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Monday July 17, 2006

Blog Bias

There are a few comments in the feedback on what I write in my blog that seem to believe that I'm biased this way or that. Nothing could be further from the truth. I wonder about this and I think it is because my mistake is to assume everyone is critical of everything - that is the nature of Australians. If you look in polls published in newspapers, it would not be uncommon for a lot of people (even 80% or more) to believe that a politician lied, even if that politician is the leader of the country.

In and article today on how Government fades, the issue of how long a Government is worthwhile having in power is raised. In Australia it is Labor vs Liberal, in America, Democrat vs Republican, in the UK, Labour vs Tories (aka Conservatives). But in all countries, I believe that the same problem remains. In countries where the population does not have any say in who makes up Government, how can there ever be any incentive for the Government to come up with new ideas, even if they are considered radical? In short, competition within the political circles gives us a better government than we would get without it. I think this is a very important benefit of being able to chose who is in Government - perhaps more important than the choice itself.

To take this back to the original topic, I often don't see the need to write anything critical about Australia - if you look in the Australian newspaper web sites, you will find plenty of criticism. Quite a large amount of it I will happily agree with. In the case of China, the criticism is largely centred around the way information is promulgated and how everything visible caters to this. There is no bias that America is the best (in fact I believe America is becoming a worse country to live in, day by day) or the same about Australia (not deteriorating as quickly as America.) If anything, America is becoming more like China quicker than China like America.