election!

so the election has been called or something. apparently in september (??) australians will go to somewhere called the "poles" (?) and decide who is going to be the next leader?? see the news or wikipedia for more details

in any case, the "election" itself is a fairly regular event; one to decide the international representative of the continent's residents are typically held about every 4 years. what changes between elections are the ppl you get to vote for, or "candidates".

now the policies and parties obviously do not change, so the results of this "electern" will in most important regards be purely aesthetic. nevertheless, it's still a big decision!

consider:

- australians need to decide who will be our primary human face to the whole world!
- every single night, australians will see this individual on tv talking about crises!
- when a disaster strikes, as they increasingly do, it will be this individual who is the primary comparing-a-natural-disaster-area-to-a-warzone in chief
- when australians go traveling, many foreigners they meet will be aware of who our pm is and have an opinion on him/her!
- the pm gets to meet (and develop a personal relationship!) with the imperial ruler of earth and inheritor of all mankind's progress, the perserdent of the united states!
- the pm gets a kinda shitty (ive seen it) house with mega good security for FREE
- the pm can more or less decide which wars we get involved with  
- the pm gets to dominate the house of reps, beholden only to the speaker

as you can see, it's no minor decision! no wonder voting is compulsory!

accordingly, ive been putting a lot of thought in to who i will vote for, trying to figure out who to pick...

LOL! psych. fooled you. i already know who i'll be voting for, it was a no-brainer: NOT tony abbott.

that's right, i have an opinion on this election and im not afraid to share it

allow me to explain, but first, let me just be clear about one thing: tony abbott is the worst politician in living memory (im 24?) and just maybe the worst politician in the entire history of australia

tony abbott:

- first came to prominence under the howard government as an irrational conservative "attack dog" who could be relied on to do howard's dirty work

- campaigned REALLY hard to deny birth control to women (WTF! wtf?) apparently out of antiquated catholic notions of hostility to progress

- has explicitly stated on national television that he will say whatever he thinks an audience wants to hear regardless of factual basis or personal conviction, and that only his written statements can be trusted

- said he would do anything (short of some expression i cant quite remember) to become prime minister

- told us every damn day that the whole fucking country would catch fire and sink when the carbon tax began and IT TOTALLY HASN'T. he also pledged "in blood" to repeal the tax if elected, a task most economists flatly say is not viable

- works really hard to cultivate an image as a "fair dinkum" bloke with the australian ppl. he pretends to be things like a firefighter or a surf lifesaver and frequently uses words like "fair dinkum" in all seriousness

- sucks. he can barely talk and he looks like shit. he's dumb as fucking fuck and obviously has zero regard for the australian ppl, who he obviously sees as idiots who are just looking to vote for the most conservative and fair dinkum politician they can find

OHH and he doesnt believe in climate change. or rather, he believes or disbelieves in the science depending on the situation and audience (see the earlier point about saying anything that flies)

the above are more or less a summary of my reasoning for voting for NOT abbott. i mean apart from the guy obviously being literally a piece of shit (he was physically violent even to competitors in university elections back in the day), think for a moment upon why a guy with zero personal convictions outside of "change is bad" would even want to enter politics? regardless of what they might actually be, they surely aint the right reasons.

and more than this, the whole time he has been the opposition leader he had behaved downright irresponsibly. fixated on minor or irrelevant issues which he felt might possibly bring down the labor government, abbott has performed none of the tasks traditionally expected of him as leader of the opposition: most notably providing a balanced review of proposed policy

and most hated of all, for me at least, abbott has simply followed the lead of the current conservative american opposition in its unreasonable hostility to obama.

gillard, much like the secret muslim and unamerican usurper obama, is apparently completely unfit to lead the country she supposedly represents. by virtue of who she is, she is unaustralian. therefore any opposition to her government, in whatever form, is a virtuous and patriotic act   

under abbott we have seen politics descend to a whole new base level never before seen in this country.

rather than doing the job assigned to him abbott has decided to repeatedly attack the government as illegitimate, as unaustralian, as liars, as childless, as thieves, as the mafia, as cowards, as undemocratic. basically as anything other than a real government under a real (read: MALE and CHRISTIAN) leader, which of course only he can provide

and we see the consequences of this irresponsible leadership every day:

idiots who have taken an interest in politics for a whole week telling you that gillard is the all-time worst pm and getting worked up over it (in reality, what little gillard has managed to achieve with a hung parliament is both remarkable and a testament to her skills as a politician)

old motherfuckers telling you about how our prime minister is a serial adulterer?? what the hell is that?

and, of course, those who accuse gillard (but rarely the labor party itself?) of somehow singlehandedly engineering immigration on a massive scale and seeking to undermine the true australia- i.e. white christian australians who conform to dated hollywood stereotypes (think "fair dinkum")

abbott has not just done an abysmal job as opposition leader, he has dirtied australian politics like no other before him. if he were to be elected in september it would set a very real precedent that any behavior as opposition leader is acceptable so long as it wins your party leadership eventually.

it is not an exaggeration to say that our entire system of government would suffer forever more were he to be elected

and so, i finally come to the point im trying to make: if you vote for or support tony abbott at this election youre either:

a) dumb as hell
b) racist, reactionary (to modern life) or chauvinist
c) a mining billionaire (or billionaire in general) looking to pay less tax and have a greater say in policy

i genuinely believe that any supporter of tony abbott at this election falls into one or more of these three categories.

those who are dumb as hell are perhaps the most numerous. and perhaps their bizarre reasoning isint even so flawed, just misinformed. perhaps for many it is simply a matter of hating gillard's accent and having no real understanding of politics and issues

the racist, the reactionary and the chauvinist require no explanation. any person living in australia knows at least one of these ppl

the mining billionaires similarly deserve little explanation; they would not even get to be mining billionaires in the first place if they werent immoral, manipulative and evil as heck

(at this point i feel i should put in a disclaimer: i do not write this post out of support for gillard. she really isint great, her accent really is terrible, she really did seize the leadership in a bad way and she certainly isint appealing. nevertheless, she definitely IS NOT abbott)

this upcoming election, more than any other i can remember (all three), is a clash of cultures and values

on one side you have irrational, populist science-hating he-men like abbott and pyne, intentionally appealing to the worst sections of our society, and on the other you have unlikable but tested folks like gillard and swan (incidentally recognized internationally as the world's best treasurer) 

this election will be a battle between the future and the past, no matter how boring and repetitive the campaign itself becomes

to be sure, the politicans will reinvent themselves over and over and unnecessary emphasis will be placed on performance in financial matters that benefit only the very wealthiest. the media will lose track of the real issues and report non-stop on some minor aspect of the campaign that they feel is newsworthy

we all know this because we all have lived through elections before. dont even bother to say it

but all the same, i still feel that this time it is important to attack (verbally!) supporters of tony abbott wherever you find them. because this man may well turn our country into a caricature of the american south if given the chance  

so when somebody you know says they will vote for abbott, call them on it. inquire in to their deeper reasoning and expose them as either A, B or C

because there is no alternative. as much as we are all sick of shitty gillard, electing tony "the insane" abbott would be a mistake to rival lead-based makeup, asbestos fireproofing and the second iraq war

to conclude: do not vote for this shitlord. this guy is every bit as insane as he looks and the party he happens to lead right now is composed of garbage. the worst thing you could do for this country, or for the world, or for your local community, or for anybody at all outside of the mining billionaire and/or racist community, is vote for abbott.

note that i do not say don't vote liberal. it is highly deliberate. this is not a party thing. it's a crap dude thing

DO NOT VOTE FOR ABBOTT.

TELL EVERYBODY


PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE