Law and order typically makes a starring role, and the usual recriminations about soft sentencing does as well during State elections.

I actually just want fair judges, not Draco. Election through approval voting or; appointment by the Premier, approved by the Legislative Council but nominated by a supervisory body isn’t a bad idea. This is or was LDP policy, or close to it…or it was once proposed for NSW…

Philip – excellent point about long terms (though this would be mitigated with term limits)… perhaps 4 year terms with half-elections every two years would be a decent compromise? (combined with voluntary voting, of course)

“four year terms; directly elected executive; proportional parliament; recall elections;a and while we’re at it – let’s add approval voting for judge”

-a very good idea, except for the four years for the legislature. I think the Americans have it right with the two year bit. The shorter the term the more responsive the pollies are to the electorate. None of this “introducing unpopular legislation” and hoping the voters will forget about it by the end of the term.

The Greens oficial position is to keep capitalism, but regulate the bejeesus out of it until it resembles something like socialism. In this regard they are definitely more ‘socialist’ that, say, the French Parti Socialiste.

Fleeced – good point about imposing their own view of morality. While I agree with them on gay rights and drugs (to some extent), in this regard they are no different from Family First.

The rise of the greens, especially amongst youth is because the social agendas of the major parties are out of touch with younger people.

As for the greens being radical, by libertarian standards they are. But they are hardly socialist. They are just rather strong social democrats. Similar governments have been elected in other countries and while I wouldn’t say that it’s helped their economies I also wouldn’t say those countries aren’t capitalist. The reality of government forces everyone to compromise.