 So we had an election in New South Wales the most popular state in Australia over the weekend and Leather swept to an overwhelming victory. Leather's the center-left party and the Liberals are the center-right party in Australia and Liberals lost power for the first time in 11 years And what was striking about the election is how little they differed on policy and how well the two competing politicians the two leaders of the Liberals and the Leather party got along like they didn't trash each other all right they like each other they respect each other and the the small amount of policy differences is representative of Australian politics over the last I don't know like 10-15 years all right there's very little very little difference between the major parties in Australia anymore and it's all kind of a near liberal consensus there's a consensus of the foreign policy that they're throwing in there a lot with the United States and there's just not a whole heck of a lot to argue about so when you watch the news in Australia you might find it very boring that happy country boring news because the major political parties are largely aligned country is pretty well governed the government runs efficiently low levels of corruption high levels of social trust social cohesion most people feel like the government is on their side and countries just had you know an unbelievable run of prosperity right they basically had approximately 30 years of uninterrupted economic growth and politics seems to occupy very little you know relative attention in the Australian mind so I was in Australia for three months and I think one person started up with me to talk about Australian politics like no one offered to me their opinion on the Prime Minister of Australia Albo his nickname Anthony Albanesey I had three months in Australia and no one offers me an opinion on the Prime Minister right no one starts up talking about Australian politics so Australia can afford to put it low priority on politics because it's not fighting for its survival right the enemy trying to wipe it out has not yet risen into view now over the past couple of weeks there's been a lot of conversation in the Sydney Morning Herald about the China threat so two of China's main shipping routes go past Australia so China may have incentives to invade or control Australia they certainly try to bribe their way into controlling Australian politics China's Australia's number one trading partner but the United States is definitely America's Australia's number one strategic defense partner and so the major all the major political parties are aligned with drawing in with the United States so the Labor Party is now in control in Australian government federally and almost all the major states run by Labor governments but they just recently agreed to buy a nuclear powered submarine from the United States which will give Australia considerable nuclear power and strategic punch against China if there's a war and it's actually a political consensus probably 75 percent of Australians feel united behind a defense alliance with the United States the United States has been the main military protector of Australia since World War II and America rescued Australia from Japanese in World War II and ever since then Australians have fought with Americans whenever America goes to war that's the that's the price to pay when you're America's military defense partner but as long as China or any other enemy is not threatening the existence of Australia and it can afford tranquil politics and as long as the economy is humming along this Australians can afford to just ignore politics