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TONY JONES, PRESENTER: In Melbourne, four of the five men accused of planning an attack on the Holsworthy Army Base have been committed to stand trial. The men are accused of having links to the Somali group Al-Shabaab. Police do not claim the men had obtained any weapons for the alleged attack, but authorities claim the men planned to die while killing as many soldiers as they could. The four men have pleaded not guilty to conspiring to prepare for a terrorist attack. Rafael Epstein has this report. RAFAEL EPSTEIN, REPORTER: In August, the men were arrested and accused of...

AN official Taliban publication warns Australia that it will have to assimilate into a dominant Asia or face the prospect of being overpowered and forced to take population overspill from Asia. The choice is spelled out in the latest issue of the online Taliban monthly magazine, Al Sumud (Steadfastness), whose lead article offers a sweeping view of a post-war order in which a Taliban-ruled Afghanistan becomes a moral pivot for a pan-Asian renaissance that will coincide with the decline of Western power. "The end of European leadership in the world will place the white settler diaspora in Australia before two...

The ideal of the coolly rational scientific observer, completely independent, free of all preconceived theories, prior philosophical, ethical and religious commitments, doing investigations and coming to dispassionate, unbiased conclusions that constitute truth, is nowadays regarded by serious philosophers of science (and, indeed, most scientists) as a simplistic myth...

TEN years ago republican campaigner Phil Cleary celebrated a glorious referendum defeat by saying that "very soon" Australians would have the republic they wanted. Cleary's Real Republic group and other supporters of direct election had thrown in their lot with the monarchists to campaign for the rejection of a republic with a president appointed by parliament, a decision that helped turn a monarchist minority into a majority of rejectionists. Their strategy, as Cleary explained, was that, following the failure of the referendum, "I'm of the view that the momentum will build immediately" for the republic that people wanted, namely one...

IT was one of those excruciating moments in Australian politics. Defence Minister John Faulkner last night gave US General David Petraeus one of Australia's highest honours, the Order of Australia, for his distinguished service against terrorism in the Iraq war. Only six years ago, Senator Faulkner had opposed the war and challenged claims that Iraq posed a terrorist threat. During a censure motion in parliament against the Howard government, he described the decision to send 2000 troops as "unilateral adventurism" and a "confidence trick". It was a different story at the Australian ambassador's residence in Washington last night. As a...

A MELBOURNE baby given no chance of survival has amazed doctors after being saved with one of the biggest long shots in medical history. "Baby Z's" brain started virtually dissolving soon after she was born 18 months ago because she had too much toxic sulphite in her system. But her parents and doctors refused to give in to the one-in-a-million genetic condition and stumbled on a highly experimental drug. The Herald Sun can reveal treatment began a month after she was born and within days Baby Z "woke up". "It was really like awakening - it was just bang, and...

Darwin’s bulldog—Thomas H. Huxley --snip-- Huxley, although an unbeliever, was thoroughly familiar with the gospel, and had little time for Christians who compromised their position by supporting the anti-biblical belief of evolutionary naturalism. He wrote: ...

POLICE in England are questioning a student after he hurled a work boot at the head of former Prime Minister John Howard during a speech at the prestigious Cambridge University. The male student, believed to be Australian, threw the boot after verbally abusing Mr Howard, branding him a racist and a disgrace, from the moment the former leader entered the room. "Go home, you racist, I am ashamed to be an Australian," the man then continued to yell as Mr Howard began his speech on leadership in the next generation, to about 400 students in the chamber. The man then...

QANTAS has stood down two pilots after a Boeing 767 landing in Sydney came within 700ft of the ground before the flight crew realised they had not lowered the plane's undercarriage. The airline and the Australian Transport Safety Bureau have launched investigations into the October 26 incident. The pilots are due to be interviewed by authorities on Friday. The crew on the Melbourne-Sydney CityFlyer service apparently recognised the problem and had started go-around procedures when they received a "gear too low" aural warning from the aircraft's enhanced ground proximity warning system. It is understood investigators are looking at possible human...

