Pauline Hanson's One Nation (PHON, ONP)

Murri leader Sam Watson does not have a high opinion of Pauline Hanson's intellect or her lack of substantial policies. However he told Green Left Weekly that “she can't be ignored”. “I was very pleased to see in the last few days when she went to appear on Q&A that there were comrades on the street to challenge her,” he said. He was also pleased when First Nations activist Murrandoo Yanner ordered her out of the building at the Cairns Indigenous Art Fair. “She is evil and we need to confront that evil and challenge that evil.”

Pauline Hanson came across a racist and incoherent cartoon character on the ABC's Q&A program on July 18. But it would be a mistake to think that Hanson, and the more than half a million people who voted for her in the July 2 federal election, can simply be laughed away. They represent, in a distorted way, the deepening contradictions in our society that have to be addressed at their root. The myth of the egalitarianism of Australia is cracking up after 50 years of Coalition and Labor Party governments helping the super rich get even richer at the expense of the rest.

While the votes are still being counted and the deals brokered, the resurrection of Pauline Hanson's racist party has sparked concern and outrage. Pauline Hanson's One Nation party has won at least one, possibly three Senate seats: Hanson claims it could be as many as six. It polled the fourth highest nationally of all parties contesting the Senate, after Liberal, Labor and the Greens,. The election platform One Nation presented was blatantly racist and anti-Muslim, and poses a threat to civil rights.

The federal election is now over and the final outcome is still being worked out, but the winners and losers are becoming clearer by the day. The two biggest losers were the major parties. While the Coalition retained enough seats to still be able to govern, it lost its sizable majority in the lower house and is facing an even more hostile Senate. The Labor Party recovered several seats overall, but it still managed to record its second lowest number of votes in a Federal election since World War II.

Pauline Hanson is back in the Senate after 18 years, riding the wave of anti-Muslim hatred spawned by various confected Wars on Terror™. But liberal commentators are warning we should take her more seriously this time. She and her 10% are “not just racists” they say. And they're right. Since the election, Hanson has made it clear that she has two major priorities this time around: protecting Christian fish'n'chips from Middle Eastern halal fast food, and tender-hearted men from the feminist Family Court.