Free Republic

Could a second Biden term be more injurious to the economy than his first term? It seems unimaginable given the first three years gave us 20% inflation, a $2,000 loss in average real incomes for the middle class, 6 million added illegal immigrants, a war on American energy that has caused gas prices to rise by more than 40% to $3.64 a gallon, the collapse of our many major cities, another $6 trillion added to the national debt, the unaffordability of new homes, and the chaos on college campuses. So what’s the encore to that abysmal performance? What will Bidenomics...

The news that billionaire philanthropist George Soros, along with the heads of other munificent nonprofits like the Rockefeller Brothers Foundation, has been financing the increasingly violent demonstrations by Hamas supporters on American college campuses appears to confirm, in an ironic way, an oft-repeated myth about the operation of America’s Constitutional order. The myth is that by using their wealth through campaign contributions or the promise of future employment, rich people induce government to adopt policies that favor their economic interests, at the expense of the poor and middle class. Of course, the allegation that the wealthy benefit disproportionately from...

Biden’s legacy will be unique in American history, for no president will ever have left America in such terrible shape. Never before has an American president been so physically unstable that he needs an accompanying entourage wherever he walks. That shakiness is a visual metaphor of Biden’s presidency. He represents a departure from previous presidents in being the only president who leaves voters doubting whether he is actually in charge and wondering why a frail 81-year-old, broadly despised man is being pushed to run again, even as most don’t believe he’s capable of completing that term if elected. Biden came...

Because it’s almost impossible to change a leftist’s mind, all you can do is reveal and revel in his loopiness. Do you remember the old days when you could have a conversation with a friend and, if you disagreed, you knew it was because he didn’t have all the facts? So, you politely filled in the holes of his knowledge and expected him to agree with you wholeheartedly. I’ve found the safest route, though, and it’s a lot of fun: Feign ignorance and surprise that they are so well-informed. “Wow, how do you know so much?” The real trick is...

Lawfare against a top presidential candidate has its consequences. Do any of the Democrats engaged in lawfare against President Trump read the news about leftists south of the border who do the same things they are doing? Maybe Panama's election a week ago would be useful for them to know. According to Foreign Policy, which has a good, if somewhat left-slanted overview of what went on there: The winner, José Raúl Mulino, was a stand-in candidate for former President Ricardo Martinelli, who was disqualified due to a money laundering conviction. (Outgoing center-left President Laurentino Cortizo was barred from running due...

Google has come in for some well-deserved criticism after its “artificial intelligence” wouldn’t answer a simple question: How many Jews did the Nazis kill? That’s bad enough. But then a not-so-intelligent Google employee compounded the problem with a lie about why it happened. The story goes that Michael Apfel asked a Google “virtual assistant” this question: “Hey Google, how many Jews were killed by the Nazis?” Google’s answer: “Sorry, I don’t understand.” Then he asked: “How many Jews were killed during World War II?” Google: “I don’t understand.” “How many Jews were killed in the concentration camps?” “Sorry, I don’t...

“These agencies are not trusted because they are not trustworthy.” — El Gato Malo on “X”. The miasma of anxiety befogging so many brains in our troubled land begins to lift as every narrative served up by the US fascist intel blob goes annoyingly stale and impotent. The worst media meme — that a vicious officialdom is “defending our democracy” — gets laughed out of the room now when repeated incessantly by such shills as Jen Psaki and Lawrence O’Donnell of MSNBC. Everybody understands they want to “defend our democracy” by cancelling your freedom of speech, pounding you into bankruptcy,...

When brave Sir Biden rode south from Scranton toward the dark, fetid swamp of D.C., he was not afraid to die. No, based on his many, many tales of personal bravery, Joe was not at all afraid of being killed in nasty ways. Like being mashed to a pulp while driving a 16-wheeler, or getting knifed in the gut in the Puerto Rican neighborhood where he grew up, or having his brains beat out by racist police while bravely standing with a black family on their porch. Nor was Biden in the least concerned about being sliced to shreds by...

While Israel fights for its life, the Biden adminstration plays bureaucratic games. I always thought “ironclad” meant binding, but to President Biden it apparently means a pledge that’s good until it becomes politically inconvenient to stick to it. On at least two occasions he asserted his (and our) commitment to Israel’s defense was “ironclad”: “On July 18, 2023, seated beside Mr. Herzog. “And as I affirmed to Prime Minister [Benjamin] Netanyahu yesterday, America’s commitment to Israel is firm. And it is ironclad.” He reiterated this pledge last month: "As I told Prime Minister [Benjamin] Netanyahu, our commitment to Israel's security...

Michigan’s Governor Whitmer and the Democrat-controlled Legislature passed a slew of bills that make it easier to commit voter fraud and harder to uncover it. In the 2022 mid-term elections in Michigan, voters handed control of the Michigan Legislature to the Democrats, giving them a majority in both the Michigan House of Representatives and the Michigan Senate -- something that hasn’t happened for forty years. Since then, they’ve been working hand in glove with our notorious Democrat governor, Gretchen Whitmer SNIP In November of 2022, Michigan voters also passed Proposal 2, a proposal to amend the voting procedures previously authorized...

