Kenneth McLeod, Bangalow
In broad terms I agree with Lindsay Tanner’s assessment of the ALP’s poverty of principle. But the problems with our system of governance are much bigger than the personal style, proclivities, and capacities of particular leaders or parties.
The most intractable of these issues are beyond the reach of national politics – like climate change, large-scale population displacements, and the structural contradictions of corporate globalisation. These are existential crises that every government over the last generation has contributed to by their bipartisan commitment to unending growth and consumption.
Tanner’s comments must also be qualified by the moribund nature of our parliamentary democracy. The political process in this country has been hijacked by a caste of professional politicians, self-interested lobbyists, and political voyeurs (the commentariat). Is it any wonder that most citizens are alienated from this spectacle, regarding the antics of its players with bored cynicism if not contempt?
A recent quote in a Naom Chomsky article explains the dilema we and democracy face; ‘Politics is the shadow cast on society by corporate power.’
Worst in the USA but their shadow falls on Australia too! There is no substance to the shadow – the reality is the substance of the body. But who is powering the light? Probably, it is us.