The Illusion of Choice

Muammar Gaddafi is a madman no doubt, and one hell of a son-of-a-bitch. I’m one of many who welcomed the hail of 124 Tomahawk cruise missiles that signalled the end of his massacre of his own people (by some estimates, this kind of ‘freedom’ retails for only $186 million). Still, when reading Gaddafi’s political manifesto The Green Book the other day, I was struck by at least one semi-sane observation – Western democracy does not deal in freedom in the strictest sense, but merely provides the illusion of choice. His example of a referendum was most interesting: the people vote (providing the smoke and mirrors), while usually only two options are given (providing the stitch-up).

Now, reiterating that Gaddafi is madder than a hundred hatters – and emphasising that much of his Green Book is racist, impractical and at times downright offensive – in this particular instance I think his point is a valid one. Our recent shambles of a State election serves as a nice example. Dissatisfied with the corrupt and inept Labor Party, the people swept them aside and replaced them with Barry O’Farrell’s Liberals. If not for cardboard cut-out Peter Debnam, this would’ve happened 4 years ago. This issue is not that Labor got shafted, but that we have merely traded one bunch of do-nothing bullshit artists for another – and really what choice is that?

Commuting in the lead up to the elections I was frequently accosted by Liberal pamphlet-handlers looking to cover the considerable spread required to claim my seat. One particularly brave soul stopped me to ask the secret to winning my demographic – who he claimed were particularly reluctant to accept his paper propaganda. If I could name one thing that would make me vote Liberal, what would it be? Easy, I say. Make the fucken trains run on time. Make them run when it rains, and not sputter to a halt when it’s too hot. Put some millennium trains on the long trek to Campbelltown – and run some more services so that I don’t feel like I’m being crammed in enroute to Auswitch every day after work… mid rant it hit me then – not only had Labor let me down for nearly two decades, but there wasn’t a single thing the Libs could do to make a lick of difference. The trains are shit and will always be, until I gather the MX-deadened plebs and lead them to revolt.

In the meantime, what am I proposing? Certainly not Gaddafi’s popular committees (for direct democracy) – because try as I might they make almost zero sense. More likely I think we’d be better off disbanding State Government all together. The sole purpose they seem to serve is to antagonise their Federal counterparts (if from the opposite party) or blindly support them (if of the same). Oh, that and get completely drunk with the ‘power’ that only comes with the front bench of our State government – the power to sell of State owned assets, push through crooked land deals and abuse waiters at Iguana Joes. Wiping out state governments all together will see a sharp decline in the amount of pointless current affairs interviews I have to wade through, dramatically cut the percentage I’m lied to about improving my hospitals – and is just the kind of public sector job trimming that I can really get behind.