Free Republic

President Biden’s job-approval rating has plummeted to the lowest of his White House tenure — and seven in 10 Americans lack confidence in the commander-in-chief’s ability to handle the Russian invasion of Ukraine, a survey released Sunday found. ​ The number of Americans who approve of Biden’s actions since he took the helm of the country in January 2021 has fallen to 40% – the lowest of his presidency and a dramatic 13 percentage-point drop from April 2021, the NBC News poll shows.

U.S. oil tumbled more than 8% on Monday, breaking below $100 per barrel, amid talks between Russia and Ukraine as well as new lockdowns in China — which could dent demand. West Texas Intermediate crude futures, the U.S. oil benchmark, lost 8.75% to trade at $99.76 per barrel. International benchmark Brent crude shed 8% to trade at $103.68 per barrel.

Oprah Winfrey is currently on her 2020 Vision speaking tour, stopping by the Forum arena in Los Angeles Saturday to discuss wellness and living a balanced life. Unfortunately for the media mogul, she quite literally lost her own balance while onstage, slipping and taking a pretty hard fall in front of hundreds of attendees.

NEW YORK – Americans, worried about jobs and the sluggish economic recovery, are having a relapse in confidence, causing a widely watched index to tumble in June and raising concerns about consumer spending in the critical months ahead. The Conference Board, a private research group based in New York, said Tuesday that its Consumer Confidence Index dropped almost 10 points to 52.9, down from the revised 62.7 in May. Economists surveyed by Thomson Reuters had been expecting the reading to dip slightly to 62.8. June's reading marked the biggest drop since February, when the index fell 10 points. The index...

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Stocks sank on Friday after a disappointing May jobs figure, while investors were spooked by the possibility of another debt crisis, this time in Hungary. Data showed the U.S. economy added fewer-than-expected jobs last month, with a large portion of those being temporary hirings for the U.S. Census. "There's no other way to describe it except flat out disappointing," said Mike O'Rourke, chief market strategist at BTIG LLC in New York. "Once you get beyond the Census numbers, it was abysmal." The drop of more than 2 percent in stocks follows Wall Street's first back-to-back advances...

A day after a man drove a car off the top of a downtown New Orleans parking garage, plummeting four stories to another rooftop, he and his passenger were under hospital care Tuesday while the adjoining building's owner pondered how to remove the wrecked vehicle.

NEW YORK (Reuters) – The Dow Jones industrial average fell to an 11-year low on Monday as investors dumped shares on uncertainty about the latest potential U.S. government action to shore up beleaguered banks. Making matters worse, worries about a fall-off in business and consumer spending on technology hurt the biggest names in the tech sector. IBM (IBM.N) and Hewlett-Packard (HPQ.N) were the top drags on the Dow industrials. Investors had initially welcomed reports the government could convert an earlier investment in Citigroup (C.N) into a big common stock holding, but enthusiasm faded as long-standing uncertainty about the government's ultimate...

COLUMBUS, Ohio – Oil prices slid to a new low for the year Thursday because of growing doubts that the $789 billion stimulus package will reinvigorate the economy and demand for energy. Crude supplies in the U.S. reached an 82-week high last week, according to the Department of Energy, showing just how far demand has fallen. ... Light, sweet crude for March delivery tumbled $1.96, more than 5 percent, to settle at $33.98 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

AURORA, Ill. - A repossession crew got a surprise when a 4-year-old boy leaped out of the sport-utility vehicle they were towing away. Fashawn Parker, of Naperville, was sitting in the back seat of a Ford Excursion that was parked outside of a house on Thursday when the repo crew approached, hooked the car to a tow truck and began driving away, Aurora police spokesman Dan Ferrelli said. Fashawn opened the door and jumped out into a construction area, Ferrelli said. It was not known how fast the truck was going, Ferrelli said, but the truck was moving in slow...