THERE are few second acts in Australian politics, let alone third ones, but that isn't helping a significant number of senior ALP figures who don't accept Kevin Rudd is following the usual script.
They don't believe he's stopping plotting. They refuse to believe he's stopped plotting.
So troops of ALP axe wielders chopping down vast forests because they fear there are not enough stakes to drive through the heart of Kevin Rudd's leadership ambitions.
It has become an obsession which is tainting the pressing matters Labor faces such as who to elevate as Rudd's replacement, and how.
The man himself hasn't popped his head up since that extraordinarily upbeat speech conceding defeat Saturday night but many of his former colleagues are talking about him.
There have been serial calls for him to quit Parliament. Folks still don't believer he is capable of sitting quietly on the backbench.
Last night on Sky News former Communications Minister Stephen Conroy blasted the Rudd legacy of party reform, and no doubt would, if asked, take a shot as other Rudd remnants.
Former Trade Minister Craig Emerson in The Australian today attacked Rudd's "cynical efforts" to win votes during the campaign on the issue of foreign ownership.
The more demanding matter for the party is whether Bill Shorten or Anthony Albanese should become Opposition Leader, and whether the Rudd reforms granting a 50 per cent say on the leadership to rank and file members should be invoked. Or should there be just one candidate and a Caucus monopoly on the decision?
Some of the arguments against the membership vote have been powered by that lingering animosity towards Rudd, to the extent he is being accused of leaving behind a "time bomb".
And Mr Albanese has been accused in backroom talks of being a Rudd catspaw, because he had supported his leadership ambitions. The fact Mr Shorten also backed the second Rudd coming is not part of this line.
The Labor Party will only jettison the pain of the Rudd/Gillard years if they want to. But there are MPs who either don't want to or can't.
The quest for total revenge against a man who used the party to deliver his own acts of destabilising vengeance appears inexhaustible.
