I look back down the years and I see many changes.
One does when comparing yesterdays with today.
Even 20 years ago politics seemed relegated to the occasional outing with State or Federal elections... then mostly backed off to a quieter place in the media.

Yet here we are in 2008 and we turn on the television and in pours politics...firstly Americas!

I mean "What is US politics doing here up-front on Aussie television and in the Aussie newspapers"?
Hillary, Hillary, Hillary, Obama clashes with Cain, Cain clashes with Obama, the Alaskan girl fights off all complaints..."What is this stuff in the Australian media"?
Why is America everywhere?
Our own politics is enough to dumb down any brain.

Did we lose something?
Are we being subliminal-ed, conditioned?
Have we forgotten the small man and woman-in-need to focus on politics.
What are our eyes off...that we are now on this "politics"?

Are more noble values being lost because we are getting so politicised?

I dont mind the yanks in support of Australian Defence but what do their pollies have to do with Australia?

We used to be governed by the born to rule conservatives.

Then we got rid of them and sucked up to Uncle Sam.

I've heard it said that we are about to become an official State of the USA.

Not happy about the ANZUS Treaty. It was a pact so that its members came to each others aid WHEN THEY WERE ATTACKED. Today, the USA is the agressor. It has laws that allow it to eliminate opposition in other countries by entering that country to carry out that supression. Then it expects us to come running to its aid.

I lived for five years in the middle east and there the Yanks are known as the sons of dogs (dogs being very low lifes)

phoenix94

You infer we are a State of the USA and then write
'I lived for five years in the middle east and there the Yanks are known as the sons of dogs (dogs being very low lifes)'

Funny how all these USA haters want to come here to live but next to none want to go to the Middle East to live. The disguised hate is nothing short of hypocrisy!

When you don't understand what happened yesterday, you are unlikely to understand what is happening today or what happens tomorrow.

Politics and the entertainment industries have merged. Since politics has become more entertaining the news/entertainment industries supply us with more of it. It's cheaper for them than paying for actors, sets and so on to make their own content. As the centre of the entertainment universe, the US does entertainment politics better than anyone else. It's live soap opera.

On the serious side of things, in a globalised world the result of the US election will have global consequences which should concern us. The small man and woman in need currently defaulting on their mortgages and losing their homes is largely attributable to goings on in the US.

On the obvious side of things, OLO is a forum for discussing news and current affairs. If you hung around another forum which discussed, say, knitting, you could form the impression that Aussie society is becoming knitified.

Bugsy, I don't understand your comment in the context of this thread.