Hey Ian,
Let me throw my 2 cents in.
I read a few pages of your linked article.
I don't argue the data so much as I argue the way you and others are reading it.
It's as if you need the mindset of a PH voter to make it make sense to you.
- But I can't speak for other PH voters.

Yes, there's going to be a greater support for PH in QLD.
Queenslanders, see her more as 'one of them' than people in other states do.
Another big factor here is ethnicity.
There aren't quite as many foreign-born looking people in QLD.
With a candidate such as PH and the rhetoric about 'racism' that surrounds her, you can pretty much just delete the ethnic vote as a non starter, so there's good reasons PH will fare better in QLD.

The actual issue might be better correlated with data such as:
Who was born here and who wasn't, and who has foreign ethnicity.
One important factor is that 28% of Aussies weren't actually born here.

Next, no self-respecting white collar or business person person was going to sit down over Sunday brunch talking about why they voted PH... the ridicule. Not in 96, and probably not now.
So you can count them out as non starters as well.

Then you've got the labour voters, those that can't be pulled to the left over minority issues, or wooed with talk of health and education for their young families.

So it leaves these 'leftover' voters that a non-PH voter could only surmise voted for PH simply because they didn't fit into the other boxes (such as successful businessman or white collar professional or growing family) already set for them.

[cont]

And the 'racism' factor.
When you have a system in this country where 'welfare breeds more welfare' then it stands to reason than some people will see an increase in foreigners in their suburbs and then also see them getting ahead and doing better than them.
This is going to lead to natural animosity.
We need to help the people at the bottom have better opportunities to get ahead.
So, this isn't racism so much as the system failing the people at the bottom.

Also the 'Keep the bastards honest' factor, in that what PH lacks in wisdom, she makes up for in courage and spirit.
She's not afraid to face up to issues other politicians would cower from.

These were just a few points I thought of, though they aren't specifically the reasons why I voted for her.

WOW! I'm amazed. This would have to be the first time I have seen a reply from one of you calibre on the Forum or OLO.

I have read your Link by Ian Watson & have made some notes. I take it this research was done on the 98 Election. I doubt very much weather it would correlate with the last Election.

So here goes.

Watson makes a statement; (What Policys?)

In 98 I went through Pauline’s Policies with a fine toothcomb. It was there on her Website in great detail & the reason for those policies. I remember at the time her opposition & Media, intent on making her out to be a fool, were always questioning her as to what her policies were but they all seemed not to see, read or to purposely ignore the content of her Web pages.

Queensland less immigrants than Victoria.

Posibly true in all out numbers but as a percentage of the population I would say that Italians, Sicilians, Yugoslavs, Hungarians, Polish, were in Queensland in droves. I grew up & went to school with them.

Blue Collar workers : 7:1

If I remember it takes seven Blue Collar Workers to keep one White Collar worker. Traditionally Blue Collar Workers are Labourites.

Union Membership normal in Blue Collar workers.

I presume that Union membership would be higher in Blue Collar workers than in Management.

LNP. & ALP. Voter’s agree with ON Policies but still vote for their Party anyway.

Most people vote for their regular Party regardless of what the policies are. A quote from my old Father-in –Law. “ My Grandfather voted Labour, Dad voted Labour & I’ll vote Labour.” & the same for LNP voters.

Anti-Aborigine sentiment.

Pauline’s policy was not Anti-Aboriginal per se, it was pro equality of treatment for all that motivated her & the people that voted for her.
cont.

Don’t you just hate the posting limit.
Cont.

Helena Catts: Casting their vote against the two major parties.

Helena is right here. People are fed up with the “Whatever you are for we are against” by both Party’s. Also the pure “Prestige of Governing” factor comes into play. Wanting the top Job.

Political dissatisfaction. Voting for Minor parties rather than Major parties.

I feel that there is a lot of that in play, especially in the latest Election.

Voter dissatisfaction with Democrats.

The Democrats became a pseudo Greens party & people dropped them..

Blue collar workers wouldn’t normally understand the intimate workings of free trade, deregulation & Economic Rationalism nor care or know all that much for the World financial institutions.

One Nation Preferences would normally fall back to a Conservative Party.

Well that’s my take on the Watsons Paper. Agreed I don’t understand the Statistical Graphs.

Let's see if we can analyse Ian Cooks mindset and figure out how he thinks.

Ian is implying that the people who vote for Pauline Hanson are dumb white males, and that conclusion is born out by "academic surveys and by opinion polls." First up, those surveys and opinion polls are notoriously unreliable. The same polls laughed at the idea that Trump could ever get up steam to even be a Republican nominee. They confidently predicted that Britain would not Brexit, that John Hewson could not lose the "unlosable" election, and that Turnbull would romp home.

As for regional demographics, the first thing your polls did not mention, is that support for multiculturalism is highest in those electorates the furtherest from it's negative consequences. "Smart" people can get very self righteous and when confronted by moral issues which do not affect them in any way. As a former member of the Australians Against Immigration Party, we soon figured out that our greatest support in terms of voting proportions came from within those electorates that were completely infested by Muslims, or other less-than-desirable immigrant groups. The muzzies may have succeeded in driving out most the Australians, but those who were left in what soon will be Muslim no-go areas were very bitter.

A lot of the dumb white men who got driven out of certain suburbs by foreign immigrants went to places like Queensland or outer Sydney, as far away from multiculturalism and Islam as they could afford to get. Unsurprisingly, they and their wives voted for Pauline Hanson because they don't want to be driven from their homes again.

Now, your presumption that only the dummies voted for Pauline by inference suggests that the "smart" people do not. But those "smart" people are unable to focus upon the Muslim express train coming right at their faces until a bomb blows up on their suburban train, or a bunch of Jihadis start running through their private schools shooting their kids. They feel secure in their leafy suburbs and in their gated communities, protected by economic fences higher than the Berlin Wall.