Free Republic

PARIS — Marat Gabidullin's face is lined from years of exposure to the elements, and his hair is thinning. But at 56, he has the trim physique and muscular arms of a man 30 years younger. He wears a chunky ring bearing the image of a skull.The skull is the symbol of the Wagner Group — a private Russian mercenary force believed to be financed by an oligarch with close ties to President Vladimir Putin. The group is fighting alongside the Russian army in Ukraine's eastern Donbas region. And it's widely believed that at least some of the "little green...

<p>Vivian Koshefobamu, a 45-year-old vendor, speaks in front of dried meat, at the Ajegunle-Ikorodu market in Lagos on August 13, 2014.</p>

Shouting matches and even physical fights break out each time a minibus pulls up to drop off passengers at a crowded bus stop in downtown Harare. It's all about not getting short-changed. Hyperinflation forced Zimbabwe to trash its worthless local currency three years ago in a move that brought much needed relief to the crippled economy but created a surprising new headache: a lack of coins. "Change is a big problem, and at the same time passengers are impatient with us. I have been slapped a few times for not having change for them," said a bus conductor Walter Chakawata....

I'm going to harp on one theme for a while: that Barack Obama is deliberately trying to weaken and punish the USA and our European allies to pay them and us back for colonialism, because he identifies with his father, a militant anti-colonialist. Today's article provides additional evidence for this point of view, and it is the only point of view that squares with all of Obama's inexplicable actions - like telling NASA that their main mission is to lift Muslim self-esteem.

In case you think I'm nuts in believing that Obama represents one of the greatest dangers ever faced by this country, and that he is trying to weaken and punish America and her key allies because of his anti-colonialist obsession, here below is another story that can only be understood in that light: "While everyone's attention seems to be focused on the crisis in Egypt, a bombshell revelation about the administration's foreign policy in Europe has largely gone unnoticed. The British newspaper The Telegraph has reported that part of the price which President Obama paid to get Russia to sign...

Why did President Obama ignore the popular uprising in Iran, a sworn enemy of the USA and rushing to build a nuclear bomb, while trying mightily to jettison Mubarek, an important ally and keeper of the peace with Israel for 30 years? Why did President Obama create the START treaty which reduces our and Russia’s stock of nuclear weapons, while ignoring the threats posed by Iran and North Korea? Why did President Obama sit idly by as the Gulf oil spill created havoc and then ban and continue the ban on drilling even when held in contempt by federal courts,...

Barack Obama is the most antibusiness president in a generation, perhaps in American history. Thanks to him the era of big government is back. Obama runs up taxpayer debt not in the billions but in the trillions. He has expanded the federal government's control over home mortgages, investment banking, health care, autos and energy. The Weekly Standard summarizes Obama's approach as omnipotence at home, impotence abroad. The President's actions are so bizarre that they mystify his critics and supporters alike. Consider this headline from the Aug. 18, 2009 issue of the Wall Street Journal: "Obama Underwrites Offshore Drilling." Did you...

In his most formative years, the boy who became President of the United States was, in other words, subjected to humiliating, demeaning membership in a lower caste and cognizant both of the seemingly undeserved privileges of children born to high-caste expatriates and the grinding poverty of ordinary Indonesians among whom his family lived. That a deep anger and sense of unfairness would develop in such a situation seems more than likely, laying the groundwork for resentment of American power and wealth, and an embrace of anti-colonialist ideologies which undergirded a quest for political revenge, later in life. It was not...

The President isn't exactly a socialist. So what's driving his hostility to private enterprise? Look to his roots. Barack Obama is the most antibusiness president in a generation, perhaps in American history. Thanks to him the era of big government is back. Obama runs up taxpayer debt not in the billions but in the trillions. He has expanded the federal government's control over home mortgages, investment banking, health care, autos and energy. The Weekly Standard summarizes Obama's approach as omnipotence at home, impotence abroad. The President's actions are so bizarre that they mystify his critics and supporters alike.