Benefits of republic push debatable at the very best

THE republican debate keeps simmering below the average conscious level, but what benefit can it realistically offer everyday Australians?

We will still have the same greedy, under-performing and morally deficient bunch of fools and bludgers, possibly even more of them, in parliament and the executive government. We would have to bear a greater cost of maintaining the presidential “compound” rather than the less expensive “board and lodging” of a local representative of an overseas government.

And just think for a moment of the expense of the equivalent of USA’s Secret Service Corps, or could anyone really think that just another limb of the AFP could competently provide the security and safety of a president?

There are many searching questions to be asked, debated and answered on these and other issues and what of the real expense of replacing the letterheaded stationery of the multitudinous bureaucratic departments the cost of which must exceed, annually, the value of at least 10 years’ worth of present parliamentary pensions and entitlements.

I am not a royalist and have little interest in the activities of the royal family but I have noticed that many Australians, quite possibly a majority, are so inclined, especially with recent increasing prominence of the younger members and their children. What harm does it do us to nurture an affection for our own historical background? Where is the advantage in our joining the ranks of the world’s republics, most of which are strife-torn and bankrupt thanks to a concentration of political and economic power in the hands of rapacious tyrants?

For a glimpse of what the creation of a republic would produce in a country with an established system of responsible government, we need to look no further than the USA.

Is there a reasonable, fairminded and intelligent Australian who was not disgusted by the conduct of the Democrats’ “sore loser” demonstrators fired by the surprising Donald Trump victory at the last presidential election, causing enormous damage to and destruction of public property?

Even the American media, basically also Democrat Party orientated, had to report graphically the nature and extent of that extreme vandalism and ragedriven rebellion against public order.

You might think that could not happen in Australia but pause and think about it. American Democrats are the political equivalents of the ALP. Both are socialist parties and the ALP has the full backing of the trade union movement, which has long been renowned for their propensity and willingness to indulge in civil insurrection to achieve their often specious demands.

Indeed, we don’t need to rely on America’s sorry history. We have our own shameful past insurrections against lawful authority, the Eureka Stockade revolt and the Shearers’ strikes in 1891-4, both revered by ALP diehards as forming the birthright of the socialist movement.

So it can legitimately be said that to support the republican movement raises the risk of arousing undesirable ghosts of Australia’s past.

That is too high a price to pay for what is really nothing more than a cosmetic alteration with no real substance, just to satisfy some disaffected Irish migrants who lack the emotional maturity to forget the clouded memories revived by any mention of Oliver Cromwell, King George or Orangemen, as well those who seek change for the sake of change, Anglophobes and other malcontents.