If Nigel Burch doesn't perceive nepotism and favouritism to be corruption, is it any surprise that many Tasmanians also have difficulty knowing what is and isn't corrupt, or what is and isn't acceptable behaviour. After a long history of poor ethics from our politicians, standards are low, so many people's expectations are also low. It doesn't always mean that they don't care, just that they don't think anything will change.

Forget politicians, they're a lost cause.

By definition, anyone who seeks a political career has to leave their ethics at the door, or they will disappear without trace.

Of more interest is that "trustworthy" chart.

position 10: Police Officers
position 20: Judges

You're on a jury, and the policeman gives his evidence, "it woz 'im wot dunnit, my oath it was". The judge, in his summing up, points out that the copper's evidence might be considered unsafe.

In the jury room, the police officer is deemed the more trustworthy of the two...

My oath.

position 27: Financial advisers
position 28: Religious ministers

What was that about God and Mammon again?

position 37: Sex Workers
position 39: Politicians

Makes sense. When it comes to getting screwed, there's not much to choose between them.

Except that one at least is honest enough to admit they're in it for the money.

The major issue for me in recent elections has been the low levels of honesty and integrity among politicians. These essential qualities will not flourish in society if they are not valued by its leaders. As for Beattie being a conviction politician, that is surely a joke. As a former advisor, I can assure you that he had no princples, no vision, no regard for public well-being beyond what would get him re-elected. Repeated knee-jerk, ad hoc responses are not the mark of a conviction politician.

Voters are right to be cynical. They are not right to accept this state of affairs.

if oz were a democracy, public business would be carried out in public where the nation's masters (that would be you, and me)could see their will done.

but oz is not a democracy. the structure of oz was set at hastings, firmed up at runnymede, and crystallized when henry put his blade in wat tyler. even cromwell did not kill a king to empower the common man, but simply to ensure that the upper class country gentleman ruled the country. parliament was and is the clearing-house of the powerful and well-connected. this structure, and this distribution of power, remains today. all that has changed is that the few hundred seats of power in oz are filled with the bottoms of a new class: the 'politician' has replaced the 'gentleman'

the people remain 'subject', cast down like their political antecedents at hastings, and barred from the deliberations of national policy. these deliberations are done in secret, motivated with at least one eye on re-election, and the visible self-interest of the process makes obvious to all that pollies are selfish and untrustworthy.

so everyone knows they lie. but do people care? no. there is a bred in the bone feeling in oz that nothing can be done about politicians, beyond replacing one thief with another. so why get upset?

in fact there is an alternative. it used to be called 'democracy' but the word was 'newspeaked' onto uselessness by the political class. nowadays, we have to say 'direct democracy' when speaking to the semi-illiterate. the trouble with democracy (i know what the word means) is that it needs citizen-quality people, subject quality isn't good enough. unfortunately, ozzies are subjects. their education and experience removes from their character the qualities needed for democracy. it's pretty much the same process and motive as that the pastoralist has in castrating calves. it makes them biddable and passive and it works a treat. like the eternal political adolescents they are, ozzies get big enough to work and be taxed without ever demanding self-rule.