Free Republic

Wall Street traders have developed a biting new acronym for a strategy that’s become surprisingly lucrative for President Donald Trump’s whiplash-inducing trade policy: TACO – “Trump Always Chickens Out.” Reportedly first coined by Financial Times columnist Robert Armstrong, the term has quickly gained traction among investors who are profiting from what they say is a predictable pattern: Trump threatens steep tariffs, the markets plunge, and days later he backs off in a way that prompts a rebound. The latest example came over the weekend. On Friday, Trump sent markets reeling by announcing sweeping 50% tariffs on European imports. But by...

What is a good way of reducing plane crashes? Obviously do not fire air safety experts and instil paranoia in those who remain. Yet that is what Elon Musk is doing to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), three weeks after America’s deadliest air collision in years. His team is moving fast to break things, as though Washington were an app. Other than China’s cultural revolution, history offers few parallels to the so-called Department of Government Efficiency’s (DOGE) assault on the state. Musk’s declared aim is to slash US deficits by rooting out waste, fraud and abuse. His model is the...

Donald Trump has told lawmakers he wants to end the special tax treatment of private equity and hedge fund profits known as “carried interest”, setting up a potential clash with America’s wealthiest financiers. The push by Trump — in a White House meeting on Thursday with Republican leaders from Capitol Hill — comes as the president intensifies talks over a broader tax cut bill he wants passed this year that is core to his domestic economic agenda. Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, told reporters that Trump had “laid out” his “tax priorities” to the lawmakers, including measures to...

The Financial Times desperate to exonerate (Oct 13) Hamas bombings its 70 citizens while trying to leave, brings in infamous Israelophobe Cobb-Smith as supposed "evidence." It intentionally avoids elaborating inhumane Gaza-regime Hamas' calls and actions to prevent Gazans to leave the north. Not to mention previous "accidents" by Hamas and Islamic Jihad shooting rockets that killed Gazans. _ The following is from media watchdog Camera, in 2022: CNN’s Farce Of An “Investigation ” By: David Litman, May 26, 2022 .. Far from being an impartial expert, Cobb-Smith is an “advisor” for the notoriously partisan rganization Forensic Architecture. This organization has...

Russia’s economy contracted for the second quarter in a row as the western response to Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine helped plunge the economy into recession.

The British newspaper Financial Times called Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy Person of the Year, in an article published on Dec. 5.FT reasoning for the choice was that "the president of Ukraine embodies the resilience of his people and has become a standard bearer for liberal democracy."

Russia is no longer requesting Ukraine be “denazified” and is prepared to let Kyiv join the EU if it remains military non-aligned as part of ongoing ceasefire negotiations, according to four people briefed on the discussions. Moscow and Kyiv are discussing a pause in hostilities as part of a possible deal that would involve Ukraine abandoning its drive for Nato membership in exchange for security guarantees and the prospect to join the EU, the people said under the condition of anonymity because the matter is not yet finalised. The draft ceasefire document does not contain any discussion of three of...

The editor of the socialist policy-loving Financial Times Roula Khalaf thinks that capitalism needs to change. British Vogue did a puffy interview headlined “‘Capitalism Needs A Reset’: The First Female Editor Of The Financial Times Is A Level-Headed Radical.” Author Zoe Williams fawned over how Khalaf was now “at the helm of capitalism’s biggest cheerleader. Though that isn’t how she would necessarily describe the Financial Times.” No kidding.

The Economist tweeted out a story headlined “Big tech’s covid-19 opportunity” with the caption: “Big tech firms are now vital utilities. Once this crisis ends, governments could push for state control of them as they have over energy firms.” The Financial Times’s Editorial Board’s editorial, headlined “Virus lays bare the frailty of the social contract,” pivoted off the pandemic to argue that “to demand collective sacrifice you must offer a social contract that benefits everyone.”

