Free Republic

California has a $26 billion budget deficit and is now issuing IOU's to creditors. If you thought they would be working hard to solve the budget crisis, you would be wrong. They are debating Cow Tails. Unbelievable. Video here.

V TO THOSE CALLING THEMSELVES REPUBLICANS: “Only to realize far too late in the day,/As stone becomes dust/The world is a field of chameleons.” — from Chameleon by G. G. Falderal I am writing to those of you who currently take the mantle of “Republican” but hold to little, if any, of the party’s core conservative beliefs. Those in this group include, but are certainly not limited to, John McCain, Olympia Snow, Colin Powell, David Brooks, Lindsey Graham, Susan Collins, Mary Bono Mack, Mike Castle, Mark Kirk, John McHugh, Frank LoBiondo, Leonard Lance, Dave Reichert, and Chris Smith. The last...

Minutes ago, the Democrats in the House passed a devastating energy tax in the form of a cap-and-trade program. The Democrats claimed that their legislation is a jobs bill that will cost no more than a postage stamp per household per day. They suggested it will allow us to take the lead in the alternative energy industry and create new jobs across the country. They lied to you.

"Special coverage: Law Enforcement and the Economy" CHICAGO — SNIPPET: "As hundreds of jobs in Chicago's police department go unfilled, officers who once patrolled the streets with partners are riding alone in what some cops bitterly call "rolling coffins."" SNIPPET: "This is what the nation's economic crisis looks like in law enforcement. As tax revenue shrivels, police agencies that for years were bulletproof when it came to funding are tightening their belts. Some worry that criminals will take advantage of the situation."

Note: The following text is a quote: THE BRIEFING ROOM • THE BLOG THE BLOG TUESDAY, JUNE 23RD, 2009 AT 11:00 AM Chains in Command Posted by Jared Bernstein Ed. Note: The Middle Class Task Force is meeting today on the future of American manufacturing in Perrysburg, Ohio. When we think about manufacturing in America, most of us probably picture a big factory churning out cars or refrigerators. But there’s another side to manufacturing in America: the supply chains that provide these end-users with the inputs they need to make the final product. In fact, there are more workers at...

Head Smashed In? There is a town in Alberta, Canada with the evocative name of Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump. It takes its name from a geologic feature that North American Indians used to hunt bison. The Indians would stealthily arrange themselves around a herd of bison and, at a signal, jump up and alarm the herd into a stampede. By their strategic positioning, the Indians would cause the herd to stampede over a cliff (the buffalo jump) thus killing or sufficiently injuring the animals so that they'd be short work for Indians waiting below the cliff. The Obama administration has been...

SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- Forget green shoots. We've seen a veritable hothouse of economic, market and political vegetation sprouting in the past several days that clearly shows the worst of the financial crisis is over. If only investors could be so sure. The latest piece of good news came from Mr. Green Shoot himself, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, when his central bank released its monthly Beige Book report Wednesday on economic activity, saying that five of its 12 district banks around the country reported that the downturn was moderating. That's not exactly a shotgun start to the next bull...

Take a minute to think about your view of human history, and our continued progression as a species. Do you believe human history is linear, always getting better, onward and upwards to a better existence? Is it chaotic, stuff happens, people react, then more stuff happens, but there's no pattern to it? Or, is human history cyclical...with those who neglect history destined to repeat it? Most of the Western world subscribes to the linear school of thought. Things are always moving in a general direction - sometimes good, sometimes bad, but always moving. And I'd assume that most people believe...

The Obama administration has used TARP participation by banks and other financial and private-sector companies to demand control over their business practices, noting that their voluntary acceptance of taxpayer funds allows the administration stakeholder rights. But how voluntary was the decision by banks to take the money? A new report from CNS and Judicial Watch shows that then-Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson told these institutions that if they didn’t accept it voluntarily, the government would force them to take it, and that wasn’t Obama’s call: Last October, then-Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson ordered nine banks that the Treasury Department described as “healthy”...

/begin my excerpts Speculation Mounts on Worsening Kim's Health N. Korea's provocation may be due to (hurrying up) succession (Beijing = Yonhap News) Kwon Young-suk = Speculation spreads rapidly among Beijing's diplomatic circles that the health of N. Korean leader Kim Jong-il, who suffered a stroke last August is deteriorating again. Diplomatic sources in Beijing said on June 4, "S. Korea, U.S., China, and Japan are lately paying close attention to health of Kim Jong-il." This is because analysis of the escalating tension including the second nuclear test lent credence to the argument that Kim Jong-il want to hurry up...

