He’s doing his best impression of it today, at The Australian:

Bill Shorten has made a dramatic move to win back support from Chinese-Australian voters following last week’s disastrous NSW election defeat, declaring Labor is not a racist party and that he welcomes the rise of China as a global power. In a group chat with nearly 500 Chinese-speaking voters on the WeChat Live social media service — the first by an Australian ­political leader — Mr Shorten said yesterday that Labor would make it easier for ­immigrant families to get visas for ageing ­parents, and highlighted the governme­nt’s past attempt to ­introduce a university-level ­lang­uage test for would-be ­citizens. Days after intervening to blast out Michael Daley as NSW Labor leader following his damaging anti-Asian comments, the Opposition Leader told Chinese-­Australian voters that “racism from anyone is unacceptable”. …“America will always be importan­t to the security for Australia, but if I am prime minister I welcome the rise of China in the world,’’ he said. “I don’t see … China as a strategic threat. I see it as a strategic opportunity. What I want to see is greater mutual understanding ­between all of us.”

A few interesting points to make here:

Michael Daley’s comments may have been bumbling but they weren’t racist, they were true. Locals have been displaced by mass immigration, especially the illegal Chinese bid into realty. It has gone now but does this mean Shorten will welcome the return of it?

Why does Bill Shorten see Aussie Chinese as attached to the motherland? If it’s true then he should be equally concerned about the influence of the CCP in the community. That throws up some very tricky questions regarding the protection of Australian sovereignty if a Shorten Government intends to keep the mass immigration pedal to the metal.

Has Bill Shorten been asleep for the past few years as Cold War 2.0 has mushroomed? Does he not see that the pendulum has swung against CCP engagement across the Five Eyes nations?

Now, as one MB reader noted the other day, we can walk and chew gum at the same time on China. And the most likely explanation is that’s what the PM is waiting is doing. This is probably just local politicking. Labor eventually supported the big push back against Chinese influence in the Australian parliament and economy after initially dawdling.

But his party’s recent record of taking Chinese bribes, working directly for CCP interests, and questioning in the old guard about the utility of the US alliance, also keeps alive questions about a Shorten Government’s foreign policy priorities from the get go.