Consider for a moment if Abbott proved an international embarrassment, had trashed Australia’s sovereignty, allowed tens of thousands of Islamic unknowns into our community and in the process was responsible for more than a thousand drownings.
Imagine also if Abbott had spent all of our savings, indebted us to the tune of $300 billion and raided our future fund with absolutely nothing to show for it.
Consider if a Coroner had held Abbott responsible for young Aussie deaths in a pink batts scandal and then ignored his Minister’s warnings before cowardly sacking him.
Imagine if half of the Coalition had publicly blistered Abbott’s flawed character and more than a dozen of his team had resigned rather than serve under him.
There are many more “imagines” but, under those circumstances would Abbott’s polling have improved ten points?
Can I suggest instead, his political career would be over?
There’s obviously much more to this Rudd anomaly and even his supporters are bewildered at his apparent, inexplicable popularity.
There are a number of factors at play in such an extraordinary event as this:
Gillard was detested by all but the loyal Fairfax and ABC. There were audible sighs of relief across the land when she was deposed.
Let’s face it she was horrible and only the loopy Anne Summers is screaming foul play on behalf of rabid feminists.
Gillard has been deserted by the rest of the Left. Her greatest defenders have already forgotten her in the rush to embrace a possible Labor victory.
Diehard Labor voters who turned Green rather than entertain Gillard are returning home.
But the Abbott factor cannot be dismissed. Voters still don’t relate to him and as noted here before, his recent boost in polling was merely a consequence of Gillard’s polling collapse.
Now that Gillard’s awful gender reign is over, voters have returned in sheer relief to the old 50/50 demographic.
If Rudd wants more than a few short weeks in The Lodge he will need to call an election as soon as possible. These sort of knee-jerk poll results do not last.
The longer Rudd was in Office before, the more his Party turned against him, the more his polls deteriorated and the clearer it became just how incompetent an administrator he was.
But Rudd possesses the vanity and arrogance to believe he can turn all that around... and his magical G20 is calling.
The abstract person polled is basically a Bogan with an IQ his boot size who sees only snapshots of headlines and television clips.
He is shallow and repeats sound bites to appear intelligent to his peers, he will go with the flow, as recent polling shows.
But placing a voting slip in a ballot box is far different to blandly answering a pollster's questions on an unsolicited phone call.
Whenever Rudd calls an election a minimum of 33 days of campaigning is necessary and that’s ample time in politics for a flawed contender like Rudd to reveal old tainted colours even Bogans will remember.
Abbott can still look forward to between a 12 and 16 seat majority but the Rudd factor has likely ensured a Green Senate, and a double dissolution will not be as attractive.
Rudd’s current polling is a temporary aberration but he has certainly saved some seats.
After all, isn’t that solely what he was resurrected to do?
