Although Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) strongly disagrees with some of the Trump administration’s trade policies, he was quick to point out some areas of common ground in an interview with Reason on Wednesday, particularly with regards to the World Trade Organization.
“His intuition on some of these things is right,” Massie said.
“I do not like the fact that Congress is now subservient to the World Trade Organization. Everything that you purchase has a country of origin label on it … but we were told in Congress a few years ago that the World Trade Organization had ruled and we were going to have to remove country of origin labeling from beef and pork because it created a hardship for cattle and pigs that were coming from Canada and from Mexico.”
Although Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) strongly disagrees with some of the Trump administration’s trade policies, he was quick to point out some areas of common ground in an interview with Reason on Wednesday, particularly with regards to the World Trade Organization. “His intuition on some of these things is right,” Massie said. “I do not like the … Keep Reading
Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), a leading figure within the libertarian-leaning Freedom Caucus, will run for Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives next year, according to a letter he sent to colleagues on Thursday. “Should the American people entrust us with the majority again in the 116th Congress, I plan to run for Speaker of … Keep Reading
Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) strongly defended the Trump-Putin summit during a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Thursday, criticizing legislation that would undermine the President’s ability to negotiate with Russia. … Keep Reading
Neoconservative Senator John McCain (R-AZ), a nemesis of President Donald Trump, received boos at Turning Point USA’s High School Leadership Summit when his name was mentioned by Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) as an individual who derailed Trump’s Obamacare repeal efforts. “The reason we didn’t repeal is because we have six or seven Republican senators who … Keep Reading
In the wake of the Trump-Putin summit, Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) has announced in a Politico op-ed that he will be making his own trip to Russia in order to further improve its relations with the United States. “In just a few weeks, I will take my own trip to Russia in an attempt to … Keep Reading
During Barack Hussein Obama’s reign over America, the feds were told that patriotic Americans were the top terror threat while radical Islam was put on the backburner. Trump has reversed those policies, but Democrats in the House have not given up on the crusade to denigrate individuals who love America. Rep. Brad Schneider (D-IL) introduced … Keep Reading
Many individuals are up-in-arms after the Miami police decided to initiate a gun buyback that they are promoting on Facebook. The social media corporation refuses to take down the video after it has been reported numerous times, which gun rights advocates claim is blatant hypocrisy. “Our ongoing gun buyback program gives citizens the opportunity to … Keep Reading
Referencing immigration, Attorney General Jeff Sessions came out strongly against the idea of states’ rights. He inferred that the states have no recourse but to submit to federal law. “There is no nullification. There is no secession. Federal law is “the supreme law of the land.” I would invite any doubters to Gettysburg, and to … Keep Reading
President Donald Trump’s recently announcement that he was going to levy tariffs on foreign aluminum and steel has challenged the “free trade” consensus pushed by globalists throughout the world. The European Union has been particularly harsh in its criticisms toward the U.S. President. These criticisms, as pointed out by Brexit engineer and former UKIP leader … Keep Reading
Today’s big announcement from the Trump administration was a shake-up in the state department. Former CIA director Mike Pompeo replaced Rex Tillerson as Secretary of State, but a smaller change in the state department may have broader ramifications for the refugee resettlement program. Andrew Veprek was recently appointed to be Deputy Asst. Secretary of State … Keep Reading
President Trump announced on Twitter Tuesday that he dumped his secretary of state, Rex Tillerson, and replaced him with CIA Director Mike Pompeo. “Mike Pompeo, Director of the CIA, will become our new Secretary of State. He will do a fantastic job! Thank you to Rex Tillerson for his service! Gina Haspel will become the … Keep Reading
As cryptocurrencies have taken off, the corporate media has attacked the concept on a wide variety of grounds from practicality to environmental concerns. John Oliver of HBO recently took pot shots at Bitcoin during his weekly comedy show, hoping to influence his young audience into rejecting the developing technology. On his show, Oliver compared Bitcoin … Keep Reading
Leftist-anarchists in the US, apparently displeased with mainstream liberal Russia conspiracies, have decided to aid the western intelligence agencies by concocting an even more outrageous ‘Russian plot.’ On Friday, the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), the liberal go-to non-profit for “tracking hate groups,” published a piece by red and black anarchist author and geography lecturer … Keep Reading
