Free Republic

Bad news for environmentally conscious pet owners: cats’ and dogs’ eating habits are responsible for dumping as many as 64 million tons of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere every year — roughly the equivalent of driving over 13 million cars. That’s due to all the meat our furry friends gobble down, according to new research. There are more than 163 million dogs and cats in the US, and they just love to eat. In fact, cats and dogs in the US consume about 19 percent as many calories as people do in the US, or about as much as 62...

Australia’s cattle industry is experiencing a significant boost in exports to China as US beef shipments have ground to a halt amid escalating trade tensions between the world’s two largest economies. The US’ $2.5 billion beef trade to China has effectively ceased after about 300 abattoirs failed to have their export licenses renewed, creating an unexpected opportunity for Australian producers. Statistics from Meat and Livestock Australia show Australian grain-fed beef exports to China have surged nearly 40% in February and March compared to the same period last year, with 21,886 tonnes shipped during those months. “Australia is now the lone...

Australia's largest mosque could begin broadcasting the Muslim call to prayer from loudspeakers every week under a proposal lodged with a Sydney council. Lakemba Mosque, also known as the Masjid Ali Bin Abi Talib, has proposed to affix four loudspeakers to its minaret in a new bid to the Canterbury-Bankstown Council in Sydney's west. According to planning documents, nearly two thirds of the Lakemba population identified as Islamic in 2021 while nearly one quarter spoke Arabic at home. The proposed development would be permissible under zoning restrictions with council's consent, according to the application. The mosque is owned and operated...

Australia rejected China’s offer to work together to combat President Donald Trump’s tariffs. "We’re not about to make common cause with China," Australian Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles told Sky News on Wednesday. "We are not going to be holding hands with China in respect of any contest that is going on in the world." Trump issued a 90-day pause on tariffs for nations across the globe — except China. Australia is among the countries that, for the next 90 days, will face only the baseline 10% tariff. Australia’s trade relationship with China puts the country in the middle of...

Large-scale solar farms, wind turbines, and associated infrastructure are touted as solutions to the climate crisis, but their development comes at the cost of native forests and critical habitats.” “Until conservation charities disentangle themselves from government funding and corporate influence, they risk becoming complicit in the very destruction they were created to prevent.” ... One of the great ironies of our age is the double standard of Big Environmentalism toward wind and solar, which commit numerous eco-sins that would not be tolerated otherwise. Dilute, intermittent, and thus inefficient? Yes. Energy sprawl requiring service roads and transmission lines in the wild?...

Australia has rejected China’s plea to “join hands” against U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariffs, declaring Thursday it is happy to keep negotiating with its long-term ally rather than join Beijing’s chorus of aggrieved opposition to Washington. The White House recently imposed an import tax of 10 percent on Australian goods, but for China – Australia’s biggest trading partner – it raised tariffs to 125 percent. China’s ambassador to Australia Xiao Qian argued joint resistance is “the only way” to stop the “hegemonic and bullying behaviour of the U.S.”, appealing for Canberra’s cooperation in an opinion piece on Thursday, the BBC...

A natural cyclone devastated the reef in 2009. Climate activists blamed CO2. Now that the reef has recovered, they’ve moved the goalposts. The coral cover on the Great Barrier Reef is as expansive now as it has ever been recorded, with coverage nearing 40%. In fact, the coral cover has nearly tripled in the past dozen years. Despite this record expanse of coral off the coast of Australia, the climate community and mainstream media outlets unrelentingly push the narrative that the Great Barrier Reef is dying. For example, CBS News ran one of its periodic pieces on the reef a...

Virginia Giuffre, the most prominent victim of Jeffrey Epstein who accused some of the world’s most powerful men of sex trafficking, says she had just days left to live after being hit by a bus. The mother-of-three, 41, who was sex trafficked by Epstein as a teenager, shared a battered picture of herself from a hospital bed covered in bruises. She said she was suffering from kidney failure after a bus crashed into her vehicle. -snip- “I’ve gone into kidney renal failure, they’ve given me four days to live, transferring me to a specialist hospital in urology. I’m ready to...

There has been considerable debate about Trump’s plan to incorporate Greenland into the American “empire,” something which I think has great strategic and security advantages. There has even been trolling, perhaps half serious, of Canada being absorbed as the 51st state of the U.S. But so far nothing has been said about Australia, which is of even greater strategic defense interest to the United States than Greenland. Many Americans may think that there is no problem here as we have the AUKUS treaty for defense. However, in this brief note I would like to ignite a debate about Australia/U.S. relations,...

If you've been driving around any major city in Australia lately, chances are you've probably already spotted a new BYD Shark 6 plug-in hybrid electric ute on the road. In the past week, I've personally counted at least 15 on the road in the Sydney area, and they certainly stand out. The first BYD Shark 6 – an all-new model never previously sold in Australia – arrived in local showrooms in mid-January 2025 and already has given the long-standing best-selling utes, the Ford Ranger and Toyota HiLux, a run for their money. According to February VFACTS data, 2026 examples of...

