Turnbull killed off the best campaign issue for the Coalition — the carbon tax, by Joanne Nova.

Andrew Bolt wonders why Turnbull didn’t run the carbon tax scare, which worked so well for Tony Abbott…

Turnbull couldn’t run the carbon tax scare because he and Greg Hunt had bought a carbon tax in themselves and they would look like complete  hypocrites. Worse, it would remind the electorate of what they voted for so emphatically in 2013 — a mandate to get rid of a carbon tax. …

Turnbull … achieved something two Labor leaders had bet their careers on and suffered legendary losses over. He managed to get the carbon tax and trade legislation through Parliament that had been sought after by Greens and Bankers for years. This extraordinary achievement ought to be something he could sell as his own success. But since the public don’t want a carbon tax, Turnbull had to hide his one really significant  “achievement” from his nine dismal months in office.

The new version of the carbon tax was buried in legislation on the last day of Parliament before Christmas. The SneakTax was hidden under something called the “SafeGuard Mechanism”. It is a shapeshifting piece of legislation that could be everything or nothing, depending on how it is used. Greg Hunt can tell conservatives that the Caps are set so high that it will hardly have an impact, and he can tell the wets that the caps can be screwed down to meet all the targets. It was the perfect legislation that could be all things to all people — the only drawback was that it would be electoral death. …

With no carbon tax the Coalition won 90 seats. With a carbon tax, the Coalition may lose government.