Makarrata

The First Nations Peoples have spoken. 

I fully expected this result.
And I wholeheartedly support it. 

Unfortunately, any changes to the Australian constitution needs to go to a referendum and allow the tyranny of the majority an opportunity to vote it down. 

Any opposition needs to be quashed!

No ifs, no buts. 

This is not a decision that should be left in the hands of ill-informed, bigoted, racist people to deny the first peoples their rightful voice. 

There should be no debate. 
Zero debate. 

It simply needs to happen. 

The First Peoples of our nation have decided on the only pathway to assure their sovereign futures and it is our responsibility as fellow human beings to support this absolutely, resolutely, unequivocally. 

We should look to our neighbours for enlightenment and with great humility acknowledge that the chosen pathway will have very little effect on our individual lives but will do an infinite greatness for all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders. 

I stand with my indigenous brothers and sisters, united as Australians, to say that this is your moment and I know you will shine through the struggle that lies ahead, knowing that it is nothing compared to the many great struggles that are behind you. 

You have spoken and my ears have heard.

If there are marches, you will have my feet.

When you face opposition, you will have my voice.

And if the country splits you will have my allegiance.

That is my Makarrata with you.

Lifestyle choices: the reality behind a PM's gaffe

The Prime Minister has come under fire for yet another verbal gaffe by referring to remote indigenous communities as being a "lifestyle choice". But what does this really mean, and is our much maligned PM a bumbling fool or is he correct? Definitely the first, but probably both.

The term "lifestyle choice" is fraught with danger. It is the favoured pejorative of the anti-homosexual campaigners, the phrase used to denigrate someone's core being and dismiss them as insignificant or to blame them for the discrimination they face, the illness they acquire, and the difficulties they encounter through life.

For that very reason the phrase should never be used by a public official as a political tool to wield like an axe for budget cuts. We are still dealing with human beings who need empathy and deserve solutions that will lift them up, not cast them aside.

Just for the moment I'm going to work with the intent of our misspoken PM, in context, and give him the benefit of the doubt that he rarely ever deserves, rather than joining the angry mob relaying the inferred and emotive response of the media and the left leaning public. 

So I say this with much thought and unrelenting candour: for some people, living in a remote community IS a lifestyle and it is a choice.

Just like the family working a drought stricken farm or moving to a mining town, just like choosing between suburban life or a CBD apartment; to marry, or not; to have children, or not; to practice religion, or not. Each of us makes numerous choices every day of the year that determine the lifestyle we lead. 

For some that decision to remain in a remote community without employment, with low quality housing and poor access to essential services might also be a choice. But we must also recognise that for others it is a rut, a crutch, or a death sentence from which they might desire to escape.

Just because you are born in a place, doesn't mean you need to stay there, even if you feel tied by family, culture, country, or the fantasy of the dreamtime, which is a religion in all but name. The choice to stay or leave still belongs to the individual.

Nobody should be forced from their home or land, yet there are many instances where the best interests of the individual require authorities to step in and force relocation. The octogenarian battling dementia can no longer live alone in their home of 60 years and is relocated to a nursing home; the children that are removed from an abusive family; the town of Wittenoom evacuated because of continuing asbestos concerns.

I am not suggesting that indigenous people in remote communities should be forced to relocate, but perhaps we can provide significant incentives to encourage them to seek better opportunities, for themselves and their children. Relocation assistance, jobs and housing could be the ticket to a better life if only the opportunity was available. Alas, the current system  is insufficient as an incentive to overcome the strong ties to country and the issues of intergenerational poverty that goes with it.

At the very least we should take Warren Mundine's suggestion of creating regional boarding schools where children can attend and then return to their communities for weekends. This can help ensure that appropriate education and health levels for children are attained while giving families and communities the long term opportunity to develop, become sustainable and even flourish. 

The future of our indigenous Australians in remote communities is currently bleak, but it can be powerful. We need a government that is willing to step up and work with communities to incentivise positive outcomes, rather than cast blame or legislate penalties for negative outcomes.

We all have a right to make our lifestyle choices, but society works best when the playing field is designed so that everyone can be assisted to make the choices that are best for them.

10 terrorist targets that are better than Parliament House

Our politicians are worried about their workplace being a potential target for a terrorist attack so they have beefed up security to make themselves feel better and our citizens safer, or at least the few thousand that work and visit each day can feel a little more safer than they otherwise would have going through the layers of security that already existed before the #TerrorHysteria invaded.

As much as many of us would enjoy seeing the demise of a few upon Capital Hill, we actually like our billion dollar flagpole and some of the people we elected to sit under it. So, with tongue firmly planted in cheek, I offer the dummies guide to 10 better targets for prospective terrorists to leave their mark on Australia.

