There are so many things about Australia I haven't had a chance to mention in this blog (not to mention the things I don't know yet!). Like, say, compulsory voting. Everyone over the age of 18 has to vote or pay a penalty. And when you vote you have to vote for more than one party. It changes everything in elections, compared to the US, where candidates pay big money just to get supporters out to vote (and, um, to suppress the votes of presumed non-supporters).
Actually I don't think I've even mentioned that Australia's in the lead-up to federal elections. John Howard, pretty much George Bush's only remaining friend in staying the course in Iraq but not Kyoto, has been Prime Minister for ten years, coming from behind to win two reelections so far. Labor has had a big edge in the polls for the last few months since a palace coup last December where a somewhat nerdy self-described Christian socialist named Kevin Rudd took the helm. (My housemates, who vote Green and would have voted for Nader in the US elections, say he's just Howard with glasses.) The gap in the polls is narrowing though.
Australian politics is Westminster-style, so there's lots of verbal jousting in parliament. The Prime Minister and his government have to face questions every day, though they don't need to actually answer them and sometimes just huff in indignation at the nerve of the opposition's questions. The opposition, meanwhile, has a shadow cabinet so interesting alternatives to government policies are considered, at least in the lead-up to an election. But most of the sound-bites you hear on the radio are barbed ad hominem comments on the order of "his policy is a dagger in the heart to Australian industry" and "he's run out of ideas." It's kind of exciting, at least at first. Then, as people call each other name-callers, it gets old quickly.
Would I pay more attention if I were a citizen and knew I had to vote? I'm used to thinking of politics as something you don't have to be interested in. Back in the US the only things compulsory are death, taxes and tipping.
