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Despite my dismay at both of the major political parties, I went to Copenhagen on Friday to cast my vote in the 2010 Australian Federal Election. I still believe there is a difference between them, and indicated my anger by preferencing the less objectionable of the minor parties first.

I thought Jay Rosen provided a good analysis of the media’s role both in the election and more generally on ABC’s Lateline.

I have also been thinking how the political system could be improved to be more representative of the entire population. Like many, I have been frustrated with the issues that have become the focus of this election, and hate seeing politicians so blatantly targeting marginal seats in both policies and funding. I came up with two possibilities:

• Remove compulsory voting; or
• Move to proportional representation in the lower house.

Removing compulsory voting would mean that candidates need to give voters across the nation a reason to come and vote. But I like the idea of compulsory voting – it encourages people to engage in politics and voice their opinion, so I will discount this option here.

Proportional voting would mean all voters directly elect the leader. This is in contrast to the current system of electing a local representative, and the party or coalition with the greatest number of representatives leads the nation.

It seems most people think we already have proportional representation. In all of the media I have seen people talk about voting for Julia or Tony. But if I were a resident of Wentworth I would be torn – I think Malcolm Turnbull is a valuable member of both the parliament and the Liberal party, but I am not prepared to see Tony Abbott as PM. If we used the same voting system as for the senate I could preference Malcolm much higher than his party leader.

One of the big fears is with proportional representation will lead to a hung parliament. I do not see this as a problem. It is rare that Australians give one party control of both houses of parliament, and when we do a change of government is imminent. So in effect we almost always have a hung parliament and seem to survive. Ultimately parliament should represent the people – and if a proportional representation system allows peoples opinions to be more accurately reflected this must be a good thing for democracy.

The potential bigger problem is that this would remove local representation from parliament – to whom do you petition your cause? Again I do not see this as a major problem. There should still be representatives interested in your vote and your cause.

The great problem with proportional representation is that it would erode the power of both of the major parties. Thus it will not happen.

I just realised that in each of the three cities I have lived in Sweden – Lund, Karlskrona and Kristianstad – the hospital and graveyards are adjacent. Further, the chapel is on the hospital side of the graveyard. Who said that government allocate resources inefficiently?!

Yesterday we made ginger beer, but didn’t want to drink it until it was ice-cold.

The recipe is surprisingly simple – the only ingredients are ginger, lime, sugar and water. The most time consuming part was roughly peeling the ginger with all its lumps and bumps.

Tim was correct when he said the recipe is spicy and gives you a kick. Both Oziel and I both watered it down to drink. We agreed it would be good mixed with carbonated water or a Lemon Loka (carbonated water with a twist of lemon and no sugar).

We thought that replacing the lime juice with lemon juice would also help reduce the impact of the “kick.

I am an avid Google Reader user, and very regularly check the blog suggested via explore. For me the results are usually a very eclectic – ranging from breaking tech gadget news and nerdy comics to an inexplicable number of design blogs focusing on weddings. Somewhere in the middle come the food blogs – and this is where I found Lottie + Doof.

The post that first caught my attention was pasta with fresh corn pesto. And that is what Oziel and I made for dinner tonight. This is our attempt below.

We were very happy with the result. The recipe makes about four serves.

The other post that caught my attention was ginger beer. We also made that tonight, but haven’t had a glass yet as we want it ice-cold (so no photos).

I love ginger beer but, like salt and vinegar chips, it is one of the things that hasn’t taken off in Sweden. It is possible to buy from Gray’s American Store in Malmö. Gray’s sells supermarket goods from around the English speaking world that are otherwise hard to find in Sweden. They even sell Tim Tams for the bargin basement price of 9.20 AUD per pack!! However, all of their Cadbury chocolate comes from the UK =(

Today I ordered my preferences for both the lower and upper houses in the Australian Federal Election. I was impressed with Below the Line as I diligently dragged the Senate candidates up and down after reading about the various political parties. The list of candidates for the House of Representitives for my seat was easy enough to handle manually.

But I am not sure I can be bothered to go and vote. It’s not the train fare, we were thinking of going to Copenhagen anyway. And it’s not that I am registered to vote in a seat so safe that Volvo is looking at using the technology in its next car. It’s that I am so disillusioned with politics – even if I cast the deciding vote I am not satisfied with the difference it will make.

Politics has become a career. There is no room for ideology as the political corporations seek market dominance. Political ideology is no longer a vision for the nation, it is about ensuring a sufficient number of votes market dominance in a sufficient number of electorates markets.

To facility change in Australian politics today, you need to be part of a focus group. You don’t need any qualification – from my observation it actually helps not to have them. No, this is more like a psychologists couch – you vent your fears and prejudices. Then the political corporations roll them into their product offerings. How else can someone explain to me why 2000 people coming by boat to seek refuge from unwarranted persecution can be blamed for trafic delays in Sydney?!

We need leadership. Leaders shape opinions and beliefs. They don’t just follow them.

I was pleased to see on the issue of adoption by same-sex partners that the Swedish politicians lead public opinion, rather than waited for it to catch up with their own beliefs. When introduced, adoption by same-sex partners was only supported by 17% of the nation, but eight years later it is supported by a majority of the Swedish nation. They did what they thought was right and took the nation forward with them.

I recommend you listen to the discussion on Late Night Live from 4 August 2010.