Graphic sourced from www.smh.com.au

10. AFL/NRL clubs or stadiums
You can't get much more Australian than sport, and you won't get more Australians enlisting in the defence force to fight against your fundamentalism than if you target their beloved national religion. It's also one of the few places you can be assured of getting tens of thousands of innocent people in one location as well as live media coverage of your attack sponsored by alcohol, gambling, interest charging banks or burgers with crispy bacon. But be careful of which team you target; an attack on Collingwood might get you more thanks than vitriol, especially if you take out Eddie McGuire in the process.

9. Australian Christian Lobby

As its name implies this is a lobby group comprised mainly of conservative, fundamentalist pseudo-Christian fanatics. It has been often argued that they may be one of the most, if not the most, influential lobby group in Canberra. They regularly garner the attention of politicians from both sides of the House to speak at their functions and conferences, where issues like abortion, sexuality, marriage and the sanctity of the 'family' unit is never up for negotiation. Please, take them. We don't like them either.

8. The Tall Poppies

Basically we would like those on our rich list to be taken down a peg or two:

Rupert Murdoch - he still thinks he is Australian and is able to influence our politics even though he technically doesn't get a vote.

Gina Reinhart - amongst other things she is renowned for the fourth worst poetry in the universe, unless you believe the rumours that she is actually a Vogon, in which case she rises to third place.

Andrew Forrest - seems to mean well, but can't keep his pesky nose out of Gina's anal gland and seems to have an unbelievable simplistic solution to every social and welfare issue known to humanity. 

7. Catch the Fire Ministries

As one of the most deplorable and bigoted 'Christians' in Australia, particularly focusing his hate speech towards Islam and homosexuality, Pastor Danny Nalliah is deserving of a fatwa, a jihad, a crusade or an untimely death from venereal ebola. He is the founder and President of an evangelical pseudo-Christian church, leader of the Rise Up Australia party, self-proclaimed healer and resurrector of the dead and a moronic young earth creationist amongst many more failings as a modern hominid. Danny recently celebrated his 50th birthday by thanking his mother for not aborting him. If only we could go back in time and convince her otherwise.

6. Adolf Hitler

Speaking of time travel, instead of being a terrorist you could use your boundless energy, endless resources and merciless martyrdom to perfect time travel and go back to the 1930s to kill Hitler, thereby preventing world war 2 and the Holocaust. This would allow the Jews to remain in Europe, Israel would never be established, the Middle East would never have been unfairly conquered and divided and Islam could remain a peaceful religion without all that nasty baggage. 

5. Australian Family Association

Founded by fundamentalist Catholics, notably the infamous B.A. Santamaria, as the National Civic Council, the core premise of its existence is similar to the ACL in attempting to 'promote the family as the natural and fundamental unit of society'. Unmarried cohabitation, children out of wedlock, single parents, non-heterosexual relationships and access to IVF or adoption by anyone other than a married couple is offensive to them. Their most vociferous spokespeople have previously warned the public of the secret agenda to turn your boys gay, your girls into prostitutes and to legalise pedophilia and bestiality.

4.Australian Defence League

A nationalist and xenophobic rabble that was once anti-Semitic but found an easier and more popular target in Islam. Apart from racist and Islamophobic rants across the Internet, particularly through its social media accounts, the organisation has come under recent scrutiny after the revelation that members of the Royal Australian Navy involved in the divisive 'Operation Sovereign Borders' are also members of the ADL. 

Because of the apparent lack of a single hierarchy or formal structure of this movement it is a difficult target, but one whose annihilation would receive resounding secular and cross-party applause around the nation.

3. Political arsehats

Pauline Hanson, Cory Bernardi, Jacqui Lambie, Mark Latham and Christopher Pyne to begin with, but we could easily list a hundred more. Yes, they are only morons and hardly anyone takes them seriously, but that potentially makes them very dangerous, especially if they were to team up like a nightmarish pack of Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers.

2. Shock Jocks

Andrew Bolt: Convicted perpetrator of hate-speech, self-affirming bigot, general egomaniac and rabid conservative douchebag.

Kyle Sandilands: Moron. Enough said.

Alan Jones: a rabid conservative and, unfortunately, popularly divisive celebrity talkback radio host with a mouth like a 17th century syphillitic tavern wench with Tourette's. He tops this list because of his unmatched ability to excite the masses and potentially incite violence and atrocities against innocent people.  His demise can not come too soon, particularly if it is caused by being put in 'a chaff bag and thrown into the sea' as he once suggested be done with former Prime Minister, Julia Gillard.

