Earth in 2007, less than 2 years after the death of original drummer Paul Hester. In many ways Intriguer continues on from that point: the group are clearly trying to create a truly expansive album that goes in many directions, and we find them much more willing to experiment with different sounds and styles, whether it’s the hardrocking outro on “Isolation” or the laidback groove of “Amsterdam” The band also sounds much more comfortable with new drummer Matt Sherrod, and benefit from appearances by Don McGlashan and Finn’s son Liam. Intriguer isn’t a great album, but it is certainly above-average and easy to listen to.

Kelechukwu Rowland Okereke is probably best known to Kiwi audiences as Kele, the lead singer of currently-on-hiatus indie rock band Bloc Party, a platinum selling group formed sometime around 1999 by Okereke and Russell Lissack. As part of Bloc Party, Kele was responsible for creating some of the most unique sounds on the indie rock scene, and leading a British music revolution that also included peers like Franz Ferdinand and Arctic Monkeys. On the back of debut album Silent Alarm, the group found worldwide fame. I mention this because it puts Kele’s debut solo effort in context. The Boxer takes the next step in the evolutionary journey his band made between their traditional indie rock roots and the electronic style of third album Intimacy. In fact, it’s hard to call The Boxer anything except dance music - it has more in common with the likes of Calvin Harris than it does with Bloc Party, and, as a result, I find myself torn between enjoying it at face value and being disappointed that it isn’t more like Kele’s earlier material. This is a great album in and of itself, but fans of Bloc Party might find themselves turned off entirely.

There is an argument to be made that Tom Petty has found much more success a soloist – after all, his hit singles “Free Fallin’”, “I Won’t Back Down”, “Runnin’ Down A Dream” and “You Don’t Know How It Feels” were all written and recorded without his band. You could even argue that the Travelling Wilburys – Petty’s supergroup with luminaries Roy Orbison, Bob Dylan and ex-Beatle George Harrison – were more successful than The Heartbreakers. After all, their 2 albums sold just as well as Petty’s solo work, and easily outsold anything by The Heartbreakers. Despite this, some of Petty’s finest work can be found in his collaborations with The Heartbreakers. The group can boast hit singles “Refugee” and “Mary Jane’s Last Dance”, and with Mojo the Heartbreakers can now boast hit records in 4 different decades. Mojo is a return to the groups’ classic blues sound, built around the natural song-writing ability of Petty, and a fantastic double act on the six-string with lead guitarist Mike Campbell. From opener “Jefferson Jericho Blues” to single “I Should Have Known It”, Mojo is over an hour of brilliant Southern rock that will have you tapping your toes and even nodding your head from time to time.

Ntriguer 3.5 stars

The Boxer 3 stars

92 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

Mojo 4 stars

SEE LIFE / MOVIES

Weaver of dreams Inception captivates Kenneth Turan, as does Kisses Inception

Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Ellen Page, Tom Hardy Directed by: Christopher Nolan Rated: PG-13 (for sequences of violence and action throughout) Running time: 147 minutes 4 stars Dreaming is life’s great solitary adventure. Whatever pleasures or terrors the dream state provides, we experience them alone or not at all. But what if other people could literally invade our dreams, what if a technology existed that enabled interlopers to create and manipulate sleeping life with the goal of stealing our secret thoughts, or more unsettling still, implanting ideas in the deepest of subconscious states and making us believe they’re our own? Welcome to the world of Inception, written and directed by the masterful Christopher Nolan, a tremendously exciting science-fiction thriller that’s as disturbing as it sounds. This is a popular entertainment with a knockout punch so intense and unnerving it’ll have you worrying if it’s safe to close your eyes at night. Having come up with the idea when

he was 16, Nolan wrote the first draft of “Inception” eight years ago and in the interim his great success with Batman Begins and The Dark Knight, not to mention the earlier Memento, put him in a position to cast Leonardo DiCaprio and six other Oscarnominated actors and spend a reported $160 million in a most daring way. For Inception is not only about the dream state, it often plays on screen in a dreamlike way, which means that it has the gift of being easier to follow than to explain. Specifics of the plot can be difficult to pin down, especially at first, and guessing moment to moment what will be happening next, or even if the characters are in a dream or in reality, is not always possible. But even while literal understanding can remain tantalizingly out of reach, you always intuitively understand what is going on and why. Helping in that understanding, and one of the film’s most satisfying aspects, are its roots in old-fashioned genre entertainment, albeit genre amped up to warp speed. Besides its science-fiction theme, Inception also has strong film noir ties, easily recognizable elements like the femme fatale, doomed love and the protagonist’s fateful decision to take on “one last job.” That would be DiCaprio’s Dom Cobb, a

