Free Republic

In this post-election haze, many conservatives are understandably confused. If the economy was such a high-priority issue, and the Democrats were mostly responsible for the runaway inflation -- why didn’t the Republican’s win more seats? Efforts to lay the blame at the doorstop of Donald Trump is pointless and a wasted exercise. Pointing to abortion as a key issue deflects from the real issue at hand. The cause of the election loss is relatively simple -- Americans have not suffered enough pain with this economy -- yet. Inflation hits everyone -- it is an indiscriminate irritant that impacts people regardless...

With a win in New Hampshire, a maybe-win in Iowa last week, and a month-long surge into second place nationally, Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., is now in strong position to win the Democratic Party’s presidential nomination. It’s been a long road for the curmudgeonly man from Vermont, who spent years toiling on the fringes of official Washington. Of all things, the event that ultimately launched him into the Democratic Party’s mainstream turned out to be a binary 2016 primary contest with Hillary Clinton, a match-up in which the contrast ultimately benefited him more than her.So, here we are, in...

Not many presidential candidates in American history, outside perhaps a Eugene Debs or Gus Hall, would announce a presidential bid vowing to “transform the country” and complete “the political revolution.” Then again, not many candidates have been like Bernie Sanders, a lifetime socialist who, in the 1980 presidential campaign, when normal people were deciding between Carter or Reagan, served as a presidential elector for the Socialist Workers’ Party. And yet, this onetime Trotskyist and member of a Marxist-Stalinist kibbutz received 13 million votes in the 2016 Democratic Party primary, or 40% of Democrat votes. This isn’t your granddaddy’s Democratic Party,...

We were trying to count the people standing in a breadline when William Contreras arrived. The line was forming outside of a bakery in the Caracas run-down neighborhood of Catia, about 20 people long with a half dozen more sprinting past me and our photographer, Cristian Hernández. It was a perfect illustration of the desperate situation of a country that was, a few years ago, boasting of its oil-funded socialist prosperity. Contreras was our government minder, a bulky 50-year-old alderman with salt-and-pepper hair. When he pulled up to us, he seemed oblivious to the snaking line.

After Bernie Sanders visited the Marxist Sandanista regime in Nicaragua on a propaganda tour, he argued that the bread lines in major cities were a good thing. “American journalists talk about how bad a country is, that people are lining up for food. That is a good thing!” The bread lines had been caused by the radical regime’s socialist agricultural policies of land seizures from farmers. Those farmers who refused to be drawn into Soviet-style communal farms rebelled, along with Indian and Creole racial minorities, and became the core of the Contras, the heroic resistance fighters whose mass murders at...

Oprah Winfrey says America would’ve had breadlines if Barack Obama wasn’t elected. That overpaid queen of daytime TV is opening her mouth again—and when she does, it usually includes praise for President Obama. In a new interview with Parade magazine, the talk show queen, who recently refocused the priorities of America by denying in an interview that she was a lesbian, offers nothing but support for Obama. Winfrey says that she is pleased as can be with everything that number 44 has thus far accomplished in his first two years. Declaring that she’s not been disappointed in anything Obama has...

Green shoots are bursting out. Or so we are told. But before concluding that the recession will soon be over, we must ask what history tells us. It is one of the guides we have to our present predicament. Fortunately, we do have the data. Unfortunately, the story they tell is an unhappy one. EDITOR’S CHOICE Tight rules helped mitigate crisis in Brazil - Jun-16 Economists’ forum - Oct-01 Opinion: The three steps to financial reform - Jun-16 In depth: Global financial crisis - Sep-04 Economics: How the world economy might recover its poise - Jun-15 Two economic historians, Barry...

So far, the collapse of the world economy since mid-2008 has been worse than it was in the Great Depression. In fact, one glance at the fall world output, trade, and stock prices really puts the "green shoots" in perspective. The government policy response to the collapse, however, has been much more aggressive. Thus, we will soon collectively learn whether the economic historians are right that the original Great Depression was caused by "policy errors" after the collapse...or whether, as some suspect, there is simply no way to avoid catastrophe after a financial bubble the size of the one we...

<p>If you look hard enough, you can find some green shoots, but here's the truth. The decline in world industrial output is tracking very close with what we saw during the Depression. This chart was put together by economists Barry Eichengreen and Kevin O'Rourke, as part of a broader study comparing this downturn with the Great Depression. The good news, they say: The policy response has been much better this time around.</p>

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Hundreds of people lined up at some Verizon Wireless stores on Friday to buy the BlackBerry Storm, the first touch-screen phone from Research In Motion that aims to compete with Apple's iPhone . More than 200 people had waited at a Verizon store in mid-town Manhattan early in the morning, many of whom were turned away after it ran out of the new phones less than an hour after opening at 8 a.m. The angry customers caused a ruckus and police came to restore order.

