Cross benches key to real change in NSW

The irony of this is that both junior coalition partners have plenty of really good ideas that could benefit the renewal of NSW.

Their problem is that they believe they are in oppositional ideological positions and that they can't be seen publically to agree on anything.

This is one of the most destabilising political arguments imaginable.

Both sides have been ideology-free since the end of the 20th century.

Both sides – Greens and Nationals – have created for themselves 'adopted positions'.

Much like the idea of 'strategic emotion' which is trotted out every time a politician sees a television camera, adopted positions make the Greens and the Nationals look very ordinary given that they have similar sustainability goals.

An adopted position requires a politician or candidate to be proscribed by whatever it is the party says they believe in.

There is no margin for tolerance, no shifting of position.

Within this adopted position frame the only thing that changes is the parties on each side of the house.

Citizens of NSW are presented with a jamboree of events and stunts reflected back to them by the media over and over so that they believe the party leaders when they both say they are renewing and changing things.

The voting process is such that the mirroring of events and stunts translates into votes for the two major parties.

Voters get caught up in the hoopla of the jamboree and are unable to extract themselves to ask serious questions of the party leaders.