When you think of the most imperfect democracies in the world Venezuela, Iran
and Zimbabwe come readily to mind and then of course there’s the Australian Labor Party.

NSW is arguably the democratic heartland of the ALP and nowhere is their style of power-broked democracy more apparent.

The democratically elected Iemma Government was replaced by the power-broked Rees Government which was in turn replaced by the power-broked Kristina
Government.

It’s true to say that power-broking has made for a better looking NSW Government but alas not better performed.

The NSW electorate was ropable. They’d always assumed that change of governments were essentially their responsibility. However ace power-brokers Joe Tripodi and Eddie Obeid took it upon themselves to recycle Nathan Rees from the dustbins of democracy and to clamber into the tank for septic Kristina.

Emboldened no doubt by this power-broking pandemic factional leaders Bill Shorten and Mark Arbib powered Julia into office and power-drilled Kevin into the wilderness.

And they did it ‘for the good of Australia’.

It was certainly good for Bill and Mark. They’ve proved they’ve got the power and if they don‘t get cabinet posts soon they’ll power-broke Wayne or somebody in to replace Julia. It was obviously terrific for Julia and arguably the Labor Party. But if they truly wanted to do something for the good of Australia and indeed the world they could power-broke Kevin into becoming Kim Jong-il’s successor in North Korea.

He’d actually be a breath of fresh air up there.

Paul Howes, the national secretary of the AWU has obvious pretensions to power-broking. The democratic rights of millions who voted Kevin 07 into office are apparently as nothing compared with the interests of Paul and his members.

He announced on television that he had power-broked against Kevin to save his union from Tony Abbott. He should be advised to use the democratic method of achieving that objective just like the rest of us. It’s called a general election.

Power-broking is exercised by people who can’t get the power they need through the democratic process or alternatively see it as a path to posterior protection.

Thank goodness general elections come along every so often to remind us that we live in a democracy rather than a power-brokery.

It is interesting that power-brokers have recently switched their support to women.

They may be disappointed to find these puppets come with no strings attached.

Kevin may have been an insufferable prig but he was our insufferable prig.

If we had to suffer because we democratically elected him we should at least have been accorded the luxury of atoning for our mistake. Unlike Labor power-brokers we have to wait three years for the opportunity.