We've set up one humdinger of a story line for 2010.

Here's how it theoretically goes. The B.C. Liberals are on the ropes, down and out, on the brink of annihilation. Gordon Campbell has no option left but to quit.

Resurgent New Democrats have clawed their way back to respectability and are riding high. Carole James is going to roundtable her way into the hearts of B.C. business. As Humphrey Bogart said in Casablanca, "I think this is the start of a beautiful friendship."

After the street riots and civil unrest have died down following the harmonized sales tax kickoff on July 1, the NDP will surf a new wave of popular support right into the premier's office.

There seems to be an expectation in some quarters that things are all going to start busting wide open the day after the Olympics conclude.

Just one small caution: What if nothing happens?

What if B.C. makes its way through 2010 with the political status quo intact?

There are so many predictions of major political activity ahead there's scarcely room for another. But the League of Pundits' code of conduct demands one.

So here's my new prediction for 2010. Nothing much is going to happen. Whatever consequences flow from the HST or shorting the pre-election deficit guess or all the budget-cutting, they don't necessarily have to kick in next year.

Campbell and the Liberals are 11 per cent of the way through a four-year term of office. There is no particular pressure on them to do anything about their popularity.

And while the HST might bring a new surge of antipathy when it kicks in next summer, that really doesn't matter. It's how people feel about the tax during Election 2013, after living with it for almost two years, that counts.

There is an outside chance that the HST furor could subside and turn into little more than a minor irritant by then. Remember the carbon tax? It was portrayed as a crushing new tax burden plunked on the everyone's back at the worst possible time. A full-scale political crusade was mobilized to stop it and drum the Liberals out of office.

All that went exactly nowhere. The Liberals were re-elected and the NDP renounced their carbon-tax stand shortly after. Now the carbon tax is all but invisible as a political issues.

And that tax kicked in 10 months before an election. The HST will start 34 months before the next vote.

There's also no immediate impetus to force career changes on either leader. For all the whispers about whether Carole James is up to being premier, she's utterly secure in her current job for at least another year. Her only obvious successor, Gregor Robertson, is locked into a term as mayor of Vancouver until November 2011.

It's Campbell's future plans on which all the "big change coming" scenarios rest. In year-end interviews he's saying all the obligatory things about carrying on. But even discounting those remarks, since that's all he can say at this point, there's still a lot of enthusiasm for the job.

"This probably won't come as a major headline ... but there are lots of days that are not exactly a laugh riot," he said. "There's always a problem in front of you.

"The thing you really feel as I look back is that it's an incredibly rewarding, energizing job. For me it's energizing ... to know you've got problems and can try to find ways you can solve them."

Some days it appears Campbell likes problems so much that he creates them for the sake of solving them.

For a driven policy tinkerer who finds a perpetual stream of problems energizing, the premier's chair is the perfect place to be.

A fourth term still looks unlikely for him. But Campbell is likely going to get a lot further through his third term than some might expect.

Just So You Know: Going on the record predicting the status quo, of course, raises the probability that all hell will break loose next year and everything will change. As always, hedge your bets.

lleyne@tc.canwest.com