I shredded my economic credibility and all I got was this lousy 5% preferred PM bounce

Forgive the headline but that may just be what's going through Brendan Nelson's mind this morning. For he has set up his party to either indulge in fiscal vandalism or show a fatal lack of policy consistency. Of course, when dealing with Brendan's Libs, you feel like Rosencrantz and Guildernstern in Tom Stoppard's play, as they vainly shout 'consistency is all I ask'! While there are occasional bursts of passion, there is too much confused thought between them.

There may be a large section of the media who believe Rudd is some kind of self-proclaimed messiah and an equally large section that feels he is well-qualified for the spin vacancy created by MacGill's retirement. However, if one looks at the nonsensical suggestions coming out of the Liberal bunker, it becomes clear that the Nationals are not the only party struggling for relevance.

Nelson's budget response appears to consist of blocking the alcopops tax and FuelWatch and raising the possibility of blocking the Medicare surcharge changes. It seems having totally mismanaged its Senate majority in government, the Libs are set to do so in opposition by a display somewhere between petulance and wilful obstructionism.

It is almost as if they believe some of the dribble that Rudd's government will implode in Whitlamesque fashion. Whereas Whitlam's mantra was crash or crash through, Rudd's mantra may as well be commission an inquiry to see if there's an obstacle ahead and then go around the back way.

Precisely how the Libs plan to pay for this nonsense is another matter. Given they cannot decide either whether there is severe inflationary pressure or not, it suggests they should seek to reduce government spending, not government revenue. The alcopops tax and the excise combined will cost something between $3-4 billion, and the Medicare surcharge (by Brendan's admission) around $500 million. It does not compute.

Nor should Nelson get too carried away with that 5% preferred PM bounce - it's not that they like him any more - his dissatisfied numbers actually crept up (within MOE) to 40%, they're just not too happy with Rudd's performance last week, probably based on a false impression of what he actually promised. Given the correlation between those who think Labor promised lower prices and those unhappy with last week, Rudd might become the first politician in history to run ads reminding us of what he promised at the last election.

So the Libs got nowhere from blanket media coverage on a hot button issue that Labor got major mileage out of in opposition, and what gains their leader made are based on a misrepresentation of Labor's election promises. That does not augur well for the future of a credible or responsible opposition.