Trump’s ‘deplorables’ are here, and they've got baseball bats

Bill Shorten plays up to the new nationalism while the Nationals get steamrolled in NSW.

Opposition Treasury spokesman Chris Bowen makes “the case for openness” in a speech to the Crescent Institute, September 7:

As the baby boomers increasingly move into retirement, the benefits of migration are likely to be even greater … Migrants tend to be younger than the existing population, which means they have a greater capacity to work and participate in the economy …

Has that policy been, dare we say, trumped? Bowen’s leader Bill Shorten, Sunday:

What’s happening is we’ve got people coming to work in Australia, nearly one million people with temporary work rights and, in some cases, they’re getting ripped off and exploited, lowering wage outcomes and taking the jobs of nurses, motor mechanics, carpenters, auto electricians. These are the jobs which can be done by Australians and we make no apology for saying Labor’s approach to the Austral­ian economy is buy Australian, build Australian, employ Australians.

Trump also has been invoked on T-shirts during campaigning against the NSW Coalition in the Orange by-election. Shooters, Fishers and Farmers Party Twitter account, Satur­day:

Let’s “Trump” the Nationals!

What do now former NSW Nationals leader Troy Grant and Democrat Hillary Clinton have in common? The Australian, yesterday:

Embattled NSW Nationals leader Troy Grant will stand down from his position after the party suffered a devastating swing in the Orange by-election on Saturday … The swing in Orange has put the Nationals on track to lose the electorate for the first time since 1957, with the Shooters, Fishers & Farmers likely to win their first lower house seat.

Will Malcolm Turnbull’s US solution be trumped as well? Who knows. News.com.au, Sunday:

Malcolm Turnbull did not discuss the US-Australian refugee resettlement deal with president-elect Donald Trump in their first official talks last week. The Prime Minister told Sky News the one-off deal announced on Sunday, which would see refugees currently on Manus Island and Nauru resettled in the US, was initiated in talks with President (Barack) Obama in January.

Flattery will get you everywhere. The Prime Minister, yesterday:

We have a very long history of co-operation with the United States. The United States has no closer ally, we have no closer ally.

Speaking of America and migrants, is this Australia’s first Trump-fugee? Fairfax’s Aubrey Perry cutting more ties to her homeland, yesterday:

This flag doesn’t represent me waved under a Trump presidency. This flag doesn’t represent me when the people holding it chant “Build That Wall!” I put it back in the box, and my heart breaks a little more. But I’m no patriot of that America. I’m an expatriate now seeking peace, refuge and a renewed faith in the goodness of people in my new home, my new land of opportunity …

She’d better not talk to fellow Fairfaxista Andrew Street. Headline, The Age website, yesterday:

We haven’t seen the last of Australia’s “rise of the deplorables”

No longer worried about Trump’s potential xenophobia, The New York Times tackles the big issue: Will you still be able to get a good brunch in Georgetown? Headline, New York Times website, yesterday:

A newly vibrant Washington fears that Trump will drain its culture