A nation against the state: Time for a change

Western Australia seems to many in the East to be a foreign world built on sand and vast industry with massive ore deposits stretching across thousands of square kilometres of desert combining spectacular scenery older than the nomadic tribes that call it home and wander the vast expanse. 

Western Australians made up their minds, a new Government will be formed and after a honeymoon period granted by the media, we shall be hearing the same cock and bull stories, poppycock and gibberish that is the heart and soul of commercial television’s early morning contribution to our daily news. There will be no difference.

What happened in Western Australia happens to all states. States become stale they have nowhere to go, nowhere to expand, they lose their way and the ultimate demise is inevitable. All policies and enthusiasm has failed to produce any solution for the Nation. The Nation is poorer and therefore looks to change that only compounds problems. 

The world is collapsing around our Governments whether State or Federal, they are losing the ability to direct or influence the behaviour of others. Governments are becoming like suppurating sores failing to react to antibiotics, determined regardless of all that is propelled at it, not to believe in its own ephemerality. 

What is the point of changing Governors each three or four years because of their parsimonious management only to inherit another quintessence of political unprofessionalism?

The present system of Government is antediluvian. What is wanted is a radical overhaul of the system but how is this achieved when even the aspiration of such is beyond the reach of the present strain of politicians. How does one change a system so swayed in elitism where superior attitudes and an exaggerated sense of one’s own value proliferates with each passing election. 

Abraham Lincoln in his Gettysburg address stated inter alia   “… government of the people, by the people, and for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”  A statement that is universally taken to be the definition of Democracy. How far we have travelled and distanced ourselves from those words. 

We are losing our sense of democracy and displaying and deploying despotism.  We no longer as a Nation have control over our destiny, that has long ago disappeared and now for the majority, it is a fight and daily struggle to survive.

What is the cause? Many people before have said, “A Nation gets the Government it deserves and in a democracy people get the leaders they deserve.”  This points to the fact that a Nation is ultimately responsible to itself for how it conduct its affairs. 

If we have a bad government, then it is because we as a Nation have established for ourselves a  bad government, and not yet replaced that bad government with a good one. That is very negligent of us as a Nation. 

As a Nation, we have allowed consecutive governments to bribe us with our own money and we have found that we can, by voting, obtain more money. We have voted not for those who will do the Nation no harm but for those who care only to retain power and give to a willing Nation what they demanded and wanted. We have not voted for those who will make the difficult decisions but for those who have allowed the apathy of a Nation to flourish. 

Thomas Jefferson said,“ Democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not.” 

It would appear that we have not learnt the lesson of the past or engrossed the wisdom of some great leaders. We need to change and change we must but how do you change an ethos of a whole Nation, change an attitude of greed and complacent selfishness working only in their own best interests that has become endemic.

We have been encouraged by the State to have a feeling of wellbeing, financial security and increased consumer spending producing a ‘must have’ attitude believing in the States ability to control the economy. From the beginning that which we considered our right, that feel good factor was doing nothing but triggering a downturn, an economic disaster that we now have. 

Consecutive Governments have encouraged spending and we, as a nation, have never questioned the wisdom of doing so or considered the inevitable and foreseeable conclusion. The State has as a consequence quietly sold the Nations assets, divested the Nation of industry to a stage when the nation has woken up from what appears a bad dream. 

We are now a Nation of material wealth but infrastructure-poor with little left to maintain and encourage our enviable lifestyle. Wealth has divided the Nation, isolated those who have not from those who have. A Nation who’s wealthy know little and care less of the hardships of those not financially secure.

The Nation is unhappy, looking to the State, blaming the State for all that has occurred failing to see or understand the Nation’s own responsibility or part in the downturn. A Nations desire for material wealth and prosperity has produced a Nation of excess and a State that is all but bankrupt. 

The Nation cannot afford to tergiversate every four years just because it is tired of the State – the Nation must change its rationale, its philosophy and prepare itself for the inevitable torment doing so. 

An antidote must be found but even then change will not occur in just years it will take decades and must start with the very young and those who have yet to be born. The State must look to the long-term benefit of the Nation and make decisions not based on expectation, greed and self-wealth but for the benefit of the State and eventually the Nation. 

Is the State strong and capable of implementing changes without fear or favour and are we as a Nation willing to do so? We will find out in the coming months and years – as the consequence of complacency is just too serious to consider.

Do you agree with Paul? 

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