Yes it's old news that WikiLeak revealed the USA does not hold Kevin Rudd in high regard but very relevent given Rudd could remain the Prime Minister into the foreseeable future.

http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/us-condemns-rudd-20101207-18obr.html

"The cables show how initially favourable US impressions of Mr Rudd, described as a safe pair of hands, were quickly replaced by criticism of his micro-management and mishandling of diplomacy as he focused on media opportunities."

Hands up all those who think we are seeing history repeat itself in more ways than one.

Thanks very much old mate.Laughter makes my day.
Few if I understand it, Americans will be voting here.
And unless I am mistaken, given current and past polling.
Australians by a wide margin , prefer Rudd over Abbott.
Any news on what America thinks of that foolish little man?
Will you be seen here after the election?
Or are you on a mission from Liberal HQ?

C’mon china, caucus booted him for all the reasons stated by the yanks…he is all those things plus a double helping of elitism….

”Listen you stupid RAAF pleb, I’m the Prime Minister and I want my forking pudding now.“

Yes Belly, your man Rudd…friend to those who need no friends, and enemy to those who have none…lol.

The WikiLeaks reference is taken from Rudd's
first Prime Ministership.
The US Ambassador to Australia, Jeffrey Bleich
welcomed our PM in Canberra to the American
Embassy to help them celebrate the 4th July this
year referring to Mr Rudd as his "good friend."
And telling him that he could "win the game!"
Former US President - Bill Clinton
has said that Kevin Rudd, is one of the
world's most intelligent leaders.

Peterr Costello referred to Tony Abbott,
as an "economic illiterate." John Hewson,
refuses to heap any praise on Mr Abbott.
Malcolm Fraser criticises Abbott.

Some of Mr Abbott's sayings are
quite hilarious and revealing, for example -
on poverty: "We just can't stop people from being
homeless if that's their choice."
On climate change: "absolute crap."
Admitting on national television that he has trouble
with the "gospel truth."

The public debate between the two men should be
a real eye-opener.

that foolish little man?
Belly,
I agree, Rudd does look like one of the kids from Southpark & his character matches to perfection.

http://500tips.com/how-to-make-your-own-south-park-characters/

http://fairmediaalliance.wordpress.com/2013/07/06/tony-abbott-blunders-bluster-backflips-bloomers-bugger-ups-bastardry-budgie-smugglers-and-er-policies-the-carbon-tax-chapter/
Well links talk of the silly little Tony too.
My point?
Tell us of the negatives you can find on the web about Rudd.
But too know I can find plenty about Abbott.
I however openly say this is not one of the best but worth a read and grin.
PS to think those with thoughts other than our own are always wrong would give warning that we may be the problem.

Tell us of the negatives you can find on the web about Rudd.
Belly,
You can't be serious ! First of all we have a 350 word limit here plus I have got to go to work, I haven't got the time to list Rudd's negatives. I'd suggest we call Abbott & Rudd "The Battery" positive & negative. Rudd positive in the frivolous leftie media & Abbott positive in competence.
Belly,
try to honest to yourself just once & admit that Labor are always a failure, they talk the talk but don't walk the walk. You are the one who is always on about truth, Struth !

Belly,
the link you provided is one of lowest forms of bias I have ever seen. For you to have to drag this out of the media gutter just demonstrates how low you lot are prepared to let yourselves go. Only one word comes close to describing your character, disgusting.

It must be true it was in the paper. Fairly describes someone out of control. I don't have any problems with it.
Maybe it's just because you can only see from one eye, is that the problem.
Abbott is alienated from his party they are in a meeting.

Tony Abbott was the man who could never be prime minister. “He’s just too right-wing,” a colleague told the Courier-Mail. “Too hardline,” said another to Abbott’s face. “He’s very much a mid-20th century sort of a bloke,” declared Labor strategist Bruce Hawker in early June, only to be trumped the following evening by Kevin Rudd, on the 7.30 program, who called him “one of the most extreme right-wing conservative leaders or politicians that the Liberal Party has thrown up”.

Now he sits on the verge of victory. People will have their expectations – and especially their suspicions – but no one really knows how Abbott would act as prime minister. Even his colleagues are unsure. There are some very specific big-ticket items – such as his parental leave scheme and his determination to rescind the carbon tax and the Liberal party room detests the former. His industrial relations policy is vague, and seems a cautious distance from WorkChoices and the reforms so many in his party and in business want to see. “Abbott looks set to become a do-nothing PM,” Peter van Onselen recently opined in the Australian. Van Onselen was voicing the concerns of more than a few of Abbott’s colleagues, who fear being handed power with no mandate and no agenda.

