KEY POINTS:
John Howard may be down, but he is certainly not out. In 1989, when he lost the leadership of the Liberal Party, he said he would need the powers of "Lazarus with a triple bypass" to make a political comeback.
He went on to be elected Prime Minister
in 1996 and become Australia's second-longest serving prime minister.
Heading into last night's televised leaders' debate and 18 years later, Howard is again on the ropes.
For months opinion polls have suggested that his coalition Government will suffer a crushing defeat by the opposition Labor Party at the federal election on November 24.
He could even lose his own seat, the Sydney constituency of Bennelong - a humiliation not suffered by a prime minister since the 1920s.
But the latest polls offer a glimmer of hope for Howard and co. A Galaxy poll released on Friday showed the Government narrowing the gap with Labor to 47 per cent to 53 per cent, where previously they had been trailing 44 per cent to 56 per cent.
That represented a halving of the 10- to 12-point lead Labor has enjoyed recently.
A Nielsen poll published in the Sydney Morning Herald put the Government's vote up two points over the past fortnight to 46 per cent, with Labor down two to 54.
The polls came after Howard pledged to dole out A$34 billion ($39 billion) of tax cuts if re-elected to a fifth term in office - a move viewed with cynicism by some voters, but welcomed by millions of "battlers" struggling with mortgage debt and five successive interest rate rises.
The closing of the gap rattled Labor leader Kevin Rudd, who after days of equivocation finally responded by offering a huge tax sweetener of his own, worth A$31 billion.
Under Labor's plan, the top tax rate would be cut from 45 per cent to 40 per cent within six years and the number of tax rates would be cut from four to three.
That would mean about 98 per cent of Australians would pay no more than 30c in tax for every dollar they earned.
A further A$2.3 billion would be allocated to an education tax refund, in which families would be able to claim 50 per cent of the cost of textbooks, laptop computers and broadband internet connections.
On health, an extra A$400 million would be made available to reduce waiting lists for elective surgery.
The Government ridiculed Labor, accusing the opposition of filching more than 90 per cent of its own tax package.
"Mr Rudd talks about education," said the Treasurer and Deputy Prime Minister, Peter Costello. "If he'd have brought his exam paper in after copying 91.5 per cent of the answers from the student sitting next to him, he'd have got an F for fail."
Labor has been derided as the "me too" opposition because many of its policies appear almost identical to the Government's on issues ranging from Tasmania's timber industry to official intervention in dysfunctional Aboriginal settlements.
Last night Labor continued to roll out the pledges, unveiling a A$1.5 billion plan to cut the cost of childcare.
Under the taxpayer subsidy plan, parents would be able to claim half of their out-of-pocket costs - up from the current 30 per cent - and would receive the subsidy every three months rather than having to wait until the end of the tax year.
The Government's tax munificence appears to have put it back in the running. On top of the huge tax carrot, it has launched a powerful scare campaign, claiming that 70 per cent of Labor's front bench are ex-union bosses who cannot be trusted to run the economy.
The television advertisements feature the faces of Labor politicians stamped with the words "Anti-business". A grave voice-over tells voters: "Anti-business, union-dominated Labor will be a disaster for our A$1.1 trillion economy".
Labor is desperate to blunt that message, saying the Government has launched "the mother of all scare campaigns" to scare voters.
But the Government will hammer away at the charge right up until polling day.
Howard, famously described by US President George W. Bush as a "man of steel", could yet show he has the mettle to arise, Lazarus-like, once again.
HOW ABOUT A CUP OF COFFEE, PAULINE?
A refugee group says it would welcome a meeting with rightwing firebrand Pauline Hanson to clear the air before her November bid for the Senate. Hanson, who is running under the banner of Pauline's United Australia Party, is campaigning on similar policies to those that won her international notoriety a decade ago, including targeting African refugees who she has accused of having Aids and other diseases.
Speaking at a lunch at Brisbane's West End yesterday, Queensland African Community Council president Bobby Whitfield said he would love to have a coffee with the former One Nation leader. "I think Pauline Hanson's remarks are made out of ignorance," he said. "She's got to be informed of who Africans really are."
KEV ON CALL
Australians whose addiction to politics isn't sufficiently sated by wall to wall media coverage can now access Labor campaign material on demand on their mobile phone. Labor says this could be a world first for a political party.
"Labor's new mobile website www.kevin07.mobi will allow users to access some of the best Kevin07 and user-generated video content on their mobile phone," it said.
WHALE OF A VOTE
Both parties have campaigned hard for the "save the whale" vote. The Sun Herald reported that Federal Environment Minister Malcolm Turnbull has launched a raft of anti-whaling initiatives including a trendy blue rubber wristband and a dedicated whale website.
Musician and MP Peter Garrett said a Labor Government would consider taking Japan to court to stop it from whaling.
