Greenland!

[Luigi300]

Greenland will soon be independent! Hooray Greenland!

In a referendum on greater autonomy leading to eventual independence, the people of Greenland, the world’s biggest island, voted overwhelmingly on Tuesday in favor of loosening their 300-year-old ties to Denmark, final results showed on Wednesday.

Hans Jakob Helms, a political adviser to the dominant political party in Greenland, said the ballot offered a “very clear answer” to the question of what Greenland’s people wanted their future to be.

The turnout was more than 70 percent and almost 76 percent of the voters were in favor. “The support was overwhelming,” Mr. Helms said in a telephone interview. The island has a population of 56,000, 90 percent of whom are native-born Inuits. Eligible voters numbered 39,000.

Denmark, which colonized Greenland three centuries ago and granted home rule almost 30 years ago, will maintain influence over matters including foreign policy and defense, Mr. Helms said.

[Wasgood]

Good for them. Maybe it will happen in Australia.

[Pox]

Well, we're already a seperate soverign nation, we just have the whole Commonwealth-colony thing to get over - whereas Greenland is a province of Denmark.
I do think it's time for another referendum for becoming a republic, though, and with Rudd's support it may even be a fair yes/no question rather than Howard's cleverly engineered piece of shit. Get that queeny thing off our coins already.

[KingAl]

Howard's proposed system was exactly what we've got now without the Queen rubber stamping things; if anything it was more democratic, because 2/3rds of Parliament had to agree to the election of the President whereas the Governor General is selected by the Government alone. You couldn't have had a yes-or-no question on whether to have a Republic because the referendum is on a change to the constitution, which pretty clearly can't be changed to say "Well we want a republic but we don't know how yet." (I guess you can have a referendum on holding another referendum on the model used? But that's still weird. And given the requirement of a 2/3rds majority in each state it's more likely neither model would get through.)
The main dispute between Republicans was whether to have a directly elected President or the system put to referendum; a directly elected President is undesirable because they're more likely to believe they have a mandate to act on their own judgement and cause things like the Dismissal, they can't be removed from office without another vote, and they need to be wealthy enough to fund a campaign, meaning either partisanship or plutocracy. At least the current and proposed system allow any worthy individual to be selected.
So, basically, the proposed model was fine in my mind. Howard is still a jerk though (y'hear he was on Fox recently and allowed the interviewer to continue calling him Prime Minister as if it were a permanent title?), and he actively campaigned against a Republic.

[Wasgood]

Well, we're already a seperate soverign nation, we just have the whole Commonwealth-colony thing to get over - whereas Greenland is a province of Denmark.
I do think it's time for another referendum for becoming a republic, though, and with Rudd's support it may even be a fair yes/no question rather than Howard's cleverly engineered piece of shit. Get that queeny thing off our coins already.

What would they replace the Queen with? Rudds face?
Or just famous Aussies?

[KingAl]

Most likely just famous Australians, if there were any face at all. You don't have to change the coins as often that way If it were to follow the current system then it'd be the Head of State, i.e. President, and not the Prime Minister on the coins.