From: pdt@mundil.cs.mu.OZ.AU (Peter David THOMPSON)
Subject: Stupid election tricks
Organization: Computer Science, University of Melbourne, Australia
Date: Tue, 7 Apr 1992 05:49:43 GMT

   Background: The electorate of Wills used to be the seat of our former
Prime Minister. (He lost the Prime Ministership, resigned the seat, and
is now a reporter for the Australian version of 60 Minutes). The local
(state, country) economy is in poor shape at the moment, & the Labor party
is in power ("left wing" (sort of). The Liberal party is the free enterprise/
GST (VAT)/bash the unions type party (sort of)).
  The Queen (the British one) has just visisted us.
  The new P.M. is pushing republicanism.
  The electoral system is based on preference voting.
  The Australian flag has a Union Jack in the upper left hand quarter (the
rest is the Southern Cross).

  The following is from the "Coburg Courier", Tues. March 31, 1992. Reprinted
  without permission. All typos are mine.

"Royals in Poll Row".

THE most colorful candidate in the Wills by-election had a busy time last week.
  Murgatroyd, who is standing for the Imperial British Conservative Party,
lodged a formal complaint with the Australian Broadcasting Tribunal over
advertisements of Channel Nine's "A Current Affair".
  The advertisements showed the British Royal family.
  Part of Murgatroyed's policy platform invloves the monarchy so he claimed
Channel Nine's advertisements could have breached the new act banning
electronic media during elections.
  A spokeswoman for the tribunal said the complaint would be followed up.
  But Murgatroyd is not waiting for the results of the tribunal's
investigations. He has proposed that the by-election be called off and the
field of 22 candidates be divided into two teams to play a one day game of
cricket on April 11. [Poll day, Saturday].
  Murgatroyd's idea is for the game to be called the Wills Cup Match and
the man or woman of the match gets to represent Wills.
  Not content with throwing the Broadcasting Tribunal into a quandary and
attempting to totally re-arrange the by-election, Murgatroyd then went on
to organise a "massed flag modification" ceremony outside Pentridge. [prison,
bluestone walls, in a surburban area (the prison was there first)].
  The ceremony involved a "public mutilation" of the Australian flag as a
"symbolic secession of Wills from the Commonwealth of Australia and the
establishment of a more direct link with the British Empire, as a seperate
colony, like the Falklands", according to an IBCP press release.
  Murgatroyd's aim in the by-election is to attract the least number of votes.
  Mutilating the Australian flag would seem to be a way of accomplisihng this.
[end of article.]

ObAntipodeanL: If New Zealand were to seek to join the Commonweath of
Australia, no part of the Constitution would need to be changed. 
ObAntipodeanL2: The antipodes of England actually lie somewhere in the middle
of the Pacific Ocean.

* These opinions belong to pdt@mundil.cs.mu.OZ.AU unless otherwise specified.
"Such energies correspond to velocities at almost 95% of the speed of light,
far faster than the speed of sound." - Scientific American, Nov. 1991.

P.S. Apologies to the person who emailed me to ask about the climate down here.
Your return address was inadequate for our mailer. Answer: 10-20 degrees C,
showers. Your milage may vary with latitude.