Australia's only small government, pro-liberty political party, the Liberal Democratic Party is looking for thoughtful input on welfare issues.

To that end, I've put up a post on Australia's most popular small-government, pro-liberty group blog, Catallaxy. We'd be interested in your comments, although it may be helpful to find out a bit about Australian politics first. My post - with lots of relevant links - is here.

Gee those Australian Politicians are stupid sometimes...  This is the latest measure to combat the drug trade and associated crime: Drug Users and Dealers will be banned from 9 Melbourne suburbs, unless of course they actually live there.  Like that's going to work! - all they need is one address and they will all say they live there.  It must be nearly time for a state election, that's my guess.

An Australian magistrate got busted, hard, for plagiarism and in typical government efficiency they will throw the book at him.  Her Punishment? A 2 Months PAID suspension, ‘additional training, counseling and appropriate mentoring.’  In a free market system, that would be grounds for immediate termination.  The cost do not end there, lost man hours from the time she should have been working on this, and the man hours that will be lost by her co-workers in fixing her mistakes.

The Free Market requires efficiency and self-responsibility; it cannot afford mistakes like this because capitalism is motivated by profit.  Government has no goal of profit, or worries about cost, they can just steal more from you.  Australian’s should be outraged and push for this woman to be fired.