I went to the Bolt blog today and I do have to admit to visiting it from time to time. I'm pretty sure there's no way on earth I'll ever agree with him, but I'm always curious to hear other perspectives. I'm not so set in my ways that I'm not open to other ideas.
What I found though was perplexing. From Bolt himself there was the usual. He was defending the PM in saying that Shorten was an economic Goebbels. The line was to be expected - that Labor has also invoked Goebbels, so therefore what the PM said was ok. Sorry Bolty, but two wrongs don't make a right.
Bolt made no distinction between Dreyfus saying that a media campaign was Goebbelian in scope and nature, and the PM saying that Shorten was like Goebbels. They are different things - the PM played the man and not the ball. The PM was wrong, he knew that he was wrong and immediately withdrew his comments.
On the other hand, Bolt wasn't entirely wrong. No, of course I don't agree with the way that Goebbels was invoked today, but I don't necessarily have a problem with the invocation itself. This is our history, and it does us no good to sweep it under the carpet and pretend it didn't happen. On the contrary we should be raising it repeatedly so we can learn from it and ensure that it never happens again.
I admit though that I was surprised when I read the comments on Bolt's blog - because a sentiment that was repeated was that the Labor party were Nazi-like. It went kind of like "why would they be upset about being compared to their heroes" and "well if they didn't want to be compared to Nazi's then they should change their ways".
I can't for the life of me understand why anyone would think the Labor Party are like the Nazis. I asked the question Bolt's blog but, unsurprisingly, my comment was not published.
Without having the benefit of a reply from those who made those accusations, I've been left to come to my own conclusions - and I can only come up with the idea that the Labor party are perceived to be Socialist, and there is some resulting confusion between Socialism and Fascism.
I actually can't expend any intellectual effort to justify that position - it's too fucking hard to engage in the mental gymnastics needed to make it work, because it doesn't, because it's just not logical.
I will say, however, that one of the things I learned during my Arts degree (which according to this government is completely useless, but that's another story!), the political spectrum does not exist on an horizon - its a sphere - when you get far enough to the right, you meet up with the far left.
So I do kind of understand how Bolt's bloggers will perceive something so far left that they see it as far right. The Nazi's fascism is far right. Socialism, as it exists within our political discourse, is moderately left. We've really not seen anything since Marx that was far left - certainly nothing worthy of challenging our capitalist assumptions. Yet the political centre has moved so far to the right that anything left of centre is seen as socialist.
I'm not here advocating communism, but surely a little more social cohesion is not a bad thing. Apparently in this day and age anything less than advocating a complete and total free market is seen as socialist. And that's the only way I can logically connect Bolt's bloggers assertions that the Labor Party is in any way Nazi-like - if they appear anything less than completely free-market, then they must be socialist/fascist - far enough left to seem far-right.
I could try to explain that National Socialism is not Socialism. I could try to explain that Socialism is not Communism. I could try to distinguish an economic philosophy from a political one, but in all honesty, I think I'd just be wasting my breath. I would have tried if Bolt had published my comment and his bloggers had engaged with me, but it didn't serve their purpose and so I was shut out.
It's sad that dissenting voices can be so easily shut out. I certainly don't claim to have all the answers, but it would be nice to have a robust debate.
Thursday 19 March 2015
Are political parties the problem with our democracy?
Well, that's a stupid question - of course they are!
There's nothing inherently wrong with like-minded people banding together to achieve a common goal, but something is very, very wrong with our system of government when those people forget that they were elected by their constituents to represent our interests, not the interests of their party.
Our elected representatives seem to have forgotten it, and so has a large swathe of the voting public who seem to think its an 'us' against 'them' proposition. I did not vote for a particular party - I voted for the person I trusted to best represent my interests, and the interests of my community.
The concept of a conscience vote should not exist - every vote should be a conscience vote. If it was a policy you brought to the electorate at election time, then you're on stronger ground, but one would hope that our MPs would still exercise the cognitive fortitude to consider all aspects of proposed legislation and not be blind 'yes' men and women. If they don't, then voting along 'party lines' is merely a euphemism for 'I couldn't be bothered to think for myself'.
I'm pretty sure that's what happened today, because I can't see, by any stretch of the imagination, that the data retention laws are in anyone's best interests. And yet the chamber during the vote looked like this:
It doesn't take much common sense to work out that the reason for that is because these data retention laws are not designed to stop terrorism, or kiddie porn, or any of the other justifications that have been proposed - they're designed to catch illegal downloaders.
