Is Abbott losing it? And I don’t just mean the election…

“Four years and he’s finally woken up to the fact that the vast majority of these people are not fair dinkum refugees. They’re economic migrants pure and simple,” Mr Abbott said.

 The Australian. 2nd July, 2013

The quote above refers to Kevin Rudd. In the past few days, he and Bob Carr were being criticised for suggesting that some of our asylum seekers were “economic refugees” So,  when you’ve got Carr and Rudd needing to justify their position, what does Tony Abbott do? He makes an even more outrageous statement.

This is not about whether people are right or wrong – this is simply about the politics of it. “Some” is a lot easier to justify than “the vast majority”. If indeed it’s “the vast majority” why did the Howard Government approve over 90% of claims? Instead of saying nothing, and letting the heat be on the Government, Abbott wades in and tries to imply that they haven’t gone far enough. It’s fine to say that he’s appealing to the same voters who want him to turn back the boats, but I suspect that many of his colleagues will shift uneasily if an interviewer asks them if they agree with his assessment.

However, it’s not just hyperbole of his comment on asylum seekers that makes his comment strange – it’s the “four years” when refering to Rudd. It’s been close to six since Rudd was elected and three since he was removed. But it’s taken him “four years”? It may seem a minor point, but it does seem to indicate a lack of attention to detail.

Or does the four years refer to Abbott’s time as Opposition Leader. In other words, it’s taken him four years to realize that I was right. Prior to me becoming Opposition Leader, there was nothing; 2009 was sort of a Year Zero for the Coaltion.

Abbott has never performed well under pressure. His “That’s bullshit” to Nicola Roxon,  his response to the Channel 7 interviewer after his Afghanstan comments and his “No, I haven’t read it/of course I read it” Leigh Sales interview all suggest that his tendency to speak without thinking could be a liability to the Liberals in the coming weeks.

When the Poll showing the two party preferred had narrowed to a mere two percent, some of the media were inclined to dismiss this as part of the “honeymoon” period,  as though this couldn’t last more than a few days. There is still a tendency to treat this election as a foregone conclusion even though any objective analysis would tell you that it’s possible that Rudd’s “honeymoon” period could last for months, that a two percent gap in the polls is too close to call and that Abbott has the sort of personality that could lose him a lot of votes very quickly.

So I wonder whether we’ll start seeing a poll like the following in the mainstream media any time soon.