At the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Brisbane, attendees were treated to a spectacle that would make most mainstream Australians feel like they'd stumbled into a foreign country. Between oblique references to transgender swimmers, blue hair, women's bathrooms, jokes about falling off stages, and Matt Canavan in hi-vis and speed dealer sunnies, the event was nothing if not memorable.

Rightwing campaigner Monica Smit was spotted deep in conversation with a Donald Trump impersonator, while opera singers belted out the national anthem - the first verse, twice, for reasons that remain unexplained. Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price and her folk singer husband then sang the anthem again, because once is never enough. Karl Stefanovic jokingly thanked CPAC for "rudely interrupting my unemployment."

But behind the theatrics, the conference revealed a deeper problem: preferences proved the sticking point as conservatives face the prospect of a third successive election defeat. The right still can't agree on how to take down Labor, and the infighting was as visible as the Trump impersonator.