01.10.2004

Vote early, vote often in this Australian election.

Posted by justin

While we were in Kuala Lumpur I thought we'd kill some time by hanging out with the AEC staff at the Australian High Commission. Now that's one building that used a lot more cement than glass in construction. A little bit tricky to get into too. They wouldn't let me take my pocket knife in - yet they let people in to access pens without even verifying whether they will vote for John Howard's illiberals. What's more dangerous - I ask you?

Because this coming Federal election on October 9 has to be one of the most important elections in Australia's history. John Howard must go down in history as one of the most politically depraved and destructive individuals ever to have laid his institution-debasing hands on the controls of our nation.

This is only one of the very minor judgements that would be passed against him in a court of higher existence. Because in the greater scheme of things the fact he has now created an Australia where a wealthy family can buy their child a place at a University above a student with a higher score is also very minor too. Who cares that at Adelaide University, for instance, Rebecca's parents can now buy her a way into a Commerce degree with only a TER of 80, while her poorer peers must study hard to make the real TER cutoff of 90?

However, Rebecca might not even have to pay for her degree if she has been well-groomed in the private school system. In 2004, the Commonwealth estimates that it will provide $3.7b to private schools and $1.9b to public schools. Hopefully The King's School, which apparently built a new pool with public funds, can build another one before the plebs in Western Sydney get new textbooks.

It is also quite trivial to note Howard's clear strategy to dismantle universal health coverage for Australians and create a two-tiered system, leading us down the poorly-maintained path to the creaky door that is the entrance to the US health care system. With forty million people without any cover, the US has one of the worst health-care systems of the first world, and spends more as a proportion of GDP on it than Australia does.

I would only note in passing that is rather odd that a Government is working hard to rid itself of the obligations of providing health and education systems to its citizens, as if that is not the purpose of a Government's existence.

It is all trivial, and devoid of any meaning because it is evident Australians do not wish to strive towards an egalitarian society. I just looked up that word that people (really only Australians) use to describe Australia - egalitarian:

"Affirming, promoting, or characterized by belief in equal political, economic, social, and civil rights for all people."

This is clearly a horrible - even horrifying - notion to John Howard and anyone wishing to vote Liberal this election. That people could be considered equal in any way, shape, or form might humanise them. That is the last thing he would want to happen.

Because if people started to consider other people as humans - gosh it might start to sink in that - yes! - we, as Australians, actually do lock up women and children in camps in the desert for years on end. When you are 21, four years behind bars until the government agrees you are a refugee is not humane. Of course this is common knowledge in Australia that no longer seems to have any meaning. It helps that our Government has essentially banned any media reporting on these refugee camps. Outside Australia on the travelling circuit it is revealing how many people are aware of our new brutal procedures in treating arrivals whose only crime is that they got here later than our predecessors.

I find it inconceivable that any intelligent, compassionate Australian could ever condone locking men, women, and children up in what are essentially concentration camps. There's no point mincing words - the only difference here is that this Government relies on the aging process and inevitable psychological deterioration, rather than chemical reactions, to reach the same conclusion. It is always small steps towards great evil, and this Government seems to set a continual pace towards electability, whatever the moral, social, and political costs. Every time you see John Howard on his morning jog it is utterly important to understand where he is heading.

That intelligent, compassionate Australians could ever put a tick in the box of a party with a leader that made this practice electorally clever, and palatable, is equally inconceivable - but it happens. Why? What has happened to memory and ethics? How can these concepts not matter to the majority of the population? They will shed a tear in a movie like Schindler's list and then happily become accomplices to similar acts in their own country.

Or even in another country - far, far away - that has never threatened our country. Surely there is no more serious and violent an act a Prime Minister can do than to send a country to war, even if it borders on nothing more than symbolism. John Howard's actions in sending a country to war - knowing the stated threat was not real and that our actions would make matters worse - is a war crime of monstrous proportions.

If he is not electorally punished for his activities then this election must really be a referendum on whether we want to do away with a national conscience. Every individual tick of the box for Howard's Liberals is like a retrospective finger pulling the trigger of the gun to blow the face off a nine-year old girl. It must be a vote for grabbing a nine-month-old baby and throwing him in a fire while you shoot his young mother in the head. It must be these types of acts done over at least fifteen thousand times.

What perverted 'polite society' can find the above conclusions outrageous and over-the-top, and yet turn around and vote for a Government that helped turn the machinery that snuffed out all these lives? Is that rational? To give a vote now to John Howard's Government based on other economic, social, or political considerations in the current environment - knowing what we do - is a base, immoral, and barbaric act.

A brilliant article by Mark Craddock sums up why the public must be unable to confront the truth about the type of individual Howard is:

"Howard is a classic con artist. Contrary to popular belief, con artists do not prey on the stupidity of their marks. They prey upon human decency. Because most people have a conscience, and are at least reluctant to tell outrageous lies for personal gain, there is considerable resistance to the idea that someone like the Prime Minister might be a serial liar. Millions of decent people in this country realise that they were profoundly misled over Iraq, but they explain it away by telling themselves that it wasnt deliberate. The PM may have been wrong, but he was sincere in his beliefs. The PM is very good at looking sincere. All con artists are."

Even from afar it's depressing to consider the reality that John Howard, serial liar that he is, may once again be voted in by people that tell themselves they are generally good. There's only one election pundit worth listening to, and it is not good news. IBM had Deep Blue and the ABC has Antony Green. His prediction that Howard will get back in with a loss of a few seats is devastating news.

He must be wrong. Maybe he forgot to carry the two, or divided by four, instead of eight. Because I believe the majority of people are generally good. You don't regularly see Australians locking their flowers in the attic, ransacking their neighbours house and killing their pets, nor rolling up to primary schools to pay off the teacher to assure their child is first in the class. Any half-decent Australian must know the societal vision that Howard has is so hideously removed from their own set of values that they will not bring themselves to vote for him this time, whatever their usual political persuasion.

Anyway, we made it in to the embassy to cast our pre-poll vote and it felt good. It could have been so easy to fly off to Borneo on Sunday and forget that most important of acts in a democractic society. As we walked out of the embassy, through the three bomb-proof glass doors, past the massive cement pillars and through the gate in the three metre high security fence guarded by a multitude of Malaysian commandos gripping their uzis I knew that I was certainly not relaxed and comfortable with John Howard's Australia. After the recent bomb blast at the embassy in Indonesia, neither were the commandos. Hopefully the rest of Australia feels the same way.