well said scorpio

I understand as having a special needs daughter and do have carers come around for her.

Will be voting for carers at the election for senate.

That is also another reason i am standing as and independent.

These people in government have no idea about what goes on, only what they are told by their party.

Stuart Ulrich
Independent Candidate for Charlton

I'd stay in whack-a-mozzie land if I were you, Boaz, you are sounding just a little hysterical outside your natural habitat.

You continue to insist that without your own personal set of moral values, all the rest of us are lost. Here's your latest laundry list of our sins - apparently our mission is...

>>Teaching them "Now Children.. there is nothing to believe in except the here and now.. EAT DRINK AND BE MERRY.. for there is nothing else.. take advantage of all the weaklings around you.. use them in the persuit of your own goals.. enhance your own life in every possible way.. don't regard others in any way except utilitarian.. how they can assist you in your own exploits and efforts...yes children.. this is life..."

That's just plain deceitful.

You do actually know, but pretend not to know, that the above is not at all the attitude of the vast majority of people on this earth, whose underlying objective is to get along with everybody and make a success out of being part of a moral and caring universe.

But I was vastly tickled to see that you blunt your argument a little by protesting, a mere two sentences later...

>>What irritates me a tad..is the HIJACKING of Christian values, and the re-packaging them as 'Humanistic/naturalistic' ideas.. when they are just intellectual stolen property!<<

Now, I know that it was not your intention to link the picture of moral degeneration with the suggestion that the concepts it contained had been hijacked from Christianity, but it is still highly amusing that you should do so. Thanks for the chuckle.

But really, joking aside, it is pretty insulting of you to keep pretending that i) only Christians are virtuous and ii) that when non-Christians are virtuous, it is only because they have "hijacked" Christian values.

These people in government have no idea about what goes on, only what they are told by their party.

Rubbish !

Most of those people in Parliament have very good idea about what goes on, still most only will do what they are told by their party and or their opinion pollster.

Deciding whether to replace TweedleDee by TweedleDum - or not to, for most people likely comes down to which of them will stuff up our hip pockets and our financial system the least.

Quick response,

See my posts on the following for some reasoning as to why Australia should not be the only country in the word of more than one million square kilometres and the only country in the world with more than ten million people not to have a middle tier of government:

Canning federalism - the Liberals' legacy? (030907)
http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=6284

The states are redundant (040907)
http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=6297

Cost-shifting, blame-shifting and profligacy (060907)
http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=6313

I would like to see:
The tax-free threshold and the 30 cent-threshold indexed to movements in the minimum wage so that any increase granted flows through in full;
Family benefit thresholds indexed in the same way;
Two tax-free thresholds for the single-income family, the only idea of mine which Labor took to the last election;
A referendum of the people rather than a double dissolution when the House and the Senate cannot agree on legislation.

A referendum of the people rather than a double dissolution when the House and the Senate cannot agree on legislation.

hmm.... how about:

A referendum of the people when the House and the Senate cannot agree on legislation, with a double dissolution.

.

"Enough with the polls - let’s talk about the kind of Australia we want our kids to live in."

Just don't rely on the traditional media to help. This is a conversation which needs to take place 'outside' of the more traditional institutions - designed to "influence" only, rather than participate openly and sincerely.