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What, exactly, is "cultural overreach"? Sounds like the Progressive(ly) Paranoid Party thinks we evil Americans are going to contaminate them somehow. The uh...cultures....of both our countries started similarly. Both basically penal colonies and havens for those society didn't want. Naturally there are some similarities between us already, though Australia has allowed itself to be bitten by the EUrosocialist bug with surprising speed.

I would guess that Oz got more misfits, prisoners and exiles than the US did, but over a shorter span, albeit at a faster pace than the US in the colonial period.
I think the socialistic tendencies in their polity started about the same time they did in all the 'White Dominions' of the British Empire.
Not sure of exact dates but Canada, Australia and New Zealand all moved towards self government and some replication of UK politics around the same time, say 1880s on (I know, confederation is 1870 in Canada), with divions into Liberals (whatever their local name), Labor and United Empire Loyalist types (traditionalists, conservatives, imperialists).