Free Republic

The NICS checks for May, 2017 were 1,942,677.  That is a new record for May. The next highest was in 2016, 1,870,000. It is obvious from the overlap of the red bar and the blue line in the chart. The National Instant Criminal background check System  (NICS) checks continue to confound expectations. Instead of a continual fall during the Trump administration, there was a one time drop in January of 2017 followed by a seasonally adjusted rise that has broken the record for May. The May 2017 checks are just under 104% of the previous record, set in 2016....

Kara Nielsen, manager of Sales and Engagement USA for Innova Market Insights, discussed food trends during her presentation at the Sosland Publishing Purchasing Seminar. KANSAS CITY — Vegetable butchery, lab-grown burgers, seaweed and spirulina may be among the food trends of tomorrow. Concepts supporting sustainable nutrition and busy consumer lifestyles are set to emerge, said Kara Nielsen, manager of Sales and Engagement USA for Innova Market Insights. During a June 6 presentation at the Sosland Publishing Purchasing Seminar in Kansas City, Nielsen discussed current and future food trends, including what’s next on the health and wellness horizon. Protein may be...

Think of it like Uber but for picking up large items. Truxx is a new app that's now in the Tampa Bay area. Ever buy something at a store or yard sale and realize it won't fit in your car? The Truxx app is designed to bring a truck to you and haul it to your destination. But, it's also a way for those with a truck or large SUV to make a bit of extra money. Those needing the service will put the information, like how big the item is, destination, location, into the app.....

China's largest e-commerce company, Alibaba Group Holding Ltd., tapped Martha Stewart and CNBC's Marcus Lemonis as speakers for its upcoming procurement event in Detroit. The Gateway '17 event June 20-21 at Cobo Center in Detroit is driven by Alibaba's need to expand internationally and provide Chinese consumers with high-quality products prevalent in this region. Stewart and Lemonis, host of CNBC's primetime show "The Profit," are joined by Jack Ma, founder and chairman of Alibaba, who will keynote the event in a fireside chat with PBS News' Charlie Rose. David Abney, CEO of UPS, is another confirmed speaker. Detroit Mayor Mike...

President Trump has said on multiple occasions that he inherited an economic mess from his predecessor. The mainstream media fact checkers moved quickly to disprove him, pointing to the grossly misleading low unemployment rate as all the proof you need. While the current economy looks better on the surface compared to 2009, there are still many danger signs pointing to perhaps a second Great Recession coming much sooner than you think. Just about all presidents discuss the direness of the economy in order to quickly claim credit for any uptick in growth, blaming the current state of affairs on the...

Michelle Obama looked out into an audience packed with mostly male tech workers and asked them to make room for women in technology. Obama was a guest speaker at WWDC, Apple's annual developer conference, on Tuesday. She was introduced by Tim Cook himself before sitting down with Lisa Jackson, the former head of the EPA who now heads up social and environmental initiatives for Apple. Their hour-long discussion touched on Obama's post-White House life, diversity in tech and not falling down the stairs of Air Force One. Apple did not allow press into the event, but CNN Tech spoke to...

The US is slowly withdrawing from the Paris agreement, but the rest of the world’s not having it. Last week, the European Union and China released a joint statement declaring their intentions to move on with the Agreement with or without America. They were clearly referring to just the Executive Branch, however, as now they’ve decided to work with US states and cities that are keen on cutting their carbon footprint by going over the President’s weirdly coiffed head. “Strong transatlantic ties are far more important and far more durable than the latest unfortunate decisions of the new administration,” EU...

Liberal billionaire George Soros gave an additional $250,000 to Virginia Democrat Tom Perriello in May, bringing his total contributions to the former one-term congressman’s primary to $500,000, according to a campaign finance report filed on Monday. Together with $50,000 that was given to Perriello from Soros’s son Gregory, money from the Soros family accounted for 16 percent of the money the campaign brought in between April 1 and June 1 of this year.

Is California too liberal for you? Would you rather live with like-minded conservatives? There’s a solution: Move to Texas. That’s the mission of a new company called “Conservative Move,” a company started last month by Iraq War veteran and former U.S. Congressional candidate Paul Chabot. In January, Chabot moved from California to North Texas for “a better life for our four young children,” according to Conservative Move’s website. Conservative Move said its focus is on moving families to Collin County, which is just north of Dallas and is one of the “Best of Places to Live” with “great schools, good...

The race to create self-driving cars is on—but what happens when they’re everywhere and nobody has to drive? That could lead to a “passenger economy” worth $7 trillion by 2050, according to a new report by Intel and analyst firm Strategy Analytics. While the name of the potential new market is lame, the amount of cash it's estimated to drive is not: the study predicts self-driving cars will free up 250 million hours of commuting time per year, providing the backbone for a thriving $800 billion industry by 2035, when the study predicts fully autonomous vehicles will begin to proliferate...

Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced Monday that the online men’s grooming products retailer Harry’s is making a “major New York City expansion” and creating 188 jobs — thanks, in part, to state tax credits. To encourage Harry’s expansion and relocation of its headquarters to 75 Varick St., Empire State Development is offering the company $1.5 million in tax credits. ESD is the state’s economic development arm. Over the next five years, the state expects the move to create 188 jobs related to technology, software engineering and research and development. Harry’s has become “a household name” since it launched in 2013, the...

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Memory foam maker Sinomax Group is opening its first U.S. manufacturing facility in Tennessee. The 500,000-square-foot plant will formally open its doors in the Nashville community of La Vergne on Tuesday. The facility is expected to create 350 jobs....

A Chinese tire manufacturer is planning to invest up to $1 billion and create up to 1,200 jobs in an Orangeburg County plant. Officials provided few details on Monday, other than to confirm the S.C. Department of Commerce is seeking $40 million to provide infrastructure for the company. "This is another step in the process to potentially secure a company, but because there are still a number of details that need to be worked out and both parties must still go through corresponding approval processes, it is too early to confirm anything further," South Carolina Department of Commerce spokeswoman Adrienne...

After last September’s revelations that Palmer Luckey donated $100,000 to a pro-Trump organization dedicated to spreading anti-Clinton memes, the Oculus founder disappeared from public view. He resurfaced in March following his departure from Facebook, and is now back in the spotlight with a new company that makes technology designed to monitor border crossings. Information on Luckey’s new startup comes from a New York Times article yesterday that cites three “people familiar” with the matter. The business reportedly uses the same kind of lidar tech found in self-driving cars for the surveillance of country borders and restricted areas such as military...

I am sending you this latest Jon Rappoport article because it reminds me of something I learned early on when I really got involved in radio broadcasting. I remember this information because it involves “marketing” and “positioning” an idea, a though into the prospects mind. The American public along with the British, Chinese, Japanese and all civilized societies with some forms of free enterprise offer huge marketing and advertising opportunities. Look at any billboard, magazine, television program, newspaper, buss bench and even soft drink cups. There are advertisements everywhere. To the New York City ad agencies it’s “over communication” and...

Industry experts had lowered their forecasts for May auto sales, having been overoptimistic every month this year, always figuring that there would be a year-over-year sales increase, when in fact sales fell every month. So for May, they became practically gloomy, but not gloomy enough. J.D. Power and LMC Automotive forecast that new vehicle sales in May would inch up 0.5% year-over-year to 1.54 million cars and light trucks. Edmunds predicted that sales would edge up 0.3% to 1.53 million units. And Kelley Blue Book forecast that sales would be essentially flat year-over-year at 1.525 million: And this is what...

The US jobs market has been described as the backbone of the recovery – 82 months of continuous jobs growth with unemployment hitting 4.5% – the lowest since 2007. However the perceived strength in jobs creation is at odds with other economic indicators. President Trump ran on a campaign that repeatedly touted “jobs, jobs, jobs.” His emphasis on jobs creation and bringing employment back to America struck a chord with voters. Trump’s election in itself contradicts the popular narrative that the US jobs market is tight and robust. Wages, disposable income and real earnings growth along with low productivity and...

Even though I write about our ongoing long-term economic collapse every day, I didn’t realize that things were this bad. In this article, I am going to show you that the average rate of growth for the U.S. economy over the past 10 years is exactly equal to the average rate that the U.S. economy grew during the 1930s. The hard fact is that the past decade’s $10 trillion in deficit spending has produced the worst economic growth as measured by Gross Domestic Product in our nation’s history. You read that right, in the past decade our nation’s economy grew...

The management of Resorts World Manila has promised financial assistance for the families of the 37 victims killed in the recent attack in the luxury hotel and casino. “We are extending PHP1 million to [each of] the families of the deceased,” Steve Reilly, the casino’s chief operating officer, announced Saturday, according to a report by ABS-CBN News. At current exchange rates, PHP1 million is worth about $20,200. A gunman fired shots and set gaming tables alight in Resorts World Manila on Friday morning. Most victims died to smoke inhalation in the blaze that followed. The mother of gunman Jessie Javier...

European leaders criticizing President Donald Trump’s Thursday decision to withdraw from the Paris climate accord have also been lobbying the administration to fast-track the approval of liquefied natural gas (LNG) export terminals. ProPublica’s Andrew Revkin reported Friday that, while European leaders were “generally basking in the glow of the Paris Agreement,” they’ve been quietly lobbying Trump since February to fast-track approvals of multi-billion-dollar investments in U.S. LNG export terminals. Maros Sefcovic, who heads the European Union’s commission on energy policy, told ProPublica in April that “LNG exports were a central focus of meetings earlier in the year in Washington with...