The Value of Minor Parties in the 2016 Australian Federal Election

I am constantly astounded by the way in which that which the Left, when in power, unfortunately establishes, is perpetuated when the so-called ‘Right’ gets elected instead. What we have been seeing in Australia over the last few decades is a progressive (as in the former USSR usage of that word) move away from personal autonomy and freedom towards a society ever less democratic and increasingly bureaucratic. In fact, it seems that what is increasingly happening is that elected representatives are taking bureaucracy’s views and passing into law the former’s recommendations, inverting the proper role of public servants to those of determining legislators (and often enacting legislation that permits bureaucrats to make their own rules, altogether bypassing proper democratic principles, as has become all too evident with, as one amongst many examples, teacher registration bodies such as the VIT).

I am reminded of an observation made by the Israeli highly insightful MK Moshe Feiglen, who is reported in Manhigut Yehudit with the following:

Why is it that when the Left is in power, it rules and leads the nation according to its principles, while when the Right is in power, the Left continues to rule and lead according to its principles? And it rules by means of the elected officials of the Right, with virtually no opposition. Why does that happen time and again?

The only disagreement I have with him on this only highlights the very reason as to why this occurs: it is not that the Left rules by principles, but rather through policies. This is, in fact, the key distinction that ought to distinguish freedom-oriented individuals and political parties with those who (usually of the Left-oriented variety) step-by-step take society increasingly away from responsible democracy: Principles are what best serves political parties, as opposed to bureaucracies who seek to impose (upon themselves as well as anyone else they can) policies.

‘Red’-tape is well-named

A political party that falls into the temptation of policy-dominance has already moved away from sound principles of democracy, and into the darkening realm of bureaucratic control and increased red-tape. Perhaps a useful read would be The Master and his Emissary.

So what to make of the coming Federal elections in Australia?

Here is what I would personally recommend in the Upper House (in those States where candidates are standing from those parties), and the reasons are simple: Section 18C is effectively an islamist notion that should never have made it into Australian law, and should be removed – something the Liberals had presumably intended and yet never followed through; in a similar vein, the bureaucratically inspired nonsense to financially penalise parents who have responsibly looked into associated risks of vaccinations and made a conscious decision to not subject their child to this intrusive medical intervention needs to be repealed – it is in fact an astounding breach of personal liberty and familial responsibility.

And for these reasons, I would encourage that votes for the Upper House (Senate) be preferenced to, in the first instance, the Health Australia Party and then the Liberal Democratic Party.