China's 'people's democracy' claim ignores one key defect

That defect is the total absence in the People's Republic of China of one of the basic principles underlying true democracy - the rule of law. The only way that that this essential aspect of any democracy can be realised is by having laws and systems of government that apply to everyone, including those exercising executive power. Unfortunately, in China, the law is whatever the government (or anybody exercising power) says it is.

Xi Jinping is the General Secretary of the CCP, the Chairman of the Central Military Commission and is also the President of the People's Republic of China (for life!) and it is now a common occurrence for anybody incurring the disfavour of the CCP to be held incommunicado, denied adequate legal representation, secretly "tried" and sentenced, sometimes to death. This is not a proper exercise of the rule of law.

The rule of law is not the only underpin of a successful democracy. It is worth noting in full what the often misquoted Winston Churchill said to the House of Commons in 1947: "It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government - except for all the others that have been tried from time to time ... but ... public opinion, expressed by all constitutional means, should shape, guide and control the actions of ministers, who are their servants and not their masters."

I enjoyed Crispin Hull's interesting article on Saturday, but wish to correct him on one point in particular .

He states that the US, UK and Australia "have engaged in a massive arms build-up" especially at sea. While it is true Australia and the US are certainly increasing their defence assets, the UK in fact is cutting its already diminished armed services even further .

From having 320,000 personnel in 1990, the UK has contracted its forces to a pathetic 148,700. The once formidable Royal Navy has gone from over 50 destroyers and frigates to a bare 18 (Australia has 12) and the army which once had over 1000 main battle tanks and 160,000 troops now has only 148 and 72,000 respectively.

Under Cameron and Johnson, the British Armed Forces have been reduced to virtual irrelevance, which is tragic for a once highly effective world-class outfit. The greatest enemy the UK defence force has had to fight since 1990 has been the British government

AUKUS would be a lot more effective if we included the French in it as well. They are the main western European power now, not Britain.

Your report announcing David Pocock's decision to run for the Senate will have given him, and us, a flavour of what to expect ('Get ready for it': ACT senate race heats up, December 18). Senator Gallagher, in the safest ALP Senate seat in the country, advises "there is no such thing as a safe seat". Kim Rubenstein says "[the Jenkins report] certainly is fundamental to me making the decision to run". She announced her candidature some months before the Jenkins report. Senator Seselja sledges Pocock as one-dimensional and an extremist. Dr Goreng Goreng implies that, as a woman and an Aboriginal person, she might be considered ahead of a white male progressive.

Pocock himself said nothing, thus avoiding the need to descend into the inevitable politician-speak that the others are practised at, or still learning. But silence won't win votes. It was George Orwell who said that "Political language is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind."

The last outsider to almost win the second ACT Senate seat (for the Australian Democrats in 1998) was the late Rick Farley: talented, charismatic and an early environmentalist. Pocock, still seen as sincere, committed, and untainted, could do worse than study how the always moderately spoken Farley, and what he stood for, came so close.

In The Canberra Times of December 17, Peter Brukner continues the debate about diet and diabetes. He says that we have been on a low-fat, high-sugar diet for the past 50 years and the results have been disastrous as we have been getting fatter and sicker. I don't think anyone would dispute this, however I disagree with his statement that in changing our diet we need to get back to eating the way our grandparents used to eat before the era of ultra-processed junk food. Certainly some of the diets of previous generations may have been healthier than ours, but in many cases their diets were high in sugars and carbohydrates.

In the post-war years we lived with a lot of bread, mostly white. We had cakes, biscuits, pastries, pies and puddings. We had lots of jam, marmalade, honey and golden syrup, and most adults loved plenty of sugar in their tea and coffee. There was little type 2 diabetes then, but there were also few fat people. There is no doubt that we are getting obese in the affluent Western world, but looking at the diet of past generations as an answer to staying healthy is complicated. What may be good for diabetics may not be good for people with heart problems and other diseases.

The Canberra Times has recently run a comprehensive series on type 2 diabetes. And, by association, diet and obesity. Canadian studies have shown an almost perfect match in the growth in supermarket floor area and obesity from the 1950s on.

The growth in food processing from the farm gate to the supermarket checkout can account for nearly all of this increase. The processed food industry is huge, and is an exemplar of the dictum "capitalise the profit (industry) and socalise the cost (obesity)". Keep up the good work. Don Quixote and King Canute salute you.

Shane Rattenbury (Opinion, December 18) has a hide to boast how the Greens have improved public transport. His obsession with an outdated, slow tram is the reason we can seldom catch a bus since his "reforms".

