Free Republic

Red Ink: The Congressional Budget Office says the federal deficit will be 33% higher than last year's. Over the long term, the deficit picture is just as bleak. But on campaign trail, this looming threat gets zero attention from either Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump. The CBO's updated budget projections show that federal government's fiscal outlook has worsened considerably over the past year. Red ink in fiscal year 2016, which ends on Sept. 30, will hit $590 billion. That's much worse than the CBO had expected just a few months ago... ...the CBO projects that in 10 years the annual...

You work and get paid. To whom do your after-tax earnings belong? Do they all belong to you or does some portion of them belong to the neighborhood grocer whose store you patronize? Who should have first dibs on the money you've earned: you or the auto dealer who sold you the last car you bought? In both cases the correct answer indisputably seems to be “you.” But not so fast. Typical discussions of trade policy imply that the answers are “the grocer” and “the auto dealer.” When politicians promise to raise tariffs on imports, they are promising to penalize...

Communities in nine U.S. states that have been hard-hit by coal layoffs are being promised more than 3,000 jobs in several industries through a multimillion-dollar federal grant. Officials for the Appalachian Regional Commission and other agencies announced the 29 projects totaling nearly $39 million Wednesday at a news conference in Huntington, West Virginia. The investments are expected to create or retain more than 3,400 jobs in agriculture, health care, manufacturing, technology and other industries. The projects are intended to help communities in Texas and in eight Appalachian states: Alabama, Kentucky, Mississippi, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia. …

In a speech in Tampa Wednesday afternoon, Donald Trump outlined a seven-point plan to bring millions of jobs to the U.S. He proposed renegotiating trade agreements like the Trans-Pacific Partnership and NAFTA and also challenging China for "illegal activities." "I am going to instruct my Treasury Secretary to label China a currency manipulator," he said. "Any country that devalues their currency in order to take unfair advantage of the United States will face tariffs to stop the cheating." "I am going to instruct the U.S. Trade Representative to bring trade cases against China, both in this country and at the...

Major problems swept under the carpet as Rio successes are praised Poverty and crime continues in the Brazilian capital after athletes leave 'Pot is empty' just two weeks before Paralympics due to begin Standing in a rainy, unfilled stadium on Sunday night, bringing the curtain down on Rio 2016, the president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), Thomas Bach, invited us all to admire the emperor’s new clothes. ‘These were marvellous Olympic Games in THE marvellous city!’ the German fencer-turned-lawyer proclaimed. As he and the rest of the IOC head for home this week, it’s easy to picture them sinking...

The national monument designation has faced opposition in the region. Gov. Paul LePage released a statement Tuesday afternoon condemning the land donation. "That's one way to get out of paying taxes to the state of Maine," he said. "It's sad that rich, out-of-state liberals can team up with Obama to force a national monument on rural Mainers who do not want it." The governor did not stop to talk to reporters Wednesday afternoon after an event in Portland, but his office released a statement. “President Obama is once again taking unilateral action against the will of the people, this time...

The world's longest aircraft - the Airlander 10 - has been damaged after nosediving on landing during its second test flight. The 302ft (92m) long aircraft - which is part plane and part airship - was damaged during the flight from Cardington Airfield in Bedfordshire.

WHO knows the most about you?You might say it’s your partner or perhaps your mum, assuming you’ve had the sort of tame life a parent would find acceptable.But you’d be wrong, because tech companies now have more information about you than almost anyone else.

U.S. Traffic Fatalities Continued to Surge in First Half of 2016 Deaths rose 9%, extending a trend that began two years ago as the economy improved and travel increased Traffic fatalities were up 9% in the first six months of this year compared with the same period last year. By Beckie Strum Traffic fatalities rose 9% in the first six months of 2016, compared with a year earlier, as a stronger economy and falling gas prices encouraged Americans to spend more time behind the wheel, the National Safety Council said on Tuesday. Traffic fatalities have been trending upward since 2014,...

I recently got the chance to sit down and talk to Andrew Torba, CEO of Gab.ai, a new freedom of speech-focused social network. Though the Twitter-style network was only launched last Monday and is still very much in early beta, thousands of people are currently waiting in line for an invitation to the service, which aims to act as a shelter for freedom of speech and expression. ------- AT: It's been an incredible week, in just four days 10,000 people registered for our beta through nothing but word of mouth. Our mission is to put people and free speech first....

