Free Republic

His Agenda: President Obama's convention speech got rough reviews, and rightly so. He offered little but tired bromides and recycled promises. But critics overlooked one promise that will guarantee an even bleaker future. There was plenty to dislike in Obama's speech. The language was flat, his delivery languid. The speech was stuffed with standard Obama chestnuts about the smallness of politics, the corrupting influence of money in politics, and how cynicism is our worst enemy. [snip] But while everyone was picking apart these and other flaws in Obama's speech, they overlooked the most frightening line of all.

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — His re-election in doubt, President Barack Obama conceded only halting progress Thursday night toward solving the nation’s economic woes, but vowed in a Democratic National Convention finale, “Our problems can be solved, our challenges can be met.” “The path we offer may be harder, but it leads to a better place,” Obama said in advance excerpts of a prime-time speech to delegates and the nation. The president’s speech was the final act of a pair of highly scripted national political conventions in as many weeks, and the opening salvo of a two-month drive toward Election Day that...

The Quadrillion Dollar Deflationary Debt Raft Interest-Rates / US DebtSep 05, 2012 - 02:03 AM By: Raul I Meijer Our Down Under roving reporter Skip came up with a few interesting questions when watching an interview that Russia Today recently ran with economist Richard Duncan. Where doth debt take us going forward, and, for that matter, where has it - really - taken us so far? If and when Japan implodes, does that force the US out of the possibility of moving - or already being - into the Japanese deflationary scenario and into something more sinister? Will it be...

Unhappy with his life as a Marine stationed in California, Terence Tyler posed a question three years ago on Twitter: "is it normal to want to kill ALL of ur coworkers?" Struggling with depression, he left the Marines and recently started working at a supermarket in New Jersey. On Friday morning, Tyler shot two co-workers and himself, police said. The 23-year-old, clad in desert camouflage gear, opened fire at a Pathmark store in Old Bridge Township, authorities said. Authorities are investigating his motive, but family members said Tyler was discharged from the Marines two years ago after suffering from depression...

U.S. On The Highway To Hell Politics / US Politics Aug 28, 2012 - 02:19 AM By: Chris Kitze (Monty Perlerin / EconomicNoise.com)The Role of The Government in The Economic Crisis At this point, everything the government is doing – and not just the US government but governments everywhere − is not only the wrong thing but exactly the opposite of the right thing. They’re passing more laws, raising taxes, creating more currency and incurring more debt. They should be doing the opposite. We’re currently still in the eye of the storm. Their actions guarantee that when we go back...

America is becoming a very cold place. If you don't have money, you don't really matter much in our society. The ads on television aren't for you - they are directed at people that actually have good jobs and that can afford to buy the nice little "extras" in life. The politicians aren't really interested in you either - they figure that they can buy your vote with all of the money that they are getting from the wealthy people. When you don't have money, even friends and relatives start to distance themselves from you. Perhaps they are afraid that...

Legendary market maven Bill Gross, the so-called "King of Bonds," said investors will flat-out lose money if they continue employing the "buy and hold" strategies of the past. In his August Investment Outlook, Gross told investors that "financial repression, QEs of all sorts and sizes" and low interest rates will "dominate the timescape" for decades, maybe longer. Investors must adjust to the new world order to avoid being the loser in this zero-growth environment, Gross warned. Ultimately, Gross said, the stock market's historical, inflation-adjusted 6.6% annual growth rate is unsustainable. Gross, of course, is a bond man. In March, he...

I’ve gotten a few requests for an embiggened version of the infamous jobs chart prepared by Obama administration economists Jared Bernstein and Christina Romer back in January 2009 (and updated by me). You know, the chart that predicted what the unemployment rate would be if Congress passed the Obama stimulus plan. Well, here you go. Click it once, let the next page load, and then click it again.

New Gallup unemployment data suggest an increase in the government's seasonally adjusted unemployment rate for August when it is reported on Friday, Sept. 7. During recent months, Gallup's measurements have been more optimistic than those of the BLS. Barring a sharp reversal in this relationship, the government's unadjusted unemployment rate might be expected to stay the same or increase in August. Gallup's Daily tracking of the unemployment situation is based on interviews with more than 30,000 adults over the 30 days ending Aug. 15, and shows essentially no change in the unadjusted unemployment rate at 8.3% compared to 8.2% in...

CHICAGO (AP) — U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. is in a "deep" depression and has "a lot of work" ahead of him on the road to recovery, former Rhode Island U.S. Rep. Patrick Kennedy said Thursday after visiting the hospitalized Chicago Democrat. Jackson has been on a secretive medical leave since June 10, when family members said he collapsed at their home in Washington. He is currently being treated for bipolar disorder at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. But neither his office nor family members have said much about his medical condition. The visit from Kennedy — who has...

