Printable View
Totally agree with you. Citizenship has responsibilites as well as rights. One responsibility is to participate in choosing leaders. Saying you don't like the candidates is a cop out as no candidate will ever be perfect. You can't refuse to vote and then complain you dont like the result. Actions have consequences.
Sent from my SM-G900I using AULRO mobile app
If voting made a difference it wouldn't be allowed [emoji48]
Let's face it, the changes with each 'puppet' are small and insignificant. Whilst the same people in the background (Public servants) go about their reporting, calculating and enforcing of the status quo.
I disagree. With that statement you show a remarkable lack of understanding of the political system.Quote:
Originally Posted by Tombie
Bob
I think I get where Tombie is coming from.
Take qld for example
Huge change of leader a few years ago - hundreds of jobs axed lots of budget cuts
Then it swings back the other way
Lots of reappointments etc etc
If anything the liberal cuts would have cost more due to payouts then the labor reappointments have us back where we started.... the department directors did the bidding of the liberal gov but their natural plan is always going to be of a bigger department
Australia from local council to the Feds is more beuracratic than democratic
S
Quote:
Originally Posted by bob10
No Bob... just a short summation.
Politicians play a short game... the real governing bodies play a much much longer game....
Anyone who believes the Westminster system is for the benefit of the people and society is demonstrating a remarkable amount of ignorance around the political system [emoji6]
Whether the Westminster system a nation is governed under has a second chamber called a House of Lords, or called the senate, whose members represent the States, fulfilling the concept of Federalism, or indeed are like New Zealand, Queensland, Northern Territory and the ACT , which is unicameral, all variations have the same key features;Quote:
Originally Posted by Tombie
The Government is chosen by the democratically elected lower house. The government requires the continuing support of a majority of members of that chamber to stay in office.
The head of government is the Prime Minister, who leads a Cabinet which is responsible to the lower house.
A loyal Opposition exists, led by the leader of the party or parties with the second largest number of seats in the lower house.
A constitutional monarch, if one exists, who is "above politics" and acts on the advice of the prime minister.
There is a career public service which impartially serves the government of the day.
The armed services are outside of politics and act on the instructions of the government.
The rule of law prevails, with an independent judiciary, subject to the Constitution.
No amount of conspiracy theories will change that.
Maybe it's time to evolve the legislative process to the public service, with oversight by what is now our legislative assembly, and do away with the senate?
Andrea Sakharov makes interesting reading (from Wiki) "all governments and regimes to a first approximation are bad, all peoples are oppressed, and all are threatened by common dangers" and "intellectual freedom is essential to human society – freedom to obtain and distribute information, freedom for open-minded and unfearing debate and freedom from pressure by officialdom and prejudices. Such a trinity of freedom of thought is the only guarantee against an infection of people by mass myths, which, in the hands of treacherous hypocrites and demagogues, can be transformed into bloody dictatorship".
And until those democratically elected individuals are held to account for all comments, actions etc rather than hiding behind parliamentary privilege we will get nowhere..
You can quote the structure all you like....
I'm aware of how it's aligned...
But it is self indulgent.
One key point you quoted "a Loyal opposition" there's no loyalty in the party lines anymore...
Preferences and 2 party preferred systems do
Not accurately reflect the people.
Nor does 3 tier government - it is a system so wrapped up in red tape that it costs the people rather than benefits the people...
The original article from this thread would best have been "One mans take on the USA" instead of the antagonistic, click bait, headline which is used to immediately divide and polarise.
Not my headline. One of us is being antagonistic, and it's not me. You shouldn't go over the top, just because some one doesn't agree with you. And I don't.Quote:
Originally Posted by Tombie
Quote:
Originally Posted by bob10
Actually Bob I think context was mixed up...I didn't mean you - I meant the Author and his choice of Headline.
Not the subject heading.....
And yes.. you're the Grenade thrower! I enjoy these threads immensely... they get the mind clicking over...
In this case, the discussion because about the people governing to which you posted a verbatim from the Westminster definition book.. it fails to account for the reality of the world and how it's working....(or not)...
I haven't disagreed with your passages on the structure, just challenged the belief that it makes a difference (a real difference) who we vote for.