Free Republic

WASHINGTON -- The Obama administration, filling in some of the blanks in its bank bailout, is considering creating multiple investment funds to purchase the bad loans and other distressed assets that lie at the heart of the financial crisis, according to people familiar with the matter. The Obama team announced its intention to partner with the private sector to buy $500 billion to $1 trillion of distressed assets as part of its revamping of the $700 billion bank bailout last month. It's central to the administration's efforts to unglue credit markets, alongside a Federal Reserve program aimed at spurring consumer...

The swooning media were enraptured by President Barack Obama’s soaring rhetoric in last week’s address to Congress despite the speech’s total lack of substance. They never bothered to ask “Where’s the beef?” in all those oratorical flourishes. In this case the beef is the money it will take to pay for his grandiose plans and programs, and that money is allegedly lining the pockets of those who dare to earn $250,000 or more a year. No matter that if you took every last cent of their earnings you would still not have enough to begin to pay for the ultra-exorbitant...

PRESIDENT Lyndon John son's administration was known for his War on Pov erty. President Obama's will become notable for his War on Prosperity. We're speaking, of course, of Obama's plans to hike income taxes on the most wealthy 2 or 3 percent of the nation. He's not just raising the top rate to 39.6 percent; he's also disallowing about one-third of top earner's deductions, whether for state and local taxes, charitable contributions or mortgage interest. This is an effective hike in their taxes by an average of about 20 percent. And soon the next shoe will drop - he'll announce...

Here is video of Sen. Fred Thompson at a panel discussion hosted by Pajamas TV At CPAC on Saturday, February 28, 2009. Fred analyzes the current stimulus package, and says he believes President Barack Obama is trying to take advantage of the economic crisis to keep people in fear and push through his radical big government agenda. He also talks about his new radio program that began yesterday, March 2. . . . . (Watch Video)

Russian President Dmitri Medvedev on Tuesday showed willingness to discuss the US-planned missile defence system opposed by Moscow, but without 'haggling' linking it to Iran. Medvedev was commenting during a visit to Spain on an alleged offer by US President Barack Obama to halt the defence system if Iran could be convinced to give up nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles. Speaking at a joint press conference with Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero in Madrid, Medvedev welcomed the 'positive signals' coming from the Obama administration with which he hoped to reach 'agreements.' 'Haggling,' however, was not 'productive,' Medvedev said....

Mike Scinto, a local conservative talk radio host who has spent the past 10 years of his longtime radio career at WDAO-AM (1210), said he was terminated Monday, March 2.

In the daily disassembly of America which the new Caesar calls “transformational change,” the latest development is the surrender of Europe. Word of that came yesterday with a report that the ruling junta in Washington is willing to abandon a missile-defense system intended to protect Europe from Russian nukes. The word from Russia is that the United States has recently offered to bag the missile-defense umbrella if Russia will defuse the Iranian nuclear-weapon program. As anyone who has ever played Stratego will tell you, swapping Iran for Europe is a pretty good trade. Here's the background. About 15 years ago,...

Shannon Bream is still not ugly.

"…no one can be at the same time a good Catholic and a true socialist"Pius XI, Quadragesimo Anno (120), May 15, 1931 The comment was controversial at the time and still is. Lots of people think religion should have no bearing on economics or politics, but Pius was making a point that is as valid today as it was during the Great Depression. The ultimate purpose of economic activity is to satisfy the temporal needs of man, all men and women, so that they have the freedom to devote time, energy, and thought to spiritual needs. Socialist principles of class...

excerpt: “Let me be very clear on the economics of President Obama’s State of the Union speech and his budget,” he said in a recent article. “He is declaring war on investors, entrepreneurs, small businesses, large corporations, and private-equity and venture-capital funds.” “That is the meaning of his anti-growth tax-hike proposals, which make absolutely no sense at all — either for this recession or from the standpoint of expanding our economy’s long-run potential to grow.”

Thanks to Max Weber, Protestantism (the “Puritan work-ethic”) has been closely tied to the historical development of utilitarian and neoclassical economics. The emergence of capitalism simultaneous to the expansion of the Reformation tradition has led many to see an innate cause-and-effect. Certain events in the Reformation “mythology” are recast in a strangely capitalistic or individualistic light: Luther’s quasi-apocryphal “Here I Stand” speech becomes a seminal moment for modern individualism; Calvin’s stance on usury becomes the theological justification for all of capitalistic theory. This Weberian thesis is not quite so popular as it used to be, although many Protestants seem very...

In this clip CNN host DL Hughley says the Republican convention "literally looked like Nazi Germany." RNC Chairman Michael Steele responds....."you're right." Not exactly the spirited rejoinder that one might expect from the newly elected RNC chief. I don't want to be too tough on Mr. Steele here. I don't think he really thinks that DL Hughley is right. Maybe he just isn't that good at thinking on his feet, or, as he said yesterday, doesn't "articulate" well sometimes. If that's the case, perhaps he needs to stay away from snake pits like CNN and stay behind a podium in...

A few days ago I published a column by David Brooks, the NY Times token conservative (only the Times would consider Brooks a real conservative) in which he basically lamented that Obama and his people really couldn’t achieve what they have set out to achieve – and we would all be the worse for their failures. In his next column, reprinted below, he goes much farther – becoming distraught because he has perceived that Obama basically lied to the American people in order to fool them into thinking that he was a moderate. Where were you, Mr. Brooks during the...

Do As I Say—Not As I Do?I confess I did not believe Barack Obama entirely during the campaign when he bragged on working across the aisle and championing bipartisanship.You see, as in the case of any other politician, one must look to what he does—and has done—not what he says for election advantage.And in the case of Sen. Obama, in his nascent career in the Senate, he had already compiled the most partisan record of any Democratic Senator. He had attended religiously one of the most racially divisive and extremist churches in the country. His Chicago friends were not...

Michael Steele it’s time for you to go. You’re an affirmative action failure who never should have been elected to run the RNC and you scare me. There is no evidence to suggest you have any grasp of your mission as RNC Chairman. With the life of our nation at stake, America has no time for you to learn. Nothing about you gives me hope or confidence we can turn our Party around. I wanted to reserve my decision and give you the benefit of any doubt, yet frankly Mr. Steele your election as the first Black RNC Chair smelled...

So far, Obama's tax plan is being looked at skeptically by both Democrats and Republicans and therefore may not pass at all. "We are going to try to figure out how to make our income $249,999.00," she said. "We have to find a way out where we can make just what we need to just under the line so we can benefit from Obama's tax plan," she added. "Why kill yourself working if you're going to give it all away to people who aren't working as hard?"

On his pre-inaugural visit to Ben’s Chili Bowl, a landmark for Washington’s African-American community, President Barack Obama was asked by a cashier if he wanted his change back. “Nah, we straight,” Obama replied. The phrase was so subtle some listeners missed it. The reporter on pool duty quoted Obama as saying, “No, we’re straight.” But many other listeners did not miss it. A video of the exchange became an Internet hit, and there was a clear moment of recognition among many blacks, who got a kick out of their Harvard-educated president sounding, as one commenter wrote on a hip-hop site,...

Bailing out the banks is going to increase the debt spiral and finally cause the destruction of the world's biggest economy, Rogers said. "I think it's astonishing, they're ruining the US economy, they're ruining the US government, they're ruining the US central bank and they're ruining the US dollar," he said. "You are watching something in front of our eyes, very historically, which is basically the destruction of New York as a financial center and the destruction of America as the world's most powerful country."

This footage is of an animated Jerboa mouse called, Jarbo!