Two years ago, economist Moritz Schularick and I coined the word "Chimerica" to describe what we saw as the key relationship in the then-booming global economy: China plus America. Cheap Chinese labour was making US corporations highly profitable. Spendthrift American consumers, in turn, were keeping Chinese corporations busy with export orders. And the Chinese monetary authorities were converting export surpluses into dollar denominated reserves with the aim of preventing their own currency from appreciating. The unintended consequence was a multi-billion dollar credit line to the United States, financing America's deficit at rock-bottom rates. It was those low long-term rates –...

Fixing the economy requires overhauling the U.S. health care system, a White House report concludes — just the message the administration needs to help implement a sweeping new social welfare program during a recession. The report by the White House Council of Economic Advisers says that health care costs — now about 18 percent of the gross domestic product — will rise to 34 percent in 30 years if left unchecked, wreaking havoc on the federal deficit, businesses and working Americans. Obama administration officials, urgently seeking to build momentum for health care legislation, planned to discuss the report's findings at...

A corrupt parliament; an unprincipled government; an economy sinking under a mountain of debt - and a people enraged. Not a bad description of Britain in 2009. Also not a bad description of Britain nearly two centuries ago, in the dismal decade of distress and discontent that followed the Napoleonic Wars. Yes, we've been in this mess before. The question is: How did we get out of it? And can we do it again? In his Rural Rides, which he began writing in 1822 and published in 1830, the radical journalist William Cobbett portrayed a country groaning under the twin...

Still not convinced? Green shoots are sprouting into a jungle around the world. Consider a few of the economic indicators published in the past two weeks: British house prices have risen in two of the past three months. Japan has experienced its biggest monthly increase in industrial production since the Fifties. Consumer and business sentiment are rising strongly in the United States and Britain and are even showing some signs of life in Europe. In America, where all the trouble started, unemployment claims have fallen, durable goods orders and property sales have bounced back and house prices have stabilised, although...

On the 30th anniversary of the Iranian Hostage crisis Iran’s Supreme leader responds to US President Obama’s video message with sound defiance suggesting that until they see the changes US President Obama preached during his election campaign then don’t expect much of a policy shift from Tehran. During the election most Iranians were intensely enthusiastic to see a US Black man with Hussein as his middle name take the highest office of the United States. The name "Hussein" is very sacred for Shia Iranians as this was the name of their third beloved Imam who, even today maintains a very...

Home prices fell 19.1% in the first quarter compared to the previous year, the largest decline in the 21-year history of Standard & Poor’s Case-Shiller Home Price Index series. Case-Shiller’s 20-city index for March saw an 18.7% decline, including a 6.1% drop in Minneapolis, the largest monthly decline for any metro area in the history of the indices. Paul Dales, U.S. economist for Capital Economics in Toronto, pointed out the massive home price gains from 2000 to 2006 have now vanished. Home prices have fallen back to 2002 levels in nominal terms, according to Case Shiller. But they’ve returned to...

It's been a tough week for the Terminator everywhere but the box office. On May 19, California voters solidly rejected a series of ballot initiatives that would have provided Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger with short-term fixes to help patch the state's $21 billion budget deficit. Then, while in Washington, Schwarzenegger got the cold shoulder from Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and legislative leaders when he asked the federal government to help guarantee some of the state's future borrowings. Back in California May 21, Schwarzenegger said he'd gotten the message and was asking budget team to go back to cutting board. "The people...

Poll: Should the U.S. Treasury Bail Out California?

BRATISLAVA, Slovakia -- This pleasant city on the Danube River is considered part of eastern Europe, although it is only as about as far from Vienna as Washington is from Baltimore (about 35 miles) and is, in fact, near the geographical center of the European continent. Slovakia was the poorer part of the former Republic of Czechoslovakia until 1993 when the country split in two parts, one being Slovakia (the Slovak Republic) and the other the Czech Republic. Economic growth languished until a reform government took over in 1998, established a set of policies that gave it one of the...

