Free Republic

It is now five years since the crash of 2008. Today's media and much of our academic crowd, of course, believe that the crisis has been handled, and that we can settle back to "business as usual." But such pundits are viewing only the trees, not the forest. They see correct Federal Reserve policy and legitimate fiscal policy on the part of the Federal Government. But this view comes from a false concept of economics and from a major failing of humans – their use of "euphemism" to flee from reality. For example, almost all of today's scholars and pundits...

What doesn't kill us only makes us stronger, right? Well, not when it comes to bullying. Some may still consider bullying a harmless part of growing up, but mounting evidence suggests that the adverse effects of being bullied aren't something kids can just shake off. The psychological and physical tolls, like anxiety and depression, can follow a person into early adulthood. In fact, the damage doesn't stop there, a British study published this week in the American Journal of Psychiatry suggests. It actually lasts well into the adults' 40s and 50s. "Midlife ... is an important stage in life because...

A new Johns Hopkins study discovers an association between prenatal exposure to antidepressant medications, autism spectrum disorder (ASD), and developmental delays (DD) in boys. Researchers from the Bloomberg School of Public Health found that early prenatal exposure to selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) — commonly prescribed for depression, anxiety, and other disorders — increased the risk for ASD three-fold. Common SSRIs include citalopram (Celexa), escitalopram (Lexapro), fluoxetine (Prozac), paroxetine (Paxil, Pexeva), and sertraline (Zoloft). The study of 1,000 mother-child pairs is published in the online edition of Pediatrics. In the study, investigators analyzed data from large samples of ASD and...

Fort Hood shooter was taking "prescription drugs for depression and anxiety". SSRIs? "Lopez was undergoing a variety of treatments for conditions including depression, anxiety and sleep disturbances, McHugh said. He was prescribed drugs that included Ambien, a sleep aid. Lopez was fully examined last month by a psychiatrist. There was no record of any sign he was likely to commit violence against himself or others, according to McHugh. "So the plan (going) forward was just to continue to monitor and treat him as deemed appropriate," he said." They say that he was "prescribed drugs" but only named one, Ambien, which...

I received this morning a heart–rending request for prayers to Saint Dymphna on behalf of a woman who has been suffering from mental illness for many years. Although I cannot reveal the details of the request, I would ask my dear readers, of their charity, to say the following prayer to Saint Dymphna for this suffering handmaid of God.O glorious Saint Dymphna, virgin martyr and chaste bride of Christ, child of Ireland, bereft of thy mother, object of thy grief-stricken father’s unlawful desires, pure dove who, to preserve thy purity, didst fly to foreign shores, dauntless follower of the immolated...

<p>Abortion proponents push for easy access to abortion, deemphasizing its after-affects to the point they absolutely refuse to acknowledge post-abortion depression, which further incapacitates those actually living through it.</p> <p>This is such a tragedy. Charlotte Dawson, RIP, was born in New Zealand but achieved fame in Australia as a model and a judge on Australia’s Next Top Model.</p>

Very interesting presentation by Thomas Woods, discussing the GD of 1920-1921, the depression nobody ever talks about. Well worth watching, :41, only a couple of slow spots, otherwise entertaining. It is never talked about because the US economy rapidly came out of it with NO federal stimulus; indeed, the Fed lowered taxes and decreased spending during this period. Instead, Warren G. Harding was universally ridiculed for his clumsy speeches; examples of which are given and which sound entirely sensible. Virtually all historians castigate Harding because he was allegedly slow and stodgy, and during the latter half of his term, the...

Nikkei 225 Stock Average declined 610.66 pts or 4.18%, closing at 14,008.47. Toyota edged down by over 5%. Panasonic, Sharp and Hitachi will soon announce quarterly results. Nippon Paint tumbled 21% over the issuance of new shares.

Are you dazed and confused by Barack Obama, the nominal Democrat, whose conduct as president since 2009 has seen him sink from nearly 70 percent to 40 percent or less in the national polling, from which he has seemed to learn nothing, but still marches on? Fear not, the doctor is in: Fred Siegel of the Manhattan Institute, whose latest book, The Revolt Against The Masses: How Liberalism Has Undermined the Middle Class, explains all you wanted to know about Obama, and much else. It explains why he never became the new Franklin D. Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy or Lyndon...

Sometimes words reveal more than they are meant to. When I read the testimonials from the charitable organization Plants for Patients (P4P) I sense a ghostly sadness. P4P hands out plants to abortion patients, succulents because they are “incredibly adaptable” and “come in a vast array of colors and shapes” like the women who experience abortion. The succulent plants are growing in tiny hand-made planters made specially by a ceramic artist. The organization is neither pro-life nor pro-choice, but pro-compassion, offering gifts to women after abortion to show “love and empathy” not “shame and hate.” Why plants? Because scientific research...

