Free Republic

The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed above 23,000 for the first time on Wednesday, driven by a jump in IBM after it hinted at a return to revenue growth. The Dow hit 22,000 on Aug. 2, only 54 trading days earlier and roughly half the time it took the index to move from 21,000 to 22,000. This marks the fourth time this year the Dow has reached a 1,000-point milestone. […] Shares of IBM (IBM.N), which beat expectations on revenue, jumped 8.9 percent and accounted for about 90 points of the day’s 160 point-gain in the blue-chip index. Solid earnings,...

Things got a little heated Monday when a group of young immigrants confronted House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi at a pro-DACA press conference in San Francisco. Several dozen young immigrants shouted down the top House Democrat, following her recent conversations with President Donald Trump over the future of a program that grants many of them legal status. "We are immigrant youth, undocumented and unafraid," they chanted, taking over a scheduled press conference Pelosi, along with Reps. Barbara Lee and Jared Huffman, organized to call for the immediate passage of the Dream Act, a federal proposal that offered many of the...

The policy take-away from President Trump’s remarks last night at the Heritage Foundation centered around tax cuts. The president likes ‘em, and if he has his way (and on this issue, I think he will), we will see a sharp cut to the corporate tax rate (from 35 percent to 20 percent), a simplification and reduction of the individual tax rate, and a big expansion of the individual exemption (to $12,000 for individuals and $24,000 for married couples filing jointly). There is a certain kind of politician who likes high taxes, partly because he likes big government, which is...

In a letter dated October 12, the ATF Association informed lawmakers that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) approved bump stocks because they do not turn a semiautomatic rifle into “a machine gun.” The letter contains explanations of basic points for lawmakers–like the fact that a semiautomatic only shoots one round each time the trigger is pulled and bump stocks to not change this basic action. And it also seeks to defend the integrity of the ATF by explaining that the body of laws governing machine guns has been in place since 1934 and that body of...

Yesterday Fox News host Sean Hannity devoted a segment of his show to make the argument that President Trump should reject proposals for trade action by Suniva and SolarWorld, calling any proposed remedies a “bailout” for failed, foreign-owned manufacturers.

In liberal billionaire Tom Steyer’s ideal world, his taxes would be raised, the coal industry would be no more and President Donald Trump would be impeached. “I am strongly opposed to even one more penny in [tax] cuts for rich people and corporations,” the prominent Democrat donor and activist declared in an Los Angeles Times op-ed Oct. 5. Instead, he wants the government to “raise taxes on the rich and use the money to invest directly in the American people.” Steyer is the founder of Farallon Capital Management, a hedge fund that made money through coal investments until 2014. He...

Just days after US President Donald Trump called for further isolation of Iran, a Norwegian solar company signed a deal Tuesday to invest €2.5 billion in the country over the next five years. “Norway is fully committed to the JCPOA (nuclear deal), and this is proof that we have taken the opening very seriously, and we will see more investment very soon,” Norwegian ambassador Lars Nordrum told AFP. He was hosting the signing at his Tehran residence between Norway’s Saga Energy and Iran’s Amin Energy Developers, who will work together to install two gigawatts of solar panels in multiple sites...

**Yes...this is a vanity*** On behalf of all of us here at Equifax, I want to express my sincere apology to you and anyone affected by our recent data breach. I can assure you that our number one priority going forward is taking care of you and giving you better control over access to your Equifax credit report. We realize that you likely enrolled in TrustedID Premier reluctantly, and unfortunately it may not have been an easy process. At first we were not fully prepared for the volume of calls, visits to our website and emails received in response to...

Did you happen to catch CNN’s latest smear? Anderson Cooper’s show recently featured a “two-part exclusive” that claims Donald Trump’s EPA director had conspired with the CEO of a mining company to “withdraw environmental restrictions” so the company could dig “the largest open pit mine in the world in an extremely sensitive watershed in wild Alaska.” The report was enough to horrify any caring person. CNN showed beautiful pictures of colorful salmon swimming in Bristol Bay, and the reporter intoned dramatically, “EPA staffers were shocked to receive this email obtained exclusively by CNN which says ‘we have been directed by...

Politicians exploit public ignorance. Few areas of public ignorance provide as many opportunities for political demagoguery as taxation. Today some politicians argue that the rich must pay their fair share and label the proposed changes in tax law as tax cuts for the rich. Let’s look at who pays what, with an eye toward attempting to answer this question: Are the rich paying their fair share? According to the latest IRS data, the payment of income taxes is as follows. The top 1 percent of income earners, those having an adjusted annual gross income of $480,930 or higher, pay about...

(Nigel Farage at :20) ...the OECD are telling us that if we had a second referendum and we came to our senses and voted to rejoin the European Union, that that could have a significant and positive effect on the UK economy. It's also downgrading its growth forecast for the United Kingdom, down to one percent for next year because of the uncertainty of what'll happen in post-Brexit Britain. Now, this of course is not the first time we've heard from this and many other of these intergovernmental global organizations because they were all part of "Project Fear" during the...

