Another friend and important international ally of US President George W. Bush is on the retreat. Australian Prime Minister John Howard looks likely to face a close-run election later this year. For the first time in a long while, the Labor opposition leads not only in the ever-fickle opinion polls but also in that more reliable guide to the future - bookmakers' odds.
This may prove a flash in the pan, a knee-jerk public response to Labor's appointment of a new leader, Kevin Rudd. He combines a moderate, centrist standpoint and polite demeanour with workaholic ways that display his ambition to become the first Labor prime minister in over a decade.
Mr Howard's 11-year run of good luck has made him the second-longest serving prime minister in Australian history. But it may be beginning to desert him. Until recently he had been immune to the electoral and personal setbacks stemming from the war in Iraq. Although most Australians never approved of participation in the war, it has hitherto not been an electoral liability. The main reason for that is that not a single Australian soldier has been killed by enemy action. It seems that the 1,400 troops in the theatre are mostly kept out of harm's way. That way they serve the purpose of cementing the US-Australia alliance without submitting it to the test of body bags.
Mr Howard has thus been able to sustain the position of being seen at home as a defender of Australian security interests and fighter against radical Islam while not having to submit the nation to the test of major combat - unlike in Vietnam, where Australians took many casualties and there was a massive anti-war movement.
But the Australian bluff has been called by US Democratic hopeful Senator Barack Obama. Mr Howard criticised Senator Obama's call for a 2008 troop pull-out, saying he would be cheered by al-Qaeda. Senator Obama responded by suggesting that if he were so keen to join the fight, Mr Howard should send another 20,000 troops - which would be political suicide.
There are allegations that Mr Howard singled out Senator Obama, rather than other Democrats calling for withdrawal, because he was black.
But the episode has rebounded on Mr Howard, who is seen to have a partisan attachment to the failing Bush agenda. This does no good for the wider US- Australia relationship, a bipartisan bedrock of Australian policies.