Free Republic

The last two days have been amazing! Just shortly after midnight on Tuesday, the phone started ringing and I let the answering machine take the call. But very soon there was another call… with an even more urgent message! Very quickly, a friend of Kevin Innes, explained to me that Kevin had been "detained" by the local sheriff and was being held for the FBI to arrest him! Holy Cow!! The #2 supporter for the Liberty Dollar and co-instructor at the Liberty Dollar University training sessions was in deep trouble with the Feds! I was sure to be next. But...

I was watching the NBC special called "Inside the White House" last night and was struck by a meeting with Larry Summers and the President. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30892505/#31073805 It was touted as an "all access" day in the life of the President but at 7:15 minutes into Part 1 Larry Summers and a man who I believe is Austan Goolsbee come into the Oval Office for a call with "the Germans". Summers is obviously on edge and shuts down the cameras when he begins to discuss the problem. Summers: "Life has changed..ahh..since the briefing…ahh” Obama: "For the better or for the worse?"...

The American economy has gone away. It is not coming back until free trade myths are buried 6 feet under.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton urged China to continue buying U.S. Treasury bonds to help finance President Barack Obama’s stimulus plan, saying “we are truly going to rise or fall together.”

ZURICH, Feb 21 (Reuters) - The right-wing Swiss People's Party (SVP) called on Saturday for retaliation against the United States over a U.S. tax probe into the country's biggest bank UBS that threatens prized banking secrecy.

NEW YORK (AP) -- Shares of IndyMac Bancorp Inc. plummeted Tuesday morning after the company stopped accepting some loan submissions and trimmed its work force, and an analyst cut his price target to $0. ADVERTISEMENT The stock fell 31 cents, or 43.5 percent, to 40 cents after hitting an all-time low of 34 cents earlier in the session. Late Monday, the mortgage lender said it has stopped accepting new loan submissions in its main mortgage lending divisions and plans to slash 3,800 jobs, or more than half of its work force. In addition, the company said its second-quarter loss will...

Say it isn't so: The Fed chairman, rapidly losing home equity in the housing bust? Bloomberg News reports Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke's Capitol Hill home is slipping in value and may soon be worth less than he paid for it. An economist quoted by Bloomberg estimates Bernanke's house has lost $260,000 in value. "Bernanke [pictured] lives in Washington's Capitol Hill area in a four- bedroom, 2,600-square-foot house he bought new in May 2004 for $839,000. Almost four years later, it may not be worth any more, according to real estate records and local agents. More: "'Even though he's the Fed...

Before the Financial Services Committee, Subcommittee on Domestic and International Monetary Policy, Trade, and Technology, Hearing on HR 5512, March 11, 2008 Mr. Chairman, I oppose HR 5512 because it is unconstitutional to delegate the determination of the metal content of our coinage to the Secretary of the Treasury. Under Article I Section 8 of the Constitution, the Congress is given the power to coin money and regulate the value thereof. It is a shame that Congress has already unconstitutionally delegated its coinage authority to the Treasury Department, but that is no reason to further delegate our power and essentially...

The word "inflation" covers two different concepts, and it's important to keep them separate. One concept is monetary inflation, which is when the supply of money increases faster than the supply of goods and services. The other concept is price inflation, which is an increase in the overall level of prices for goods and services. The relationship between the two is the relationship of cause and effect. Monetary inflation causes price inflation. But while almost everyone sees price inflation when it happens, few people notice the monetary inflation that is causing it. And so they tend to blame the producers...

The center of focus this past week on Wall Street – and indeed, much of the financial world – was whether or not Bear Stearns will go belly-up. As questions arose about the quality of its $395 billion of assets that were carried on only $12 billion of equity, its customers and other brokers became unwilling to accept the counterparty risk that arises from transacting with Bear, while its lenders began worrying about repayment. Being leveraged to that extent, even a small decline in the value of its assets can significantly erode the firm's equity base. But given that Bear...

This week, as the financial sector began to give way under the unbearable weight of bad mortgage debt, the Federal Reserve stepped in to save the day. At least that’s what it says in the script. In a surprise move, the Federal Reserve announced its intention to swap $200 billion of treasury debt for $200 billion of potentially worthless mortgage-backed securities. The Fed may have been partially spurred to take the step as a result of the rapid collapse of Carlyle Capital Corp. a publicly traded private equity firm that is a subsidiary of the Carlyle Group. The Dutch firm...