Free Republic

On his show last night, Mark Levin said that President Barack Obama is the Commander-in-Chief of the war on the private sector. Levin discussed the lack of U.S. jobs and pointed to a number of disappointing economic statistics. “I want you to look around you. I want you to think about family members and friends and co-workers. Many of you look at your own situation. Look at the situation of your children. Think how prices are rising, costs are rising. But, for most people income is flat – if not, losing ground.” “There are 23 million unemployed or underemployed today."...

SAN FRANCISCO, June 6 (UPI) -- U.S. President Barack Obama said Democrats and Republicans used to think "about the good of the country and the future" but "that's changed on the other side." Speaking Wednesday to an audience at a fundraiser in San Francisco, Obama said he and presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney offer voters "two fundamentally contrasting visions" for America -- and he said Romney and congressional Republicans represent a departure from the GOP of 2008, when he defeated Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., in the general election. "The character of the party and the Republicans in Congress had...

Writing in today’s Washington Post, former Obama economist Larry Summers put forth the strange hypothesis that more red ink would improve the federal government’s long-run fiscal position. This sounds like an excuse for more Keynesian spending as part of another so-called stimulus plan, but Summers claims to have a much more modest goal of prudent financial management.And if we assume there’s no hidden agenda, what he’s proposing isn’t unreasonable.But before floating his idea, Summers starts with some skepticism about more easy-money policy from the Fed. Many in the United States and Europe are arguing for further quantitative easing to bring...

President Barack Obama said: "Since I've been president, federal spending has risen at the lowest pace in nearly 60 years." And then he said, "Think about that." I went to the White House website to see what sort of historical light the data published by Obama's Office of Management and Budget would shine on his fiscal record. The data says this: Since fiscal 1930, the earliest year for which the government has made official calculation, only two presidents have spent 24 percent or more of GDP for three or more straight fiscal years that started while they were president. They...

That’s the headline on yesterday's AP story by Charles Babington. The headline appeared on the main Yahoo page, which is far more heavily trafficked than any newspaper, and was picked up, based on a Google News search, by several hundred newspapers.*snip* The idea was to attribute plausibility to what is in fact a laughable suggestion. In order to effect the economy, Republicans would have to 1) enact policies that would do one or the other, or 2) block the Democrats from enacting policies that would do one or the other. The Republicans haven’t enacted anything since the Democrats took control...

This powerful video exposing the Democrat Party’s plans for America is making the rounds on the internet. –You must watch this video– http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=CZ-4gnNz0vc

It has been said many times in recent months that we aren’t Greece. Now it will start to be said that we aren’t Spain. Both propositions are certainly true. (For one thing, Spain elected its socialist government in 2004, thus getting a head start on us.) But if we compare America’s debt crisis to Europe’s as a whole, how do we stack up? The Republicans on the Senate Budget Committee did the math and produced this graphic, which shows that the U.S. is now deeper in debt than the entire Eurozone, plus the United Kingdom. UPDATE: Mark Steyn thinks I...

Government-controlled mortgage giant Freddie Mac has requested $6 billion in additional aid after posting a wider loss in the third quarter. Freddie Mac said Thursday that it lost $4.4 billion, or $1.86 per share, in the July-September quarter. That compares with a loss of $4.1 billion, or $1.25 a share, in the same quarter of 2010. This quarter's $6 billion request from taxpayers is the largest since April 2010.

Team Obama is out and about mourning a “double-dip recession,” while Fed head Ben Bernanke is warning of a faltering economy. I have described the current economic environment as the front end of a recession. But Obama’s attack on millionaires and billionaires, his new war on bank profits, his linking arms with the anti-capitalist protesters in New York, and his big-government stimulus plan will surely not solve this crisis. ... Here’s the real silliness of all this. The Obama plan would permanently raise tax rates in order to pay for a temporary tax cut. In other words, taxes are going...

Creative Destructionism    Capitalism has been described as "creative destructionism". Market Based Management (MBM) is a management system built on the logical framework of Austrian economic theory. The path of evolution of a politically effective plan built around the ideas of liberty more closely resembled the creative destructionism of capitalism than a well-organized management plan, but the finished product can readily be described in the terms used to describe MBM. As part of the Great Debate that defines the advantages of capitalism over the liabilities of socialism, one of the primary goals of our politically effective plan is to help people...

