Labor's problem: Rudd too vain to call election immediately Couldas and shouldas in Labor: Kevin Rudd could have pulled off an unlikely election win if he had quickly gone to the people after regaining the leadership in June, says the man armed with the polling data at the time, Labor's campaign director George Wright. He said with hindsight Mr Rudd should have pulled the election trigger sooner after replacing the unpopular Julia Gillard... First, I doubt Rudd's sugar hit could have lasted an entire election campaign. Remember, too, calling the election immediately would have left Rudd no time to negotiate the PNG deal on boat people, which at least gave him a fig leaf. But second, the problem with bringing back Rudd was that Labor also brought back his monstrous ego and selfishness, as I warned at precisely the time Rudd was dithering about going to the polls: Rudd's interests divide from Labor's. He is not there to lead Labor to an honorable loss. He is there to win. He would not want to take Labor to an election he thinks he would lose, even narrowly. He would rather wait in hope for a change in fortune, even if that means there's a greater risk of losing big. He'd rather go for broke - for all or nothing. At least he'd be Prime Minister for longer, something he really, really loves. That means Rudd, a confidence player, will now come under a lot of pressure from insiders telling him he's less popular than he thinks and shouldn't ride his luck. That he shouldn't put self before the party. But that would have called for someone big enough and ugly enough to tell Rudd he wasn't half as popular or as clever as he thought and had better dash to the polls before he was found out. Then there was one other hitch: THE return of Kevin Rudd ripped apart the team Labor assembled in its bid to win the election this year... Wright brought together a team of 150 people for a "full trial"" of the election strategy at campaign headquarters in Melbourne.They were "in their roles, doing their jobs, set, ready to go,"" Mr Wright told the National Press Club... "Two weeks out from the (start of the campaign for the September 7) election we had to replace 110 of those people because of the change in leadership and the impact that had on whether people's interest and willingness to participate in the campaign,"" said Mr Wright..