Free Republic

There is a cynical expectation, at least among the global punditry, that wise politicians employ any expedient rhetoric to win elections and that, once victorious, do precious little to unsettle a cosy consensus. There was a quiet expectation in some quarters that the 45th President of the United States would do precisely that. Even after he made a joke of the entire polling industry and beat Hilary Clinton on November 8, there was a belief that Donald Trump should be allowed his indulgences -- such as engaging with Taiwan and describing NATO as 'obsolete' -- till his inauguration on January...

President Trump says he will be the greatest jobs producer God ever created. "I'm going to work very hard on that. We need certain amounts of other things, including a little bit of luck, but I think we're going to do a real job," he said recently. While his critics laughed and economists urged caution, the truth is American manufacturing is already showing signs of confidence and optimism about a Trump presidency. U.S. CEO's are rewarding the incoming administration with a flurry of announcements promising new jobs, bigger inventories and a reduction of operations moving to Mexico and abroad. Some...

President Obama and his team still engage in a hissy fit over Donald Trump's questioning Obama's place of birth... ...in 2000, a number of disgruntled Democrats referred to him as "President Select." Now President-elect Trump is being hammered over his refusal to except the intelligence community's consensus about Russia's alleged role in the election. All of the intel agencies maintain that the Russian government attempted to influence our election, and that Russia preferred Trump over Hillary Clinton. From the outset, Trump doubted both the argument that Russia hacked the Democratic National Committee and that the release of damaging emails was...

The day of reckoning for the Wall Street is nearly here. Donald Trump is set to be sworn in as leader of the free world and the level of consternation in the market is palpable. That is not to say that equities won’t continue to carve out fresh records, spurred by animal spirits; or that Trump’s promise to “make America great again” won’t come to fruition, leading to halcyon days for investors from the lowest sociopolitical rung to the deepest-pocketed 1%... ...“I’m dying to look back at this and like the outcome,” Blankfein said on Wednesday during an interview on...

The American middle class is disappearing. We hear it from everybody. Senator Bernie Sanders (D., Vt.) focused throughout his campaign on what he termed the “disappearing middle class” — disappearing, Sanders said, thanks to income inequality. Sanders explained, “If you have seen a massive transfer of wealth from the middle class to the top one-tenth of 1 percent, you know what, we’ve got to transfer that back if we’re going to have a vibrant middle class.” From the other side, Donald Trump has echoed the same message: “The American worker is being crushed. . . . The great American middle...

The number of people receiving unemployment checks in Michigan reached at least a 30-year low this past October. In the week of Oct. 8, 2016, there were 39,395 people receiving unemployment insurance. That’s the lowest number since 1987, the earliest year for which online records are available. By comparison, during the Great Recession, 186,801 people in Michigan received an unemployment check during the week of Oct. 10, 2009. The highest number of people receiving unemployment benefits since 1987, however, occurred the week of Jan. 24, 2009, at 363,212. “Just confirmation that the economy of the state is doing very well,”...

<p>Tax "reform," starting with taxes on business, seems to be on everyone's agenda, and it may be a place where the incoming Trump administration and its Democratic critics find common ground. But it's still going to be a slog, and one reason is so-called "pass-through" businesses whose taxes are levied at personal income tax rates.</p>

NEW HAVEN – Speculative markets have always been vulnerable to illusion. But seeing the folly in markets provides no clear advantage in forecasting outcomes, because changes in the force of the illusion are difficult to predict. In the United States, two illusions have been important recently in financial markets. One is the carefully nurtured perception that President-elect Donald Trump is a business genius who can apply his deal-making skills to make America great again. The other is a naturally occurring illusion: the proximity of Dow 20,000. The Dow Jones Industrial Average has been above 19,000 since November, and countless news...

Donald Trump hasn’t moved into the White House yet, but the president-elect is already influencing the outlook for global economic growth. This week, the International Monetary Fund raised its US economic growth forecast by half a percent for 2017 and 2018, as a result of Trump’s planned tax cuts, infrastructure spending and regulatory reform. The IMF now expects the US economy to grow 2.3% this year and 2.5% next year. But Paul Sheard, chief economist at S&P Global, says the outlook for economic growth is largely dependent on which Donald Trump we get in the White House. Sheard believes there...

Good afternoon. It is a pleasure to join all of you at the Commonwealth Club today, not the least because the club and the Federal Reserve have a few things in common. Both organizations, as it happens, have a board of governors and a chair. And both the club's and the Fed's histories extend back more than a century. The club, as many here know, was founded in 1903, and the Federal Reserve a decade later. Perhaps because of our shared origins in the Progressive Era, a period of reform in American life, we hold certain values in common. According...