Five years into the Long Slump it almost seems as if we are back to square one. China is sufficiently alarmed by the flint hardness of its "soft-landing" to talk up trillions of fresh stimulus. The European Central Bank is preparing to print “whatever it takes”to save Spain and Italy. Markets are pricing in an 80pc chance of yet more printing by the US Federal Reserve in September or soon after. There is no doubt that the three superpowers acting in concert can launch a mini-cycle of growth early next year - assuming they deliver on their rhetoric - but...

Congressman Jesse Jackson Jr. is suffering from debilitating depression and even collapsed at his home in Washington two months ago, his wife said in an interview published Saturday that revealed new details about his secretive leave of absence. Sandi Jackson, who is a Chicago City Council member, told the Chicago Sun-Times that contrary to rumors, her husband did not try to kill himself and was not being treated for alcohol or drug addiction. "No, no, none of that is true," she said. The Chicago Democrat and son of civil rights leader the Rev. Jesse Jackson has been off the job...

When pressed for a “success story” of their policies, Keynesians point with pride to World War II. They claim that it is the perfect illustration of the ability of massive government spending to lift an economy out of the doldrums. In the effort to battle this myth, Steve Horwitz and Michael J. McPhillips offer an interesting new article that analyzes diaries, newspapers, and other primary source documents from the wartime era. They show that average Americans on the home front certainly did not think they were living amidst a great economic recovery. Yet as I’ll show in this article—relying on...

Illinois Congressman Jesse Jackson Jr., whose whereabouts haven't been disclosed since he mysteriously took a medical leave several weeks ago, is being treated for depression at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., according to a statement Friday from the hospital. Jackson is undergoing an extensive inpatient evaluation for depression and for gastrointestinal issues, according to the statement, which also provided the first details about his medical condition. But it provided no details about where the congressman, the son of civil rights leader Jesse Jackson, had previously been staying. [Snip] The timing of [Jackson's] leave has raised questions, in part because...

Some 5.7 million Spaniards, equivalent to almost one in four, are now seeking work, according to official figures. The country's unemployment rate rose to 24.6% during the April to June quarter, up from 24.4% during the previous quarter. Separately, Spain's third largest bank reported an 80% fall in net profits. CaixaBank said net profits fell to 166m euros ($203m; £129m) during the January to June period. CaixaBank also set aside 2.7bn euros against its property assets, in accordance with reform requirements stipulated by the government in May. On Thursday, Spain's biggest bank, Santander, reported that its profits halved during the...

Banks are slowing foreclosure rates yet again, and it isn’t because they are out of borrowers to foreclose on. With the settlement earlier this year, banks began to clear out their existing REO inventory, and they slowed foreclosures in the Southwest in order to modify mortgages to meet their requirements under the settlement (note the uptick in cancellations last month). Ideally, the banks would like to modify loans to keep borrowers in place and complete short sales for those who want to leave. They don’t want to resolve there legacy toxic loans by foreclosure. Unfortunately, borrowers are not cooperating....

BofA: QE3 Is Coming In September Sam Ro July 11, 2012, 7:25 PM Economists spent the afternoon thumbing through the minutes of the June Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting. They were searching for clues on what the Fed's next move might be. Bank of America's economics team led by Michael Hanson and Ethan Harris think that the next move is QE3, a form of monetary policy that involves buying certain securities to lower interest rates. From this afternoon's note to clients: The minutes from the June FOMC meeting revealed a larger number of Fed officials either favoring or willing...

ROUBINI: Next Year Could Be A Global Perfect Storm—Much Worse Than 2008 Henry Blodget Jul. 9, 2012, 6:07 AM NYU Professor Nouriel Roubini is in Aix-en-Provence. But the French countryside hasn't cheered him up any. In fact, in a new video interview with Bloomberg's Caroline Connan, Professor Roubini has outdone himself, issuing a forecast so apocalyptic that even devout Roubini-ites will be startled by its pessimism. (It's the smoothness, eloquence, and utterly matter-of-fact delivery that makes it so alarming). The fun starts at the 5-minute mark. Here are the highlights, which are delivered in perfect bullet-point format by Roubini, one...

In Chairman Bernanake's doctoral thesis, he "focused on the role of monetary policy in affecting economic activity, and on the historical analysis of the causes of the Great Depression." His thesis and resulting understanding of the negative impact that uncertainty has on business cycles should provide insight on the actions needed by government to resolve our current economic difficulties. In short, Dr. Bernanake understood that "[i]t is shown that increased uncertainty provides an incentive to defer such investments in order to wait for new information" (page 2 of the dissertation). In the same paper, he wrote, "Uncertainty is seen to...

How many of you out there today are asking the same question? Will today be America’s last Independence Day? After three and a half years of Barack Obama the economy is in ruins. The regulations more oppressive. The government is more intrusive. And the future looks bleak. Think of this – Just three and a half years ago– ** In President Bush’s last year in office, 2008, the deficit reached $459 billion. Today, for the third year in a row, the US deficit is over a trillion dollars (and Obama still says it’s Bush’s fault). This is after he promised...