This may sound like a technicality, but what I said was that this is the Government that the Australian people want. Reason being that they voted it in … again. It's not as if the current government have changed their stripes since the election before last.

Australians have become, in my view (happy to be proven wrong), very conservative because of the fact we've had it so good for so long, and therefore are a bit weak / soft and will cling to whatever excuse is presented by politicians that will appear to keep the good times rolling a bit longer, no matter how illogical the premise or how much it sacrifices a future just too far away to be scary yet.

Climate change and broadband as two divisive examples. They cost too much. Standing athwart history yelling Stop!

Giving me a choice of two or three mendacious, self-serving, incompetent cliques and then saying the one I grudgingly picked as the temporarily least appalling is what I /wanted/, is a bit of a long bow to draw.

Point soberly taken and understood through the scarring of experience. But then, what's the alternative to the cookie-cutter alternatives?

Start yet another micro political party doomed to the fringes? Even Nick Xenophon gave up after a few years.

Revolution? If you can't succeed as a political party how are you going to build a revolution? And does the ends justify the everything-in-between, along with the very high likelihood of potential failure and after-effects of such failure?

Maybe the silent majority have just done the maths already?

Never underestimate the huge authoritarian streak in Australia. The Wowsers have always been a powerful force in politics, and the average Aussie loves the smack of firm government.

Most of the problems in Aussie politics can be laid at the door of the Boomers, who vote in idiots because they don't understand the issues and are scared of change.

Is there an option to call an election void if no candidate gets enough votes? Have to rerun a special election, and maybe get a solid percent for a writein who actually has a different plan?

For any given political view espoused by members of a major political party, if you think "none of us" want it, you need to get out of your bubble.

There's a lot of voters out there who are quite okay with the government doing what they think needs to be done to ensure national security.

This is mostly true but it also comes with self deception/naivety that the people in charge won't do harm to civilians.

Given evidence to the contrary they prefer to imagine it as a lie.

So it's not correct today that they condone anything the people in charge are doing for national security they repress the existence of the things they don't condone.

Yeah, ok fair call - there must be some who want this. “None” was too bold.

Politicians are indeed afraid of public outrage.

But there is none (relevant) enough.

Because most people care most about stability.

I think his point was that if you’re unwilling to stop something, that is politically equivalent to wanting it.

I think ssss11's point was, if no matter who you vote for they do the same dastardly things, and the political system is set up to lock out newcomers not allied with either major party, then there's no way within the system to stop something by voting.

Yeah thats right, I think in Australia your vote basically means nothing.

This is not true. Federal senators are elected on a state wide basis with the top N candidates past the post (N depending on size of the state). This can result in Senators being elected with a very small % of the overall votes.

For the lower house, we've had many years of the balance of power in the hands of a small number of independents who get an outsized voice.

Yes, if you live in an non-swing electorate, that is strongly held by the incumbent, then you could argue that your vote doesn't matter, but only because there are more people voting for something else. Isn't that how things are meant to work?

All of this is true, but it ignores the fact that the two major parties pretty much agree on many important issues (such as government monitoring of internet traffic).

Also the fact that (especially with a hung parliament which we've had for years) independents get an outsized voice is a bit of a two-edged sword. It's far more luck than anything else that determines who's in that vote-tipping seat and sometimes they demand all sorts of special-interest stuff in order to let things through.

You are certainly correct if you vote for the center-left or center-right parties. But that is true in all western states.

Are you familiar with French politics? For all the crap Americans give them about surrendering in the world wars, the french have had the courage to sideline both their center right and center left parties and now the biggest parties are nationalist and socialist.

I’d genuinely like to know how everday citizens get their government to do the rght thing. It seems everywhere around the world they just do what benefits themselves. people protest, and get hit with rubber bullets, but nothing seems to change.

I've been wondering the same thing lately. The solution isn't with protesting in the street, even if you can topple the government, you just get more tyranny from the next crowd.

Unlike the Ron Popiel rotisserie oven, politics isn’t “set and forget”. There’s no magic system where, once established, good honest people can ignore politics and have effective government.

I would suggest to vote with your feet.

Pick a government you like and move there, instead of trying to change the government in the place you happen to be born in.

Voting with your feet also changes where you pay taxes. (Unless you are American, then you need to jump through some extra hoops to make sure your mother country doesn't get your money any more.)

I'm not sure this is a good idea. Why would anyone abandon their home/nation to jump ship into a culture they know nothing about -- except for government policy? Only in the US with it's state system is what you're describing practical.

The US is far from the only federal country. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federalism#Examples

You are not only jumping to a new government policy, but the whole package changes. Including culture etc. Yes.

Many people around the world are looking to migrate. If borders were more open, many more people would migrate. About why? You could go and ask some of them. (Or as an alternative, Googling for 'why do people migrate?' gives lots of results to studies etc.)