In the western suburbs of Melbourne, a political ambition long in the making has surfaced once more — Ben Carroll, Victoria's deputy premier, has positioned himself as a challenger to Premier Jacinta Allan with a state election just four months away. His rise from a Kmart worker in Niddrie to the threshold of the premiership traces a distinctly Australian arc of union roots, factional maneuvering, and patient accumulation of power. The question now before Victorian Labor is whether the party, beset by corruption concerns and teacher unrest, will reach for continuity or change in its hour of el