Comments on: Federal Election: John Howard, Kevin Rudd…Who Cares?

By: kage

kage — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 07:30:15 +0000

Terrible current account deficit, towering foreign debt and money supply in flood mode. The nice fat farm animals are being enslaved (via housing bubble and mortgage),and can't even feel the shackles tightening.
Economically Oz is a pimple on the backside of the world. The lenders of the world will soon own a lovely strip mine and nuclear waste dump, formerly known as Australia. The faunal emblem of the ACT, where our federal capital Canberra is located, is the Gang-Gang Cockatoo. A less polite name is Galah (a byword for really stupid). Pretty appropriate.

By: TechnoFreak

TechnoFreak — Wed, 13 Jun 2007 10:02:30 +0000

I concur with your observations about Oz. We are engulfed in a comfort zone that seems to have no end. A deep luscious couch that we laze on at the end of every day and accept our programming.
It worries me that our apparent wealth is in the hands of a global movement rather than good management. I dont for one minute believe that our current leaders of Oz are responsible for the wealth that pours into this great wide (dry) land.
Unlike you fine chaps I am not in finance yet I know what a rat smells like....

By: Chris. Fulker

Chris. Fulker — Wed, 13 Jun 2007 05:37:25 +0000

Of course they don't care! There is no "working class" anymore, anywhere in the West. There might also be little or no distinction anymore between "white collar" and "blue collar": they make about the same pay, do similar sinecures of jobs... There is only the Consuming Class. Well-fed farm animals - maybe sheep! - are only concerned about what's in front of their noses and what's for dinner. Their time horizon extends no further than tonight's prime-time TV slot offerings. So all the political parties offer this - no change, life-goes-on-as-ever-before soporifics, reassurances and now and then, guarantees that life will be secure with nothing scary under the bed. Maybe free money helicopter drops for those deemed in need. Depend on the government! Long Live Consumerism! The government. My government. It's always there to help those in need... So modern politics is merely administrative. Authoritarian when stability is threatened. Or the threats are imagined. Or conjured up. The dominant ideology might best be termed "authoritarian consumerism".

By: Adrian Liston

Adrian Liston — Wed, 13 Jun 2007 05:36:42 +0000

Well that was about as superficial insight as I've ever seen. The ALP is hardly socialist, while Australia in general believes in social support (such as universal health care), the ALP does not (unfortunately) propose pushing it much further than it already is. One wonders if you have read the ALP policy on Industrial Reforms, from the false Union soundbite it sounds like you relied on John Howard to read it for you. One also wonders if you have been awake the past decade - Australians do have very good reasons for wanting Howard out, and they are not based on his eyebrows.

Finally, it seems like you miss the entire point of government. We as a society have to make society-wide judgement calls. We control government, they are making our value calls, not their own. You complain about the government "telling us where to smoke, how much water to bathe with, and what kind of car to drive" and postulate that the world would be a better place. Yeah, a place where children would be forced to suck in second-hand smoke and develop cancer, where water would be rapidly used up by greedy corporations to leave us thirsty, and where car manufacturers have unlimited pollution, covering our cities in soot.

Libertarians complain about government imagining that anarchy is such a wonderful place. Save your complaining for bad government instead.