It’s a similar style of proceeding to Imre Salusinszky’s; who, incidentally, looked almost disappointed that Nathan Rees had actually put a bomb under the endless round of destabilisation at NSW Labor conference. All those Chinese lunches and hot tips over yum cha about Della or Kristina Keneally, or someone, being Premier before the month or year is out or whenevs, gone to waste.

Much more astute was the commentary in today’s Fin Review and Crikey – Turnbull is being squeezed by a pincer movement – Minchin within and Rudd without. The commentariat should wake up to the fact that the truth is Labor would like to see Mal go – because he’s actually the most plausible opponent (and who knows what he could have done had he not been forced to lead such a rabble – including the Coalition’s false friends in the media among the troops in constant revolt).

No one else the Libs could put up against Rudd would have even a ghost of a chance.

… which leads me to the “honeymoon is over” theme. If indeed it is true that there has been a bit of a shift in the electorate’s mood (and as I’ve said recently, I think it’s too early to call that), the so-called return to normalcy is much more likely to be a result of relief that the effects of the GFC are finally past us, rather than any supposed “doubts” about Rudd or concerns about asylum seekers. Anyone who’s ever run a focus group can readily imagine how such “doubts” could come up, without having any massive significance. In fact, if you’re doing your job, you’d be asking the same questions about Turnbull. I smell a big rat on this particular media leak. And on the latter, I think it’s much more probable that it’s the messiness of Rudd’s message, and the sheer volume of ‘crisis’ rhetoric that’s likely to account for the blip, if that’s it at all.

The biggest failing of the public polls, unlike the parties’ tracking polls, is that they don’t ask any questions which would disclose the salience of issues and events to vote shifts. That’s why a lot of the hackneyed commentary is just that. If they did, of course, it would cost a bit more, and they’d need to know a bit more about stats to interpret them, and it would also forever destroy the myth that there’s some privileged insight political journos have.

But in the absence of access to such data, the more prosaic hypothesis is that voters want to see the government act on what it promised to do – bread and butter improvements in service delivery, primarily. The Rudd government, if not the commentariat, will be aware of this, and I’d expect a switch in the rhetoric very quickly after parliament rises for the year and the political shenanigans around the CPRS wear out their use by date as political fodder for beating up the opposition.

So – does this mean that Labor’s support is “soft” in the absence of something the government portrayed as a national emergency? Well, yes, sort of. But what needs to be recalled here is that Rudd has always been determined to maintain a large lead in the polls, and thus prepared to lose a few points during a campaign. In part that’s a reflection that his own campaigning skills (as opposed to political skills) aren’t the best ever. It also builds up a cushion for all sorts of fires to burst out, compensates for regional and state based weaknesses (and drag by unpopular Labor administrations).

It’s a classic State Labor strategy.

It may not – in the different environment of federal politics – lead to a landslide 2nd term victory (though it might). It does rest on keeping the opposition irrelevant, and making them bear all the brunt of looking political and petty. So far it’s working. It works in part because most of the parliamentary theatre – of so much interest to Liberals and media alike – is perceived negatively by the electorate, if not ignored entirely. Rudd’s victory was a victory for a strategy which recognised that people were sick of John Howard, in part because he got too political. That strategy is still in place. If Turnbull is toppled, it’ll only reinforce its success.

In other words, the obsessive focus of the media on the minutiae of the political cycle, and the constant reporting and inciting of leadership divisions and rumblings in Liberal ranks, plays into Rudd’s hands, rather than “putting the government under scrutiny”. If you actually wanted to go looking for some real political problems the Rudd government would not want people to read about, you wouldn’t have to look too far.

It can also be interesting to compare first term governments at this stage of the electoral cycle, and here the obvious contrast – despite all the media beatups – is the absence of major scandal and ministerial resignations compared to both the Hawke and Howard governments. That doesn’t, of course, imply that all the Labor ministers are fabulous, but it is worth observing.

One of the things that’s interested me in the discussion that had already began quite a while before we reached the actual milestone is that in both comments on this blog and in conversations with some friends I’ve seen the sentiment expressed that simply avoiding hearing a daily litany of horrors from the Howard crew is Rudd’s greatest achievement. It might, and no doubt will, be objected that – “lefties would say that, wouldn’t they?” But I think there are a couple of points here. First, there is no doubt that a government with a more humanitarian tinge and an appreciation of propriety and ethics is to be welcomed, and that sentiment – along with the promise keeping – will be a contributor to Labor’s continuing lead in the polls. Secondly, I think The Howard Years has been interestingly timed to stimulate some comparison and to reinforce the whole sense of relief that we don’t have that turgid mob to kick around any more.

But, again, one thing that wore out the Coalition’s welcome with the electorate was the constant “rabbits out of the hat” and the whole bag of divisive tricks, along with the internal ructions and the cockiness of ministers. I agree that the Liberals are still playing at the same game in many ways. John Howard was elected in 1996 as a safe pair of hands and the Libs were “the party of order”, if you like. By the end of their fourth term, they looked like the risky and unsafe proposition and Kevin Rudd’s calm demeanour undoubtedly contributed much to Labor’s victory. WorkChoices was also probably the biggest single mistake the Coalition made, and the related apprehension that worse would follow and more leadership instability also condemned the Howard government to defeat.

