Free Republic

Mark Levin calling Trump's trade and economic advisers "idiots" in the first hour. Then he drones on and on about how having a trade deficit is supposed to be good for consumers and belittling other conservative talk radio hosts as "It depends" rather than discussing free markets. Does he not know that this is a negotiation tactic of Trump and the goal here is to make trade policies better for everyone involved? Of course he doesn't, because at heart he's a Never Trumper who is secretly hoping Trump fails so that some massive conservative movement will rise up and elect...

Niagara Regional Police Const. Scott Heron has been found guilty of four criminal charges that include conspiracy to smuggle cheese and chicken wings across the border from the United States into Canada. Heron, 42, had been charged with six counts, three of which related to the Customs Act, and three breach of trust charges that related to his duties as a police officer. Heron was found guilty on all three of the charges laid under the Customs Act, but only one breach of trust charge. Justice James Ramsay delivered his decision on Friday following a five-day trial in the Superior...

The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea) is not democratic—it’s barely even a republic. The same goes for the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and the Lao People’s Democratic Republic (Laos). In fact, if a country includes democratic in its name, you can safely assume that it’s not democratic. This is a classic example of, what I like to call, the wisdom of irony: things are often not what they claim to be, and the more they claim, the less they are. Consider Reason Magazine. In a recent piece, columnist A. Barton Hinkle argues that tariffs are sanctions, since...

Dan Moore, a 58-year-old steel mill worker, gives the president an A+ on everything from tax cuts to foreign policy, but he is not so sure about tariffs. "We need tariffs, but when it starts to impact the company where you work ... you're thinking, well wait a minute, time out!" he said. Moore is worried the tariffs might cost him his job. The mill where he works, NLMK Pennsylvania, in the town of Farrell, not far from the border with Ohio, employs 750 workers and is a subsidiary of Novolipetsk Steel, or NLMK, Russia's top steelmaker. But even though...

Take a look and comment please

German Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Wednesday she expected “contentious discussions” at a G7 summit this week, given differences with US President Donald Trump on trade, climate and security. Speaking two days before the Canada meeting of the club of major industrialized democracies, Merkel also said the leaders may not necessarily manage to agree on a final joint statement. “I think everyone knows there will be difficult discussions there, because G7 summits deal with the global economy, trade, climate protection, development—and foreign policy,” she told German parliament. […] Merkel vowed to enter the talks “in good faith”, but stressed that...

OTTAWA (Reuters) - Leaders of the Group of Seven rich nations headed for a summit in Canada on Thursday more divided than at any time in the group’s 42-year history, as U.S. President Donald Trump’s “America First” policies risk causing a global trade war and deep diplomatic schisms. In a bid to rebuild America’s industry, Trump has imposed hefty tariffs on steel and aluminum imports, including those from key G7 allies like Canada, Japan and the European Union. He has threatened to use national security laws to do the same for foreign car imports and has walked back on environmental...

German Chancellor Angela Merkel shared a picture on her official Instagram account that shows her staring down President Donald Trump during the G-7 Summit in Canada this weekend. True to form, online commenters have since turned the photo into a humorous caption contest. Merkel—or an aide that runs her account—shared the picture on Saturday, as Trump was preparing to depart early from the meeting in Montréal, Quebec ahead of a high-stakes Singapore meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. The photo depicts Trump sitting behind a table with his arms crossed, while stony-faced aides and leaders look in his direction....

Caption Time

There are two interviews with Alan Tonelson that I think everyone should listen to. The: link to both interviewss The first interview is from May 31, 2018. Scroll down to that date and click on: 3 Breitbart News Tonight - Alan Tonelson - May 31, 2018 The first interview is from June 8, 2018. Scroll down to that date and click on: Breitbart News Tonight - Allen (They misspelled his name) Tonelson - June 8, 2018

U.S. Steel Corp. says it will restart the second of two shuttered blast furnaces at its Granite City mill and hire 300 employees. The decision by the Pittsburgh-based company follows a March announcement that it would restart the other blast furnace at the Granite City Works in the Metro East and recall 500 workers. U.S. Steel laid off hundreds of workers when it idled the furnaces in late 2015, with employment at the nearly 2,000 worker plant dipping as low as 100 in the ensuing two years. The company says the restart of the first furnace is in progress and...