I don’t often write about alternative remedies for serious medical conditions. Most have little more than anecdotal support, and few have been found effective in well-designed clinical trials. Such trials randomly assign patients to one of two or more treatments and, wherever possible, assess the results without telling either the patients or evaluators who received which treatment. Now, however, in describing an alternative treatment for asthma that does not yet have top clinical ratings in this country (although it is taught in Russian medical schools and covered by insurance in Australia), I am going beyond my usually stringent research criteria...

A famously-rude Kiwi politician has proposed a new solution to the country's dire child abuse problem - sterilise the "underclass". Michael Laws - who stirred up contempt by calling the late Tongan King a "bloated brown slug" - has again hit headlines for the wrong reasons. The regional mayor claimed that the children of social security beneficiaries, drug addicts and criminals had little chance in life and were prime targets for child abuse. Sterilising their parents was the best solution, he brazenly suggested. "If we gave $10,000 to certain people and said 'we'll voluntarily sterilise you' then all of society...

The Bible tells us that God made mankind—male and female—“in His image” (Genesis 1:26, 27). This gives us humans a special significance in the cosmos. However, modern secular (godless) thinking minimizes this significance. As Voyager 1 reached the edge of our solar system in 1990, astronomer Carl Sagan asked NASA to instruct Voyager to turn around and take a picture looking back towards Earth. The grainy image showed our home as a tiny pale blue dot. In a book written soon after, atheist Sagan wrote, “our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are...

VICTORIAN health authorities have renewed their warnings over links between semi-dried tomatoes and an outbreak of hepatitis A ... "Because the incubation period for hepatitis A could be as long as two months, trying to get people who fell ill to accurately pin down what and where they actually ate this product can be difficult," Dr Carnie said. Bottled semi-dried tomatoes in supermarkets were pasteurised and considered safe along with any of the cooked product such as in pizzas or quiches. The greatest risk would appear to be at restaurants and cafes, where semi-dried tomatoes are served in foods such...

Life is not a naturalistic phenomenon with unlimited evolutionary potential as Darwin proposed. It is intelligently designed, ruled by immutable laws, and survives only because it has a built-in facilitated variation mechanism for continually adapting to internal and external challenges and changes. The essential components are: functional molecular architecture and machinery, modular switching cascades that control the machinery and a signal network that coordinates everything. All three are required for survival, so they must have been present from the beginning—a conclusion that demands intelligent design. Life’s built-in ability to adapt and diversify looks like Darwinian evolution, but it is not....

A SENIOR CSIRO environmental economist has gone public to accuse the science body of trying to gag his report attacking the Federal Government's climate change policies. The paper, by Clive Spash, criticises the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme and argues that direct legislation or a tax on carbon is needed... Dr. Spash also wrote that the economic theory underpinning emissions trading schemes was far removed from the reality ... He said trading schemes were ineffective ... He claims the CSIRO had tried to block the publication of the report, despite it being internationally peer reviewed and accepted by the journal New...

UP close and personal, the modern day pirate gang is a mob of scruffily dressed Somali males armed to the teeth with AK-47 assault rifles and other weapons. And the group encountered by those aboard the Anzac Frigate HMAS Toowoomba in the Indian Ocean last month were distinctly unhappy that their plan to hijack a Portuguese freighter had been thwarted. But they weren't about to admit they were pirates. Communicating through a Somali language interpreter, Lieutenant Jace (Jace) Hutchison, officer in charge of Toowoomba's nine-member boarding party, asked just what they had in mind in approaching the Portuguese vessel. They...

TEN years ago republican campaigner Phil Cleary celebrated a glorious referendum defeat by saying that "very soon" Australians would have the republic they wanted. Cleary's Real Republic group and other supporters of direct election had thrown in their lot with the monarchists to campaign for the rejection of a republic with a president appointed by parliament, a decision that helped turn a monarchist minority into a majority of rejectionists. Their strategy, as Cleary explained, was that, following the failure of the referendum, "I'm of the view that the momentum will build immediately" for the republic that people wanted, namely one...

