Snippets:

Tasmania is no longer the Welfare State, or the Apple Isle, but the Crash State. Blame is given to those who actually deserve it:

TASMANIA has the second- highest road fatality rate in the nation and dangerous driving is to blame, new statistics show.

Europe has gas.

Putin began the news conference by praising the deal, under which Ukraine will pay an average of $95 per 1,000 cubic meters for gas in 2006, nearly double the price it paid last year. Gazprom had demanded that Ukraine pay $230 instead.

(Oh, and Putin’s tie is much better than Yushchenko’s.)

Muscular Liberals recommend some good reading on a bad writer:

It's hard to believe that publishers are still willing to print books consisting of such long discredited arguments and even harder to understand how they keep selling. As Cushman says, once you've read one you've read them all.