People often ask today: if the Fed has created so much new money, why hasn’t it produced more inflation? When the Fed creates masses of new money, it initially flows to Wall Street, which profits from it in a variety of imaginative ways, but from there its path is unpredictable. The Fed inserted into the TARP bill in 2008 the authority to pay interest on bank reserves. Of course this interest is paid by creating even more new money, but it provides an incentive for banks to leave reserves idle. On the other hand, the reserves are not as idle...

On Sunday, Hunter Lewis, Founder and former CEO of Cambridge Associates, told Breitbart News Executive Chairman and host Stephen K. Bannon that, "We are in a depression." Lewis delivered his assessment of the U.S. Economy on Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot radio channel 125. He explained that part of the reason the economy is in such a shambles and the political system is in such a shambles is bad economic policies that have fed special interest groups, instead of supporting the middle class and the poor. And those same policies have given us crony capitalism. Hunter, ....has served...

The 19-year-old daughter of Mayor-elect Bill de Blasio admitted in a YouTube video released on Christmas Eve that she sought treatment for alcohol and drug addiction after years of also battling depression. Chiara de Blasio said in the nearly five-minute video that she'd been suffering from clinical depression since her adolescence and used alcohol to cope with her sadness and anxiety. She said she hopes that by sharing her story, she will inspire others to get help. De Blasio said she thought her problems would be solved by leaving home and going to California for college, 3,000 miles away. But,...

At a time when Wall Street is absolutely swimming in wealth, New York City is experiencing an epidemic of homelessness. According to the New York Times, the last time there was this many homeless children in New York City was during the days of the Great Depression. And the number of homeless children in the United States overall recently set a new all-time record. Americans like to think of themselves as "the wealthiest nation on the planet", and yet the number of young kids that don't even have a roof over their heads at night just keeps skyrocketing. There truly...

Ellen Richardson went to Pearson airport on Monday full of joy about flying to New York City and from there going on a 10-day Caribbean cruise for which she’d paid about $6,000. But a U.S. Customs and Border Protection agent with the Department of Homeland Security killed that dream when he denied her entry. “I was turned away, I was told, because I had a hospitalization in the summer of 2012 for clinical depression,’’ said Richardson, who is a paraplegic and set up her cruise in collaboration with a March of Dimes group of about 12 others. The Weston woman...

Media ‘Saturday Night Live’ Mocks Obama Scandals by Offering ‘Second Term Strength’ Anti-Depressants Nov. 17, 2013 8:05am Oliver Darcy Related: Barack Obama, Beyonce, DOJ Snooping, IRS Intimidation, Libya: The Truth?, Obamacare, Saturday Night Live, Video Late night comedy show “Saturday Night Live” featured a parody commercial on last night’s episode aimed at highlighting the several scandals plaguing President Barack Obama’s second term in office. The skit was a parody advertisement for an anti-depressant dubbed “Paxil: Second Term Strength” which the ad said was “the only anti-depressant strong enough for an embattled second term.”

Officials at Harvard conducted a 12-year study on 43,000 women and found higher rates of depression in those consumed more pasta and other refined grains, according to Newser. The study found that women who cosumed more soda, red meat and refined grains like pasta, white bread and chips were 29 to 41 percent more likely to be diagnosed with depression when compared to women who consumed more wine, coffee and vegetables.

Of all the bitter fruit of the Barack Obama disaster, the most bitter may be the sense of hopelessness that has descended on Americans, especially the young. Has there ever been anything like it in our history? Even on the eve of the Civil War, was there this much pessimism about our future? Gallup wasn’t around in those days, but I wonder. For a simple measure of how the Obama administration has crushed any sense of hopefulness in the American people, take a look at the survey that Rasmussen Reports does periodically on whether America’s best days are behind her,...

China as finally come out in very strong terms and told the U.S. to get its financial house in order. This is now in public. Their warning was straightforward as compared to previous warnings that were generally of the “read between the lines type.” They hold $1.3 trillion worth of treasuries and well over $3 trillion in dollar denominated assets. No matter what anyone says, China now has the ability to “pull our strings” in Washington. Without going any further I should add that I believe that they certainly will pull our strings AND pull the plug on this whole...

The 32-year-old Californian elementary school teacher and mother-of-two who admitted performing sex acts on a 12-year-old student was sentenced on Friday to six-years in prison with no option for parole. Malia Brooks, from Southern California, pleaded guilty in June to three counts of committing lewd acts with a child under 14 and faced up to 12-years in prison, but Judge Kevin McGee imposed a sentence half that because of the fact she was experiencing manic episodes at the time.