The Catholic-run Calvary Public Hospital in Canberra Canberra, Australia, Oct 30, 2009 / 10:25 pm (CNA).- The Australian Capital Territory Government’s bid to buy Calvary Public Hospital in Canberra could endanger other public hospitals run by religious organizations, Archbishop of Sydney Cardinal George Pell has said. He has also asserted that anti-Christian motives may be driving the proposal. The cardinal gave his full support to Archbishop of Canberra and Goulburn Mark Coleridge, who opposes the sale of the 250-bed Catholic-run hospital.According to the Archdiocese of Sydney, Cardinal Pell said the motives behind the effort to buy the hospital, which...

Related Story: Australia 'must prepare for cyber attack' SNIPPET: "More evidence is emerging of sophisticated attacks by criminals and foreign governments on Australia's computer networks. Government officials from the spy organisation ASIO, as well as federal police and computer security experts, have joined forces with the top-secret Defence Signals Directorate since July. The Cyber Security Operations Centre has found attacks on company information, apparently conducted by organised crime, which turn out to have national security implications."

A QANTAS plane landed safely in Perth this morning after calling for assistance when a pilot became incapacitated. The airline confirmed that flight QF593 from Adelaide had issued a “pan" alert and asked to be met by an ambulance after one of the pilots suffered a health issue, The Australian reports. The Qantas 737-800 from Adelaide carrying 110 passengers left Adelaide about 6.50am (local time) and touched down in Perth at 7.30am. An emergency was declared by the co-pilot and air traffic control vectored the aircraft onto the longest runway 21/03, thewest.com.au reports. After touch down the aircraft came to...

AN eight-year-old boy has been hailed a hero after he hot-wired a two-way radio to call for help as his dad lay trapped in the wreckage of a horror truck rollover. Michael Bowron stripped the radio wires and connected them to a spare battery he found among the wreckage. Yesterday, the Bonnie Rock youngster told The Sunday Times his fingers burned from sparks flying off the battery while he desperately called for help. "I was scared, but I was trying to be brave," Michael said. "My dad had heaps of blood on his face and heaps on his leg. "I...

THE Queen's youngest son, Prince Edward, chairman of the Duke of Edinburgh Award scheme that encourages participation in outdoor activities, believes that one reason young people are attracted to the program is the possibility that they could die in pursuit of the award. In an interview with The Australian yesterday, the Earl of Wessex, who is seventh in line to the British throne, said the program, established in Britain in 1956 and open to people aged between 14 and 25 in more than 120 countries - remains popular with so many because it offers the promise of adventure and the...

New subs come with a $36bn price IAN MCPHEDRAN October 30, 2009 12:01am The project will be a boon for South Australia, with the Federal Government saying the 12 next-generation submarines will be built at Osborne regardless of who wins the contract. But a report out today warns that trying to build the new subs in Australia would be fraught with danger and the purchase of smaller, short-range "off-the-shelf" overseas submarines should not be ruled out. The report, from the Government-funded Australian Strategic Policy Institute, predicts the Australian-made subs would cost a "staggering" $3 billion each - three times the...

OPPOSITION Leader Malcolm Turnbull tonight swapped the unholy noise of parliament for angelic tones in Brisbane's St John's Anglican Cathedral. Mr Turnbull and wife Lucy were among hundreds of guests from around the globe to celebrate the world's last Gothic cathedral to be completed. St John's was designed by English Victorian Gothic architect John Pearson in 1889. But it was not until this year that the third and final stage of its construction was finished - at a cost of almost $40 million. Brisbane's third Anglican bishop William Webber was mocked when he suggested the northern outpost have a cathedral,...

