Plot attacked

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Last updated on August 8th, 2017 at 05:04 pm

The SMH’s Phillip Coorey reports:

Kim Beazley’s gamble in calling a Labor leadership ballot on Monday could backfire following a surge of support last night towards challengers Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard.

Word out of Canberra as early as mid-afternoon suggested Beazley might jump before he’s pushed. Unlikely; Beazley isn’t a fighter by nature, but it’s difficult to imagine even him surrendering under these circumstances. Further from Coorey:

The Sydney frontbencher and Beazley backer Tanya Plibersek attacked the plot against Mr Beazley, which was led by former Mark Latham supporters including Joel Fitzgibbon and Simon Crean.

“I’m frankly just appalled at the behaviour of the people who’ve brought this on,” she told the Herald.

“They are the same geniuses who gave us Mark Latham. They’re not smart, they’re not that intelligent. They are just bitter has-beens who are infuriated by their own lack of relevance in the party or in public. Not one of them has landed a blow on the Howard Government.”

As opposed to all the blows Plibersek has landed. Here’s Tanya after the 2004 election:

I think [Latham] ran a fantastic campaign, really, and I was going around to polling booths yesterday and I can tell you that the people who watched politics, the people who are interested, are very, very positive about Mark.

Except for Tanya, who a few months later said:

I didn’t vote for him and as it turns out neither did the Australian people. I think it’s plain that it was a mistake, that Mark was never really ready for the top job.

Our planet will be molten (or ice-coated) before Plibersek herself is ready for the top job. The Telegraph’s view: Beazley is toast. More from Christopher PearsonMatt PriceSamantha Maiden, and those chuckleheads at the Age.

Posted by Tim B. on 12/01/2006 at 12:17 PM
    1. I just dunno – I don’t see Rudd struttng the world stage.

      Is it the glasses? The inability to seem angry in a ‘real’ way? The fact that he used to be on Channel 7 with Kochie and Mel each week pretending to be tough?

      He is a gift to the Coalition. Beazley can’t win but Rudd is no better.

      Posted by Villeurbanne on 2006 12 01 at 01:26 PM • permalink

 

    1. Rudd’s blown it and Labor is history, killed by a thousand cuts.

      Posted by JAFA on 2006 12 01 at 02:30 PM • permalink

 

    1. Historically, we in Oz are suspicious of know-alls.  Rudd comes across as the archtype knowall, in a big way. Against Howard, Costello et al in the Parliament, he will be in for a hard time.  Gillard does not appear to me to be quick enough off the cuff.

      Cheers
      RodC

      Posted by Rod C on 2006 12 01 at 05:36 PM • permalink

 

    1. I wouldn’t write off Labor under Rudd. He works hard to know the issues in detail, can argue cogently and put his point across well.

      He could very well start asking tough questions that get people saying, “Yeah. What about that? We don’t like the guy but he makes a strong case.”

      Assuming he wins and if the Coalition make one slip up from now to the election then it’s game on.

      Posted by Jack Lacton on 2006 12 01 at 06:11 PM • permalink

 

    1. One can only imagine what it would like to have the pixie in charge………….

      Posted by surfmaster on 2006 12 01 at 07:45 PM • permalink

 

    1. Labor under Rudd? Who’d really care. Still beholden to union officials, minority interests, environment panic merchants and multiculti madmen.

      As they say, you can put lipstick on a pig, but no-ones taking it to the ball…

      Posted by CB on 2006 12 01 at 08:13 PM • permalink

 

    1. http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/

      Have a look at the pic of Rudd and Gill – grimaces for smiles and no top lips – what does this mean, face-readers?

      Posted by boxofmatches on 2006 12 01 at 08:20 PM • permalink

 

    1. The anti-IR marches pretty much sum it up for Labor.  It was their ace in the hole, but you see better turnouts at global-weather protests.

      Come to think of it, I haven’t seen any of the indignation applied to the narrow-interest IR protestors blocking traffic as we saw for the narrow-issue Critical Mass doing much the same thing.

      Posted by anthony_r on 2006 12 01 at 08:26 PM • permalink

 

    1. #6 – As they say, you can put lipstick on a pig, but no-ones taking it to the ball…

      W.S. Gilbert skewered this in 1884—

      A Lady fair, of lineage high,
      Was loved by an Ape, in the days gone by.
      The Maid was radiant as the sun,
      The Ape was a most unsightly one,
      The Ape was a most unsightly one
      So it would not do
      His scheme fell through,
      For the Maid, when his love took formal shape,
      Express’d such terror
      At his monstrous error,
      That he stammer’d an apology and made his ‘scape,
      The picture of a disconcerted Ape.

      With a view to rise in the social scale,
      He shaved his bristles and he docked his tail,
      He grew mustachios, and he took his tub,
      And he paid a guinea to a toilet club,
      He paid a guinea to a toilet club
      But it would not do,
      The scheme fell through
      For the Maid was Beauty’s fairest Queen,
      With golden tresses,
      Like a real princess’s,
      While the Ape, despite his razor keen,
      Was the apiest Ape that ever was seen!