The Labor Party learned that, when they try to go against Rupert, even in the very modest way they did under Rudd/Gillard, they will be crucified. Rupert gets what Rupert wants - cross him at your peril.
I wonder whether perhaps some of these MPs had the wherewithal to realise that and reasoned that perhaps it was better to give a little on this issue in order to gain or retain power to make broader changes. On the one hand I think that that reasoning was wholeheartedly wrong, on the other, I kind of hope that their thought processes did extend that far rather than simply brainlessly voting along party lines. Make no mistake, neither of them are good choices, but at least in one scenario they applied independent thought.
Yet looking at that photo of the chamber I just can't believe that every single member of the Labor Party applied independent thought and still decided to vote to pass these laws. Can they all really be so intellectually vapid that they actually believe that these laws are good for the people of Australia? I'm naive enough to hope that they're not all that dumb.
They do, however, appear to be dumb enough to think that if the party chiefs tell them to vote a certain way, then they should. That's not the way it's supposed to work. And guess what dummies - there is no higher purpose than our freedom. We're not going to reward you for selling us out. Sure, you might get a few more terms on the basis that you're just slightly better than the other guy - but more and more people are starting to wake up to your game, they're starting to wake up to the bias in our media, and they're starting to realise that you are in it for yourselves.
We're awake - are you?
There's nothing inherently wrong with like-minded people banding together to achieve a common goal, but something is very, very wrong with our system of government when those people forget that they were elected by their constituents to represent our interests, not the interests of their party.
Our elected representatives seem to have forgotten it, and so has a large swathe of the voting public who seem to think its an 'us' against 'them' proposition. I did not vote for a particular party - I voted for the person I trusted to best represent my interests, and the interests of my community.
The concept of a conscience vote should not exist - every vote should be a conscience vote. If it was a policy you brought to the electorate at election time, then you're on stronger ground, but one would hope that our MPs would still exercise the cognitive fortitude to consider all aspects of proposed legislation and not be blind 'yes' men and women. If they don't, then voting along 'party lines' is merely a euphemism for 'I couldn't be bothered to think for myself'.
The authorities can already subpoena your data, they can already access your history - but they need to get a warrant first and they need to have some basis on which to investigate you that justifies the issuing of that warrant. Under the new laws, even as amended, some government apparatchik is to decide what is an is not in the national interest, who is and who is not worthy of protection.
Apparently our current elected representatives know better, apparently they are more than happy to throw out hundreds of years of legal and political history and to undermine our entire system of government.
We have a separation of powers for a reason. The executive has claimed powers previously (and rightly) allocated to the judiciary. This is bad legislation and yet no-one, from either of the two major political parties, was willing to stand up against it.
It doesn't take much common sense to work out that the reason for that is because these data retention laws are not designed to stop terrorism, or kiddie porn, or any of the other justifications that have been proposed - they're designed to catch illegal downloaders.
The Labor Party learned that, when they try to go against Rupert, even in the very modest way they did under Rudd/Gillard, they will be crucified. Rupert gets what Rupert wants - cross him at your peril.
I wonder whether perhaps some of these MPs had the wherewithal to realise that and reasoned that perhaps it was better to give a little on this issue in order to gain or retain power to make broader changes. On the one hand I think that that reasoning was wholeheartedly wrong, on the other, I kind of hope that their thought processes did extend that far rather than simply brainlessly voting along party lines. Make no mistake, neither of them are good choices, but at least in one scenario they applied independent thought.
Yet looking at that photo of the chamber I just can't believe that every single member of the Labor Party applied independent thought and still decided to vote to pass these laws. Can they all really be so intellectually vapid that they actually believe that these laws are good for the people of Australia? I'm naive enough to hope that they're not all that dumb.
They do, however, appear to be dumb enough to think that if the party chiefs tell them to vote a certain way, then they should. That's not the way it's supposed to work. And guess what dummies - there is no higher purpose than our freedom. We're not going to reward you for selling us out. Sure, you might get a few more terms on the basis that you're just slightly better than the other guy - but more and more people are starting to wake up to your game, they're starting to wake up to the bias in our media, and they're starting to realise that you are in it for yourselves.
We're awake - are you?
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