Free Republic

Tuesday's Republican presidential debate wasn't the most entertaining, but it was the most educational. The two-hour session gave the candidates a chance to critique the Obama record, as well as tease out the GOP's economic fault lines.

Ted Cruz isn’t the only presidential candidate trying to hide his support of the globalist trade deal known as TPP. Marco Rubio is trying a similar approach at avoidance. It would appear that both Rubio and Cruz have recognized that not only is TPP unpopular, but their support for TPP has the potential to expose their hidden alignments with Wall Street globalists. This election will be won/lost around this issue – watch. Marco Rubio - enters race( Via Breitbart ) Marco Rubio declared the Trans-Pacific Partnership to be one of three essential “pillars” of a Rubio Presidency—is now taking issue...

The prize committee for the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel – known more commonly as the Nobel Prize in Economics – is set to discuss the nomination of bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto. The move comes days after UCLA finance professor Bhagwan Chowdhry penned an op-ed in The Huffington Post stating his intention to nominate Nakamoto for the prize. In his widely-covered article, Chowdhry wrote that Nakamoto deserves the prize because his invention, bitcoin, is "nothing short of revolutionary". Following its publication, however, some observers raised the question of whether Chowdhry violated nomination rules by...

Walter Williams, conservative economist, professor, author, commentator, and occasional fill-in host for Rush Limbaugh, is the scheduled guest on C-Span2's "In-Depth" tomorrow, Sunday November 1. The show runs from noon until 3PM EST. It features discussion of Williams' writings and philosophy and responses to viewers' emails and call-ins. Williams' most recent book is American Contempt for Liberty. His other books include Race & Economics and Up from the Projects.

By Frosty Wooldridge “Tolerance and apathy are the last virtues of a dying society,” said French historian-philosopher Voltaire. Within the next 24 months, John Kerry and Congress, abetted by Barack Obama, expect to import 200,000 Syrian Muslim refugees into our country. That’s on top of the usual 1,000,000 (million) legal refugee immigrants expected to land on our shores in 2016 and another 1,000,000 (million) more in 2017. That’s on top of the 100,000,000 (million) total legal immigrant refugees projected to land on our shores within 30 years.  (Source: US Population Projections by Fogel/Martin; PEW Research Center) Ironically, you won’t hear a...

Until we entered the Great Recession, most economists regarded Keynesian economics as a relic of the past. You could still find it discussed in some introductory textbooks. But, as University of Chicago economist John Cochrane points out, it wasn’t on the syllabus in any of the leading graduate schools. Then came the most serious downturn since the Great Depression and something living economists had never seen before: interest rates that were near zero and in some cases negative. Keynes himself speculated that the economy could become stuck in a liquidity trap – where monetary policy is ineffective and only fiscal...

Listen to Jacki's interview with Scott Tinker, Director of the Bureau of Economic Geology at University of Texas in Austin. Scott Tinker, University of Texas in Austin

When it comes to considering the arguments of newly resurgent Christian progressives, we hold these truths to be self-evident: Jesus was not a socialist, the Bible is not an economics textbook, and while scripture commands believers to help the poor, it also commands the poor to help themselves. As Pope Francis gains rock-star status on the economic left, Christians would do well to remember not just scripture, but the economic reality of recent world experience. This morning, the pope addressed Congress with relative restraint. Rather than decrying the perceived excesses of global capitalism — calling it, as he once...

The “Economic Freedom of the World Index” published by the Fraser Institute of Canada measures the degree to which the world’s 157 nations and territories permit voluntary, peaceful economic exchanges between their own citizens and with people in other countries. The most recent index has just been released, and based on data from 2013, it ranks the United States 16th in economic freedom. Given this country’s history and traditions, America should be far and away No. 1; that fact that it does not hold the top slot is yet more evidence of how governance has gone off track in this...

I've been a Roman Catholic since 1954. I have great respect for Pope Francis. When it comes to matters of faith and morals, what he says, goes. But when it comes to politics and economics, the pope is about as far from infallible as anyone can get. For example, he was in Cuba earlier this week, meeting informally with Fidel Castro and touring the island to say Masses and meet with priests. Apparently the pope was having such a good time he forgot that for more than half a century Cuba has been a rotten communist prison camp and his...

I’m not interesting in commenting on the specifics of either party’s job plan. There are, no doubt, many good ideas that could help the economy and many bad ideas to avoid. I’ll let you decide which are which.But I thought it might be worthwhile to think about where private sector jobs come from. Most basically, new jobs come from people with money to spend who want to spend their money on more people. This means:(1) The employer must have money. He may spend his own money. Or he may borrow money from investors or the bank. But somehow he...

