Free Republic

A look at how the majority of the rest of the world sees things through the lens of Pepe Escobar. Pepe Escobar is a Brazilian journalist and geopolitical analyst. His column "The Roving Eye" for Asia Times regularly discusses the multi-national "competition for dominance over the Middle East and Central Asia." Very useful, eye opening discussion for the very intelligent freepers. I do not recommend it for the others.

Multiple polls out of Brazil this weekend show socialist former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva with a sizable lead against incumbent conservative Jair Bolsonaro, though not a big enough lead to deter a runoff vote. Brazilians will go to the polls on Sunday to choose a president, but the winner will only move on to take over the top office in the country if he receives more than 50 percent of the vote. If not, the top two candidates – very likely to be Lula and Bolsonaro – will move on to a runoff election later this year.

Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel on Tuesday assured incoming high schoolers that they need not to worry about President Trump ending the “Dreamers” program, saying Chicago Public Schools are a “Trump-free” sanctuary for young illegal immigrants. “To all the Dreamers that are here in this room and in the city of Chicago: You are welcome in the city of Chicago. This is your home. And you have nothing to worry about,” Mr. Emanuel told a group of freshman on the first day of classes at Solorio Academy High School, the Chicago Sun-Times reported. “Chicago, our schools, our neighborhoods, our city, as...

Award-winning author Joyce Carol Oates came under intense fire from social media users on Sunday after tweeting that she has only heard “puritanical & punitive” things about the Islamic State and wonders whether there is anything “celebratory & joyous” about the terrorist group. "All we hear of ISIS is puritanical & punitive; is there nothing celebratory & joyous? Or is query naive?"

HIGHGATE CEMETERY, LONDON—On a summer visit to the grave of Karl Marx, Ben Gliniecki found that he would have to pay £4, or about $6, to pay respects to the man who sounded the death knell for private property. Mr. Gliniecki, a Marxist, said no. “Personally, I think it is disgusting,” the 24-year-old political activist said. “There are no depths of irony, or bad taste, to which capitalists won’t sink if they think they can make money out of it.” The charity that looks after this cemetery has long taken swipe at a different irony: Karl Marx’s decision to buy...

Does anyone remember the American Jobs Act? A year ago President Obama proposed boosting the economy with a combination of tax cuts and spending increases, aimed in particular at sustaining state and local government employment. Independent analysts reacted favorably. For example, the consulting firm Macroeconomic Advisers estimated that the act would add 1.3 million jobs by the end of 2012. There were good reasons for these positive assessments. Although you’d never know it from political debate, worldwide experience since the financial crisis struck in 2008 has overwhelmingly confirmed the proposition that fiscal policy “works,” that temporary increases in spending boost...

I’ve written before about the crisis of inequality in the United States and about the quasi-religious abhorrence of “wealth redistribution” that causes many Americans to oppose tax increases, even on the ultra rich. The conviction that taxation is intrinsically evil has achieved a sadomasochistic fervor in conservative circles—producing the Tea Party, their Republican zombies, and increasingly terrifying failures of governance. Happily, not all billionaires are content to hoard their money in silence. Earlier this week, Warren Buffett published an op-ed in the New York Times in which he criticized our current approach to raising revenue. As he has lamented many...

WASHINGTON — Is this another John Kerry flip-flop? Less than three weeks after vowing in defeat to sweep aside partisan bickering, Kerry is slamming the White House for "a right-wing assault on values and ideals that we hold most deeply." In a new four-minute Internet ad on his campaign Web site, Kerry paints a doomsday future based on Bush's recent nods to fill vacated Cabinet posts. "The Cabinet is being remade to rubber-stamp policies that will undermine Social Security, balloon the deficit, avoid real reform in health care and education, weaken homeland security and walk away from critical allies...

“Tax Max” Supports Resurrecting Death Tax and Other Taxes, Opposes President Bush and Zell Miller On Making Tax Cuts Permanent, Sides with Tax-and-Spend Democrats Yesterday Senator Max Cleland announced that he favored raising taxes, including resurrecting the death tax and large hikes in federal income taxes and taxes on small businesses and family farms. In an Associated Press report, Cleland called making the Bush tax cuts permanent “dangerous economics.”[1] Cleland, who has voted 116 times for higher taxes during his term and voted 29 times to cut or delay the implementation of the Bush tax cut, again showed why he...