E.D. Butler (1916–2006) was an influential Australian nationalist and founder of the Australian League of Rights, known for his opposition to international financial power and his advocacy for national sovereignty.
Read more: Champion of Sovereignty: E.D. Butler and the Fight Against Australia's 'Planned Surrender
By Roderick “Whiskers” McNibble, reporting from somewhere between Dusty Gulch and a hard place
“Little Rat calling Home Burrow… repeat, Little Rat to Dusty Gulch Control. If you’re hearing this, the yarn’s run out, the kettle’s cold, and the cat’s asleep on the keyboard. This is Biggie Rat, reporting live and furry from under a chandelier in Mar-a-Lago… don’t ask.”
It started with a dodgy scooter and ended under a chandelier at Mar-a-Lago. Titanium knees were bugged, ducks were quacking coded signals, and President Trump himself whispered the plan to Dusty Gulch’s most unlikely hero - a rat with nerve, a nose for intrigue, and a VPN ready to scramble every spy frequency.
Like Nancy Wake slipping through occupied France, I dodged every surveillance cat, rogue poodle, and suspicious chandelier to carry the Southern Crossfire message back to the Gulch. The Outback’s secrets are safe, the knitting signals secure, and the Gulch has its own furry resistance… at least for now.
Read more: DUSTY GULCH’S LAST FREE SIGNAL: Roderick, VPN, and the Nancy Wake of the Outback
From the Dusty Gulch Bureau of Equine Affairs – by Roderick “Whiskers” McNibble
The sun is high, the dust is thick, and the smell of oats, spilled beer, and ambition hangs heavy over the paddock. Welcome, ladies, gents, rats, and casual gawkers, to the Dusty Gulch racetrack... the only place where the fences are crooked, the odds are stranger than finding an honest politician at a press conference, and every horse is convinced it will outrun the apocalypse.
Today marks the return of the nation’s most unpredictable spectacle: the Australian Stakes, where old rivalries, new controversies, and the occasional rogue emu collide in a cacophony of hooves, slogans, and scattered hay bales. The crowd buzzes, the stewards nervously flip coins, and somewhere in the distance, the Dusty Dingo is topping up the kegs of Emu Brew.
Dust off your fascinators, fill your hip flasks, and brace your betting slips - because no one, not even the bookies, can predict what will happen when these illustrious nags thunder to the starting gates. Every finisher thinks it’s a champion; every loser thinks it was robbed. By the time the dust settles, the bar will be open, the photo-finish camera pawned, and the moral victories distributed like stubby holders at a Bachelor and Spinsters ball.
When I was a lad in Western Australia, the 5th of November used to be an eagerly awaited event.
That was Guy Fawkes Night, commemorating the apprehension in 1605 of conspirators who plotted to blow up the British Parliament and were hanged and quartered.
Just the sort of thing a young Flysa could get excited about.
The Catholic conspirators led by Fawkes, placed thirty-six barrels of gunpowder in an undercroft beneath the House of Lords in order to assassinate the Protestant King James 1 during the opening of Parliament, and place his young daughter Elizabeth on the throne as a puppet Queen.
Phar Lap, the legendary Australian racehorse, and President Donald Trump, the American business magnate turned political figure, share a unique legacy of resilience under extraordinary pressure.
Both captivate people worldwide - one for speed and stamina, the other for defiance and determination.
And in both cases, the burden they carry only amplifies their legend.
Phar Lap defied the odds to become a symbol of hope during Australia’s darkest economic times, achieving legendary status through sheer heart and speed. Trump, rising from business to the U.S. presidency, has become a polarising figure whose boldness challenges institutions and expectations.
Read more: Phar Lap and Trump: Carrying the Weight of a Nation
Beneath the still waters of Lake Argyle lies the ghost of a homestead — Argyle Downs — once the beating heart of the Durack cattle empire.
This is the story of how the Duracks rose from famine to fortune, and how the land they conquered finally claimed them back.
In the heart of Australia’s wild Kimberley, where the sun scorches the red earth and rivers carve ancient paths through rugged landscapes, one family’s name looms large—Durack. They weren’t born to riches, nor did they inherit vast estates, but through sheer grit, ambition, and an audacious cattle drive across thousands of kilometres, the Duracks carved out an empire. Yet, for all their triumphs, they knew their castles were built on fragile ground, vulnerable to nature's whims and the shifting tides of fortune. This is the epic tale of the Duracks, the cattle kings who ruled the outback—until their grass castles, like so many before, were swept away.
Read more: Grass Castles Beneath the Water: The Lost Empire of the Duracks
And here is where the teddy bears come in......
Read more: Medals and Teddy Bears: The Complex Face of Heroism
I’ve started and restarted this article, pondered how to avoid hurting anyone’s sensitivities, and in the end have decided to accept Admiral Farragut’s advice at the Battle of Mobile Bay in 1864: Damn the torpedoes - full speed ahead!
I have an intellectual and emotional stake in this matter of the Charge of Beersheba (Be’er-Sheva). My maternal grandfather, 2788 Trooper John Joseph McGrath, was a horse breaker who served in the 2nd Remount Unit for more than three years under Major A.B. ‘Banjo’ Paterson in Egypt and Palestine.
My father, QX 17611 S/Sgt James Hammill served in the 2/ 14th LHR between the wars, then in Tobruk and the Middle East, including Palestine, with the 2/9 Bn. The subject of the Charge of Beersheba was not an infrequent topic at home and in places that I visited.
Read more: The Charge at Beersheba... a photograph full of mystery. Real or Re Enactment?
From our Dusty Gulch Bureau of Unofficial Meteorology
By Roderick (Whiskers) McNibble - Senior Correspondent & Climate Analyst
When the Bureau of Meteorology rolled out its brand-new, $4.1 million website on October 22 - promising “modern, user-friendly” weather forecasting - Dusty Gulch residents did what they always do in moments of national confusion: they looked out the window.
The Bureau’s overhaul, part of a whopping $866 million “Robust Modernisation Initiative,” was meant to drag Australians into a sleek digital future. Instead, it left half the country lost in a maze of buttons, colours, and drop-down menus that even a kangaroo with a PhD couldn’t decode.
Read more: Calendar Cancelled as BOM Bungles, Wallaby Knees Take the Forecast
Beersheba is a name that should resonate with every Australian with the same ease and reverence as Gallipoli.
Sadly it does not.
Because the charge on the desert city of Beersheba on 31st October, 1917 is the most outstanding piece of military daring and execution ever undertaken in the military history of the World.
On that day 800 members of the Australian 4th Light Horse Brigade of the Imperial Mounted Division brought a stunning victory from the jaws of defeat and started the dismembering of the Ottoman Empire.
The attack began in the late afternoon by this unique breed of men riding a unique breed of horse. It is widely described as the last great cavalry assault yet the participants were not cavalry; they were mounted infantry.
How have we come to this mess in the Middle East?
The strange thing is that my mind immediately went to that figure of historical notoriety, Lawrence of Arabia.
It is probably accepted that most kids today wouldn't have a clue who he was, but most of us from the era who actually got taught things other than gender fluidity in school , have heard of this imposing figure.
The British gentleman who rode around the desert with his blue eyes and, today, would have had more fans on social media than Taylor Swift.
So who was he?
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