The will of the people
8 Feb 2006Interesting debate from two senators on the RU486 vote. From one side – a Nationals senator – a well-reasoned argument why it should be up to the Therapeutic Goods Administration and not the Catholic, anti-abortion health minister to decide which drugs are safe to use. And from the other side – a Liberal senator – a bunch of emotive bullshit, attempts to confuse the issue and skewed statistics recycled directly from an anti-abortion lobby group. (DO NOT get me started on pro-bleeding-choice vs pro-bleeding-life terminology today.)
Here’s a good guide. When a politician says:
I have received a lot of correspondence on [insert topic here]. They are letters written with passion by ordinary Australians whose concerns have prompted them to put pen to paper.
. . . he or she is lying. (This is probably no big deal: doesn’t the old joke go that you know a politician is lying if his/her lips are moving?) It’s a bit of lame-arse rhetoric designed to convice you the politician isn’t pushing his or her own politicial/social/moral agenda but reflecting the will of his or her constituents.
Crap.
[...] I said the other day I didn’t want to get into the pro-life vs pro-choice terminology argument. I still don’t, but suffice to say I think both terms are hopelessly prejudicial. And support somtimes comes from the most unexpected quarters. For example, you’ll never guess who said this . . . I would like the pro-life people to get another name because, frankly, that describes everybody in this place [...]