Really? My Panasonic is really fast, plus I think its the only ultra small p-n-s with image stabilization (works GREAT btw).
We've gone through a lot of point and shoot digital cameras in my house, and the ones that are about 2 years old are really slow but the newer ones are quite fast. My mom's Cybershot (DSC-S90) is about a year and a half old and is quite quick. My Panasonic Lumix the fastest I've seen.
http://s9.photobucket.com/albums/a97/zguy95135/Night%20Photoshoot/
Night shots using a 1 second exposure (on fireworks setting), tripod (except the first two) and no flash. (keep in mind they look much better uncompressed, photobucket takes away some contrast, and gives it more grain then it actually has). They are shrunk down from 3072x1728 to 950x534.