This page written circa 1 November, 2004.
Last week Australians re-elected their right-wing
Prime Minister, John Howard.
The main lesson is that educating the
populace seems to have little effect upon
their capacity to discriminate intelligently between candidates.
If I was to be cynical I would reflect that
at least George Bush has the courtesy to
pay people to let him ruin their country's
economy and international reputation.
To be honest, I must acknowledge that Howard's
fiscal policy has made Australia's economy relatively strong
even if he has been dishonest and patently deceptive
after the fashion of Mr Bush, while strangling the education
and medical systems.
It surely is not the truth of a politician's words that get
him elected: The proletariat still believe whatever they are told.
Next week Americans go to the polls, and the race is expected
to be close.
If Bush is defeated, I will consider this proof of my theory
that a country does not benefit from widely educating its
citizenry, since the breadth and average level of education is much lower in the
USA compared to Australia.
It is sad to think that education changes this so little, and I have many good friends who
would disagree with me, but consider that the average
Australian is far better informed, especially about
global matters, than the average American, yet they
seem no more likely to be swayed by long-term concerns for
humanity, nor more likely to reject a politician
who distorts the truth.
Additionally I watched the best students graduate year
after year and promptly leave Australia and generally not return...
they took their free educations and ran.
Eventually, so did I.
The USA has wasted a great deal of resources in Iraq.
I do not think intelligent people accept that any part
of this escapade was motivated by compassion, for which
the USA is not renowned.
If you doubt the lack of institutional compassion,
consider this report from New Scientist
a couple of months ago:
On the personal front, a good friend has been diagnosed
with a follicular lymphoma, was nearly killed by a very minor oversight
in the biopsy, and continues to show up the shortcomings
of being at the mercy of the current Australian public
health system.
You have to accept that the numerous reports of "preventable deaths" in
the medical system are absolutely correct. Kay and I found ourselves
responding to this by assuring each other that we would be close at hand
with a sharp lawyer should this have befallen either of us. It is one
thing to find out that your medical insurance (national or private) does
not cover a treatment you need, but altogether another to find you are a
victim of incompetence, on anyone's tab.
Some of you will respond to the above paragraph by saying that such attitudes
only give rise to ambulance-chasing lawyers and huge liability insurance
machines. Such is a risk, but would only arise if the legal system
deals with the problem by means of the dollar in punitive damage
awards, rather than something more constructive. The better purpose of
lawyers is to trim the less able by exposing their incompetence,
and thus improve the average. This
brings us back to the main theme of this essay: The extent to which the
average homo sapien exercises his powers of discrimination to ensure
that the most able and most honest men prosper, while the short-sighted,
manipulative, secretive, and over-elevated do not, be they doctors,
politicians, CEOs, or whatever.
The aforementioned extent seems to be very limited.
All in all, some would say that it does not look too good for mankind.
Such discovery of the worth of the common man is enough to drive you to vote for the right.
For example [of useless government agencies] we
[Bali bombing rescuers] contacted the US
consulate [on Java] and advised them we had one
of their nationals in a terrible state with 60%
burns. They responded by asking if he had a
credit card to pay for his own evacuation.
Incredulous at this reply we pointed out that
he had almost no skin let alone a credit card -
but the official could not offer or suggest any
constructive course of action. We subsequently
arranged to have him flown to Australia.
If compassion, regard for the long-term future or
common respect for honesty were to dominate,
Bush would be swept away.
We are about to conduct an excellent test of the average American.