A coalition of 22 state attorneys general have sent a letter to Joe Biden voicing their opposition to the World Health Organization’s (WHO) proposed pandemic treaty and amendments to the International Health Regulations (IHR). Attorneys general from Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, and West Virginia, led by Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen, raised concerns that the proposed agreement threatens U.S. sovereignty by giving the WHO “unprecedented and unconstitutional powers over the people of the United States.” Critics say that the proposed “pandemic accord” and...

The signs are everywhere. The nation’s youth are waking up to the fact that the Democratic left – with its preening, humorless self-righteousness, its relentless judgmentalism, its mask-wearing Hamas-cheering campus-trashing college crybabies, its hypocritical pampered elites, and its octogenarian president who thinks he can buy young people off with abortions, dope, and bailouts – is totally uncool. It’s about time. Now we just need a national anti-smoking-like campaign to sustain it. There are so many recent moments showing this shift in attitude that it’s hard to narrow down the list. But here’s a sampling: - A CNN poll found that...

In its obsession with ‘getting Trump,’ it now stands in bright sunlight for all to see. As I’ve watched the political Uniparty and administrative Deep State conspire to destroy Donald Trump over the last eight years, a tinge of optimism has taken root inside me. Not only have his tormentors been unsuccessful, but also a growing share of the population see the attacks against him as un-American, vindictive, and dangerous. There is a heightened social awareness that D.C. is filled with corrupt people who operate the tentacles of government solely for their own benefit and enrichment. No matter how omnipotent...

As the progressive Elite grows in power, it has come increasingly to rejoice in its own shared consciousness and increasingly abhors showing any sort of consideration for the civic American tradition. The conservative media sphere was collectively stirred by the recent claim of Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, during oral arguments in Missouri vs. Biden, that restricting the government’s power to police social media for ‘misinformation’ -- the critical issue of the case -- would result in “The First Amendment hamstringing the government in significant ways.” Jackson continued, “I'm really worried about that because you've got the First Amendment operating in...

Several days ago, after the New York police broke up the kill-the-Jews occupations at Columbia, NYU and other universities, it emerged that close to half of the arrestees were not students or otherwise affiliated with the schools in question. At a news conference on April 30, Mayor Eric Adams adopted the term “professional outside agitators” to describe the main organizers of the protests (“What should have been a peaceful protest, it has basically been co-opted by professional outside agitators."). The protests certainly give an appearance of being well-organized and equally well funded. For example, large numbers of identical newly-ordered tents...

Commencement scrapped? Sure. But nobody messes with the festival of the fops put on by the devil who wears Prada. Pro-Hamas protestors have been feeling their oats lately, proud to have run circles around Columbia University for weeks with their illegal and smelly campouts, their antisemitic signs and screams, their building takeovers, their endless 'negotiations,' their adoring media coverage, and the groveling of their woke university leaders anxious to please them. This crap went on for weeks, with deadline after deadline missed, suspensions reversed, non-charges filed, food delivered, and other foofaraw until the cops were finally called in and tasked...

There was, if hazy memories recall correctly, a time when the Democratic Party was merely an alternative to the Republican Party and not a threat to the country. Those days are gone. Today’s Democrats are in the business of wracking, ruining and razing. The Biden administration, says former Hawaiian Democratic congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard, is “​​destroying the foundational, fundamental elements of our country and what it means to be an American.” Speaking recently to Dave Rubin of the Rubin Report, Gabbard noted that “we have seen now consistently throughout his entire administration over these last three and a half years, consistently...

“Ok, let’s be clear. If the intelligence community led by the CIA is not the “deep state,” what is?” — Jeffrey Tucker. You realize, don’t you, that the gross misconduct of government officials from RussiaGate on down to the courtroom of Judge Juan Merchan has amounted to one continuous operation against the American people? If it were ever honestly adjudicated, many hundreds of them might go to prison, or worse. Each successive seditious and treasonous action they attempt against their arch-nemesis, Mr. Trump, only compounds their criminal liability — the Steele Dossier, CIA agent Eric Ciaramella’s 2019 impeachment prank, the...

The solar project is destroying the Joshua trees…to save the Joshua Trees from “climate change.” There are a lot of essential lessons real environmentalists can learn from this post. I have offered post after post proving that the Earth’s climate has continually changed. Any temperature rise observed from reliable temperature stations is likely cyclic and part of the world’s warming after an intense period of glaciation. I have noted repeatedly that carbon dioxide is a life-essential gas in trace amounts, and data shows it has no significant role in global warming. I have highlighted that fossil fuels and nuclear energy...

Americans shocked at the aggressive protests on our most elite campuses often imagine these kids have become brainwashed while away at school. That indoctrination certainly does take place. Yet the process for most starts far earlier, often in the K-12 years — or even before. What we’re seeing on our campuses is the culmination of many years of leftist activists pushing kids to the forefront to spread their propaganda. And it’s not remotely just board books like “A is for Activist” that introduce toddlers to the idea of protest before they even set foot in school. Teachers push their agenda;...