Abbott was a laughing stock and had he stayed on as leader Shorten would be PM now, not sure which is worse. There is no knowing if some one else could have taken the leadership and won the last election but as I said at the time of the leadership spill Turnbull was the obvious choice and no one else nominated. At the time the change of leadership was vindicated by a lift in the polls from 46% to 54%
No matter who else leading the LNP now, they would be facing the same problems Turnbull is. There are divisions in the LNP, they have a slim majority in the house of reps and have a lot of cross benches to deal with in the senate.
The Turnbull Government have managed to get legislation through the senate, some of it that Abbott could not get through. Sure some of it got watered down but 80% of some thing is better than 100% of nothing
