Free Republic

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said Thursday he expects to see some banks fail due to their exposure to the commercial real estate sector, which has declined significantly in value following the shift to remote work. Powell said the banks that are in trouble with falling office space and retail assets are not the big banks, which were designated as “systemically important” in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis. That episode, which resulted in a taxpayer bailout of the financial sector, was also triggered by unsound real estate assets. Rather, the banks at risk of failure now Powell identified...

Pennsylvania Democrat John Fetterman recreated the classic 1979 Coca-Cola advertisement featuring football legend ‘Mean’ Joe Greene in a bizarre video during his failed 2016 U.S. Senate campaign. The original Coca-Cola advertisement began with Greene, a Pittsburgh Steelers legend, hobbling down the tunnel after a game when a child approaches him to offer a coke. Greene accepts it and tosses this child his jersey, saying, “thanks, kid.”

Ron Reagan’s advertisement for the Freedom From Religion Foundation was the clear winner of the CNN/Des Moines Register Democratic presidential primary debate, according to several Twitter users. Tuesday night's event was criticized for being “low energy,” but one commercial that reappeared several times kept viewers entertained. The Freedom From Religion Foundation ran an advertisement featuring Reagan, who is the son of President Ronald Reagan, proudly declaring that he’s not afraid of “burning in hell.” “Hi, I’m Ron Reagan, an unabashed atheist, and I’m alarmed by the intrusions of religion into our secular government,” Reagan says in the opening of the...

President Obama warned today that 2013 “can be a year of solid economic growth” but warned “self-inflicted wounds in Washington” would hurt progress. Translation: Republicans should surrender and allow more government spending, more “stimulus,” more debt, HIGHER taxes, etc. I don’t think that Republicans will fall for this ploy since it hasn't worked so far. Perhaps it would be easier for President Obama to deal with Grumpy Cat.

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) on Tuesday voted unanimously to approve rules implementing legislation that makes it illegal for advertisers to pump up the volume during television commercial breaks. The law, called the Commercial Advertisement Loudness Mitigation (CALM) Act, aims to answer the complaints of Americans who have for years protested that commercials are too loud. "The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) today took a major step toward eliminating one of the most persistent problems of the television age - loud commercials," the FCC said in a statement following the passage of the CALM rules. "Congress gave the Commission, for the...

If I weren't getting so used to the inequity of political correctness, I would be stunned at this: http://www.blackpeoplemeet.com/index.cfm The Fresh Prince happened to be on TV while I was surfing the Internet and of course, the commercials are aimed toward the largest audience for such programming, black people. For a moment my jaw dropped as I watched the commercial that caught my attention as soon as I heard "black people meet" in the background. To be sure, I checked http://www.whitepeoplemeet.com/ and was redirected to a dating site for Generation X'ers that never once mentioned race. I don't know why...

n.Korea Ends Experiment with TV Commercials North Korea stopped TV commercials in late August, less than two months after they started to be shown in July. A Unification Ministry official on Sunday said occasional advertising of goods on [North] Korean Central TV started July 2 with a commercial for Taedonggang Beer but stopped on Aug. 29. Quoting a North Korea source, the Yonhap news agency reported that North Korean leader Kim Jong-il fired Cha Sung-su, chairman of the Central Broadcasting Commission in charge of all TV programs. Kim was said to have been "enraged" because he regards commercials as the...

How far has Ben Stein sunk? Far enough that I feel compelled to resuscitate the Ben Stein Watch, just to share this unfunny and positively harmful TV ad which is now being aired: "I went to freescore.com and found out my score for free", says Ben, while an annoying squirrel holds up a sign with the word "FREE" in some horrible brush-script font. A few points are worth noting here. First, the score itself is not very useful to consumers. What's useful is the report — if there's an error on the report, then the consumer can try to rectify...

Treasury Works on 'Plan C' To Fend Off Lingering Threats Troubling Issues in Lending Could Still Disrupt Economy By David Cho and Binyamin Appelbaum Washington Post Staff Writers Wednesday, July 8, 2009 As the financial system tries to right itself after its near-collapse last fall, the Treasury Department has assembled a team to examine what could yet bring it down and has identified several trouble spots that could threaten the still-fragile lending industry. Informally known as Plan C, the internal project is focused on vexing problems such as the distressed commercial real estate markets, the high rate of delinquencies among...

Commercial Real Estate Takes a Beating Tuesday, June 30, 2009, Vol. 124, No. 126 ERIC SMITH | The Daily News SILVER LINING: The Wesley Highland Manor senior nursing facility at 3549 Norriswood Ave. near the University of Memphis sold for $7.3 million in May and was by far the top commercial deal for the month. -- PHOTO BY ERIC SMITH Commercial real estate suffered a sharp decline in May, with sales falling dramatically from the same month a year ago and the previous month. Shelby County saw just 35 commercial sales in May, marking a 49 percent dropoff from 69...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tef7je4HMdY

ExposeObama.com put together the commercial below highlighting the Democrat front-runner’s soft record on crime–always an important issue with American voters. ExposeObama had some heavy hitters on board to help put the video together, including Floyd Brown, of Willie Horton fame. One of the key members of our team is Floyd Brown. You may remember Floyd as the man who created the Willie Horton ads which brought the truth about Mike Dukakis directly to the American people. Before the Willie Horton ads came out, Dukakis had a healthy lead over George H.W. Bush in the polls, in part, because the liberal...

Ann Althouse says the new Hillary commercial has a subliminal message: a kid is wearing pajamas that seem to have the letters “NIG” on them. It’s at :12 here:Click logo below to watch: This is, of course, exceedingly silly. The only interesting question is whether Big Media will run with it or not. The answer: possibly. Since it hurts Hillary and helps the Messiah, why not?Once the subliminal craziness starts, my friends, it never stops. I am now receiving e-mails detailing alleged Jewish references as well: Opening shot: light allegedly resembles Star of David.:04 — six-pointed stars on the girl’s...

A national black Republican group is running a radio advertisement accusing Democrats of starting the Ku Klux Klan and saying the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. was a Republican, a claim challenged by civil-rights researchers. The National Black Republican Association ads have been heard in Ohio, the Ohio Democratic Party said Thursday. Republican Party officials and the campaign for Republican gubernatorial nominee Ken Blackwell, who is black, said they haven't heard of the ads and can't say whether they've aired in Ohio. Blackwell, the state's secretary of state, faces Democratic U.S. Rep. Ted Strickland, who is white, in the November...

How about a head start on watching a really cool commerical ~ in this amazing "Colour Like No Other" ad, 250,000 'superballs' come flying, in slow motion, over the brow of a typical street in San Francisco, raining down on anything that gets in their way. And it was done without computer graphics. In an age when CGI is commonplace, this commercial is all the more extraordinary. Every single frame was shot over two days - with the main sequence involving a 23-man camera crew and only one chance to get it right. An entire block was closed off and...

AD WATCH | Evaluating the accuracy of political advertising Edwards Says Bush Favors Wealthy Candidate: John Edwards Market: Iowa EDWARDS: This president should be made to explain why a multimillionaire sitting beside his swimming pool should be paying a lower tax rate than a teacher, than a police officer, than a secretary. < snip > ...the commercial creates a misleading impression. Under Bush's tax cuts, the average single taxpayer Edwards is talking about -- earning less than $68,800 -- pays a rate of 15 percent or 25 percent, plus payroll taxes, while those earning more than $311,950 -- including multimillionaires...