The concept of pork barrel politics came to mean
spending by a politician done primarily for the
benefit of a group of people in exchange for their
support, often at the expense of the broader
public.

Money and politics often go hand in hand as the cost
of mounting an effective political campaign is quite
high. We've had many examples of pork barrel politics
in Australia particularly regarding marginal seats.

Of course pork-barreling by politicians is corrupt.
And Australia has a long and not so proud and not
particularly creative history of political pork
barreling. The following link gives an example
of a particularly brazen one:

http://www.abc.net.au.news/2020-01-16.bridget-mckenzie-saga-pork-barreling-brazen-example/11874224

cont'd ...

Excuse my typos. Here's the link again:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-01-16/bridget-mckenzie-saga-pork-barreling-brazen-example/11874224

I always find it amusing that those who are most in favour of big government, for whom the answer to every societal issue is more government, are the ones most offended when, inevitably, government is shown to be inefficient, corrupting and self-serving.

If you have a system where vast sums of money and influence are given to those who control government, it's inevitable that those funds and that influence will be used to the benefit of the few against the interests of the many. Absolutely inevitable.

Its beyond the scope of human ingenuity to design a system where massive government can be controlled exclusively for the unbiased benefit of populace. It's never happened. It can't happen.

If you don't want corrupt government, don't have big government. If you want big government then you just have to accept that unscrupulous activity will ensue.

On face value, I think it's a fine line.

I think there's a fair argument that the person who wins the election is given a mandate by the majority to do what they promised in their campaign.

That person isn't there's to enact the oppositions policies, they're there to enact the policies they won the election with.
In this way, the person in government doesn't really owe anything to those who didn't agree and didn't vote for them.

Who cares what they say or think... BUT

I watched this documentary last night.

The USN Mothball Fleet - Storing up for a rainy day
http://youtu.be/MqNKreV8KGg

It kind of showed me how ENORMOUS amounts of money could be put into something under one government or administration; and then be wasted completely when an opposition government or administration comes in with entirely different ideas.

Switching back and forth in completely different directions every few years probably isn't good for anyone.

Should there be some standard rules to make a better outcome - playing field for the citizens best interests?
I don't know, probably.

Look at these Sydney riots, going to be a lot more Covid now.
I think if peoples right to publicly protest is temporarily suspended (and maybe it should be to prevent spread of Covid)
- Then governments right to enact new laws and regulations during this period should also be suspended.

They really are incompetent, they haven't really managed any of this that well at all. Flights going everywhere in and out of the country, no proper quarantine facilities, and people getting fed up.

in the 1990s, Ros Kelly was forced to resign from cabinet (and not return) after a procedural breach that made porkbarrelling possible. A quarter of a century later there's blatant porkbarrelling, procedures to prevent it are ignored or don't exist, and Scotty From Marketing thinks they've done nothing wrong.

I wonder what Ros Kelly's doing now? And if she decides to run against the PM, would he lose his seat like Howard did?

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ttbn,
> Why do a couple of people here always ask questions, like "Is pork barrelling by politicians corrupt"...
To see if the others here agree with them, of course.
Indeed the results have been quite surprising - I'd expected some might disagree, but I didn't expect anyone to take the view that corruption's no big deal.

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thinkabit,
>they shouldn't give any consideration to the wishes of a minority of voters that oppose the majority
What? You actually WANT the tyranny of the majority?
Haven't you seen what that led to in Zimbabwe?

Looking at a less extreme example, do you think the Singapore situation, where the tactic of effectively punishing voters for voting against them (by withholding funding from opposition controlled seats) has helped keep a single party in power since independence, is in any way desirable?

The purpose of democracy is accountability, not division!