President Barack Obama will fulfill his vow to sell his jobs plan in the four corners of America Monday, after warning a Republican win in 2012 elections could "cripple" the country. Obama was to appear in a town-hall style meeting sponsored by executive social network LinkedIn in San Jose, before tapping donors in Democratic strongholds in San Diego and Los Angeles. Faced with a recalcitrant Congress and Republicans who accuse him of waging class warfare over his call to raise taxes on millionaires and billionaires, Obama told supporters Sunday to brace for a "tough" reelection campaign.

Liberals self-righteously wrap themselves in the mantle of public spirit. They ardently promote policies promising to deliver the poor and oppressed from their latest misery — policies which can only find solution in the halls of government. But no matter what issue one examines, over the last fifty plus years, the liberal prescription has almost always been a failure.Why is this so? Why does virtually every liberal scheme result in ever-increasing public spending while conditions seem to get continually worse? There are a number of reasons: The programs usually create adverse incentives. This is especially true in so-called “anti-poverty” programs....

Liberals self-righteously wrap themselves in the mantle of public spirit. They ardently promote policies promising to deliver the poor and oppressed from their latest misery — policies which can only find solution in the halls of government. But no matter what issue one examines, over the last fifty plus years, the liberal prescription has almost always been a failure.Why is this so? Why does virtually every liberal scheme result in ever-increasing public spending while conditions seem to get continually worse? There are a number of reasons: The programs usually create adverse incentives. This is especially true in so-called “anti-poverty” programs....

Senator Crapo, Senator Risch, Representative Labrador, July 28, 2011 RE: The budgetary/financial crisis CC: Representative Simpson I’m sending this letter to my elected representatives of Idaho at the National level. First, I am a 55 year old man who has worked my whole life. I have owned my own businesses and worked in industry for over 35 years, as an individual contributor up to Directing large operations for private companies in organizations of over 150 people and controlling revenue streams of over 250 million dollars, and as a business owner. I tell you this to let you know that...

Those of you still collecting a paycheck should have noticed an increase in what you took home starting in January of 2011. Unless you got a raise, you might not notice the difference. However, we did, and when my husband asked the payroll department at his company what caused the difference, all they could tell him was the tax rates were different. Of course I immediately wondered what was done, but could find no answers. Then my husband came across a small article in our local paper taken from the Wall Street Journal that told about the social security rate...

Glenn Beck continues to suffer an onslaught of programmatic propaganda by progressives, who accuse him, Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, and Sarah Palin's kitchen sink of inciting violence -- while at the same time assailing Beck for his exposing the true violation of Americans' lives and livelihoods by these neo-Marxists.

From deep in the article... The kill shot was taken six days later from a window of AmericanThinker.com, by former White House accountant, James Simpson, in his now famous, "Barack Obama and the Strategy of Manufactured Crisis." Now, that corpse still lays open and the autopsy goes on. Bio-testing of its body of evidence reveals the seed of many paramours, including two names that appear on numerous rap sheets: Soros and said Obama. It all tends to answer the oft repeated question, "They aren't that incompetent, what are they doing?" My only bone to pick with Kurtz' article is his...

This is the high-impact political ad, of 2010. Video, October 20, 2010, "Chinese Professor," by Citizens Against Government Waste http://gulagbound.com/7800/the-most-powerful-video-ad-of-the-2010-election-season Political pollster, Frank Luntz showed this to his focus group and it drew the highest marks of all, the highest this observer has ever seen. Republicans in his audience took the famous Luntz dial pads and scored it 95 percent favorable -- and Democrats reached the 70's -- Democrats. That is because it goes to the heart of what is disturbing American Citizens about Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid (George Soros, Maurice Strong) and the mega-subterfuge of the overall...

Allen West at CPAC 2010; photo: Bill Dupray, Liberty PunditsFreelance writing doesn’t pay much, but a compensating benefit is the opportunity one finds to meet and speak with really interesting people. Florida District 22 Congressional candidate Lt. Col. Allen West (USA, Ret.) is one such person, and I interviewed him for this article recently. Col. West is one of the most promising candidates on the GOP horizon for this election. He is a genuine conservative, unafraid to speak his mind and more importantly, take action to demonstrate his commitment. His candidacy has gone national on the strength of his inspiring...

In shocking news, the New York Times cites figures that investors withdrew $33.12 billion from domestic stock market mutual funds in the first seven months of this year when billions of dollars should have been expected to be flowing in. The New York Times blames this unusual development on “economic uncertainty.” One explanation is that the financial reform bill pushed by President Obama and passed by Congressional liberals was a complete fraud. The bill failed to protect invested capital, did nothing to stop the devaluation of our homes, and didn’t reform Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the government-sponsored mortgage entities...