Abbott is the hyper-Catholic, overly aggressive, climate change–denying, homophobic, sexist populist who wants to impose his idiosyncratic religious views on an unwilling public. Julia Gillard would never use quite those terms, but she came close with her recent prediction that an Abbott government would “banish women’s voices from our political life” and make abortion “the political plaything of men who think they know better”. This Abbott is the embodiment of everything the last five decades of social progress have strived to overcome. Thus he is cast as essentially regressive: a creature of the past, intending to take us all back there. His foes are maddened that the nation apparently cannot see what seems so obvious to them: Abbott is shallow, devious and so frighteningly backwards that no sane person would hand him power.

Abbott is the hyper-Catholic, overly aggressive, climate change–denying, homophobic, sexist populist who wants to impose his idiosyncratic religious views on an unwilling public.
doog,
Sounds like Labor is in the severe stages of desperation if supporters like you, Suseonline & Belly are to be used as an example to go by.
I really am at a loss how you people can stigmatise Abbott to that degree when he still has got to prove himself yet Rudd who is already a twice broven beyond doubt failure is the one you're putting on a pedestal. Either Labor is chic-a-bloc with morons or they're so corrupt that it defies belief. There's definitely not a single "normal" component in that organisation.

Sorry Indy but that was written by his own kind. Not all coalition members are Abbott supporters.
Not ever tried yet, that does not bear contemplating. His style is on show every day., so i don't know how you can support such an arrogant a hole as Abbott.
A policy free zone, this is not the type of politics we need here. Negative to the core, where is the vision, the progressive hunger, the words of a highly educated leader, nothing is in his style.
He is a leader of oppression and does not belong in this society.

"Abbott is the hyper-Catholic, overly aggressive, climate change–denying, homophobic, sexist populist who wants to impose his idiosyncratic religious views on an unwilling public.... Abbott is the embodiment of everything the last five decades of social progress have strived to overcome."

Why hold back... you missed embodiment of Satin himself.

Doog you need professional help if you have that much hatred bottled up. Get a grip on reality. You may not like Abbott but that statement was one of the craziest things I've ever seen posted on this site.

doog,
congratulation, you've just qualified for the moron club.

doog,
Offer your opinion on the thread "Prime Minister Abbott - can he really step up?"
let's see if we can rescind that membership.

No idea what you are talking about there. Indy.
All i know is i was in favor of the libbers but i know too much about Abbott. Not to be trusted with a dog let alone a nation of gullible people.
i can't support a character that is dangerous to our society. Hitler was a man engulfed in his own belief, Abbott can be worse.

Doog... and you are not worried about Rudd who has shown what a tantrum he can throw if he doesn't get his way? Rudd the man who's first act after getting back into the driver's seat was to start a process where it will be impossible to turf him out ever again.

Call me a moron but Rudd seems the one with dictatorship on the agenda.

The libs did exactly the same thing before rudd.
So those sort of comparisons do not fit.
We have a man of no distinction running for PM, this country deserves better. Not one word of the economy, shows Gillard had things well and truly in hand. As CN in QLD all he has done is channel money toward his own kind and fixed nothing. they have rising debt., The very thing he was going to fix. Neo Liberalism has serious complications, and a dangerous agenda. The days of the liberal have finished. Far to one sided. Class distinction. Do not vote Abbott.

Mr Abbott unfortunately bases his outlook
on what is the most politically
beneficial position rather than a detailed
study of any issue. Good decisions are based
on good information - because as we've been told
time and time again -
for every complex problem there is an answer that is
clear, simple, and wrong.

The following link may help:

http://www.independentaustralia.net/2013/politics/the-polishing-of-tony-abbott-two/

There could be a move against Abbott at any minute.

Lexi,
they weren't asking questions, they were ganging up on him. What a basic mentality tactic. He told them that there was a speech 24 hours ago yet they still had to ask ? Imagine the outcry if they had asked Rudd similar questions but they don't do they ?
the bias that surfaces now from the left is bordering on stupid & therfore they remain unaccountable.
At least rather than tell lies before the election Abbott remains tight lipped, a far more integrity laden mentality than what we have experienced from the ALP musical PMs.

Indy your remark about my link?
I agree with you totally!
See I hold the view, and fully intended to express it, some of the anti Rudd stuff is just as bad.
I congratulate you, on seeing how truly biased it is.
But remind posters the human who is always right has not yet been born.
We however are far from short of those who mistake their views as being both right and the only one.
If Kevin Rudd is not twice the man the mad monk is, I am wrong.

Individual
I have read your posts for some time now and respect your capacity to contribute this site along with many others. Obviously we see many differing polarities on many subjects.

