I’ve always wondered, with these politicians, whether they believe it will be different for them when they knock off an incumbent prime minister, and squeeze their feet into their shoes.

Do they actually think they will be the one to crack the code, to levitate above the wreckage, making everything seamless, purging the animus from the system by an act of charm, or of will?

I suspect, from watching them, that they do kid themselves that things will be different, that they will be able to resist gravitational forces that their predecessors succumbed to; then they learn that things can never be different, that this is just wash, rinse and repeat.

They learn from standing in the shoes of the person they replaced that being prime minister is the toughest job there is, and it feels nigh on impossible without a clear, unencumbered, mandate, because so much energy has to be invested in containing the damage, it’s hard to move forward.

Morrison has spent the last couple of weeks attempting to fashion himself as the 30th prime minister of Australia, to take on the enlarging the role requires. But over the past 24 hours, the weight of his bitterly contested ascension, and the one before that, and the one before that – the Liberal party’s vale of tears – has settled on Morrison, forcing him to contract in plain sight.

At the mid-winter ball hosted by the parliamentary press gallery on Wednesday night, the Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young hollered “bring back Malcolm” in a room full of movers and shakers at the precise moment where Morrison’s, well intentioned, hail-fellow-well-met speech was starting to flag.

The prime minister flinched, physically, at the rebuke, before gathering himself and ploughing on to his conclusion. The whole room felt the rebuff with him – both friends and enemies – a joke from a fellow combatant that sank like a stone in the room.

While the prime minister endured that awkward public moment, a targeted missile was being lobbed from New York, with Malcolm Turnbull offering helpful advice on social media about how New Boy should proceed to resolve the constitutional questions hanging over Peter Dutton.

Just in case anyone might have missed Turnbull QC’s pro-bono advice, Julie Bishop, who is these days very much a free agent, and very much enjoying herself, paid a fleeting visit to the parliamentary press gallery and, in a development no reasonable person could have foreseen, was circled immediately by television cameras.

During her brief sojourn with the cameras, some throat-clearing pleasantries were exchanged about how great it was that Malcolm had taken a break from politics, and was consequently free to express his insights.

Then Bishop left open the possibility she might vote to refer Dutton to the high court in the event that proposition ever came up, rolling her own hand grenade gently along the floor. It had come up of course a couple of weeks back – and Dutton had avoided his appointment with the justices by just one vote – and likely will again.

Bishop has spent the parliamentary week sitting with her friend, Julia Banks, on the backbench, tackling a stack of correspondence from constituents in question time – hundreds of letters from voters expressing their despair about the circus and their displeasure with her departure from the deputy leadership.

The former foreign minister has worked methodically through her “we love you Julie” pile every day in question time while sharing quiet asides with her new chamber mate – the two women nestling like a brightly coloured pair of birds perched in a tree high above the fray.

Dutton, in receipt of his unsolicited postcard from New York, felt that political losers should be seen and not heard. Or possibly not even seen. Political losers apart from himself, that is.

The home affairs minister took himself off to 2GB, and advised Turnbull to keep his mouth shut. John Howard, Dutton observed, had set the “gold standard” for the behaviour of former prime ministers.

“I hope that all former prime ministers can do that,” the home affairs minister ventured, before sinking the boot in. “I hope that Mr Turnbull is able to enjoy his retirement and contribute to the Liberal party in a way that John Howard has – that would be the ideal circumstance.”

The implication was rank opportunism, a bit of drive-by revenge. Dutton noted Turnbull had never “raised once with me any issue around section 44, his staff never raised it with my office, he never asked me for the legal advice that I had that showed I had no problem at all”.

This hadn’t come up at all until, drum roll please, leadership week.

Because everyone was not quite done feeling the feelings, and sparring at close quarters, testing their right left combinations, Barnaby Joyce wandered across the collective field of vision, and warbled about pinning tails on donkeys.

The sudden appearance of the donkey was a little unexpected, but Morrison’s new drought envoy digressed no longer than necessary. Joyce landed his principle insight: Turnbull seemed to be a teensy bit upset.

It seemed, Joyce said, like Turnbull “has an active campaign to try and remove us as the government” and “boy, that is bitterly disappointing”.

Boy indeed.

The man who replaced Joyce as Nationals leader after Turnbull called time on all the personal unpleasantness – Michael McCormack – also had an insight.

Asked on Sky News why Morrison was now the prime minister – a question Morrison has struggled all week to answer because there is no answer that makes sense to the voters – the new Nationals leader offered up “ambition”, “Newspolls”, and “opportunity”.

It was a pithy summation, but somewhat off-script from the Morrison formulation, which is “my colleagues turned to me in their darkest hour and I came to their aid”.

In the parliament, Labor surveyed what was arrayed before them.

A prime minister succumbing to gravitational forces. Bishop, a former deputy leader lurking, brightly, in the back corner. Tony Abbott, another former prime minister in another corner of the chamber. Joyce, a former leader of the National party a little further on from the former prime minister. Dutton, a leadership aspirant still on the frontbench, turning a flamethrower, liberally, on his enemies. And another former prime minister in New York, with a Twitter account, and an inclination to shit stir.

As banquets go, the abundance seemed overwhelming, almost ludicrous.

The Labor veteran Jenny Macklin asked Morrison why Turnbull was no longer the prime minister. Morrison, who is trying to keep everything together with superglue, with bandaids, with sticky tape, was so proud. Proud of serving with Tony Abbott. Proud of serving with Malcolm Turnbull. Proud of everything.

Proud of “three strong leaders who have achieved strong results for the Australian people”.

Bill Shorten and his frontbench couldn’t believe their luck.

They roared laughing at the spectacle of the hydra-headed government. And they applauded at what fortune had delivered: a government apparently happy to kill itself, with the voters watching on.