@matildagirl I always love the Australian lamb ads. Thanks for posting!
We seem to be having a rethink on our alliance with America and Trumps reign is only 2 months in. Some recent articles on changes to our thinking.
https://apple.news/ARSSKGw62RcCVAWrnKhhzLQ
The Trump administration is a direct threat to global security. And its traditional allies are paying attention.
Polling by the Australia Institute suggests that a significant shift is under way in how Australians think about our alliance with the US, driven by the Trump presidency. Given three choices as to who they thought is the greatest threat to world peace, 27% of Australian respondents chose the Russian president, Vladimir Putin. The same number chose the Chinese president, Xi Jinping.
Thirty-one per cent chose the US president, Donald Trump.
Australians are listening when Trump tells us who he is. For Australians the US president is now on a par with the world’s most powerful authoritarians.
https://australiainstitute.org.au/post/poll-trump-a-greater-threat-to-world-peace-than-putin-or-xi/
https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/why-australia-trump-s-treatment-canada-so-troubling
The US alliance is far shallower and more transactional
than its Australian supporters like to believe.
It’s the “Canada” of it all that makes it so worrisome for Australians, because Australia and Canada are so alike. Canada is safe, likeable, reasonable, wealthy, friendly, Western, English-speaking. Australia and Canada share a colonial heritage, membership to the Commonwealth, and a long-established alliance with the United States, reinforced by deep historical, economic and cultural ties.
All of which ought to make us wonder: if the Americans can impose a 25% tariff on Canadian goods entering the US, as announced by the Trump administration earlier this week, what should Australia expect?
https://apple.news/Ax5cO4CIqRwKT4lU1D6WQ8A
Australia’s key ally has gone rogue – and Trump has us expertly wedged. We need a plan B
The Atlantic alliance, which has protected peace in western Europe for almost 80 years, however imperfectly, is evaporating before our eyes in real time.
We would be deluded not to realise this has the most profound and alarming implications for Australia and consequences for which we are not prepared.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-03-03/australian-us-alliance-in-crisis-under-trump/105000672
Anthony Albanese and Peter Dutton aren't facing reality — our US alliance is in crisis under Trump
The Western alliance as we have known it is in an unmissable crisis, but our leaders are dancing around that reality.
They're sending clear signals that we stand as a nation with Ukraine but not dealing with the deeper reality — the elephant in the room — that our once reliable American partner is no longer reliable in the same way. That can't be inconsequential for our country.
Regards to all
Matildagirl
We have an election coming up, the date hasn’t been called yet but it will probably be in April. The leader of the opposition is trying to be a bit Trumpian, not so much great again but on the right track. One of our billionaires who has started several political parties before that seem to implode during elections has created a new one for the coming election Trumpet of Patriots. Wonder where he got that name from.
The oppositions policy statement
The current governments policies
Hopefully common sense will prevail though it may be a minority government with a lot of independents on the cross bench.
Regards to all
Matildagirl
I think it's very worrying times for the US and all its allies right now.
In Europe, Germany just won a close fought election battle against the far-right, and so did France.
The UK currently has the far-right polling highest in all the political polls, but fortunately for us we don't have an election for another 4.5 years.
It's worrying that Australia has been gripped by the same rise of far-right Trumpian politics. I know that New Zealand has been, and they are struggling with a government over there that is hurting a lot people with their policies.
I really hope Australia sees sense and doesn't elect a party that appeases to Trump and the far-right, as it will weaken our collective alliance in Europe and Canada in standing up to Trump and supporting Ukraine.
I firmly believe we can do it, but it requires collective effort and strength in unity.
I would have a re-think if I were Australian too. I hope your elections go well.
I am not so sure we will have many allies left soon, and rightly so.
I remember a prediction I am pretty sure it was on this site a few years ago either a 100 years from now or 2100 that Australia, New Zealand and Antartica would be the last democracies in the World. That stuck in my mind.
@lenor is that right? Or I have I just made something up.