Many people argue that liberals, socialists and progressives do not understand basic economics. I am not totally convinced about that. Take the law of demand, for example, one of the fundamental principles of economics. It holds that the lower the cost of something the more people will take or do of it. Conversely, the higher the cost the less people will take or do something. By their actions, liberals fully understand the law of demand. Let's look at some proof. The Seattle City Council voted unanimously to establish a tax on gun and ammunition sales. Hillary Clinton has called for...

Most people don't know what a socialist is. Socialist sounds too much like "social." A socialist, I suspect, for most Americans means to be "social." Who could be opposed to that? Bernie Sanders is a Socialist. In reality, he's a theft using the respectability of the United States Senate as cover for his criminal views. Like all socialists, Sanders believes it's OK to steal from people if he can get enough votes and enough support from the people he will be stealing for -- the beneficiaries of his thieving ways. Of course, Sanders isn't the only socialist in Congress. Most...

Bush's plan starts by slashing tax rates. He'd return to the top personal income tax rate of 28% that America had when Ronald Reagan left office. That top rate, by the way, was a true bipartisan reform designed in part by congressional Democrats like Bill Bradley and Dick Gephardt. The rate has since migrated up to 42%, with many Democrats longing to tax the rich well above 50%. Middle-class tax rates would fall to 10% for families with incomes up to $89,000 and to 25% for incomes up to $163,800. For singles, the thresholds are lower. But the thresholds are...

The Washington Post’s “Wonkblog” recently ran a piece titled, “What it’s like to be a part of the world’s richest 1 percent, in 15 incredible photos.” This features photos of a man floating in a swimming pool on top of a skyscraper, an in-home cinema, maids, the Opéra de Monte-Carlo, the Hollywood Walk of Fame, a patient about to undergo plastic surgery, a personal chef at a luxury lodge and a gated community. The article is about a new photo collection which is attempting to draw more attention to wealth inequality. But those protesting about this issue in America may...

Economist Paul Krugman thinks Donald Trump's presidential campaign actually gets a few things right. Krugman previously derided the Republican real-estate mogul as a "belligerent, loudmouth racist with not an ounce of compassion." But in a Monday op-ed in The New York Times, the left-leaning writer praised Trump's "heresies" from Republican orthodoxy when it comes to economic policy. "So am I saying that Mr. Trump is better and more serious than he's given credit for being?" Krugman asked, making it clear that he is still not a Trump supporter. "Not at all — he is exactly the ignorant blowhard he seems...

Jim Bryan III, 75, of Longboat Key, FL, died Sep. 1, 2015 at Arkansas Hospice from complications of pancreatic cancer. He was born in Harrison, AR in 1940 to the late J.W. and Jane Bryan of Bellefonte, AR. He was preceded in death by his son Joey (who died of a brain tumor in 1981 at age ten) and grandparents Witt and Zula Burns Bryan and Noah and Myrtle Eoff Dearing. He is survived by his beloved wife of 52 years, Ann, son Jim, IV and his wife Ann, son Chris and his wife Jennifer, grandchildren Laura and her newlywed...

The quote of the day comes from pages 476-477 of the 5th edition (2015) of Thomas Sowell’s Basic Economics:At one time, it was believed that importing more than was exported impoverished a nation because the difference between import and exports had to be paid in gold, and the loss of gold was seen as a loss of national wealth. However, as early as 1776, Adam Smith’s classic The Wealth of Nations argued that the real wealth of a nation consists of its goods and services, not its gold supply.\ Too many people have yet to grasp the full implications of...

The amusement is strong from this one.... The economy has made great gains and is approaching an acceptable normal. Policy should shortly acknowledge this reality. The Fed took extraordinary policy measures in response to extraordinary economic conditions. Conditions are no longer extraordinary. Compared to earlier in the year, we know a lot more and can shelve some concerns. We appear to be past the most acute concerns of a spillover from Europe. I have more confidence in the resilience of the economy today compared to even a few months ago. I am much less concerned about a reversal of economic...

RUSH: Yesterday, remember there was the story about Dan Price, who has the credit card processing company out in Seattle. Back in April, you know the drill here, he announced that he read $70,000 is the magic salary. Everybody that makes 70 grand is pretty happy, pretty productive, and so he made a decision that everybody in his company in Seattle was gonna be paid $70,000, including him. He was earning over a million. He cut his own salary down to 70 grand. New hires got 70 grand. The most experienced people there got 70 grand. The slackers got 70...