Free Republic

During his recent European tour, President Obama did his best to help beleaguered German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who is under intense fire for bringing 1 million-1.5 million (or more, no one knows for sure how many) Muslim “refugee” migrants into Germany in 2015. He also made promotion of the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), the mammoth treaty aimed at political and economic merger of the EU and United States, a key priority of his trip.

British voters are getting set for a national referendum in June that will decide whether they leave the European Union or stay in. There are many issues driving the British exit vote (dubbed the “Brexit”): EU spending, EU taxes, EU regulations, EU bailouts, EU corruption, EU usurpations of power, EU migration — and much more. The ongoing migrant/refugee crisis caused by the disastrous EU policies was the last straw, not only for freedom-minded Brits, but for sensible residents all across Euroland. With a tidal wave of more than a million and a half migrants and “refugees” flooding across Europe since...

Hey Hillary! You really need to do a better job of faking sincerity. That is the advice of Dave Johnson at the Huffington Post. Johnson is worried that in the general election Donald Trump, if he is the nominee, would be a lot more credible in his opposition to trade deals than Hillary Clinton who is merely faking it. What she needs to do to is put on a credible game face to get away with faking her opposition to trade deals such as the Trans-Pacific Partnership in order to fool enough people to win the general election. So far Trump is much...

Asian businessmen are probably the friendliest conquerors the world has ever seen. But despite the politeness and the smiles, Western governments must act quickly to combat the rise of China and Asia. The West should discuss an ambitious project: a European-American free-trade zone. For 50 years it was a highly controversial institution. Today, though, every schoolchild knows that without the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, free Europe wouldn't exist. If the Western alliance hadn't ostentatiously demonstrated its power -- with its fighter jets, tank divisions and continually updated weaponry -- Soviet communism would have expanded westward instead of imploding as it...

Published: September 20 2006 19:02 | Last updated: September 20 2006 19:02 Susan Schwab, US trade representative, on Wednesday welcomed the news that Germany was considering reviving plans for a transatlantic single market, saying these were unlikely to clash with attempts to relaunch the Doha round of multilateral trade talks.While stressing that she had yet to see any details, Ms Schwab said in an interview with the Financial Times: “Initiatives that are likely to enhance global trade and contribute to more open trade - bilaterally, regionally or above all multilaterally - are positive developments. Contributions to more market liberalisation are...

Published: September 16 2006 03:00 | Last updated: September 16 2006 03:00 Spurred by concern about China's growing economic might, Germany is considering a plan for a free-trade zone between Europe and the US.A senior aide to Angela Merkel said the chancellor was "interested" in promoting the idea as long as such a zone did not create "a fortress" but rather "a tool" to encourage free trade globally, "which she is persuaded is a condition of Germany's future prosperity". Separately yesterday, the US, Canada and the European Union complained to the World Trade Organisation about China's tariffs on car parts,...

Font Size: Time for TAFTA? By Joshua Livestro  Published   12/01/2004  In his first week in office, the new European Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson dropped some interesting hints about his ambitions for the next five years. There was first of all a welcome acknowledgement of what he called Europe's "relative decline vis-à-vis the rest of the world." To break out of this downward spiral, Mandelson said he wants Europe to rethink its priorities on global trade. Simply trying to block out the competition from low-cost countries like China is no longer an option. In his view, the way forward is...

The European Union is sending mixed signals on business transparency. On Tuesday, the European Commission responded to the Panama Papers disclosures by unveiling new legislation that would force more tax transparency on major companies in member states. But on Thursday, the European Parliament voted in favor of a new measure that critics say could prevent such leaks in the future. Campaigners say the new Trade Secrets Protection Act — aimed at protecting multinationals from corporate spying — will effectively criminalize whistleblowers and make it less likely that revelations like the Panama Papers and the Volkswagen scandal will ever see the...

German states have called for media outlets to release the cache of 11.5 million documents to authorities. But the journalists behind the largest data leak in history say it's not going to happen. Germany's federal states on Friday called for increased measures against tax havens and for media outlets to allow prosecutors to examine the contents of a cache of 11.5 million documents known as the "Panama Papers," which had been leaked to the press. "If the data sets from the 'Panama Papers' are not made accessible, then we cannot draw any consequences," said Lower Saxony's Finance Minister Peter-Jürgen Schneider,...

Secretary of State John Kerry and his wife Teresa Heinz have invested millions of U.S. dollars through family trusts in at least 11 offshore tax havens, according to an analysis by The Daily Caller News Foundation. The revelation comes on the heels of the release of the Panama Papers, a treasure trove of 11.5 million legal and financial records documenting how some of the world’s richest and most powerful people have used offshore bank accounts to conceal their wealth and avoid taxes.

