NSW is the chief beneficiary of a $4.7 billion federal spending package announced yesterday to boost road, rail and education infrastructure, as well as give business more than $1.6 billion in tax breaks to encourage investment during the economic downturn.

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has urged Australians to quickly spend money they receive as part of the Government's economic stimulus package.

From tomorrow, families, pensioners and some low income earners will start receiving payments as part of the Government's $10.4 billion package designed to keep the economy out of recession.

Mr Rudd says by spending the money quickly, everyone can help to avoid a rise in unemployment.

Dr Dennis Jensen BAppSc (RMIT), MSc (Melb), PhD (Monash) is the only member of the Australian Parliament with a PhD in a science discipline.

Yesterday Dr Jensen suggested in the Australian Parliament that many of the current problems facing the Murray Darling Basin are the result of low runoff as a consequence of changed land management practices (including more plantations in the top of catchments), catchment-wide drainage management plans (place in the 1980s and 1990s to lower water tables) and more efficient water use (resulting in less leakage). 

In the real world outside the U.S. Naval Base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, Barack Obama’s pledge to close Guantánamo and scrap the military commissions (the system of trials for “terror suspects” that was established in the wake of the 9/11 attacks) has provoked a rare outburst of frenzied media coverage.

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has temporarily put aside hostilities on the final scheduled parliamentary sitting day to wish the Opposition a Merry Christmas.

Mr Rudd has used a parliamentary speech to thank all parliamentary staff and his Labor colleagues for their efforts during the Government's first year in office.

In the much praised career of Eric H. Holder Jr., President-elect Barack Obama’s choice to be attorney general, there is one notable blemish: Mr. Holder’s complicated role in the 2001 pardon of Marc Rich, a billionaire financier who had fled the country rather than face federal tax evasion charges.