Free Republic

Foreign Exchange: Thailand's ham-fisted capital controls, announced Tuesday, sought to halt the baht's rise. But all that did was knock $23 billion in value from Thai stocks and rattle world markets. It's not the answer. What it actually shows is that the caretaker military regime, in power since its September coup, isn't quite up to the task of running Thailand's economic powerhouse. Thailand's markets, which have done well this year, don't need new controls. What they really need are the same thing Thailand's people need — more freedom, economic and political. Thailand's government Tuesday told foreign investors they would no...

BANGKOK, Sept 3 (Reuters) - Thailand's Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra on Tuesday said part of the government's vaunted 450 billion baht ($13.1 billion) "digital wallet" handout will be distributed in cash, in another change to its flagship populist policy. Details are still being finalised and will be announced in a policy statement to parliament, she added. The digital wallet handout had previously entailed transferring 10,000 baht ($292) in credit to 50 million Thais via a smartphone application to spend in their localities within six months.

Robert Fico, the Slovak Prime Minister who was seriously injured in an attempted assassination shooting in May, has said the Trump attack was a “carbon copy” scenario and blamed hostile media and Trump’s political opponents for creating an atmosphere of hate. The populist prime minister of Slovakia, who only recently re-emerged into the public eye after he was shot multiple times in the abdomen by an activist and government critic, said the attempt on President Trump’s life was like a “carbon copy” in a statement on Sunday morning.

A president’s budget proposal is seldom passed into law. Instead, it’s an expression of the priorities the president promises to fight for, often coming on the heels of an agenda laid out in the State of the Union address. In his recent State of the Union speech, President Biden previewed his economically populist priorities when he said “the days of trickle-down economics are over.” Trickle-down refers to the idea that tax cuts for the wealthiest “trickle down” to the rest of us. It’s long been a popular idea in Washington, but it’s just not true. A few years ago, the...

The upcoming European Parliament elections will see a “sharp turn to the right” as populist parties are projected to be victorious in at least nine EU member states and come in second or third in a further nine countries. According to an analysis of opinion polls in each EU member state in combination with statistical modelling based on the previous performance of national parties, the globalist European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) think tank has predicted that right-wing populist parties will come out on top in Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, France, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, and Slovakia in...

The European Union is scared -as it should be.The Globalist superstructure of the EU is at odds with the majority of the continent’s population, which is becoming increasingly Conservative and lending its support to populist and nationalist parties. (snip) So Brussels is scared. Unelected EU foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, I fear mongering in the MSM, warning that parliamentary elections in June voters will flock to rightwing populist parties.While fear mongering, Borrel, in a wonderful case of projection, blames the European shift right on ‘fear’ – and not in the very real widespread rejection of EU’s failed leftist policies.

WASHINGTON — Former President Donald Trump declined Thursday to appeal a court order ending his lawsuit challenging the FBI’s seizure of documents from his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, paving the way for investigators to finally get hold of the bulk of documents collected in the search. The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals last week dismissed the lawsuit he filed after the Aug. 8 search. The appeals court overturned U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon’s order appointing a special master to review the trove of documents federal agents recovered and preventing the government from using them in its investigation into Trump’s...

Italians are set to go to the polls following the resignation of Prime Minister Mario Draghi. Giorgia Meloni, who leads the far-right Brothers of Italy party, has been tipped to become the country's first female prime minister. Meloni, worked as a journalist before entering politics and since 2014 has been leader of the party, which has been historically described as neo-fascist...

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine (R) was projected to win his state’s GOP gubernatorial primary Tuesday, fending off challenges from populist detractors who argued he was insufficiently conservative. NBC News and CNN both called the race for DeWine around 8:17 p.m. ET. He defeated former Rep. Jim Renacci, restaurateur Joe Blystone and former state Rep. Ron Hood.

'Life, Liberty & Levin' host Mark Levin breaks down what it means for someone to believe in 'America First.'

Fox News host Mark Levin explained what "America first" means to him, Sunday, by debunking the notion that our founders were "nationalists." The "Life, Liberty & Levin" host said how the word "nationalist" cannot be found in our founding documents because the founders and framers "believed in Americanism," guided by "natural law and rights," not nationalism" or "populism." "The Tenth Amendment rejects nationalism. It’s federalism. Talks about state sovereignty. Why do we have a Ninth Amendment? Have you read that one lately? It talks about individual liberty, it is in my view, a reflection of the Declaration. They put it...