TASMANIAN police are tackling a "new generation" of street drugs, which are being made in a bid to circumvent existing laws. Police said there had been a dramatic shift in the past year towards a new type of party drug with the street name of Israeli's. The drugs are sold in capsule form and contain derivatives of methcathinone, a psychoative stimulant, the Department of Police and Emergency Management's annual report says. The report says the drugs have been produced "in an attempt to circumvent existing legislation". Southern Drug Investigation Services chief Ian Lindsay said police became aware of the drug...

THE Australian Greens have described as "despicable'' a suggestion that Australia needs to have a serious discussion about the growth of its Muslim population. At least one Liberal frontbencher has distanced the party from the views of the last immigration minister in the previous Howard government, Kevin Andrews. Mr Andrews says the issue of a growing Muslim population is a topic that has to be discussed. "To have a concentration of one ethnic or one particular group that remains in an enclave for a long period of time is not good,'' the Liberal backbencher told Macquarie Radio Network today. "You...

LIBERAL MP Kevin Andrews has called for a debate on Muslim "enclaves" in parts of Australia, blaming political correctness for a failure to discuss the issue. Mr Andrews, a former immigration minister who is heading the Coalition's policy unit in the lead-up to the next election, told radio broadcaster Alan Jones this morning that to “have a concentration of one ethnic or one particular group that remains in an enclave for a long period of time is not good”. And Mr Andrews told The Australian Online that it was clear that some Muslims were not “dispersing” into the community as...

A FEW weeks ago in London, British Foreign Secretary David Miliband told me that 75 per cent of the terrorist plots aimed at Britain originated in the federally administered tribal areas of Pakistan. Some 800,000 Pakistanis live in Britain... The real historic significance of the illegal immigration crisis in our northern waters is that this could, if things go wrong, be the moment Australia loses control of our immigration program, and that would be a disaster. It is extremely difficult to talk honestly about Muslim immigration... The most enlightening book you could possibly read on this is by Christopher Caldwell,...

UPGRADED Vietnam war honours have been conferred on the army heroes of the Battle of Long Tan but only one new individual citation was announced - to an RAAF helicopter pilot Cliff Dohle, who passed away in February. Braving a monsoon downpour Mr Dohle and his co-pilot flew a hazardous resupply mission when the diggers were running critically low on ammunition. The long-awaited decision was announced today by the federal government's Honours and Awards Tribunal. The tribunal rejected moves for individual upgraded awards to 12 soldiers of D Company, 6th Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment, opting instead for a Unit Citation...

A giant shark that could be up to 20ft long has sent shockwaves across Australian beaches after a great white was nearly bitten in half.

AUSTRALIANS who wear a crucifix to work or offer to pray for a patient in hospital could run foul of a charter of rights, according to a British legal expert who says its introduction in this country would trigger an attack on religious expression. Barrister Paul Diamond said equivalent laws in Britain had intensified religious resentment and introduced a degree of uncertainty into the rule of law. He cited the example of a workplace dispute at British Airways in which the company had tried to prevent an employee from wearing a crucifix while permittting other workers to carry Sikh ceremonial...

Supplements of the sunshine vitamin may improve insulin resistance and sensitivity, both of which are risk factors for diabetes, says a new study from New Zealand. Insulin resistance, whereby insufficient insulin is released to produce a normal glucose response from fat, muscle and liver cells, was significantly lower in women following high-dose vitamin D supplementation, according to results of a randomised, controlled, double-blind trial published in the British Journal of Nutrition. The optimal effects were observed when blood vitamin D levels were in the range 80 to 119 nanomoles per litre, said the researchers, “providing further evidence for an increase...

PARENTS have accused early childhood centres of "greenwashing" their children by burdening them with the responsibility of saving the world.Tots as young as three have sent letters to Kevin Rudd about their passion for green living and asked companies to reduce their packaging.Others are growing their own food, repairing toys and walking to preschool in an effort to reduce their toll on the environment.But experts have called for caution in teaching children about climate change because of the potential for fear, anxiety, frustration, anger and despair at catastrophic events.Mother Paula Driscoll, from Sydney, said environmental disaster was the new...