Tech Mahindra will continue to invest in hiring more and more local people in the US as part of its efforts to augment competitiveness across locations, CEO CP Gurnani told a TV news channel on Wednesday. “Tech Mahindra is very conscious that not only the US, but the world is about localisation now,” Gurnani said in an interview to ET Now on the sidelines of the ongoing World Economic Forum in Davos. “Local skills have to be upgraded so that the products continue to be getting delivered,” he said. He was responding to queries on concerns about the US President-elect...

On the day before Thanksgiving, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced the final levels of renewable fuel required to be blended into gasoline next year, officially known as the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS). In 2017, the RFS will rise to 19.28 billion gallons, up from 18.11 billion gallons in 2016. A part of the Energy Policy Act of 2005, which was expanded in 2007 by the Energy Independence and Security Act and is administered by EPA, RFS requires 36 billion gallons of renewable fuel sources, such as ethanol, be blended into gasoline and diesel fuel by 2022. Two reports released...

Imagine a short person spending his days cursing the “strong” inch for it “robbing” him of impressive height? Better yet, please contemplate a compulsive eater who blames his substantial weight on a pound that is too “weak.” Wise minds would mock the unhinged individuals who would rage at the foot ruler, inch, pound, and scale for revealing reality. Such people would logically be the object of our ridicule and scorn, or maybe just pity. Scales, rulers, inches and pounds are measures. Nothing else. They don’t weaken or strengthen us. They just are. What’s important about them is that if the...

Health Reform: Over the weekend, Donald Trump said he's nearly finished with an ObamaCare replacement plan. Based on the sketchy outline he provided, Trump's vision of health care reform is troubling. In a phone interview with the Washington Post on Saturday, Trump said the replacement plan is "very much formulated down to the final strokes." No problem there. Trump has the right political instincts about how to get rid of ObamaCare. Rather than repeal a portion of it through the reconciliation process — as Republican congressional leaders propose — then delay even that until a replacement plan gets hammered out,...

The Copyright Industry, especially the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America), and MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America) have suppressed every form of innovation, and technology to protect their questionable rights. In the 80s, they sued to stop video recorders, but were thankfully held back by the Supreme Court in the famous Betamax case. The Media Industry forced manufacturers of blank cassettes, tapes, and CDs to pay a royalty... ...1998, the RIAA sued to stop the first portable Mp3 player, Diamond Rio, from being sold. In 1999, they took down Napster... ...In 2014, the RIAA considered suing Google for even...

The mainstream press loves to tell readers that it can be trusted because it employs professional journalists backed by layers of editors. Oh, and they're all unbiased. So how to explain a recent Washington Post headline, which manages both to misrepresent its own poll and expose the ridiculous extent to which its reporters and editors will go to bash President-elect Donald Trump? The story is about a Washington Post/ABC News poll that asks, among other things, whether Trump should sell his business to avoid any possible conflicts of interest while president. Trump has taken steps to avoid these conflicts, although...

SEOUL--Hyundai Motor Co. (005380.SE) said Tuesday it will invest as much as $3.1 billion in its existing U.S. manufacturing facilities, and is considering a new plant in the world's most profitable auto market that would help to create thousands of new jobs. The South Korean automotive group, which includes affiliate Kia Motors Corp., said it will spend the money over the next five years on research and development of new technologies such as autonomous vehicles and on upgrading existing facilities. "The U.S. market is crucial to our success as a global auto maker. We will continue to expand our presence...

Wal-Mart plans to add about 10,000 retail jobs in the U.S. as it opens new stores and expands existing locations. The world's biggest retailer said Tuesday that there will also be about 24,000 construction jobs as well. Wal-Mart Stores says there will be 59 new, expanded and relocated Walmart and Sam's Clubs facilities....

SAN JOSE – Around the world, people are demanding change. Recent electoral outcomes – perhaps most notably, the Brexit vote in the United Kingdom and the presidential election in the United States – have highlighted rising economic uncertainty. In this environment, it is imperative that leaders articulate and deliver on a clear vision for inclusive economic growth, one that accounts not only for tax and trade policy – the focus of many of today’s debates – but also for digitization. Representing $19 trillion in potential economic value over the next decade, digitization has the power to enable countries to kick-start...

Donald Trump won the Rust Belt and White House with help from his threats to slap tariffs on Chinese imports and goods shipped across the border from Mexico. Whether he’d make good on those threats became almost an after thought as his promised tax cuts, infrastructure spending and deregulation drove stocks higher after the election. But with the president-elect taking to the bully pulpit—like his Twitter posts threatening a “border tax” onToyota andGeneral Motors—the questions are bubbling to the surface, especially as his Jan. 20inauguration nears. What kind of protectionist measures can he get away with, for good or bad?......