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Guess who One Nation supporters admire most, after Pauline Hanson?

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05.09.2026

If ever I meet any alien creatures from galaxies far away I doubt that they, however green they are and however many heads they have, will seem more alien to me than lots of my fellow Australians do.

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That thought is rekindled in my bosom not only by some newsworthy goings on in the world of extraterrestrial adventure (of which more in a moment) but also because of last week's release of fascinating findings of a survey of 1014 One Nation supporters.

The survey run by pollster John Utting and Labor strategist Bruce Hawker investigated what it is that makes One Nation supporters click - or perhaps what makes them clunk, since it is hard to imagine a lively, fully-wound-up, clockworkingly tick-tocking mind thinking in One Nation ways.

So for example, the research finds that the Australian these aliens most admire, after Pauline herself, is (prepare to gasp in disbelief, thinking Australian earthlings) the disgraced (disgraced in the eyes of most of us) Ben Roberts-Smith.

But in spite of my cheap quip about One Nation minds not doing any clicking, I am genuinely interested in and intrigued by the One Nationers. While obviously numerous out there in the real, discontented Australia, here in privileged and smugly contented Canberra they are alien and extremely rare, their rarity and extreme novelty lending them (like our imagined Martians) a thrilling mystique. I can't wait to meet one.

When I do I will be truly interested to learn (I will listen respectfully as one always should when meeting people of other cultures and listening to their colourful beliefs) what it is they so intensely admire about Ben Roberts-Smith.

Other reasons for thinking of aliens today (as well as finding........

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