Australian politics has become increasingly managerial. The transformative politicians, such as Keating and Greiner have been replaced by the Howard's, Carr's and Rudd's. The dour accountants who on budget night seem happy that the nation, or at least the media, is interested in who carried the one and knows what modulus means.
This is in stark contrast to the regalia of American political events. Overly staged to the point of cynicism under Bush, but remarkably fluent and historical with the calming rhetorical hand of Obama.
So do we take the physically awkward but ruthlessly managerial Carr's of the world over the Obamas or Keatings? If Obama and Clinton have anything is it political presence. It is hard to argue that Keating comes within coo-ee of Obama for that. Hawke would be the one that comes within the instinctual politics of those two, but he doesn't have the sam rhetorical flourish.
It is also hard to argue against the dour accountant and managerial prime ministers and premiers. They have not made the same mistakes that American politicians have, then again, they wouldn't have the political courage to cruise to the edges of laize-faire and back again as American politics have.
Even the dour managerialism has not been a protection against bad governance or corruption. Under Howard the last five years were overtly political where policy followed the campaign trail and left a muddle of policy and expenditure that was little more than attempted wedge after wedge.
NSW has a history of its politicians being chased out of office by ICAC and Carr was no different. The dour managerialism descended into corruption and autocratic policy making. Considering how democracy almost negates permanent entrenchment entirely from the political scene, getting too comfortable, or forgetting the constituents is a mechanism for being thrown out.
I thought Keating was an arrogant ass, but at least he was happy to tell Australians you are ready for this, you just don't know it yet. After Howard and Rudd maybe Australia needs an Italian suit kind of PM again.
Phoenix Eats Out is the restaurant review site for
Phoenix,
Scottsdale and
Old Town Scottsdale which lists the modernist and contemporary restaurants, taverns and bars in the greater Phoenix area.
This is the list of the most popular restaurants pages from phoenixeatsout.com that have been viewed the most;
My personal favourite restaurants in Phoenix are
AZ88,
Postinos,
Bomberos with
Grazie,
Humble Pie,
Orange Table,
The Vig,
Fez and others coming close behind. View the complete list with the photo-journalistic style images on
phoenixeatsout.com
Arizona is an outdoor state and has lots of hiking in the city and around the state. Phoenix is unusual for most cities in having several large mountains in the center of the city with great hiking. Anyone who comes to Phoenix has to do the
Echo Canyon trail on Camelback and the
Summit Hike on Squaw Peak or Piesta Peak. The views of the city, suburbs and surrounding mountains are wonderful from Camelback and Piesta Peak.
For more experienced hikers there is the McDowell Mountains in North Scottsdale that has several difficult and strenuous hikes in
Tom's Thumb and
Bell Pass. Alternatively, you can hike the highest mountain in Arizona. At 12,600 feet
Humphrey's Peak is a long and difficult hike.
Between 2004 and 2009 this site,
southsearepublic.org, was a constitutional blog based on scoop which focused on Australian and global constitutional issues.
One of the strongest aspects of it was the development of constitutions by those involved in the blog. These constitutions are the outcome:
The constitutions were built using principles from Montesquieu's separation of powers, the enlightnment's universal political rights and the ancient Athenian technology of sortition and choice by lot.
South Sea Republic started in 2004 as an Australian constitutional blog in 2004 based on scoop software. It was an immigrative outgrowth of Kuro5hin. The archives for each year since then;
The articles are ordered by views.
I am an Australian living in the United States as a permanent resident.
I am a software developer by trade and mostly work in Java and jump between middleware and front end.
I originally worked in the New York area of the United States in telecommunications before moving to Washington DC and
working in a mix of telecommunications, energy and ITS. I started my own software company before heading out to
Arizona and working with Shutterfly. Since then I have joined a startup in the Phoenix area and am thoroughly enjoying myself.
I do a lot of photography which I post on this website, but also on flickr. I have a photo-journalistic website which lists
the modernist and contemporary restaurants in phoenix. I have a site on the
Australian Flying Corps [AFC] which has been around since the 1990s and which I unfortunately
lost the .org URL to during a life event; however, it is under the
www.australianflyingcorps.com URL now.
The AFC website has gone through several iterations since the 90s and the two most recent are
Australian Flying Corps Archives(2004-2002) and
Australian Flying Corps Archives(2002-1999) which are good places to start.
