tagged: 'ranga, Channel 7, debate, economy, election, Julia Gillard, Labor Party, Liberal Party, paid parental leave, Politics, Recession, Tony Abbott, Twitter

Don’t do it Tony!

Posted by Claire Connelly in Humour, Politics

Rumours have been flying around the twittersphere today that Tony Abbott has agreed to do another debate…though I have found nothing in the media to confirm this.

Nonetheless, here are my highly overrated thoughts on the matter:

1. Julia should never have asked for another debate. It makes her look weak, desperate, and naive.

2. What on god’s green earth (get it? Green earth? Eh? EH?) was Julia Gillard thinking when she asked for a debate on the economy?!

For a party intent on moving forward, Gillard seems pretty intent on bringing up the past! As if the first debate wasn’t bad enough, Labor would be dragged through the mud backwards had this debate gone ahead! Does she really want to bring it all up again?

The recession (narrowly avoided albeit), the waste, the deficit. What on earth kind of precedent does she have to argue on?

Labor would have been better off having a debate on the issues, as well as the economy, then at least there would be something to distract the audience should Labor get a slugging on the economy.

3. If Gillard absolutely insists on having a second debate, then she is going to have to be prepared to play dirty and up the ante on the smear campaigns.

The only way that Tony Abbott will agree to a second debate is if Julia Gillard successfully convinces people that he is a gutless coward… which so far,  she has not managed to do.

When asked whether he would agree to Julia Gillard’s request for a debate on the economy, Mr Abbott replied “Are you suggesting to me that when it comes from Julia, ‘no’ doesn’t mean ‘no’? “When she said ‘no’, I thought she meant ‘no’. I believed her. You can’t change the rules just because you are in trouble.”

All rape jokes aside, Abbott has so far managed to avoid/handle the backlash from his allegedly insensitive comments by getting out in front of gender bullying accusations before the Labor party even had a chance to put their pants on, lace up their boxing gloves, spin three times in a circle and move forward.

“This suggestion that I am in some way insensitive to women – I announced today a visionary, indeed a generational reform in paid parental leave, and they’re trying to run this kind of nonsense,” said Mr Abbott.

Tony is doing a pretty good job at painting Labor’s efforts to discredit him as an absurd smear campaign.

When Julia Gillard took power she said she didn’t expect people to “go easy” on her because she is a woman. She said she wasn’t made of porcelain and that she expected to be treated the same as the rest of the boys.

I think she is going to have a hard time playing the victim card this late in the game.

4. Channel 7 should not be allowed within 10 feet of the political debate (not that it’s going to happen anyway).

5. As for the mediator, if we’re going to have a second debate, it’s Tony Jones or bust!

The worst thing Tony Abbott could do now is accept Julia Gillard’s challenge of a second debate.

Tony has so far managed to stay in control of his campaign.

This week we’ve seen him pick up his game and he’s come out swinging and ducking, avoiding much of the mud that Labor has been slinging at him.

A debate on the economy may seem appealing to Abbott, given the Liberal party’s track record of sound economic management,  the temptation to gloat may  eventually be too much for him to bear.

My instincts tell me that Labor’s desire for a second debate has nothing to do with the economy and the only outcome they hope to achieve is to provoke  Tiger Tony and force him into attack mode (insert ‘ranga endangered species joke here).

That would be very very bad for the Liberal party.

The last thing they want is for voters to feel sorry for Gillard, or worse – start perceiving Abbott as some kind of aggressor.

Only time will tell whether this lucky streak will last.

If the mud does begin to stick,  he may have no choice but to suck it up and get behind the podium a second time.

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