Free Republic

America’s long-term national debt problem could lead to economic Armageddon. The misguided belief that we are actually paying down our debt is giving this administration a false sense of security. We can have all the growth we can muster in our GDP but if we are spending more than what’s coming in, the debt will only keep building. The days of growing our way out of debt were lost $5 trillion ago. This week the CBO announced that for the first four months of the government’s fiscal year ending in January we had created a deficit of $1.2 trillion. As a...

SHANGHAI/PARIS - An elderly Chinese tourist infected with the coronavirus has died in France, Paris said on Saturday, becoming the first fatality in Europe and the fourth outside mainland China from an epidemic that has rattled the world. Thought to have originated from a wildlife market in the Chinese city of Wuhan, the outbreak has dented the world’s second largest economy and presented a huge challenge to the ruling Communist Party. In the French case, the 80-year-old Chinese man died at the Bichat hospital in Paris of a lung infection due to the flu-like virus, Health Minister Agnes Buzyn said.

The Weekly Gardening Thread is a weekly gathering of folks that love soil, seeds and plants of all kinds. From complete newbies that are looking to start that first potted plant, to gardeners with some acreage, to Master Gardener level and beyond, we would love to hear from you. If you have specific question about a plant/problem you are having, please remember to state the Growing Zone where you are located. This thread is non-political respite. No matter what, you won’t be flamed, and the only dumb question is the one that isn’t asked. It is impossible to hijack the...

... The practice of government taking land for recreational uses—typically bike lanes, hiking paths and fashionable “rail trails” and “greenways”—is spreading across the country, marking a sharp and troubling expansion of eminent domain. The Takings Clause of the Constitution’s Fifth Amendment grants government the authority to seize property to be used for the public good, as long as government pays “just compensation” to the owner. Over the years, the Supreme Court has consistently expanded what is considered a “public good” to justify government seizures. In 2005, for instance, the high court upheld the taking of Susette Kelo’s waterfront home by...

The New York Times pointed out that there were as many commercials for electric vehicles during Super Bowl LIV as there had been between 2011 and 2019 combined. GM teased the upcoming GMC Hummer EV, Audi promoted its e-Tron Sportback, and Porsche showed off its new Taycan. While these commercials highlighted the new vehicles getting ready to hit the road, they did not acknowledge a much less flashy but still critically important issue: transitioning to this greener future will require charging infrastructure that can fuel the nation as effectively as gas stations currently do. And as a nation we are...

Posted on 9/10/2016, 10:40:12 AM by nikos1121 I am proud to stand and say unashamedly and unabashedly that I am deplorable. Who else is deplorable? Stand up and be counted! I will always believe that the turning point of the 2016 Election occurred during the week of 9/10/2016 when Hillary Clinton called us all here Deplorables. I’m reposting this today to see how many of here are still deplorable, and proud of it.

... Mr. Sanders wouldn’t be this close to the White House if not for the complicity of Democrats and the liberals who dominate the academy and media. Rather than fighting the ideas that animate him and his millennial voters, they have indulged and promoted them. They created the political environment in which he could prosper. Consider the intellectual currents he is riding: • The attack on capitalism and markets. Like Tony Blair in Britain, Bill Clinton’s New Democrats accommodated the economic lessons of Ronald Reagan. By the Obama Presidency, all that had changed. The left blamed markets for the 2008...

CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- There were women weeping in a chapel here. One named Veronica was something like inconsolable. She was talking about the crucifixion of Christ as if it was happening right then and there. She was feeling it. She was overwhelmed by the love of a God who would save humanity from the misery of sin and finality of death by coming into the world as a baby and dying such a brutal death. Through their tears, women were giving thanks to God for a successful three-day mission here at America's largest Catholic parish, St. Matthew's, led by a...

The Las Vegas Raiders have been rumored to be interested in Tom Brady, and a report emerged indicating they may pay handsomely to land the future Hall of Fame quarterback. Veteran NFL reporter Larry Fitzgerald Sr., the father of the Arizona Cardinals receiver, provided this interesting nugget on Friday: I’m told Las Vegas is prepared to offer @TomBrady $60 million over 2 years. Now, $30 million a year isn’t exactly top dollar these days, and there are reports that $40 million a year could soon be reached for another top QB.

... Mr. Bloomberg’s giant spending isn’t just buying ads, it’s driving up ad rates to make it harder for other Democratic candidates to get their messages out, it’s buying up campaign talent so they can’t, it’s corralling Democratic Party influentials to endorse his candidacy or at least mute any noisy criticism of his effort. When a recording leaked of Mr. Bloomberg defending stop-and-frisk in New York, Andre Fields of the liberal voting-rights group Fair Fight Action rushed out a tweet hitting him as a “true terrorist” but promptly deleted it. Fair Fight Action had received $5 million in funding from...

