ALP in trouble, Liberals not the beneficiaries

 
“We would be rooted if anybody else but Abbott was leading the Liberals right now because the punters just won't trust him. Then again, we might be rooted anyway.” - senior ALP Member of Parliament.

Political commentator Paul Daley, has an assessment that should be very worrying for the ALP in the upcoming federal election in the Brisbane Times and the Canberra Times:

'Both sides have, foolishly I believe, tried to bury the environment as a campaign issue.

'I say “foolishly”, because the biggest single factor in the evaporation of support for Kevin Rudd's Labor appears to have been his decision effectively to jettison plans to introduce emissions trading. On the other hand Abbott, a climate change sceptic, has offered a direct action policy that amounts to little more than a transparent act of political expediency.

'Voters appear to have been angered by the major parties' cynicism on the environment. This is more than likely why the primary support drift for Rudd (towards the Greens and others) has not translated at this point to a crushing election-winning surge of support for the Coalition.'

And the Canberra Times political cartoonist David Pope summed it up beautifully recently, around the time the movie Master and Commander was being replayed on TV. Click on the picture to zoom in.

It seems that Kevin Rudd is falling back into the mode that got him into Government in the first place. Against John Howard, his campaign tactic was to do or say nothing that would allow voters to differentiate him from Howard. Now facing "Howard Redux", in the form of Tony Abbott cranking up the way-back machine, he has been throwing everything overboard that got him into the position. And now the commentariat are actively canvassing his replacement by Jullia Gillard, if not before then likely soon after the election.

Mr Rudd, the thing about being such an overt control freak is that there is now no-one else to blame but yourself.

On the Liberals' way-back machine, John Clarke and Brian Dawes produced a brilliant quote this week: "dragging the Liberal Party into the 20th Century."