Where are the inspiring ideals?

FEDERAL POLITICS

OF the recession of the nineties, Paul Keating famously remarked: “It was the recession we had to have”. With the Federal Liberal Party now receding behind an ebullient Federal Labor Party, whose own leader continues to languish well behind the leader of the aforementioned beleaguered political pileup, does that mean Bill Shorten will become the Prime Minister we had to have?

Just once, wouldn’t it be nice to be choosing a political party and its leader based on their commitment, vision, and ability, rather than having to vote for the lesser of two evils?

And they say we get the governments we deserve by voting them in. I guess that also means we end up getting the governments we have to have. nationality to the countries we were at war with? Solution: You cannot become an Australian citizen unless you revoke your former citizenship. If you are of Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander descent and your elders consider yourself to be a member of their community, then you should automatically be deemed an Australian citizen.

However, as long as Queen Elizabeth II is head of our state, I fail to understand how we can object to any federal politician who has dual nationality with any of her dominions.

Commonwealth rules

I WRITE to ask a simple question that has struck me in regards to various members of our Federal Parliament having been found to hold dual citizenship, and thus against the law to actually sit in our Parliament?

Barnaby Joyce, the current Deputy Prime Minister has a New Zealand father and thus dual citizenship, the news tells us.

Today’s news now lists Nick Xenophon as having British parentage, adding to that problem. So, in the cases of both of those gentlemen, what is the problem?

I ask that when I am told that our head of state is the Queen. Isn’t she British by birth? Aren’t Australia, England, and New Zealand all members of the British Commonwealth of Nations, the replacement for the ex-British Empire which ended in 1945.

If the member of parliament’s dual citizenship was, say, from Germany or Croatia or the United States, I could see an issue. A reasonable person should think that where a parliamentarian was born A new way to have your say themercury.com.au readers have a new way to have their say. It’s free to use, just register and have your say. For more details and to register, visit the website. here in Australia, and his parents held another Commonwealth Nation as their heritage, that should make no difference e as long as the royal member for our head of state was from the British throne.

Misplaced pity

OH, our poor politicians. Because of an accident of their birth or a quirk of their ancestry, or because of the arbitrary boundaries that applied during the era of colonial empires, they suddenly find their lives filled with uncertainty and their options taken away from them.

Through no fault of their own, their fate suddenly rests in the hands of judges and other strangers who find obscure meanings in the confusing words of antiquated laws and in the dusty records in the long-forgotten files of foreign bureaucracies.

They should tell their woes to our detainees on Manus Island and Nauru. They would find much understanding there.

A bridge too far

WHEN he envisages that marriage reform could lead to people wanting to marry the Sydney Harbour Bridge Eric Abetz is too restrained.

They’ll be demanding the right to espouse abstract ideas as well as inanimate objects: truth, justice and the American way, say, or the belief the Earth is flat. This is the thin end of the slippery slope.

Won’t get my vote

WILL Hodgman’s 43-point plan to get re-elected. Surely a case of the incapable defining the implausible while in pursuit of the unthinkable?

Extraterrestrial viewpoint

AUSTRALIA is the only democratic country not to protect human rights says Greg Barns (Talking Point, August 21). Mr Barns attempts to justify this assessment with allegations that Centrelink pursue welfare fraud, Immigration torture illegal immigrants (a la the KGB??) and police have the temerity to investigate crime? One wonders on what planet Barns lives.

Papers please

SO Bill Shorten declares he is not a British citizen but will not show the paperwork to prove it. Sounds dodgy to me Bill. Time for an audit of all politicians as this is such a shambles.

Pokies cause harm

HISTORY indicates that political and bureaucratic collusion and corruption was involved in the original decision to allow poker machines into Tasmania. Judging by what is being suggested by the current inquiry nothing has changed. Do any of you people care about the social damage that these insidious machines cause in the community.