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Andrew Bartlett posts today at Crikey on the political prospects of The Greens as a third party in our 'two party' system. In his (always insightful) analysis he makes mention of the inevitable internal tensions about direction within the Greens over whether their effort to grow the party's support base should focus on trying to consolidate "the more doctrinaire left wing vote" or "broaden their appeal to capture some of the 'small l' liberal1 vote that the Democrats2 used to get."
The Australian Democrats are in a hard place right now, but I for one, hope we haven't seen the ... more
Why Queenslanders should vote for the Democrats in the Senate
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I just read a couple of really interesting pieces on the Senate competition in this election, which (as it should be) has been receiving much more attention than in some of Australia's elections from recent history.
Over at Larvatus Prodeo Anna Winter has argued that if you're in WA your vote is best spent on the Labor Party in the WA Senate race1. That probably makes sense for WA voters, but I will argue strongly that for Queenslanders, a vote for the Democrats 2 (Andrew Bartlett and Sharon Neill) is easily the best way to help ensure the Senate both ... more
This is sw'as, the digital home of Simon Elvery - a 26 year old Web Developer with too many extra curricular interests. Usually written from Brisbane, Australia, sw'as has entries dating back to 2004 on subjects including politics, photography, books, music, and many other flights of fancy.
