As a political party is essentially a collection of like minded individuals, endorsement to a seat is based on similar values. Banning dis endorsement of a renegade is not only constitutionally impossible, but a contradiction in terms.

The system of preferences is put in place to mitigate the "winner takes it all" aspect of the Westminster system, however, this makes it extremely difficult for independents to win seats.

Combined with the compulsory voting, and the resultant "donkey votes" which over whelming go to the major parties, the lower house is unlikely to field many independents.

DISAPPEARING FROM HISTORY(Part 1)

In the last months of my career as a full-time teacher in 1998/99 in Western Australia and the first months of my sea-change and retirement in Tasmania at the age of 55, Augusto Pinochet was back in the news. I had first come across his name and his activity in Chile while teaching high school in Whyalla South Australia in September 1973, the very month I was hired for a position as senior tutor in human relations at the then Tasmanian College of Advanced Education. On both these occasions, in the 1970s and at the turn of the millennium, I was so occupied with my 60 hours a week job as a high school teacher and senior tutor and then 25 years later as a post-secondary teacher as well as my role in the Baha’i community--another people-centred activity--that I did not really appreciate the details of the story connected with this Chilean dictator’s role in politics and contemporary history.

I won’t go into the details of Pinochet’s political role and his personal, military and notorious history in this prose-poem. Readers can easily find that out on the internet or in books should they be interested in the topic. But on watching the doco-drama, telemovie, Pinochet in Suburbia1 last night and on reading some background on his life and on the history of Chile, I came to form a considered opinion—not so much about Pinochet the man as about the importance of international law in any true democracy in the modern world.-Ron Price with thanks to 1SBS TV, “Pinochet in Suburbia,” 11:55-1:30 p.m. 6 June to 7 June 2010.

My world was a hot, intense landscape
in a dry-dog-biscuit of a town far down
at the bottom-end of the world where I
had come as a young man so long ago--
when I heard the name Pinochet---“was
he an Indian?” I thought to myself trying
as I was to survive after falling in holes in
my young adult-life…..I fell in a few more
before I heard that name in the closing years
of the mirabile dictu incredible century. He’d
been a busy man as I had been a busy man in
those years from 1973 to 1999 and he was a
busy man again in suburbia in the UK1 before
he disappeared from history bit by bit2 while I,
too, was disappearing from history, taking up
a life in cyberspace much safer and protected
from the slings--arrows of outrageous fortune.

1 Pinochet was placed under house arrest in Britain and was at the centre of a judicial and public relations battle, the latter run by Thatcherite political operative Patrick Robertson. He was eventually released in March 2000 on medical grounds by the Home Secretary Jack Straw without facing trial. Pinochet returned to Chile on 3 March 2000. The TV program, the telemovie, I watched tonight was centred on this house arrest.

2 On 25 November 2006, after I had given away all PT and casual-volunteer teaching and installed myself as a FT writer, editor and publisher with no name, no fame and no pay-cheque, Pinochet marked his 91st birthday by having his wife read a statement written by him. Read to his admirers it stated in part: "I assume the political responsibility of all that has been done." Two days later, he was again placed in house arrest for the kidnapping and murder of two bodyguards of the then President Salvador Allende who were arrested the day of the 1973 coup d’etat and executed by a firing squad during what was called the Caravan of Death episode. Pinochet died a few days later on 10 December 2006 without having been convicted of any crimes of which he was accused.

A reasonably accurate DESCRIPTION of Australian politics but seriously lacking analytical and prescriptive input.

"In truth, we are still rather a primitive species: avaricious, selfish and brutal. I can see a time when people would look back upon the way we are today and denounce us as being barbarians for the way we celebrate tribalism over individualism, might over right, and contention and disputation over harmony and conciliation."

Far too over-generalised ... like our political 'leaders' who continue to con the ignorant and gullible with statements such as 'WE must share the pain & pull the belt in during times of recurring economic crises.'

Like the 'justice system', our system of parlimentary 'democracy' operates within (and to preserve) a Capitalist mode of social production, distribution and exchange. For those so blind, the numerous millionaire pollies in Canberrea and elseware are there to enhance THEIR interests & don't give a damn about those who voted for them. There can be no true democracy under Capitalism

I've been stating this for many years & I'll keep saying so until proven otherwise;

Democracy as is practised in our times is the most hypocritical form of dictatorship.

What's missed here is that the major political parties generally give some sense of direction to voters which is difficult to get from independents (and to some extent smaller political parties).

The complaints against the major parties are valid but at the same time I'd rarely know an independent candidate well enough to know how they will vote on a myriad range of issues. I won't always know which way my preferred major party will go on some issues but for the most part decisions will have a degree of consistency with some core values.

I'd like some changes and part of that should revolve around the ability of party leaders to discipline dissenting voices. Howard showed us a lot about how a leader can distort the basic values of a party, I suspect that Rudd is giving us the advanced course.

R0bert