Free Republic

As Democrats are politically targeting former President Donald Trump for allegedly paying hush money during the 2016 presidential election, President Obama's "illegal foreign influence operation" is flying under the radar. Earlier this week, actor Leonardo DiCaprio testified in federal court that Malaysian financier Jho Low revealed his plans to donate up to $30 million to help Obama's 2012 reelection campaign. "It was a causal conversation about what party he was in support of; I told him what party I was in support of. And he told me that he, or he and a group, were going to make a significant...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The United States moved Wednesday to recover more than $1 billion that federal officials say was stolen from a Malaysian economic development fund and that was used for high-end real estate, fancy artwork and production of the Hollywood film, "The Wolf of Wall Street." The diverted funds paid for luxury properties in New York and California, a $35 million private jet and expensive paintings by Vincent Van Gogh and Claude Monet, according to federal government complaints that demand the recovery and forfeiture of the ill-gotten assets. The complaints, filed in Los Angeles, allege a complex money laundering...

Leonardo DiCaprio and Kelly Rohrbach have reportedly split. The 41-year-old actor and 25-year-old Sports Illustrated model -- who has recently been signed up to star in a big-screen Baywatch remake with The Rock -- were first linked in June of last year and apparently broke up a month ago. "They've been broken up for over a month. It was mutual. They both have intense work schedules and a lot going on in their lives right now. They both needed to take a break because of that. They are still friends and talking but it's over," a source told Us Weekly....

Hundreds of people (mostly men) packed the house at the 92nd Street Y in Manhattan's Upper East Side to see the real-life "Wolf of Wall Street," Jordan Belfort. Belfort is the author of a best-selling tell-all memoir that chronicled his boozy, drug-fueled, high-flying Wall Street lifestyle running 1990s-era boiler room Stratton Oakmont. The convicted felon’s book was adapted into a film directed by Martin Scorsese starring Leonardo DiCaprio. Belfort was arrested in 1998. In 2003, he was convicted for securities fraud and money laundering. He served a 22-month prison sentence after being sentenced to four years. He was also ordered...

Inside twisted Tinseltown, Martin Scorsese has marked a new career achievement. His latest film, "The Wolf of Wall Street," includes a mighty 506 uses of the F-bomb in its three-hour running time. That's almost three curse words a minute. Someone has proclaimed this the new record for F-bombs. Another Hollywood high mark. Scorsese often has hundreds of F-bombs in his films about crooks. But this takes the cake. "That was a badge of honor for me, to be in a Martin Scorsese movie and say the F-word," actor-director Rob Reiner told a TMZ.com interviewer in a parking lot. When he...

I went to see Wolf with a friend who has zero investments. As we watched the film, which for all its 3-hour length flew by in a compulsively sickening but sustained high-wire act of what's next?, he commented that he owns no securities. Now, watching this debauchery, he would never invest with this species of human infection. When I spoke with my account manager after the film, I admit that even I -- much more sophisticated than my friend, if far less knowledgeable than almost anyone in finance -- also spoke with some shaded caution, as the film reminded me...

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, dear Kings of Hollywood, but you have been conned. Let me introduce myself. My name is Christina McDowell, formerly Christina Prousalis. I am the daughter of Tom Prousalis, a man the Washington Post described as "just some guy on trial for penny-stock fraud." (I had to change my name after my father stole my identity and then threatened to steal it again, but I'll get to that part later.) I was eighteen and a freshman in college when my father and his attorneys forced me to attend his trial at New...