Free Republic

Many leading Republicans and conservatives want someone other than Donald Trump to run for President in 2024. But this judgment requires an assessment of Trump’s vices and virtues in the context of our current political and cultural circumstances, as well as an assessment of other prospective Republican presidential candidates. Tom Klingenstein, Chairman of the Claremont Institute, explains Trump's Virtues.

Between inflation under Biden and The Fed’s counterattack to get inflation to 2%, I call this the Biden Blitz. Unlike what the elites in Washington DC think, small business are the cornerstone of the US economy. Unfortunately, small business optimism is getting crushed and just fell in March to a level lower than that found during the Covid economic shutdowns of 2020. HOW is it possible for small businesses to be even less optimistic than it was in April 2002, the nadir of the Covid economic shutdown? Small business optimism soared in November 2016 after the election of Donald Trump...

The NFIB Small Business Optimism Index is plunging and just fell below 90. The index was above 100 before the Wuhan virus outbreak in 2020, but has only been at 100 or above for only two months under Biden. And the trend is definitely looking bleak as The Federal Reserve fights inflation with M2 Money growth having collapsed to 0% YoY growth. And the Baltic Dry shipping index is falling with M2 Money growth YoY. I wonder what Fed Chair Jerome Powell is thinking?

As Democrats voice growing confidence about their midterm election prospects, two trends suggest that the party’s newfound sense of optimism may be misguided. Taken together, unrelenting inflation and the potential for a 2020-like polling error that overestimates Democrats’ strength could indicate that the Democratic Party is in a more fragile position than most in the media are currently acknowledging or appreciating. Earlier in the year, a red-wave midterm election — on par with 1994, when Republicans gained 54 U.S. House seats and flipped control of both houses of Congress — seemed almost inevitable.

It seems that lockdowns and mandates for vaccines and masks are on the way out, and we will learn to live with the risks of COVID as just another slightly more deadly disease than the flu. Big Pharma will no longer make unreasonable profits with its vaccines as they prove ineffective in the long run and there are alternative treatments for COVID at much less cost. We will all be able to return to a normal life. The Supreme Court will not be packed with three members instead of the nine currently favoring a conservative interpretation of the Constitution. Biden...

Former President Donald Trump issued a Thanksgiving Day message, telling Americans "do not worry, we will be great again." Trump issued his comment as progressive lawmakers remain focused on passing $2 trillion in social spending and climate legislation amid rising inflation, and on a partisan House select committee investigating events surrounding the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol. The country also is dealing with a surge of migrants at the southern border, critical race theory affecting school curricula, and recent high-profiled trials concerning fatal shootings with racial implications. Additionally, China and Russia have taken steps that seem to threaten U.S....

What a difference a month can make. Pessimism surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic is surging along with cases of the Delta variant in the US — with only 40 percent of Americans now saying the country is on the right track, down from 89 percent in June, according to a Gallup poll. About 45 percent of Americans said the situation was getting worse, not better, in late July — marking a drastic turnaround from the month before and a psychological return to last year and this past winter, when most US residents were not optimistic the country was overcoming the virus,...

Whenever I’m asked what I miss most about youth I answer “the optimism.”Hello May,You seem a bit hesitant to commit this year. Please do, you’re arrival will be as welcome as, well, a breath of fresh airSo stop screwing around and settle in please; we could really use your optimism this year.Springtime, 1921, Penleigh Boyd (1890-1923)Posted from: MOTUS A.D.

Politics can be fearfully depressing if you mainly focus on the sensationalism of the tabloid-like media and view trivial news and trivial information too seriously and too often. Stop and think a little about the many things going right in the country. There is definitely a trend against the corrupt ruling establishment since about 74 million voted for Trump. I’m sure that some thinking Democrats would also like to make America great again in a slightly different but similar way. The pandemic only killed a small fraction of one percent of the population. The killing potential of most pandemics turned...

There is a massive pandemic to which we have to adjust. But we must not forget who we are and what we need to be. Free beings. Freedom is the opposite of a corrupt culture of fear. Right now it is Donald Trump who is showing the world how to face the Coronavirus without fear. God Bless America

The IBD/TIPP Economic Optimism Index, a leading national poll on consumer confidence, revealed dramatic increases in positive sentiment this month, rising from 45.0 to 55.2 (22.7%) overall. This brings the index back into positive territory for the first time in seven months. For the IBD/TIPP indexes, a reading below 50.0 indicates pessimism. “We’ve seen some interesting swings in consumer sentiment throughout the pandemic, but October revealed the biggest gains by far,” said Ed Carson, IBD's news editor. The IBD/TIPP Economic Optimism Index has established a strong track record of foreshadowing the confidence indicators issued later each month by the University...