94 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

thief who specializes in what’s called extraction, in taking secrets from the subconscious. Aided by Arthur (a fine Joseph GordonLevitt), the trusted associate who is a whiz at the mechanics involved, Cobb is introduced in the middle of a dream involving Saito (Ken Watanabe), a wealthy Japanese businessman. That one last job is soon proposed by Saito, who asks Cobb if he is also able to do inception, the planting of ideas, a manoeuvre many people believe can’t be done. Saito promises Cobb, who has a past which prevents him from returning to his children in America, the one thing he can’t resist. If he takes on this one last job, if he agrees to practice inception on Robert Fischer (Cillian Murphy), the heir to a multibillion-dollar energy empire, he will be able to return home. In true movie fashion, Cobb has to round up a team to do the job. Aside from Arthur, he needs Eames, the forger (Tom Hardy), gifted at impersonating people inside dreams, and Yusuf, the chemist (Dileep Rao), who makes the compounds that put people under. And with the aid of his father-in-law Miles (Michael Caine), he meets Ariadne. Named after the mythological character who helped Theseus find his way out of the Minotaur’s labyrinth, Ariadne is a young architect who is needed to create the subconscious landscapes the dreams will take place in. As played by Ellen Page, adroitly cast for her youth, intelligence and earnestness, Ariadne is the team’s last essential element. In addition to not knowing what they’ll find inside Fischer’s dream (believe me, there’s plenty going on), Cobb and his team have to contend with a wild card: Moll, the untrustworthy femme fatale, a woman with deep and complicated ties to Cobb’s past and someone who specializes in finding her way into dreams where she is not wanted. The selection of Oscar-winning French actress Marion Cotillard as Moll typifies the care Nolan has taken to cast these thriller roles for emotional connection, a move which pays off in the scenes she shares with DiCaprio. In addition to the impeccably professional Batman veterans Caine and Murphy, the film is also on the money with the smaller roles, including Pete Postlethwaite as Fischer’s ailing tycoon father and Tom Berenger as one of his key associates. The reason all these diverse elements successfully come together is Nolan’s meticulous grasp of the details necessary to achieve his

bravura ambitions. A filmmaker so committed he does his own second unit direction, Nolan is one of the few people, to quote F. Scott Fitzgerald on film mogul Monroe Stahr in The Last Tycoon, “able to keep the whole equation of pictures in their heads.” Because he’s been so successful, Nolan, like Clint Eastwood, has been able to return again and again to the same creative team, which includes exceptional director of photography Wally Pfister, sharp-eyed editor Lee Smith and composer Hans Zimmer, whose propulsive score helps compel the action forward. Incapable of making even standard exposition look ordinary, Nolan is especially strong in creating the stunts, effects and out-of-theordinary elements whose believability characterizes this film as they did his previous Batman efforts. Shooting Inception in six countries, preferring to do elaborate stunts in camera whenever possible but expert at utilizing computer-generated effects when necessary, Nolan and his team (including production designer Guy Hendrix Dyas, special effects supervisor Chris Corbould, visual effects supervisor Paul Franklin and stunt coordinator Tom Struthers) have come up with some unforgettable set pieces. As detailed in a thorough cover story in American Cinematographer magazine, the standout imagery includes: a 60-foot-long freight train that barrels down the middle of a city street, shot in downtown L.A. with a replica of the train engine placed on the chassis of an 18-wheel tractor-trailer; a 100-foot hotel corridor built so it could rotate through 360 degrees to mimic a zero-gravity experience; a mind-altering CGI scene that has a Paris street roll up and over itself like it was some kind of a tapestry instead of a steel and concrete boulevard. His goal in doing all of this, Nolan told American Cinematographer, is a desire to always “be putting the audience into the experience,” to create “what I like to call a ‘tumbling forward’ quality, where you’re being pulled along into the action.” Speaking of Paris, it’s one measure of how wide-ranging Nolan’s influences are that he used the classic Edith Piaf song “Non, Je Ne Regrette Rien” as a key plot element. The pleasure of Inception is not that Nolan, as the song says, regrets nothing, it’s that he has forgotten nothing, expertly blending the best of traditional and modern filmmaking. If you’re searching for smart and nervy popular entertainment, this is what it looks like.

Kisses

Starring: Kelly O’Neill, Shane Curry, Neilí Conroy, Paul Roe Directed by: Lance Daly Rated: TBA Running time: 75 minutes 3.5 stars Kisses shows how much you can do with very little. Only 75 minutes long and made in Ireland for what had to be a micro budget, this sweet, savvy and heartfelt film will affect you more and stay around longer than many more elephantine productions. The story of a Christmas Eve a pair of 11-year-old runaways spend in downtown Dublin, Kisses can sound familiar but it really isn’t. Written and directed with deftness, wit and restraint by Lance Daly, it makes magic happen on-screen when you least expect it. Kisses is best thought of as a kind of urban fairy tale, and, like all fairy tales, menace and trouble are part of the equation. Focusing on children but not for them, the film delivers a great deal by not promising too much. Although Kisses starts on the afternoon before Christmas Eve, there is definitely no peace on Earth for the youthful protagonists and best pals who live next door to each other in a dreary housing tract on the outskirts of Dublin. Because he has to put up with a rage machine of a father and an understandably resentful mother, Dylan (Shane Curry) has cultivated a fascination with electronic games as well as emotional distance as ways to retreat when things get too hot around him. Kylie (Kelly O’Neill) doesn’t have a father on the premises, but she has five obstreperous siblings and a weary mother. Her best defence is a good offense, an ability to be practical, assertive and somehow optimistic. Although these kids are teased, tormented and even tortured on a regular basis, a particular combination of bad events so terrifies them about potential consequences that they make a spur-of-the-moment decision to make a break for downtown Dublin, where Dylan’s older brother has been living for a couple of years. Hitching a ride on a convenient dredger, the runaways hear for the first time about Bob Dylan, Dylan’s presumed namesake – “a musical god,” the dredger’s captain says, though his language is a bit more colourful – and the singer-songwriter’s music unexpectedly becomes one of the film’s recurring motifs.

