Republicans cannot agree

It appears that I misunderstood Klaas Woldring (Peninsula News, March 19) when he criticised the "two-party tyranny of the Westminster system" as he put it in a previous letter.

But then it is difficult to know what the republicans really want for this country.

Surely it is rather disingenuous to compare Australia unfavourably with such countries as the Republic of Ireland and the United States of America.

Journalist Paul Sheehan wrote in the Sydney Morning Herald (January 5) of the agonising process Americans go through every four years in selecting their president.

He concluded by saying: "Anyone who thinks Australia would be better served by having a directly elected president as head of state does not understand why such a model will doom the republican movement."

The debate has never been about attitudes to the monarchy so much as it is about the reluctance of the electorate to add a new layer of pomp and politics to federal government.

We have a simpler, superior system in place to the one now on show in the United States."

Your correspondent Bruce Hyland appears to agree as he states "the present system seems to have served us well, and it would be hard to suggest that there is a better existing model anywhere in the world that we could adopt".

So this is exactly the reason for the stance of monarchists here.

We could overthrow a system such as ours and end up with a regime that could bring us down and refuse to budge.

As your correspondent Les Walker (Peninsula News, March 5) warned: "Be careful what you wish for, it could cost more than you imagine."

If the republicans with all their ingenuity cannot agree on a republican model which they would consider superior to our present constitutional monarchy, then they only have two options left open to them: Either accept the obvious and enjoy this great nation which we are all so lucky to live in or otherwise immigrate to a republic if their choice.

Letter, 28 Mar 2012 Don Parkes, Woy Woy