Regards
Matildagirl
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-03-12/trump-rejects-australia-s-bid-for-tariff-exemptions/105039966
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, local time.
But White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt told the ABC on Tuesday: "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.
Australia had argued that, unlike most countries, it usually imports more from the US than it exports there, a trade surplus for the US contrasting with the trade deficits it has with most other countries, and which infuriate Mr Trump.
Time to find other markets I guess to buy from, hello China my old friend. Canada might like to sell to us.
Donald does know that the US is only about 340 million as against at least 7.9 billion of the rest of us able to buy and sell to each other, why would the world want to bother with the US anymore.
Regards to all
Matildagirl
More Tariffs to come
https://apple.news/AdY7g1CXaRUeWk_8YI3bI1g
American medical giants have slammed the $18 billion pharmaceutical benefits scheme in a plea to US President Donald Trump to impose punitive tariffs on Australia because it subsidises medicines for millions of patients.
The PBS cost taxpayers $17.7 billion last financial year and helped reduce the cost of 930 different medicines. It means Australians can buy life-saving drugs worth thousands of dollars for as little as $31.60 per script, often after the government has negotiated with the drug company to secure the best deal for taxpayers.
Australian National University law professor Peter Drahos said the US companies would push strongly for the Trump administration to act against Australian subsidies because of their longstanding dislike of the PBS.
Got to keep those profits up.
Regards to all
Matildagirl
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-03-19/canada-snuck-past-trump-buy-jorn-defence-radar/105069292
Canada was always meant to follow the United States in acquiring world-leading Australian radar technology but "things moved quickly" after Donald Trump won the US presidency.
The Canadian prime minister.
"Today, I'm announcing that our government will be working with our long-standing defence and security partner Australia to build a new, long-range, over-the-horizon military radar system," he said.
"[It] will enable Canada to detect and respond to both air and maritime threats over our Arctic both faster and from further away. It will most fundamentally keep all Canadians safe."
Following President Trump's repeated threats to annex Canada and Greenland, Ottawa is purchasing the Australian-developed technology known as the Jindalee Over-the-Horizon Radar (JORN) to build its new Arctic Over-the-Horizon Radar system.
Maybe also to keep an eye on USA?
Regards
Matildagirl
The Trump administration told Australian university researchers a push to promote administration priorities and avoid “DEI, woke gender ideology and the green new deal” was behind a “temporary pause” of funding, according to a memo seen by Guardian Australia.
University sector sources say the US has severed research funding at six universities – Monash University, Australian National University (ANU) and the University of Melbourne, University of Sydney, University of New South Wales and University of Western Australia – since Donald Trump came to power, including some as early as January. ANU is the first university to publicly acknowledged it.
The projects, which spanned a range of topics from agriculture to foreign aid, social science and geology, were cancelled pending a review as part of US higher education cuts. Some notifications came directly from US government agencies to researchers.
In 2024, US government funding to Australian research organisations totalled $386 million, the Australian Academy of Science (AAS) estimates.
For context, the Australian government provides about $800 million annually in non-medical research funding via the Australian Research Council.
"Twenty-five per cent of Australia's publications in biomedical and clinical sciences involve US collaborators," AAS president Chennupati Jagadish said.
"Australian researchers collaborate with these organisations to develop vaccines and medical products that underpin Australia's heath security."
Matildagirl
America's big tech sector is lobbying the Trump administration to take up a new fight with the Australian government — over its rules governing social media and streaming services.
Silicon Valley, whose top executives have cultivated close relationships with Donald Trump, is now pushing the new president to pressure Australia to relax its regulations or risk retaliation.
How to win friends and influence people? The boys are being busy.
Matildagirl
https://apple.news/AO3M2SZ6iQXeR8oRXpy3Unw
Australia is having a Federal election, we go to the polls on 3rd May 2025 after a 5 weeks campaign by the parties trying to get our vote.