The US dollar is not Russia’s basic reserve currency anymore. The euro-based share of reserve assets of Russia’s Central Bank increased to the level of 47.5 percent as of January 1, 2009 and exceeded the investments in dollar assets, which made up 41.5 percent, The Vedomosti newspaper wrote. The dollar has thus lost the status of the basic reserve currency for the Russian Central Bank, the annual report, which the bank provided to the State Duma, said. In accordance with the report, about 47.5 percent of the currency assets of the Russian Central Bank were based on the euro, whereas...

The Credit Card Death Spiral By Ian Cooper | Thursday, May 14th, 2009 The stress tests are done. The results were so-so. Financials are up. Unfortunately, foreclosures are still climbing, credit card defaults are growing and could out-pace unemployment, and no one knows how to value toxic assets. But the bank crisis has been solved! Yep, and I'm the king of England. Just as we called back in July 5, 2008, credit cards have and will continue to take it on the chin. But not many people listened: "AXP will be fine," one reader said. "You're blowing the consumer issue...

There is a long list of professions that failed to see the financial crisis brewing. Wall Street bankers and deal-makers top it, but banking regulators are on it as well, along with the Federal Reserve. Politicians and journalists have shared the blame, as have mortgage lenders and even real estate agents. But what about economists? Of all the experts, weren't they the best equipped to see around the corners and warn of impending disaster?

Note: Video included. # Note: The following text is a quote: THE BRIEFING ROOM • THE BLOG Wednesday, May 13th, 2009 at 1:12 pm Health Care Reform: “Urgency and Determination” download .mp4 (92.6 MB) | read the transcript This morning the President, Speaker Pelosi, and Leadership from the House of Representatives emerged from a meeting together with a new target on moving forward with health reform: pass legislation through the House by July 31st. The President spoke to the press after the Speaker in the South Drive at the Oval Office, telling them that "this is a gorgeous day and...

WASHINGTON (AFP) – US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said Wednesday that the financial system "is starting to heal" as a result of massive efforts to rescue banks and steady the housing market. In a speech to community bankers, Geithner said the adjustment in the financial system has largely been accomplished as a result of government rescue efforts. "The financial system is starting to heal," he said. "Concern about systemic risk has diminished. And overall lending conditions have started to improve." Geithner said this is reflected in easier borrowing conditions for corporate bonds and interbank lending as well as for mortgages,...

President Barack Obama will aim on Monday to build support for a sweeping overhaul of the U.S. healthcare system by highlighting a drive for greater efficiency he predicts could save trillions of dollars. Obama has invited several large trade groups, such as the American Medical Association, America's Health Insurance Plans and the American Hospital Association, to an event to discuss ways to wring cost savings from the health system. At a 12:30 p.m. EDT event, the trade groups will present Obama a letter pledging to reduce the growth of health spending by 1.5 percentage points annually through more efficient practices,...

NOAA released its prediction for sunspot cycle 24 this past Friday, May 8 - - normally a droll affair, attended by few and hardly worthy of politics. No more. Like eveything else coming out of Washington, D.C., this NOAA report has a "spin" attached, in the form of a sensationalized tale of solar-storm damage. Well, NOAA is a Federal government agency, and the Federal government these days operates on the basis of crisis!!!, be it real, imagined, or manufactured.

The people who promote the so-called “Tea Party”, and who made a lot of money doing it, at least help to undermine Obama’s credibility, deflate his messianic pretensions, sow widespread public discontent with his socialist economic program, and perhaps even limit, on an ad hoc basis, the amount of damage he can cause. But just about all of their grievances relate to the pocketbook. They do not address hardly at all the greatest causes and FUNDAMENTAL ROOTS of the destruction of America. For example, among so many great evils indicated in this article, they do not address the evil of...

Outbreak! was the title of the movie released in 1995 about an Ebola epidemic, inspired by news reports of outbreaks of the deadly virus in Africa. Some experts opined that "it could happen here" and that it was just a matter of time before Ebola would show up in the US. Never one to play along, I posted a sign in my office in 1996 that if Ebola broke out here I would move to Africa and live with the monkeys. I am still here. In 2003 a horrible new disease was spreading out of Asia. SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory...

The people who do TV news -- the big-time, ostensibly serious, 24/7 stuff -- know what the audience likes. One of the things they've found out about us is there's nothing we find more entertaining than a crisis. We love that hint of danger -- vicarious, of course, but not so far removed that we can't put ourselves in the shoes of the real people who are going through something kind of scary. Governments love crises, too. Crises offer the chance to sound concerned look busy and tell us what good care they're taking of us. And made-up crises are...

U.S. President Barack Obama marked his 100th day in office Wednesday by rallying support for his policies, and tackling an unfolding health crisis. On day 100, the president took questions from the public at a school near St. Louis, Missouri. "It is great to be back in the middle of America, where common sense often reigns," he said. And he fielded inquiries from reporters beneath the chandeliers of the White House East Room at his third formal news conference. Originally, the White House downplayed the 100 day marker. But in the end, it embraced the chance to showcase the president's...

The swine flu scare is all set to surpass the dramatic turnaround in air travel caused by the Sars epidemic. The news of swine flu broke out in India on Monday and in just two days, the rate of cancellation has jumped for international travel. While airlines said it’s too early to comment, Amadeus — one of the biggest technology providers for ticketing — said 2-4% increase in cancellations has already happened and this could rise further in coming days. “Because of flu, we have seen a jump in cancellations for international travel transactions made in India in past two...

Rahm Emmanuel, Pres. Obama's chief of staff, is known as a strategist, manager, and organizer of considerable ability. For the blindly partisan, this will make them see red. For those who try to fairly evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of an opponent, it will be a point that makes them pause. As he was preparing to take his place in the Obama Administration, Emmanuel is quoted as saying that politicians can have tremendous success manipulating a crisis, even if it is a manufactured crisis. "You never want a serious crisis to go to waste. And what I mean by that...

U.S. officials said yesterday that they are renaming the swine flu crisis the "2009 H1N1 virus outbreak" and warned other countries not to "ban or prevent" imports of U.S. pork or other products. "This really isn't swine flu. It's H1N1 virus," Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said. "We want to say to consumers here and abroad that there is no risk to you. There is no scientific evidence whatsoever that there is any link between consuming pork, prepared pork products and the H1N1 virus," U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk added. Prices of U.S. pork, corn and soybeans dived Monday after Russia,...

Does this POTUS ever leave campaign mode? Apparently not. As the media hypes the swine flu to unreasonable heights, the POTUS decides to weigh in in the attempt to temper the hype, but can't resist getting in another talking point for government spending. President Barack Obama said Monday that he is closely monitoring the swine flu, and the global outbreak is cause for concern but not alarm. "We face more complex challenges than we have ever faced before,” Obama said. “If there was ever a day that reminded us of our shared stake in science and research, it’s today,” Obama...

Obama to not let crisis go to waste with press conference @ 9AM this am per Fox News. What will TOTUS add that was not said yesterday.

WASHINGTON (AFP) – The IMF and World Bank have warned that the global economic crisis is turning into a "human calamity" and called on members to speed up pledged aid and give even more to help the most vulnerable. At the end of spring meetings in Washington, the two Bretton Woods institutions on Sunday told their 185 member countries that the worst global slump in generations had already driven more than 50 million people into extreme poverty. "The global economy has deteriorated dramatically ... Developing countries face especially serious consequences as the financial and economic crisis turns into a human...

We're doomed. Is it even safe to listen to Pink Floyd Animals anymore?

One. Trillion. Dollars. The CDC yesterday, joined with the WHO (and the same media types who put 0bozo on the cover of Time magazine now 13 times) in declaring the Mexican flu a "crisis". Which brings to mind. Those famous words of Rahm Emanuel:

Haven't seen so much media-generated hysteria since forever. But it's all bull. Smoke. All of it. Every. Single. Year. 30,000 Americans are killed by this exact same Flu. Type A. How many Americans have succumbed to this one? (that's a rhetorical question) I suspect, this is all an elaborate ruse. To cover up our "dear leader's" plummeting approval numbers. Someone, has been doing some polling. That's what I think.

Note: The following text is a quote: April 22, 2009 TG-97 Secretary Timothy F. Geithner Remarks before The Economic Club of Washington As Prepared for Delivery Thank you, David. I appreciate the chance to speak to the Economic Club of Washington. I want to talk today about the global nature of the current financial and economic crisis. I will offer an update on our efforts to bring the crisis to a close and set the stage for a new, more balanced prosperity in the future. The world economy is going through the most severe crisis in generations. We each face...

WASHINGTON – The Senate has agreed to spend $5 million to investigate the cause of the economic crisis, as it moves toward passing a $245 million bill that would substantially increase the number of FBI agents and prosecutors working mortgage fraud cases. ... "We must hold those responsible for this calamity to account," said Sen. Kent Conrad, D-N.D.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said on Wednesday that the United States bears a substantial share of the blame for the current economic crisis but the world must work together to ease the strains. "The rest of the world needs the U.S. economy and financial system to recover in order for it to revive," Geithner told the Economic Club of Washington. "Just as importantly, we need the rest of the world to recover if we are to prosper again here at home." But a balanced recovery will mean that other countries cannot be "dependent on the U.S. consumer."

The Quiet Coup The crash has laid bare many unpleasant truths about the United States. One of the most alarming, says a former chief economist of the International Monetary Fund, is that the finance industry has effectively captured our government—a state of affairs that more typically describes emerging markets, and is at the center of many emerging-market crises. If the IMF’s staff could speak freely about the U.S., it would tell us what it tells all countries in this situation: recovery will fail unless we break the financial oligarchy that is blocking essential reform. And if we are to prevent...

Mohamed Heikal, the Egyptian newspaper editor and confidant of President Nasser in the 1960s, captured the excitement felt in the Middle East when a new US president takes office. Whatever the shortcomings of the American political system, he said, it at least provides variety and the regular promise of change. “Each new face in the White House means a whole new team of decision-makers recruited from the best brains available in the business world, the universities, the law and anywhere talent is to be found.” That moment described by Heikal, even though he was writing 30 years ago, is what...

Affluencein the 1950’s, 60’s and 70’s brought about complacency in the 1980’s and 90’s.Complacency then brought apathy by the turn of the century. This procession of events is commonly referred to as the Cycle of the Body Politic that was believed to be promoted by noted Scottish Historian Alexander Tyler in the mid 1780’s. The election of Barack Obama in 2008 ushered in the Age of Dependency whereas a significant portion of the population had voluntarily gave up their liberties for government security. Although one can blame the Far Left for engineering the current state of affairs, it the American...

Last week saw a continuation of the impenetrably misguided policy response to this financial crisis, which seeks to address the downturn by encouraging more of what got us into this mess in the first place. The U.S. Treasury's toxic assets plan, for instance, looks to "leverage" public funds (with the FDIC providing the "6-to-1 leverage") in order to defend the bondholders of mismanaged financials who took excessive leverage. At the same time, the Treasury plans to limit the "competitive bidding" to a few hand-picked "managers" who will be encouraged to overpay thanks to put options granted at public expense. This...

When the tree fell in the financial forest, the reported sound was deafening but hardly anyone talked about the ax. Imagine if Hitler had won World War Two and having done so, his historians and propaganda machine would never speak of his crimes. Rather, they would blame all the problems on those horrible, nasty Jews led by Churchill and Roosevelt...

LONDON (Reuters) - World leaders are set to declare an end to unfettered capitalism at a G20 summit on Thursday after France and Germany demanded they act fast on promises to prevent a repeat of the worst economic crisis since the 1930s. A communique drafted for release at a G20 summit in London, obtained by Reuters, signaled that leaders would submit large hedge funds to supervision for the first time and enhance regulation through a new agency and a beefed-up International Monetary Fund.

The organization NARAL Pro Choice America blasted Virginia’s Governor Tim Kaine — the chairman of the Democratic National Committee — on Tuesday for signing a bill that, NARAL says, includes state funding for crisis pregnancy centers. Essentially, if someone buys a “Choose Life” license plate, some of the proceeds would go to crisis centers. NARAL claims that crisis pregnancy centers — which exist to dissuade women from having an abortion — mislead woman. In New York, abortion rights groups lobbied Attorney General Eliot Spitzer to shut down such centers because they allegedly “scared” women. As a life-long feminist, I find...

North Korea already has the capacity to launch a nuclear missile strike against Seoul and Tokyo, even before the long-range rocket test that it is promising in the next few days, an international think-tank has reported.