Having a penis does not a good Prime Minister make

A week ago, as a result of some internal politics, the Prime Minister of Australia, Kevin Rudd, stepped down from his post and was succeeded by his deputy, Julia Gillard.
Just like that, Australia took a major step toward being a truly equal society; Gillard marks the first female Prime Minister this country has seen.
Now we still have a long way to go: around the same time that this was happening in Australia, Iceland's lesbian PM was legally marrying her girlfriend. But still, this is a step in the right direction, and every step is a victory.

Perhaps I shouldn't be, but I've been surprised by all the backlash and bigoted comments that have surfaced as a result of this event. I guess I knew on some level how prevalent sexism still is, even in the 21st century; but you don't often see it rear its ugly head so blatantly.

Such comments as, "I for one will by voting for Tony Abbott in the next election, as I feel more confident having a man in charge."
Now for those who don't know, Tony Abbot is, essentially, an Australian George Bush, complete with apelike appearance and inability to string a series of words into a coherent sentence. He believes that a woman's place in the kitchen making sandwiches, while a man goes to work. He believes that homosexuality is wrong, and that gay couples are less deserving of the rights that straight couples are privilege to. He believes that everything in the Bible is true, and that if you're not a Christian, you're a heathen.
If he should ever become Prime Minister, he will set the country back 50 years. If we're lucky.

Now it really does concern me when people, and otherwise Labor supporters at at that, would choose this, over having a woman in charge. How can anyone hold this opinion and not see the ignorance in it?
Just to be clear, I'll say this now, loud and clearly in bold text:

Having a penis does not qualify one to run a country.

Nor does having a uterus, or breasts, or a vagina impair one's ability to do so.

Intelligence, charisma, decisiveness, passion, strength of character, sense of morality: these are the characteristics that count as a leader, and these have absolutely nothing to with one's gender. These are also characteristics that Gillard has in spades; and things that Abbott wouldn't know the meaning of if he was a senior editor at Oxford.

I'm also not saying that being female automatically makes one suitable to run a country; Sarah Palin has quite clearly demonstrated this during her time in politics.

At the end of it all, candidates for Prime Minister, or indeed any seat in government, should be voted for or appointed based solely on their suitability for the job. The only way this is going to happen is if minorities in politics - females, non-whites (less of an issue in Australia than in, say, USA, but an issue nonetheless), and out-of-the-closet homosexuals - continue to do as Julia Gillard has done, and fight through the discrimination to secure these positions. This opens the door for others to follow suit, and eventually we will reach the point that the likes of Iceland and India are at; where female rulers are not even newsworthy because of how ordinary they are, and have legitimately equal footing with their penis-owning adversaries in the fight for positions of influence.