While the Coalition has been rightly slammed for its failure to articulate much policy ahead of last month's election, this was never the case with its tax strategy.
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The roll out of a three pronged reduction in taxes that would create a 30 per cent bracket for all Australians earning between $45,000 and $200,000 a year by 2024 is one of the few things Scott Morrison and Josh Frydenberg can claim a mandate for. They took it to the people and the people voted them in.
Labor, which has been accused of trying to govern from Opposition for its refusal to pass the crucial third tranche of cuts, does not appear to appreciate the significance of its defeat.
Anthony Albanese, who recently pledged to pursue a more bipartisan approach, is saying one thing and doing another.
Little more than a month after his party lost the unlosable election he is reverting to type in the apparent hope voters will overlook the disconnect between the two.
Given many of his own team, including Joel Fitzgibbon, fear Albanese may be leading the ALP even further into the wilderness, he is playing a dangerous game.
"You can't deny punters a tax cut from Opposition particularly so soon after an election where we had our backsides kicked," Mr Fitzgibbon said this week.
The real mystery is what do Albanese and the ALP hope to achieve.
If Labor persists in playing the spoiler it risks being blamed, possibly rightfully so, for any sudden economic downturn.
Given car sales, a key economic indicator, have already been heading south for over a year, the Reserve Bank has cut rates once since the election and is poised to do so again next week, and the possible impact of the US-Chinese trade war, this is not the time for political one-upmanship.
Labor's claim the third round of cuts should be opposed because they won't take effect until after the next election is fundamentally dodgy.
If it had won the election Prime Minister Shorten would now be pressuring the Coalition to pass the negative gearing changes even though they would have an impact that would last forever or until they were repealed by a future Coalition government.
Labor would also be seeking to pass its changes to the franking credits provisions, which would also have an impact well beyond the current parliamentary term.
Albanese does not have an intrinsic right to oppose the Coalition's tax package. He does have the right to go into the next election saying Labor would unravel the disputed third tranche.
The ALP also appears to have been wedged itself internally with shadow treasurer Jim Chalmers saying on Sunday the pre-election attacks on the "big end of town" were a mistake.
This is a fight that appears unlikely to end well for the ALP.
"If you're on a good wicket, good on you. We want more people to be on a good wicket," Mr Chalmers said.
Labor also risks sidelining itself in a new Senate which is far less hostile to the Coalition than the motley crew that preceded it.
If Mathias Cormann, an accomplished deal maker, can get the Centre Alliance and a handful of others on board what Labor thinks won't matter in the slightest.
It is unfortunate Albanese still seems to be hung up on "fighting Tories".
This is a fight that appears unlikely to end well for the ALP.
There is a lot to be said for accepting defeat, passing the package and then moving on to the re-invigoration of federal Labor.
The alternative is another divisive attack on the "top end of town" that risks dividing the Parliamentary Labor Party, crippling Albanese's leadership, and further alienating the voters.
