KEY POINTS:
Peter Costello's old boss, former Liberal Prime Minister John Howard, used to describe himself as Lazarus with a triple bypass. At this moment, with Howard's shadow still hanging above him, Costello is contemplating a rise from his own deathbed.
Or maybe not. While Howard was as tenacious as a monster from a B-grade horror flick, his former Treasurer and one-time heir apparent has yet to announce whether he will answer mounting calls to replace the stricken Dr Brendan Nelson as leader of the Liberal Party.
His critics claim he has not the heart for a challenge, and political tacticians argue that his wisest course is to allow Nelson to exhaust himself completely before stepping in to popular acclaim. Costello is saying nothing.
And this may be the first leadership contest - real, imagined or even just maybe - that is hanging on the publication of a book. Costello has said he will make his future clear when his memoirs are published next month, and Nelson has said he is content to wait upon that.
But in the meantime the dogs are baying. Nelson is in deep trouble and, whatever Costello's decision, is almost certainly dead in the water. Supporters of the former Treasurer have been building up a head of steam for his ascension, political commentators have been further stoking the fires, and a recent poll has Costello far and away the top choice for Liberal Leader.
Coalition super-optimists have also been scenting weakness in the eight-month-old Labor Government of Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, suggesting that a perception of arrogance, some unpopular policies and decisions and continuing economic malaise could spell a one-term Administration.
Unlikely as this is, the scenario is one that could favour Costello's resurrection.
Rudd is having none of it.
Opinion polls show Labor continues to have a commanding lead over the Opposition - if a little scuffed at the edges - with no indication of any desire for an early return to a Liberal Government.
The most recent Newspoll says Labor's primary vote has increased since the November 24 election, while the Coalition's has slipped more than five percentage points. The same pattern has emerged in the two-party preferred vote that decides elections under Australia's preferential voting system. Newspoll reported that Labor has widened its lead to 14 percentage points, sitting on 57 per cent to the Coalition's 43 per cent.
Rudd refused to comment directly on the speculation surrounding Costello, telling Channel Nine's Today Show: "I'm not into the name-calling part of politics. I don't actually think that helps at all for the Liberal Party, it's a matter for those guys to turn their current soap opera into something else."
But Labor has been taking no chances. Senior ministers have been hammering the former Howard Government's record at every opportunity, emphasising Costello's key role in policies they claim left Labor with a massive stable to clean out, and hammering the election mantras of industrial relations, interest rates and climate change sloth.
"Peter Costello, Brendan Nelson and [Shadow Treasurer] Malcolm Turnbull all stand for Workchoices, they stand for climate change denial and they stand for having left Australia with the second-highest interest rates in the developed world," Rudd said.
Nelson assumed the parlous Liberal leadership after the carnage of the November election that saw Howard, the nation's second longest serving prime minister, lose his own seat, along with several other ministers.
Nelson, a former GP and one-time Labor Party member, had been Defence Minister with a string of controversial and troubled decisions before the fall. After the election, he narrowly defeated Turnbull for a job that was inevitably self-destructive.
His performance since as Opposition Leader has been severely criticised, notably his muddled response to Rudd's February apology to the Stolen Generations, and the Liberals' debacle over climate change policy.
Opinion polls have been disastrous for Nelson, barely placing him in double figures. The most recent Newspoll has him trailing Rudd by 20-30 per cent in terms of strength and decisiveness, vision, understanding of major issues, caring for and in touch with people, and trustworthiness.
Only in arrogance does he peg Rudd, a quality he and the prime minister are seen to share by more than 40 per cent of voters.
Given Costello's public intention to remain on the backbenches until he found a job in private business, the general assumption was that Nelson would struggle on, take the worst of the bruises in the rebuilding of the party, and then fall to Turnbull.
Newspoll showed Turnbull ahead of Nelson as preferred leader - until late last month, when the bombshell broke. Costello is now preferred Liberal leader by a margin of more than two-to-one over Nelson, attracting 41 per cent of voters against Nelson's 18 per cent, and Turnbull's 24 per cent. Two-thirds believed Costello should stay in parliament, and 53 per cent of Liberals want him to lead their party.
Costello was on holiday in the Pacific islands when all this broke, and returned - publicly bemused - to wildfire speculation that a wave of anger at Nelson's performance and nostalgia for the golden past would thrust him into the top job.
No one claims to know Costello's mind - some commentators believe Costello may not yet know it himself - although friend, former staffer and now Senator Mitch Fifield remains convinced the member for the blue-chip Melbourne seat of Higgins has no intention of contesting the leadership.
"Peter Costello made clear that he's not available for the leadership and that remains the case," he told Sky News.
Others believe that Costello would have no interest in the hard, demanding and unrewarding job of leading the Opposition into an election it is likely to lose, and to grind away for at least six years before having a realistic shot at power.
Time and opportunity are slipping by: Costello turns 51 this month. The least charitable say that Costello showed his true colours by refusing to challenge for the leadership on the two occasions when he had the chance: in 1994, when Downer won the job after John Hewson lost the election to Labor's Paul Keating, and following Howard's defeat.
Costello was long recognised as Howard's heir, but was repeatedly frustrated and claimed to have been cheated out of leading the Liberals into the last election by Howard's reneging on a succession deal.
Keating this week lambasted Costello for failing to take Howard on, describing him as a "slow-acting dope - a guy without imagination, a guy without courage".
Hewson joined in, claiming Costello "never had the balls" to challenge Howard, while former Victorian Liberal Premier Jeff Kennett ascribed to him "all the attributes of a dog except loyalty".
Australia now waits to see whether Costello's memoirs will be a final wave, or the platform for re-launching his ambitions.
