(an earlier cartoon repeated)...

Fed up with those popular images of the female secret agent, Ms. Wilson decided to draft her own. Eight years after her cover was blown by the political columnist Robert Novak, she has signed a book deal with Penguin Group USA to write a series of international suspense novels, with a fictional operative, Vanessa Pearson, at the center. Ms. Wilson will write them with Sarah Lovett, a best-selling author of mysteries, who also lives in Santa Fe.

The idea for the books, Ms. Wilson said, “was born out of my frustration and continuing disappointment in how female C.I.A. officers are portrayed in popular culture.”

A South Sydney game sky...

from David Brooks

Researchers have been looking into these subtle paraconversations, and in this column I’m going to pile up a sampling of their recent findings. For example, Tobias J. Moskowitz and L. Jon Wertheim wrote a fantastic book excerpt in Sports Illustrated explaining home-field advantage. Home teams win more than visiting teams in just about every sport, and the advantage is astoundingly stable over time. So what explains the phenomenon?

The US military lacks the people and resources to defend the country adequately from concerted cyber attacks, the head of the Pentagon's cyber command has warned.

"We are very thin, and a crisis would quickly stress our cyber forces," Gen Keith Alexander told Congress.

The US says government systems are attacked millions of times a day.

Disputes over budgets are holding up a new cyber protection system ordered by the Department of Homeland Security.

However, some argue the threat of cyber warfare is greatly exaggerated.

picture by Gus — from Stanwell Park

But if Sydney is Elizabeth Taylor, then Melbourne is Helen Mirren. Far from faded glory, Mirren is using her later years to put in some of the best performances of her career. And boy can she rock a swimsuit!

In eight days, when NSW voters boot Labor out of power for the first time in 16 years, it will be less about the rejection of a few wayward politicians who demonstrate a desire to dance about in their underwear. It will be the rejection of what we see reflected in the mirror.

CATHOLIC bishops have warned the faithful against voting for the Greens in the state election, saying some of their policies were of ''grave concern''.

Yesterday the NSW Greens outlined a plan which would transfer government funding from wealthy private schools to public schools.

If Saint Patrick's Day was designed to bring out the blarney, then Tony Abbott and Kevin Rudd last night laid it on thick.

For the second year, Mr Abbott and Mr Rudd spoke at a Brisbane Saint Patrick's eve dinner, a good-humoured affair where the political anecdotes were taken with a pinch of salt - or a pint of guinness.

In his own words, Mr Abbott said he was often described as the love child of John Howard and Bronwyn Bishop.

"They assure me that it was an immaculate conception," Mr Abbott said.

A spike in radiation levels at Japan's stricken Fukushima nuclear plant has forced workers to suspend their operation, a government spokesman says.

He was speaking after smoke was seen rising from reactor three. Earlier, a blaze struck reactor four for the second time in two days.

Friday's 9.0-magnitude earthquake and tsunami, which killed thousands, damaged the plant's cooling functions.

The site has also been hit by four explosions, triggering radiation leaks.

Time was running out for Libya's revolution last night as Muammar Gaddafi's forces routed rebels in the east of the country, driving them into retreat from the town of Brega under a rain of rockets and shells, and opening up the road to the principal opposition stronghold, Benghazi.

CARDINAL GEORGE PELL has rebuffed the head of the Bureau of Meteorology, who had said Australia's highest-ranking Catholic was ''misled'' in his views on global warming.

Dr Greg Ayers told a Senate estimates hearing last month that the Archbishop of Sydney's argument against human-induced climate change was based heavily on a book by Ian Plimer, Heaven and Earth - Global Warming: The Missing Science, which had been discredited by members of the scientific community.

''The contents of the book are simply not scientific. I am concerned that the cardinal has been misled [by its contents],'' the bureau director said.

Senior Liberal Nick Minchin says the globe is more likely to be cooling than warming and has slammed the Government's key climate adviser, Ross Garnaut, as "on the Government's payroll".

Amid fierce debate about the Government's carbon tax plan, Professor Garnaut yesterday warned the scientific case for climate change had strengthened the position that the Earth is warming and that human emissions of greenhouse gases are the main cause.

Senator Minchin - who led the Liberal Party's move to dump leader Malcolm Turnbull over his support for action over climate change - says Professor Garnaut, an economist, "knows nothing about the climate".

MOTORISTS received a petrol jolt at the weekend when the pump price soared in capital cities, with prices reaching almost $1.50 a litre in most Melbourne suburbs.

The price jumped 18c to $1.49.9 a litre in less than 24 hours and fuel price experts laid the blame squarely at supermarket giants Coles and Woolworths.

In Adelaide the average price jumped 13c overnight while Sydney took a 10c hit from Saturday to Sunday, according to Motormouth Fuel Prices.

Independent petrol market analyst David Cumming said consumers should ignore the spike and wait for the price to fall again.