Both illustrate the depths to which politics have plummeted in our nation.

On the federal scene a Coalition Government so bereft of ideas and policies that even a Bill Shorten-led Opposition is now poised to sink them and probably will if it trots out the successful 1972 It’s Time (Again!) campaign that catapulted Labor into Canberra.

In the Premier State, a similar predicament exists that Nick Greiner’s government created by taking the “local” out of local government as well as instituting the costly and disastrous corporate and privatisation agenda that was quickly labelled “NSW Inc”, amongst other issues such as Labor’s later crooked governments and ministers.

Nevertheless it is worth reminding the Wagga electorate voters that it is now 61 years since Eddie Graham, the last Labor MP for Wagga died after 17 years in office, leaving foundation stones across the electorate and the city upon which it flourished.

Perhaps It’s Time again here, too.

It is at the federal level, however, where chaos runs un-governed; devoid of policies of any sort from two of the most inferior Coalition governments since the Country Party and Liberals joined forces in 1946, though Sir William McMahon’s shambles of 1971-72 was generally deemed to be the worst.

You don’t need to be a political genius to work out why the Murdoch newspapers’ assumption that the recent Super Saturday by-elections would be a test of Shorten’s leadership was a crushing miscalculation; as the astute commentator and author, Mike Carlton (writing in The Saturday Paper), nailed it: “That the (by-elections) poll might equally be a referendum on Turnbull’s leadership went largely unremarked. Voters might not like Shorten very much, but they looked at the Turnbull lot and liked them less”.

So it proved. The people were worried about issues not personalities which the dominant right-wing commentators completely overlooked.

Try this list of issues - the “bastardry of the banks (and finance institutions)” as Carlton described it; wage freezes and inaction; inequality of education funding; superannuation slow down and the apathy towards super by the government; the cost of living - huge power costs, the age-old petrol prices run-around, just for starters; nursing levels especially in aged care institutions; aged care funding generally not forgetting the underhand attempt by cabinet ministers to dismember the ABC.

This list is endless but it touches only on federal issues.

The performance by investment companies, superannuation and finance institutions in this nation is abysmal; the banking royal commission needs to be extended and the government, whichever side wins the next election, must cut the greed, show some guts and institute company taxes as well as penalties, including criminal prosecutions should the commission rule for them.

On Wednesday, this week, The SMH ran two front page stories about a major charity rocked by fraud and one of the nation’s largest superannuation funds who spent members’ money on entertaining employers.

The column supports John Hewson’s view in June: “Politicians must set aside differences and work together to lift important issues out of the daily mire; voters are dissatisfied … (they) are losing trust and belief in the political process”. Yes, all of that, and add those party pre-selectors who, in Labor’s case, elect too many union leaders when its rank and file have excellent candidates; the Liberal Party, which re-elects “yes” men and women in the bid to avoid opposition while the Nats, as pointed out this week, still select candidates who can’t or won’t embrace climate issues _ even in a drought!

We are at the 1972 situation again and the best thing may be that Labor is returned to power forcing the conservatives to clean out the rubbish and rebuild.

Here’s a short list of some of the lack-lustre Liberal MPs who, if the party was truly looking for inspired candidates and policy makers, and not so obsessed with maintaining bums on seats, should dis-endorse immediately: Abbott, Turnbull, Pyne, Abetz, Dutton, Cash, Morrison and Fifield, just for starters.

Shown the list, a current party member said: - “you’ve missed Bishop!”

Indeed, the political climate is not dissimilar to the early 1930s when a disorganised conservative government had fallen but Scullin’s Labor Government quickly teetered on the edge.

Joseph Lyons, the steady, stable Labor MP, was persuaded to cross the floor and lead the conservatives back to power.

He won three elections in a row, restoring stability - a quality which, it appears, voters are crying out for today.