Andrew Bolt: Kevin Rudd pushing silence on imminent war is mad and dangerous

There are few issues in this election bigger than the China threat, yet seemingly deranged Kevin Rudd doesn’t want the PM to talk about or “politicise” such things.

Once again, the seemingly deranged Kevin Rudd perfectly illustrates the latest lunatic attacks on the Morrison government.

Rudd, the former Labor Prime Minister, joined commentators last week blasting the government for talking about imminent war, instead of something really important, like perhaps “teenager” Grace Tame’s latest anti-Liberal rant. Has Australia disappeared up its own navel?

Rudd, for one, knows China is a massive threat because he’s releasing a new book on what he optimistically calls “the avoidable war”. He knows Russia, China’s ally, is also a threat, because he’s tweeted that “Europe tragically edges closer to war”. But like many commentators, Rudd doesn’t want Prime Minister Scott Morrison or Defence Minister Peter Dutton to talk about these things, nor to “politicise” them, ahead of the election.

Kevin Rudd knows China is a massive threat because he’s releasing a new book on what he optimistically calls ‘the avoidable war’. Picture: Patrick Woods

No, Rudd tweeted angrily, only a fascist dictator like Benito Mussolini would do that: “Get ready for Colonel Blimp (Morrison) and Benito Mini-Me (Dutton) to strut around in full martial mode. All to distract from pandemic mess, 1000 aged care deaths (their responsibility) & record debt.”

So for Rudd, it is just a “distraction” for the Morrison government to last week remind Australians that Russia and China are aggressive superpowers now threatening war, and Labor doesn’t have as good a record as the Liberals in responding.

No wonder Rudd and the rest of Labor would rather switch the topic. After all, the last time Labor was in government (under Rudd, then Julia Gillard, and then Rudd again) it let our defence spending fall to the lowest proportion of GDP since 1938 – the year before a world war our politicians hadn’t seen coming.

There are few issues in this election bigger than the China threat. Picture: AFP

I agree, Morrison should not have called Labor’s deputy leader, Richard Marles, China’s “Manchurian candidate”, as if Marles was some hypnotised Chinese agent. That’s stupid.

But the idea – shouted by so many journalists – that Morrison should not “politicise” foreign affairs by talking about what he sees as the difference between Labor and the Liberals on China is not just mad but dangerous.

Are they seriously saying a debate on how we best defend ourselves from an existential threat is wrong? That this is not an election issue? Should we instead keep babbling about the media’s preferred issue this month – an unnamed minister two years ago supposedly calling Morrison a liar?

Spare me. There are few issues in this election bigger than the China threat, and Labor and its media mates screaming down the debate tells me plenty about them that’s bad.