U.S. equity benchmark indexes were trading in record territory Wednesday afternoon, as investors drew hope from progress in the development of tests and vaccines for COVID-19, along with the potential for another fiscal stimulus package in Washington. Investors also largely ignored a mixed batch of economic reports, including a private-sector jobs reading that came in weaker than expected suggesting only a slow recovery from the coronavirus pandemic. The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA)gained 375 points, or 1.3%, at 29,020, edging nearer to its Feb. 12 closing high of 29,551.42. The S&P 500 index (SPX) climbed 44 points, or 1.3%, at...

If you watched last week's virtual Democratic convention, you heard about an America with which you might not be familiar. Speaker after speaker portrayed America as a failing nation full of misery, poverty and angst that only they can make better. On his radio program last week, Rush Limbaugh reminded listeners what the fight for the future of America is about. He played an excerpt from Donald Trump's inaugural address on Jan. 20, 2017: "The establishment protected itself, but not the citizens of our country. Their victories have not been your victories. Their triumphs have not been your triumphs. And...

Initial indicators show that Americans are very optimistic for an economic rebound in the short term. There are some good reasons for this optimism. Here are four reasons why Americans are ready for an economic rebound never seen before in world history:1. US optimism for an economic recovery is at an all-time high for most sectors. People are ready to begin making money again like never before: More & more sectors are showing record-breaking short term optimism.We previously noted this in tech, healthcare, small caps.Now, short term optimism for sectors like energy, retail, homebuilders, & materials are reaching *HISTORIC* and...

"A cheerful heart is good medicine, but a broken spirit saps a person's strength." (Proverbs 17:22 NLT) Everywhere you look -- from newspaper headlines, to TV "alerts," to those too-long White House briefings, to people wearing masks in public places, there is hardly any news that isn't negative. Stories of people not getting the coronavirus, much less stories about people who have recovered from it, are usually buried, if covered at all. This negative attitude produces its own kind of infection. In a 2016 article for Forbes magazine, neuropsychologist Dr. Fabian van den Berg warned that constant negativity causes stress....

Here is my 2020 election prediction: Donald Trump will defeat any of the dystopian-minded candidates proffered by the Democratic Party as their nominee in the 2020 presidential election by a country mile. Why so? In a word: Optimism. Martin Seligman, the Princeton-trained “father of positive psychology,” has dedicated much of his medical career to studying successful, happy people. Unlike most in the field of psychology who study the pathologies of the human mind, Dr. Seligman became fascinated early on by what makes successful people successful and spent much of his life focused on them. He wrote a wonderful book published in...

It’s been a very long time since I’ve been so optimistic about what is happening in the economy. The latest optimism index dispels all notions of a looming recession. We are living in an economy with business owners feeling very grateful for significant tax relief, so confident that they are set to move forward with business growth plans, all while creating even more plans to raise compensation. This sentiment abounds and gets even better when we consider the most recent jobs report, fueling only more excitement into this already strong economy. We witnessed not just great but astonishing numbers, and we...

US small-business sentiment rose 2.3 points to 104.7, the biggest jump since May 2018, according to the November optimism survey from the National Federation of Independent Business. It shows a reversal from "previous months of clatter" about a looming recession, the report noted. Positive earnings and expectations that business conditions will get better drove the results, according to the survey. "Owners are aggressively moving forward with their business plans, proving that when they're given relief from the government, they put their money where their mouth is, and they invest, hire, and increase wages," said William Dunkelberg, the chief economist...

For all the complaining we hear on cable news on a daily basis, you might be tempted to think that the world was ending. Liberals wring their hands over how terrible things are under the hateful regime of the Bad Orange Man. Conservatives see Democrats making gains in the polls and fret that the rise of socialism and the inevitable collapse of our nation that would follow may be just around the corner. Maybe we spend too much time watching cable news because most people don’t feel that way.A new poll out from Scott Rassmussen asked Americans how the...

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