SYDNEY — It's a big gamble, but Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd is ready to take it. He will go into an election on the strength of his stance on, of all things, health care.
Never one to avoid a verbal standup, especially when all television cameras have been called in, he is banking on Australia's world-beating run of economic wins to make stunned voters forget a string of political shocks and return his Labor government for a second term in Canberra.
In picking health system reform for his election winner, he is taking a calculated risk that could blow his comfortable Canberra majority out of office. Already he has upset state governments still smarting over their loss of public face over Rudd reforms in education.