Kevin Rudd is now Australia's chief feminist watchdog?
SO much for the positive politics of Kevin Rudd's "New Way". The Prime Minister has let the dogs off the leash in a full frontal personal assault on Tony Abbott on the grounds of "sexism, racism and homophobia". The last refuge of a loser.
The misogyny and sexism campaign we thought dead and buried with Julia Gillard's prime ministership was resuscitated last week to demonise Abbott's comment that the Liberal candidate for Lindsay, Fiona Scott, has "a bit of sex appeal".
Scott thought it was a "very charming compliment". But the hyperbolic reaction we have come to expect from Labor's Fembots, the Greens and the twittersphere rattled on all week.
The Opposition leader was "lecherous", "demeaning" and an "international embarrassment for modern Australia" howled Emily's List co-convenor Tanja Kovac.
But it was Kevin Rudd who elevated it into a national campaign issue, prissily answering a question in Cairns with the declaration that he was ignoring advisers' warnings to leave the commentary to "others". (Uh Oh!) "I've decided it's worth commenting on … this one is pretty odd, to be blunt." Odd? From Captain Odd himself! That takes chutzpah.
The man who was kicked out of a New York "gentlemen's club" for behaving weirdly with topless dancers, is suddenly the arbiter of appropriate attitudes towards women?
The man who relentlessly stalked Labor's female leader for three years, sabotaged her election campaign, and reportedly derided her as a "childless atheist", is now the nation's chief feminist watchdog?
The 55-year-old who gatecrashed a "beautiful" 18-year-old's party in a Townsville pub last week is lecturing the Opposition Leader about how to describe a grown woman who is a friend and fellow Liberal? Rudd went on to classify the "sex appeal" comment as a workplace relations problem, in which a "male employer" has wronged a "female staff member".
Do you really want to go there, prime minister?
We don't have amnesia. We remember the 23-year-old flight attendant he reduced to tears on VIP No. 1 flight when she didn't bring him the vegetarian meal he requested.
Nice workplace behaviour there, not to mention the MPs who chose career hari kari rather than work for Rudd again, including one who described him as a "psychopath".
No, the prime minister is in no position to give lectures on seemly conduct. Rudd's reference to "homo-phobia" was another gotcha attempt. After clumsily inserting his newfound support of gay marriage into the dying moments of the not-so-great debate last Sunday, he must have thought he'd found a wedge to embarrass Abbott.
But most voters don't regard it as a first-order issue for the federal government, no matter what their views.
Abbott answered umpteen questions that sprang up, referring to his respectful disagreement with his gay sister Christine Foster.
"My idea is to build on the strength of our society and I support, by and large, evolutionary change," he said.
"I'm not someone who wants to see radical change based on the fashion of the moment."
This thoughtful comment was twisted by Deputy Prime Minister Anthony Albanese into a "deeply offensive" description of "sexual orientation as the fashion of the moment".
Not what Abbott said.
If anything, Rudd seemed more anxious last week than ever, as dire polling in marginal seats showed his celebrity appeal was wearing thin. He seemed thrown off balance by Abbott's "captain's call" to reject Green preferencing.
He seemed tentative and unprepared after getting journalists out of bed at 3am to fly to the Northern Territory for a rushed announcement mimicking the Coalition's proposed special economic zone for northern Australia.
Wherever Rudd's mojo has gone, it wasn't to be found in Darwin. As the Prime Minister shrinks before our eyes, we also see an Opposition leader growing in confidence and stature.
At least Abbott is acting his age, and not like an overgrown five-year- old haunting schools for "selfies" and high fives.
What grown man describes himself as "the glasses-wearing kid in the library" as the Prime Minister has?
It's as if Rudd's emotional development stalled circa 1969.
Maybe that explains his penchant for hanging out with kids. Now he's a popular VIP he's returning over and over again to a time in his life when he may have felt under-appreciated. Whatevs, as he might say. It doesn't do to examine his state of mind. What we do know is he is not behaving like a grown-up with a serious job, and so an already trivialised political process is becoming an infantile version of Celebrity Big Brother.
In such a contest, Abbott needs to be on guard, lest he fall into the Rudd way of doing politics.
His explanation that his sex appeal comment was due to "exuberance" should give his supporters pause. With three weeks still to go until election day, unrestrained joy after a convivial day on the hustings is just premature hubris.
That's Rudd's game, anyway, congratulating yourself on how many people mobbed you at the showground.
It's novelty popularity, as fickle as it is shallow, not the popularity of a prime minister like John Howard, who earned it grudgingly over time from a public which came to respect his steadiness and judgment.
Some commentators still obsess about Abbott's relative personal unpopularity versus Rudd in national opinion polls.
But Abbott's job is not to make people like him. He is being pitched by his campaign strategists as your advocate. "You don't have to like your lawyer" is the way one describes it. You just have to know he will get you out of a pickle.
It takes considerable ego mastery for a political leader to accept such a grim role, and resist the temptation of public adulation.
In any drawn-out battle, it's human nature to take on characteristics of your opponent. "To know your enemy you must become your enemy," advises Sun Tzu in the Art Of War.
But if Abbott's exuberance ever stretches to "selfies" with schoolkids, we'll know he's had too much of Kevin Kool-Aid.
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/opinion/kevin-rudd-is-now-australia8217s-chief-feminist-watchd...
