Not long according to the likes of Laurie Oakes. The vacuum they are leaving in the media is being filled with nothing but negative press.
The Sydney Morning Herald has devoted an entire page on their website to the numerous stories that have arisen about Coalition members' looseness with their expenses claims. Just keeping their mouths shut won't make this go away, and anger is growing.
And there is a great piece on the Independent Australia website which examines the full extent of the Abbott govt's attempts to shut down the media's and the public's right to know.
And what answers does Abbott have? Almost as many as any other deer who's been caught in the headlights.
![Picture](/uploads/8/4/1/7/8417532/4365961.jpg)
Now that the Abbott government's honeymoon period has evaporated as quickly as Tony Abbott's likely lie free run on a polygraph test, the public criticism is flowing thick and fast on every issue the ABC asks for comment on in its online news service. Whether the issue be the government's scrapping of the low income Super payment, or Joyce's refusal to repay the expenses on his trip to the footy, or the repeated lies which are being exposed by the ABC's Fact Check from Christopher Pyne, Joe Hockey, Tony Abbott, Greg Hunt... the predominantly negative comments and the public anger is palpable.
What an achievement from a one-term PM - destroy all your political capital before you've actually achieved anything. Abbott makes Newman looks like a political genius.
And the Age is carrying stories of Abbott's incompetence when it comes to International relation.
The only papers who are quiet on the ineptitude of the Abbott government are those owned by Rupert Murdoch.
The really interesting thing is that I have not seen any opinion polls published on Abbott's performance or his standing as preferred Prime Minister. I'm expecting the numbers to be low, and I'm expecting Tony to set a record for the most unpopular PM of all time.
The Mad Monk is about set some benchmarks that will likely never be repeated. The performance of the current government reminds me of a Monty Python skit.