-(Ammoland.com)- There will be a gun turn in event on Saturday, 27 August, 2016 in Minneapolis, Minnesota.  While these events are commonly labelled with the propaganda term “buyback” the guns were never owned by the people attempting to buy them.The event will be held at two locations: Fire Station 17 at 330 E 38th St. in south Minneapolis; Fire Station 14 at 2002 Lowry Ave N in north Minneapolis.  Compensation will be in the form of Visa gift cards. The event will run from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. The compensation offered at this event is very generous when compared...

Public Corruption: As the unseemly ties between the Clinton Foundation and Hillary Clinton's State Department become more glaring and disturbing, the rhetoric from the Democratic side is getting more desperate. Now Clinton hatchet man James Carville says critics of the foundation are going to hell. Over the past two weeks, it has become painfully obvious to anyone but the most hard-core Clinton loyalist that the Clinton Foundation was little more than an influence-peddling operation designed to exchange cash for favors from Bill and Hillary Clinton. We noted in this space yesterday that a fresh batch of emails showed how the...

When World War I began, many analysts believed that the international gold standard would keep the war short. A war of attrition was not thought to be possible because the disciplining effects of the gold standard — capital flight and gold outflow — were supposed to restrain the ability of states to mobilize resources in times of war. As many believed at the time, states under the gold standard would quickly run out of money to pay for soldiers and resources. No one ever imagined that the war would last four long years and that most countries would stop using...

The marketing team of Frankfurt never expected its English-language dummy website to attract new businesses would actually go live after Britain’s European Union referendum. “We hadn’t really assumed that we would need the site at all,” spokeswoman Michaela Kahle told AFP, as the team thought Britons would surely vote “Remain”. But as it turned out, the Welcome to FrankfurtRheinMain site was not only put to good use, but has become a hit, with 27,000 views since Britain stunned the world by deciding to leave the bloc. Quickly recovering from the shock, Kahle and her colleagues kicked into action, fielding inquiries...

BANGOR, Maine — The closing of one of the last two Howard Johnson restaurants in a couple of weeks will mark the end of its fried clam strips, ice cream and other menu staples that nourished baby boomers and leave the once-proud restaurant chain teetering on the brink of extinction. The slice of roadside Americana will no longer be served up in Bangor after Sept. 6. For waitress Kathe Jewett, it's the only job she's held since starting work when the restaurant opened in 1966. "It's bittersweet, but it's nothing to be sad about," the 68-year-old Jewett insisted Tuesday during...

...All of this is little comfort to McGrath, who chafes at the thought of the Postal Service helping Chinese merchants poach his customers. “All of us sellers are selling a lot of Chinese goods in America but at least we’re creating jobs, making money, and adding to the economy,” he said. “But when people buy direct from China that’s adding nothing to the American economy.”

An­drea Tantaros filed a law­suit with the Su­preme Court of the State of New York against Ro­ger Ailes, Fox News, Wil­li­am Shine, Di­anne Brandi, Irena Brig­anti and Su­z­anne Scott. In the com­plaint, she called Fox News a “sex-fueled Play­boy Man­sion-like cult.”

The theory that Donald Trump is preparing for a defeat at the polls in November by planning to launch a media company is really picking up momentum. The rumors started swirling earlier this summer. After a few op-eds came out about the idea last week, CNN tackled it this weekend. Now that Fox News’ Sean Hannity has revealed himself to be informally advising Trump, The Young Turks took it on, too: Cenk Uygur mentioned in a broadcast that Hannity, Steve Bannon, and Roger Ailes, all of whom have been rumored — with varying levels of confirmation — are big in...

MELBOURNE, Aug. 23 (Xinhua) -- A tablet developed in Melbourne that "melts away" cancer cells has been approved for use in the United States. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced on Tuesday that venetoclax was approved for prescription outside of human trials for patients with chronic lymphotic leukemia (CLL). Venetoclax, which overwhelms the BCL-2 protein that is vital to cancer cell survival, was developed in Melbourne in the 1980s after researchers at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research (WEHI) discovered the importance of BCL-2. WEHI's head of clinical translation, Professor Andrew Roberts, said that 80...

Students who work as teaching and research assistants at private universities will be allowed to vote to unionize under a ruling Tuesday by the National Labor Relations Board that found that they are employees under federal labor law. The case arose from a union election petition filed by a group of primarily graduate students at Columbia University, who are seeking to form a union that will join the United Automobile Workers. The three Democratic members of the board made up the majority; the lone Republican member dissented. A fifth spot on the board has been vacant since last year. The...