Free Republic

Consumers keep at it despite tax increase at start of year WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) — Consumers increased spending in January for the third straight month, suggesting that a big drop in income and a tax hike at the start of the year only exerted a mild drag. Consumer spending advanced a seasonally adjusted 0.2% last month, the Commerce Department said Friday. That matched the estimate of economists polled by MarketWatch. Americans continued their spending ways despite an increase in their taxes and the biggest plunge in income in 20 years. A two-year law that reduced payroll taxes by 2% expired...

Everyone is talking about the Pentagon-sponsored study which concludes that the 2008 economic meltdown may have been deliberately triggered. Oh wait − not everyone is talking about it. In fact, few people have even heard of it. I didn’t learn of the study from ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, CNN, or liberal newspapers. I learned of it only by surfing conservative websites that reference the Washington Times. The study was prepared in 2009, but it was just made public. The study does not say that the economic meltdown was the result of deliberate action − that is, economic terrorism − but...

--SNIP-- Partly responsible: a new Florida Supreme Court rule that requires lenders to verify they are the actual owners of a home before making the initial case for foreclosure. Show me the "note," in other words. The problem is that the notes — legal promises from borrowers to repay a debt — have been sold and resold, bundled into securities, scanned into computers, sealed in unknown vaults and lost in other ways as homes got caught up in the puzzling markets of the real estate boom. "The original note is something very significant, and they just seem to have lost...

It's getting hard to keep track of all the different ways people are attacking Friday's employment number. You've got TrimTabs which keeps banging the drum about the birth-death model. You've got folks talking about how it was all in temp work, or the public. Then there are those who point out all of the people who have left the workforce. David Rosenberg chimes in with another: that it just can't be right, because it doesn't jibe with the contraction in the services sector ------ A 1-IN-35 EVENT It’s remarkable nobody talks about this. The big surprise in the payroll data...

Trashing America Did p-resident Obama ever produce a valid birth certificate? In less than 6 months he's trashed over 200 years of American history in his struggle with the WE THE PEOPLE. Americans have had it with the screwball congress who's approval ratings are or recently were in single digits. ENOUGH!!! There was a time in America where an "Elected Representative" did just that and when there was no clear majority opinion among their constituents they envoked their own opinion and voted on what they felt was the best choice. That was the only time a Representative "votes their conscience"....

The newest jobs report is comming out at 8:30am today. The prediction is 275,000 more jobs lost.

The U.S. Treasury has apparently found another way to lose more taxpayer money. Perhaps $9 billion down the drain, unless changes are made soon. Last year, when the Treasury doled out some $200 billion from the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), it also acquired warrants to purchase common stock in banks that received TARP assistance. However, as the law was written, the Treasury must sell those same warrants back to the banks once they have paid back their original TARP loan. What the law does not state is for how much. One of the first banks to pay...

Barney Frank talked about limiting executive pay across the board not just limiting it to bailout companies. Barney Frank tried to misrepresent the questions and was totally evasive on being direct. Frank may be on the finance committe but there is no question he does not understand real world ecconomices. It is further clear Barney Frank is disconnected from any kind of outside the betway reality. The time index to watch is after 5 minutes 35 seconds. At that point is where he hissy fits and ends the interview.

When it comes to the inner workings of its parks, the Disney empire can be as secretive as the Kremlin. But one thing the company is admitting is that it's firing lots of people at its theme parks. It's not discussing the exact number of dismissals except to say it's restructuring and aiming for efficiency, but by adding up reports, we can approach an understanding of the severity of the situation. Earlier this winter, voluntary buyouts were offered to 619 executives, and 50 took the offer. One unattributed person told the Orlando Sentinel that the cuts numbered around 450, while...

President Obama's address Tuesday to a joint session of Congress will have a heavy emphasis on the economy and will try to strike an optimistic tone, aides said. That's a sign Obama has heard the criticism, including from former President Clinton, that he needs to mix sober talk with an upbeat bottom line. "He believes we will meet these challenges and lift ourselves out of this" recession, one top aide said. "He will say, 'The best days are ahead of us.' "

Eager to show that he feels people's pain, President Bush told the country Thursday his administration is working feverishly to calm turmoil in the financial markets. With reports swirling of possibly imminent new government action, the president met with his treasury secretary and the head of the Federal Reserve. Nothing was announced immediately after the 40-minute meeting at the White House, which included Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Christopher Cox, along with Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke. White House spokesman Tony Fratto would not comment on whether any decisions were made at the session, or whether...

By Sibel Utku Bila - Agence France-Presse ANKARA - Turkey hinted yesterday that it may shun the start of EU membership talks next week as political tensions rose over the country's place in Europe, leading Britain to warn of a «huge betrayal» if the door was slammed shut on Ankara. Raising the risk of a political showdown, the European Parliament issued a stern warning to Ankara to recognize Cyprus and acknowledge that the Ottomans committed «genocide» against Armenians during World War I, two highly sensitive issues that have already strained ties. The Parliament did, however, endorse the start of talks...

Euro doubts labeled ‘absurd’ The Bank of Greece’s governor, Nicholas Garganas, dismissed doubts about the future of the eurozone yesterday as the euro dipped on continued weakness in the currency to lows not seen in the last 10 months. Garganas, who is also a European Central Bank (ECB) Governing Council member, said that he shares the view of others on the governing council that speculation over the future of the euro is “absurd.” The euro dipped below 1.20 dollars yesterday for the first time since August 2004, under the weight of expectations for an interest rate cut. It later recovered...

(This is one sick read I read something similar at BBC but nowhere near the detail here) "The accelerating speed of that environmental change is most evident in the Yellow River, the heart of Han Chinese civilization. The river has virtually disappeared." "The first big dam-construction projects of the communist era, such as the Sanmen Xia Dam, concentrated partly on the Yellow River, where a cascade of 46 dams was started. Yet the more engineering took place, the worse the river became. It now exists only in name, except for a couple of months during the rainy season, causing a...

Jerry Flint Speech To GM Proving Ground Engineers and Technicians.There was an auto executive, he was a very high ranking GM man. You all know his name but I won't mention it because it might embarrass him. He's not at General Motors anymore. I once asked this man what he would do if he found himself the chief executive of General Motors. He said, and I quote, "I would fire 1,000 executives." End of quote. I'm not sure whether it made any difference to him which 1,000 executives, if he had anyone in particular in mind, or any thousand would...