Free Republic

Those aged 18 to 24 have seen their incomes decline under President Barack Obama. Worse, they were one of his most reliable voting blocs. Yet Hillary Clinton, the Democrats' likely 2016 presidential candidate, says, "I don't think President Obama gets the credit he deserves for digging us out of the ditch Republicans put us in"? Obama, when asked to name the accomplishment for which he is most proud, brags, "I'm proud of saving the American economy." The numbers are stark. The Obama recovery, which began after the recession ended in June 2009, has averaged 2.2 percent inflation-adjusted annual GDP growth...

When you hear the phrase “tax treaties,” your first response (besides yawning) would be to assume that, out of all the treaties the United States is involved in, these would be the most harmless. Generally, you’d be right. When we talk about tax treaties, we usually mean agreements between countries to ease excessive taxation (usually double taxation) while promoting cooperation in tax compliance. But pending in the Senate right now are two tax treaties that are particularly dangerous to privacy, to U.S. sovereignty, and to the security of individuals and human rights.

Last November, the day before the Muslim terrorist attack in Mali that killed 27 innocent civilians, including one American, former Peace Corps volunteer Anita Datar, Republican Speaker of the House Paul Ryan shot down the idea of a religious test for refugees coming to America at taxpayer expense. Ryan said, "We will not have a religious test, only a security test," before touting his bill, the SAFE ACT of 2015, that allegedly gave extra scrutiny to those “refugees” coming to the U.S. from Syria and Iraq. Paul RyanAs we pointed out at the time, the bill was nothing more than...

"The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration." – The 16th Amendment, Ratified 1913 The birth of the income tax! Prior to 1913, the constitutionally limited responsibilities of the federal government were generally covered by import tariffs. Occasionally, temporary taxes were imposed to pay for wars, but were to be apportioned by the states and could not be direct, personal taxes, according to the Constitution in Article I, sections 2 and 9. W. Cleon Skousen wrote a very...

A professor of the sciences at a western U.S. college wrote an op-ed in The Chronicle of Higher Education about struggling over whether or not to write a former student's requested letter of recommendation -- because the student is a gun enthusiast. "Myrtle Lynn Payne" (the professor wrote under a pseudonym) described her former student in this way: "Sarah" was a very nice young woman who turned up in one of my classes a year or so ago. Her academic abilities were not strong but she had great energy and was a class leader. Definitely a process, and not a...

The dropping of two atomic bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945 remains the only wartime use of nuclear weapons in history. No one knows exactly how many Japanese citizens were killed by the two American bombs. A macabre guess is around 140,000. The atomic attacks finally shocked Emperor Hirohito and the Japanese militarists into surrendering. John Kerry recently visited Hiroshima. He became the first Secretary of State to do so -- purportedly as a precursor to a planned visit next month by President Obama, who is rumored to be considering an apology to Japan...

I write this from the hospital. Seems I have lung cancer. My doctors tell me my growth was caught early and I'll be fine. Soon I will barely notice that a fifth of my lung is gone. I believe them. After all, I'm at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital. U.S. News & World Report ranked it No. 1 in New York. I get excellent medical care here. But as a consumer reporter, I have to say, the hospital's customer service stinks. Doctors keep me waiting for hours, and no one bothers to call or email to say, "I'm running late." Few doctors give...

The Obama administration’s hint that it was considering allowing Iran to access directly or indirectly U.S. dollars drew furious, negative reaction from both sides of the aisle. On Monday, Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) denounced the effort and called for the administration to reaffirm definitively its explicit promise that barriers to Iran’s accessing dollars would remain in place. “Our concern is that there are at least four workarounds to provide Iran with access to the dollar, including dollar-denominated transactions, dollar-clearing, dollar-based conversions, and dollar-related foreign currency transactions,” he said. “Here’s the bottom line: The administration should definitively rule out any potential...

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: Are you kidding me? I don't believe this. Are you kidding me? The State Department says it doesn't know if Iran is using its new cash to fund terrorism. Seriously? It's entirely possible Iran used its new cash to fund terror, State Department. What an admission. But they can't be sure that they're using their new cash, the $150 billion unfrozen with the Iranian nuclear deal once the sanctions were killed. This is unreal. The State Department, the wizards of smart, "Well, we don't know. We can't determine whether or not the Iranians are actually using this...

Just over a year ago, Wisconsin became the 25th state to adopt a “right to work” law, as states are allowed to do under Section 14(b) of the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947. Many people misunderstand what the phrase “right to work” (RTW) means. A RTW law does not guarantee anyone a job. Nor does it damage or prohibit unions, as Big Labor advocates often suggest. All that a RTW law does is to deny the validity of collective bargaining contract clauses that require the company to fire a worker because he or she refuses to pay the union dues. But...

