It is ironic that the anti-global phenomenon of populist-conservatism makes such an easy link between events across the oceans.
Buoyed by the US electoral earthquake, Australian populist-conservatives or "popcons", are suddenly enlivened, preaching a new universal truth with the certainty of someone who's just been tipped off about the second coming.
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Turnbull: Trump a 'deal maker' and 'pragmatist'
As is customary in presidential elections, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull called to congratulate US President-elect Donald Trump, remarking that he's a deal maker and pragmatist.
The promised land is tantalisingly close.
For Cory Bernardi, Eric Abetz, George Christensen, and Pauline Hanson, there are clear antipodean applications from Donald Trump's successful animation of Budweiser-Democrats - or what the conservative intellectual Tom Switzer recently called Trump's blue-collar base of angry-white-males. Similarly unmistakable is the warning for quisling moderates.
Popcon glee over Brexit which, it turns out, was merely the entree, has reached eleven. Trump's extraordinary triumph was sweet vindication - the inevitable corollary of a long-denied outsider grievance against political correctness and the stultifying diktat of cultural elites.
But for Malcolm Turnbull, struggling with an unimaginative program, a wafer-thin majority, poor polls and a resentful right wing, the Trump fillip for hardliners spells danger.
First though, to the president-elect. The "system" against which Trump railed may have just dodged a bullet. That is counter-intuitive given the billionaire's vain contempt for convention. But when Hillary Clinton made her concession speech, she uttered the very reassuring sentiments that were simply unthinkable, had the fortunes been reversed.
Clinton's concession, buttressed by Obama's gracious comments, displayed the best principles of American institutional democracy. In a message to her supporters, Clinton noted that a peaceful handover was not just valued by Americans, but "cherished".
Trump's apparent grace was far easier to muster from the victory dais. Winners are grinners. But let's not forget his potentially explosive legitimacy threat. The system remember, was hopelessly corrupt and utterly rigged. Where's that talk now?
That equity markets recovered swiftly after an initial plunge which wiped trillions off stocks, is testament to the danger of uncertainty. Trump's threatened refusal to accept defeat had been the dynamite. But by clearly recognising the will of the American people, Clinton and Obama quickly restored that certainty.
Back to Australia, there are already signs that Turnbull's internal critics are emboldened. "I think it's going to have implications globally," opined a delighted Bernardi from New York, celebrating a "substantive change in politics".
Bernardi talks of a "global" disconnect between the people and politics. Christensen though blames globalism, referring to the failure of governments to keep companies like Ford and Holden operating. His is an unashamed new protectionism, repudiating his own government's position.
Tony Abbott and Abetz echo these sentiments praising Trump's courage to stand up for the forgotten masses while blithely ignoring their own doctrinaire indifference to job losses as they waved off Australia's car industry under the heroic banner of ending corporate welfare and the age of entitlement. It's a position as intellectually muddled as it is contradictory.
Nonetheless, the populist pressure on Turnbull from Hanson's post-election Champagne-popping and from like-minded popcons within his own party room, will only grow from here.
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