Defense attorneys for Roger Stone demanded a new trial Friday, one day after President Trump suggested that the forewoman in his longtime political confidant’s case had “significant bias.” The legal motion could affect Stone’s Feb. 20 sentencing date on charges of witness tampering and lying to Congress. The basis for the request was filed under seal Friday, but its existence was disclosed in a court order by U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson, who gave U.S. prosecutors until Feb. 18 to respond.... The Supreme Court standard for juror qualification is that they need not “be totally ignorant of the facts...

Today’s CG from The Arkansas Gazette should be easy. So, for a little extra challenge try solving the quote word for word or sentence by sentence. JM, ZML KHON NM PAAN NCA VMFA MQ ZMLB VXQA? VMMW XO NCA PXBBMB.---UZBMO WHNXA You can find this little fun word game, to combat early dementia and senility in us baby boomers, in several daily publications. The way it works is a letter stands for another letter. For example: AXYDLBAAXR is LONGFELLOW (does not apply to today's cryptogram). Beware, the game is very addictive. If this is your first time, don't be intimidated....

TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Jakarta Metro Police spokesman Sr. Comr. Yusri Yunus said the investigation into the disposal site of aborted fetuses in Paseban, Central Jakarta, is still on going. He suspected the perpetrators had thrown hundreds of aborted fetuses into the septic tank. "We are still investigating where [the fetuses were discarded], but from similar cases like this, [the fetuses] are usually disposed of in septic tanks," said Yusri in Paseban, Central Jakarta, on Friday, February 14, 2020. In addition, Yusri urged the patients who had had an abortion in Paseban to report, as the practice of abortion in the...

Sorry The page you are trying to access does not exist. This might be because you have entered the web address incorrectly or the page has moved. For help please visit help.ft.com. We apologize for any inconvenience. Why wasn't this page found? We asked some leading economists. Stagflation The cost of pages rose drastically, while the page production rate slowed down. General economics There was no market for it. Liquidity traps We injected some extra money into the technology team but there was little or no interest so they simply kept it, thus failing to stimulate the page economy. Pareto...

“We’re losing our damn minds!.. (Bernie Sanders) has never been a Democrat. He's an ideologue." (James Carville, Feb. 7) "The issue of this campaign. It is that word, socialism…Those of us like me, who grew up in the Cold War, and saw some aspects of it after visiting places like Vietnam, like I have, and seeing countries like Cuba, being there, I've seen what socialism is like and I don't like it. Okay. It's not only not free. It doesn't frickin' work." (MSNBC’s Chris Matthews, Feb.8.)Let’s give Sanders some credit. He’s holding up a mirror to his fellow Democrats and...

Last week, rumors began circulating that endangered pangolins — also known as scaly anteaters — might have been the intermediate host that allowed the deadly new coronavirus disease COVID-19 to spread from bats to humans, based on unpublished research findings announced in a Chinese university press release. Although evidence was not provided, I witnessed a flood of social media posts celebrating the “revenge” of pangolins because Chinese traditional remedies can include pangolin body parts. As much as I love pangolins and don’t want to see them driven to extinction by the illegal wildlife trade, I am concerned to see environmentalism...

Given the history of Americans of slave descent, it is ironic that most today have allied themselves to a Democrat Party whose policies amount to a modern form of slavery. It offers guaranteed minimal subsistence and perennial treatment as an inferior victim. It disintegrates their families, denies their children a quality education, and a recent Harvard/Yale study showed that liberals condescend to them as inferiors lacking intelligence. *snip* Sadly, many in the black community have internalized the limitations the Democrat Party’s philosophy has placed upon them. The liberal orthodoxy of dependence and inferiority has its rewards. If you will nod...

Joyce Parks was struggling to afford her Kia Soul when, she says, the dealership where she had bought it pitched her an unconventional idea: Stop making the payments. Ms. Parks, 63, says employees told her that she couldn’t trade in the Soul, but that she could buy another car. To get rid of the Soul, the dealership told her, she should have the lender repossess it, Ms. Parks said. The trade-in, where a buyer hands a car back to a dealership and uses it as credit toward another one, is often a crucial step in car buying. But some dealerships...

The contract between the Iowa Democratic Party and the company tasked with designing the app that sits at the center of the caucus meltdown on the opening night of the presidential nominating process underscores how deeply involved the Democratic National Committee was in ensuring the online tool was secure. The app eventually failed on Feb. 3, the night of the caucuses, with a glitch making it impossible for many precinct chairs to use the tool that was meant to calculate and submit data from Iowa's more than 1,700 caucus sites. The app's failure -- combined with an overwhelmed call center...

The Iranian regime will hold its so-called parliamentary elections next Friday amidst mounting crises. The "elections" this year unfold in a radically different setting, with growing popular discontent and uprisings exacerbating an already dire situation for the regime. Braving systematic suppression and human rights, people in Iran usually vote on the streets. In their massive protests in November, they voted to change the regime in its entirety. Elections in one of the most repressive states in the world are nothing but a farce. The regime has effectively monopolized power through the concept of velayat-e faqih (absolute clerical rule). The supreme...