It all seemed so sudden. One moment she was photo-opping in time-honoured fashion, the next she was being sent down for three years. Shut away in the sort of seclusion that will be the stuff of a dozen New Idea covers – “Pauline’s Prison Torment!” Indeed, it’s already started with rumours of “breakdown” emanating from behind the walls, as well they might be.
I’ve always thought Hanson to be totally over-rated. A not all that smart, small business owner whose metier was probably being narrow-minded, obdurate and argumentative on some benighted city council somewhere. That she crashed through several ceilings of incompetence with dizzying rapidity owed much more to her capacious appetite for flattery – and the ends to which the flatterers put her undoubtedly newsworthy and photogenic appeal – than to any discernible ability.
She behaved like some Kath & Kim rendition of Elizabeth 1. Capricious without tactics, a polemicist without philosophy and egocentric with no solid basis so to be.
That she’s guilty of fraud, (Anthony Green provides some clarity in the SMH), seems pretty self-evident – and not terribly surprising given that she seems to have a problem with “details” generally. Whether or not imprisonment for three years is a fitting response is very much open to debate. And debate is raging. Her biographer (of sorts) Margo Kingston, is thundering away about the iniquity of Hanson’s incarceration seen against the continuing liberty of the Dark One who wickedly benefitted from her misguided idealism.
This is Margo at her feverish, hyperbolic, overkill best and is best digested without a cup in your hand – to avoid keyboard spillage. One Nation aficionados appear onscreen in walkshorts, long socks and bad humour to compare her travails to those of Nelson Mandela. Peter Beattie worries at the capacity for Hanson to transmute into Jeanne d’Arc – or maybe Pauline d’Ipswich. Conspiracists point to evil plots to bring her down but at the end of the day, the only person to bear ultimate blame here is Pauline.
One Nation’s vote may have declined because Howard “stole her agenda” – though the fact that immigration roars along at a 10 year high sits a bit uncomfortably with that notion – but I think it’s more likely that people eventually saw through her. Let’s face it, looking through Pauline isn’t all that hard.
The only conspiracy I’m prepared to wear is the one I’m about to spread: the whole thing was jacked up by Margo in order to get her 1998 Hanson opus “Off the Rails” out of the remainder bins. Just off to fax Tony Kevin.
Pauline’s initial campaign would probably have been her last, had not Keating inadvertently helped turn her win the seat, and be turned into a national heroine for so many voters. Paul’s savage attacks not on her, but on Howard for having her on his “team”, provided the original media push.
As a direct consequence of this, she ceased to be a Liberal candidate, and was thus able to win the seat. As a Liberal, a drover’s dog could have beaten her in Bill’s old seat. It was the ONLY Qld Federal seat Labor had never lost. As an independent [well publicised now by Keating] she attracted the hordes of disgruntled Labor supporters waiting for someone who was NOT a Liberal, for whom they could vote.
Whether Hanson was/wasn’t right, whether voters were/weren’t being rational, is irrelevant. Keating helped create a situation in which long frustrated Labor voters felt they could express their concerns; and Labor’s long term problems became even greater than they had been, before Keating’s calculated risk of trying to use Pauline Hanson as a weapon against Howard.
Interesting Norman. Do you think that the Libs wouldn’t have moved to de-select her without Keating’s contribution? Not sure I can buy that in toto…….
Norman,at the risk of starting a ‘flaming’ war, you’re exhibiting the very reason Hanson finds herself in jail. You’re taking her, her accolytes and her policies seriously. She started of as a joke, a nudge-nudge, wink-wink, commentary on the shibboleths of conventional political wisdom, and she became a farce.
Unfortunately a considerable number of people, and I suspect you’re one of them, didn’t understand that Australian politics needs a focus for un-PC thoughts from time to time to allow the major parties to resile from their excesses. She has reaped the whirlwind, proving that politics is restricted to the elite powerbrokers (why is it that the majority of politicians are either lawyers or ex trade unionists ?), those who are pragmatic about doing what needs to be done. Pauline never fitted into that cabal, not even at the urging of the two Davids.
It is most unlikely that what Antony Green said; But if self-aggrandisement is to be a crime in Australian politics, then there are many more politicians than just Hanson likely to find themselves in jail. is likely, because, unlke Hanson et al, most politicans of all persuasions, ensure their efforts are based in pragmatism, not self deluding hope.