Former House Speaker Paul Ryan plans to condemn the populist appeal of former President Donald Trump during a Thursday evening speech at the Reagan library. “If the conservative cause depends on the populist appeal of one personality, or on second-rate imitations, then we’re not going anywhere,” Ryan plans to say according to speech excerpts released to Punchbowl News.

They're still there, planted in front of stately homes in wealthy suburban neighborhoods, on flag poles in middle-class communities, and along the front stoops of inner-city row houses. Whether they say "Trump 2020" or simply "Trump," there are plenty of people who have left their sentiments planted on their own personal hill. It is not just here in Pennsylvania. The signs are not hard to spot as you travel to the Great Lakes, the Midwest, and Appalachia. The reason is complex. People who come from a variety of socioeconomic, religious, and political experiences formed a conservative populist coalition long before...

By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, it is hereby ordered as follows:Section 1.  Purpose.  Americans spend more per capita on pharmaceutical drugs than residents of any other developed country.  Americans often pay more for the exact same drugs, even when they are produced and shipped from the exact same facilities.One way to minimize international disparities in price is to increase the trade of prescription drugs between nations with lower prices and those with persistently higher ones.  Over time, reducing trade barriers and increasing the exchange of...

Sen. Ted Cruz said the future of conservatism after President Trump leaves office can be both populist and libertarian. The Texas Republican weighed on ideological debates among conservatives, saying the future of conservative politics can be a combination of libertarian beliefs and populism during a Tuesday interview with the Washington Examiner about his podcast, The Verdict, co-hosted by conservative commentator Michael Knowles. "I think properly understood, those concepts are complementary, and they're not antagonistic. So I am a conservative, an unabashed conservative. I'm also a populist. I am deeply a populist," Cruz began. "And I also have deep libertarian principles....

Bernie Sanders is a survivor, but can he survive the orchestrated media onslaught that seems determined to bring him down? At 78, Sanders has survived a heart attack, and the loathing of the Democratic Party establishment and its compliant media wing. He survived that recent vicious and shameful CNN takedown accusing him of sexism for allegedly saying a woman couldn't be elected president. Sanders denied it. CNN didn't much care. Now his supporters are being shamed as dangerous and angry by other media and also as tools of President Donald Trump. But guess what? It's all backfiring. Sanders is surging,...

It never ceases to amaze me how the populist Right, or what speaks in its name, overestimates its strength both here and in Western Europe. One needn’t be an enemy of these activists to recognize the exaggerated nature of their claims. Those in the media who now demand a border wall insist that the “people” want this goal achieved immediately if not sooner. In fact, according to Ann Coulter, Trump “scammed the American people” by not giving them the wall they’re clamoring for. But according a nationwide poll by The Hill, 51 percent of American voters oppose Trump’s project, while...

FULL TITLE: Unfixable? Several nations have tried to restore democracy after populist strongmen. It was never the same. In April, aided by massive gerrymandering, Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s ruling coalition crushed opposition in Hungary’s national elections, claiming a supermajority in the parliament. The prime minister — who had used two prior terms in office to dominate media outlets, alter electoral rules so that urban areas were massively underrepresented and seize control of the top courts — moved to further consolidate his power. He is pushing Central European University, a leading academic institution backed by George Soros, whom Orban has demonized,...

ROME (AFP) - Italy's new anti-establishment government took power on Friday, ending months of deadlock that saw the eurozone's third largest economy narrowly avoid snap elections after a last-gasp coalition deal. New Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte, 53, was sworn in at the head of the first populist government in an EU founding member that was forged by the Five Star Movement and the far-right League. "The new right is in power," declared left-leaning daily La Repubblica. The handover of power follows an inconclusive March election and months of political turmoil which had spooked global financial markets and spread unease among...

Italy’s populist parties would win an outright majority in parliament if new elections were held, according to the latest polls. The anti-establishment Five Star Movement (M5S) and nationalist Lega parties’ first attempt to form a coalition fell apart last week when President Sergio Mattarella vetoed their choice of finance minister, Paolo Savona, because of his eurosceptic views — but a populist government appears to be back on the cards now, with the two parties ready to put fresh proposals to the unelected president following polls showing fresh elections could make them even stronger.