Free Republic

U.S. FINANCIAL CRISIS HAS GIVEN CAPITALISM BLACK EYE Every year the Milken Global Conference hosts a roundtable of Nobel laureates in economics, chaired by the financier Michael Milken. This year's discussion, held in Los Angeles April 29, includes Gary Becker (1992), Myron Scholes (1997), Michael Spence (2001) and Ed Phelps (2006). In this excerpt, the Nobel laureates discuss the depth of the U.S. financial crisis, its effect on the rest of the world and the commodity price rises for oil and food. By Gary Becker, Myron Scholes, Michael Spence and Ed Phelps Michael Milken: Almost 50 percent of the world's...

Advertisement A group of boy scouts attended the Thursday Flower Mound Town Council meeting. The scouts attended the meeting for a merit badge, but what they got was an education in politics. During the heated meeting, Mayor Jody Smith cautioned the audience to maintain decorum. Much of the audience in attendance was there to protest the Shops at Market Street Project. The Council voted 4-1 to deny an amendment to the Master Plan redefining the Master Plan...

RANCHO BERNARDO – Developer Ron Bamberger doesn't deny stepping into a Hooters once or twice. Even though he didn't really like the food, that's not the reason he thinks it's a bad idea for the company to open a restaurant in the area. “We're in a high-end, award-winning master-planned community, and Hooters is not consistent with the culture,” he said. Bamberger is president of Boardwalk Development, which among other ventures manages the shopping center on Bernardo Center Drive that houses Vons and other stores. He said that for the good of the community where he does business, he's spearheading what...

Britain should drastically reduce the growth of air travel to bring greenhouse gas emissions within levels that will avoid dangerous climate change, a report by leading environmental scientists said Wednesday. Air travel has boomed in recent years thanks largely to cheaper flights, and the government predicts that the number of air passengers in Britain will more than double by 2020. But aviation is a major source of carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas, because planes burn huge amounts of fossil fuels at high altitudes. The government says it wants a 60 percent cut in carbon dioxide emissions by 2050, compared...