Wayne, I think Norman was musing more on the question of how her ascendancy was facilitated rather than the ‘substance’ of her policies. And on the question of Pauline’s policies: I think her “explanation’ of One Nation’s “Tax” policy in the run-up to the last federal election has to be one of my all-time favourite pollie moments.
The image of Pauline wrapped in the flag is my favourite Hanson memory.
I’m still confused – How was the registration of the One Nation Party fraudulant? The SMH article states:
“The finding in the Sharples case acknowledges that the constitution put forward for registration was in fact the one used earlier to obtain federal registration from the Australian Electoral Commission.”
So the federal registration was legitimate, but because they used the same document for the state registration, the aec deemed it fraudulant? Why did they not just call the signators again, as the article claims they had done to verify them in the national registration?
Just because Hanson and her followers are naive fools, doesn’t mean the party was intended as a joke, i’m sure they thought it quite serious.
Anyway, Geoff is right, her explanation of One Nation’s ‘tax’ policy still makes me LOL..
okay, I’ve heard her likened to Nelson Mandela, Jeanne d’Arc and Simon de Montfort.. but a “Kath & Kim rendition of Elizabeth 1” takes the (carrot) cake.
Might as well toss in False, fleeting, perjured Clarence, what with the date and all.
I hope the spends the three years sharing a cell with a very butch, very angry Maori, who treats her as her personal douch bag.
All right, I don’t really. But it’s a delicious thought just the same.
For sheer irrelevancy, discussions about this woman’s policies, personality and lack of vocabulary (xenophobia!) are hard to beat. What is it with Queensland – they seem to have lost all semblance of perspective and balance. Di Fingleton, Pauline Hanson – what next?
Of course she broke the law. I do it myself constantly, trying not to exceed 55 in a 50 zone. She was found guilty. Not so surprising, the law appears to have been reasonably clear. And spare us the silly comparisons with Mandela. But three years in the slammer! For God’s sake are they all mad up there? What is it about the tropics and the near-tropics? Perhaps mad dogs and the English just weren’t meant to live in that ridiculous mixture of heat and rain.
The role that climate plays in judicial sentencing is an under-investigated area Ron.
That’s got to be the silliest contribution to the global warming debate that I’ve heard yet, Geoff.
There’s a lesson here for all of Queensland’s frumpy, middle aged red headed women.
Surely you’ve seen To “Kill a Mockingbird” Gummo?
The foetid, airless courtroom, baking in magnolia and cigar scented Southern summer heat. The rhythmic waving of palmetto fans, the torpor and lassitude that leads inexorably to the sort of rough and quick justice that brisker climes eschew?
I’m not sure that “to Kill a Mockingbird” had any effect on Global Warming and I’m afraid that Professor Quiggin has forbidden me access to Junk Science – so I can’t check.
Now Bargarz, should you be writing about a judge in those terms?
Ron,
she was sentenced to 3 years for each of 3 convictions, which the Judge very compassionately allowed her to serve concurrently.
And why is everybody feeling so sorry for her and not Ettridge?
I recall Tony Abbott saying a few years ago that Oldfield was in it for the power, Ettridge for the money and Hanson for the ego. It’s a strange, ironic outcome to have Ettridge and Hanson in the pokey while ubersleazoid Oldfield continues to cream it in the NSW Upper House.
Geoff, do you remember when Oldfield said a few years ago that it is a well known fact that the children of single mothers are more likely to be homosexual?
Ergo, stop single motherhood, and voila!, no more poofs!
You can only marvel at a political process that lands great minds like that in our parliaments.
Dave, Oldfield is a principle-free zone. He’d sell his mother into prostitution and take up Radical Maoist Nihilism or Francoist Falangism – possibly concurrently – if he saw a political advantage in it.
“The foetid, airless courtroom, baking in magnolia and cigar scented ….. summer heat. The rhythmic waving of palmetto fans, the torpor and lassitude that leads inexorably” …to long Friday lunches under gorgeous galah coloured skies….. You’ve been to Ken’s place have you Geoff ?
The reason, Dave, is that most people think the two Davids are smarter than Hanson. It’s easy to think of those two tricking her into doing something stupid (knowing the risks), than it is to think of her doing the same to *them*.
No Wayne…but it sounds alluring.
