We need something , that vote on selling uranium to India was crap ! Nearly half the labour party didn't want to do it ! And it still got through!!!

If India blow the bejesus out of some thing half the ALP will be to blame !!!!

there was a bloke who ran for the senate in the last federal election. his plan was to only vote whichever way he was told to on the basis of online polling. he would post the issue up for debate online (constituents could click for yes or no) then vote in the upper house according to results.

great idea i reckon. pollies are only supposed to be mouthpieces for the citizenry.

good point. i guess not many would bother to log on & read the entire bill being proposed. they would just go for the easy fix...i guess i didn't really think that one through before i sung his praises

Some of you guys are referring to direct democracy (the real democracy). There are only a handful of countries in the world that have a direct democracy – Australia is not one of them neither are the US. But having a direct democracy requires the people to get involved, the citizens would decide if uranium gets sold to India or if a carbon tax is being introduced, not the polies. Technically this could be done via electronic vote, but that would result in another Myki disaster.

However, direct democracy usually work well I smaller civilized countries with a high living standard i.e. Switzerland. The problem with this system is that there are always regional differences in how people vote, the majority forces their will onto the minority, which leads to tensions over time. The minority then blames the majority for everything instead of the polies. If you throw in economic instability over an extended period of time you have a civil unrest, and in some countries that have tried it has resulted in a civil war. Not sure if this would work in OZ.

What we need is politicians on both sides that have balls and long-term thinking, and don't bend over for any slight pressure form the industry.

gibberjoe,

if you read the article you would have seen it criticises journalists more than politicians. The author brings the case in point of the ABC Sunday morning TV show "The Insiders" showing how our system is of democracy is being debased and corrupted. When journalists become part of the system and are on the "inside", they can't or won't do the job that is expected of them.

This can be seen moreso in the USA where the mass media is completely undemocratic as evidenced by it ignoring a major politician who has widespread support and a chance of being the next president of the USA, Ron Paul.