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Seawitch sends this awesome video of Aussie lass Beccy Cole who is singing "Poster Girl" in response to some of her fans who disagree with her supporting the Diggers, the Australian soldiers fighting in The Long War. Simply put, it is amazing...turn it up:

IT’S a yellow flag with three red stripes. But an attempt to ban the South Vietnamese flag from flying over memorials to Australians killed and injured during the Vietnam war has upset veterans and the Australian Vietnamese community. And it forced the third — but largely unseen — back flip by the Federal Government in as many days. Backbench revolts over plans to send all boat people to islands for asylum processing and a ban on therapeutic cloning for stem cell research dominated the news. Behind the scenes, a quieter rebellion was brewing. Veterans’ associations in Queens-land, Victoria and South...

An attack on a Sydney synagogue may have been fueled by anger over the Middle East conflict and the spiraling civilian death toll in Lebanon, a rabbi said Monday. Rabbi Wernick, who cited religious reasons in declining to give his first name, and his young family were inside a house attached to a synagogue in suburban Parramatta when it was attacked Sunday evening. Concrete blocks smashed the windows of two cars, and other projectiles were hurled at the synagogue roof. Shortly after the incident, witnesses told police they saw a group of about 10 Middle Eastern men laughing and running...

(SYDNEY, Australia) -- The thin man is back behind bars. Police in Sydney, Australia, report recapturing an inmate who went on crash diet to escape from custody. Authorities charge Robert Cole dropped more than 30 pounds and squeezed through a hole in a wall just six inches wide. Cole escaped from a hospital Wednesday, but he wasn't on the street very long. Officers captured him over the weekend. They say Cole tried to disguise himself by drawing a beard on his face in pen. He's now in maximum security. No word, though, if guards are trying to fatten up Cole.

Tell gangs you're an Aussie: Iemma By Jonathan Porter 15-12-2005 From: The Australian   NSW Premier Morris Iemma has called on people not to renounce their Australian identity in the face of intimidation by Lebanese gangs - even if it means being bashed. His advice came after victims of rioting in Sydney told how they were asked if they were Australian before being attacked by large groups of Middle Eastern men. Mr Iemma said that if approached, people should say: "I'm Australian and this is Australia and this is a country that is here to be shared by all. "(We...

Chilling call to arms via SMS December 19, 2005TEXT messages on seized mobile phones have revealed calls for Arabs to unite in a war against "rednecks" and to "take Sydney from Cronulla to The Rocks".Police yesterday used new powers to confiscate mobile phones, to check for SMS messages calling for violence. Police Commissioner Ken Moroney said his officers were yesterday specially instructed to target mobile phones, after text messages were used to urge race violence at Cronulla. One officer was photographed scrolling through the contents of at least six phones. Five men of Middle Eastern descent were yesterday arrested in...

In Australia this week amidst anger over an Islamic man’s rape conviction and the bashing of two Aussie life savers, working-class locals erupted in a rampage of anger and brawling in some of the worst racial riots in decades. But there is more to the story than is being repeated in the American mainstream media.... Four days after he set foot in Australia, the rape spree began. And during his sexual assault trial in a New South Wales courtroom, the Pakistani man began to berate one of his tearful 14-year-old victims because she had the temerity to shake her head...

NSW Premier Morris Iemma has called on people not to renounce their Australian identity in the face of intimidation by Lebanese gangs - even if it means being bashed. His advice came after victims of rioting in Sydney told how they were asked if they were Australian before being attacked by large groups of Middle Eastern men. Mr Iemma said that if approached, people should say: "I'm Australian and this is Australia and this is a country that is here to be shared by all. "(We are) Australian and proud of it and they're not going to - with baseball...

POLICE prepared to impose a virtual blockade on Sutherland Shire last night, erecting checkpoints on every main access road to prevent a repeat of the race riots at Cronulla. And State Parliament will be recalled tomorrow to give police emergency powers to lock down parts of Sydney, ban the sale of alcohol, conduct random searches and confiscate vehicles. An extra 450 police took to the streets in expectation of a third night of racial tension. Officers restricted in-bound traffic to Cronulla to one lane and checked every car passing a checkpoint on Kingsway, at the corner of Wilbar Avenue, from...

A man tries to hit police with a beer bottle at Cronulla Beach in Sydney, Australia, Sunday, Dec. 11, 2005, after ethnic tensions erupted into running battles between police and a mob of thousands of youths, many chanting racial slurs. At least six people were arrested and several injured in alcohol-fueled fights at the beach. (AP Photo/Rob Griffith)

Bali, Tampa, 9/11: a potpourri of causes THE flashpoint for the race riot came when a teenager of so-called "Middle Eastern appearance" made his way defiantly through the car park heading for Cronulla beach. According to one witness, when the mob jeered him, the 17-year-old yelled back: it was his beach, too, and he had every right to swim there. The mob, freshly fuelled up on a cocktail of booze and racist propaganda from the Australia First movement, thought otherwise. A mob gave chase, screaming racial obscenities, hurling beer bottles and turning on police who tried to stop them. "They...

