Quick Debate: The rise of Australia’s “hairy-legged femocrat” should dismay the liberal left

Summary: The once wildly popular Australian PM, Kevin Rudd, has been toppled by an internal Labor party rebellion, to be replaced by Julia Gillard, his Welsh born deputy, who becomes Australia’s first woman leader. Unmarried, proudly pro-abortion and happy not to shave her legs, there has been much joshing about the incongruity of such a Sheila taking charge in the land of hairy handed machismo. But more significant than her rise, in many ways, has been the fall of a man whose anti-fat cat, green agenda had inspired many on the left. Yet neither Rudd's emissions trading scheme, nor his retro-active 40% super-tax on mining, nor many other of his cherished schemes ever saw the light of day. Should the left rue the departure of an idealist, or welcome the more pragmatic Gillard, learning to recognise that in a capitalistic system there are limits to how far you can go in antagonising capitalists