We live nowhere near the tram, but we can no longer catch a local bus to Barton. We have lost our express buses, and as most school buses disappeared there is little room left on the buses that remain during the peak. What horrors he has in store for our remaining buses, after years of traffic chaos and squillions of wasted dollars, are the stuff of nightmares. Shane, you made me vote for the Liberals at the last election. The choice will be even easier next time.

I'd like to respond to Anne O'Hara's letter on the lack of electric vehicle chargers between Canberra and the South Coast and beyond. Anne is correct about "range anxiety" when day trips are involved due to the current lack of fast charging stations. However, until this situation changes (and it will), an overnight stay will alleviate the problem, as was my experience when I stayed overnight at Batemans Bay some three weeks ago while giving my new EV a run to the coast.

l left Canberra with a full (100 per cent) charge, and consumed about 30 per cent going down to the Bay. I did the normal running around while there, and trickle-charged overnight via the motel 10amp kitchen power point outlet (I took an extension lead) by adding $10 to the motel bill, which the manager was more than happy with.

I consumed about 40 per cent of the battery coming home up the Clyde, with about 50 per cent left in the pack on arrival home.

I'm sure that in the coming years, as the electric vehicle takeup grows (it's currently only about 1 per cent), there will be ample fast charging stations in almost every town in the country.

Thanks for the heartwarming article on nine-year-old Evelyn Fox and her conversation with Chief Scientist Cathy Foley.

Responding to Evelyn's letter about solar cars, as Dr Foley did, may be just the catalyst for Evelyn to achieve the greatness in science she aspires to. But I couldn't help noticing Evelyn's enthusiasm for Behind the News. BTN first started in 1968, and is in its 53rd year. The role that the ABC plays in inspiring students and supporting teachers is amazing and undervalued.

The concerted attack on the ABC by the Institute of Public Affairs and the Liberal Party over the years is wrong and dumb. There is no way they will ever convince today's young voters, past viewers of Play School, The Wiggles and Bluey, that the ABC is not a national treasure to be protected at all costs.

I was surprised to see that your regular column "Today in History" for December, 17, 1967, did not list the disappearance of PM Harold Holt at Cheviot Beach, Victoria. Perhaps it's because, in recent times, most of our former prime ministers won't disappear.

As a tweet said today, "Would it not be better for the Governor-General [and not Mr Morrison] to visit the grieving families in Devonport? Just to take the politics out of it." I would add yet again, what is the point of the Governor-General, whose name I cannot remember?

I notice that our shallow, disingenuous PM was in Tasmania Saturday at the launch of the new Antarctic ship, with a trip to Devonport to lay flowers at the site of the jumping castle tragedy. Amazing how our PM turns every situation into a photo op, irrespective of the circumstances.

The first question in Sunday's Quiz Corner (Canberra Times, Relax, page 29) was "In Greek mythology, how many Muses were there?" The answer given was "three". This is incorrect; in fact, there were nine.

They were the daughters of Zeus, and each was concerned with an aspect of the liberal arts: Calliope (epic poetry), Clio (history), Erato (love poetry), Euterpe (music and lyric poetry), Melpomene (tragedy), Polyhymnia (sacred lyrics), Terpsichore (dancing), Thalia (comedy) and Urania (astronomy).

The appropriately garish yellow and black full-page advertisement for the United Australia Party and Craig Kelly for "Prime Minister of Australia" (December 20, p5) infers that Clive Palmer's UAP is a linear descendent of the United Australia Party of Joseph Lyons, Billy Hughes and Sir Robert Menzies. This is surely false and misleading advertising writ large.

If Liberal National Party voters are happy to elect the likes of Craig Kelly and George Christensen, they will happily vote for Zed Seselja.

What a delight re: Dr Nick Coatsworth (The Canberra Times, December 20). At last someone who knows what he is saying, not a politician or bureaucratic scare monger. Some COVID facts, not ABC gibbering about numbers which are meaningless because they give no trend, nor do they give answers. Dr Nick Coatsworth, I will vote for you no matter what party.

The Jeffrey Smart exhibition at NGA is superb, but is spoiled at present by the taxpayer-funded art police acting as attendants. Woe betides a visitor who wants a coffee and hopes to return into the exhibition space, or wants to sit a few minutes outside the space, or must go to the toilet, or who has a difficult child. Once you leave the exhibition, that is it. Jeffrey Smart would be turning in his grave at this paltry heavy-handedness of what is superb art.