Free Republic

During an interview with WVON on Thursday, Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson said “the fluctuations of the market and Trump’s tariffs” have resulted in massive losses to the city “just because of the uncertainty and the chaos.” And also stated that he wants to raise taxes by imposing a financial transaction tax and expressed openness to a corporate head tax and stated that those things, along with lots of other ideas, would put “the burden on the very people that Donald Trump is trying to protect.” While discussing the city’s budget, [relevant remarks begin around 5:35] Johnson said that the budget...

As many as 3 million New Yorkers may be fraudulently reaping taxpayer-funded Medicaid and other public health insurance benefits at a potential cost of $20 billion a year, a staggering new study claims. About 5.5 million Empire State residents have incomes low enough to meet the standard eligibility limits for Medicaid or the Essential Plan, a related public health insurance program. But with expanded eligibility rules under Obamacare and an increased demand for a controversial homecare program, enrollment has swelled to 8.5 million, a potential surplus of 3 million.

The British taxpayer is footing the bill for a record number of out-of-work migrants, who are reportedly costing the government up to £8.5 billion per year. A record 1,689,000 foreigners are currently unemployed or otherwise “economically inactive” in the UK, according to analysis of government figures by the Centre for Immigration Control. The think tank noted that the current level is the highest in British history, surpassing the previous high in 2012 of 1,628,000.

A raft of regulations enacted by the Biden administration is pinching Americans’ wallets to the tune of nearly $10,000 per household as of the end of last year, according to a budget watchdog group. Should Biden’s regulatory trajectory keep pace with that of his former boss, Barack Obama, the cost will skyrocket to roughly $60,000 per household by the end of Biden’s possible second term in office, the Committee to Unleash Prosperity estimated in a recent report that measured “current and expected future costs.”

A gallon of gas is now costing buyers $5 on average in San Diego as the national average recently climbed to $3.72. Fox 5 reported on Friday:

Billions of dollars in potential oil revenue that could help close the federal deficit is being lost as a result of President Obama’s anti-drilling agenda. Production in the Gulf of Mexico — which normally accounts for about 30 percent of all U.S. production — is expected to drop this year by 220,000 barrels per day, according to projections from the U.S. Energy Information Administration. With oil currently at $90 a barrel and the royalty rate at 18.75 percent, that equals $3.7 million in lost revenue each day.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's ballot call for California to live within its means is triggering questions about whether his own administration is living within its means -- especially when it comes to his wife, Maria Shriver. Shriver doesn't hold elected office, but records show she does command a half-million-dollar-a-year staff -- which, depending on how you cut it, is anywhere from $60,000 to $180,000 more than what her predecessor, Sharon Davis, had. Recently, Daniel Zingale -- a Democratic gay rights advocate who had been working on Controller Steve Westly's gubernatorial campaign -- was appointed Shriver's $123,255 chief of staff. When he...

Alek Boyd at VCrisis has an interesting new article out about what London's oil traders say about Venezuela's Marxist president, Hugo Chavez who controls one sixth of our oil. Boyd points out that not only does Chavez raise oil prices by his trash talk, but also by cutting available supply. He's doing the latter through the destruction of existing oil contracts among U.S. oil companies and general neglect of his state oil company. At The American Thinker, we also have noted how Chavez's abuse of oil workers is hitting world oil prices. And Chavez, through his current actions, is doing...

SACRAMENTO - Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's attempt to save money by replacing the eastern span of the Bay Bridge with a towerless concrete skyway could end up costing more than the suspension bridge favored by local leaders, the legislative analyst said Monday. The analyst, the Legislature's adviser on budget matters, said the skyway could run into design and environmental problems that would add to its current estimated construction costs, which range from $800 million to $1.7 billion. The suspension bridge would be more complicated than the skyway and would cost $1.2 billion to $2.1 billion to build, according to current projections....

<p>SACRAMENTO - During the past four years, California's troubled prison system hired 1,000 guards at a cost of up to $100 million and without permission from the Legislature, state finance officials revealed Wednesday.</p> <p>In fact, the non-partisan legislative analysts office told lawmakers that the Department of Corrections budget in recent years grew at a faster rate than the inmate population. Over the past decade, the budget has doubled, to about $6 billion, while the number of inmates jumped only about 20 percent, to roughly 160,000.</p>