Seizing on the media- and government-manufactured “Panama Papers” brouhaha, governments and globalist organizations announced a wave of new edicts and agreements last week in a plot to kill what remains of financial privacy rights and impose a radical global tax regime on humanity. The Obama administration, the United Nations, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, Socialist International, the European Union, and more are fully behind the effort. Of course, as this magazine has documented, those establishment forces, socialist groups, international organizations, tax-funded shills, and bloated governments have been pushing the same dangerous agenda for years without much success. Now...

Did you see that Sen. Bernie Sanders released his income taxes?....well, his 2014 income taxes, anyway. He did it around 7 p.m. on a Friday night, on the same day that the Democratic presidential hopeful was making international headlines by speaking at the Vatican and meeting Pope Francis, for at least a handshake. In journalism, releasing information at that off hour is what we call "a Friday news dump" -- usually an attempt to bury bad news. That's weird, because if I were handling PR for the Bernie Sanders campaign, I'd be shouting the news from the Green Mountain-tops. They...

The “Panama Papers” exposed thousands of offshore bank accounts of the politically high and mighty; 350 reporters---an International Consortium of Investigative Journalists---are pouring over a massive dump of more than 11.5 million documents from the Panama-based Mossack Fonseca law firm; the first findings were revealed earlier this month. Hillary quickly decried the “outrageous tax havens” for “the super-rich.” But it turns out that Hillary and Bill have multiple connections with people named — including campaign staffers and major donors, McClatchy Newspapers revealed Saturday. Those named used the Panama-based law firm Mossack Fonseca to set up offshore entities. The firm has...

Back in July of 2014, we reported that in an attempt to obtain if not compensation, then at least confirmation of bank manipulation in the precious metals industry, a group of silver bullion banks including Deutsche Bank, Bank of Nova Scotia and HSBC (later UBS was also added to the defendants) were accused of manipulating prices in the multi-billion dollar market.

Exposing tax dodgers is a worthy endeavor, but the “limited hangout” of the Panama Papers may have less noble ends, dovetailing with the War on Cash and the imminent threat of massive bail-ins of depositor funds. The bombshell publication of the “Panama Papers,” leaked from a Panama law firm specializing in shell companies, has triggered both outrage and skepticism. In an April 3 article titled “Corporate Media Gatekeepers Protect Western 1% From Panama Leak,” UK blogger Craig Murray writes that the whistleblower no doubt had good intentions; but he made the mistake of leaking his 11.5 million documents to the...

When Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko ran for the top office in 2014, he promised voters he would sell Roshen, Ukraine’s largest candy business, so he could devote his full attention to running the country. “If I get elected, I will wipe the slate clean and sell the Roshen concern. As President of Ukraine I plan and commit to focus exclusively on welfare of the nation,” Poroshenko told the German newspaper Bild less than two months before the election. Instead, actions by his financial advisers and Poroshenko himself, who is worth an estimated US$ 858 million, make it appear that the...

Panama Papers SCANDAL! & Is a new Crisis brewing in the Middle East? Recorded Saturday (4/9) 8 AM EST This week, world elites were rocked by the release of the Panama Papers, demonstrating that world leaders, their friends and family, and the super wealthy routinely use offshore companies for tax avoidance. Meanwhile, reports out of the Middle East indicate a growing concern of Iran's activity. From Yemen to Iraq to Gaza, Iran continues to fund and arm terrorist insurgencies that are reshaping the region. Not only Israel, but the Gulf states and their Sunni allies are preparing for potential confrontation....

‘Panama Papers’ Implicate Client of Clinton-Linked Lobbying Firm Podesta Group registered to lobby for bank subsidiary weeks before tax haven leak BY: Lachlan Markay April 5, 2016 A firm with ties to senior members of the Hillary Clinton presidential campaign registered to lobby on behalf of a major Russian bank just weeks before a massive leak exposed the bank’s role in a web of secret financial dealings that have enriched members of Russian president Vladimir Putin’s inner circle. The “Panama Papers” are being called “the Wikileaks of the mega-rich.” Corporate documents leaked from the law firm Mossack Fonseca show how...

It now turns out that Putin's neighbor's cat had a post office box in the country of birth of John McCain, through which his contraband Wiskas Cat Treats got smuggled past the liberal Western sanctions against Russia. It is impossible that Putin knew nothing about this. Finally, there is photographic evidence, with intimate expressions of love, between the errant Ivan and the bewhiskered little beastie. [Photo above] But that is still far from everything. Because then this evidence would be pretty thin. The investigative journalist of the Suddeutsche Zeitung have found that the cat has more outstanding connections to the...

The revelations of the so-called Panama Papers that are roiling the world’s political and financial elites this week include important facts about Team Clinton. This unprecedented trove of documents purloined from a shady Panama law firm that arranged tax havens, and perhaps money laundering, for the globe’s super-rich includes juicy insights into how Russia’s elite hides its ill-gotten wealth. Almost lost among the many revelations is the fact that Russia’s biggest bank uses The Podesta Group as its lobbyist in Washington, D.C. Though hardly a household name, this firm is well known inside the Beltway, not least because its CEO...