Since Parliamentary sittings have ended, Kev is in the enviable position of being able to promise anything and everything to everyone in order to get elected. If the electorate are stupid enough to fall for this and he actually does win, then of course he will discover all sorts of reasons why it's not 'expedient' to carry out his promises at this time. I would have thought that the Australian public were too smart to fall for this old trick, but the opinion polls suggest that a fair number of them are.

But I pin my hopes on Abbott's election campaign when it begins in earnest. There is enough mud in Rudd's trail to slather him inches deep.

"There is enough mud in Rudd's trail to slather him inches deep."

And there is a correspondingly deep pool of mud to throw at mrabbott and the rest of his colleagues and supporters.

If the Lieberals choose this path they should be very wary as Laborites are way way better at that game.
You only have too look at preselections, factional brawls, branch shenanigans not to mention union and university politics to see Labors proficiency at dirty politics and the campaign of the smear. Indeed we have just witnessed a perfect example of it with the demise of Julia Gillard.
The tories, and mrabbott in particular, are featherweights when it comes to that sort of gutter politics.

Personally I think politics and elections should be about more than mud slinging and playing the man (or woman) not the ball.
But when it comes down to it rabbot started it and by refusing to discuss his policies (if he has any) he isnt leaving Labor with much choice is he?

Both comments already posted miss the point of the article.... And the article is correct. Both Howard and Hawke managed their Ministers very effectively giving them plenty of scope so they could run their portfolios effectively.

The idea of broader party participation in the election of the leader is almost a non-sequiter. Voting requires the electorate be informed to some degree about the candidates. Debating the merits of candidates in public is destructive as the Australian Democrats found out in the clash between NSD and Meg Lees. Lees could never say what NSD failings were and her subsequent leadership led to the destruction of the party's vote.

The alternative, I suppose is for the Parliamentary Party to state their choice and have the organisation accept or reject it. That would be time consuming and so problematic.

revisionist grabbage the author hasn't even bothered to read the wikipediea bio's of the men he talks about, let alone aground anything he says in facts.

arh but that opion pieces for your, no need to sully your thoughts with the facts.

The hangers-on will board the taxpayer funded bandwagon, waiving their taxpayer funded slogan boards in their taxpayer funded time. It's going to be an ugly battle between moral & immoral.

Yep...but the "people" are obviously happy with the change...