As Malcolm Turnbull marks his 61st birthday on Saturday, Australia's 29th Prime Minister will likely feel pretty good about the world.
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The Liberal Party's decision to install him in place of Tony Abbott has seemingly changed the complexion of federal politics, sweeping away the putrescent tone of the Rudd-Gillard-Abbott years and replacing it with a new optimism.
The polls, in this early honeymoon period, have been kind, with this week's Fairfax-Ipsos poll showing a big surge in the Liberals' two-party preferred vote; from 46-54 in the August poll that pitted Abbott against Bill Shorten, to a 53-47 Liberal lead now.
Turnbull is preferred prime minister for 67 per cent of voters, whereas Shorten gets the nod from just 21 per cent..
Now questions are being asked about the Labor leader that were largely left unpondered in the Abbott years.
Can Shorten defeat Turnbull? Could Labor do the almost-unthinkable-but entirely-predictable thing and replace Shorten before the next election, expected between March and September?
The Opposition Leader was asked on Friday if his leadership became a drag on Labor's vote, would he quit?
His response: "I believe that Labor has a great chance at the next election because we've got policies which really matter to Australians. Labor will make sure that our hospitals and health care system are properly funded...only Labor's going to have a policy to make sure our schools are well funded. Labor's committed to addressing inequality in our society by a strong safety net of workplace conditions and making sure that people with disabilities and other groups that miss out on jobs get jobs. It's only Labor that's going who's going to take real action on climate change," he said.
"I believe if you look after the policies the polls look after themselves."
Admirers and detractors
In a little over two years as Labor leader, Shorten has gathered admirers and detractors; inside the ALP, on balance, the Opposition Leader has probably gathered more supporters than enemies in the party.
Pro-Shorten MPs say he does not get the credit he deserves for holding the party together after the disastrous 2013 loss, nor for holding the Abbott government to account.
But few in the parliamentary wing of the party, when pushed, will actually claim Shorten can beat Turnbull.
One of the most senior factional bosses in the country, for example, spent 15 minutes extolling the virtues of Labor, and Shorten's, carefully crafted Turnbull-targeting strategy in a chance conversation with Fairfax Media last week.
But asked directly if Shorten could actually win, the response was blunt: no chance.
It's a bleak response repeated by hard heads across the party's right faction, particularly in NSW.
Shorten's timidity is a recurring theme in conversation with his MPs on the front and backbench.
"Bill has to be prepared to take risks because you have to put down markers. Part of his problem has been a short term focus, not a medium or long-term focus," one MP says.
New approach required
While a small target strategy may have worked against an Abbott government with a singular talent for self-harm, against Turnbull, who has shown an early propensity to eschew doltish slogans and explain policy to the Australian people, a new approach is required.
Low level grumbling about strategy and tactics in question time and in the media persists, too.
And while the royal commission into trade unions has confirmed the Opposition Leader will not be called again, the evidence presented by Thiess John Holland executives, not to mention Cleanevent and Chiquita Mushrooms workers, is still ringing in Labor ears, and presages a less than complimentary set of findings when the commission hands down its final report.
But as one recently said to Fairfax Media, if the party recorded three consecutive primary votes of less then 35 per cent in published opinion polls, "come and see me".
Idle conversations about alternative leaders have taken place, including how Kevin Rudd's "60 per cent" rule, which requires 60 per cent of the caucus to vote for dumping an opposition leader could, in fact, be dumped by 51 per cent of MPs.
Three people – Chris Bowen, Anthony Albanese and Tanya Plibersek – are mentioned as alternatives – but the storm clouds are far from ready to break, and all three have drawbacks.
Plibersek is seen as unacceptable by large sections of the NSW and Victorian right factions; her stance on a binding vote for Labor MPs on same-sex marriage did her untold damage.
Bowen is seen as the next leader by his colleagues in the NSW right faction, but the view at present is that Shorten should be allowed to finish what he has started and given the chance to stand (there is also a pragmatic view that Bowen should not be "wasted" this term).
Which leaves Albanese, the winner of the popular vote in the last leadership contest in 2013. He has, however, told colleagues that he would not challenge Shorten.
So while leadership talk remains low-level chatter the picture is not pretty for Shorten.
But is it as bad as all that?
Strategic and tactical shifts
There are clear signs of strategic and tactical shifts under way within Labor, in two parts – a counter-narrative about Turnbull, and a switch to a more positive message.
Or as Albanese put it on the Nine Network on Friday, the Fairfax-Ipsos poll was tough for Labor "but you expect that after a change in leaders ... if you want an example of how every new leader gets that immediate lift, wait and see what happens when people have a look at the substance of Malcolm Turnbull. The substance is that the same unfair cuts are in play; 136,000 single parents will be affected by the cuts that they introduced just this week".
On the policy front, Labor has unveiled details of substantial new policies in the infrastructure, higher education, mental health and innovation portfolios in the last month, and there is more – much more – to come.
Party strategists say the development work has largely been done in a raft of other areas and that Labor is in a position to bring forward the release of policies to build momentum.
The party secretariat, led by national secretary George Wright, has already formed a small team devoted to establishing and running an election campaign HQ.
And then there is the counter-narrative.
'Two sides to Turnbull's success coin'
A week ago, Shorten was pilloried for Labor's attack on Turnbull's wealth, and his holdings in the Cayman Islands.
It was ugly politics and the verbally dextrous Turnbull turned the attack back on to Labor.
But claims the attack backfired are over-stated, party strategists say; while 50 per cent of voters approved of Turnbull in a recent Newspoll and just 25 per cent disapproved, the race is on for the undecided 25 per cent, and both sides know it.
"The research we have show there are two sides to the 'success' coin. People think because he has made a lot of money, he might be a success leading the country. But the flipside is there that people ask if he is out of touch or if he thinks he is above the rules," the strategist says, pointing to recent reports the Prime Minister uses a private email server, for example.
While people may not have liked the attack on Turnbull over the Caymans fund, they do remember it.
"The attack on Turnbull was ugly but necessary," says an ALP front bencher, who adds that the change in the tone of politics since Turnbull's ascension suits Shorten, because it requires the Labor leader to be positive and mount more sophisticated arguments.
When the Turnbull honeymoon effect wears off, or so Labor believes, unpopular spending cuts and the prospect of changes to the tax system and possibly even penalty rates will remain.
Or as a hard-headed Liberal MP puts it: "This is the easy part, we are just banking political capital. Eventually, we will have to spend some of it".
Labor, and Bill Shorten, are counting on it.
