Nath

TL;DR: all the experts say "yes".

I don't have a strong opinion on the topic, but my non-expert opinion is "probably not". It would have been outright "no" before reading this article, but some of those arguments were actually persuasive.

It isn't that I want a weak military, it's that I see so many priorities the government can be spending on and defense still isn't at the top of that list for me.

Greens get a steady 15-20% percent of voters just about everywhere around the nation (except Melbourne where it's higher). Not enough to win a seat, but enough that their preferences are extremely valuable. But Greens have nobody else to give those preferences to - at the end of the day the Liberal party is less compatible to Green policies than Labor is.

It would actually be a strong signal one election for those preferences to go somewhere else. Labor won't get elected without those preferences - but they seem to take them for granted. One Nation do it from time to time and they only get 2-5% of the vote. Some elections, they give their preferences to the non-sitting member (Liberal candidate if sitting member was Labor/Labor if the sitting member was Liberal). One election, it was enough to tip the balance.

15-20% of the vote is plenty enough to get representation in the senate, of course.

Greens need a re-brand. They are seen by older voters as one-trick ponies. Caring solely about the environment and not having any policies on anything else. That's not true of course, but their marketing sucks. If they could actually articulate their positions to voters somehow, I think far more voters would realise they align with Green policies.

Step one: Submit a bunch of bullshit answers to the classifications request form.
Step two: Trigger some algorithm that initially refuses classification.
Step three: Press release saying your game was banned in Australia.
Step four: Free Press!!
Step five: Get your classification when a human gets around to your title and have far higher interest in your game because of the press.

This whole episode fails the sniff test. I think Konami did this on purpose to intentionally rustle your jimmies.

That's what's so funny - the election campaign hasn't even started. 😁

It's wild that a disease I got in the 90's was completely eradicated from the country 20 years later.

Measles sucks if you get it as an adult. Two miserable weeks of going from the bed to the bath and back again. I had spots everywhere on my body except my palms and eyeballs. And I mean everywhere. I still have scars all these later.

If your parents didn't vaccinate you or if (like in my case) the vaccine didn't exist when you were a kid, go get the MMR shot.

I meant customers, but Dave has already answered.

Home delivery services are a recent offering. What did these people do before about 5 years ago?

I swear there's a hole in the market here. A third option that was online-only with collection points/delivery services similar to Colesworth that undercut on price.

Startup costs would be massive, though not as much as trying to enter the market as a third retailer with physical stores in all the suburbs.

It could start with a few distribution nodes (warehouses) and grow out. Order online, go to warehouse to collect. The next step where you can distribute in more suburbs or deliver to homes is where it gets most difficult.

Odd examples. WA is 23/45 - it's the state most likely to vote Yes, I think.

Results have come down to 3:3 among the states a few times, but I think WA was Yes each time.

Yes, that check on power. John Kerr acted because he knew that Whitlam was going to sack him and he dismissed the PM in a preemptive strike. He did not involve the Queen in his decision and he completely overstepped his (implied) authority. I don't deny the one time the Governor General used their power to dissolve a government was an utter shitshow, but corrections were made in the wake of that act and I am confident there won't be a repeat on just the whim of a future Governor General.

I was too young at the time to understand anything about the Pine Gap angle, but while I can see Whitlam losing power was good for US interests, I don't believe they were directly involved in events as they played out. Kerr denied CIA involvement (of course he would) and Whitlam agreed that Kerr had more than enough incentive to act without the CIA being party to proceedings.

All I want is to abolish the governor general keep everything else exactly the same.

And I want to keep the government answerable to someone who can veto bills and force a new election in an emergency like we are seeing in the USA. Even if those powers were never used again.

Australians rarely vote "yes" in a referendum. Our rate is 8 positive results in 45 (source).

After watching events as they play out this year in the USA, I doubt there would be a lot of support in the electorate to remove checks on power in Australian governments.

I personally would not want to.