THE US no longer expects Australia to automatically support it in a conflict with China over the flashpoint of Taiwan, Bush administration officials have told Australian MPs. The message was delivered by US military, Pentagon and State Department officials to a delegation of visiting MPs, before John Howard delivered one of his strongest speeches in New York last week distinguishing Australia's approach to China from that of the US. Under the ANZUS treaty there has been an expectation that Australia would support the US in a conflict over Taiwan. But Foreign Minister Alexander Downer shocked the region with a speech...

SYDNEY (Reuters) - An Australian man built up a 40,000-volt charge of static electricity in his clothes as he walked, leaving a trail of scorched carpet and molten plastic and forcing firefighters to evacuate a building. Frank Clewer, who was wearing a woollen shirt and a synthetic nylon jacket, was oblivious to the growing electrical current that was building up as his clothes rubbed together. When he walked into a building in the country town of Warrnambool in the southern state of Victoria on Thursday, the electrical charge ignited the carpet. "It sounded almost like a firecracker", Clewer told Australian...

The sweat-stained felt hats worn by Australian cowboys, as much a part of the Outback as kangaroos and sun-baked soil, may be heading for the history books. They fail modern industrial safety standards. It all stems from the death of a cowboy, who suffered massive head injuries after being trampled in a fall from a horse while mustering bulls in July 2001. His sole protection was the tattered hat provided him for shading from the sun. The New South Wales state government brought charges against the ranch owner, who employed 23-year-old Daniel Croker, convicting and fining the company $72,000 last...

Prime Minister John Howard's election victory would boost the confidence of US President George W Bush and his Republican Party, Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said. Mr Downer agreed Mr Bush, currently embroiled in a hard-fought campaign for re-election on November 2, had probably taken heart from Mr Howard's victory. But he said it was hard to believe the Australian election result would resonate in the US for more than a day or two. "I suppose it's much more a question just of a confidence boost for them," Mr Downer told the Nine network. "If the Australian government had lost the...

Drunken police raid US students LUKE MORFESSE - CRIME REPORTER A group of drunken off-duty police officers forced American students to kneel on the ground at their Fremantle dormitory while taunting and humiliating them about the United States involvement in Iraq. The incident is one of several being investigated by police internal affairs after a wild night in two of the port city's popular night spots involving seven WA police and two NSW officers. Some of the worst behaviour was inflicted on patrons at the Orient Hotel, where one of the officers vomited across the bar after the drunken group...

British-born man admits bomb plot By Nick Squires in Sydney (Filed: 29/05/2004) A British-born Muslim convert was convicted yesterday of plotting to bomb the Israeli embassy in Canberra. Convicted: Jack Roche Jack Roche, 50, who discussed the plot with Osama bin Laden at a camp in Afghanistan, had originally pleaded not guilty at Perth district court. But halfway through the trial his lawyers asked for the charge to be read out again and he replied: "Guilty". Roche, who was arrested in November 2002, is the first Australian citizen to be convicted of a terrorist offence and faces a maximum 25...

AN Australian trained with Spanish al-Qa'ida militants in a camp in war-torn Poso, central Sulawesi, according to intelligence reports. Security expert Ken Conboy told The Australian the terrorist training camp was set up in an abandoned Christian village about 10km east of Poso. There was some al-Qa'ida funding for the camp, he said, but he was unsure whether it was for food, transport or buildings. At least one photo exists of militants in the Poso camp. Mr Conboy said the Spanish militants abandoned the camp late in 2001. He speculated that the September 11, 2001, attacks in the US had...

<p>SYDNEY -- The makers of Kazaa, the peer-to-peer file sharing software, failed to quash a court order Thursday that allowed the music industry to raid its Sydney-based offices, prompting a furious response from its chief executive.</p> <p>In February, the music industry was granted an Anton Piller order, which grants copyright holders the rights of search and seizure, allowing it to raid 12 sites across Australia to seize documents and data. Sites raided included the offices of Sharman Networks, the home of its chief executive, several universities and other companies that were believed to be holding information relating to Kazaa.</p>

Qantas is resisting pressure to install new systems to defend its fleet against terrorist missile attacks, throwing the responsibility for protecting its aircraft back onto government. The airline's CEO, Geoff Dixon, rejected suggestions that it deploy expensive decoy systems against surface-to-air missiles, saying these would would cost nearly $700 million to protect the international fleet alone. Mr Dixon also questioned the effectiveness of the systems and said the best way to deal with the missile threat would be for governments in Australia and the region to identify potential launch sites near airports. His comments came after the Prime Minister, John...