A cautionary tale against taking Australia recklessly down the republic route by an erstwhile public servant (or some such function). Set in 2021 or thereabouts, 'Straylya's adopted the republican model by essentially doing a find-and-replace on the Constitution, replacing "Governor General" with "President," without due consideration to the bounds of authority between the Prez and Parliament. She'll not be right. Imagine the hijinks when the President decides that hey! the Constitution doesn't say anything about me being a figurehead, and in fact... yep, there it is, I'm the Commander in Chief of the armed forces. No worries... but what's this about the Government (with the Prime Minister in charge) having authority too... hm. What potential for conflicting ideologies and subsequent orders.
In order to bring this all to a head, the book's plot relies on trusty terrorists to assassinate the Australian and American ambassadors to ... some place in Asia. And off we go!
In the end, this is more of a policy paper masquerading as a novel. Even the effusive praise on the cover is from generals and political types.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment