Free Republic

President Barack Obama is in full 2012 reelection mode. Part of that process is preparing to possibly take on Mitt Romney – whom (it appears) he thinks has the strongest chance to be his Republican opponent. Which he and many Democrats think is very good news. Romney fits right into the Left’s absurd anti-capitalism, “robber baron,” Occupy Wall Street anti-1%-er, scorched earth storyline. Romney is very wealthy, which for Obama and his Democrats is the height of eee-vill (except – these Donkeys are mostly rich…). Never mind that Romney’s wealth is right in line with many past Presidents and candidates...

President Barack Obama’s first paid TV ad of the 2012 campaign had one basic purpose, Democrats say: to ensure that Solyndra doesn’t become the Bain of the president’s existence. Typically, the kickoff ad in a presidential reelection campaign has a gauzy, upbeat, “Morning in America” vibe. Not this one — it was a pointed response to a $6 million ad campaign, paid for by the Koch brothers-linked nonprofit group Americans for Prosperity, which hits Obama on the semi-scandal surrounding the now-defunct, government-subsidized maker of solar power components. It’s clear Obama’s campaign staff in Chicago sees the Solyndra attacks as a...

A judge tossed out California's newly adopted lethal injection procedure on Friday, throwing the state's already stalled capital punishment system into further doubt. Marin County Superior Court Judge Faye D'Opal, finalizing a tentative ruling she issued a day earlier, said prison officials failed to properly explain why they rejected a one-drug process using only a barbiturate when one of their experts recommended it as being superior to the three-drug mixture that was adopted to execute inmates. *** Prison officials will now either have to appeal or again revise their lethal injection procedures and submit them to public comment, a process...

No serious constitutional argument can be made against the death penalty. The endless campaigns to ban it cost taxpayers millions to defend. By David B. Rivkin Jr. and Andrew Grossman On the September night that the state of Georgia put Troy Davis to death, a crowd of several hundred gathered at the Supreme Court in Washington to protest America's continued practice of capital punishment. But they were in the wrong place. The protesters should have assembled 600 miles southeast, in Atlanta.

Secretary of State Clinton, in a sharp departure from her stance when she was a senator, is warning that any American action, even symbolically, toward recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel must be avoided for the reason that it would jeopardize the peace process. Wrong hand giving the salute, Ms. Clinton. Her warnings were issued in a brief she has just filed with the Supreme Court — in which she is arguing that a law she voted for when she was Senator is unconstitutional because it could require the U.S. government to give to an American citizen born at...

Would the Steiger amendment benefit chiefly the rich, as the President says? Not really. Undeniably, a cut in the capital gains tax below the present top rate of 49% would help mainly people in (or above) the 50% tax bracket, who are more likely to own stock and other assets. To be in that lofty bracket, one needs taxable income of about $40,000 or more. But a lot of "average" taxpayers leap into the higher brackets a few times in their lives—when they sell a house, a farm, or the stock that Aunt Tillie left them; or when they collect...

The rotting bodies of 30 men, almost all black and many handcuffed, slaughtered as they lay on stretchers and even in an ambulance in central Tripoli, are an ominous foretaste of what might be Libya's future. The incoming regime makes pious statements about taking no revenge on pro-Gaddafi forces, but this stops short of protecting those who can be labelled mercenaries. Any Libyan with a black skin accused of fighting for the old regime may have a poor chance of survival. The atmosphere in the Libyan capital is frighteningly uncertain a week after the sudden collapse of Gaddafi's forces. Nobody...

There may have been no rioting in the Highlands, but no one has been watching the arson and looting of Britain’s cities more closely than the Queen. With fewer than six months to her Diamond Jubilee, when celebrations are planned for the length and breadth of the kingdom, the disorder has alarmed aides planning the extravaganza. Central to their concern is not just the damage to the country’s image overseas, but also how quickly the feelgood factor engendered by April’s Royal Wedding has been lost. From her summer home in Balmoral, the Queen has kept in touch with developments and...

Rolling coverage of the third night of violent disturbances in London, with arson and looting reported at several locations across the capital.

In June, President Obama celebrated a rare sliver of good economic news: Foreign investment was up 49% last year over 2009. The president says that this boost in capital shipped to the U.S. by international companies or foreign investors leads to more businesses and higher-paying jobs here at home. He's right. But this isn't the economic success story that the White House is spinning. The real truth of the recession and limping recovery is that for the first time in decades America is, on net, losing, not attracting, growth capital. That may be the single most important explanation for persistently...

A Facebook post by nephew Billy got me thinking today. He wrote, "If it's legal to get an abortion, it should be legal to abort a child molester. Just sayin'." It occurred to me that, since Governor Pat Quinn signed the legislation abolishing the death penalty on March 9, 2011, he established curious moral inconsistency, given his radical, enthusiastic support for another death penalty: Abortion. In the State of Illinois, an unborn human being who has never committed a crime can be executed, but due to the repeal of the death penalty here, Cecil S. Sutherland, who abducted, raped and...

The $29 Trillion Recovery by: Calafia Beach Pundit April 05, 2011 Since the low of early March 2009, the capitalization of global equity markets has more than doubled, rising by $29 trillion. Valuations now are only $7 trillion shy of their late 2007 high. It would be an understatement to say that "fortunes" have been won, lost, and won again in the past several years; the magnitude of the collapse and the rebound have been more than anyone could have imagined. It is a testament to the resilience of markets, risk-takers, and workers that the global market economy has not...

Yes, in New York, there's a "capital tax" -- a tax on money you have in the bank. New York, apparently, wants to encourage companies to take as much risk of bankruptcy as possible, by raising or retaining as little cash as possible, so it taxes them on cash they have in the bank. And we raised a whopping $3 million last summer, and we still have it in the bank. So that means we have to pay New York $10,000 of "capital tax" as punishment. Never mind that we've created 45 new jobs in New York and that most...

Anti-government protests raged Monday for the first time in the Libyan capital, Tripoli, with unconfirmed media reports of pro-regime snipers firing into crowds, bloody clashes on the city's main square, and fires blazing in key government buildings. Al Jazeera reported that a fire was burning inside the People's Hall, a symbol of longtime strongman Moammar Kadafi's repressive regime. TV images ......posted using frpa

Shirley Lynette Ledford was a pretty, 16-year-old teenage girl just coming into her own in 1979, the year she was kidnapped and murdered. She would have turned 48 this year. I got to thinking about her Wednesday after reading another story about how we can't seem to come up with a humane way to thin out the waiting list on San Quentin's death row without causing murderers too much pain and suffering. It's a hard argument to swallow when you know the pain and suffering Ledford went through at the end of her short life. I can still hear her...

Join The Movement Find out how you can help Islam on Capitol hill become a successful event this year!

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) -- Ohio says it's switching its lethal injection drug to an anesthetic commonly used to euthanize pets as a shortage of the drug normally used for executions has worsened.

Russia will abolish taxes on capital gains from long-term direct investments starting next year, seeking to lure funds to reduce the economy’s energy dependence and subdue speculative capital, President Dmitry Medvedev said. “Such investments are critically important for modernizing the national economy and we are ready to create institutions to facilitate such investments,” Medvedev said at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum today. His government will create an investment fund within a year to help draw “strategic investors” by raising 3 rubles of private capital for each 1 ruble of state money, the president said. The world’s largest energy exporter...

The Tennessee State Supreme Court acted Monday to stop the executions of four inmates, including one set for Tuesday, to consider whether prison officials have found a way to carry out lethal injections humanely. The court gave Davidson County Chancellor Claudia Bonnyman 90 days to rule on the constitutionality of the state’s new lethal injection procedure. The ruling came hours after lawyers for condemned double-killer Stephen Michael West asked the court to stop his execution Tuesday (read article here). They argued prison officials have failed to ensure he won’t suffer horrific pain as he suffocates on the gurney in the...

The King of kings is about to call ! Unilateral agreements are now coming into play , The Bride of Christ coming together all in one day , So break out the confetti and raise your voice and sing , For the King of Glory and his banquet are about to ring \o/ , The sound of unity across his Body and Bride , For The Kingdom of God is moving in leaps and strides , No longer will hindering spirits be allowed to stand , For The Lord himself is coming with an army to take back all his...

Ironically, a major focus of the speeches at the "One Nation" hate rally was the need for "Green Jobs" along with plenty of rhetoric accusing conservatives of not caring about our environment.

Obama's poorly coded message to investors is to take your money out of America and keep it out. Whether through excessive taxation, suffocating over-regulation, or thuggish confiscation, the lesson to be drawn by anyone with excess capital is to look for friendlier places to put it to work. The list of friendlier places excludes North Korea, Venezuela, and Iran for the time being, but almost everywhere else qualifies. Russia's president spent several days in Silicon Valley recently looking for adventurous investors and came away with a $1B commitment from Cisco Systems. For Cisco, sitting on a cash hoard of...

Capital controls should be considered in future May 28, 2010 Korea is considering measures to regulate capital flows as part of a broader international effort, the head of the Financial Supervisory Service said yesterday. Kim Jong-chang, the FSS governor, told foreign correspondents at the Bankers Club in Jung District, central Seoul, that “we are mulling whether to impose regulations on the inflows and outflows of foreign capital.” Government officials have been raising the issue of capital controls in recent weeks in reaction to the global financial turmoil resulting from the European sovereign debt crisis, which has caused massive selling by...

Joe Biden’s May 6 speech to the European Parliament appears to have been largely ignored by the American media, both old and new. The full performance can be viewed below. The video comes complete with images (at 0:18 of the clip) of Biden puffing out his chest as Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy,” the unofficial EU anthem, is played. ----click on link for amazing video and analysis

As Joe Biden gaffes go, this one’s a …medium. Biden saluted Brussels, Belgium in the opening of his address to the European Parliament with the traditional, obsequious praise all speakers offer to another country when addressing their legislatures — well, almost all, anyway. However, as Biden is wont to do, he goes overboard, and in the process denigrates his peers in the American political system and his own country:

Even though we refer to Washington, D.C. as the capital of the free world, Vice President Joe Biden suggested Brussels – in Belgium – may well have claim to that title. But would Brussels still exist as a capital for not the allied forces in World War I and World War II? Read the full post including Biden's remarks on video...

Mitt Romney's boyhood home, which sold for $645,000 as recently as 2002, is in the news:  It's slated for demolition this summer. This fine old house, situated in a once-vibrant upper-middle-class neighborhood of Detroit, is one of 10,000 homes and other buildings that Detroit intends to knock down as soon as possible. The city fathers have decided to accept the city's continued decline as unalterable fact, and since the current economic environment cannot fill those 10,000 homes with eager buyers, they assume that the future economic environment won't, either. So they may as well just knock them all down...

Michael Lewitt has an interesting new book out, called "The Death of Capital". In it, Lewitt attacks speculative investment activities such as private equity buyouts. He notes that such speculation "has been a prime abuser of capital as it has diverted an inordinate amount of capital into unproductive uses while producing (at best) mediocre returns and charging unjustifiably exorbitant fees." He also cites naked credit default swaps, leveraged buyouts and quantitative stock trading strategies as cases where capital has been channeled into unproductive use. Surveying the base metals this week, his point is driven home. The aluminum price ticked up...

TRIPOLI: An eight-year-old Dutch boy was the sole survivor when a Libyan plane arriving from South Africa exploded on landing at Tripoli airport on Wednesday, killing more than 100 people, officials said. Afriqiyah Airways listed 93 passengers and 11 crew members on board its flight 8U771 from Johannesburg. "I can confirm the crash but not the number of the dead," said Bongani Sithole, an official of the airline at Johannesburg airport. "We hear that it happened one metre (yard) away from the runway." A Libyan security official earlier said that all those on board the Airbus A330 had died but...

It couldn't have happened to a nicer country. On March 18, with very little pomp and circumstance, president Obama passed the most recent stimulus act, the $17.5 billion Hiring Incentives to Restore Employment Act (H.R. 2487), brilliantly goalseeked by the administration's millionaire cronies to abbreviate as HIRE. As it was merely the latest in an endless stream of acts destined to expand the government payroll to infinity, nobody cared about it, or actually read it. Because if anyone had read it, the act would have been known as the Capital Controls Act, as one of the lesser, but infinitely more...

It couldn't have happened to a nicer country. On March 18, with very little pomp and circumstance, president Obama passed the most recent stimulus act, the $17.5 billion Hiring Incentives to Restore Employment Act (H.R. 2487), brilliantly goalseeked by the administration's millionaire cronies to abbreviate as HIRE. As it was merely the latest in an endless stream of acts destined to expand the government payroll to infinity, nobody cared about it, or actually read it. Because if anyone had read it, the act would have been known as the Capital Controls Act, as one of the lesser, but infinitely more...

While I was out playing happy camper in the Everglades and checking on my ‘local’ BOL, some news snuck through the system but thankfully good old Tyler Durden at ZeroHedge.com has the scoop: It’s Official – America Now Enforces Capital Controls This is not something I say lightly after reviewing this information and reinforcing the commentary from the Rangel rule which restricted and penalized voluntary emigration and/or renunciation of one’s citizenship from the United States. If you can, even if it means a 75% loss of your fortunes, get out now. If you have a universal skill set (Programmer, trader,...

What is wrong with this picture: the MTS just announced that the February budget deficit was $220.9 billion, after receipts of just $107.5 billion with vastly surpassed by outlays of $328.4 billion. This is a record. Yet the interest on the public debt was a mere $16.9 billion (page 13 of the MTS report). The reason for this is because as TreasuryDirect points out, in February the interest on public marketable debt (actual cash outlays), which as of Monday stood at $8.061 trillion, hit an all time low of 2.548%. How is it possible that unprecedented debt accumulation can result...

FHA Is SOL By Ian Mathias 11/13/09 Baltimore, Maryland – Just as we forecast, the Federal Housing Administration revealed yesterday that it will likely need a government bailout. The results of an external audit (after being suddenly delayed for a week) showed the FHA’s capital cushion to be just 0.53% of its portfolio of insured mortgages. That’s way below the 2% mandated by Congress. In other words, the FHA has just $3.6 billion in reserves to back up a $679 billion book. That’s into the Fannie Mae stratosphere of leverage insanity, worse than anyone expected, and way, way beyond the...

The email: ======================================================== Craziest Action Alert You May Ever Receive Dear Fellow Tea Party Patriots, Thank you for your generous monetary donations this past week. We have raised over half of the funds for the Farmer Relief and Freedom Relay. That is enough to launch us. Once the checks are in, we may still send one more fund raising email out next week. In the meantime, this maybe the craziest email you have ever received. The work we did around the country and in DC yesterday was powerful and instrumental. There were over 50,000 of you in DC in less...

'In God We Trust' conspicuously absent at launch of Capitol Visitor Center,Yesterday, individuals across the country who were willing to stand up on behalf of our nation's religious heritage saw a major victory," announced U.S. Rep. Randy Forbes, R-Va., in a website statement this week. Last year, WND reported Forbes responded to concerns the Christian heritage of the United States had been scrubbed from the 580,000-square-foot facility. He worked with other members of Congress until the Committee on House Administration and the Senate Rules and Administration Committee agreed to include references to the nation's

Another two US banks have been closed by the federal regulator, taking the total number of American banking failures this year to 94. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), which controls the banking sector, has shut Irwin Union Bank & Trust and Irwin Union Bank. The move comes after their parent firm - Irwin Financial - was unable to meet an FDIC demand to boost their capital. The failure of the two banks is likely to cost the FDIC $850m.

Where is Cecilia Ibru? By Ruona Agbroko August 21, 2009 01:56PMT For someone whose intimidating frame, trademark pearls and penchant for A-list events on Nigeria’s social circuit is legendary, Cecilia Ibru, the recently sacked managing director and chief executive officer of Oceanic Bank Plc, is doing an excellent job of going underground. On Friday August 14, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria announced her dismissal, alongside that of the CEOs and executive directors of Afribank, Intercontinental Bank, Union Bank and Finbank. Declaring that the CEOs came under the axe for acting “in a manner detrimental to...

Wriston’s Law is named after the late Walter Wriston, a giant of banking and finance. In his 1992 book, The Twilight of Sovereignty, he predicted the rise of electronic networks and their chief economic effects. Wriston said capital (meaning both money and ideas), when freed to travel at the speed of light, “will go where it is wanted, stay where it is well-treated.” By applying Wriston’s Law of capital and talent flow, you can predict the fortunes of companies (and countries). All predictions about future performance must start with this most basic question: Do companies (and countries) attract money and...

It is hilarious listening to the propagandists try to “spin” the events in bond and currency markets to make it sound like the U.S. government is still operating from a position of strength.

A man who fatally stabbed a convenience store clerk during a robbery 23 years ago apologized repeatedly to her relatives and to his mother before he was executed Tuesday. "I know I hurt you very bad," Michael Lynn Riley said to his victim's relatives, including her two daughters and husband. "I want you to know I'm sorry." Brandy Oaks said she accepted Riley's apology and was pleased to hear it. She was 4 when her mother, Wynona Harris, was killed. "This is a difficult day and there are no winners on either side," Oaks said. "Her spirit will live on...

REUTERS A lawsuit charges hedge-funder Ezra Merkin "knew or should have known" that Madoff was a fraud, and seeks $500M from Merkin's funds. Merkin's Gabriel Capital Corp. received $tens of millions in fees from deals with Madoff. Stanley Chais of California was charged last Friday. Microsoft's wholly owned affiliate, Microsoft Licensing GP, one of the pioneers in the field of computerized stock trading, joined the Bankruptcy Court case against Madoff, but declined to discuss its claims against the swindler.

My Pictures from the Sacramento Tea Party http://www.flickr.com/photos/jaysterdotcom/sets/72157616839465318/show/ http://www.flickr.com/photos/jaysterdotcom/sets/72157616839465318/

A condemned Texas inmate who removed his only eye and ate it in a bizarre outburst several months ago on death row is “crazy,” yet sane under state law, a judge wrote in an appellate court ruling on Wednesday that rejected his appeals. Here’s the story, from the Associated Press. According to the story, Andre Thomas challenged his conviction and death sentence for the murder of his estranged wife’s 13-month-old daughter five years ago in Grayson County in North Texas. His wife and their 4-year-old son were killed in the same attack. The victims were stabbed and their hearts were...

Phillip Cherney has represented some notorious clients in his time, notably infamous Oakland drug czar Felix Mitchell Jr. in the mid '80s and Joel Radovcich, whom Fresno social climber Dana Ewell hired to murder his sister and wealthy parents in 1992. *** Cherney has the unenviable task of going before the California Supreme Court on Tuesday during oral arguments in San Francisco to plead for the ignominious death row inmate's life. Cherney knows he has his work cut out for him, noting in court papers that Davis, 54, is "one of the most reviled defendants" in recent California history, a...

Even amid the real-estate bust, waterfront property in the San Francisco Bay area is a luxury few can afford. That's why some California lawmakers want to sell San Quentin State Prison -- which houses more than 5,300 inmates on prime land with stunning views of the bay -- to developers who might pay as much as $2 billion. State Sen. Jeff Denham, who has sponsored a bill to sell the complex of historic buildings for private development, thinks the proceeds could help replenish California's recession-depleted coffers. "I believe maximum-security inmates shouldn't have waterfront property," said Mr. Denham, a Republican from...

District of Columbia when it became the nation's capital two centuries ago would be granted under legislation the Senate passed Thursday. Congress is "moving to right a centuries-old wrong," said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid shortly before the 61-37 vote. The House is expected to pass the measure with a strong majority next week and President Barack Obama, a co-sponsor when the bill failed to clear the Senate two years ago, has promised to sign it. The measure is likely to face a court challenge immediately after becoming law; opponents argue that it is unconstitutional because D.C. is not a...

Jeffrey Imm writes in with an AP report about the January 21 Inaugural prayer service to take place at the National Cathedral in Washington. Among those officiating will be Ingrid Mattson, president of the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA). This is an outrage and should be stopped. What's ISNA? As I have written (here, for instance), the US government has identified ISNA as a Muslim Brotherhood front organization. Actually, the Muslim Brotherhood itself has identified ISNA as a Muslim Brotherhood front organization. And the Muslim Brotherhood is all about extending Islamic law globally--even in America. According to its 1991...

WASHINGTON – The US military plans to mobilize thousands of troops to protect Washington against potential terrorist attack during the inauguration of president-elect Barack Obama, a senior US military commander said Wednesday. They will fly combat air patrols and man air defenses, organize large scale medical support, and help local law enforcement provide security in the capital, said General Gene Renuart, head of the US Northern Command. "(It's) not because we see a specific threat, but because for an event this visible, this important and this historic, we ought to be prepared to respond if something does happen," he told...

For ancient Greek and Roman pagan authors, Jerusalem definitely was a Jewish city. This article draws on references to Jerusalem from nearly twenty different sources, dating from the third century BCE to the third century CE, which are included in the late Professor Menahem Stern's comprehensive anthology, Greek and Latin Authors on Jews and Judaism. An examination of these texts indicates the unanimous agreement that Jerusalem was Jewish by virtue of the fact that its inhabitants were Jews, it was founded by Jews and the Temple, located in Jerusalem, was the center of the Jewish religion. In these sources, Jerusalem...