If you find yourself wondering, wait, what, why are we funding Australian universities? You are likely not alone.Apparently, the U.S. government has been sending $6oo million/yr to universities in Australia to subsidize various college research programs. The Trump administration has told Australia the funding will likely end.The Australian university system is in a state of panic, telling their government to declare a “state of emergency”.One particular quote from within the Sky News article below seemingly encapsulates the mindset of the situation in the land down under:AUSTRALIA […] Last week after it was revealed the universities had been asked to justify...

Australian universities are crying foul after the Trump administration asks questions that put $386 million in research grants in jeopardy. The bone of contention was a questionnaire sent to Australian grant recipients asking if the institution had "ties to communist or socialist parties, receive funding from China and it only recognises male and female sexes." The grants were frozen in January, shortly after President Trump was inaugurated, but were unfrozen at some time thereafter. This new round of questions is the second time the universities were queried, but this time, it has their attention. Seven days after the Trump administration...

Australian politician Chris Minns inadvertently said the quiet part out loud when he admitted that the existence of true “free speech” is incompatible with a multicultural society.The Premier of New South Wales tacitly admitted that in order to uphold the myth that ‘diversity is our greatest strength’, the freedom to say it isn’t must be censored.“I recognize and I fully said from the beginning, we don’t have the same freedom of speech laws that they have in the United States, and the reason for that is that we want to hold together a multicultural community and have people live in...

A group of isolated researchers has been stranded for months on end in the most inhospitable environment – until one of the team members goes rogue, sexually harassing and eventually threatening to kill a female colleague. That could be the plot of a successful thriller or horror film. Still, unfortunately, this is reportedly what’s happening in real life to a group of South African scientists trapped in the tiny Sanae IV base in Antarctica. The story broke in the outer world because a member of the research station sent out an email to a major newspaper pleading for rescue after...

Australia will not be granted an exemption from US tariffs on aluminium and steel imports, the White House says. US President Donald Trump had previously said he would consider excluding Australia from the 25 per cent tariffs, which take effect on Wednesday. But White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt has now told the ABC: "He considered it, and considered against it. There will be no exemptions." Asked why, Ms Leavitt said: "America First steel." "If they want to be exempted, they should consider moving steel manufacturing here," she said. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese described the decision as "entirely unjustified"....

Australia is considering joining a group of countries that are prepared to protect an eventual ceasefire of the Russia-Ukraine war, the UK said on Saturday. Britain and France have been leading efforts to form the “coalition of the willing”, as the United States’ long-term commitment to Europe’s security is now in doubt under Donald Trump. Sir Keir Starmer, Britain’s Prime Minister, “spoke to the prime minister of Australia, Anthony Albanese, this morning,” the UK leader’s office said on Saturday. “He welcomed prime minister Albanese’s commitment to consider contributing to a coalition of the willing for Ukraine and looked forward to...

Australia’s treasurer, Jim Chalmers, will continue to push for steel and aluminum tariff exemptions in his discussions with Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent this week. Chalmers traveled to Washington Sunday night for his first in-person meeting with his counterpart since Bessent assumed the post, though Chalmers noted in a statement that “our established relationship predates this meeting.” Chalmers told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) that he doesn’t “expect to conclude those discussions on steel and aluminium while I’m in DC,” but expects the tariffs will be a focus of discussions. “Trade and tariffs will be part of the conversation, but not...

New Zealand's commerce minister Andrew Bayly has resigned as a government minister after he "placed a hand" on a staff member's upper arm last week, in what he described as "overbearing" behaviour. Bayly said on Monday that he was "deeply sorry" about the incident, which he described as not an argument but an "animated discussion". He remains a member of parliament. His resignation comes after he was criticised last October for calling a winery worker a "loser"- including putting his fingers in an 'L' shape on his forehead - and allegedly using an expletive directed at them. He later issued...

🚨PURE EVIL🚨 Muslim hospital staff at Bankstown Hospital are SPITTING in Jewish patients’ food, neglecting their post-op care, and leaving them covered in their own waste. How many Jewish patients left Bankstown worse than they arrived—or didn’t leave at all? INVESTIGATE NOW. pic.twitter.com/ONtABYhWTr — Jews Fight Back 🇺🇸🇮🇱 (@JewsFightBack) February 17, 2025

This disturbing story comes to us from Down Under, where two nurses were caught on camera stating that not only would they refuse to treat Israeli patients -- they'd actively kill them. "The clip was shared by content creator Max Veifer speaking to Ahmad Rashad Nadir and Sarah Abu Lebdeh, both of whom have been confirmed to be health workers from Bankstown Hospital in Sydney's south-west," according to Australia's ABC News. "It is one of several videos on Mr Veifer's account that feature conversations with people in different parts of the world — mainly the Middle East — on the...