Former prime minister Kevin Rudd has tipped President Barack Obama to win a second term.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
With the election currently looking too close to call, Mr Rudd predicted on Tuesday night that President Obama would edge out Mitt Romney.
In a conversation with Phillip Adams on ABC Radio National, Mr Rudd said that he had been speaking to "friends on the ground" campaigning in the swing state of Virginia.
"I know Barack reasonably well, he's a good man. I've only met Governor [Mitt] Romney once," Mr Rudd said.
"So leaving aside what you want to happen ... I think it's more probable than not that President Obama will have four more years."
Speaking about the close relationship he enjoyed with Mr Obama during his prime ministership, Mr Rudd noted that the US President was a complex leader.
"A lot of folk don't quite get him, his complexity."
This comes as Foreign Minister Bob Carr said that if Mr Obama did not win the US election, it would be because of the global financial crisis.
"It would be bitterly disappointing for all those who endorse Obama in the circumstances of his election in 2008, but it would reflect nothing other than the sluggish nature of the American economic recovery in the wake of what's summed up in the initials GFC," Senator Carr told ABC's Lateline.
Mr Rudd's Radio National interview is one of several interviews he has done in recent days, in keeping with his habit of making public appearances while Prime Minister Julia Gillard is out of the country. Ms Gillard leaves the Asia-Europe Summit in Laos today for talks in Bali.
During his interview last night, the Member for Griffith did much of the questioning, in view of Mr Adams's new book, Bedtime Stories. Mr Rudd introduced the program: "It's Kevin Rudd here ... I'm your guest presenter here this evening. There's been something of a coup."