But what of policy, and that shibboleth beloved of the punditariat, “the narrative”? First, there’s the irony that Paul Keating – through one artifice or another – succeeded in setting the critical tone for assessment of the next Labor government after his fall from power. So it probably wasn’t surprising to see Rudd – in an interview with the Fin on Saturday – insist that the government does have a narrative. In fact, I don’t think that’s ever been in doubt. The three themes Labor laid out last year – broadly speaking – human capital and infrastructure, modernisation and social inclusion have continued to be a leitmotif of the government’s program. Rudd himself encapsulated the major tones somewhat differently, including security and defence for instance, but in practice that hasn’t been a domain that’s been at the forefront of public debate.

One could spend a lot of time assessing all manner of policy initiatives and announcements – and the symbolism which actually unifies those three themes (think of Quentin Bryce’s elevation or the Closing the Gap initiative associated with the Apology). But, when forming an overall view, probably the most significant single political factor has been that people really have – on the whole – got what they thought they would get, and that even though the ship of state now has to be steered through some rather more stormy waters, the promises have been kept. It’s almost impossible to underestimate the political importance of this one fact. That’s why, or the biggest reason why, Labor and Rudd have continued to enjoy – monotonously for the punditariat – a level of support somewhat in excess of the election winning vote.

Forget about almost everything that’s been written about politics this year – politics has in effect been on hold. Labor ministers really have been able to play the requisite game in their sleep, and Malcolm Turnbull’s elevation hasn’t changed much. It’s also been accompanied by a maturing of the government’s communications and strategy and sense that a tighter outfit is emerging less obsessed with winning the daily media cycle. It really would be a waste of effort to examine which groups and demographics have shifted slightly or whatever – at least from the perspective of the bigger picture. The reality is that it’s highly likely that a substantial majority of electors are happy with the decision made last year and despite all the counterfactuals and scenarios the media love to play with, the truth is that it would likely take a lot to reverse that satisfaction and comfort level.

It may be, of course, reasonable to borrow one of the punditariat’s favourite notions and remark that the hard decisions lie ahead – two of the most important being the final shape of the emissions trading scheme (and the stance adopted in international negotiations) and the industrial relations changes (with Julia Gillard introducing the legislation tomorrow). As well as the obvious questions about economic policy, service delivery and improvement will be another key yardstick for judgement. But we need to recognise that Rudd plays a long game, and that if the planets align, all the criticism of government by review and so on will appear very ephemeral and fleeting.

My punt is still that Labor are dug in for a long innings. But the continued salience of the “not Howard” factor suggests to me that we do have to wait somewhat longer to discern the true shape of the government elected one year ago.

There was another outbreak of this guff on Monday in The Australian, apropos of quarterly newspolls in New South Wales and Victoria. There was the usual news story and two op/ed pieces to ram home the point. It was intriguing to see the frame applied to the comments of ABC election analyst Antony Green:

Voters clearly see benefits in balancing a federal government with state and territory governments of the opposite political complexion.
ern
“All the state governments are suffering from the same thing,” ABC election analyst Antony Green said yesterday.

“They no longer have the federal Coalition to run against,” he said. “They have to stand on their own two feet and can’t blame John Howard any more.”

“The Victorian poll shows it’s competitive and Labor can come back. The NSW ratings are terminal, unless Rees can leverage his popularity into votes.”

Any moderately careful reading of this passage would disclose that Green is not making the point which has been seized on as the current all purpose iron law of politics. What he’s in fact referring to is the fact that Labor governments find it harder to make excuses for poor performance on infrastructure and service delivery. Peter Beattie made much of the fact that Howard hadn’t come to the party in 2006, and the focus groups Graham Young and I conducted showed this message resonated. In turn, Kevin Rudd very successfully argued in 2007 the same thing in Queensland – implying that governments working in co-operation could turn things around, but not immediately. That, in turn, suggests that there’s a chance that Howard’s ghost is still available for Anna Bligh to run against in 2009 – because voters know there are long lead times for infrastructure and improvements in services, and the economy may also provide some sort of alibi. Different dynamics, and versions of this one, will be operating in other states. As Green points out – in direct contradicting the spin that his quote is woven into – Victoria’s circumstances are different to those of the putrid NSW Labor regime. Fixed terms allow governments to frontload unpopular decisions, and that’s what Brumby has been up to.

By the way, these comments aren’t intended to suggest that the state governments are all bright and shiny and the fount of all things good. I think Peter Beattie deserved in many ways to lose in 2006 – precisely because of a lack of foresight until quite late in the piece in improving service delivery and attending to infrastructure. What I’m trying to do is suggest that the analysis we’re being told is “common knowledge” is in fact wrong, and reflects neither actual voter behaviour nor some logic of politics, but is itself derivative of a partisan political strategy.

Elsewhere: Possum points out another gaping hole in the commentary on these polls – the fact that almost 30% of respondents in NSW are choosing to indicate a preference for neither major party, and that the same effect is present in more muted form in Victoria. That’s what’s worthy of analysis!