"Vote early and vote often"- Al Capone

I got up to go to class today but I guess I was having a slow morning because I realized with about 15 minutes until my class started there was no way I would get there in time. I ended up skipping my biology lecture, but I did go to my Aboriginal Colonised History lecture and tute. We had a guest lecturer from some Native Title group thing. The lecture room was freezing (as it always is) and his lecture was only an hour, so for the second hour we went into the tute room. Our normal lecturer then talked about our final essay/research paper. The book/paper we are supposed to read is over 400 pages, so he helped us to narrow down what we had to read and write about. We also just talked and also talked about what the class has meant to us. He told us that this is probably going to be the last time it is being taught because the uni is in a lot of debt and cutting units. The tute got over early and we went down to Kulbardi because he made copies of part of the reading for us. The other AIS (Australian Indigenous Studies) lecturers were having a party there for the Melbourne Cup, but we missed seeing it because we were in class. Some of the lecturers had crazy hats, including one lady with a stuffed horse on top of her hat! I wish I got a picture, but I didn't have my camera. This afternoon/evening I didn't really do anything.

Since today is election day in America, my dad suggested that I talk about Australian politics. When I got to Australia it was in full swing election mode. They had elections for the Prime Minister on 21 August. The two candidates were Julia Gillard and Tony Abbot. Julia Gillard was the candidate for the Labor party and the current PM. Tony Abbot was from the Liberal/National coalition. Voting in Australia is mandatory in that you have to sign in, but no one actually checks the ballots so you don't really have to vote as long as your name gets crossed off of the list. For a few days they didn't know who had won the PM election, but the results finally came in and Julia Gillard won by a small margin. They have a quick turn around (unlike the few months the US has) and she was sworn in again on 14 September.

I find the politics of Australia confusing because it isn't really like America. They are their own country, but still loyal to the Crown which is not a concept that I can understand. I also don't really understand the different political parties because they aren't the same as Republican/Democratic. They do have a Legislative branch called the Parliament of the Commonwealth of Australia. It is made up of a Senate and House of Representatives like the States, but I think their elections and terms differ from the state. The PM is also always a member of the House of Representatives.

Australia is also broken up into states. The states are Western Australia, Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria, Tasmania, and South Australia. There are also two territories, Northern Territory and Australian Capital Territory. The capital of Australia is Canberra, which is in ACT, kind of like Washington, DC.