I don't understand how any of this works.

So if the United States was Australia, would this man be prime minister?

http://www.conservativenewsandviews.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/JAB-official-682x1024.jpg

He is the leader of the majority party in the House of Representatives.

how are the parliamentary districts made? because ^^^ dude is leader of the majority party of the usa h of r largely due to gerrymandering by individual state governments of his party

If the first ballot is me ranking all the parties I like in order, can I rank Labor ahead of Liberal, but still vote for the Liberal guy in my district because he was an awesome football player back in the day?

oh and I found another picture of Prime Minister John Boehener:

http://i.imgur.com/nplA9Fs.png

such pretty eyes! he is the alex rodriguez of politics

1. yes!

2. set by the electoral commission. gerrymandering and malapportionment not such a problem nowadays, not like say queensland in sir joh's reign - now there's a prick who could represent the country on the world stage if there was a corruption olympics.

3. strictly speaking, you vote for individual candidates in the house of reps. you can put liberal footballer at 2 on the ballot after labor if you like. the senate is more on your 'voting for a party' tip.

haitch has got dis covered

also all the awesome football players from back in the day were running for the PALMER UNITED PARTY

if you require an explanation for the PALMER UNITED PARTY by the way here it is:

http://www.youtube.com/v/NuVgMLNhFuc&fs=1&hl=en

that's more of a justification, imo

what happens is that australia has a democratic process, and then rupert murdoch (american) decides who will run the country, and then people sip their lightly chilled chardonnay and click their tongues and say 'oh yes what a valuable democratic process'

and now we have a ministry of _________, a ministry of ____________ and a ministry for blokes

clive palmer is rite, the military is ~stealing ballots~

how clive palmer ever got $5, let alone $1 billion, is a mystery to me