Stop trying to make Eylon Levy happen

A few years ago I wrote a piece for Gawker (RIP) laying out how Australia has become a sort of international retirement home/image rehab facility for the English-speaking world’s professional right-wing grifters. Word has seemingly gotten round that our biggest media outlets are forever waiting to roll out the red carpet for whichever clout-chasing shithead has run their career into a wall and give them one last taste of big-dog status.

People like Milo Yiannopoulos, Ann Coulter, Katie Hopkins, Gavin McInnes, Stephen Yaxley-Lennon aka “Tommy Robinson”, Steve Bannon, Lauren Southern, Tucker Carlson and Douglas Murray have all tried to pitch their tents here when their careers started sputtering. Often the “speaking tour,” if its headline act doesn't manage to get themselves deported before it starts, turns out to be a scam in itself, or else so poorly planned the idiots who fork out hundreds of dollars to hear about how roundabouts are the New World Order or whatever end up having the worst evening of their lives. Candace Owens is apparently planning a tour, which means she must be pretty hard-up for cash.

It was in that context that this piece in the Sydney Morning Herald on Wednesday caught my eye: