Free Republic

A White House spokesman called July’s 7.4 percent unemployment rate proof that “the U.S. economy is continuing to recover from the worst downturn since the Great Depression.” He said it with a straight face. The data tell another story: America remains mired in the Great Obama Depression. The unemployment rate that the administration trumpets is a liar’s number. The formula for the unemployment figure that is released every month is rigged to look favorable to the administration in power. The true numbers from the Bureau of Labor Statistics show a far different picture. They show an America that is in...

Above: Brewer reacts to Obama criticism of her book on the Phoenix tarmac in Jan 2012. Obama returns to Phoenix this week, enroute to a Jay Leno appearance.- Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer mocked the Obama administration’s assertion Saturday that the border is more secure than ever. “It’s Jay Leno comedy every other week,” Brewer said during an interview at the National Governors Association meeting here, alluding to the president’s scheduled trip this week to both Phoenix and the talk show host’s couch. Brewer said her Yuma border is “pretty secure” but “Tucson is a nightmare.” The Yuma Sector is the only border sector with...

But what has Obama himself been doing throughout 2013? Pushing gun control, and then pushing an immigration bill, and failing at both, in between vacations and rounds of golf. Whose eye is off the ball here? As the failures have piled up and the economic data isn’t getting any better, a frustrated Obama now critiques the system he leads as if he’s just a bystander and threatens to just bypass Congress to exert his will. Neither of those amounts to anything close to leadership, making deals, and compromising. His rhetoric in fact makes compromises all but impossible, because he resorts...

Obama threatened the GOP this week that “racial tensions may get worse” if he does not get his way with the economy.The White House Dossier reported: President Obama said that if economic prescriptions of the type he supports to increase economic growth and reduce “income inequality” are not adopted, then race relations in the United State may deteriorate further. “If we don’t do anything, then growth will be slower than it should be. Unemployment will not go down as fast as it should. Income inequality will continue to rise,” Obama said in an interview published Sunday by the New York...

The Senate’s effective rejection of President Barack Obama’s post-Newtown gun control bill robs the Democratic Party of an important tool for trying to regain a majority in the House in November 2014. “Are they serious?” a visibly angry Obama demanded of opponents of the Toomey/Manchin Senate bill. In a late-afternoon announcement outside the White House, the president added that if Congress continues not to pass a gun control bill, “the answer will have to come from the voters.” But without a Senate bill, there’s little chance that vulnerable GOP House members in suburban swing-districts will face the unpleasant choice of...

Following a series of amendment votes in the Senate, including the Manchin-Toomey Amendment expanding background checks that failed to pass, the President makes a statement to reporters on what the White House calls "common-sense" gun control.

Pic courtesy another major Japanese national TV network, TBS For those who have been following this, the Japanese press is filled with snippets, chortling and stories and about the keystone-cop-ish US White House (specifically the National Security Council under Tom Donilon) and the White House website, which mistakenly listed the first name of Japan's Prime Minister (the third largest economy in the world you recall) as a common Japanese "female first name", "Yoshiko" (sic), and now the Chunichi Shimbun News off a Kyodo News Agency story (which is the blue ribbon equivalent of AP), has run an article saying...

....Mr. Obama has already attended 103 fund-raisers, roughly one every three days since he kicked off his campaign last April (twice his predecessor's pace). The president faces other fund-raising challenges. For one, there are only so many times any candidate can go to New York or Hollywood or San Francisco for a $1 million fund-raiser. Team Obama is running through its easy money venues quickly. For another, many of Mr. Obama's 2008 donors are reluctant to give again. The Obama campaign itself reported that fewer than 7% of 2008 donors renewed their support in the first quarter of his re-election...

JAY CARNEY, WH Press Secretary: "They don't give a lick about the day and time: ED HENRY, FOX News: "Why doesn't he give a speech from the oval office tonight saying here's my plan?" CARNEY: "He wants to speak before Congress because he recognizes that while there are things he can do without Congress, and he will do them, there are actions that need to be taken with Congress that require legislation to grow the economy and create jobs. And he wants to go to Congress, speak directly to members of Congress, and layout his proposals."

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: Does anybody now doubt that this is on purpose? I mean, after all, Barack Obama inherits a AAA credit rating from George W. Bush, and look what he does to it. Obama is always running around complaining and whining and moaning about all that he inherited from George W. Bush. Well, he inherited a AAA credit rating, an unemployment rate of 5.7%. Does anybody doubt that this is on purpose? Well, look, my credit rating doesn't suck. There are a lot of individual Americans whose credit ratings aren't in trouble. The United States has never been in...

CNBC just broke in and told the audience that the President has requested airtime and will speak to the nation at 1300hrs EST (12 noon central, 10 AM PST) on the US national debt downgrade.Developing...

A top Obama adviser blames tea party for downgrade WASHINGTON — Who's to blame for the U.S. debt-ceiling mess? Politicians and political advisers took to the airwaves Sunday to point fingers, mostly at each other. David Axelrod, a top political adviser to President Barack Obama, blames the downgrade of the U.S. credit rating on tea party Republicans for being unwilling to compromise on how to reduce the federal debt. The Obama campaign strategist tells CBS' Face the Nation on Sunday that the decision by the Standard & Poor's credit agency to downgrade the U.S. from AAA to AA+ for the...

I just read two very interesting articles on the U.S. economy, written from historical perspectives. They compelled me to share my own historical perspective. And what I want to say is more about our changing culture than our economy. One of the articles, by Julie Crawshaw of MoneyNews.com, notes that the "Misery Index"—the combined unemployment and inflation rates—made infamous under President Jimmy Carter, has hit a 28-year high. It's also 62 percent higher than when President Obama took office. But that's nothing compared to Mort Zuckerman's article in U.S. News & World Report. Zuckerman measures the current situation against the...

President Obama on Tuesday said he cannot guarantee that retirees will receive their Social Security checks August 3 if Democrats and Republicans in Washington do not reach an agreement on reducing the deficit in the coming weeks. "I cannot guarantee that those checks go out on August 3rd if we haven't resolved this issue. Because there may simply not be the money in the coffers to do it," Mr. Obama said in an interview with CBS Evening News anchor Scott Pelley, according to excerpts released by CBS News.

House Speaker John Boehner is turning up the heat on President Obama, calling the debt-ceiling increase "his problem" and putting the onus on him to present a deficit-reduction plan that can pass Congress. Republicans in both chambers had tough words for the administration ahead of another White House sit-down Tuesday afternoon. On the Senate floor, GOP Leader Mitch McConnell accused the president and his party of "deliberate deception." The comments may reflect increasing pressure from rank-and-file Republicans to press for deeper spending cuts and not cave in to the administration's call for tax hikes.

After meeting for exactly 90 minutes, the president and members of congress achieved absolutely nothing except for what ZH readers already knew: that a debt deal has to be reached by July 22 or else. "President Barack Obama said Sunday that "we need to" work out a debt deal within the next 10 days as he convened a meeting with congressional leaders, aiming to fashion a deficit reduction package for the next 10 years. As the meeting opened, Obama and the leaders sat around the table in Sunday casual dress. Asked whether the White House and Congress could "work it...

Just as Israeli officials feared, US President Barack Obama's "vision" of pushing Israel back to it's 1967 borders has become the basis for international peace efforts in the Middle East. Last week, France offered to host renewed peace talks based on the "Obama vision." Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas at the weekend accepted the French proposal, even though it would likely end his campaign to unilaterally declare a Palestinian state at the UN in September. But it appears just the threat of taking such unilateral action has paid off. A former adviser to US presidents on Middle East issues said that...

The White House has finally forged a bipartisan consensus in Congress. Unfortunately for President Obama, lawmakers are uniting in opposition to his approach to the ongoing U.S. involvement in the Libyan civil war. Some see the operation as an ill-advised and useless military venture; others argue that Mr. Obama is breaking the law.... The War Powers Resolution comes into effect “in any case in which United States Armed Forces are introduced into hostilities or into situations where imminent involvement in hostilities is clearly indicated by the circumstances.” The plain words of the statute apply to Libya. On April 26 the...

Democrats try to wave off the birther controversy as a right-wing tempest in a teapot, but the president, his own staff and backers are the rainmakers who have stirred the recent storm. Even when conservative critics of this administration try to ignore the numerous conspiracy theories flying around Mr. Obama, Democrats like Mr. Matthews keep bringing the issues to the fore and thus make the scandals more bipartisan and mainstream. Hawaii Democrat Neil Abercrombie - a left-winger who made his political debut in 1970 as a longhaired Vietnam war protester - is another example. After being elected governor in November,...

Egypt's foreign minister has rebuffed calls from Washington to speed up the pace of political reform. Rejecting a US demand to lift a state of emergency, Ahmed Aboul Gheit said Washington should not "impose" its will on "a great country".