Free Republic

Meh, I don’t believe it. And yes, I remember that the GOP left Senate seats on the table even in the magical wave year of 2010, nominating Christine O’Donnell instead of Mike Castle in Delaware and sending Sharron Angle into battle against Harry Reid in Nevada. Catherine Cortez Masto isn’t Harry Reid, though. At a moment when inflation is the highest it’s been in 40 years, Biden’s approval rating is well below 40 percent, and Hispanics are shifting towards the GOP, I’m supposed to believe she’s going to overcome all of that and hold onto her Senate seat? She’s polling...

Near- or above-average temperatures are anticipated from the Southwest to the Northeast and South.Some cooler air is possible across the North to begin April.The end of the month could be even warmer compared to average... April is expected to bring seasonal or above-average temperatures to most Americans, but the northern tier could see relatively cool temperatures for April, according to the latest outlook from The Weather Company, an IBM Business. Near-average temperatures are anticipated from California to New York, while much of the South will be above average. April 2020 Temperature Outlook(The Weather Company, an IBM Business) This forecast, if...

The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and NASA are currently locked in a high-stakes negotiation with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), which oversees US wireless networks. NOAA and NASA have asked the FCC to work with them to protect frequencies used for Earth observations from interference as 5G rolls out. But the FCC auctioned off the first chunk of the 5G spectrum with minimal protection. The sale ended on 17 April and reaped nearly US$2 billion. Because the United States is such a large communications market, the decisions the government makes about how to deploy 5G are likely...

Let us review the Obama administrations GDP projections: - In August of 2009, the White House — after having a half year to view the economy and its $800 billion stimulus response — predicted that GDP would rise 4.3% in 2011, followed by 4.3% growth in 2012, 2013 and 2014. - In its 2010 forecast, the White House said it was looking for 3.5% GDP growth in 2012, followed by 4.4% in 2013, 4.3% in 2014. - In its 2011 forecast, the White House predicted 3.1% growth in 2011, 4.0% in 2012 and 4.5% in 2013, 4.2% in 2014. -...

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- Corporate America's strong earnings have been pushing stocks higher for more than two years now, but there are early signs that the momentum many companies have had in this miserable economy is beginning to fade away. Seventy six companies in the S&P 500 have issued warnings that third-quarter earnings were going to be lower than previously expected, according to data compiled from Thomson Reuters. That's up modestly from the same period a year ago. Meanwhile, stocks have fallen to levels where Wall Street is pricing in little-to-no earnings growth for the rest of the year. The...

Click ths link to view the forecast.

Fox News has an all-star grouping of environmental forecasts that turned out to be so off base that the only question remains is why are the people who made them are still taken seriously? A couple of examples: 1. Within a few years "children just aren't going to know what snow is." Snowfall will be "a very rare and exciting event." Dr. David Viner, senior research scientist at the climatic research unit (CRU) of the University of East Anglia, interviewed by the UK Independent, March 20, 2000. Um...no. Kids in England today know very well what snow is. They've had...

None can foretell the future, and yet the shape of what we face can be shrewdly estimated with enough attention to historical trends; with broad contextual understanding; and with sufficient insight into the character of leaders, their societies, and the structures which define their basis. These estimates will be tempered by the sudden acts of nature, the sudden emergence of true leadership from unexpected quarters, or key breakthroughs in science. Still, we can hazard reliable views on the shape of the world in, say, a decade — in 2020 — if present trends and characters remain, and on a knowledge...

No forecast is complete without some indication of its uncertainty. If you run an economic model whose output is a single point you are making a very strong statement. It is no different than claiming that you are certain that the future is known, that car sales will be 1.4 million. Adding an internal “plus or minus” moves you away from dogmatism, but the problem is that these adjustments can be swayed by emotion, inexperience, or desire (moving a forecast in the direction you want it to go is called wishcasting; moving the thing forecast in the direction of forecast...

2010 Economic Trends: Paths Of Least Resistance by: Steven Hansen January 01, 2010 I have been reading economic and financial forecasts by many. I am sure you can easily find one who agrees with your outlook – and just as many who have the opposite vision. Based on economic fundamentals, the trends should be: * Higher interest rates which will suppress economic activity; * Higher taxes which will suppress economic activity; * The evaporation of the stimulus during 2010 which will suppress economic activity; * As the equities market is anticipating a strong “V”, there should be a correction to...

