Contrary to the opinion of Jezza Lefty, I reckon this has become a meme, what with all the usual suspects he's linked to who've done it.
The Test, worth doing if you're a politicaphile.
My results placed me Centre Left on most issues, and indicated that, although it is pretty neck and neck, my ideal party is the Democrats, followed by Greens then Labor. All 3 made strong matches, apparently.
Not surprising. Lefty puzzled over the gap between what people nominate as their most representative party and the results. I'd say it's the already acknowledged difference between what your ideal world might look like and what you think a party should have as its platform to be a serious contender for running the country.
It may also relate to just how much you fear the places those parties, in your view, fall down. The Democrats and I see much in common, but they have been poorly run and constituted for years, unable to decide whether to be the deal-making opposition-scuttling keeper of honest bastards, or the centre left "true liberals", or something out wide in competition with the Greens.
No-one so stupid as to stab 'Tash-Stott in the back would ever get my vote.
And the Greens might or might not deserve the extra couple of compatibility points I raised for them, but I do not trust them to manage the economy, foreign policy, or to deal with the expectations that come with the word Green any better than Labor deals with its nomenclature baggage.
Ah, the liberal centre left, an Australian dead zone...
Groundbreaking new Australian film: Coma
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1 day ago
8 comments:
"I do not trust them to manage the economy, foreign policy,"
Why? Granted, they're a growing political party without a huge amount of economic/foreign policy management experience to this point, but that won't be the case once they grow to the point of forming a coalition.
If you rule out any growing party because they don't, obviously, have previous experience at government, then you limit yourself permanently to the status quo, for better or worse.
And remember, of course, that the present parties had to start somewhere... They didn't destroy the country when they first won government; why assume that the new guys would?
I'm with you 'Gnac! Sounds like our results were very similar.
I am afraid that I really don't trust the Greens either. It's not a question of lack of experience, either.
It is because of a certain irrational streak that I perceive in the environmental movement: eg, George Monbiot saying we should ban plane flights ASAP - what would that do to the global economy? And I worry that the introduction of something like carbon credits would end up disadvantaging the vulnerable in society, leaving the rich as the only ones able to afford travel, heating etc. In some respects, I think the Green movement is not compatible with old-fashioned left wing values.
George Monbiot is not a member of the Australian Greens. The Australian Greens have no plans to ban air travel or anything of the sort.
Total smear.
Total cop out, he's 100% greens material and comes from precisely the same political space.
Actually, failure of green supporters online to address the genuinely held concerns of people who may broadly be not too far from the greens' logical constituency with anything other than animosity, has convinced me more than anything else that my judgement about them is bang on the money.
RE the monbiot concern expressed above, the reason this is relevant is that even by the moderate left the greens are seen as attracting and housing members of the more lunatic left, people who may not entirely resemble bob brown when they're in full flight.
I see nothing to convince me otherwise. I see nothing to convince me that they could keep the hard left away from...
* over zealous anti industry measures
* picking fights with indonesia in particular while failing to increase our defence capability
* allowing the PETA sector to go hard at field sports, meat eating et al
* avoiding decisions that benefit the country but that occasionally result in the loss of a native habitat or similar
etc.
YOU have to convince me, and others, that you aren't the left's answer to one nation.
"YOU have to convince me, and others, that you aren't the left's answer to one nation."
Depends whether you're willing to judge us by what the party and the MPs say and do, or whether you're going to insist on judging us by what extremists who don't make up the party say and do. I'm not even going to deign to answer the One Nation comparison; it's patently ridiculous.
"RE the monbiot concern expressed above, the reason this is relevant is that even by the moderate left the greens are seen as attracting and housing members of the more lunatic left, people who may not entirely resemble bob brown when they're in full flight."
Yes, well, the ALP attracts and houses members of the cynical corrupt right - and they RUN THE JOINT.
Why don't you name just 1 individual from the current serving right who you accuse of corruption, Jeremy...?
Jeremy, no, of course Monbiot is not a member of the Australian Greens. But that wasn't my point!
My point was that there are some in Green movement who agree with Monbiot. He is an influential environmentalist, after all. I'm not saying all Greens agree with him, either, but there are enough who have extreme environmentalist views to make me very wary of the Greens. Like Armagnac, nothing I have seen has convinced me that the Green party won't be influenced by the lunatic fringe.
That being said, I wonder what would happen if the Greens ever come to power? I have found that power tends to water down idealism, and reality takes over. I think it's a bit like becoming a parent, really: you find yourself sounding exactly like your mother - even though you promised that when you became a mother you would never do that!
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