How good is Pauline Hanson's trolling game?
Way better than the government's, and that's saying something.
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Hanson: Turnbull wasn't invited to Trump's inauguration
Bragging about her proximity to US President-elect Donald Trump, Pauline Hanson said she will be sending One Nation Senator Brian Burston to Washington in her stead.
These are the guys, remember, currently running a giant email scam that'd shame that Nigerian prince who inherited a diamond mine and an oil lease and a lazy hundred million in negotiable bearer bonds and who just needs details of your savings account to get the money out of the country.
These are the guys who go onto A Current Affair threatening to hunt Centrelink clients to the ends of the earth for debts they don't owe, while taking luxurious holidays on the public tit at the other end of the world and claiming it as a work expense.
Seriously. Try that one when you file your tax return this year. See how far you get with it.
So their trolling game is pretty good. But not as good as Pauline Hanson's. It's a feature of her comeback; this time around she seems somehow more knowing and, I dunno, ironically distanced or something.
She's playing with them, mostly on Twitter, but also in her awkward, scratchy public appearances.
Her style is still awkward and scratchy, after all, but it appears to be a more studied awkwardness, as though she's actually figured out how to turn her outsider status into, well, real status.
That might seem an odd thing to say, given that she was always an outsider, but she also appeared to be forever floundering and unsure of herself before. Now, not so much.
Yesterday's tweet announcing how surprised and happy she was to be invited to the Trump coronation was a small masterclass in speaking to her base, which isn't a million miles removed from his, and in throwing some epic smirk and side eye at the Turnbull government.
(Slightly off topic, but does anyone else feel uncomfortable putting those two words together. Turnbull and government? It seems ill fitting for a such a hapless collection of arse clowns running what's basically an adhocracy).
Hanson seems to have realised that, unlike Shorten, she doesn't have to speak to everyone. She only needs to gather her tribe behind her.
Would you believe it? I have been gifted tickets to the Presidential Inauguration Ceremony of @realDonaldTrump - What an honour! #auspol
— Pauline Hanson (@PaulineHansonOz) January 15, 2017
Even the weirdest of her lieutenants gets it. Malcolm Roberts' tweet following up on the Trump invite to One Nation's Borg Queen was such a droll and languid bitchslap of Turnbull that it could mistakenly lead you to believe there might be a human soul trapped somewhere behind those bright, glassy, crazy-robot eyes.
Pauline and I received an invitation but not the Prime Minister. OUCH https://t.co/rihdNqFyeb
— Sen. Malcolm Roberts (@SenatorMRoberts) January 16, 2017
They give the impression that they're winning, even as their party inevitably fractures and disintegrates along the fault lines of the deep, subterranean craziness that underpins it.
This is very disturbing.
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