KEY POINTS:
What a mess. Nicky Hager's exposure of National's inner machinations will hit the party like a neutron bomb. The structure will remain intact. But few inside are expected to emerge with their reputations intact.
The first shockwaves have left Don Brash again fighting for his political life as
he prepares to weather not just what the book reveals about him and his inner circle of advisers, but also his flawed handling of yet another self-inflicted crisis.
The best that can be said is that he came to his senses last night and admitted his strategy for handling the crisis surrounding the so-called "stolen" emails had been a disaster and the High Court injunction blocking publication of Hager's book might be lifted.
National faced a Hobson's choice of truly awful proportions. Suffer a torrent of embarrassment that will likely flow from the book's contents becoming public now, but at least get that over with. Or suffer protracted agony for months.
Dr Brash's initial tactic yesterday was to shut his eyes and ignore Hager's hints of highly damaging revelations in expectation that public interest in what are historical matters would quickly fade, especially if there is no book in the bookshops to back them up.
This was never going to work.
The book's contents were bound to seep out. Any discrepancies between what National had said in public and what it had said privately would sooner or later be raised in Parliament where MPs can flout the injunction.
Dr Brash's legal action had anyway always been a total sham designed to hide the party's embarrassment. It was based on a flimsy argument that the privacy of emails should be protected.
As Hager pointed out, National would never afford such generosity to Helen Clark if anyone leaked copies of the Prime Minister's emails.
Hager has effectively outwitted Dr Brash, cutting the ground from under him by not including highly personal emails in his book. He confined his revelations to the political. Many of those emails were apparently authored by Dr Brash's taxpayer-funded staff. They were leaked, not stolen. Hager's argument led to one conclusion - the public has a right to know what those emails contain.
He has specifically thrown down the gauntlet to Dr Brash, saying top figures in the party, including the leader and aspiring leader John Key, were well aware of the Exclusive Brethren's plans for a pro-National advertising campaign during last year's election months before they said they knew.
If the emails reveal that to be the case, there are serious questions to be asked about Dr Brash's integrity - a commodity he has accused Helen Clark of lacking.
Can he survive? The injunction backfired, only drawing more attention to Hager's book and provoking media organisations to mount legal challenges.
The theft or leak of the emails is not necessarily his fault. But it happened under his watch. He may have to take the rap.
The overwhelming view of those who have seen the emails is that he is a goner, and the only question is the extent to which the book damages Mr Key.