Adding to all the speculation that election is about to be called is the overnight transformation of the Liberal party website in a much more campaign focused presentation.
It looks like it's on. And just when we were all expecting the government to take a big switch to socially conservative on race and anything else, the PM has embraced reconciliation and gay rights.
Here in latte land, the OC thinks both should be pursued without further debate but at least we comprehend that neither are greatly popular causes out where elections are normally fought and won. Sadly.
CONFUSED MESSAGE REVEALS THE EXTENT OF LIBERAL PAIN
But there's the clue about how bad this election could end up being for the government, Liberal insiders tell the OC. They explain that they need to shore up the small 'l' liberal voters in normally safe Liberal seats otherwise they'll lose those too. When this was explained to me very late last night, I said with the inflection of the sceptic "excuse me?" and our well-placed informant sombrely and glumly informed me that this was true, based on current research.
So there you have it, the government is trying to plug too many holes in the dyke. It needs to simultaneously belt the Sudanese and love aborigines. Good luck with that. And much as this publication of freedom wants a close contest and wants Little Johnny, the prodigiously successful politician of his generation, to slug it out right to the end, at this stage, having seemingly forsaken the opportunity to belt Rudd in Question Time for two weeks, they really do like they're cruising for a bruising.
IT COULD HAVE ALL BEEN DIFFERENT
In recent days, the OC has pondered with our network of thought-partners, informants, leakers, patriots and nervous participants how the government might have fixed it and I think I've finally worked out the missing ingredient, Kevin Andrews.
He's been the only one willing to take big risks to rescue the show.
The stud, whose policies on the Sudanese the OC found at one level deeply disturbing were causing Labor candidates and advisers more heartburn than some dodgy meat.
Twelve months ago, if the government had changed leaders, not to the obvious Costello but the dark horse Andrews. Yes, Kevin Andrews. Only the Lib Kevin could have trumped Labor's, in the OC's not very humble opinion. At the least it would have spared the nation Kevin07 t-shirts.
IF THIS AND IF THAT
If the new leader had repealed Workchoices and said they'll devise something better with a summit chaired by Bob Hawke and Andrew Peacock, who'll still be using tanning studios even once they're banned.
If they reintroduced tariffs to save us from the Chinese manufacturing "menace".
If they brought in paleo-conservative Pat Buchanan to secretly advise them on everything else then they just might have re-connected with Howard's battlers sufficiently to turn it around.
The fact that those policies would set Australia back decades from our destiny as an open, prosperous, united country doesn't change the reality of the popularity of those ideas where elections are normally fought and won.
That's what they needed to do. Repudiate a good half of what they stood for and take the biggest, boldest risks for reinvention. It is only the best business that can turn on itself, cannibalise its revenue knowing that if they don't do it themselves, their competitors will. It's so counter-intuitive. Just as it is in politics. You don't need an MBA from the University of Chicago to know that, you need courage and true grit.
AT OUR CORE, WE CRAVE SECURITY AND SAFETY TO PROTECT OUR AUSTRALIAN MONUMENT // WHY WOULD WE NOT?
Australians have a long history of voting for the safest, most conservative choice. We've said this for some time. Even Whitlam was that way. While he's now reinvented as Labor's version of Che Guevara, prior to his election and martyrdom, he was a true blue Labor moderate of suburban reassurance. The responsible, decent barrister who'd cleaned up Labor's act.
Hawke was much the same. Keating was out there but was saved by Hewson's crazed radicalism in 93. There's a real pattern.
It's amazing to think that Howard by being perceived as breaching faith with his "battlers" over Workchoices reinvented his safe, reliable, dependable self into a Dr Hewson scary-dude. But that's exactly what appears to have happened.
THE BRAVE BATTLE AWAITS // ANYTHING IS POSSIBLE BUT...
Can it change? Anything's possible. But let's not wear the Christian Kerr beret of indecision here just to be polite. John Howard is going to go down like a dead dog on a freeway. That's inevitable probably. There's no joy in any of that either, I like it when greatly successful politicians go out on top and he could have at his ten year mark and it would have been a delight to behold.
Sadly, like the best of us, things got complicated and he held on. Just a bit too long.
Having declared that very obvious fact, it will be interesting to see what the wily old fox can do to take some nips out of the Rudd. The Libs have full coffers, some smart strategists and not much to lose at this point so we hope they are preparing for their Henry V moment.
Can they turn around the sinking ship of state?
Putting on the ungentlemanly Christian Kerr raspberry beret of indecision for a moment, maybe, you know, if
■ they find proof that the Labor leader hangs with strippers who lied about his childhood and is married to a multi-millionaire whose fortune has been taxpayer generated exploiting the most vulnerable in the community,
■ their Deputy was a paid operative secret former communist symp,
■ that there'll be wall-to-wall, coast-to-coast Labor governments,
■ that unions have 50% of the decision-making power within the ALP,
■ that Kim Carr is serious about industry planning,
■ that Mad Mark Latham's best buddy Joel Fitzgibbon could be in charge of defending our island continent;
■ that Beijing kow-tow-er Simon Crean could end up being Foreign Minister because the incumbent likes to speak up for the civil rights of convicted mass murderers,
■ that half the dunces in Labor's not really expected to get seats are a menace to society and some other things I dare not even mention,
then it might all change.
Trouble is, the voters know all that already and it hasn't made a lick of difference.
NINE PER CENT? IS THIS REAL?
Labor 56 Coalition 44. 56-44. And last time was 47-53. A nine per cent nationwide swing is on, if the polls hold up in the way they stubbornly have all year.
Ouch.
Could we really face the national nightmare of Penleigh girl Julia Mason being the member for Goldstein? Toad of Toad Hall Dympna Beard the member for Casey? Our very own Sophie Mirabella losing her safest of seats? It's crazy talk. Isn't it? In the latter case of course, it borders on being a national emergency. Shall we really have to move the OC's centre of operations to Wangaratta for the duration to defend her honour from defeat and slaughterhouse?
I'll be the first to admit all of this has amazed me. I perhaps know the horror stories of Gartrell's worst excesses and the Leader's eccentricities to imagine a nine per cent swing. But, in the heartland, because of Workchoices, Howard's break with his battler homies seems like a permanent fracture that will not heal despite the very best efforts of the best in the business.
And that's the backdrop to this election. Can the government strip votes back from people reluctant to give Rudd a landslide? Well, if anyone can it will be Team Loughnane but nothing they've done so far has worked, or been allowed to work.
PATRIOTS ON EITHER SIDE OF THE AISLE WE SALUTE YOU
To patriots on both sides, you are all in our prayers, we especially pray that you unite to vanquish the common Greens party foe that threatens all of us, we hope you all get the results you deserve whether that be the landslide that is your destiny or the narrow scraping home that lets you live to fight another day.
Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more,
Or close the wall up with our English dead!
In peace there 's nothing so becomes a man
As modest stillness and humility;
But when the blast of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the tiger:
Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood,
Disguise fair nature with hard-favoured rage;
Then lend the eye a terrible aspect.
Game on.
since failed candidate 
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