A big chill across the northern and eastern half of country will lead to plummeting temperatures over the next few days. Arctic air will push from Canada into the northern Plains by Thursday,

President Barack Obama’s economic forecasts for long-term growth are too optimistic, many economists warn, a miscalculation that would mean budget deficits will be much higher than the administration is now acknowledging.

The state may get more bad fiscal news this week when the state controller makes his final tally of April sales taxes. It's no secret that the recession is taking a toll on the state's thinning coffers, but more troubling is that revenue is coming in slower than pessimistic forecasts. April, the state's largest tax-collection month, has fallen short of expected revenue by more than $1.8 billion in personal and corporate income taxes. The state was $750 million behind projected tax collection on April 1. There's good reason to believe April's sales tax receipts may disappoint, too. New car sales...

WASHINGTON, Feb 26 (Reuters) - President Barack Obama will forecast the biggest U.S. deficit since World War Two in a budget on Thursday that urges a costly overhaul of the healthcare system and would spend billions to arrest the economy's freefall. An eye-popping $1.75 trillion deficit for the 2009 fiscal year is projected in Obama's first budget, according to U.S. officials who briefed reporters on the numbers. That is equal to 12.3 percent of U.S. gross domestic product -- the largest share since 1945 when the country ran a shortfall of 21.5 percent of GDP.

WASHINGTON - The government is promising $45 trillion more than it can deliver on Social Security, Medicare and other benefit programs. That is the gap between the promises the government has made in benefits and the projected revenue stream for these programs over the next 75 years, the Bush administration estimated Monday. The $45.1 trillion shortfall has increased by nearly $1 trillion in just one year, according to the administration's "Financial Report of the United States Government" for 2006. And, it's up 67.8 percent in just the past four years. In 2003, the shortfall between promised benefits and revenue sources...

George W. Bush will win this year’s presidential election, according to the American Political Science Association. The group developed seven models of the election results, six of which had Bush on top. The APSA used “nine distinguished and nonpartisan political scientists” to predict the outcome of the race, according to a press release. An average of the experts’ results shows that Bush will receive 53.8 percent of the popular vote. Only one of the seven models predicts a narrow victory for Senator John Kerry, while all others show a solid lead for Bush. The biggest Bush lead comes from Brad...

Leading the way was John Mueller, a long-time supply-sider, with a 5.32 percent forecast for 2003. Our own Larry Kudlow, at 4.40 percent, was third. Brian Wesbury, of Griffin, Kubik, and Stephens in Chicago, ranked sixth, and the Bear Stearns team of David Malpass/John Ryding followed in seventh place. (I don't participate in the WSJ forecast, but my own forecast was in line with the above supply-siders; in December of 2002 my La Jolla Economics called for better than 4 percent real GDP growth.) Not only were the real GDP forecasts of the supply-siders among the top ten, when I...

Wage increases for employees at almost all income levels are giving important and unexpected support to the nation's economy. If the gains continue, they offer hope that the rapid economic expansion of recent months could prove more durable than other spurts of growth over the last two years. Forecasters expect the Commerce Department to say in its quarterly report on Thursday that the economy grew about 6 percent in the three-month period ending in September, which would be the fastest pace since 1999. Most of that growth stemmed from a sharp rise in consumer spending, driven largely by a continuing...

Big quake 'certain' in San Francisco by 2032 By Andrew Gumbel in Los Angeles 23 April 2003 San Francisco is almost certain to suffer a severe earthquake in the next 30 years, which could uproot tens of thousands of buildings and kill hundreds of people in California's densely populated Bay Area, a detailed study by the United States Geological Survey predicts. The study, compiled by 100 geologists, disaster management experts, politicians and academics, said there was a 62 per cent chance of a devastating quake with a magnitude of 6.7 or greater on the Richter scale between now and 2032....

SANTA CLARA, Calif. — The bear may be heading back to hibernation. The electronics industry is beginning to shake off its bear-market blues with a pair of assessments that suggested resurgent growth next year — two years after the industry's worst recession began. Semico Research Corp. (Phoenix), at its 2002 Forecast Workshop here this past week, repeated its call for 30 percent growth for semiconductors in 2003. And LSI Logic Corp. chairman Wilf Corrigan, in a presentation to financial analysts at the New York Stock Exchange, said the market should grow 20 percent next year. Those optimistic views came amid...