Watching Kevin Rudd being interviewed by Kerry O'Brien on The 7:30 Report last night, you couldn't help but realise that Rudd is as smart as John Howard is dumb. The best that can be said of Howard is that he is wily, cunning, clever. But when it comes to his capacity to nut out policies that benefit the nation (as opposed to his cronies), he is wanting to the point of dumbness. Rudd didn't drop the ball once. He knows what he's talking about to the point where a debate between the two before the election would utterly destroy Howard.

That doesn't mean he will lose the election. This morning I had a pleasant encounter at the Safeway checkout. The woman taking my money agreed that everyone is tired of Howard, but on the subject of multiculturalism she turned feral. And the expression of the burly bloke behind me was one of contained hatred.

Over the years, Howard has successfully uncorked the racist genie. It may be true that no one really likes him (not even Janette, probably), but he remains the hero for xenophobic white supremacists. That demographic, in combination with Aspirational solipsists, could well see him over the line.

The ludicrous thing about white supremacists all over the world is that most of them look like genetic garbage. Here they are trumpeting the superiority of the white race above all others, while anyone attaining power on such a deranged policy (Hitler, for example) would have them gassed immediately as prime examples of untermenschen.

Having said all that, Howard may finally be finished off by what the Safeway lady and so many others are saying: they are sick to death of him. People may have grown tired of Menzies, but with Howard they are reacting more viscerally. That and the perception that he is beginning to stumble under pressure. Two articles in yesterday's Herald Sun point to the canvassed possibility of Costello replacing Howard: not likely. According to Bruce Baird (NSW) "the only way Mr Costello could take the reins of power would be "if the PM resigned, fell under a bus or had a fatal heart attack". The other, They think I'm elegant? Hear hear points to Howard's recent gaffes possibly caused by poor hearing. "Some MPs call the gaffes 'senior's moments'."

Kevin Rudd is playing this election game close to Howard's so-called conservatism. So well has Howard indoctrinated the nation into an intellectual-despising, quasi-Orwellian state that Rudd knows he cannot truly represent what used to be called humanity or community or the fair go without incurring suspicion. Of course, it remains to be seen just how conservative Rudd is -- some are truly worried, particularly about his religious beliefs. In the end, he may be no less conservative than Howard, just a conservative with heart, unlike the Prime Minister who, tragically for us all, was born without one. Rudd also might restore some honour to conservatism which, let's face it, is the way most human beings engage with life.

Every election since 1996 has been about restoring Australia's integrity, but none more so than this one. Try to imagine the depths of despair that will come over this country if this tired, clueless impostor is re-elected yet again. Not only the despair of those who cannot believe he's been there for so long, but of those who will eventually come to realise that they have voted for no future at all, a moribund state based on reactionary fear.

-- Olney Garkle