Australia's Bligh hopes to avoid hat-trick
We feel the hand of Australian political history hovering over our shoulder as we approach this weekend's state elections in Queensland, where Anna Bligh is seeking to become the first woman ever to be elected as a state premier. True, there have been other female state premiers before - in Victoria and Western Australia - but, like Anna Bligh, they inherited their jobs from male predecessors, rather than winning a mandate of their own.
Both her female forerunners - Carmen Lawrence in Western Australia and Joan Kirner in Victoria - were defeated in their first elections as premier. Anna Bligh is hoping to avoid the hat-trick.
Although Labor has won three consecutive victories, Queensland is arguably Australia's most conservative state - this was the home, of course, of the arch conservative, Sir Johannes "Joh" Bjelke-Petersen, who was the state's premier from 1968 to 1987.
So she has not sought to attach any feminist or crusading meaning to her candidacy. The Queensland election is not a referendum on her gender. 
Instead, she is trying to stress her economic credentials in an election where the slowdown in the once-booming mining sector has cast a long shadow over the sunshine state. She called the election early, probably in the anticipation that the economy would get worse, and with it the voter backlash.
She faces a united opposition - the Liberals and the Nationals have merged in Queensland to form a new party - and the polls are close. But the newly-formed LNP led by Lawrence Springborg needs to gain 18 seats - which is a big ask.
Of course, another Queensland female politician has been in the headlines: Pauline Hanson, the former leader of the One Nation party, who is trying to mount yet another political comeback. Other, more gossipy, have attached themselves to her candidacy, but the more interesting one is what explains her decline?
A decade ago, her anti-Asian immigration One Nation party won over a tenth of the seats in the Queensland Legislative Assembly. Now she is widely seen as something of a comic figure, a minor celebrity who tried to foxtrot her way back into the limelight on Dancing with the Stars
The former federal MP for Oxley certainly became easy to lampoon when she asked an interviewer to 'please explain' after being accused of being xenophobic. She did not understand the word. After that, she became tagged as the 'Oxley Moron.' Many people thought her shrill and extreme, especially after her maiden speech in parliament in September 1996 when she claimed that Australia was 'in danger of being swamped by Asians' (although the switchboard at Parliament House received an unusually high number of calls with people asking for copies of her speech).
Another view is that as Hanson self-imploded, the Liberal and National Party started to inherit or claw back many of the disaffected voters who had started voting for One Nation. The Howard government took a tough line on immigration (though not as tough as Hanson), which carried appeal for some former One Nation voters. Pauline Hanson claimed to be speaking on behalf of what Robert Menzies called 'the forgotten people.' Under this argument, John Howard gave these 'battlers' more of a voice and a greater say.
Many of you will have lived through the Hanson phenomenon. I would love to hear your thoughts.
UPDATE: After double-checking the last blog with immigration officials before publication, I checked again. It is correct. For other ways into Australia, I would urge anyone with concerns to contact a reputable immigration agent or the Australian immigration authorities.
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