Campaign Diary Day Three
"The Big Bird" sits on the tarmac, a C-17 Globemaster.
I guess it's fitting that an Air Force cargo plane is going to carry us around the electoral battlefield.
After two days on the road following Tony Abbott through commercial flights, we're now on the official campaign plane. About 30 journalists, cameramen and photographers are in the group.
Some are veterans, most are not. The new generation media members all have smartphone cameras at the ready, tweeting and photographing almost every moment, including the safety briefing.
Chaperoning us are two political staffers from Abbott's office. They're the gatekeepers. Only they and the air crew know where we're headed.
We shuffle on the the mammoth aircraft and buckle up. Only after we're in the air,with phones switched off, we learn that we're headed for Adelaide. The paranoia about disclosing travel plans reaches a new level once we're all gathered together.
In many ways, it's only now that it feels like the campaign has really begun, yet it's already the end of day three.
The day started on the New South Wales Central Coast, in Australia's most infamous seat, Dobell, held by scandal-plagued former Labor MP Craig Thomson.
Abbott continues a familiar theme attacking the carbon tax. Only this time he's talking about it crippling families, not businesses.
For an Opposition Leader not to release any new policies or make any new promises in the first two days of a campaign is slightly unorthodox.
He clearly wants to play to his perceived strengths. But it's not a strategy that can be maintained for five weeks.
Sooner rather than later, Abbott needs to detail his vision for Australia. Simply talking about how he will fix the problems he blames on Labor is not enough.
Of course, revealing more policies opens him up to more lines of attack. Abbott is understandably cautious given he is ahead in the polls and doesn't want to take too many risks.
He knows that Labor will pounce on and amplify any Coalition mistake.
Take Joe Hockey's comments on interest rates for example. The Shadow Treasurer had a valid point highlighting how a cut reflects the slowing economy.
But his clumsy way of expressing that message allowed the Government to claim he didn't support the reduction in cost of living pressure that a rate cut brings to families.
It showed the Coalition still has some work to do fine tuning its message. With the economy the most important issue of this campaign, it's a message the Coalition has to get right.
