Dilapidated Aussie infrastructure

With the election over, and an era of political instability lying ahead, let me get back to my regular observations about the rickety infrastructure of a nation with enough mineral wealth in its subsoil to be able to pay cash for the entire French Riviera (if ever it were for sale).

In an electoral cartoon by Bill Leak in The Australian, an amusing background detail caught my attention.

That structure is not much better than my donkey's dilapidated shelter, shown in my previous post. On the left of the fragment, there's a sign marked Polling Booths. A big panel on the right bears the government's arms. The small text is blurry, but clear enough to be read:

A Nation-Building Project
Economic Stimulus Plan

So, the ramshackle shed is in fact an official government building. The cartoonist seems to taking a stab at the way in which Australia's "nation-building" funding has often produced pitiful results. Now, don't get me wrong. I'm not suggesting that Australia would be wiser to look into the idea of buying pieces of the French Riviera. Normally, well-built polling booths would be an excellent idea. And, if indeed such solid booths existed, it would be even better still if citizens were able to use them to vote for potential statesmen and stateswomen, rather than for political lightweights such as Abbott and Gillard.