Free Republic

Without a doubt, the Chinese central bank (PBoC) is still the leading single entity that is driving up the gold price to record highs, year-to-date by more than 55 percent. In the third quarter of 2025, the PBoC’s gold purchases (reported and unreported) accounted for 118 tonnes, up 39% MoM and 55% YoY, according to my long-time methodology1 (now copied by Goldman Sachs, Bloomberg, MarketWatch, The Washington Post, TIME magazine, Financial Times, Financiele Dagblad, and El País, to name a few). Chart 1. Reported central bank gold buying versus estimates by the World Gold Council on central bank gold buying...

After the 2024 humiliation, the left is back. It could hurt the party in 2026. Kim Strassel speaks with law professor Jonathan Turley about why the charges were dismissed against James Comey and Letitia James and how Donald Trump is separately using the legal system to the executive branch’s benefit. What could get in the way of a coming 2026 Democratic wave, given history and the current public mood? Nothing but the Democratic Party itself, which is sitting placidly by as the progressives who lost them last year’s election mobilize to take over even more of the party. Bernie Sanders...

The United States would suffer a devasting defeat and lose its biggest aircraft carrier if it tried to stop China invading Taiwan, according to a top secret Pentagon report. War games showed the U.S. would be overwhelmed by China's arsenal of around 600 hypersonic weapons, along with missiles and nuclear submarines. The grim assessment, revealed by the New York Times, confirmed the conclusions of previous war games, but it also highlighted wider concerns about the future direction of the U.S. military and its continued reliance on outdated methods. *** Ships like the $13 billion USS Gerald R. Ford - the...

Western automotive and green energy executives who visit China are returning humbled — and even terrified.As The Telegraph reports, the executives are warning that the country’s heavily automated manufacturing industry could quickly leave Western nations behind, especially when it comes to electric vehicles.“We are in a global competition with China, and it’s not just EVs,” Ford CEO Jim Farley told The Verge last month. “And if we lose this, we do not have a future at Ford.”“You get this sense of a change, where China’s competitiveness has gone from being about government subsidies and low wages to a tremendous number...

Lawmakers are warning of risks from Chinese Communist Party-linked networking and smart home products that are quietly being sold at Army, Air Force, and Navy exchanges — online military stores. Fearing Chinese infiltration, 23 lawmakers from both chambers of Congress are pushing the Trump administration to investigate and consider banning products sold by TP-Link Technologies Co. and its affiliates throughout the entire US. “Open-source information indicates that TP-Link represents a serious and present danger to U.S. ICTS [Information and communications technology] security,” the group of 23 lawmakers led by Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) wrote in a letter to Commerce Secretary...

After socialist Zohran Mamdani won last week’s New York mayoral race, an upstate city has gone one better by electing a full-blown communist. Hannah Shvets, 20, a student organizer and member of the Communist Party USA, was elected to the Ithaca Common Council on Thursday in the Democratic stronghold’s Fifth Ward, which covers the western half of Cornell University’s campus in the city. Shvets, a Democrat and Cornell sophomore, defeated independent candidate and former Democratic primary hopeful G.P. Zurenda after winning the endorsement of groups that include Ithaca branch of the Democratic Socialists of America and the Ithaca Tenants Union....

Seattle might elect its first democratic socialist mayor by an incredibly slim margin of 65 votes if the candidate maintains the same percentage of votes she received in the most recent batch of counted ballots. Katie Wilson, 43, closed the gap between herself and mayoral incumbent Bruce Harrell to within 4,300 votes on Friday - a less than two percent gap - as ballots continue to trickle in since election day on November 4. The incredibly tight race, which has swung back and forth in the week since the general election, still has 50,000 ballots remaining to be counted. Former...

FT Exclusive: Jensen Huang has warned that China will beat the US in the artificial intelligence race, thanks to lower energy costs and looser regulations.

ince Democrats have shut down the federal government because they want another $1.5 trillion bailout of Obamacare, it’s a good time to remind everyone that the law has been a wide-ranging and expensive fiasco. Virtually every promise made by Democrats regarding the Affordable Care Act has failed to come true. Sure, former President Barack Obama infamously promised that Americans could keep their preferred insurance if they desired. By the end of his second term, around 7 million people had been booted from their insurance because of the Affordable Care Act. Who knows how many have been dropped since. But let’s...

DETROIT -- A Detroit elementary school is asking for donations of toilet paper and light bulbs to keep their school functioning. The principal of the Academy of Americas sent a letter to staff, parents and partners asking for donations of items "that are of the utmost importance for proper school functioning and most importantly for student health and safety." In the letter, Principal Naomi Khalil cited budget constraints within the district as the reason why the school could no longer stock the items. The district is grappling with a more than $400 million budget deficit and is on the verge...