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The Australian bishops' statement on the federal election is significant as much for the fact it was made as for its argument. Given the polarisation of public debate, they might well have thought it wiser to remain silent. For them the greatest success of the statement may be that, when they spoke of public issues, the sky did not fall in.
The American writer H. L. Mencken said the aim of politics is 'to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary'. Over the years there have been many hobgoblins of varying sizes and shapes, and this election campaign promsies to be no different.
The next month will be full of sugar-hits and sweeteners, whether they be personal tax cuts, grants or special deals for organised interests. Every candidate and party is guilty of this in their scramble to win. Citizens are complicit too if their main concern is 'what's in it for me'. Churches play the game as much as any pressure group.
Cuba's constitutional referendum in February displayed overwhelming support for the government. More than six million voted yes, while around 706,000 voted no. The new constitution represents a step forward for the democratic, economic and social development of the country.
Witnessing the sense of relief from Australian-African activists at the outcome of the Victorian state election, I was not sure why I had a sense of déjà vu. Then I realised this collective exhale reminded me vividly of the sentiment from the LGBTQ community after the marriage equality survey results were announced.
The Victorian state election is on this Saturday and if I’m being honest, I don’t think I could be less inspired about it if I tried. I want readers to understand just how much of a statement this is coming from me. I loathe our political system and most of our politicians but being an Aboriginal woman who works in the union movement and writes opinion, I am deeply invested in it all.
What we need is a listening and inclusive Church — a plenary council at which the clergy and the laity have a proper place at the table, at which the voices of the ‘rusted-on’ and the ‘cheesed-off’ Catholics are heard and at which the bishops are respectfully listening as much as speaking.
Something strange happens to the vote after it's been gifted to us. It's the most valuable thing when we don't possess it, and the most disposable when we do. Millions of Americans discovered this when a minority of voters who showed up to the polls in 2016 managed to elect that improbable candidate, Donald Trump.
In a year when voter suppression has become a key tactic for Republicans' defense of their majorities in the house and senate, Prairie View is once again a perfect microcosm for voter suppression in the United States. Local officials have made it difficult for students to register, and restricted their opportunities to vote.
To posit that the results of an election come down to who shows up at the polls is to admit America's civic life is broken. Moreover, analysis from the perspective of turnout overemphasises the will and passions of voters and ignores the structural flaws embedded in our electoral process.
As leaders like Gough Whitlam and Patrick Dodson have attested, if we are to imagine and strive towards New Horizons for Justice and Solidarity, we need conviction, perseverance, capacity for compromise, relationships of trust, humour.
Wentworth as I know it is not an electorate that is easily pinned down. It's also not easily duped. At the far eastern tip of the Wentworth electorate, a measured war is being waged. It's a microcosm, at state level, of the forces that will come to play in the upcoming federal by-election.