“Corruptissima re publica plurimae leges”
– Tacitus, Annals, Book III, 27
Translation: The more numerous the laws, the more corrupt the government.
Variant: The more corrupt the state, the more laws.
Original Quote: And now bills were passed, not only for national objects but for individual cases, and laws were most numerous when the commonwealth was most corrupt.
Your humble blogger always finds it bemusing to hear politicians – of all stripes and colours – proudly boast that their passing more new laws is a “record of achievement.” One that somehow proves they are doing a good job.
Indeed, our present ALP government has made it something of go to slogan of self-praise … and self defense. Especially when their manifest incompetence – record debt, endless deficits, bungled “stimulus”, bungled mining tax, failed asylum-seeker policy, et al – is pointed out.
Naturally, the mainstream media parrot the politicians’ crapola without thought:
But is the Gillard government really as ”incompetent” as it seems? Despite the drama, the Parliament under Gillard has passed 485 bills since the end of 2010… Over a similar period, the Rudd government had 409 bills passed, while the Howard government passed 520 in its final three years.
Ok, maybe our politicians are not “incompetent” after all.
Just corrupt.
Barnaby Is Right 
Treason never prospers,
What’s the reason
For if it does
None dare call it treason
Here is Manegold of Lautenbach writing in the 11th Century:
“No man can make himself emperor or king; a people sets a man over it to the end that he may rule [serve] justly, giving to every man his own, aiding good men and coercing bad, in short, that he may give justice to all men.
If then he violates the agreement according to which he was chosen, disturbing and confounding the very things which he was meant to put in order, reason dictates that he absolves the people from their obedience, especially when he has himself first broken the faith which bound him and the people together.”
http://www.heretical.com/British/main.html#uk_directory
“Government is not reason;
it is not eloquence;
it is force! Like fire,
it is a dangerous servant
and a fearful master!”
George Washington
Corruption never seen before in my long life in Australia. I was once proud of my country paid my taxes and lived a carefree and happy life. Saved for what I wanted. Now it is the government’s grab on super leaving future governments to pay for people on the pension because their nest egg has been broken. No checks come forth, only the shall left. All this government has done is bribed for votes, broken untold promises, full of spin and cover-ups. Policies have been pushed through without any consultation, and the Prime Minister is the worst on record for her deceit. Inquiries are there by the hundreds and the bureaucrats use money as if there will be none tomorrow. And sadly that will be the case. It will take the next government years to get this once lovely country back as it was. This government needs to go immediately and the next will need all the strength and resolve to reverse the mess this government has got the country into.
According to –
http://www.australiandebtclock.com.au/
the total Australian debt is $4,551,945,000,000 while actual currency [printed/minted?] is only $51,322,925,000. So we are only $4,500,945,000,000 short to pay the bill?
An interesting article —
“…….It is clear that Washington is relying on the Gillard government in Canberra to extend NATO’s and America’s military influence in the Pacific and Indian Oceans. After attending the NATO Summit in Chicago in May 2012, Gillard agreed to a major presence of U.S. naval and air bases in Darwin and Perth, as well as the establishment of a drone base on the Australian-administered Cocos (Keeling) Islands in the Indian Ocean. There have been suggestions that Labor Prime Minister Kevin Rudd was ousted in a parliamentary coup organized by the CIA and its Australian counterparts because Rudd was not keen on Australia’s closer military ties with the United States and NATO. Rudd reportedly favored a more independent and Asia-oriented foreign policy. If Rudd was a victim of a “perfectly-democratic” CIA coup, he would not have been the first victim. Independent-minded Labor Prime Minister Gough Whitlam was deposed in a CIA-initiated constitutional coup in 1975. Whitlam was replaced by Liberal leader Malcolm Fraser, who, like Gillard, was more in synch with Washington’s wishes.
To be fair, Fraser, who is now 82, was one of the first Australian leaders who came out against the U.S. base expansion in Australia. In 2009, Fraser left the Liberal Party, criticizing its leader, Abbott, as a “conservative” and not a “liberal”. Earlier, Fraser’s denunciation of Bush’s war policies, earned him the wrath of neo-cons in the Liberal Party, one of whom called the former prime minister a “frothing-at-the-mouth leftie” who supported Islamic fundamentalists. The criticism was similar to other knee-jerk character assassinations launched against anyone who disagreed with the neo-con, Israel-genuflecting, globalized NATO crowd. Whitlam, who is 96, patched things up with Fraser long ago. In 1996, they united to support Australia breaking its ties with the British crown and becoming a republic. Both were keenly aware that it was the Queen’s appointed Governor-General, Sir John Kerr, a longtime CIA asset, who engineered Whitlam’s ouster in 1975………”
http://www.veracitynow.com/opinions/views/7305-nato-turns-into-ioto-as-it-spread-to-the-east
Heard on ABC radio this morning that one of the reasons politicians are pushing back on super reforms is the changes will affect their Parliamentary Super Scheme.
http://wakeupfromyourslumber.com/blog/andie531/australian-democracy-israel-lobby-s-leash-australias-faceless-men
Australia ratified The Law of the Sea Treaty in 1994 —
http://www.ruthfullyyours.com/2012/12/24/lawless-at-sea-a-case-study-in-the-dangers-of-the-law-of-the-sea-treaty/
The curious case of the U.S. hedge fund, the Argentine ship and Ghana is getting curiouser, and now it has taken a turn against national sovereignty. That’s the only reasonable conclusion after a bizarre ruling this month from the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea in Hamburg.
The tribunal—who knew it existed?—ordered the Republic of Ghana to overrule a decision of its own judiciary that had enforced a U.S. court judgment. The Hamburg court is the misbegotten child of the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. Sold as a treaty to ensure the free movement of people and goods on the high seas, it was rejected by Ronald Reagan as an effort to control and redistribute the resources of the world’s oceans.
Sat 16 June – THEME: Oceans Day
Download background documents [external link]
10:00-11:00 Renewing our political commitments: Perspectives on Rio+20
11:00-12:15 Scaling up integrated governance of the oceans
12:15-13:30 Lunch: Celebrating 10 Years of the Global Ocean Forum, and the 30th Anniversary of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea
13:30-14:30 The Living Ocean: Enhancing Fisheries for Food Security, Social and Economic Benefits
http://unfccc.int/meetings/rio_conventions_calendar/items/6940.php