This upscale progressive magazine ran a super-long, super-detailed article titled "The Math Revolution." It basically wanted to proclaim the happy news that extraordinary things are taking place in American education. The Atlantic fell all over itself with enthusiasm. You would reasonably suppose that some fresh winds were blowing, and students in America would actually know how to add and subtract with competence, and maybe even multiply and divide efficiently. What else does the word "revolution" suggest but wonderful sweeping change? At last, at long last, our public schools will redeem themselves and began to turn out little math experts. Then...

A candidate like Donald Trump should be impossible. A loud, unscripted, hard-edged reality show-style candidate with exceedingly flexible positions on many hot-button issues would be laughed out of contention for the Republican nomination in other years. A man whose serial gaffes and willingness to stick his thumb in the eye of the gatekeepers of good taste would be cooked before he stepped onto the debate stage. An utterly inexperienced politician, who describes our rights and privileges as particular to us as Americans rather than universal moral mandates, would be rejected by both parties at any other time in the modern...

t has already become clear that the campaign to keep Britain in Europe is fundamentally a negative one. As George Osborne’s Brexit dossier confirmed this week, the focus is all about the costs of leaving, not the potential benefits of staying.There are several reasons for this, but chief among them is that uncertainty over Britain’s place in Europe after June 23 cuts both ways.If we leave, no one knows what "out" looks like - choose from a smorgasbord of Norwegian, Swiss-Canadian and WTO trade arrangements - but if the UK stays, it is equally uncertain how Britain will fare long term as the...

Last month, I wrote about some important legislation in Florida that would modernize that stateÂ’s harsh alimony and child custody laws. Florida is lagging behind many states which have updated these laws to reflect the fact that most women now work outside of the home and that children need both parents to thrive, regardless of whether their parents are living together or apart. Sadly, Florida Governor Rick Scott (R) capitulated to intense lobbying by liberal special interest groups and vetoed the bill. The bill had immense support, passing both houses of the Florida legislature by super-majority margins. The governorÂ’s office...

A military parade may soon look less like a VE-Day parade down Times Square and more like a Mardi Gras parade in New Orleans, unless liberals in leadership stop using the U.S. military as a social engineering experiment. Let us not forget the same president who confused "corps" with "corpses" and exchanged a traitor for terrorists, also promised to fundamentally transform America. What we didn't know is that transformation would begin with the U.S. military, the protector of our nation and our values. The wussification of our military is in full swing, thanks to all the empty suit "yes-men" clad...

It's a bad sign when you get halfway through a presidential campaign with no sages wagging their heads sagaciously as they cite Lord Acton. No wonder the politicians get away with so much. Their consciences have not had to reconcile with the most profound political sagacity of modern times. To wit: "Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely." The great English historian delivered this pronouncement in a letter to his friend Bishop Mandell Creighton. I'm not aware of any instance in which the words have suffered intellectual rebuff -- probably because they illuminate such occasions as the Supreme...

When I worked my way through college in the 1940s, tuition was $200 to $250 a year. My children’s tuition was $2,000 to $2,500 a year, and my grandchildren’s college education each cost $20,000 to $40,000 a year for tuition alone. College is so expensive that only about half of today’s college graduates think their degree was worth the cost, according to a survey by Gallup-Purdue. The more debt the student incurs, the more likely he is to doubt that he received his money’s worth. The total amount of student debt in the United States is a staggering $1.2 trillion,...

Don't look for any happy ending here. Or any ending. The debate over the Spanish Civil War (1936-39) can be expected to last as long as there are isolationists and interventionists arguing over American foreign policy -- that is, approximately forever. Few if any conflicts illustrate the tragic nature of history so well, for there were no simple choices in Spain. There were more than enough heroes and villains, not-so-innocent bystanders and gawkers galore -- along with an endless supply of impossible choices. No one's hands were Ivory Soap clean, but curiously enough none were hopelessly dirty. Time, the great...

The left is masterful at rewriting history. Witness HBO's TV movie "Confirmation," which aired Saturday, about Anita Hill's accusations of sexual harassment 25 years ago, which almost derailed Clarence Thomas from becoming a Supreme Court justice. The drama's makers claim that they didn't take sides in depicting Thomas' Senate confirmation hearings, even as a trailer punctuates close-ups of actress Kerry Washington, who played Hill, with stentorian capital letters: "It only takes one voice ... to change history." Another trailer proclaims, "One woman made a choice ... to take a stand." Apparently, because HBO didn't expressly label Thomas as guilty, producers...

The Mafia, in its heyday, ran lucrative protection rackets. Pay them and your business would be kept safe from "unforeseen" threats. Don't pay them and your business might go up in smoke with you inside. Today, things are more sophisticated. The New York Times reports that Saudi Arabia, playing the role of Mafia extortionist, has threatened to "...sell off hundreds of billions of dollars' worth of American assets held by the kingdom if Congress passes a bill that would allow the Saudi government to be held responsible in American courts for any role in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks." The...