Free Republic

How odd it is that America is wasting billions of dollars hiring DEI czars and electing woke politicians, who so often accuse others of a multitude of sins, largely as a way of enriching themselves. When ideology replaces meritocracy or provides immunity from the consequences of illegal behavior, systemic mediocrity follows. Under toxic National Socialism, Stalinism, and Maoism, millions of cronies and grifters mouthed party lines in hopes that their approved ideology would allow them to advance their careers and excuse their lawbreaking. The same thing has happened with the woke movement and the now-huge Diversity/Equity/Inclusion conglomerate. Grifters and opportunists...

Biden energy loan czar Jigar Shah was a major investor in a struggling green energy company that is in advanced talks to receive a $1.5 billion loan from his office. The Department of Energy’s loan office, where Shah serves as director, is working to fast-track the funding to Plug Power, a hydrogen fuel company on the brink of bankruptcy. But the ties between Plug Power and Shah could add to concerns from lawmakers about conflicts of interest in the federal loan program. Securities and Exchange Commission records detail a long-standing financial relationship between Plug Power and Generate Capital, an investment...

Retired Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, who made waves as a witness during the first impeachment proceedings of former President Donald Trump, is now being accused of trying to profit off the war in Ukraine by pitching lucrative defense contracts through his private company. In a statement to Fox News Digital, Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., who was one of the sharpest critics of Vindman throughout the impeachment investigation, blasted him as an "opportunist," and accused him of undertaking continuous efforts to try and personally profit from his attacks against the Trump administration to his reported dealings in Ukraine. The first impeachment...

A Chinese military company that Hunter Biden’s investment firm teamed up with is now assisting the Russian air force in the war in Ukraine. The BHR Partners investment firm, which counted President Joe Biden's son as a board member and 10% stakeholder, worked with AVIC Automotive, a subsidiary of the Chinese state-owned Aviation Industry Corporation of China, to purchase Michigan-based Henniges Automotive in September 2015. The Wall Street Journal reported in February 2023 that AVIC subsidiary AVIC International Holding Corporation had shipped “$1.2 million worth of parts for Su-35 jet fighters” to sanctioned Russian defense conglomerate Rostec subsidiary Kret on...

Citing his "unauthorized disclosure of proprietary information," Pfizer attorney Isu Yakuza announced a $50 billion lawsuit against Jordon Walker, former Director of Research and Development, Strategic Operations - mRNA Scientific Planner at Pfizer. "The monetary damage that Pfizer will suffer from Mr. Walker's chat with the notorious undercover journalist James O'Keefe of Project Veritas is immense," Yakuza said. "Walker was fully aware of the damage his loose talk could do when he boasted of a scheme to create a virus mutation that could be cured by a drug that our company would create and patent and calling it a 'cash...

Both President Biden and Congress have sent tens of billions of our tax dollars in the form of weapons, ammunition, and cash to Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky to help save his regime from Russian invaders. While support for these outlays has come from both Democrats and Republicans, no clear benefit to our country can be detected. Ostensibly, the claim is that we are trying to save Ukraine's democracy. But is Ukraine really a democracy? In the past week, Zelensky signed legislation that allows the Ukrainian government to censor news sites, control the flow of information to the Ukrainian people, and...

A collection of high-ranking European officials are fed up with the Biden administration for what they view as war profiteering during the conflict in Ukraine. The comments come amid rising gas prices and mounting tension toward US legislation that offers tax credits to those who “Buy American.” Meanwhile, Putin’s invasion of Ukraine is pushing European economies toward recession while the US is benefitting, some officials claim. “The fact is, if you look at it soberly, the country that is most profiting from this war is the US because they are selling more gas and at higher prices, and because they...

In free markets, commodities bought and sold possess perceived value. When a buyer and seller reach an agreed upon price for any product, there is a "meeting of the minds." The value of any natural raw material is proportional to its scarcity. The more of it there is, and the more easily it can be obtained, the less value it holds. A vendor who sells ordinary rocks cannot make a living when his product is found freely all over the ground. If he transacts in gold or silver, diamonds or rubies, however, his hard-to-find "rocks" are worth a small fortune....

HOUSTON (AP) — Three people who have worked for the top elected official in Harris County were indicted on Monday after being accused by prosecutors of steering a nearly $11 million contract for COVID-19 vaccine outreach to a political consultant with ties to local Democratic officials. Alex Triantaphyllis, Aaron Dunn and Wallis Nader were each indicted on one count of misuse of official information and one count of tampering with a record, according to court records. Triantaphyllis is chief of staff for Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo, while Wallis Nader is a policy director and Aaron Dunn is a former...