During a testy phone call with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, U.S. president Donald Trump reportedly cited the War of 1812 in order to justify seeing Canada as a security threat. “Didn’t you guys burn down the White House?” he told Trudeau, according to sources cited by CNN. The reason for the call was the U.S. imposition of tariffs on Canadian steel and aluminum, which Trump has justified on national security grounds. The new tariffs, announced last week, sparked disbelief from across the political spectrum in Canada. For more than a century, the United States has had no problem building military...

Mexico put tariffs on American products ranging from steel to pork and bourbon on Tuesday, retaliating against import duties on metals imposed by President Donald Trump and taking aim at Republican strongholds ahead of U.S. congressional elections in November. Mexico’s response further raises trade tensions between the two countries and adds a new complication to efforts to renegotiate the trillion-dollar North American Free Trade Agreement between Canada, the United States and Mexico. American pork producers, for whom Mexico is the largest export market, were dismayed by the move. Trump last week rattled some of the United States’ closest allies by...

China offered to purchase nearly $70 billion of U.S. farm, manufacturing and energy products if the Trump administration abandons threatened tariffs, according to people briefed on the latest negotiations with American trade officials. In weekend talks in Beijing, Chinese negotiators led by Liu He, President Xi Jinping’s economic envoy, presented a U.S. team headed by Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross a package that includes Chinese companies buying more U.S. soybeans, corn, natural gas, crude oil, coal and manufactured goods. Chinese and U.S. officials estimated the value of the package at nearly $70 billion in the first year. President Donald Trump has...

The good news for home builders and house hunters is that lumber prices have sold off since hitting an all-time high in mid May. The bad news: wood prices are still up 66% over the past year, adding thousands of dollars to the cost of each new house. The historic run-up in lumber prices–attributable to a trade dispute with Canada, wildfires and limited rail capacity–comes as U.S. home builders are already struggling to meet demand amid shortages in buildable lots and labor. Lumber futures at the Chicago Mercantile Exchange closed at $586.80 per 1,000 board feet on Monday, down 8.2%...

Donald Trump is following through on his threat—or promise, as his voters see it—to impose steep tariffs on foreign goods in the name of supporting American industry, starting with levies of 25 per cent on steel and 10 per cent on aluminium imports. Allies and neighbors that had been granted temporary exemptions are now set to feel the brunt of the tariffs: Canada is America’s leading source of foreign steel, and Mexico and the European Union will also feel the pain. They’re all threatening to retaliate, and the press is calling this a trade war. If this is a war,...

Are the U.S. and China “destined for war“? Harvard professor Graham Allison posed that question in a provocative book published last summer. I’ve written previously in this space about Allison’s thesis, but it seems newly relevant in light of developments over the last month, if not the last few days. The gist of Allison’s argument is that the modern world’s two most powerful nations are stumbling into a “Thucydides Trap.” That’s Allison’s shorthand for the theory of an ancient Greek general who identified sudden, significant shifts in the relative strength of major powers as a primary cause (if not the...

New tariffs intended to bolster the American steel and aluminum industries are starting to have the opposite effect in a key part of the U.S. supply chain. U.S. steel producers are benefiting from tariffs that make it more expensive for companies to buy the metals overseas. But some U.S. firms that use the metals to make everything from refrigeration parts to wheels say the tariffs have led to higher materials prices that are forcing them to charge more for their products. These firms say that in some cases, customers are turning to foreign suppliers that use cheaper, tariff-free metals to...

Europe hit back at the US after President Donald Trump slapped tough tariffs on European steel and aluminium earlier this week. The united front was delivered from European Union's trade commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom who warned President Trump of retaliation. However, the unity shown in response to the tariffs could quickly change, according to a leading currency strategist. Jane Foley, a senior currency strategist at Rabobank, predicted that over time the tariffs will start to hurt and the rest of Europe will blame Germany. "This could become Germany versus the rest of the EU. "If you look at the US Treasury...

Andy Marsh’s New York factory is trapped in the Trump trade wars. As Mr. Trump threatens tariffs on America’s economic allies and its adversaries, many of the domestic businesses that the president says his policies are meant to protect are finding themselves victims of his aggressive approach. Prices are rising for imported goods, other nations are erecting retaliatory trade barriers, and companies like Plug Power, the manufacturing business that Mr. Marsh runs outside Albany, are facing crippling uncertainty from Mr. Trump’s fickle approach. It is not the first time Mr. Marsh has felt firsthand the impact of decisions made hundreds...