I do find the reference to the "lefties" or "righties" a little confusing. What on earth do these expressions mean?

Starting with a simple analogy I offer my simple understanding of this question. I have left and right hands and legs, one side does slightly better than the other but put together they have served me extremely well. Similarly the right and left sides of my brain. I appreciate that some may think all this open to question!

However the main issue here is to do with me or anybody else in terms of our individual freedom and that relationship to the society we live in. I suggest that our "right" to individual freedom is absolutely dependent on maintaining a societal structure which allows this. I have enjoyed the freedom which this society has provided me as an individual but I fully appreciate that it is the maintenance of a strong social agenda which has allowed this.

We may denigrate the agenda of the "Lefties" or "Righties" at our whim but perhaps we should remember that just as with our hands, legs and brain we need the right balance to remain upright.
Den71

Belly,
cheers to that.
DEN71,
I must admit I was always wondering about those terms & how they eventuated. I have my own interpretation & that is that there is a centre, a left & a right.
Symbolically Left is not as good as right, right ? When someone is accused as having two left hands it means that they are pretty impractical. So, right has to be seen as more practical then, right ? I see left as symbolically wrong & right as symbolically right, right ?
Those whom we describe as lefties are the ones who are wrong & those who are right are right, right ?
cheers

DEN71 well see many of those who talk about lefty.s come from Queensland.
Not being rude some of them, like me are getting old.
That leads to comments about what was, 40 years ago.
And a blindness to was currently is, true left are as rare as hens teeth.
A lifetime as long as mine, riding in the ALP bus,has let me see todays ALP largely in the spot inhabited by yesterdays Liberals.
While, in part, the Liberals look for a footing in about the spot American Republicans hold in that country, more right than once.

doog>> All i know is i was in favor of the libbers but i know too much about Abbott. Not to be trusted with a dog let alone a nation of gullible people<<

In favour of the Libbers…..hahahahahahahahah.....hahahahahahha.....hahahahhahahah...

Please stop doog.....your Delphi like prognostications are giving me a stitch...Rudd good---Abbott bad---what an oracle you are champ

todays ALP largely in the spot inhabited by yesterdays Liberals.
Belly,
I think you're onto something there. I have come to a similar conclusion a long time ago. Many Labor supporters are frustrated Liberals & they're even more frustrated now. Same as many new Labor supporters are gradually turning into an australian version of Tories.
The Liberals have never appealed to me but I always had a soft spot for the Nationals because they did have a few decent members who were genuinely concerned about Australia.
This new breed of Labor/Liberals now are just a bunch half-baked academics who stumble from dawn till dusk.

Seems like even the POMS have got Rudd’s measure

http://www.spectator.co.uk/australia/8955281/a-complete-and-utter-fraud-2/

Rudd didn't do badly for himself since he got in according to Wikipedia.
Prime Ministerial Pay History in Australia.

John Howard 1999-2006, $289,270 - $309,270
Kevin Rudd 2007-2013, $330,356 - $507,338

Which of those PM's had money in the coffers when they handed over ?
Which outfit smells less corrupt in using our money ?

http://mywage.org.au/main/salary/celebrity-pay/politician-pay
Gawd,
How pathetic, let's make it more interesting.

http://mywage.org.au/main/salary/celebrity-pay/politician-pay

judging by the lack of interest on this topic OLO'ers must be on really good money so as not to care about this. Doesn't anyone feel these pays are outrageous at a time we're asked to tighten our belts ? I condemn the opposition & minority parties for not rejecting this & change that legislation. Talk about all tarred with the same brush. Disgusting !

U must be talking about QLD, anything can happen there.
The last four years of Howard were out of control, as usual they self destruct. Power drunk, indestructible, been there to long.
No one wants Abbott as PM so what are they going to do about it. Put Turnbull back and put tony out with the cat, be a good decision all around.
Clean out the front bench and get rid of all the Howard warts, they may even come up with a party to be recon'd with.

He sure is a clown, and a good one. He has trouble with Gospel truth, what next can we expect.
Thomson is going along with all charges against him in a hope this can be wrapped up. If it can't be proved he didn't have permition for those spending's the whole thing will be thrown out.

get rid of all the Howard warts,
doog,
and then what ? Leave the ALP mutts in place ? If you're trying to be funny you're failing miserably.
How do expect to get the coffers filled up again if you leave the ALP in place ? Is the ALP buying lottery tickets to get money in or just keep raising fees ?

WikiLeaks on Kevin Rudd
I'd have thought the integrity-devoid defenders of the sense-devoid would have swamped this thread to no extent. Looks like they've run out not only of substance but also of fibs.