During an interview aired on Friday’s edition of Bloomberg’s “Wall Street Week,” economist, Harvard Professor, Director of the National Economic Council under President Barack Obama, and Treasury Secretary under President Bill Clinton Larry Summers responded to President Joe Biden’s tweet accusing oil and gas companies of padding their profits by keeping gas prices high by stating, “there’s nothing that would support that in the president’s tweet, and I haven’t seen any analysis coming out of the administration, or anyplace else, that provided serious support for that.”

On Thursday’s broadcast of CNN’s “New Day,” Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm called for “everyone to step up, whether it’s gas station owners, whether it’s oil companies” to increase energy supply and said there is “concern about whether there is profiteering happening at the gas station level, as well as at the oil company level.”

On Wednesday’s broadcast of CNN’s “New Day,” Rep. Adam Smith (D-WA) stated that he would be surprised if oil companies weren’t engaging in profiteering on gas prices and Congress needs to “keep an eye on that and try to make sure that the oil companies don’t take advantage of the situation.” Co-host Brianna Keilar asked, “Oil prices, as you know, are falling. Gas prices, they’re not following yet, but they are expected too. And one of your colleagues, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, says that there is profiteering that is happening by oil companies. Do you agree with that?”

AAA announced that the U.S. average gas price is now slightly more than $4 per gallon. Gas is at its highest since 2008. But before gas prices took a jump due to the first Green New Deal War, being hosted this year by Ukraine and Russia, there was Bidenflation, supply chain fiascos, COVID-19 lockdowns, and Joe Biden’s turn toward windmills and Chinese solar panels to fuel cars and planes. And because he took America away from making most of its own energy, we suckers in the provinces are staring down the barrel of $7-per-gallon gas.Even electric car maker and spaceship...

DURING 15 years of confinement in psychiatric institutions in the former Soviet republic of Kyrgyzstan, Dimitri Gerasimenko was starved and repeatedly beaten. The indignities did not end with his death five years ago at the age of 30.Staff at the ramshackle asylum 50 miles from Bishkek, the capital, have never told his mother Raisa, 65, how he died. All her attempts to retrieve his remains have been met with prevarication, compounding her grief. “First I was asked for money if I wanted the body back,” she said. “Then I was told Dimitri had been sent to a medical academy. When...

An investment firm that counts Hunter Biden among its founders helped a Chinese company purchase one of the world’s most lucrative cobalt mines from an American company, according to a report by The New York Times. Biden established the firm Bohai Harvest RST (BHR) Equity Investment Fund Management Company with two other Americans and some Chinese partners in 2013. The American members controlled 30 percent of the Shanghai-based operation and served on the board. The company notably completed a deal in 2016 that saw a Congo cobalt and copper mine transfer from American company Freeport-McMoRan to Chinese outfit China Molybdenum...

Watch it slipWatch it slideI bet $10 on the losing horseFeel the gripOf my brideWatch me do it againWhere’s my dinner?!– Short Lip Fuser, Rocket from the CryptEmpty StomachsEvergrande’s going down. And it’s taking the life savings of countless good people down with it.But while Evergrande’s going down. Food prices are going up. Moreover, they’re going up a lot.According to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), global food prices were up nearly 33 percent year over year in August. Vegetable oil, grains, and meat all cost more. Unfortunately, rising food prices – and empty stomachs – often presage...

Vivek Murthy, President Biden’s pick for surgeon general, cashed in last year as the Chinese coronavirus pandemic gripped the nation, making more than two million dollars off pandemic “consulting.” Several of Biden’s nominees have filed financial disclosures, including Murthy, who according to Politico made millions by consulting various companies, including those in industries severely impacted by the pandemic, such as Carnival Cruise Line. Such consulting gigs have raised eyebrows due to concerns of bias. The outlet estimated that Murthy, who served as U.S surgeon general from 2014-2017, made nearly one million last year consulting for Netflix, Airbnb, and Carnival Cruise...

Left-wing activist Shaun(talcum X) King has become a vocal proponent for the Black Lives Matter movement, but a recent report calls into question where the money raised by his political action committee has gone. King founded the Real Justice PAC in 2017 with the goal of electing "reform-minded prosecutors" who are committed to fighting "structural racism" and defending communities from "abuse by state power," according to the PAC's website. The Washington Free Beacon reviewed the PAC's finances and found that over the past 15 months, a quarter of the money the Real Justice PAC brought in was funneled back to...

Multiple former aides to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi have cashed in on their connections by lobbying on coronavirus-related spending bills. According to a report Wednesday in the Washington Free Beacon, at least seven Pelosi aides are now on the other side of the revolving door of influence for such clients as Delta Airlines and Uber that have sought to cash in on the trillions of dollars of recovery spending sloshing around Washington this spring. “The former aides lobbied on policies related to the coronavirus pandemic for over 50 clients in the first quarter of 2020. Their firms received over $2...

White House Trade Adviser Peter Navarro said during an exclusive interview on “Sunday Morning Futures” that China "cornered" the personal protective equipment (PPE) market during the coronavirus outbreak and “is profiteering.”