That is the point GYM-FISH, Tony has been doing it for 10 years, un heralded or promoted, & is trained.

He is also governing better than the last couple. In a month he had cut the boats dramatically, something the other 2 could not do in 6 years.

You are right of course Shaggy Dog, the only problem there is are we still fit enough apply all that wisdom, by the time we have acquired it.

One of the great sorrows of my life is, by the time I had accumulated the knowledge & the skills to be a master of sex, I was too damn old to apply it at all regularly.

I am given to understand that Tony Abbott has been volunteering in various capacities for many years. He has observed that it keeps him grounded. Doubtless he also has a sense of community service.

No doubt the nasty serial drive-by artists will also find a snipe in that, but who cares? For it is their own deficiencies they lay bare in doing so. That doesn't matter either, their choice and because behaviour generalises they must live with the inevitable outcomes of their outlook on life, soon and long.

Three points ...

Firstly. Sorry, Mishka, but no amount of firefighting daring-do will ever make up for Abbott's trainwreck of a paid parental leave policy. I'm as feminist as the next feminist - a whole lot more so as OLO readers would well know - but I draw the line at the taxpayer lining the pockets of uber-paid female executives who take time off to breed, while other much more needy unemployed single mums and welfare recipients are treated as Centrelink scum.

Secondly. I don't know why we can't have a major disaster in this country without turning it into a mawkish ego-fest about heroes and fair go's and what it means to be Australian and blah-de-blah-de-blah. I haven't seen the Abbott photo-op, but I'm sure he looks as suitably faux-exhausted, charcoal-faced and heroic as only the best public relations firm can muster.

Thirdly. Abbott the Maggot? Haven't heard that one. Gross!

Killarney,

"I haven't seen the Abbott photo-op, but I'm sure he looks as suitably faux-exhausted, charcoal-faced and heroic as only the best public relations firm can muster."

Nope

He's usually in a truck smiling out the window.

Or he's standing next to fellow fireys smiling.

I did see one of him all decked out walking with some fellow firefighters...with Peta Credlin pacing a few metres behind (just to keep him in check)

I haven't seen any photographic evidence of him having been "in the thick of things"...certainly not charcoal-faced, nor exhausted.

If it had been Rudd, he would have had 3 make up artists suitably charcoaling his face, & making his fetching forelock appear genteelly damp with imitation sweet, just for you Poirot.

Oh & he would have sworn at them, not smiled. Definitely not smiled at them, he only did that at TV cameras

Poirot

Fair enough. I would have checked out the photos first, but to actually go looking for photos of Tony Abbott comes hard to me. I'm more used to avoiding having them shoved at me ad nauseum every day of my life.

However, I like my 'faux-exhausted, charcoal-faced and heroic' PR version better.