An optimistic article that ALL of us will enjoy

[sherrife]

A dreamy little piece from the Sydney Morning Herald. We can only hope it's true - a shift to the 'left' in electoral politics will allow revolutionaries to highlight the real limitations of democracy in a capitalist system...

But unfortunately for the world, our friend Steve is living in a fantasy land.

[HAL]

My brain contains 58272 categories, but not one that matches your last input. Oh, corporate sector is. Tell me about your likes and dislikes?

[member34258]

I can think of at least 2 people who may not enjoy that article

[Northern Pie]

Exactly what they were saying about the Labor party in 1996, 2000 and 2004....to declare the Liberal party or dying is complete and utter rubbish as it was the press declaring the Labor party dead and dying after all the other elections......I am hoping Rudd does a good job and gets time to do it but with these Labor aligned journo's going of half cocked like they are will certainly damage the Labor party....Now is not the time for the Labor party to be arrogant and aloof, they need to recognise that a lot of people swung to give them a go and with only 3% swing to defend at the next election they have to be sure that they will deliver everything they promised. I for one hope they can!

Cheers

[stui magpie]

[Alec. J. Hidell]

I don't think so sherrife

Just about all western democracies have two 'roughly centralist' parties.

But the next 18 months are certainly going to be interesting for sure.

[Dave The Man]

[Jason]

And like it or not we need our governments to have two opposite sides otherwise you'd get fiascos like Workchoices being shoved through parliament unopposed. And in our capitalist world we need to have periods of gain for the individual and periods of economic boost... I don't think the two can happen at the same time.

[David]

Someone who thinks that all the Liberals stand for is 'greed' clearly doesn't have a great grasp of politics. And the Greens as new opposition? This is a party that has still never won a seat in the house of representatives.

What makes a shift to the left even less likely is that Australia just voted in a right-wing prime minister. I believe that certain attitudes will change over time, and certainly that the country will be less conservative in a few decades' time, but I also believe that the parties will adjust to this as it occurs. The Liberals aren't going anywhere.

[3rd degree]

Sook in corner David your grey koala idol don't have a seat in the house of reps either.

[nomadjack]

The Greens won the seat of Cunningham in 2002 in a by-election David.

You will see a shift to the left on many social issues if not on economic issues. There is a very real chance the Liberals will splinter around the conservative versus small l Liberal divide or around the personalities of key figures such as Turnball and Nelson. This has happened many times before on the right in Australian politics. I hope it doesn't because Australia needs a strong opposition that offers a viable alternative government and the Greens are nowhere near providing it.

[stui magpie]

Both Labor and Liberal try to claim centre ground. Neither is extreme in their views although both have factions and lobbyists who are.

I agree, Nomad, that on social issues the pendulum will probably swing fractionally left, but the Libs will get their act back together, they need to. Any government that feels secure that they have no opposition is dangerous.

[David]

[sherrife]

Dude, they have 5 and were a couple of thousand votes in Victoria away from getting 6.

They almost certainly will have the balance of power in the senate after the next election.

[Jason]