This morning I read Antonio Castillo's article in Eureka Street 'US-Mexico relations are officially off-the-wall'. The expression 'off-the-wall' refers to something that is so crazy it defies rational explanation.
The US is making a fast u-turn into isolationism, and 'off-the-wall' could be applied to America's relations with just about any country including Australia. The difference is that with most of the others it's crazy-bad but with Australia it is crazy-good.
In quite an unexpected development, Trump has told Turnbull that the US will honour the Manus and Nauru deal stitched up in the last months of the Obama administration despite the ban on the entry of refugees into the US.
There are not many things Trump does out of the goodness of his heart, and he didn't have to do that. I'm surprised that our media commentators and the Labor opposition are not busily speculating. If the Australian summer has dog days, these are them, and journalists and the opposition appear to have succumbed.
I didn't notice anything beyond Michelle Grattan's headline in The Conversation: 'Trump gives Turnbull refugee deal green light but government provides no detail'. Grattan herself provided no detail about her reference to no detail. In Fairfax, Mark Kenny is way too gentle in his 'wait and see' depiction of Turnbull's 'soft-shoe shuffle around Donald Trump'.
Elsewhere I've seen commentary pointing out that the Trump-Turnbull relationship is somewhat unique among Trump's pairings with world leaders because of their common background in business. They both speak the language of 'the deal'. With Trump, there's no appeal to better angels, and leaders will get nowhere if they persist in speaking about shared values such as democracy and human rights.
So what's the deal here? What is Turnbull giving Trump in exchange for Trump's green light on the refugee deal? In the short term, there's Turnbull's refusal to condemn Trump's anti-Muslim executive order. He said in his media conference yesterday that it's 'not his job' to comment on Trump. In this he is alone among his peers. Even Theresa May, Trump's new best friend of last week, eventually criticised Trump for issuing this order.
We will have to wait to find out what else Turnbull owes Trump in the wake of the Manus and Nauru deal. But I would guess that Australia is not going to be pursuing a foreign policy independent of the US any time soon. Which is a pity, because now is the time to do it because we're at the crossroads.
In December I wrote about attending a gathering of retired Australian diplomats who all believed it was time for Australia to let the ANZUS alliance fade away in favour of an independent foreign policy. They pointed out that there are a number of things the Australian Government is being quiet on.
Most notable of these was America's heavy reliance on the Pine Gap defence intelligence facility in central Australia. This would probably be an early target in the event of a nuclear conflict involving the US, and the fallout would impact Australia's population centres including Sydney and Melbourne.
Is this the price we are paying for Trump's green light on the refugee deal?