cerhobRe your post which included;"... Nothing sadder than a...

cerhob

Re your post which included;
"... Nothing sadder than a dedicated Howard hater. ..."

I'm not a hater at all, that is your terminolgy!

I'm just someone who took issue with much of what Howward did & did not do as PM. I have high expectations of our leaders & do not easily accept carefully air-brushed accounts of the impact of Howard's prime ministership.

As for those dates - how many federal elections have been held in January or for that matter in February? Do you really think January was an option?

http://australianpolitics.com/lists/federal-election-dates-and-outcomes

It was common knowledge throughout 2007 that Kevin Rudd's popularity drove the Coalition nuts. They were convinced that Rudd's leadership would unravel & even threw in the nasty curved ball of the intervention to open a few more community divisions.

Howard could easily have gone earlier but elected to hang on for as long as he could prevent Peter Costello from taking his job.