Alabama bites back after Rudd reacts to redneck comments

LOS ANGELES: Alabama residents have hit out at Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd for a comment he made after comedian Robin Williams told talk show host David Letterman "Australians are basically English rednecks".

Rudd, during an interview on Eddie Maguire's Triple M radio show, responded by saying: "First of all, I think Robin Williams should go and spend a bit of time in Alabama before he frames comments about anyone being particularly redneck."

United States media organisations picked up Rudd's remarks.

Alabama newspaper, the Birmingham News, ran an "Australia v Alabama" headline on the most prominent section of its website and asked readers to comment.

They did not hold back, with one accusing Rudd of making a "racial epithet" while another wrote "if it weren't for some Alabamians fighting in the war, the Australians would be speaking Japanese".

"I spent a month in Australia. Ninety-five per cent of it is a desert wasteland and looks like a Mad Max dump. There is a good reason Britain sent its criminals there," one wrote.

The furore began this week when Williams, just returned from a two-week trip to Australia, appeared on the Tonight Show.

Yesterday, however, Williams made an on-air apology and, when asked by an interviewer why he thought Rudd had been so sensitive, he said: "Maybe it's because Mr Abbott did well in the ironman."

Australian Opposition leader Tony Abbott last weekend completed the Australian Ironman.

- AAP