Responding to progressive propagandist Trevor Noah, host of “The Daily Show,” who has been hosting his show from Chicago, where he has been bashing conservatives for highlighting the longtime Democrat-controlled city’s astronomical murder rate, despite having some of the strictest gun control laws in the country, former Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clark appeared on FOX Business to discuss not only Chicago but also the anti-American NFL protests against the American flag and the National Anthem. Sheriff Clarke accused Trevor Noah of trying to downplay Chicago’s murder rate because it sheds a negative light on the Democrat Party and that it’s...

Chinese President Xi Jinping opened a critical Communist Party Congress on Wednesday with a pledge to build a “modern socialist country” that will never copy the political systems of others and will remain open to the world. […] “Through a long period of hard work, socialism with Chinese characteristics has entered a new era. This is a new historical direction in our country’s development,” Xi said in a speech carried live across the nation on state television. China will relax market access for foreign investment and expand access to its services sector, as well as deepen market-oriented reform of its...

At last check, 47 women have now said they were sexually harassed and/or assaulted by the producer Harvey Weinstein. That number is certain to grow. There’s no way a psychopath with a 30-year history of meeting with young women alone in hotel rooms clad only in a bathrobe only had 1.566 such assignations per annum. These astounding numbers do not suggest, as many now are, that Weinstein is a representative figure of American maleness in our time. It’s precisely the opposite: His is a story of demonic excess that is so horrifying because it is so exceptional. In that sense,...

Sunday night, using her Facebook account, actress Rose McGowan accused disgraced attorney Lisa Bloom of offering her millions of dollars to hop on board the “Harvey’s Changed bandwagon.” Bloom immediately denied McGowan’s allegations. Nevertheless, with her reputation already shattered by similar accusations of incompetence and inappropriate behavior in defense of producer Harvey Weinstein and Amazon’s Roy Price, the last thing Bloom needed was McGowan hopping on board the “Lisa Bloom’s a bumbling sell-out” bandwagon. McGowan opens with: Lisa Bloom. Lisa Bloom. Your very name makes my stomach clench with a stressed tightness that takes my breath away. As does your...

Google Maps has removed a feature that informed users how many calories they could burn by walking, which took the form of counting how many cupcakes would be burned off based on the distance, following complaints by users that claimed it was “triggering.” According to the Telegraph, “Users have reacted badly to cupcake metric on social media describing it as ‘shaming’ and some saying it could be a trigger for people suffering from eating disorders.” In a post on Twitter, Taylor Lorenz, a reporter for the Hill and Mic, called the feature “triggering.” “I guess Google maps now automatically shows...

There is a Big Story in Monday’s New York Times: “Harvey Weinstein’s Fall Opens Floodgates In Hollywood.” Except for the fact that not a single floodgate is open, that headline is deadly accurate. There is a Big Story in Monday’s Hollywood Reporter: “‘Grey’s Anatomy’ Showrunner on Harassment in Hollywood: ‘It’s Not Just Harvey.’” Except for the fact that it is “just Harvey,” that headline is deadly accurate. There is a Big Story in Monday’s Daily Mail: “Oscar-Winning Actor Accused of Assaulting a Broadcaster’s Loved One.” Except for the fact that not a single Oscar-winning actor is accused, that headline is...

Fashion designer Donna Karan is "apologetic from the bottom of my heart" and embarrassed about "stupid" remarks she made last week that suggested sexual harassment victims were "asking for it" by the way they dressed. Her comments on a red carpet touched off outrage online following sexual harassment and assault allegations against fallen movie mogul Harvey Weinstein. Karan spoke to Women's Wear Daily in an interview published Monday, saying she spoke while sleep deprived and without knowing details of the mounting allegations against Weinstein, telling a red carpet reporter: "How do we display ourselves, how do we present ourselves as...

Three Maine roofers put their hammers down and stood up to show respect for the national anthem on Saturday, in the process unknowingly posing for a photo that's been used to symbolize one side of the contentious nationwide debate about "The Star-Spangled Banner." The roofers, who were working near Waterville High School’s football field, stood for the national anthem “even though they didn’t have to,” Michelle Lyons Cossar, the Old Town resident who snapped the photo, told Fox News on Monday. While Cossar was standing for the anthem prior to the start of Saturday’s game, she said she heard someone...

To be a smart conservative, you have to hate Donald Trump.Salon recently published a list of “The 25 Conservatives Actually Worth Following on Twitter.” “Yes, they exist,” the subhead read. “Liberals in shock over the 2016 election were prescribed a heavy dose of reality. ‘Get out of your bubble,’ the doctor’s note illegibly read. It was a hard truth for the American left. They found out the U.S. was not as progressive as originally thought. Their steady diet of MSNBC and left-wing op-eds only reinforced biases and preconceived beliefs. The country’s actual, collective title wholly evaded them.”