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ORIGINAL: DesideriScuri

Actually, did you really get rid of a federal government that needed to go, or did you just get rid of the people running the government? The Revolutionary War ended governance by England, giving way to a loosely united group of states each governing itself and little more. The US Constitution ended that original US Government, and created the Constitutional Republic we still have governing us today. Changing the President doesn't change the system of government here.

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If the populace isn't armed, there will be no ability to throw off a despotic government, if it becomes a necessity.

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ORIGINAL: Focus50

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ORIGINAL: DesideriScuri
Actually, did you really get rid of a federal government that needed to go, or did you just get rid of the people running the government? The Revolutionary War ended governance by England, giving way to a loosely united group of states each governing itself and little more. The US Constitution ended that original US Government, and created the Constitutional Republic we still have governing us today. Changing the President doesn't change the system of government here.

Not sure what you're asking....
The way I understand it, if you want your say on who runs your country, your 2 choices are to vote either Republican or Democrat, yeah?
Here we also have 2 major parties - the ALP (Aus Labor Party) and the Liberal/National coalition, better known as the Liberal Party. There are other choices of minor parties and usually a few independents managed to get elected but overall, there's only the two with a chance of actually governing.
And they're an interesting pair. Historically, the Libs are favoured by business and the affluent whereas Labor is the working man's party, with strong union ties. The simple version is that the Libs manage the economy better and tend to govern for longer terms. They're like the 3 minute rounds of a boxing match.
Labor is the creative party; the one with the grand ideas. The trouble with good financial managers (the Libs) is that voters eventually get bored with them. Enter Labor with ideas and energy - and an unfortunate art for pissing away taxpayer's money. So they tend to govern in shorter spells. Labor is like the one minute break between rounds of a boxing match. We need a spell from the Libs only to realise the main event is the actual boxing rounds.
Where the Libs take their turn at getting voted out of office, Labor tends to get punted in landslides - as they did 10 days ago. This time round (from 2007), took them 6 years to turn a 5 billion dollar budget surplus (inherited from the Libs) into a 30 billion dollar deficit. The local stock market rose almost that much just on the election result.
To answer your question (I think), the 2 parties form their own policies but those charged with administering such policy (bureaucracies etc) doesn't change with government.

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If the populace isn't armed, there will be no ability to throw off a despotic government, if it becomes a necessity.

I s'pose - but if there's never been that necessity, or even a hint of it? Eureka Stockade (1850 ish) comes to mind, though - a revolt against unfair governmental policy. Americans can relate; that particular government was the Brits way back then. It's even possible that your War of Independence may have had some historical influence on the Brits eventually backing down.
But that was considered the beginnings of Aust democracy - that the armed revolt was the people against the government from a foreign land. There's been a time in your history where the people were agitating toward revolting against their own elected government?
Focus.

• A Conservative interpretation of the US Constitution
  
• Personal Responsibility
  
• Help for the truly needy
  
• Limited Government
  
• Consumption Tax (non-profit charities and food exempt)
  

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ORIGINAL: Kirata

Well that's a fair enough definition, but our history of black slavery and contaminated race relations has given rise to two very different "gun cultures" in America. There is the traditional American culture of "legitimate and legal owners and users of guns, using guns for self-defense, sporting uses, hunting, and recreational uses," and then there is a dysfunctional predominanty black underclass culture of guns and violence which, despite representing only perhaps five percent of the population, is so insanely vicious that it accounts for fully half of our entire national homicide rate. To lump these two together simply ignores reality, tarring the former with the excesses of the latter and frustrating any attempt to solve the problem by denying that it exists.

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ORIGINAL: DesideriScuri

But, that wasn't what I was saying, exactly. You changed who was running your government. You changed who was making the rules. The system wasn't changed though. If we liken government to a boat, you changed who was at the helm, not the boat itself.

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They are not even remotely the same culture, not even by your own definition of culture as something groups of people do, and ten minutes spent in some of our inner-city neighborhoods would make that apparent to anyone.

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ORIGINAL: Kirata

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ORIGINAL: Focus50

Well no, they're two sides of the same thing; the same culture.

They are not even remotely the same culture, not even by your own definition of culture as something groups of people do, and ten minutes spent in some of our inner-city neighborhoods would make that apparent to anyone.

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ORIGINAL: Focus50

Dunno if I'd be putting all the blame for US gun crime on a particular race...

Well first of all I didn't. And second of all I'm not. These violent sub-cultures are predominantly black and to some degree Hispanic, but there is no intention on my part to tar all blacks or Hispanics. I've gone to school with, worked with, and had as neighbors blacks and Hispanics whose negative opinions of "that part of town" exceeded my own. They avoided it, and did their best to keep an eye on their children's choices of friends to counter them being infected by the values and attitudes characteristic of the violent and dysfunctional sub-cultures that thrive in those neighborhoods.

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In truth, it's not even a "white" versus "black" issue at all. Traditional American culture comprises blacks and Hispanics and people of every description who share its values, among them education, stable families, productive work, and appreciation for achievements that benefit society. There is nothing exclusively "white" about those values. They are evident among civilized people everywhere, despite the conceit of these aberrant sub-cultures that they're rejecting the "white man's" values. What they are rejecting is humanity's values, and their own humanity along with them.

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ORIGINAL: Kirata

They are not even remotely the same culture....

Surely I'm not to take the abrupt loss of communication as meaning you're conceding the point...?

Focus.

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what we have now isn't what we were intended to have. State Governments were supposed to have more authorities than the Federal Government.

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ORIGINAL: Kirata

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ORIGINAL: Focus50

What I disagree with is your interpretation of "culture", never mind boxing it as specifically "gun culture". Without reaching for any dictionary, *my* interpretation of "culture" is to mean it as something groups of people do - the good, the bad and the ugly of it.

Well that's a fair enough definition, but our history of black slavery and contaminated race relations has given rise to two very different "gun cultures" in America. There is the traditional American culture of "legitimate and legal owners and users of guns, using guns for self-defense, sporting uses, hunting, and recreational uses," and then there is a dysfunctional predominanty black underclass culture of guns and violence which, despite representing only perhaps five percent of the population, is so insanely vicious that it accounts for fully half of our entire national homicide rate. To lump these two together simply ignores reality, tarring the former with the excesses of the latter and frustrating any attempt to solve the problem by denying that it exists.

K.

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In truth, it's not even a "white" versus "black" issue at all. Traditional American culture comprises blacks and Hispanics and people of every description who share its values, among them education, stable families, productive work, and appreciation for achievements that benefit society. There is nothing exclusively "white" about those values. They are evident among civilized people everywhere, despite the conceit of these aberrant sub-cultures that they're rejecting the "white man's" values.