Also on that brief boat journey, what up to that point has been a film shot in delicate black and white slowly and with an almost imperceptible charm begins to change until it becomes full color once Dylan and Kylie land in downtown Dublin, all to the accompaniment of melodic music from the group Go Blimps Go. At first, downtown seems like a bit of a wonderland to the two pals, as they wander through malls, do some shopping and in general seem to be having fun for the first time in their lives. Writer-director Daly and his cast are particularly expert at capturing small improvisational moments of pleasure that are especially winning. However, given that downtown Dublin isn’t exactly Disneyland, Kisses makes a few brief visits to the dark end of the street, but these end up giving the film more texture and substance without ruining the magic. For what is lovely about this gentle fable of childhood is that it takes its cues not only from the songs of Dylan but also from the William Blake title “Songs of Innocence and Experience.” In a tough world, friends like Dylan and Kylie have to look out for each other. Small though it is, Kisses evokes all kinds of feelings, and that is no small thing from a film of any size. – By Kenneth Turan

INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010 95

SEE LIFE / THE CUTTING ROOM

Inside his head Inception director Christopher Nolan spills the beans, writes Rick Bentley Director Christopher Nolan spent 10 years turning an idea about how dreams can be an entry points for others to steal information or plant ideas into the mindblowing feature film Inception. In a recent interview, he talked about making the movie, which is as intellectually complicated as it is action oriented. It’s his first release since making the monster hit The Dark Knight. Q. Where did you get the idea of being able to invade the dreams of others? A. I’ve been fascinated by dreams, really, my whole life. For me, the primary interest in dreams, and making this film, is this notion your mind, while you’re asleep, can create an entire world that you’re also experiencing without realizing you’re doing it. I think that says a lot about the potential of the human mind – particularly the creative potential. That’s something I’ve found fascinating. Q. How did the story change during the decade you were writing it? Did you always have an architect (the person who designs the dream worlds) as part of the team?

A. Really, the pitch was very much the movie you’ve seen except I hadn’t yet figured out the emotional core of the story. That took me a long time to do. I sort of grew into the film in a sense. I had the heist thing. I had the relationship between the architect and dreams. All of those things were in place for several years, but it took me a long time to sort of find this idea of emotionally connecting with the story. Q. Why not just make it a simple heist movie? A. When I looked at heist pictures they tended to be superficial. That doesn’t work when you’re talking about dreams because the whole thing about dreams, the human mind, it has to have emotional consequences. My process over the years was finding my relationship with the love story, with the tragedy of it, with the emotional side. Q. Scripts for your previous movies – The Dark Knight, Insomnia, etc. – have been based on short stories, other movies or comic books. Was it different with Inception

96 INVESTIGATEMAGAZINE.COM August 2010

because it’s your original screenplay? A. The interesting thing about an original concept is that – particularly with the 10-year gap from my initial set of ideas to finishing the script – by the time you get there you’ve lived with the idea so long, it really isn’t that different from working with someone else’s story. Q. What’s your writing process like? A. I don’t actually tend to do a lot of research when I’m writing. I took the approach with writing Inception that I did when I was writing Memento, which is I tend to just examine my own process – in this case dreaming and in the case of Memento memory – and try and analyze how that works from my own process. I do that because I think a lot of what I find you wind up doing with research is confirming things you want to do. And if the research contradicts what you want to do, you go on and do it anyway. At a certain point you realize if you are trying to reach an audience, being as subjective as possible, and trying to write from something as real as possible, is the best way to go. Q. This film includes everything from a love story to a James Bond-style battle. Why so many different dream locations? A. For me, when you look at the idea of being able to create a limitless world and use it as almost a playground for action and adventure, I naturally gravitate toward cinematic worlds, whether it’s the Bond worlds or things like that. As I was writing, I certainly allowed my mind to wander where it would naturally. Q. Did you consider releasing the film in 3-D? A. We looked at shooting on various different formats, including 3-D. But when I really looked at the time period we had and where my attention needed to be in finishing the film, I decided I didn’t have the time to do (3-D) to the standard I would like. Q. What kind of dreams do you have? A. At various times in my life I’ve had the experience of lucid dreams, which is a big feature of Inception. It’s the notion of realizing you’re in a dream and therefore trying to change it or manipulate it in some way. That’s a very striking experience for people who have it.