Geoff: — I believe that if it hadn’t been for Keating making it a major media circus, Hanson wouldn’t have gained such enormous early publicity, and she’d have been forgotten. Howard would have been happy to be able to remain “unaware” of her existence. Hanson wasn’t unique, in terms of having an eccentric set of personal policies. In previous years, far more bizzare ideas than hers have been held by some candidates in unwinnable seats; but they didn’t get the exposure, and leaders could ignore them.
Woodsy: — Clearly I lack your political awareness and astuteness, so I bow to your apparent superior understanding of what I actually understand.
Dave, Oldfield is a principle-free zone. He’d sell his mother into prostitution and take up Radical Maoist Nihilism or Francoist Falangism – possibly concurrently – if he saw a political advantage in it. ( WHAT AND THE LABOURAL PARTIES ARENT SELING AUSTRALIANS SHORT? GIVING YOUR JOBS TO FORIEGNERS FOR LESS PAY ,LESS WORKING CONDITIONS, BOT KNOWING HOW MUCH THEIR IMMIGRATION POLICY IS COSTING US AUSSIE TAXPAYERS, NOT KNOWING HOW MUCH THE HYPOCRITICAL SEPERATIST RACIST AND DIVISIVE MULTICULTURAL POLICY IS COSTING US?..MAKING WIMIN EXPLAOITATION CENTRES LEGAL?..GIVING THE OLD FOLK KEROSENE BATHS AND HOSING THEM DOWN WITH FIREHOSE POLICIES?..THEY HAVE ALREADY MENTIONED THAT PROSTITION IS A WORK ALTERNATIVE TO SOME BLOKE, WONT BE LONG BEFORE ITS A DOLE REQUIREMENT..I COULD GO ON..WITH MORE EXAMPLES OF THE IDIOCY OF THE MAJOR PARTIES AND THE AMOUNT OF TAXPAYERS MONEY THEY WASTE AND LITERALLY GIVE AWAY TO FORIEGNERS…CHECK AUSSIE NEWSTALKBACK ,USTRALIA THREAD FOR PLENTY OF EXAMPLES OF THESE MAJOR PARTY PUPPETS WASTING OUR AUSTRALIAN TAXPAYERS MONEY…WHY HAVE THE GREENS/ALP/LIBERALS,UNITY PARTY ADOPTED ONE NATION POLICIES IF THEY ARE STUPID?..AND IF THE TAX POLICY SHE MENTIONED IS SO STUPID, THEN WHY DID THE PRIME MINISTER FAIL TO ANSWER THE QUESTIONS ASKED OF HIM? AND WHY DID HER TAX MEET ALL 7REQUIREMENTS IN THE 1996 CANBERRA TAX CONVENTION TO DETERMINE THE BEST TAX POLICY FOR AUSTRALIA, YET WE ENDED UP WITH THE IN FACT ILLEGAL GST TAX THAT MET ONLY 4 REQUIREMENTS ASKED FOR?..ONE NATION HAVE GOT TO BE BETTER THAN THE MAJOR PARTIES WHO ARE DICTATED TO BY THE FORIEGN CORPORATIONS THAT FUND THEM, SEE SEMEN CREAM SHIT HIMSELF WHEN THE JEW LOBBY GROUP TOLD HIM TO SHUT HIS MOUTH ON PALISTINE/ISRAELI CONFLICT, HE SAID IS THIS HIGH ENUFF FOR YAS..PLEASE TELL ME YOU GENIUSES, WHAT BENEFIT DOES CHASE MANHATTAN BANK RECIEVE FROM THE BOTH MAJOR PARTIES IN AUSTRALIA FOR THE FUNDING THEY GIVE THEM…..HOW MANY BRANCHES IN OZ DOES CHASE MANHATTAN BANK HAVE? HOW MANY AUSSIES DO THEY EMPLOY? WHY DOES GEORGE BUSHES OIL COMPANIES ALSO FUND THE AUSSIE MAJOR PARTIES? COULD THIS BE THE INFLUENCE THEY HAD TO MAKE THE LIBERALS GO AGAINST NEARLY 80% OF THE POPULATION AND COMMIT OUR TROOPS TO INVADE IRAQ?..AND BY THE WAY, WHY DONT YOU FOOLS GET YA FACTS STRAIGHT..THE TAX WAS PUT FORWARD AS A POLICY SUBMISSION..WHY DIDNT THE MEDIA REPORT THIS?> THE TAX POLICY WASNT SET IN CONCRETE AND IN FACT ONE NATION WANTED TO SUBMIT IT BEFORE THE TAX EXPERTS BEFORE ACTUALLY IMPLEMTING IT..
