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The stock market's recent run-up of over 11% has been the best sustained rally of Obama's young Presidency. What to do now, if you are an investor? Unfortunately, the market seems very fully priced now based on historical Price/Earnings benchmarks, especially after its recent run-up - which in fact may well have been primarily due to investors cheering the marginal decline in prospects for ObamaCare. Indeed, the St. Louis Fed's graph below on growth of the monetary base is all you need to see, in order to understand why you want to buy gold. In congressional testimony last week, Fed...

With bare feet, they shuffle around the island muttering prayers; pain and suffering writ on their faces and a rainstorm breaking over them. An ancient pilgrimage set in what medieval Christians called “the ends of the world” is undergoing a revival in Ireland as economic woes prompt a spiritual reawakening. St Patrick’s Purgatory, on Station Island, a rocky islet in the midst of Lough Derg, was once Christendom’s premier pilgrimage. Its renown was based on the belief that it was a gateway to the next world and a place where penance could be matched to any sin. Now that the...

Hello, my name is Robin of Berkeley and I write for American Thinker. I was left but last year turned right, and, if you'd like to know more, you can read Everything You've Ever Wanted to Know About Robin (But Were Afraid to Ask) by clicking on my byline. Thank you for taking the time to read this letter which I've been meaning to pen for a while. I just had a provocative conversation with my editor extraordinaire at AT which has prompted this piece. He informed me that I'm getting more attention from liberals, though not the venerating kind....

On Capitol Hill, those innovations have made Group Health a prototype for a political compromise that could unclog health care negotiations in the Senate and lead to a bipartisan deal. After a month of brainstorming, including briefings from Group Health executives, the Senate Finance Committee seems poised to propose private-sector insurance cooperatives — instead of a new government health plan — as its primary mechanism for stoking competition and slowing the growth of medical costs. But state officials say Group Health's impact on holding down costs has been mixed. And its successes might have less to do with its governance...

Mitchell, Gates, Ross and a whole US team are in discussions for the sought-after freeze among other things.One Israeli diplomat commented on Israel's position, "The Americans now understand that if they get anything from us on the settlement issue, it will only be in the broader context of some kind of Arab return," Secretary of State Hillary Clinton appeared to confirm this in a policy speech two days after Obama's White House meeting with the Jewish representatives. "Progress toward peace cannot be the responsibility of the United States - or Israel - alone," Clinton told the Council on Foreign Relations....

A new poll claims that nearly 1 in 2 U.S. voters believes that the nation's best days are behind it. This is the highest level of whining on this question in a year, according to Rasmussen Reports. How is it possible that so many people believe the next generation will be in worse shape when nearly every positive indicator of the human experience is on a positive trajectory -- from our standard of living to our life expectancy to our technology to the health of the environment? Perhaps there is a nebulous understanding of what "better" is supposed to mean...

n one of my favorite episodes of "Star Trek," Captain Kirk is mistaken for a god by inhabitants of a planet of Native Americans (it's a long story). The illusion works for Kirk until a jealous shaman cuts Kirk's hand, revealing that the divine being is just a man after all. "Behold! A god who bleeds!" the shaman mocks, exposing Kirk as a fraud to the rest of the tribe. It may sound like a stretch -- and, let's be fair, it is -- but I keep thinking of that episode when I look Barack Obama's poll numbers these days....

WASHINGTON -- There are intermittent signs that the recession may be near an end, though darkened by forecasts that the economy will likely take much longer than expected to achieve a full recovery. Home sales are slowly climbing; durable-goods orders to U.S. factories, absent the transportation sector, were up 1.1 percent in June; corporate earnings have begun to improve; and banks are making a comeback as a result of a growing savings rate. But it may be a bit premature to begin cheering that we are coming out of the woods, as a Newsweek cover story suggested last week. Housing...

For more than twenty years American foreign policy has been guided by a freedom agenda: the notion that our security interests are best protected by advancing the cause of freedom around the world. Ronald Reagan championed it when he won the cold war, George H.W. Bush when he fought the first gulf war, and Bill Clinton when he committed America to defending human rights in the Balkans. Now, here comes President Barack Obama. who has effectively turned America’s back on the cause of freedom around the globe. Right now, freedom hangs in the balance in Honduras. President Manuel Zelaya has...

