According to modern folk lore the term was coined when soldiers hated their CO and would roll a fragmentation grenade into the COs tent. The CO was "fragged" and everyone walked home through the minefield happy.

Queensland had a worse and longer drought, which broke sometime last year. At the same time that the southern states were experiencing the heatwave, we were experiencing temperatures barely hitting the high 20s. Worldwide, while Melbourne was suffering a heatwave, Great Brittan was suffering from extreme cold. Contrary to popular belief, this was not the longest or hottest heatwave in Victoria - that was in the 1930s.

Local fluctuations are simply that - fluctuations. Trying to use a variation to verify something as big, far reaching and slow burning (so to speak) as climate change is akin to drawing one card from a deck and using it to "prove" that all cards are aces.

None of this is to say that climate change is not real, only that isolated incidents like this cannot be used to verify anything, except an individual's religious beliefs on this topic (eg those who religiously preach global warming like Al Gore or Tim "let's pump sulfur dioxide into the atmosphere" Flannery will use this as "proof").

I don't care too much about the other features in Windows 7 but these are the two things that I need:
Quick Launch Bar
Up button in windows explorer

Without these I will find it very difficult to migrate (I launch almost all my apps from the quick launch and use the up button religiously - particularly on notebooks).

The explorer file navigation pane is still missing the "up" button that was present in all versions of Windows prior to Vista.

Microsoft can go get stuffed if they expect for me to buy an operating system without this button. I use it all the time and it kills me that it isn't there.

Perhaps this is what I was refering too. Or perhaps not. Only I will know, but since I won't tell me noone knows. All this work on Christmas eve is making me loopy.

Australia is fantastic at this time of the year. What's this talk of snow? Is that some sort of special beach or something? Can I play cricket on it?

You gotta love Christmas time :)

The Boxing Day test starts on the 26th as well which is always a highlight of this time of year.

If it is cold, you can keep wearing layers until you feel comfortable. If it is hot, you can only take off so many layers.

Yeah, but so do the girls, and that gets fun.

Not with civilisation it wasn't. Bands of nomads living subsistence lifestyles who had not developed writing do not count as settled.

If it weren't for the Brittish it would have been the Spanish, the Dutch or the Portugese. It may have been the Chinese or the Japanese. It may even have been Singapore. No matter who planted the flag, Australia would never have existed primarily as an Aboriginal nation after the age of sail.

The sooner people realise that the sooner that we can move forward as a nation and work on solving the real problems that beset the Aboriginal communities. Self loathing for acts performed eight generations ago will do noone any good today.

They're only impotent because the opposition has the numbers in the senate.

I'm guessing that you're a lefty? I always loved the effect that Howard had on the lefties out there, much as I love the effect Keating had on the right wingers while he was in power.

To see the rabid foaming at the mouth of the left-wing media was a glorious sight and I enjoyed it for the last 11 years.

Or to put it another way, the Brittish came and settled before the Chinese did thus ensuring that Australia was founded as a democracy with the rule of law.

The self loathing of some of my countrymen and women really is difficult to believe. The English were the least worst choice for settling our country.

Really the previous government was about as good as you can expect from politicians. They just botched their last term by trying to introduce IR legislation without taking it to an election.

The Australian is an example of a successful newspaper with growing readership at the moment. It is successful because it puts out very good content. All of its articles are well researched and informative. The opinion pages gives voice to both sides of any political debate.

My father calls it a "Tory" newspaper because it is well-researched and factual, and sometimes has opinions that present a conservative opinion. Yet I think that many of the columnists would cry fowl to have that label applied. Regardless, a newspaper should promote debate and factual analysis, which it does well.

Contrast that against the tabloid rags that are losing popularity as the internet takes hold and you can see why the newspaper industry is "dying". Tabloids will lose popularity to flashy websites, while content rich newspapers will always appeal as their audience is different. Print media is all about the words, while online media is all about the interaction. What many newspapers are trying to do these days is run a website in newspaper form. Opinions are becoming more lopsided and thus boring in most newspapers, but the ones that are succeeding are the ones in which there is very informed and factually based opinions that present both sides of any debate.

Marital rights are now likened to atrocities? A widely condemned cult is now linked to the mainstream that condemned it? A war sold to the public on secular grounds is now a religious war?

If these are the largest criticisms you have of Christianity, or at least the best examples you can give of "why Christianity is evil" then you are doing a very poor job of selling your argument. The fact is that the worst atrocities associated to Christianity actually occurred before the printing press - and the subsequent public education of what Christianity actually said.

As a "religious nutter" myself - well said. Human nature, or in religious terms - sin - has been the cause of conflict. Not the ideas presented in each religion or belief set. Some ideologies are more prone to shaping violent tendencies, but ultimately violence is a part of human nature, and large scale violence is a part of that condition.