Free Republic

In 2008, Barack Obama won 26% of the evangelical vote; in 2012, he won 21%. Hillary Clinton won 16%. If she had simply replicated Obama's performance among evangelicals, she would likely be President. In his new book, Do We Have a Center? 2016, 2020 and the Challenge of the Trump Presidency, Walter Frank, author of Law and the Gay Rights Story and Making Sense of the Constitution, warns that Democrats ignore the many lessons of the 2016 campaign at their peril. "The Democrats," Frank counsels, "are in grave trouble if they don't understand exactly what happened in 2016 and all...

Reuters reports that China will exempt some American agricultural products from its latest round of tariffs. This is welcome news—particularly for our pork and soybean producers who’ve been on the front lines of the trade war. But what does the news really mean? Did China blink? Are they throwing us a bone? Or is just part of Xi Jinping’s 200 IQ 4D underwater chess gambit to win the trade war? The answer begins and ends with the economic data. First up: pigs. China is by far the largest pork consumer on earth, and is expected to consume more than 50...

China already lost in the trade war with the U.S. Although you will never hear Chinese authorities, especially President Xi Jinping, admit it as such, the evidence is everywhere and only becoming more compelling by the day. Reuters recently reported that based on the Chinese government's own data, China's economic slowdown has worsened in August, with "growth in industrial production is at its weakest in 17-1/2 years amid spreading pain from a trade war with the United States and softening domestic demand. Retail sales and investment gauges worsened too." Despite such poor readings, Premier Li Keqiang insists that China is...

Once confined to the small scientific community of climate researchers and ecological economists, the idea of degrowth is now blazing into the mainstream. Not surprisingly, people are trying to figure out what to make of it. Is it an inspiring idea that points the way to a better economy? Or is it a mad notion that’s sure to plunge us all into poverty? Degrowth is a planned reduction of total energy and material use to bring the economy in line with planetary boundaries, while improving people’s lives by distributing income and resources more fairly. The scientific case for degrowth is...

Donald Trump is waging a nonstop, all-encompassing war against progressive culture, in magnitude analogous to what 19th-century Germans once called a Kulturkampf. As a result, not even former President George W. Bush has incurred the degree of hatred from the left that is now directed at Trump. For most of his time in office, Trump, his family, his friends and his businesses have been investigated, probed, dissected and constantly attacked.

The donor-class Koch network headed by GOP mega-donor Charles Koch is now admitting they failed to turn the American people against President Trump’s tariffs on Chinese imports. In June 2018, the Koch network of organizations — which include Americans for Prosperity, Freedom Partners, and the Libre Initiative — launched a campaign against Trump’s economic nationalist policies that have helped weaken China’s economy and brought the U.S. steel industry roaring back, mostly by imposing tariffs on various foreign imports. The goal of the Koch network’s campaign was to champion free trade at all costs by claiming tariffs are increasing prices on...

The political network funded in part by billionaire libertarian Charles Koch is going to try a new strategy against President Donald Trump’s trade war with China after conceding that its previous campaign hasn’t worked. Koch network leaders said Thursday that their digital and TV ad blitz that emphasized how Americans could experience financial pain from the tariff fight wasn’t panning out the way they had hoped. “The argument that, you know, the tariffs are adding a couple thousand dollars to the pickup truck that you’re buying is not persuasive,” a senior Koch official says. he political network funded in part...

Chinese agriculture officials who were due to visit U.S. farm states next week have canceled their trip to Montana as the officials will return to China sooner than originally scheduled, the Montana Farm Bureau told Reuters on Friday. The cancellation came as U.S.-Chinese trade talks were held in Washington and U.S. President Donald Trump said he wanted a complete trade deal with the Asian nation, not just an agreement for China to buy more U.S. agricultural goods.

CNN’s Martin Savidge traveled to the iron range area of Minnesota this week. The Iron Range near Lake Superior is traditionally a Democratic stronghold. Not anymore. Miners and working families are voting for Trump. Democrats and their Socialist promises scare the hell out of middle Americ

I’ve looked and could find no information on which US steel manufacturers are providing the steel for the wall. Does anyone know?

George Washington. Thomas Jefferson. Abraham Lincoln. Theodore Roosevelt. When you hear their names what comes to mind? The White House? Possibly. Mount Rushmore? Probably. How blasé. What ought to come to mind are tariffs. Yes, tariffs. Despite the mainstream media’s copious efforts to cast President Trump and those who support tariffs as economically illiterate at best — and as wannabe-Stalinists at worst — in reality most of America’s Founding Fathers and former presidents favored tariffs. In fact, America’s first major piece of legislation was the Tariff Act of 1789. Why? Tariffs are the form of taxation most consistent with the...

We wanted to find out what appeals to Donald Trump’s supporters and why they believe he deserves another term. The economy, the judges and a get-the-job-done attitude is just part of it. Here are their stories. BOSTON — His critics call him dangerous, unhinged and unstable, and 10 leading Democrat contenders and three Republican challengers would like to replace him. But less than five months from the Iowa caucuses, President Donald Trump enjoys the support of a solid majority of Republicans, and they have sound reasons to stick with their man despite the furor that continually surrounds him. According to...

Chinese consumers are not happy about higher prices and decreased supplies of food.  Yesterday, Chinese buyers snapped up "at least 10 boatloads of soybeans," according to Reuters, as the U.S.-China trade war showed signs of compromise.  The South China Morning Post reports: Beijing will allow Chinese businesses to purchase a "certain amount of farm products such as soybeans and pork" from the United States, according to the Xinhua report. "China's market is big enough and there's great potential to import high-quality US farm products." The official Xinhua News Agency reported on Friday that China's National Development and Reform Commission and the Ministry of Commerce made...

Chief Elizabeth Warren, who lies constantly, has a plan to end corruption. Repeating her anti-government rhetoric, in a piece titled, END WASHINGTON CORRUPTION, Warren writes that big insurance companies and hospital conglomerates put profits ahead of the health and well-being of the American people, and dump piles of money into political campaigns and lobbying efforts to block any move toward Medicare for All. This comes from a woman who has no problem with unions and Planned Parenthood sinking a fortune into Democratic campaigns, including hers. She has no problem with their lobbyists or those of far-left groups. In order to...

The leftstream media characterization of Joe Biden is that he is moderate, likable, and the most electable Democrat candidate.  He is affable Uncle Joe, the self-made lunchbox-toting common man of the people. In truth, he is none of the above. Joe the Moderate The "Biden as moderate" canard is getting increasingly hard to defend.  On the economy-, car-, and cow-killing $93-trillion Green New Deal, Biden was asked if it goes too far or is unrealistically promising too much. He answered, "No, no it's not." When previously asked if there would be any place for fossil fuels, including coal and fracking, in his administration, Biden answered,...

This is funny in so many ways; especially for CTH readers who have a far better-than-ordinary understanding of the big picture Trump goals around China.(1) CNBC tweeted this story last night (note the date/time). (2) It is written exclusively from the perspective of the Goldman Sachs analysts who represent the U.S. multinational position. (3) However, the article was actually written on May 12, 13, 2019.What is funny about CNBC pushing this story, NOW, is how the claims within the CNBC story can be fact checked; and their predictions are, well, absurd (especially in hindsight).   Keep in mind this was written...

Full Header: The Three Issues The Democratic Debate Decided To Gloss Over To Prevent Embarrassing The 2020 Field As members of the 2020 clown show debated last night, three questions remained off the docket. Granted, there was a lot of Trump-bashing, some intense moments where the candidates slung mud at one another, and the reiteration of trash left-wing policies. One thing is clear: there is not a single person on that stage last night who can beat Donald Trump. It’s not even close. For the three-hours this breakfast was on, we learned that Democrats want to increase taxes, have a...

Recent polls reveal a downgrade in President Donald Trump's job approval rating on the economy and show he's trailing in head-to-head match-ups against the leading 2020 presidential election Democratic candidates, but a majority of U.S. business leaders believe, at least for now, that he will win reelection. More than two-thirds of North American chief financial officers surveyed by CNBC say Trump will win the 2020 election, while a quarter say former Vice President Joe Biden, according to the results of the latest CNBC Global CFO Council survey for the third quarter 2019.

President Donald Trump signaled Thursday that he may consider an interim trade deal with China. The president told reporters he would prefer a full agreement with the world’s second largest economy. However, he left the door open to thinking about striking a limited agreement with Beijing.

President Trump needs a trade deal with China as quickly as possible to avert a sharp slowdown of the US economy, as recent polls have made clear. There won’t be any deal unless the US finds some way to walk back its efforts to keep China’s top telecommunication firm Huawei out of world markets. The summary dismissal today of National Security Adviser John Bolton increases the prospects of a deal, although the immediate motivation for Bolton’s departure most likely lies elsewhere. China and the United States seemed on track for a trade deal in early December 2018 when XI Jinping...