By Andrew L. Urban.
Democracy? Demonocracy is what we are heading for, here in Australia, as the July 2, 2016 Federal Election campaign begins its final 4-week marathon. Both three sides of politics – the Liberal/National coalition, Labour and the Greens – have slumped into their ideological bunkers and hurl insulting grenades towards their opponents. There is so much shrill outrage it crowds out, shouts down, rational debate. It doesn’t even make decent spectator sport.
The mind numbing repetition of each day’s talking points simply reinforces the view that politics now comprises products, not policies. There are deeply disturbing signs that this tolerant but soft-headed democracy of ours allows the demonising of policies which otherwise were supported. Like tax cuts to business, once championed by both successful and wannabe Labour leaders.
The problem beyond it being immensely irritating to many voters who feel they are being taken for fools, is that many other voters will feel inclined to regurgitate the demonising.
This is not a new phenomenon, I realise, but it has taken a turn for the worse, not so much in quality but in its virus-like infection of the entire political class.
Along with this slide into kindi politics of ‘she pushed me’ ‘no I didn’t, you pushed me’ is the observable idiocy of auto-reflex rejection; this is where one politician automatically rejects whatever is being proposed by the other party’s politician. All other party’s politicians are forever scheming to bring the country to its knees. All THEIR policies are totally wrong and designed to smash the working families/productive businesses/social harmony ….
It is certainly a failure of the political class to be so self centred as not to notice their empty gesturing and crude demonising is making them loathsome.
That these elected representatives of Australian voters behave in such a fashion is accentuated by their venality. Who could trust this class of self serving mouths constantly being caught out feeding itself with extra little perks to decorate their pile of big perks and big salaries and huge pensions? Yes, there are exceptions, I hear you say. Name a dozen …