For many months Mr Salmond and his media handlers have been happy to allow the impression to grow at Holyrood and beyond that January 25 would be the day when their Referendum Bill would be published. They, and they alone, circled Burns Night on the calendar. If they are now accused of being disingenuous, they can hardly complain.
That said, the other widespread wisdom about the Bill is that it is a waste of everybody’s time since there is not a snowball in Hell’s chance that it will get through the Scottish Parliament, given the strength of Unionist party opposition.
That will almost certainly turn out to be the case but that does not mean that Mr Salmond, ever the opportunist, will not turn it to his political advantage.
So far, only the Tories have been vehemently opposed to the notion of holding an independence referendum at any time. Labour and the Liberal Democrats have refined their stance. Their intention to vote against the Referendum Bill is based on the argument that this year of hoped-for Scottish recovery from grim recession is not the right time for such a “distraction”. What that suggests is that there will, at some stage, be a “right time”. Mr Salmond will realise that he has an opportunity here. He can put Labour and the Liberal Democrats in a position of acute embarrassment by simply leaving out his preferred date for a referendum when he finally publishes his Bill.
The Bill would then effectively become a paving Bill, clearing the way for a referendum to be held at some undefined point in the future ... exactly the position that Labour and the Lib Dems hold at the moment.
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It would mean that if these two parties continued their outright opposition to the Bill, even though Mr Salmond had accepted their argument that 2010 should not be the year for the referendum, they would be voting against their own clearly stated position. Not only would they have some explaining to do, they would also be in danger of being a laughing stock.
Mr Salmond, it has to be said, is unlikely to take advice from this quarter but he should remember that he has already made life difficult for the Unionist parties. He is, it seems, ready to accept that a version of the Calman Commission proposals on extending devolution, to which the Unionist parties are, in one form or another, signed up, should be on the referendum ballot paper as well as the independence option.
So, if he can move to accommodate Labour, Lib Dems and Tories on what form the question should take, he can also, surely, accommodate them on the issue of timing.