What you've got to remember is that the Qu'ran is selectively quoted out of context deliberately by people who have an irrational hate of Muslims. They do this because often the context doesn't support their point.

If you selectively quoted the bible, it looks just as bad. Zechariah 12:3 for example tells Christians to kill false prophets, Leviticus made it clear it's OK to keep slaves, then there is the well known example of Ezekiel 25:17 (think pulp fiction). In fact the entire story of Ezekiel 25 is pretty violent and advocates killing an entire people, the thing is, I know this is a story, a work of fiction the same as verses in the Qu'ran are poems built in the same manner. If you take individual parts of Ezekiel 25 it sounds like commands from god to kill the Ammonites, but in context its part of a story.

It's a case of "figures dont lie, but liars figure".

Erm, pretty much.

Almost all Christians ignore things like Leviticus on slaves, by the same token almost all Muslims dont take "kill the unbeliever" literally.

This. I know this argument borderlines on "no true scotsman" but you can argue that a lot of the people who join Islamic terrorist groups are proper Muslims. A lot wont follow the same tenants as are proselytised by the likes of ISIS, certainly this is the case with most western recruits. Then again, the tenants of groups like ISIS hardly represent the majority of Muslims.

This cannot be understated.

Well you can cross Australia off that list, there's no way ASIO is that competent.

They say that the CIA gets its bad news from CNN, ASIO gets its bad news from Slashdot.

iiNet/Internode/Westnet/etc are the last service-oriented consumer ISP in the marketplace

+1 to everything you've said.

There's a reason I'm still with iinet ADSL despite being able to get Telstra cable to my house. After the TPG deal I'm thinking I might just jump ship.

Then again, I'm the kiss of death for ISP's. A few months after I joined Westnet, they were acquired by iinet, a few months after joining Internode they were acquired by iinet, a few weeks after joining iinet the TPG acquisition was announced. I wonder who's big enough to buy Telstra.

Insurance companies in Australia do not provide lawyers, they handle the entire thing for you because _that_ is what you pay them for.

ISP's on the other hand, you pay for internet access, not legal access (they're internet service providers, not legal service providers). So offering legal assistance for free is pro bono.

I would. Mainly because anyone who uses the word "sheeple" ironically points out that they aren't creative enough to come up with a semi original or at least entertaining insult.

I have the same policy with a variety of other brainless insults that have no meaning, things like PC, SJW, Fanboi, Hater (especially this one, see my sig).

Also this topic has reminded me of this topical and classic XKCD (for extra karma whoring points).
https://xkcd.com/1013/

The first problem with the last election was primarily that Murdoch went on an unrelenting attack on Labor. Coverage was so skewed that it wasn't funny.

The second problem was that there were too many back room preference deals. More people voted for Labor than the Liberal party but because the Liberal party had a lot of preference deals with smaller parties they received enough to get them _just_ past the post.

Voter apathy is still a huge problem in Australia and our mandatory voting system is part of it. I still prefer our Instant Runoff Voting system but the 2013 election is a good demonstration of how no system is perfect.

I've actually lived in a Muslim country, in fact the largest Muslim country in the world.

I lived and worked in Yogyakarta, Indonesia for 6 months. There were bars I could get beer in (in fact they were open longer than bars in Australia were permitted to), bacon was never hard to find. I was never forced to convert, people were friendly, I'd have no hesitation about going back to Yogya despite it being predominantly Muslim.

What the anti-Muslims dont want you to realise is that 99.9% of Muslims just want to get on with their daily lives. They've got jobs, families, homes, friends and dont really care that much about holy wars, much the same as 99.9% of Christians, Taoists, Shintoists, Atheists, LeVeyan Satanists and so forth. Using a few nutjobs as a representative of all Islam is like condemning all westerner by analysing the KKK.

Oh, and before someone trots out the old "well why dont they do something about the crazies, blah, blah, blah". They do speak out against them. I was in Yogya when 7/7 happened in London, every single person, regardless of creed was appalled, the problem with crazies is that they dont listen to sane people. Beyond this, I find those who are the first to point fingers at normal Muslims for doing nothing tend to be the last to act against the radical elements in our own society, mainly because they tend to support that radical element (so pot, kettle, black).

Actually most cars sold in Australia aren't built here.

Also an Australian made V6 Camry (we call it the Toyota Aurion) costs the same as it does in other countries. So Holden/GM are a really bad example especially considering that Australian made cars aren't really exported (Holden have exported less than 10,000 VE and VF commo's, Ford exported 0 Falcons in the same time).

Price differentials are due to car manufacturers deliberately pricing cars higher in Australia, not the minimum wage.

Honda is a better comparison (but doesn't support your theory). Holden is not Chevy. Most of the Holden fleet is being supplied by Opel (Germany) or Daewoo (GM Korea). None of the American made cars are available here and when local manufacturing ceases (good riddance, the subsidies and protectionism can now stop) Holden are replacing the Commo with the Opel Insignia OPC as GM America have plainly said we're not making the Camaro or Corvette in proper hand drive.

Which is entirely due to the manufacturer.

A Holden Barina spark does not cost any more to import into Australia from South Korea than a Chevy Spark does to import into the US.

In fact you'll find the Spark costing approximately the same in both our nations, around $13,000 USD. Same with most Kia's, Toyotas, Hyundais and so forth. Its only certain manufacturers (*cough* euro *cough*) who jack up the prices for Australia. This is the reason that grey imports for cars are likely to be approved in the near future.

Actually its the other way around. Finance and accounting tend to think IT workers are amongst the better people with money. Most IT workers have more discretionary funds than other forms of workers and tend to make better financial decisions. We tend not to rack up stupid debts and fall victim to "buy now, pay later" or "no money down" scams which end up being huge money sinks.

Now you would have had a point if you said "marketing and sales people" but being told that a marketing and sales person thinks you're wrong is a pretty good complement.

Nope, Its a mechanism by the Republican party to prevent voters from voting Democrat by giving them something else in the Republican party to vote for.

They really should have called it the "I can't believe it's not the Republican" party.

Australia has something similar called the National party. Because the Liberals (our conservatives) continually screw over rural Australia but rural Australia are too thick and pig headed to vote against them they vote National and pretend they aren't voting for the Libs.

Thats an example of the system working. The last thing the UK needs is a party like UKIP dictating terms to a hung parliament.

Price reserves are a price control.

Besides this, tenders are better as you aren't legally bound to accept an offer you dont like. Tenders have the advantage of not telling the purchaser what you will accept, so a purchaser may offer far in excess of what you wanted, also Auctions can turn against the seller when buyers refuse to bid (which is why you have to have a reserve).