We are after all, a parliamentary democracy, and the leader leads by permission of the party, rather than as sometimes claimed, the electorate.

The electors can only ever elect one single member, after which all else is down to internal management!

Rather than tolerate another Bonaparte at their head, making really bad judgment calls as Captain, he/she should be told to behave more statesmanlike; less like a elected dictator, and pull the head in.

And if we the people have to make our wishes plainer by many more single term parliaments, then that's is what will need to occur.

What we can no longer tolerate are ideologues mendaciously/disingenuously arguing their way into powerful positions, then having got there, applying already thoroughly disgraced ideology that simply exacerbates problems.

There are things we can and should do to improve our economic prospects and trade our way out of the current raft of difficulties; but for the current ideologues at the helm, for whom they seem to be verboten!

Personalities at the helm may be part of the current problem, but are hugely overshadowed by some really dumb policies/management paradigms.

We need some long term vision back at the helm, and a viable plan to turn the ship of state around, preferably before she founders on the economic rocks waiting just ahead!?

It beggars belief we have yet to try are thirty year self terminating bonds, (good debt)to finance income earning infrastructure; which if done on a large enough scale, will turn things around, as will GOVERNMENT investment in vastly cheaper energy outcomes!

Or the introduction long overdue tax reform, that ends all avoidance and finally puts the national interest first! We have a revenue problem, not a spending problem!

And we need to permanently remove the usual medley of unproductive parasites, bleeding the system white!? Tax is garnered for the national need, not millionaires.

Welfare has to be returned solely to the needy, not the greedy! And that's also how you get medicare under control!

The age of entitlement is well and truly over!
Rhrosty.

I think we will have Dysfunctional government until they engage the people more. Setting an agenda with only a small group as interest inst going to work any more for either side.
How about we have a 20-30-40 year plan agreed to bipartisan and engaging the people and both parties stay within these guideline, they can handle the day today stuff as long as it conforms with the overall plan. I think 24 million people all working towards the same goal we might even have a chance of achieving something.

It seems that Labor/Greens have trained and employed enough journalist and public servants sucking on the public purse to create panic in the electorate whenever a Government wants to stop wasting billions of dollars in tax payer money. The self intertest of unions, public servants and overpaid abc journalist c ertainly seem to be winning out at the moment. Shorten can just sit their like a goose. The sad part is that when we end up like Greece with 50% youth unemployment the brainwashed fools will be dumb enough to ask why.

"Abbott has simply affirmed what he always was. He is an avid monarchist, to the point of parody – witness his granting of an Australian version of a knighthood to Prince Philip. He is provincially stingy and mean-spirited in his concept of welfare – his obsession with seeking a co-payment from patients visiting their general practitioner being a case in point. He is insufferably obsequious when it comes to the US-Australian alliance, which doubles up as an Anglophone wet dream in search of a purpose, usually a military one."

Binoy, I couldn't agree more. And that is before one even looks at his foreign policy gaffes: "shirt fronting" Mr Putin (but then he didn't); the government's support at all costs for the appalling mob in Tel Aviv; the blatant lies and misinformation about Ukraine; concealing from the public the fact and terms of the secret 8 August 2014 agreement; negotiating the TPP agreement without telling us that it is quite possibly the worst possible deal for Australians; and many many more examples.

Ah ha James. Perhaps Tony's problem is that people take the paranoid left like you too seriously? Tony's been more successful than most PMs on foreign policy. Strong relations with most of our Asian neighbours. Doesn't lecture them like KRudd did, a couple of free trade agreements, and stopped the boats.

You might complain about the TPP, but that is just because you don't like free trade, or the idea that governments ought to be subject to the law. Except on all those treaties you do agree with, when you will demand that the Australian Government acceded to "international law". Which is just custom, and not law at all.

Graham Young, "Tony's been more successful than most PMs on foreign policy. Strong relations with most of our Asian neighbours. Doesn't lecture them like KRudd did, a couple of free trade agreements, and stopped the boats."

Andrew Robb wanted to join the Asian Development Bank like New Zealand. John Kerry at the last G20 pressured Abbott not to join, as this would have broken the private cartel of Central Banks monopoly of counterfeiting our currencies as debt. Abbott like a little US puppet did not let us join the Asian Development Bank. Abbott is gutless in my view because he will not stand up to the Western Central Bankers.

Graham you can no longer simplify all economic and political activity as being left or right and classify James O'Neill as some worthless lefty. It is about being fair and you cannot see the forest for the trees just like Tony Abbott.