NEARLY three-quarters of projects claimed by the Rudd government as evidence of its delivery of major new infrastructure were conceived by John Howard. But Infrastructure Minister Anthony Albanese has defended the government's record, saying its infrastructure investment is on track and has insulated the economy against the effects of the global recession. Mr Albanese faced opposition ridicule last night after rejecting Business Council of Australia concern about infrastructure provision by saying the government had completed 32 big road and rail projects since taking office late in 2007. However, Nationals leader and former transport minister Warren Truss scoffed at Mr Albanese's...

Among evidence released by the court was a transcript of an intercepted telephone call in which Aweys allegedly describes Australians as “filthy people” and thanks Allah for February’s deadly wildfires. In March police intercepted a call to a friend in which he allegedly noted that wildfires had broken out across the country “and all were happy”. “The whole nation is coming down … the economy comes down first,” he said in reference to the global financial crisis, before commenting on the drought and Melbourne’s water shortage. “By Allah, factories shutting down, nothing here mate, nothing barely anything,” he told the...

KEVIN Rudd is poised to sign off on Australia's biggest military buy -- up to 100 F-35 Joint Strike Fighters for the RAAF. The sign off is happening as pressures continue to bear down on defence spending in the face of the global financial crisis. Federal cabinet's national security committee is set to approve the $16 billion F-35 acquisition in late November but the number of aircraft in the RAAF's initial squadron could be cut from 24 to as few as 14. On present planning the air force will get its first operational squadron by 2018 with two F-35s to...

MELBOURNE schoolboy Aaron Dryden has been revealed as the shy hero who pulled a tiny baby from under a train at Ashburton station. Aaron, 18, told Woman's Day how he crawled under the train after six-month-old Saurish Verma's pram toppled from the platform. He leapt on to the tracks without a thought for his own safety and ran to where the train had ground to a halt. Followed by Saurish's terrified mother Shweta, and fearing the worst, he crawled 5m under the train to find the battered pram. "When we got to him, the pram was lying on its side...

DISTRAUGHT HSC candidates have accused the Board of Studies of setting an unfair exam by including questions about subject matter not included in the syllabus. Students who sat one of the Studies of Religion papers yesterday said they were shocked to find the exam asked them to provide answers they had not covered during the year in class. Teachers also complained that part of the paper sat by almost 14,000 candidates across NSW on Thursday afternoon was unfair. ..... Question four on Islam, worth 20 marks, gave candidates a quotation referring to the Qur'an and the prophet Muhammad. Then it...

British backpackers holidaying in Australia are returning home with much more than a suntan, as a result of having unprotected sexual intercourse with multiple partners and helping to spread sexually transmitted diseases around the country. A survey of 1,008 backpackers at hostels in Sydney and the Queensland city Cairns found that British backpackers often had triple the number of sexual partners they would have normally at home, even if they were not single on arrival.

Peter Hitchener, who was broadcasting on Channel Nine, somehow managed to keep a straight face despite the sudden appearance of the gull. It loomed large on the screen behind him after it wandered in front of a camera used to film a Melbourne backdrop for the studio. The timing could not have been worse as Hitchener was trying read a story about organised crime in the city. "I was reading away and it was a serious story, and I suddenly thought 'Oh my gosh, that seagull's back again', because we had a bit of a problem last night," Hitchener told...

"Australia: Islamic cleric harasses families of soldiers killed in Afghanistan with haranguing phone calls and letters" SNIPPET: "Mr Sher's father Felix received a phone call and letters, allegedly from self-styled Muslim cleric Sheikh Haron, just before his son's funeral." SNIPPET: "Other Australian families of men killed in Afghanistan have allegedly received similar letters in the past two years. On Tuesday Sheikh Haron was charged with seven counts of "using a postal service or similar service to menace, harass, or cause offence". He was granted bail to appear in court on November 10. [...]"

