Tonight:
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Twelve points ahead in the polls, a floundering and tired Government: what could possibly go wrong for David Cameron?
As it happened, the way the Conservatives were caught off guard last week by the assassination of Benazir Bhutto provided an unexpected reminder of the distance still to travel.
Cameron's brief statement on the day sounded entirely underwhelmed by a shattering global event. Ditto Boris Johnson who, if he had thought about the impact on Pakistanis in London, didn't give much sign of it.
Up popped Gordon Brown on the airwaves talking eloquently about the implications, looking, for the first time in many grim weeks, at home in his job.
You might say that what any British politician says about bloodshed in Pakistan hardly matters. But what happens there reverberates in the UK - not least because a generation of suicide bombers have roots in that country or have been trained there.
Anyway, one thing senior politicians have to do is respond to shocking deaths and articulate something when others feel lost for words: the test William Hague failed on the death of Diana and which confirmed Tony Blair (for a good while) as the People's Prime Minister.
I dare say Mr Cameron is kicking himself, too, at this holiday lapse. But it is a reminder that Oppositions can easily get into the enjoyable habit of landing blows on governments, as with this week's attack on the Government as "hopeless and incompetent", so that they forget the other bit of the equation - to show that they are ready for government and the many roles it demands.
That is Dave's New Year challenge. He must continue to oppose vigorously, of course, but he also needs to propose: so that any event becomes a chance for the voters to get a sense of what his tone and instincts would be if he were in No 10, not Gordon.
The PM wants to "show that he is the man to steer the canoe through the economic rapids of '08" - as one of his close advisers put it to me.
This claim opens up an inviting flank of attack on his previous record - overspending on public services with questionable returns in many areas, the Northern Rock saga and whether the level of debt is imprudent given that we are facing such lean years now. It is perfectly possible that a major housing crash could be the means of Labour's destruction.
Again, though, the Conservatives must watch their step if they are to be credible as a government and not just a pack of well-bred attack dogs. George Osborne wins my "most improved politician" of the past year award hands down: he has lost the self-consciousness which made him sound jejune. His inheritance tax announcement was a huge risk but it saved Mr Cameron's leadership from a buffeting after a bad summer. But Mr Osborne is also a bit prone to being on two sides at once. There is a "told you so" tone to Tory pronouncements about Northern Rock but at no point can any of their spokesmen suggest a different course of action from the Government's.
This is not only my view but that of two former Conservative chancellors who are admirers of Mr Osborne.
Both counsel caution about the appearance that the Opposition is gloating as times turn hard. People require constructive reassurance when they fear losing their jobs and/or houses - not just Schadenfreude.
The great hope in No 10 is that the Tories' economic plans will unravel as uncosted under the scrutiny of what is now, effectively, a two-year election campaign. "We'll do to them what they did to us on tax in 1992," says one of the PM's acolytes with relish.
It is not at all certain that the balance of argument will come down on the Government's side. Still, it is a warning that Mr Osborne et al must take seriously. Any chink in the Tory figures will come under renewed scrutiny in the wake of the early promise of a huge bill for inheritance tax relief.
Another issue which the party needs to focus on is the tone in which senior Conservatives put their arguments. Listening to Radio 4's Any Questions one Friday night, I heard Dominic Grieve, the Shadow Attorney General, arguing against ID cards. Bravo, I thought, as the hapless minister wriggled to explain why a government that has lost sackfuls of personal data should be allowed any more of it than strictly necessary.
Alas, Mr Grieve then meandered on about how until the 1850s there was no central record of who was in Britain at all - and my empathy evaporated into an irritated spasm of "How Old Tory is that?" The modern party doesn't need to harp on about how great things were more than a century and a half ago to make a point about bureaucracy in 2008.
That brings me to a final thought for Dave. Does he really intend to keep reforming his party or think it still needs to change? The signs are ambiguous. Since the grammar schools debacle - which he won in terms of policy but lost on authority - he has not really challenged his own tribe in any way.
On inheritance tax, he has given them what they wanted and more. On immigration, he has tacked Rightwards by suggesting an absolute cap on figures. On environmental issues, much of the early pan-Green enthusiasm has been discarded - to the extent that he has backed off criticism of the Heathrow expansion, which is about as ungreen as it gets. It's a matter of judgment, of course: but I would say Dave should beware believing that he has done enough to make his party attractive beyond the core of voters who were keen to return to voting Tory anyway.
He has untrammelled authority and he should use it now to clear up the areas where his own side appears weak, reactionary or incoherent. In education, it still doesn't look like it knows whether it wants to be the "back to tradition" party, or using all possible means to provide a high-standard system to compete with the best schooling systems in the world. The goals may overlap but we are entitled to enquire what its driving instincts are here and elsewhere.
On Europe, it is still uncertain whether the Cameronian aim is to pursue gut anti-Europeanism to the logical end of seeking to undo the new constitutional treaty, as he implied this week - or (as I suspect it will ultimately do) simply learn to live with it. The danger of parochialism also looms with the fraught "English votes on English laws" proposals of Malcolm Rifkind which have touched a nerve among the grassroots.
Now Mr Cameron has woken up to the fact that much more of this enticing separatism could play into the Scottish Nationalists' hands and make him the man who helped destroy the Union. So it's goodbye to "shallow nationalism". Well, amen to that - but just this week, or for keeps? One virtue the party will need to consolidate in the months ahead is greater reliability in its reactions and instincts.
It will begin to make the difference between Dave being the exciting leader who has revived his party - and becoming one who is single-mindedly leading it back to power.
