Free Republic

Deutsche Bank: It's Time To Decide Whether The US Recovery Is Over Sam Ro Jul. 3, 2012, 9:02 AM According to the National Bureau of Economic Analysis, the U.S. economic recovery began in June 2009, which means it has been growing for a solid 36 months. Yesterday, we learned that the June ISM report collapesd to 49.7 from 53.5 in May. Economists were looking for a reading of 52.0. A reading below 50 signals contraction. So, are we heading for a recession? Deutsche Bank's Jim Reid notes that the duration of the average recovery usually ends right around now: H2...

40) "A hippie is someone who looks like Tarzan, walks like Jane and smells like Cheetah." 39) "The American dream is not that every man must be level with every other man. The American dream is that every man must be free to become whatever God intends he should become." 38) "When you can't make them see the light, make them feel the heat." 37) "Welfare's purpose should be to eliminate, as far as possible, the need for its own existence." 36) "A taxpayer is someone who works for the federal government but doesn't have to take a civil-service exam."...

Thy word have I hid in mine heart,that I might not sin against thee. (Psalm 119:11)

Heretical sect founded in A.D. 144 at Rome by Marcion and continuing in the West for 300 years, but in the East some centuries longer, especially outside the Byzantine Empire. They rejected the writings of the Old Testament and taught that Christ was not the Son of the God of the Jews, but the Son of the good God, who was different from the God of the Ancient Covenant. They anticipated the more consistent dualism of Manichaeism and were finally absorbed by it. As they arose in the very infancy of Christianity and adopted from the beginning a strong ecclesiastical...

Beirut's Minet al-Hosn construction site does not contain the remains of a Phoenician port as maintained by the Directorate General of Antiquities and the former Culture Minister, according to an archaeological report obtained by The Daily Star. The Archaeological Assessment Report on the Venus Towers Site states: "While the site ... is intriguing, it does not fit the known parameters for a port, shipyard, or shipshed facility." The report, written by Dr. Ralph Pederson of Marburg University following an extensive investigation, maintains that there is nothing to connect the site to ships or shipbuilding. "The trenches could not have functioned...

Many are talking about teaching the GOP a lesson. As a fellow Freeper suggested - teach the Dems a lesson instead! 'Penalties' is the red hot topic. We the people can impose penalties on the violators of the Constitution by voting them out! So teach them a lesson by dishing out the most severe penalties - vote them out!

An internet campaign has been launched to raise money to turn part of Detroit into a zombie amusement park. The group behind the campaign is hoping to use the internet to raise $145,000 by August 10 for what they're calling Z World Detroit. The fundraising website say the plan is "fun and unique" and will help "revitalize an area while creating some jobs for Detroiters.

To quote Lando Calrissian, this deal's getting worse all the time. General Motors(GM) shares fell to a fresh 2012 closing low of 19.57 on Monday. The stock hit 19 in mid-December, the lowest since the auto giant came public at $33 in November 2010 following its June 2009 bankruptcy. Normally you might say, tough luck investors. But this is Government Motors. The Treasury still owns 26.5% of GM, or 500 million shares. Taxpayers are still out $26.4 billion in direct aid. Shares would have to hit $53 for the government to break even. Those shares were worth about $9.8 billion...

Tallahassee — A federal judge has permanently blocked a Florida law barring doctors from asking their patients about gun ownership, ruling the law unconstitutionally violates physicians’ freedom of speech. U.S. District Judge Marcia Cooke issued a permanent injunction Friday that barred the law from going into effect and rejected the state’s argument that the law was aimed at protecting gun owners from discrimination. Cooke had temporarily put the law on hold last year, after three groups of doctors sued Gov. Rick Scott within days after he signed the National Rifle Association-backed bill passed by the GOP-dominated legislature. “This law chills...

Since Stalin labeled Leon Trotsky -- the man who was the father of Russian Bolshevism! -- a "fascist," the Left has labeled its ideological opponents evil. And when you control nearly all of the news media and schools, that labeling works

"How do you get to Carnegie Hall?" "Practice." It's an old line, and perhaps an obsolescent one. I can't recall the last time I heard anyone use it. Americans don't seem to want to get to Carnegie Hall, not if American Idol is auditioning round the block. And practice is one of those things, like math, the education system seems to have ceded to the Asians. These days, China not only makes most of the pianos, but plays them. David Goldman (the Internet's "Spengler") likes to point out the correlation between the study of Western classical music and success in...

