Australia's voters a bunch of dummies?

According to analysis in the Guardian, Malcolm Turnbull's downfall as Australian opposition leader had nothing to do with inept leadership:

Last week, Malcolm Turnbull became the first right-wing leader to be deposed for the ideological crime of taking global warming seriously. Turnbull was a confident politician, from a party that had dominated Australian politics until Labor's victory in 2007. He thought he was at the centre of the English-speaking world's conservative consensus. He dutifully committed his Liberal party to go along with Labor's plans to use a cap-and-trade scheme to cut emissions. His party's members went wild.

A right-leaning Australian journalist told me that, for conservatives there, "climate change is now morphing from a science issue into yet another front line in the culture wars, in which any obsession of the inner-city, mung-bean-flavoured-tofu-eating, latte-slurping political/academic/media class is automatically the target of resentment and scorn".

Tony Abbott, a reactionary Catholic, saw his chance, added opposition to green taxes to the old agenda of opposing gay marriage and abortion, and replaced Turnbull as leader.

Yes, Abbott is Catholic but I can't recall him recently saying anything about gay marriage or abortion. And if Abbott has hijacked the party, how to account for the Liberals' by-election victories over the weekend? Obvioulsy Australia's voters are a bunch of dummies who can be manipulated at will.