Free Republic

Is the party almost over? Volatility has returned to Wall Street in a major way, and certain investors are getting absolutely crushed. On Wednesday, a trillion dollars in paper wealth had been wiped out during the trading session at one point, but those losses were later pared back as cryptocurrencies rallied. On social media, there has been a lot of weeping and wailing due to the huge financial losses that some people have experienced this week. But if you think that these losses are bad, just wait until you see what is coming later. In the old days, investors would...

An FBI agent who quit his top position over the bureau’s handling of the Hillary Clinton email investigation is heading to Congress to testify. John Giacalone, who led the Clinton investigation for the first seven months, will reportedly expose former President Barack Obama and fired FBI Director James Comey for corruptly helping Clinton. There’s a massive media blackout on this because Giacalone is expected to testify that top brass at the FBI rigged the investigative process so that Clinton could skirt charges for clear violations of the law. Exposing Comey also shines a big light on Obama, who many believe...

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The delicate posturing began with the phone call. The proposal was that two buddies back in New York City for a holiday break in December meet to visit the Museum of Modern Art after its major renovation. "He explicitly said, 'I know this is kind of weird, but we should probably go,' " said Matthew Speiser, 25, recalling his conversation with John Putman, 28, a former classmate from Williams College. The weirdness was apparent once they reached the museum, where they semi-avoided each other as they made their way through the galleries and eschewed any public displays of connoisseurship. "We...

Well, Oscar Night is upon us again. And if Chris Rock is nearly right, I might be the only straight white man who watches the Oscars for both the pretty women almost dressed plus the primetime fun of making rude comments as the awards are handed out. I think I seen about every Academy Awards when I've been able to since my folks got a television set in 1955. It was always in the back of my mind to one night walk up and accept one of those small golden guys. I tried the acting route, even obtaining a SAG...

With the Oscar nominations looming on the horizon, I feel the need to point out that low budget does not necessarily translate into high quality, that past history offers no guarantees, and that "Sideways," the critics' favorite, is the most over-hyped commodity since Enron stock. This particular emperor is as naked as a jaybird. Because I thought that "Election," the earlier Alexander Payne-Jim Taylor collaboration, was terrific, and their "About Schmidt" was pretty good, I had reasonably high hopes for their latest. However, about five minutes into the movie, I began to get that queasy feeling one usually gets 30...

I waited far too long to see Sideways, the latest film of Alexander Payne (the director of Citizen Ruth, Election, and About Schmidt). It is so good that I am kicking myself for having procrastinated. Gratification for the mind, the eye, the heart, and the sense of humor, unnecessarily delayed. Sideways initially opened on just three screens, in New York and Los Angeles, to allow word of mouth and critical reaction to spread, and build an audience from the ground up. The strategy seems to have worked well, with Sideways currently on 497 screens, and a very respectable per screen...