Sin 700. This sin business worries me. Is it possible that mortal man can sin against Almighty God? I can see that he can sin against his fellow mortal men. It is possible precisely because we are mortal men and He is Almighty God. What is sin? Sin is a crime, and crime is a breaking of the law. Now God created us, and He certainly has the right to lay down laws according to which we must conduct ourselves. If men will not obey those laws they sin against God just as those who refuse to obey the state...

Last week, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee Patrick Leahy spoke out against critics of Sonia Sotomayor as playing “racial politics.” According to Leahy, "You have one leader of the Republican party call her the equivalent of the head of the Ku Klux Klan… That's what comes across. It comes across that if you belong to a group that tries to help Hispanics... somehow you're suspicious.” Last week, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee Patrick Leahy spoke out against critics of Sonia Sotomayor as playing “racial politics.” According to Leahy, "You have one leader of the Republican party...

Here is a Yahoo poll on Barack H. Obama's performance on the economy. Hurry up and vote before they take it down. Where is Drudge?

A judge in Washington State ruled that 138,500 residents who signed a petition protesting a recent move to give gay couples the same rights as married couples will not have their names released on the internet as requested by a pro-gay lobbying group. The group, Whosigned.org, sought to release the signatures to “make this public record signature information accessible and searchable on the internet,” and to “provide Washington State Voters with a way of reporting when their signature has been recorded either fraudulently or in error.” But James Bopp, Jr. the attorney for the plaintiffs that sought the injunction against...

July 31 Spiritual Bouquet: He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me, you can do nothing. St. John 15:5 SAINT IGNATIUS of LOYOLAFounder of the Society of Jesus(1491-1556) Saint Ignatius was born at Loyola in Spain, in the year 1491. He served his king as a courtier and a soldier until his thirtieth year. At that time a cannon ball broke the right leg of the young officer, who in a few days had reached the brink of death and received the Last Sacraments. It was the eve of the feast day of...

Everything you need to know about false Hope and Change can be found in one picture: the image of President Obama embracing embattled Sen. Chris Dodd. The troubled Democrat is in deep over his sweetheart Countrywide home-loan deals, corporate bailout cash and crony associations. New revelations by Countrywide whistleblower Robert Feinberg confirm what more and more of Dodd's constituents in Connecticut are coming to realize: He's a lying weasel. Dodd denied knowledge of the special treatment the subprime mortgage company had given him and Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad on home loans. (Dodd's were worth more than $800,000.) Feinberg...

When it mattered, ‘the most trusted man in America’ actually wasn’t that trustworthyOn the face of it—and on the face of them—Michael Jackson and Walter Cronkite would not appear to have much in common. Cronkite was (all together now) “the most trusted man in America”; Jackson was the least trusted child-man in America, at least to any parents whose ambitions for their kid extend beyond a $30-million out-of-court settlement. But, for those members of the Jackstream Media hoping to eke out one more week of prostrations and ululations for their Gloved One, Cronkite’s death served as a kind of intervention....

CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX CONCERNING SPIRITUAL COMMUNION ALTHOUGH ACTUAL RECEPTION of the Sacrament of the Eucharist is limited to once a day, you are nevertheless at liberty to communicate in spirit every hour. And nothing except your own negligence can prevent you from receiving the inestimable benefits to be derived from such a union with Him. It is worth noting that spiritual Communion is sometimes of greater benefit to the soul and more acceptable to God than many sacramental Communions received with little preparation and less affection. When, therefore, you are properly disposed to receive the Son of God spiritually, be assured...

August's new movie G.I. Joe: Rise of Cobra may not be at the top of our list of must-sees this summer, but we have been watching closely for the strange weapon designs they come up with. Bad procurement choices and G.I. Joe–the toys, cartoons and, now, the movie–have a long history. Here, we look at the five most misguided equipment designs placed in the hands of G.I. Joe figurines over the years. The Mole PodHistorically, mining underneath a defensive perimeter is an iffy military tactic–when it works, it can end a siege (particularly when walls can be collapsed, or explosives...

The House has passed a far-reaching food safety bill requiring more government inspections and imposing new penalties on those who violate the law, reacting strongly to an outbreak of salmonella in peanuts that killed at least nine people. The legislation would require greater oversight of food manufacturers and give the Food and Drug Administration new authority to order recalls. It also would require the FDA to develop a system for better tracing food-borne illnesses. Food companies would be required to create detailed food safety plans. President Barack Obama praised the bill soon after it was passed, calling it "a major...