It’s between Anthony Albonese Labor and Peter Dutton Liberal National coalition. Dutton is trying to be Trump lite, he wants to sack 41,000 government workers. It could be decided by the smaller parties and independents, the feeling is it may be a minority government. Will see.
5 weeks is long enough I don’t know how you guys get through your election marathons.
Regards to all
Matildagirl
@matildagirl I think that for us, those who haven't made up their minds before the campaign starts usually do so within a matter of a few weeks. The rest of the circus is both sides trying to get the non-voters to go to the polls on their behalf. I personally think the ones who still claim to be "undecided" practically until they walk into the polling booth actually have decided, but they like the attention they get for claiming otherwise.
@tgraf66 Hi, in our case because it’s compulsory you will get them to vote but what they do in the booth is what you are trying to gain. If they really don’t care they won’t fill it out or just go 1,2,3 etc a lot of penis’s get drawn but it is a decision.
We also have preferential voting so if a candidate doesn’t get over 50% the candidate with the lowest no of votes drop out and the people who voted for them, their second choice votes go to the those 2nd choice candidates and so on until a clear winner is found which in theory is the candidate most voters can stomach.
So sometimes the winning party isn’t known for a couple of weeks. The other issue these days is that the parties are losing people to more independents and smaller parties so big majorities are harder to get. There is a feeling around that this election may be a minority government and the winning party will have to work with the cross bench (the independents and smaller parties) to get things done.
Last election Labor got a majority but it was only 2 seats.
Throw in the Trump effect this election and it will be interesting.
Regards to all
Matildagirl
https://apple.news/AMqv5EmGyQbW6cAHq0FsO7w
Australian Federal Election 2025: How to vote, key dates, major issues, and how a government is decided
If anyone is interested in how our elections work. Here is everything you need to know about the upcoming election.
Regards
Matildagirl
One of these gentlemen will be our next Prime Minister. I was wondering if you want to as an exercise see if you can pick who it will be. You will know if you were right on the 3rd May, just as a bit of fun.
Regards to all
Matildagirl
One of these gentlemen will be our next Prime Minister. I was wondering if you want to as an exercise see if you can pick who it will be. You will know if you were right on the 3rd May, just as a bit of fun.
Regards to all
Matildagirl
Hi guys,
Well Labor is back in with a greater majority, Peter Dutton our Trump lite leader of the LNP who looked like he would win a few months ago as he adopted Trumps ideas is gone, lost his seat and lost lots of seats for his party.
Australia’s centre-left prime minister, Anthony Albanese, has won a second term with a crushing victory over the opposition, whose rightwing leader, Peter Dutton, failed to brush off comparisons with Donald Trump and ended up losing his own seat.
Addressing the party faithful in Sydney, Albanese said voters had chosen Australian values, including “fairness, aspiration and opportunity for all”.
“Australians have voted for a future that holds true to these values, a future built on everything that brings us together as Australians, and everything that sets our nation apart from the world,” he said.
In an apparent reference to Trump’s policies, Albanese said he would “choose the Australian way”.
“We do not need to beg or borrow or copy from anywhere else. We do not seek our inspiration from overseas. We find it right here in our values and in our people,” he said.
As 2025 approached, Dutton looked to be in a strong position, drawing encouragement from the success of populist right-wing parties across the democratic world. These victories suggested Dutton had a winning formula – a pitch consistent with the populist-nationalist zeitgeist.
Trump’s defiant return was a frontal repudiation of liberal elites and their priorities around climate change, procedural governance, feminism and other identity-based politics.
More explicitly, he praised Trump as “shrewd” and a “big thinker”, and when tariffs were placed on Australian imports to the US, Dutton hinted he would have secured exemptions because of his ideological like-mindedness with the president.
Trump had trashed the global trading system. He insulted America’s closest and most dutiful friends, Australia included.
Polls showed that Australians saw Trump as a threat. Dutton had backed the wrong horse.
I think possibly because the election got put back a month because of the flooding in QLD and we got another month of Trump and his tariffs etc people here thought no way do we want that.
Regards to all
Matildagirl