but it only worked because of the inherent distrust of Julia Gillard, and the electorate's bafflement at what had happened. Bill Hayden had plenty to say about Bob Hawke after he'd taken the leadership, but it didn't hurt Hawke a bit, because of his already solid popularity.
You obviously feel very emotional about Julia Gillard, and I certainly think she has a great deal of administrative ability, but she is the cause of a lot of her own problems right now; it is not all the fault of Kevin Rudd. Julia simply has very poor political antennae, and a gift for trying to outsmart opponents in ways that rebound on her.
Rudd's resignation and challenge last week were a futile exercise and very hard to understand in any rational terms, but instead of playing the issues, Julia attempted a personal smear campaign which backfired. And allowing Swan and Crean to attack Rudd in such a humiliating way was unstatesmanlike and should not have been countenanced by a leader who clearly had the upper hand.
Sorry, but whatever her attributes, reading the public mood is definitely not one of them; Julia repeatedly shoots herself in the foot whenever she tries to get too smart. And while the caucus vote was the one that mattered this week, incalculable harm has been done to the Labor party, much of it by Gillard and her supporters, and I don't think the electorate will forget. Rudd should not have challenged, but instead of a clean victory, Julia Gillard's image has been tarnished once again by her own actions.
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