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Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 30th 2023 at 11:03:59 AM
Weren't the bozos the Brits exiled to the Land Down Under too poor to own slaves or something?
On empty crossroads, seek the eclipse -- for when Sol and Lua align, the lost shall find their way home.![]()
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It was... For about five minutes before the newly-elected government brazenly broke every one of its promises that wasn't "kill the tax, stop the boats" via an extremely unpopular austerity budget that was immediately derailed by the senate, causing the debt and deficit to skyrocket beyond even what the previous government had accumulated. The Labor party didn't even need to bother with opposition when it could just let the government repeatedly shoot itself in the foot (while also getting very little done) until Malcom Turnbull (a moderate) finally had enough and booted Tony Abbot (a right-winger who is a fantastic wrecker and the king of scaremongering and negative politics - if he was somehow persuaded to try and destroy Donald Trump politically I have no doubt he would succeed - but is incapable of actually governing a country because he's more suited to attacking political opponents than actually constructive governance) out of the top job. But he had to make concessions to the right-wingers to gain power and keep it, and once he started dithering on tax reform (not helped by Abbot pulling a Kevin Rudd and being a major pain in the ass despite promising he wouldn't be) and Labor finally got off its ass and started announcing actual good policies, Turnbull's shine had worn off, and now he's announcing a double dissolution early election out of desperation. Labor is slowly rising in the polls, practically neck and neck in two party preferences, and a right-wing dominated Coalition would cause it to gradually lose relevancy due to the contested seats being moderate or more towards the left, the only genuinely safe seats are held by right-wingers, and that's nowhere near enough to hold government.
It's not the absolute circus that is the election over in the US, but this government's term has been nothing but rampant incompetence that was only reduced when someone who wasn't completely insane took charge, and proved to be not particularly great either. It's at least incredibly entertaining, though.
So, yeah, that's the last three years of Australian politics in a nutshell.
edited 29th Mar '16 10:52:58 AM by Cronosonic
You know the US elections are a circus when the Israeli elections are more dignified.
On empty crossroads, seek the eclipse -- for when Sol and Lua align, the lost shall find their way home.
Depends on the country, certainly in the US and especially on racial and social issues the right cannot hope to hold in the long term, but in Israel for example the more conservative groups are having more children, and thus demographics are shifting their way. And apparently in several asian countries the youth are becoming more nationalistic.
Israel's political landscape is nuttier than a squirrel in an eating binge.
On empty crossroads, seek the eclipse -- for when Sol and Lua align, the lost shall find their way home.The problem, as noted, is that conservatives have more children, and they have a marvelous track record of capturing the disenfranchised into their circle-jerk of hate and fear.
The formula is fairly simple: Take advantage of complacency among leftists to sneak into power, then enact policies that wreck the social and economic landscape. Blame the resulting disaffectation on liberals, socialists, and minorities as a recruitment tool. Get so crazy that people revolt against your abuses.
Meanwhile, the left works as follows: Build on outrage at the excesses of the right to seize power, attempt to construct durable social and economic institutions using your perceived mandate. Fail, but do well enough that you make things better for a lot of people, who promptly forget their outrage and settle into complacency. Then get trapped by ivory-tower idealism while the right sneaks in.
edited 29th Mar '16 11:11:57 AM by Fighteer
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"Silaws: Quality probably isn't the word I'm looking for, but I am wondering if the ideological split on the connected issues of poverty and racism in the Americas and Africa can be traced back to how the Europeans settled their colonies. The British supplied their North American colonies had a steady flow of black slave labor, and the United States inability/unwillingness to dedicate itself to emancipation during its early years undoubtedly had consequences existing to this day.
To the best of my very limited knowledge, and someone feel free to correct me if I am wrong, Australia was settled with white British people almost in its entirety. So it looks from where I am standing like the mass institutionalized racism and its effect on issues like poverty and welfare don't play a big role in Australian politics.
To make it short, does Australia have its own Dixiecrats. And does the existence or non existence of these Australian and American Dixiecrats depend on whether the original British settlers brought black slaves with them?
My understanding is that racism in Australia is alive and well, but is mainly focused on its indigenous population. New Zealand has a similar issue.
edited 29th Mar '16 11:21:31 AM by Fighteer
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"![]()
Anecdotal, but my dad visited Australia in the eighties. Guy sat down beside him at the bar and without having any reason to think my dad would agree began a monologue about how "they should put all the damn abbos on an island and drop a bomb on it."
My dad thought that the guy's willingness to say that outloud to a total stranger said some pretty bad things about what was socially acceptable in Australia. I expressed a hope that maybe it just said some pretty bad things about what was socially acceptable in that bar.
To be clear, the "religious extremists" were mostly Northern and the ones most willing to give up on slavery, especially the Quakers. The Revolutionary-era South were mostly mainstream Anglicans at the time (most of said colonies being business ventures sponsored by Crown charters), though they did build up a religious-sounding justification for slavery being "good", particularly after the cotton gin raised demand for slaves. The Puritans pretty much fell apart as a political power, though their ideals (like our sex taboos) hung on. Modern religious extremism is a product of revivalist movements in the 1800s.
edited 29th Mar '16 11:46:31 AM by Elle
The ACLU and various other civil rights groups, including Equality NC, are already in the process of filing a federal lawsuit against NC to challenge the bill, for much the same reasons as Cooper's refusal to defend it. The only thing I really fear is that people will get too focused on the trans-rights part of HB 2, and forget about the other far-scummier parts (like how people can no longer file discrimination suits in state court, or how it's now illegal for municipalities to set their own minimum wage).

You can put every single country on Earth in a bad category depending of the metric.
South America as a whole? Slavery, genocide, exploitation of natural resources and latifundium economy and a buttload of racism.
China? Conquest, quasi-slavery for the vanquished, more genocide, tyranny and despotism.
Japan? War driven expansionism, notions of superiority by divine right, militarism and racism towards anything that isn't Japanese.
Russia? Military expansion, forced annexation of nearby territories, strong police state presence and a long history of brutal and ruthless autocrats.
European Nations? Royal and religious wars, more genocide and colonialist driven expansionism.
African Nations? Colonialism, genocide, tribal warfare, slavery and more racism among different tribes.
Middle East? Religious ethnic ruling, racism and religious discrimination, tribal wars again and modern slavery.
There isn't a single nation on Earth without a bloody past or spotless history records, so the US in that regard isn't the best one but neither is the worst offender when it comes to it.
Inter arma enim silent leges