Many Pauline Hanson supporters judge her by standards very different from those they apply to other politicians. For them, she’s a medium through which to register their general feelings of grievance and alienation. So they don’t care much if she flouts ordinary rules.
But is there a limit to this tolerance – a limit Hanson has tested with her recent behaviour? In the past, Barnaby Joyce has warned those over-hyping One Nation’s prospects of the danger of flying “too close to the sun”. Will some supporters see Hanson to have been doing just that in the company she’s kept during her current overseas trip?