Fantasy Election

By Geoff | Published 27 July, 2010 9:01 pm

Having voiced my distaste for the current options in the Federal Election, and with lots of people (myself included) getting caught up in fantasy football competitions like SuperCoach and DreamTeam, I wondered what this election might instead look like with the party leaders I’d prefer to have the option of voting for. So here it is, my Fantasy Election dream team.

Labor Party: Lindsay Tanner

Sure Lindsay is officially stepping down at this election, but you can’t tell me that the Labor leadership wouldn’t tempt this man to make a run at glory. And Lindsay is one of the best things about the Rudd government: the one member of the “gang of four” you felt could genuinely be trusted and a man who genuinely believes in things and speaks intelligently about why he does so.

Interchange: Penny Wong impressed me on Q and A last night. Mind you I reckon I’d almost take anyn of the Labor politicians without the “faceless back-room hacks”.

Liberal Party: Malcolm Turnbull

Maybe he just feels let off the leash now he’s a glorified back-bencher, but Malcolm was very impressive last night on Q&A. He showed that he actually had vision for the nation that didn’t involve shutting the front door and bagging out the other guy. While I think he got a bit lost in his first attempt at the Liberal Party leadership I’m pretty certain that he wouldn’t take the same crap if he got another go around.

Interchange: Ummmm. Well. Would it be too late to get Fraser back? Perhaps Joe Hockey on a really good day, but it’d be touch and go.

Greens: Christine Milne

Bob Brown is a little past it for my liking, and while I have little doubt the man is passionate he usually comes across as though he’s just watched “How to Lose A Guy in 10 Days” for every day for four months and has completely lost the will to keep his eyes open. Christine Milne in contrast actually composes well constructed arguments in response to the sort of lines that have historically always been used against the Greens (blah blah hippies, blah blah unrealistic, blah blah blah).

Interchange: Do the Greens have anyone else in parliament? Let’s leave this as is.

Democrats (or perhaps just as an independent): Andrew Bartlett

Sure he’s running for the Greens in the House of Reps this year, and the Dems are well and truly dead (buried and cremated?) but Andrew Bartlett is still one of the best thinkers in Aussie politics, and the parliament is much much poorer for his absence. His blog is still worth a read.

That’s my ideal election: at least with the poor standard of politicians we have on offer right at the moment. Feel free to submit your own if you’re the kind of politics nerd who thinks about these things too.

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Policy is dead, long live the Spin

By Geoff | Published 26 July, 2010 1:17 pm

I watched the “Great Debate” (or should that be “Grate Debate”, given the vocal characteristics of both our leadership options in this election) last night. Has there ever been two parties more desperately trying to convince you that the other is unelectable, without actually providing any compelling reason to vote for them? It will surprise nobody that I lean well to the left, but I was hoping at least that the nominally left Labor Party (whose current leader I’ve had the pleasure of meeting at a TFA event) would provide some positive policy focus, but instead all she seemed willing to talk about was the ways in which a Liberal government would hurt the world.

Abbott was worse: even his summation failed to provide any positive policy that wasn’t just a reaction to the Labor party. The sole time he impressed was when he got on the subject of paid parental leave: a position that is surely from the playbook of the other party and a clever attempt to bring some dissatisfied Labor supporters across.

But the saddest part about politics this year and every year for as long as I’ve been allowed to vote is that the migration of about 2000 desperate people a year (in a country who reportedly takes about 300,000 a year) will define how a huge percentage of constituents vote, and will likely decide the election whichever way it goes. It’s the most pathetic issue, and apparently the only way to make it work for you is to see who can possibly be the nastiest.

So I’ll be voting, but certainly not for either of these two disgraceful attempts at political parties, and I’m definitely not happy about having to vote for the guys who will end up with it. Politics is very hard to love these days.

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Clarke and Dawe on Immigration

By Geoff | Published 15 July, 2010 10:14 pm

Fantastically relevant and important perspective from my favourite satirist team. Though I’m a bit slow on the uptake on this one.

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Be in the light

By Geoff | Published 7 June, 2010 2:08 pm

1 John 1:5-9

5 This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. 6 If we claim to have fellowship with him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live out the truth. 7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all [b] sin.

8 If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. 9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. 10 If we claim we have not sinned, we make him out to be a liar and his word is not in us.

I had a bit of an Inigo Montoya moment with this one (you know the bit where Vizzini keeps saying “inconceivable” and then after a while Inigo says “I don’t think it means what you think it means). Well I don’t think this means what I thought it meant.

The book of the month for our Missio Dei crew is in actual fact all three of the numbered Johns, so in a moment of procrastinating from writing reports I started reading and didn’t get very far at all before I found something I needed to blurt about. For all my life: whether through poor teaching or (more likely) through theological laziness, I’ve assumed that wherever the Bible talks about “being in light”, I’ve equated that with some form of sin-management style “righteousness”. So being in the light means doing the good things, not doing the things from the dark-side, and mostly just being a nice guy.

But that’s not what I read here when I have another go. Because this does talk about sin, but it talks about says that when you’re in the light you “have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all [b] sin.” If “being in the light” was about not sinning then the sentence is farcical: when you don’t sin Jesus purifies you from sin.

Instead, what I’m reading here is closer to this: being “in the light” is about vulnerability with one another. It’s about being real about where we are: not “claiming to be without sin” and making Jesus a liar, but instead opening ourselves up to the harsh reality of light – letting the people you are in fellowship with see who you really are – warts and all.

So maybe this is not a new thing for most people, but I can’t remember hearing this taught on like this. Regardless, this represents a huge challenge for whatever brand of faith community you are a part of: being really honest with one another, genuinely transparent. In a similar vein, I wanted to share something from Pete Rollins’ “Ikon” community who have just done a thing on this theme:

Most of the time when we are with each other we are covered.  We have so much technology now – technology that shrinks the distance between each of us and makes all sorts of new communication possible.  And yet a lot of the time we still feel far apart from each other.  It is almost as if our virtual selves have become just that – almost selves hovering around our lonely and disconnected interiors.  Almost selves covered in the salve of technology bravely telling ourselves that we are showing our real selves for the first time.

But one of the amazing and frustrating things about being a human being is there is always the OTHER and nothing can get rid of it – nothing can span the space, nothing can take away the distance that exists between the OTHER inside and the OTHER in those around us.  That no matter how many beautiful words and liturgies we construct, no matter how warm and inviting the atmosphere we provide, no matter how much we want it that we will always be in a state of lack.

And what happens when we set down our props – our candles, music, multi-media and set pieces.  What happens when we only have our eyes, our ears, our mouths, our guts, our bodies to know each other with?  What happens when we sit down with our lack and the OTHER and try to speak?  What would we say?

PeterRollins.net – Naked

Hope that helps you think, anyway.

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The “iPad Revolution”

By Geoff | Published 15 May, 2010 11:38 am

Here’s a video, and two thoughts that are sadly in conflict:

  1. I can’t watch this video without believing, at least for a moment or two – that this piece of technology would make me a happier, more complete person. It’s a fantastically brilliant piece of advertising.
  2. Promises like this feel to me to be an alternate gospel.
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