The behaviour of federal opposition leader Malcolm Turnbull during the past two weeks of gloom and crisis has been appalling.

The pretension that the Rudd government is powerless to deal with current world events without Turnbull’s contribution is no more than political opportunism.

All any Australian government can do is try and lessen the impacts, something that has already been done with the $10.4 billion package that will help stimulate the economy from early December.

The man is attempting to create an impression that only the Coalition has the skills to manage the economy.

Was he not a member of a government that hung onto the reins of a resource boom and inflation in property and share markets all the while describing the artifice that has proved without foundation as an example of its economic brilliance?

I’m not about to begin debating the pseudonyms of the blogosphere but really, does anyone truly believe that we would be better off right now with a government that had conspired with big business to produce Work Choices?

That Orwellian piece of legislation was about stripping choices from workers by enabling businesses to cut more cost from their bottom line than was humanly decent.

All the while fat cats were receiving massive bonuses for delivering to the share market profit results built increasingly not on growing market share and the quality of their products, but through the erosion of the pay and conditions that allow ordinary people the right to family time and a reasonable wage.

Ask anyone who has worked on split shifts and casual hours about how great the past decade has been.

Ask all those earning under $30,000 a year while performing critical roles the same question.

Think how much more vulnerable the most vulnerable of us would be with a government that was willing, even in the so-called good times, to deny them any real and sustaining share.

Feeding off this have been the investment funds that would instantly devalue companies that failed to deliver unrealistic and unsustainable results.

Former United States federal reserve chairman Alan Greenspan admitted last week to a house oversight committee that he had got it wrong.

Green’s economic philosophy that the self-interest of lending institutions would protect shareholder equity informed a certain, widely-held conservative view that government regulation was detrimental to efficient economies.

The market can not now have it both ways.

Any guarantees from government must come at the price of greater regulation.

Where does Malcolm Turnbull really stand and who does he represent?

What’s his vision for the Australia of the future and where does each of us fit in that?

If he is to fashion himself with any legitimacy as an alternative prime minister he will need to do more than fire cheap shots from the sidelines.

Rather than hectoring the government he needs to explain himself.

The fact that he was once a merchant banker is hardly reason for the elected government to allow him a place back at the policy table.

Nor is the prospect that he may stop his harmful and disruptive assault on treasury secretary Dr Ken Henry.

The naked opportunism of the opposition leader’s display during the past fortnight has done him absolutely no credit.

A global economic crisis is not a political opportunity. Its impact is already being felt at every level of society.

Mr Turnbull would be better to give the theatrics a break and instead begin developing a narrative that will re-position a party that has been a cheer leader for philosophies and processes that have delivered us this mess in the first place.

On your bike

I have a mate who’s fast approaching 70.

He reminds me a bit of the economy. He has a dodgy ticker which is being regulated by a machine implanted in his chest.

The trouble is that there is still some tinkering to do with his medication.

This makes him prone to occasionally falling down, sometimes with dire consequence.

A week ago he embraced, head first, the Plaza car park. When I went to check on him after he had been released from hospital, I found him standing on his front porch, bicycle helmet in hand and pushie seemingly at the ready.

“I hope you are not about to get on that,’’ I said like a parent admonishing a wayward teenager.

In fact, he had just come back from visiting the doctor to check the progress of his injuries.

His confidence that he won’t fall down keeps him going and really, short of locking the doors and staying in bed, is the only option he has.

A lesson for us all.