Free Republic

For decades, China has waged a trade war—targeting U.S. industries and stealing jobs from ordinary American workers. President Obama’s weakness on trade—along with the left’s obsession with identity politics—helped put Donald Trump in the White House. Now we have a leader who puts American workers first but his factious trade team appears clueless about how to bring effective pressure to win at negotiations or if necessary unilaterally reorder our trade with China to be fair. To prevail in any international confrontation—whether it is disarming North Korea, stifling Russian aggression or fixing trade aggression—the president needs to know the enemy, cultivate...

Hillary Clinton claims the economy does better with a Democrat in the White House--that’s simply false.Unless a president presides over an absolute disaster—as did George W. Bush or Herbert Hoover—comparing one with another is tricky business. Too much depends on the domestic circumstances each inherits and conditions in the wider global economy.The best recent apples to apples comparison is between the tough situations Ronald Reagan and Barack Obama faced when they assumed high office and how the fortunes of America's families subsequently progressed—with Reagan relying on conservative prescriptions and Obama on activist government to fix things.Obama took office during a punishing financial...

Economist Peter Morici had this to say this morning about Obama’s fiscal cliff negotiating tactics: “The president, by being so persistent that it’s my way or the highway, no spending cuts, taxes on folks over $250,000 or nothing, has basically put a pistol to the head of the middle class. It’s threatened them with financial extortion if he doesn’t get his way to satisfy the populist wing of the Democratic Party.”

[preceeding excerpted] While Citigroup(C) Chairman Vikram Pandit pays new bank executives $5 million and $10 million a year with its share of the $2 trillion in taxpayer money ploughed into Wall Street by the Federal Reserve and TARP, as many as 3,000 of the 8,000 regional banks may disappear through failure or acquisition by larger brethren. Washington provided Wall Street with taxpayer cash to monopolize banking. Now those banks are pushing down CD rates the elderly receive on savings, jacking up credit card fees, and setting aside credit for big multinationals that outsource more jobs than they create. Meanwhile, disappearing...

BALTIMORE, June 4 (UPI) -- A U.S. economist praises Congress for planning to fight global warming, but he says the plan being considered would hasten environmental calamity. Peter Morici, former chief economist at the U.S. International Trade Commission, is concerned about the Warner-Lieberman bill pending in the Senate. It would limit U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 2012 to 2005 levels, and reduce those by 70 percent in 2050. "Unfortunately, by encouraging energy-intensive American industries to flee to developing countries, this bill would penalize U.S. businesses that could contribute to reducing greenhouse gas emissions and thus accelerate global warming," said Morici...