Can’t address the OP, but in the US, as others have noted, mandatory minimum sentencing has been popular with legislators in recent years, especially with drug offenses. And the subsequent offense trigger mentioned by DVous Means is closely parallelled by California’s “Three Strikes” law. Pop that into your search engine and you’ll find much domestic criticism, although I’m not aware of anything from the international community.
I take issue with the term “massively in arrears” with regards to our dues. When I heard the actual figure a few weeks back, I was shocked because I’d always assumed it was really huge because of the noise made about it in the international news. Can’t recall the exact figure now, but it was on the order of $800 million. snort Our government spends more than that on toilet paper. 
As for the rest, every nation has dirty laundry.
OOH, zombie thread. Just an update: the Northern Territory Government was defeated in the last couple of months. The (rightwing) Country Liberal Party has been replaced by the Australian Labor* Party. They will abolish the mandatory sentencing regime. This was a major political boilover in Australia, the CLP having held government in the Teritory (it’s not an Australian state) since self-government was introduced in the 1970s.
*[sub]Anal spelling note: whilst “labour” is still more or less standard spelling in Oz, the ALP adopted this spelling many decades ago in response to the promptings of the then nationalist Bulletin magazine’s campaign. Just thought I’d add it since an American friend admitted it had been driving him crazy for ages.[/sub]
Excellent slortar. Maybe if some of your fellow citizens also take issue with it then your government might cough up. The figure is more like a billion dollars though. Now if your government spends more than that on toilet paper, it would seem hypocritical to me that they should withhold payment until the UN deals with its issues relating to mismanagement of funds. Perceived waste by the UN is supposedly the reason the US is shitty and hence mean little games with funds.
I don’t know what your crack about the dirty laundry means but one would think you should be able to do something with yours. That billion your government is holding onto should be able to buy a helluva big washing machine. 
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Excellent slortar. Maybe if some of your fellow citizens also take issue with it then your government might cough up. The figure is more like a billion dollars though. Now if your government spends more than that on toilet paper, it would seem hypocritica l to me that they should withhold payment until the UN deals with its issues relating to mismanagement of funds. Perceived waste by the UN is supposedly the reason the US is shitty and hence mean little games with funds.
I don’t know what your crack abo ut the dirty laundry means but one would think you should be able to do something with yours. That billion your government is holding onto should be able to buy a helluva big washing machine. Å’9
Forgive my ignorance, but isn’t a billion dollars equal to 1000 million dollars, meaning that the poster who said 800 million isn’t too far out (what’s 200 million between friends?).
But not in GQ.
This thread is closed.