Women who own cats are more likely to have mental health problems and commit suicide because they can be infected by a common parasite that can be caught from cat litter, a study has found.

Sen. Richard Burr, R-NC, and Sen. Jim Webb, D-Va., have again co-sponsored the Veterans Second Amendment Protection Act, a bill that will allow veterans to legally designate another person to handle their finances without being barred from owning firearms. Right now, if a veteran legally designates another person to handle his or her affairs -- a standard bureaucratic procedure done by many veterans for many reasons -- the Department of Veterans Affairs classifies the veteran as "incapacitated" and notifies the FBI’s National Instant Criminal Background Check System, or NICS. The NICS then uses the VA's "incapacitated “classification to prohibit the...

My son called me, furious.  “I was just in line at the grocery store, and the girl in front of me had all this food and paid for it with an EBT card,” he told me.  “Okay,” I said, trying to calm him down.  “You’ve lived here all your life--you know that’s normal in L.A.”  “Yeah, but her boyfriend was in line right behind her and he had beer and all kinds of alcohol and then he got cigarettes and they paid for it with their EBT cash card after they got all their food!” he yelled.  “I saved all...

Here's what needs to be asked after every shooting in Bridgeport: Where did the gun come from? That's what Bridgeport Mayor Bill Finch said the other day at yet another community meeting in his city to address what the mayor calls the "disease" of gun violence, and he's absolutely right. Within the overall context of gun violence in Connecticut's cities -- including Stamford, where guns are fired on the streets with regularity -- is the urgent issue of the pool of young men who are likely to be at one or the other end of the gun. It is those...

<p>With the federal health care law once again an election-year issue, a new poll finds Republicans are far more fired up and ready to vote than Democrats over the policy.</p> <p>A Kaiser Family Foundation poll, conducted in the wake of last week's Supreme Court ruling that upheld the Affordable Care Act, found that 31 percent of Republicans reported being more likely to vote because of the ruling. Just 18 percent of Democrats said the same.</p>

CHESTERFIELD, VA (WWBT) - As storms rolled through Saturday night, a different kind of danger erupted at a convenience store in Chesterfield. The shop owner at Tienda Joana boldly refused to back down to a pair of robbers who burst through the door just before closing time. The owner, William Avaloa, drew his gun to match theirs. Avaloa described how one of the robbers kept watch at the door, while the other aimed his gun at one of William's future teenaged stepsons. "He said, ‘Nobody move!'" said Avaloa. "I was really nervous because you never know what's going to happen."...

Jacksonville, FL — A man who flagged down Jacksonville police to report a shooting also said he thought he was responsible. An off-duty officer was flagged down Saturday around 3:30 AM by a man who says someone tried to rob him. He says they got into a gun battle and he believed he shot the robber. Police found a deceased black man behind a house at W 13th Street and Thames Avenue. He appeared to have suffered a gunshot wound and there was a hand gun lying next to the man. A witness says he was sitting in a car...

US Manufacturing contracted this month as reported in the June 2012 Manufacturing ISM Report On Business® Economic activity in the manufacturing sector contracted in June for the first time since July 2009; however, the overall economy grew for the 37th consecutive month, say the nation's supply executives in the latest Manufacturing ISM Report On Business®. "The PMI registered 49.7 percent, a decrease of 3.8 percentage points from May's reading of 53.5 percent, indicating contraction in the manufacturing sector for the first time since July 2009, when the PMI registered 49.2 percent. The New Orders Index dropped 12.3 percentage points in...

Some 130 lawmakers sent President Obama a letter on Monday expressing their opposition to a pending arms trade treaty if it impinges on gun rights and U.S. sovereignty in any way. The United Nations this week begins a month-long process of crafting a long-delayed treaty to create international standards for importing and exporting conventional weapons. Proponents say the treaty would bring much of the rest of the world in line with U.S. standards without affecting domestic sales, but gun enthusiasts are worried. “The UN's actions to date indicate that the ATT [United Nations Arms Trade Treaty] is likely to pose...