      He bought white ties, and he bought dress suits,
      He crammed his feet into bright tight boots
      And to start in life on a brand new plan,
      He christen’d himself Darwinian Man!
      He christen’d himself Darwinian Man!
      But it would not do,
      The scheme fell through
      For the Maiden fair, whom the monkey crav’d,
      Was a radiant Being,
      With a brain farseeing
      While Darwinian Man, though well-behav’d,
      At best is only a monkey shav’d!

      Posted by walterplinge on 2006 12 01 at 08:26 PM • permalink

 

    1. So, who is going to wear the pants in that relationship?

      Posted by Nic on 2006 12 01 at 08:45 PM • permalink

 

    1. Well, OT, but day 2 of the cricket has started.  The poms scored 270 odd on the first day, a run rate which we’d normally describe as glacial, but that adjective has been ruined now.

      Collingwood has got his ton.  OK, now get the bastard out.

      Posted by anthony_r on 2006 12 01 at 08:46 PM • permalink

 

    1. #3, RodC to put it another way, nobody likes a smart arse.

      The average Aussie is never going to relate to Pixie Rudd: he looks like the priggish school swot who never got his hands dirty and wouldn’t know one end of a shovel from the other.

      Posted by Big Arnie on 2006 12 01 at 08:52 PM • permalink

 

    1. If Latham ran such a fantastic campaign, why didn’t Tanya vote for him?

      Just asking …

      Posted by dee on 2006 12 01 at 09:16 PM • permalink

 

    1. #12
      Nor the right end of a cricket bat … wouldn’t go down well with Joe Citizen; comes across as the archetypal pedantic, condescending public servant

      Posted by egg_ on 2006 12 01 at 09:22 PM • permalink

 

    1. If Rudd fails in the leadership challenge, he may still be elected head hall monitor. He’s also in with a ripping shot at taking out the spelling bee.

      Posted by Infidel Tiger on 2006 12 01 at 10:38 PM • permalink

 

    1. SMH reported November 20, 2006:

      But Ms Gillard denied speculation in The Sunday Age that she was “campaigning” with the former leader Simon Crean against Mr Beazley. “I absolutely deny the contents of this story.” A spokesman for Mr Rudd said “reports of a plot are ridiculous”.
      The environment spokesman, Anthony Albanese, who was also named in the report as having lost confidence in Mr Beazley, said: “I have been supporting Kim Beazley consistently for 10 years. Nothing has changed.” Also named was the ALP national secretary, Tim Gartrell. He told the Herald: “I believe Kim Beazley can and will
      win the next election.”

      While News.com.au November 20, 2006 reported:

      “Rudd supporters just laughed it off,” a spokesman for Mr Rudd said yesterday. “Kevin has said repeatedly that Kim Beazley will lead Labor to the next election.” Ms Gillard said she was planning “no moves” against her leader, and there was no “dream team” ticket with her and Mr Rudd’s names. “I’m 100 per cent behind Kim,” she said.

      So now we know it is only media speculation as earlier we were told by KR and JG in their denials.

      Posted by stackja1945 on 2006 12 01 at 10:51 PM • permalink

 

    1. boxofmatches, in the US, our research would say that Rudd has the ‘babyface’ or neotonous face.  This is not good for attracting voters.  We want our male candidates to look healthy, have regular features, not look old (frail, unhealthy), and look mature in a masculine sense (i.e. prominent jaw, brow ridge and other testerone markers).
      Female candidates should look ‘like young grandmothers’. That is, healthy but past childbearing/rearing years, have shortish easily cared-for hair, visible earlobes and regular features.

      In the US this pair would be lucky to be elected dogcatchers.

      Posted by JorgXMcKie on 2006 12 02 at 01:49 AM • permalink

 

    1. Interesting Jorg… Thanks.

      We want our male candidates to look healthy, have regular features, not look old (frail, unhealthy), and look mature in a masculine sense (i.e. prominent jaw, brow ridge and other testerone markers).

      So how come Gorebot and that Kerry twat get so close to the White House?

      Posted by Stop Continental Drift! on 2006 12 02 at 03:20 AM • permalink

 

    1. …how come they got so close to the White House, that is.

      Posted by Stop Continental Drift! on 2006 12 02 at 03:22 AM • permalink

 

    1. Well, the people voting in Democratic primaries aren’t exactly made up in the same way as the electorate at large, I’d say.

      Posted by PW on 2006 12 02 at 11:23 PM • permalink

 

    1. I’m tipping a Rudd victory. Kim Beazley has NEVER won a contested ballot.

      Posted by Young and Free on 2006 12 03 at 12:18 AM • permalink

 

    1. On the Plibersek issue, I live and vote in the Sydney electorate and I had to go to the Web to see what she looked like.  I have been in banking and finance for many years and have met many politicians including the last 4 PM’s.  In Balmain at least this lady is invisible. Yet she gets elected virtually unopposed. Oh please give me a job like that and I will be the faithful lapdog of whoever is in charge!

      Posted by allan on 2006 12 03 at 06:54 PM • permalink

 

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