1. Yourself

Seriously, if you want to make a public statement using martyrdom to promote your cause then just blow yourself up in a wide open space with no one else around. I am happy to post your message on YouTube and ensure that you are remembered as a complete douchebag along with everyone else on this list. Please accept that as a small token of my appreciation for making this world a better place by your absence.

The by-election that wasn't

This was not a by election, it was a wake up call for all of Canberra and each of the state governments. And the message is clear; ignore the citizens at your own peril. 

There are undoubtedly a few sore political heads in the wake of he Western Australian Senate re-election held over the weekend. Counting is still in progress, and will continue for some time. It will probably be a couple of weeks before we know who has gained the final seat but we can be fairly certain that we have two Liberals, one Labor, one Green and one PUP, with the two old parties competing for the final seat.

While each party will be claiming its own victories, putting whatever small spin they can manage into action, the rest of us need to take a step back and assess what might have actually happened. It is all guesswork obviously, we cannot make any conclusions on the motivations of voters, there are only assumptions.

So what went wrong and what went right? Let's look at each party in detail before we assume to understand the big picture.

Liberal v Labor

It is fair to say that a big swing against both parties is always expected when viable alternatives are present. We have seen it when the Democrats were in their prime and with the rise of Pauline Hanson or Family First. These are the real swinging voters, not simply disaffected followers of the two old parties. Many political boffins put the swinging vote as high as 20-30%, but I believe it to be about 15% as I prefer to exclude the recidivist protest voters, like myself, who never vote for either major party. 

The Liberals, particularly Eric Abetz, were premature to claim that the ALP had a greater swing against them than did the Liberals. The current state of play is that the swings are fairly close with the Liberals down 5.5 and Labor 4.8. 

What is more discerning is the combined results of the traditional allies. The Nationals felt a big blow losing a third of their base meaning the Coalition vote decreased by a total of 7.5 percentage points against the combined ALP/Greens vote, which increased by 1.6 points. Even if you assume that the right shifted into the hands of Palmer United Party it leaves the right with a zero change and the left with a slight increase.

Part of their woes also relied on the fact that the Liberals were busy attacking Labor and failed to deal with the real competition, PUP. In addition both lead candidates for Liberal and Labor were noticeably absent from the campaign. Whatever you may think of the average voter, one thing for sure is that they do not appreciate being taken for granted.

It is also clear that the ALP ostracised some of the left with the painful antics of Joe Bullock. Revelations in the last few days of the campaign would have seriously damaged the Labor vote and I suggest that a great many loyal ALP voters went below the line to support Louise Pratt while some others just moved elsewhere, mostly to the Greens. I predict that Louise Pratt will acquire the final seat based on a strong below the line vote from those voters.

Unlike some pundits, I don't think that this had anything to do with the state Barnett government, but no doubt the shark cull policy has attracted some support towards the Greens. 

The Greens

Regardless of your politics it is fair to say that The Greens ran one of the best campaigns of their history. Scott Ludlam was everywhere and he stayed on message. It paid out in big dividends with a full quota in their own right and left he ALP's Louise Pratt reliant upon the remainder, as well as strong preference flows, to potentially secure a second Labor seat. 

Scott Ludlam's tour de force was undoubtedly his Senate speech to the Prime Minister which gained viral momentum akin to Julia Gillard's misogyny speech. Tony Abbott now seems to have the record for being the subject of the most watched videos of any Australian politician, all negative.

Palmer United Party

PUP was always going to be strong and they have managed to capture the vast majority of protest votes against the coalition. They had the second biggest media presence and again ran a decent campaign appealing to their core constituency, whatever that might actually be - the jury is still out on that one. 

Many, including myself, have criticised Palmer for running ridiculous advertising messages promising taxation and other reforms that will be undeliverable and sometimes just pure mathematical fantasy. However, the popularity of the party seems to indicate that fiction is more trustworthy than fact to the politically uneducated. There is clearly an element of Australia for whom Palmer has found a heartwarming, but perhaps fickle, kinship.

Are you listening?

It is my conclusion that the result of this unprecedented Senate election was a direct message to the Abbott government; the voters of Western Australia are disapproving of the current two-party political system and especially of the Abbott agenda. 

However, while they disapprove of the Coalition, they remain uncertain of Labor as a viable alternative preferring to support a third way. 33.7% of Western Australian voters support the Liberals while 21.8% are behind Labor. Neither party has a mandate and only barely make a majority between them. 44.5% of the state prefer an alternative to the traditional parties. These are undeniably strong figures that should not be ignored. 

They should also ignore at their peril the clear fact that two strong contenders for alternative governance are emerging in the years to come. The Greens are clearly filling the gap left by the defunct Australian Democrats and PUP are following in he wake of One Nation to provide an alternative for the right.

We live in interesting political times.