THE Christian churches strongly support human rights and their attendant responsibilities. But religious freedom should not be eroded by stealth. ..... In whatever form it comes, Brennan's charter of rights is a bad idea because it is a threat to some freedoms. The upfront version at least has the merit of being in plain sight. The Trojan Horse version is more difficult to come to grips with. It is contained in the recommendations the committee describes as "the primary options" the government should implement even if it rejects an upfront charter. ..... And if you do have to include some...

AUSTRALIA'S military chiefs favour the US over Europe in a planned $4 billion naval combat helicopter buy that is generating high-level concern among senior government ministers and local defence industry leaders. In a classified submission sent to defence ministers John Faulkner and Greg Combet, the military chiefs have opted for the US Navy's MH-60R Seahawk as the best choice for the Royal Australian Navy's new rotary wing anti-submarine warfare platform. The military chiefs favour an early decision on the Sikorsky MH-60R, arguing that it represents a cheaper, risk-free solution for Australia compared with its competitor, the European NH90 naval frigate...

A MAN who established a sophisticated network of peepholes and cameras to spy on his flatmates has escaped a jail sentence after police were unable to crack an encryption code on his home computer. Rohan James Wyllie, 39, yesterday pleaded guilty in Southport District Court to charges of attempting to visually record one of his flatmates when she was in a private place without her consent. But police were unable to prove his elaborate surveillance system had actually been used. Wyllie's three flatmates, two women and a man, grew suspicious that he was up to something when they noticed lights...

WASHINGTON – Nicole Kidman conceded Wednesday that Hollywood has probably contributed to violence against women by portraying them as weak sex objects. The Oscar-winning actress said she is not interested in those kinds of demeaning roles, adding that the movie industry also has made an effort to contribute to solutions for ending the violence. Kidman testified before a House Foreign Affairs subcommittee that is considering legislation to address violence against women overseas through humanitarian relief efforts and grants to local organizations working on the problem. Asked by Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, R-Calif., if the movie industry has "played a bad role,"...

A WOMAN who helped rescue a baby hit by a Melbourne train says the unsung hero is a teenage boy who pulled the helpless infant free. Amanda has told Fox FM’s Matt and Jo Show that she was still stunned by the amazing survival of the six-month boy, and says “it really was a miracle” that the boy was not killed by the passenger train last week The mother’s anguish as the boy’s pram rolled off the platform and onto the tracks as a 250 tonne train pulled in to Ashburton Railway Station was captured on CCTV. Amanda says she...

A VAN has exploded in a Melbourne driveway, causing "massive flames". Eight houses in Chelsea Heights were evacuated by the fire service and police after the blast just after 6am today. Two homes were damaged, but no one was injured. Neighbour Meredith told 3AW: "I don't know whether the house caught on fire but it looks like it has, there were huge flames and a massive, massive explosion, it scared the hell out of us."

What started out as a simple challenge by a college friend, “Bet you can’t prove evolution,” turned into a 30-year journey for Dr. Carl Werner. Like most of the other biology and medical school students, Carl was educated in and committed to an evolutionary belief system. But when his friend challenged those beliefs, his quest for answers began...

THEY are young Australians who paid the ultimate price, losing their lives at war - but now their families have allegedly been targeted by self-styled Muslim cleric Sheik Haron in an anti-war campaign. Finally, after an alleged two-year letter-writing spree that has devastated the families of seven Diggers who died in Afghanistan, Haron faces criminal charges, The Daily Telegraph reports. In the letters he allegedly wrote to grieving parents and wives of the Diggers - one addressed to a widow, care of a funeral home - he apparently accused some of the dead Australian soldiers of being "criminals", "killers" and...

Defence has admitted the Collins submarines are again a major concern, with the most recent mishap requiring a vessel to limp home after a catastrophic engine breakdown. Head of the Defence Materiel Organisation (DMO) Dr Stephen Gumley said the Collins submarines had now gone to the top of the list of troublesome projects - a position once occupied by the now cancelled Seasprite helicopter project. Once labelled "dud subs" after a series of problems, the Collins had undergone a protracted remediation program over the past decade which seemed to have overcome all defects. Following the recent engine breakdown, just one...