The only conspiracy I’m prepared to wear is the one I’m about to spread(WHAT CONSPIRACY THEORY YOU FRIGGEN NUTCASE? DIDNT TONY ABBOT SAY HE WANTED TO GET RID OF HER BECAUSE SHE IS DANGEROUS?.WHY DID THEY SET UP THE DISHONESTY FUND? AND THE UNFAIR GO ALLIANCE? WHY WASNT ANY ONE NATION SUPPORTERS MEMBERS ASKED TO JION THESE SLUSH FUNDS? WHATS SO HONEST ABOUT THEM AND HOW ARE THEY GIVING EVERYONE A FAIR GO WHEN THEY DONT INCLUDE ALL?…PLEASE EXPLAIN , JUDGE WOLFE IN SHEEPS CLOTHING MIGHT LIKE TO EXPLAIN THIS AS WELL, WHY DOES WOLFE THINK HANSON IS SO DANGEROUS? IS IT BECAUSE SHE DOESNT AGREE WITH HER VIEWS? IF SO SHOULD HAVE SHE DEALT WITH PAULINES CASE IN THE FIRST PLACE, WHEN YOU CONSIDER WOLFE IS A WELL KNOWN ALP ACTIVIST JUDGE?..AND WHAT ABOUT JUDGES GETTING MEDIA REPORTS SENT TO THEM? SHOULD THIS BE ALLOWED? WOULDNT THIS INFLUENCE THEIR VIEWS?..AND WHAT ABOUT THE FRAUD HIGH COURT JUDGES? VISIT AUSSIE NEWSTALKBACK FOR LINKS AND IF YOU HAVE THE GUTS TO DEBATE ME ON A NON NAZI CONTROLLED BOARD WHERE FREEDOM OF SPEECH TRUELLY RULES, NOT ON A MODERATED BOARD LIKE THIS WERE THEY BAN YOU SO YOU CANT ANSWER THERE PATHETIC COMEBACKS.., ALSO I GUEESS BRONWYN BISHOP BELIEVES IN CONSPIRACY THEORIES AS WELL, DIDNT SHE ALSO SAY WE SHOULDNT HAVE POLITCAL PRISONERS IN AUSTRALIA?..)
OH AND DAVE, HOWS PAULINE HANSON HELPING OUT THE YOUNG ABORIGINAL KIDS HUH? DID YA HEAR ABOUT THAT YA WANKER?..WHY WOULD SHE BE SCARED OF THE MAORIS ANYWAY, THEY CANT FIGHT..HOW MANY WORLD CHAMPION MAORIS DO YOU KNOW?..BESIDES THAT POINT ISNT THEIR A MAORI FELLA IN NEW ZEALAND SAYING THE EXACT SAME THING ABOUT ASIANS AS pAULINE IS?..AND WHAT ABOUT THESE WORDS FROM PAULINE HANSON…HOW ARE THESE WORDS RACIST?…(” I DONT CARE HOW MANY ASIANS ARE LIVING AUSTRALIA, AS LONG AS THEY SPEAK ENGLISH” ) HARDLY A RACIST STATEMENT NOW IS IT?.BY THE WAY, WANNA SEE HANSON DINING WITH OTHER ASIAN AUSSIES?.WHY WOULD SHE BOTHER DINING WITH ASIANS IF SHE HATED THEM?..AND WHAT ABOUT THE UNREPORTED ABORIGINAL SUPPORT FOR HANSON?..DIDNT THEY HUSH UP THE SUPPORT HANSON HAD WITH THE ABORIGINALS IN SA?..AND WHAT ABOUT THE ABORIGINAL, MUSLIM,YUGFOSLAV CANDIDATES THAT RAN FOR ONE NATION SEATS?..HARDLY A RACIST PARTY NOW IS IT?..AND IF YOU CAN POINT OUT ANYTHING RACIST ABOUT ONE NATIONS IMMIGRATION POLICY, ILL FUCK MESELF WITH THE ROUGH END OF A PINAPPLE..
