A poll dip that Tony should be thankful for. Tony Abbott should not be upset about one stray opinion poll showing a Labor revival into a potentially winning position. This week’s Newspoll has done him a great favour by substantially decreasing the chances that his opponents will do the vote-winning thing and draft Kevin Rudd back into the prime ministership. If, and it is a mighty big if in my opinion, voting intentions really are close, then Labor under Rudd would be a runaway winner and if, as I suspect they are not close at all, they surely would be under a Rudd leadership.

Opinion polling nonsense. I mean, take a look at these and tell me what it means.

Two party preferred voting intentions:

  • Newspoll — Labor 50% Coalition 50%
  • Nielsen — Labor 47% Coalition 53%
  • Essential Research — Labor 45% Coalition 55%

All these results were published on Monday by supposedly reputable pollsters. Pay your money and take your pick.

I simply cannot believe that with most people almost completely disinterested in politics this far out from an election that public opinion is as volatile as indicated by these recent Newspolls:

And I wonder, incidentally, where all the stories about the dramatic Green “revival” are being hidden? There were certainly plenty of headlines a fortnight ago about the dramatic decline.

It’s never too late. The pundits who keep writing that the chances of Kevin Rudd becoming Labor leader before the next election will disappear if it doesn’t happen soon. They should ring and have a chat with Bill Hayden. His replacement came on the day an election was called.

Something wrong at Defence. In Australia’s first 97 years, the Department of Defence had just eight departmental secretaries — an average tenure of more than 12 years. With the replacement yesterday of former special forces commander Duncan Lewis, Foreign Affairs Secretary Dennis Richardson becomes the seventh Defence Secretary since 1998. Something has gone wrong somewhere with our country’s public service.

Suing not such a good idea. I’m just curious about whether taking legal action to stop publication of something actually helps or hinders. Hence, my interest in how many people have actually had a peek on the internet of those pictures of the the topless princess.

It is not the kind of story that I would expect Crikey readers to have clicked on under normal circumstances but please do me a favour and fill in my HAVE YOU HAD A PEEK form.

News and views noted along the way: