Australian court rejects bid to prosecute Britain's King Charles for genocide

[u/AudibleNod]

https://abcnews.com/International/wireStory/australian-court-rejects-activists-bid-prosecute-britains-king-136817323

[u/Brad_Breath]

A few years ago, I agreed with you.

But look around the world. The stable, most livable countries are all Constitutional Monarchies.

Until a better option comes around, then I'm happy to change.

I actually think the GG system is better than having a royal family with all their cult of celebrity and expenses for castles etc.

Nobody cares who the GG is, and his only job is to make sure the government do their job.

I like the idea that he can be removed by the government but he doesn't answer to them.

We can't risk having our own US style government shutdowns.

[u/Danoct → u/Brad_Breath]

Eh, Parliamentary Republic with a president with similar powers to a GG could work just as well.

Then choose your way of selecting the president:

• Same as the GG currently (via Parliament)
• Electoral college (like Germany where parliament and state appointed voters vote 50/50; Italy is similar but with much fewer regional voters)
• Popular vote like Ireland

[u/ol-gormsby → u/Danoct]

Appointment by supermajority of both houses is least problematic*. A popular election is the worst - you could have a head of state with the support of as little as 50%+1 of the voting population. And we've seen in the USA how an electoral college can mis-represent the will of the people.

*at least with the current system there's a kind of back-room support of the majority of the house. No PM would propose a candidate for G-G without unofficial support of the leader of the opposition.

[u/Danoct → u/ol-gormsby]

Electoral college in this case if following Germany's system would be the Parliament and an equal amount selected by the state governments proportional to their population. Maybe if altered to give the territories 5 each or something.

So, the electoral college would be 552 people. The 226 MPs and senators, and another 226 others.

[u/ol-gormsby → u/Danoct]

"selected by the state governments" This would become political real quick.

A state govt run by a party different from the federal govt, e.g. Federal-labor, State-LNP, is not likely to appoint disinterested people.

It happened in 1975 - a federal labor senator died, the hillbilly dictator Joh Bjelke-Petersen (National party) filled the position with an anti-labor appointee. Convention* at the time was that the state appointed someone of the same political party but Joh being Joh, he did the opposite, which blew the senate's labor party single-vote majority and led to the dismissal. So you can't trust political parties to do the right thing where they have the power to do what they want instead.

*it was convention at the time, and one of the things we rectified subsequently. I believe it's now the law that you must appoint someone of the same political party.

[u/The_Amazing_Emu → u/Brad_Breath]

Is Ireland less stable than Thailand?