UNREAD FUCKEN FOOLS THATS WHAT YOU ALL ARE…AND I HOPE YOUR GAOLED FOR YOUR VIEWS ONE DAY, BUT THEN CONFORMERS LIKE YOU FRIGGEN HYPOCRITS WONT HAVE ANYTHING TO WORRY ABOUT..JUST STAND IN LINE FOR YOUR NUMBER OF THE BEASTS. YOUR ALL FUCKEN FOOLS..IF YOUR NOT..WHY ARENT YOU ASKING HOW MUCH OF YOUR TAXPAYERS MONEY IS GOING TOWARDS THE MULTICULTURAL POLICY AND THE IMMIGRATION POLICY..THIS COST TO THE AUSTRALIAN TAXPAYER IS NOT KNOWN BY OUR TREASONOUS MAJOR PARTIES, WHY? AND WHY DONT YOU FUCKEN FOOLS CARE? YET YOU FOOLS HAVE THE GALL TO WHINGE ABOUT WHERE YOUR MONEY IS GOING..JUST CHECK OUT THE USTRALIA THREAD AT AUSSIENEWTALKBACK FOR AN IDEA ON WHERE IT IS GOING..AND IT AINT WHERE IT IS SUPPOSED TO BE GOING..400MILLION TO ADVERTISE THE GST..YET THEY CANT FIND 250,000 FOR A DESPERATELY NEEDED HEART RATE MONITOR ..PFFT.. AND YOU ARSEHOLES HAVE THE GALL TO SIT HERE DENIGRATING HANSON AS THE IDIOT..FARK ME..TAKE A LOOK AT YOURSELVES YA FUCKEN FREAKS..WHO IS THE FUCKEN IDIOT HERE, WHEN YOU FUCKEN DOPEY CUNTS DONT EVEN WANT TO KNOW HOW MANY BILLIONS THEY ARE SPENDING ON A POLICY THAT WAS NOT WANTED BY THE MAJORITY OF AUSTRALIANS AND INTRODUCED BY WAY OF SSTEALTH, NOT TO MENTION THE COST OF THE IMMIGRATION POLICY…ISNT IT BAD GOV NOT TO KNOW THE COSTS OF THESE POLICIES?..WHY DONT YOU FUCKWITS CARE ABOUT THE BILLIONS BEING WASTED ON THESE UNWANTED POLICIES?..
AS BRONWYN BISHOP WOULD SAY…NO POLITICAL PRISONERS IN AUSTRALIA
SAY NO TO THE STATUS QUO…
VOTE 1 ONE NATION
AND PUT THE MAJOR PARTIES LAST AND SECOND LAST…
DO SOMETHING PROUD FOR YOUR COUNTRY FOR ONCE INSTEAD OF VOTING FOR EASILY PROVEN TRAITORS…NOT TO MENTION FORIEGN DICTATED MAJOR PARTIES..
Dazza, I can only assume you mean to insult us all by continuing to use capitals. I for one refuse to read it and I just wish there was some way effectively to block you from this blog.
Ron,
I asked on another thread whether people thought Dazza is for real or is taking the piss. I take it you think he is for real. I’m not so sure.
Hi,
I think you are all a bunch of misogynists.
Putting that aside, your focus is on belittling
the One Nation Party but you fail to address some
major issues. One Nation had some good policies
and wanting equal treatment for all Australians
does not make Pauline Hanson a racist.
If you love the Labor and Liberal Parties so
much, I feel sorry for you. Their policies
for “helping” Australians including the disadvantage are disguting. The health system and the public school system are seriously underfunded and are in a poor state. I suppose most of you arrogant people are affluent males who are not reliant on the public system anyway. Why don’t you go shove your pathetic posts where the sun doesn’t shine?
Radfeminist
Good morning rad fem
You are right about the males situation here but you undermine yourself by assuming anything more.
What is it that you ‘radical’ feminists are so pissed off about? D you realise that you alienate women lke me with your stupid man hating statements and stances. I care because I am a woman who would like not to flinch at the concept of feminism. You lot have narrowed the entire feminist debate so that it is easily dismissed and negated as errant aggressive unthought out rubbish. This is stupid in the extreme. Can you see it otherwise?
Pauline round-up: what the bloggers think
BERNARD Slattery: So it’s again come to this in Australia — political prisoners … Ironic isn’t it? The most populist of all popular MPs gets locked up at the same time that media elites declare that debate of a critical social issue such as cap…