RGE Monitor MEDIA ALERT: Nouriel Roubini predicts the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression and the worst U.S. Recession in the last few decades. New York, July 15, 2008- In a series of recent writings on the RGE Monitor Nouriel Roubini - Chairman of RGE Monitor and Professor of Economics at the NYU Stern School of Business - has argued that the U.S. is experiencing its worst financial crisis since the Great Depression and will undergo its worst recession in the last few decades. His analysis leads to the following conclusions: This is by far the worst financial crisis...

So much for that second-half rebound. Truth be told, that was always more of a wish than a serious forecast, happy talk from the Fed and Wall Street desperate to get things back to normal. It ain't gonna happen. Not this summer. Not this fall. Not even next winter. This thing's going down, fast and hard. Corporate bankruptcies, bond defaults, bank failures, hedge fund meltdowns and 6 percent unemployment. We're caught in one of those vicious, downward spirals that, once it gets going, is very hard to pull out of. Only this will be a different kind of recession --...

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Sales of existing homes fell to a record low in October, according to the latest reading on the battered housing market by an industry trade group released Wednesday, as even the largest drop in home prices ever wasn't enough to revive moribund sales. The National Association of Realtors reported that sales of homes by homeowners fell to an annual pace of 4.97 million in October, down from the revised 5.03 reading in September, which was the previous record low since the trade group started tracking sales on that basis in 1999. Economists surveyed by Briefing.com had...

Applications for U.S. home mortgages fell last week as rates on some adjustable loans soared to their highest levels in more than two months, according to data from an industry group Wednesday. RELATED LINKS Comments Lift Sentiment Stocks Open Higher Durable Goods Orders Fall for Third Straight Month Mortgage Applications Fall as Rates Soar The Mortgage Bankers Association said its seasonally adjusted index of mortgage application activity declined 4.3 percent to 652.5 in the week ended Nov. 23. Rates on one-year adjustable-rate mortgages that include many jumbo loans climbed 26 basis points to 6.24 percent, the highest since the height...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Consumers, battered by a steep downturn in housing and a severe credit crunch, slowed spending growth in September to the weakest performance in three months. The Commerce Department reported Thursday that consumer spending rose by 0.3 percent in September, slightly lower than the 0.4 percent increase that analysts had been expecting. Incomes grew by 0.4 percent, matching the August gain, and in line with analysts' forecasts. Video More video The latest in business news with the CNN.com business bulletin. Play video Economists are worried that consumers, the main support for the economy, may cut back on their...

<p>BOSTON (CNNMoney.com) -- For those in the real estate industry and for those looking to buy or sell a home, it could take until 2009 to catch a break.</p> <p>That's the forecast from Doug Duncan, chief economist for the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA), who will present his outlook to an auditorium full of real estate professionals on Wednesday morning.</p>

<p>NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Builders continued to slam the brakes on new homes in September, as the government's latest reading on the battered market out Wednesday showed housing starts and permits were weaker than expected at levels not seen for more than a decade.</p>

<p>NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- The meltdown in the mortgage market in August dried up the supply of buyers for homeowners looking to sell their homes, as an industry group report showed the lowest level of homes under contract on record.</p>

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- The bullhorn message from the government to mortgage lenders has been: Bend. Do what you can to help struggling homeowners. The message to troubled homeowners has been: Call your lender. You may be able to work something out. Despite the persistent blare, there is not a whole lotta "loan modifying" going on yet. A survey by Moody's found that most loan servicers this year had modified only about 1 percent of their adjustable-rate mortgages (ARMs) that had reset to higher rates by the end of July. At the Consumer Credit Counseling Service (CCCS) of San Francisco,...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Demand for big-ticket manufactured goods plunged in August by the largest amount in seven months, with widespread weakness signaling a slowdown in the nation's industrial sector. The Commerce Department reported Wednesday that orders for durable goods, everything from commercial jetliners to home appliances, fell by 4.9 percent in August, the biggest decline since a 6.1 percent fall in January. It was far larger than the 3.5 percent drop that economists had been expecting and resulted from across-the-board decreases in a number of categories. The concern is that the steep downturn in housing and turbulence in financial markets...