A number of posters are rightly critical of Abbott's performance.
One major factor in any kind of information, or 'selling', is the credibilty of the salesman.
You can wax on as much as you like about policies and their soundness, but the majority of communication about these is in the media.
That vehicle demands credibility from the spruiker.
That, Abbott does not have.
One poster commented on how he seems to address us as thought we were schoolchildren, and this is one of his problems.
He's living in the communications past where a few words from the mighty one would be sufficient to re-assure the masses.
We don't want snake oil - we want sincerity.

Yeah of course. We need the sincerity of Rudd Gillard Shorten and Labour.