A few weeks on the job and there is an Independent Commission Against Corruption inquiry into corruption on the Wollongong Council. And with everything. Lashings of sex. Bribes. Con-men. Crooked developers. Politicians tripping over as their hands move from their own pockets, to the pockets of developers to the bra straps of council staff.

The Mercury, as one would expect, is having a feast with page after page of sordid details. So is The Sydney Morning Herald, in part because the story fits into its view that the NSW Labor Government is corrupt, incompetent and complacent, with only odd and then possibly accidental inklings of honesty.

In this, bad things in Wollongong are but a subset, albeit a juicy and prominently presented one, of stories about hospitals falling down, incompetently built new hospitals, public transport in chaos, babies dying of bureaucratic neglect, Labor figures sexually and physically harassing people, signs of open corruption in government dealings with developers, and liquor and gambling interests, and any amount of nudge-nudge about particular ministers. And the trial of a former minister for underage sex abuse.

The hapless Reba Meagher, presiding over an amazingly incompetent public hospital system, is called "the Grim Reba" in headlines. Old ICAC and parliamentary transcripts are ransacked for "safe" additional innuendo about old mate and Labor heavyweight Joe Tripodi. The Daily Telegraph, unwilling to be outshone for a tabloid headline, has weighed in with some beauties: Up to their necks in it. Mile-high rise club. Going, Going Gong. What NSW Labor Govt told an alleged crook: YOU'RE HIRED.

Contrary to my general view that the more damning the story and the detail, the less one needs, or should have, a strong slant on a headline, the subtext of virtually every headline is the idea that the NSW Government is "imploding", that virtually everyone is a crook or incompetent or both, and that, as the Herald front-page editorial put it so sweetly on Friday, "there is always the hope, no matter how forlorn, that even the most incompetent government might improve. A corrupt government, however, does not deserve the chance."

The frenzy, of course, is because of the smell of blood. There have been a few items missing from the coverage. The official Opposition, for one. Perhaps it reasons that a government in the process of destroying itself should be allowed to do the job on itself. The relative silence of the NSW Liberals may be because it is still so shattered, demoralised and debilitated by its own internecine wars, its repudiation at state election last year when a drover's dog should to have been able to defeat Morris Iemma and the crushing defeat of the Federal Government, and personal defeat of NSW Liberal leading light, John Howard, later in the year.

Also missing has been a federal dimension to the crisis. The Rudd Government ministers are busily distancing themselves from every aspect of the present scandals, and will no doubt end up weakly suggesting (falsely) that the ICAC inquiry is sub judice, preventing their saying what they would otherwise be keen to say.

But the scandal is primarily about the way the NSW Right organises itself into a web of corruption, and there are any number of NSW right-wing political figures who have tight holds on vital parts of the anatomies of a number of prominent federal members and ministers. And tight holds on parts of the party's federal machinery, too.

There are also some federal members John Faulkner, Anthony Albanese and Daryl Melham come immediately to mind who must be finding it difficult to conceal their pleasure at seeing old factional enemies in such diabolical trouble. Some of them could not have had so much fun since Laurie Brereton was facing bribery charges. (Mercifully, a Labor government, by a no doubt completely arms-length process, lost enthusiasm for pursuing such "ancient history" and dropped the charges, leaving Brereton without a stain on his character.)

One does not mean by this that the left wing of NSW Labor is entirely virtuous. It, or its various sub-factions, can stack branches, forge minutes, appoint mates, punish enemies and engage in character assassination with the best of them. But its "thing" in politics has hardly ever been so closely connected to the use of political power to advance the interests of developers, publicans and others with a cheque book. Elements of the NSW Right have always been for sale or for hire, and the fortunes, and power, of some of the senior party officials have always turned primarily on their capacity to line the faction's war chests.

Over the past decade, there has been a bit of a transition between the old Tammany-style Irish and Poms who once controlled things to a more multicultural lot.

But business is business, as ever. Business is biggest at the local government level (with help in processing development applications), than at state level. But it also turns on the capacity to deliver in Canberra.

Many Labor MPs and party officials are not corrupt. One would, however, have to be a very naive MP or official who was not aware of how influence and access is peddled. Over the years several prominent Labor MPs have told me they have worried about whether money played a role in particular decisions, and whether improper internal party pressure (on behalf of moneyed interests) played a role in others.

Kevin Rudd is the Labor leader whose power is most independent of this system since Gough Whitlam and Bill Hayden, but he has yet to take a step to seek fundamental reform of the party. Kim Beazley, himself honest, depended heavily on corrupt factions, and not only from NSW. Paul Keating, before becoming PM, became estranged from his old "mates", but he, and his closest friends, were once key players in the NSW Right.

It may take time for the cancer to become obvious in the way Labor governs itself at the Federal level. But, if Labor is in power for a long time, there's nothing more inevitable than that it will engulf it.

Since Rudd plans on being around for a long time, it is strange that he tries to ignore it. It really would be better if he confronted it head on. Now.