Only Australia has excluded Australia from Australia's migration zone.

I do agree with you in principle, but that unused land is a long way from where most people live. If it were viable to do anything out there we'd be grazing it.

Not that we can't do both, I guess. :-)

You may be correct, but I've yet to see it happen. Tony Abbot's mantra of "we have a mandate" is almost as scary as the "we don't comment on operational matters" one. They both seek to treat the entire electorate, including a proportion of their own voters I'll bet, like they are completely stupid. You can vote Liberal but still think it's inappropriate for someone else to control who you can and can't marry. Tony Abbot would stand up and say he has a mandate on that too - in fact I'm surprised he hasn't.

I don't think I was indulging or attempting to push any agenda and if I was it certainly wasn't to depose the democratically elected government of my country, merely to point out the sheer numerical weight AGAINST the idea of having a clear mandate on any one topic without having had a specific referendum on that topic.

As someone already pointed out, they voted Liberal to get rid of Labour (an action I find irresponsible but anyway...). That means at least one person didn't vote for repealing the carbon tax, but voted Liberal. Does that mean that they now have "mandate-1"? No, it just reinforces the fact that they don't have a mandate on anything.

That's right, it is if you're rich. You just pay your levy and enjoy your fucking private health insurance.

The rest of us will be paying GP copayments, increased HECS, and all those other things that probably don't affect you, forever.

In actual fact most connections used by HFTs are encrypted AND dedicated.

The thing is that this is so wrong and simply not how things work. Nobody would trade on a market where the first person to bid or offer is the not first person to trade. In your example, as soon as someone said 'will pay $500', they would be given the bike that was available at $400. And they would pay $400, not $500.

The other thing is, even if this did occur, the person wanting to pay $500 for a bike has gotten what they want. This is called liquidity and it's valuable in its own right. If they didn't want to pay $500 for a bike then they shouldn't go to a market place and say that they did. But they did, because they didn't want the $500 as it won't help them travel to the shops (by itself).

I'm not sure if this post was sarcastic... but just in case it wasn't: Microsoft have adopted automated testing? Wow! What's next, bug tracking?

I agree, it was great when everyone was just on MSN messenger. But like all things MS they crapped in their own bed by turning it into a games platform, office suite and 30 other things with Windows Live. So everyone left.

If they could have just learnt that ONE lesson... Oh well.

We're sitting on the largest known deposits of radioactive materials in the world I believe. But in a country where racism is still rampant under the title of "Operation Sovereign Borders", how accepting do you think the population will be of nookular power?

Do you happen to work at the Australia Institute?

I'm so sick of being told that because one party has a majority at one election they have 'a mandate' to follow through on every horrible plan they conceive.

1 - Not everybody voted for them.
2 - They aren't the only party sitting in parliament.
3 - Even if you DID vote for them AND live in one of their electorates you are still entitled to disagree with them on any issue you choose.

Let's not even go down the path of trying to separate the rhetoric of 'power poverty' from all the other contributing factors in power prices.

Did you get your $550 yet? Didn't think so.

Windows 8 has yet to be supported at all.

It's especially ridiculous when it's a CG generated space scene and THERE IS NO LENS.

You can't possibly be that naive - he did say unintentional deaths, did he not?

Add in all the _intentional_ gun deaths and it becomes the MOST common way for young people to die.

Come on! We're not opposed to shooting people, we're opposed to being told we can't!

Geeez! I mean COME ON!

This, in context of MS, means they have been so completely pwned that they've now decided to do ONE THING their customers want.

This is only to shut you up, not because they give a fuck about you want.

If they gave a fuck, there would be a new version of Windows 7 coming out and Windows 8 would be dumped.