Political quiz

The Australian Political Quiz has been updated and edited (thanks Kirk), and has now been re-released.

Based roughly on the World’s Smallest Political Quiz, the Australian Political Quiz asks 10 questions about public policy, gives you a score and then shows where you fit on a 2 dimensional political compass. We have also plotted various Australian political parties so that you can see which party most closely alligns with your philosophy. The page also offers a brief introduction to Australian political parties.

Please try out the quiz and tell us your score. E-mail the quiz link to your friends and post it on discussion forums. Help spread the word.

Liberal’s list of shame

Following on from Labor’s list of shame, here is a Liberal version. Once again, I’ve only picked out random examples of government spending because the internet isn’t large enough to fit a complete list of hand-outs promised in this campaign.

* $50 million for climate change research at Griffith Uni
* $500 million on housing infrastructure
* $12 million on rural students
* $20 million in local projects for Bennelong
* nearly $12 billion on roads
* $433 million on emergency medical centres
* $2.1 billion on technical colleges
* $800 million towards vocational training
* $75 million for renewable energy programs
* $5 million for W.A. cricket
* $15 million for young cancer patients
* $1/2 million for Indonesians orangatans
* $4 billion for pensioners & carers
* $15 million to eradicate feral animals
* $16 million for Kokoda Track
* $170 million on small business training
* $2.4 million to set up a mental health council
* And of course, the $4 million/second speech

Like the Labor hand-outs, lots of the Liberal handouts go to the ever-needy “working families”. What people don’t seem to realise is that these same families pay much of the tax in the first place.

Tax decreases wealth by misallocating resources… the money then gets tied up in bureaucracy, causing administration and compliance costs… and then it is handed back to many of the same people as a complex program which probably increases effective marginal tax rates and/or further bastardises our tax system. And after all of that, apparently we are supposed to be thankful! Only the LDP wants to stop the churning and simply let people keep more of their own money.

Greens join the Secrets Club

The Greens have shown their hypocrisy on government transparency. The NSW Greens have joined with the NSW Labor Government to suppress the release of documents that could reveal whether Mr Newhouse’s candidacy for the Labor Party in the seat of Wentworth was invalid.

This shows the Greens can’t be trusted to hold the balance of power under a Labor government. They are simply too cosy with Labor. They cover each others backs. It seems that government transparency is for the Greens just a catch cry designed to win them more power. Transparency is not something they apply to their friends and clearly they are pretty cosy with the Labor Party.

The Greens have shown a complete lack of integrity in this matter.