What are Labor values? The traditional values have changed since the emphasis on working class rights and a fair go. The rush to privatisation was the first step in betraying the principles of a social democracy.

What are Liberal/National values? Those traditional champions of small business have also changed including failure to ensure a regulatory framework around competition and mono/duopolies.

Both parties are very similar in essentials - that is the travesty. The voter has very little to discern on many issues and few choices in relation to responses and policies around global pressures.

Mismanagement and wasteful spending was seen under both Howard and Rudd. Howard was the epitome of middle class welfare handouts and pork barrelling while allowing essential infrastructure to degrade, then Rudd in attempting to stave off the GFC over-ran with the stimulus package allowing the private sector to rort the government's largesse.

Maybe we do get the government's we deserve if voting is based purely on the back pocket.

I wonder if it would help if we were to follow the US example and constitutionally limit the number of years a PM may remain in office?
Perhaps then Peter Costello may have been PM. As Peter Coleman tells us in his Preface to, "The Costello Memoris," " It was his (Costello's) misfortune to come up against a man whose determination to hang on to power, while not Mugabe-esque, was unyielding. John Howard is not an unusual case. There's the pain and frustration of dislodging PM Hawke and Premiers Askin and Bjelke Petersen. Tony Blair was unwilling to vacate 10 Downing Street as Howard was to vacate Kirribilli House (although Blair finally made way for his successor)."

Coleman further states, that most politicians, "...whatever they may say, most of them do not go into Parliament to bring about particular reforms; they go in because they find the life irresistible. They want to be in it all their lives. They enjoy its exhilarating highs and take its miserable (and tedious) lows in their stride. They face long years in the wilderness with equanimity. They take for granted the slander of fools. They also believe that the voters will get it right in the end. Their day will come. They are politicians in the way others are poets. They can't help themselves..."

Perhaps we need to look at people that belong to a different parliamentary tradition. Perhaps what we need to look for are people who go into Parliament to make changes. But that's probably easier said than done. It's no wonder voters are taking their comedians seriously and their politicians as a joke. And let's not forget the special interests that have a huge amount of influence on politicians through campaign donations, which in turn can lead to policies that favour those interests rather than the needs of all citizens. How does one level the playing field for candidates? How do we give all citizens regardless of worth a fair shot to be heard and participate in the democratic process?

In fairness we should under stand that the Liberal National coalition and the ALP are no longer the party's they once had been.
Why is the question.
The introduction of television is one factor, we once only saw black and white news print photos of our leaders.
As we progressed the need for a story/headline blurred what was behind policy's.
How do we neglect Rudd's popularity that fell so far.
Or the climate change action that had massive support becoming the likely end of Julia Gillard.
Do not ignore this,self interest still rules, like him or hate him know J W Howard won over ALP voters by giving them what they wanted,or appearing to.
Refugees stands out, before the awful work choices.
It will NEVER BE POSSIBLE to see a greens government, EVER .
Labor inhabited the ground conservatives left behind in a race away from their core belief.
Both are moving not away from middle Australia but toward it.
Abbott's middle to high income Social security is blindingly wrong, at a time both party's want to review welfare.
Look closely at both party's, with openness, then consider why they act as they do.
But understand in voting green, looking for an old Labor alternative, you vote conservative.
Nothing harms Labor more than looking back not forward.

Getting back to the current issue that gave the topic legs, and the 'South Australian Connection' that I touched upon in my post of Thursday, 28 April 2011 at 11:48:28 AM, it is interesting to see the views of the SA Attorney-General (and Deputy-Premier), John Rau, arising out of the issue as to the identification of the SA Labor MP charged in relation to child porn matters. We can see Labor values at government level in SA in action in a way that would tend to back up Shadow Minister's 'second barrel' question's inference that most of Labor's statements at that level are nothing but 'populist blurb' to get them re-elected.

It seems the SA ALP website has removed all reference to the charged Labor MP. See: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/alp-rubs-disgraced-mp-from-website/story-fn59niix-1226046581036 .

There is, as of today, a total of 34 ALP members of the SA Parliament. See: http://www.parliament.sa.gov.au/Members/Pages/List of All Members.aspx . (Copy and paste makes it work)

As of today, the SA ALP website shows a total of only 33 names as ALP members of the SA Parliament. Bernard Finnigan, although still a member of the SA Legislative Council (and of the ALP), is the only name missing from the list of ALP members of the SA Parliament. See: http://twitpic.com/4qtnwk

In its rush to minimize any collateral damage to its 'brand', the SA Labor organisation has effectively named the charged MP, contrary to what is said to be law.

But look at what its Attorney-General proposes in the face of this hypocrisy:

"We are, in fact, looking at [identification of
persons charged in the (social) media] as a
national problem, ..."

He means how SA law can be imposed on the rest of us throughout the Commonwealth. The imposition of 'Star Chamber' onto our Australian polity. Labor, via SA, has done the like before. See: http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=7585&page=0 . The fourth last paragraph.

Me, on Paul Keating, on John Robertson and the NSW power sell-off: http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=11834#205202 . A SA connection.

The SA government was dead before this issue.
It lacks the guts to remove its leader.
I think its a long bow to draw that they are hiding anything.
This law would need to have been introduces just for this case if that was true it existed long before it.
Past events, including the banning of certain TV shows in Victoria but not other states seemingly did not involve self interest.
I think watering down SMs intentions will not wash, and doubt ALP voters are any less upset than others

Just a bit of clarification on the link posting problem I ran into in my post of Friday, 29 April 2011 at 4:14:42 PM, in relation to accessing the list of members page on the SA Parliament website.

I obtained the web address for that page by doing a Google search using the search terms [SA Parliament], and clicking on the word 'Members' displayed in the first result abstract for the SA Parliament home page. That action delivered me to this page: http://twitpic.com/4qupe8 . Note how the web address for the page displays in the address bar in the screenshot of this page shown in the Twitpic.

I attempted to post the address of this page as a link in my OLO post by copying the address displaying in the address bar for this page when on it, then pasting it into my post in the OLO posting pane. The OLO software truncated the link at the first space in the words '/List of All Members'. Clicking the gamboge text of the link as posted yields a '404 message', 'page not found'.

If I manually typed the web address into the OLO posting pane as it displays on the SA Parliament site, the link is still effectively truncated at the first space encountered. If I typed in underscores where the spaces appear the whole entry appears as a gamboge text link, but still yields a '404' if clicked. See: http://twitpic.com/4r3qm6

However, if I copied the whole link as displayed on the SA Parliament website into the address bar of a new tab in my browser, I was able to bring up the List of All Members page. So if one copies the whole link in my OLO post, both the gamboge text and the black text, thus ( http://www.parliament.sa.gov.au/Members/Pages/List of All Members.aspx ), and then opens a new tab and pastes what has been copied into the address bar there, one will be able to display the page.

One can see Bernard Finnigan is still on it.

An OLO software glitch, apparently.