Ronan Farrow says twice-failed presidential candidate Hillary Clinton iced him out upon learning of his investigation into the accusations of sexual assault against Harvey Weinstein, noting how people will turn “if you threaten the centers of power or the sources of funding around them.” The Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Ronan Farrow told the Financial Times that Clinton slowly iced him out upon learning of his investigation into Weinstein, a Clinton ally and major Clinton Foundation donor. Weinstein also donated to groups that supported Clinton’s failed presidential bid

“How to stop a civil war” says the cover of the latest Atlantic magazine. I can suggest a fix: the international community should intervene in the US. Of course Americans have a right to self-determination but the priority now is saving democracy.

Former British spy Christopher Steele and Fusion GPS founder Glenn Simpson claimed to have concerns about the safety and security of one of the sources for the dossier, but outed him anyway by talking to journalists. Steele told a State Department official in October 2016 that “source protection” was a focus in his investigation of President Donald Trump, according to notes from the meeting released earlier this month. That purported concern was also shared by Simpson, who hired Steele on behalf of the Democratic National Committee and the Clinton campaign. He told Justice Department official Bruce Ohr on Jan. 20,...

Fast developing story out of Rome. No details yet, but you can check it out on the Drudge Report.

George Soros, the billionaire Democratic donor who has become a lightning rod for criticism from conservatives, including President Trump, was named “Person of the Year” by the Financial Times on Wednesday.

Journalist arrogance is the staple of British publications such as the Financial Times and Economist.  They are experts at putting Trump down and feeding us heavy globalist and EU bias with $10 words no Deplorable ever used in conversation. Our local library gets the Economist, a weekly magazine written in London.  If you scan the past two years of editorials and news, you'll read weekly diatribes against Trump.  According to them, Trump has been a complete and utter failure. So I was curious what kind of coverage they would give the Yellow Jackets protests in France, given that Macron is...

John Kasich apparently doesn’t like being asked why he's only won a single state in the Republican presidential primary. On Saturday, the Ohio governor — whose lone victory was in his home state — was talking up his chances when Demetri Sevastopulo, a reporter for the Financial Times, interrupted him. . . . "I'm answering the question the way I want to answer it," Kasich said. "You want to answer it?" Kasich then snatched Sevastopulo's voice recorder out of his hand and turned it toward him: "What do you think?"

The fall in traffic could signal a permanent shift in the fundamentals driving globalisation. The Port of Charleston spent most of the early 2000s enjoying double-digit growth as an accelerating wave of globalisation — fuelled by a rising China and a US consumer boom — brought robust volumes of cargo into the seaport. But those days are long gone. Jim Newsome, chief executive of the South Carolina Ports Authority, says he would be happy with 3 per cent growth in Charleston this year, a goal he concedes may be too ambitious. In January, container traffic at the port fell 5.1...

Warren Buffett has dismissed the possibility that climate change could prove a big risk to Berkshire Hathaway’s insurance business, in a combative annual letter to shareholders. In the letter, released on Saturday, Mr Buffett took on a dissident shareholder who plans to raise global warming at Berkshire’s annual meeting next month, as well as critics of the company’s Clayton Homes mobile homes subsidiary and politicians who paint a gloomy picture of the US economy.

Penning an article for the Financial Times, historian Simon Schama, a liberal belonging to the establishment, writes that “the problem of the left with the Jews has a long and unfortunate history” and that “criticism of Israeli government policies became a rejection of Israel’s right to exist”. Schama then asks: “Why is it so much easier to hate the Jews?” This is an article that should be sent to all those intellectuals, journalists, writers, academics who for years, every day, in Italy and the West, demonized the Jewish State. The good people on the left who feel that it is...

Saudi Arabia has ruled out a deal by major producers to cut oil output and warned high-cost operators such as US shale drillers to trim costs or go bust in a stark message that triggered fresh pressure on crude prices. Saudi oil minister Ali al-Naimi said a lack of trust between the world's biggest producers meant a cut in production "is not going to happen". He said the kingdom would instead push for a co-ordinated production freeze to help balance a market swamped with an excess of crude which has taken oil prices to their lowest level in more than...