As social media corporations become more hostile toward free speech, calls are increasing for regulation to be imposed on those companies forcing them to curtail their policies of Orwellian censorship. The founder of the World Wide Web has come out in favor of such reform. “What was once a rich selection of blogs and websites … Keep Reading
President Trump ought to have a establishment challenger in 2020 who believes in free trade, limited government and economic freedom, stated disgraced and outgoing Republican Sen. Jeff Flake. “I do,” Flake of Arizona responded Sunday when asked if Trump needs an opponent from the establishment. “It would be a tough go in a Republican primary. The … Keep Reading
Former Trump administration adviser Steve Bannon informed members of France’s far-right political get together Saturday that “the tide of history is with us, and it will compel us to victory after victory after victory.” Bannon — who was once President Trump’s chief political strategist — made the remarks at the anti-immigrant National Front congress in … Keep Reading
Raucous cheers of “USA, USA, USA,” flowed through the crowds at President Donald Trump’s Saturday-night rally to support Republican congressional candidate Rick Saccone in Moon Township, Pennsylvania. The speech was quintessentially populist, or rather, “Trumpian,” free flowing, direct, braggadocious, and sometimes quite humorous. Trump then took time to critique a recent piece by Peggy Noonan which ridiculed his demeanor and deemed it as not “presidential.” Trump mocked Noonan’s concept of what it means to be presidential. The enthralled crowd chuckled as Trump imitated a stiff, tight-lipped, rank-and-file politician. Noonan, Trump added, “is writing like I’m some kind of Neanderthal.”
Retail investors are in love with dividends more than they should be with significant fan followings and discussion forums online dedicated to the worship of dividend stocks. Clearly, dividends are seen as important because public companies love to brag about how consistent their dividend payments have been and how much they’ve raised them. Dividends are beloved because they give investors the allure of safety. Retail investors feel that a dividend payment is secure which means the investment is secure. However, in the financial crisis, dividend stocks fell about the same amount as the S&P 500. To be clear, dividend payments…
The Fed funds rate is a hotly debated topic because it’s the main policy tool the Fed uses. There is economic data which can be interpreted to support every argument. Furthermore, after the metrics are taken into account, the goals are subject to interpretation. Just because the core inflation rate goes above 2%, doesn’t mean the Fed needs to hike rates, as we have previously discussed. The Fed could determine that its mandate of creating stable prices is hit when the core inflation is 3%, as an example. We’ve seen the Fed ignore the data in 2017 because it felt…
Marvel’s Black Panther is smashing box office records left and right, due in no small part to the mainstream media’s dogmatic marketing campaign, while triggering strong emotions left and right, if you catch my drift. There has been much talk of the politics of this movie and yet they cannot be overstated. Set in an “Afro-futurist” world unencumbered by white influence or oppression, but somehow light-years ahead of the Western world in technology and sophistication, the isolationist nation of Wakanda is led by King T’Challa, also known as the Black Panther. It exists beyond an invisible barrier or wall separating…
President Trump deserves applause for boosting the prospects for this county’s forgotten manufacturing workers, notably in steel and aluminum. Democrats lately have neglected these Americans. Hillary Clinton barely campaigned among them in Michigan in fall 2016, and she thoroughly ignored them in Wisconsin. Alas, Trump is doing this all wrong. He likely will hurt the very middle class that he has championed since his escalator ride onto the political stage. Trump aims to protect U.S. metal makers with new taxes of 25 percent on foreign steel and 10 percent on overseas aluminum. “Tariffs” is just a jumped-up word for taxes on…
President Donald Trump announced last week that he plans on slapping a 25 percent tariff on steel and a 10 percent tariff on aluminum. Everyone seemingly lost their minds in response. Republicans and Democrats, conservatives and liberals, and the mainstream media all had the same reaction: they universally opposed it. Where’s the other side to this story? The fact that no mainstream media outlet, politician, or think tank “economist” is willing to even mention the other side of the story will raise questions in every critical mind. Clearly the political and media establishment are all on-board for free trade. But…
In the financial media, it’s easy to see what the economists and analysts think about the current economy because usually they propose more of the same when asked about the future. It’s simple to extend the current trend indefinitely, but that’s not always a good idea, nor is it realistic. Even during economic expansions, there are mid-cycle slowdowns. While a slowdown doesn’t mean a bear market is coming for the overall market, it could mean a correction is coming in at least a few sectors. Therefore, it should affect how you allocate capital.
The purpose of this article is to objectively examine trade policy and its impact on the economy. While there will be discussion of government policy, our review is not negatively nor positively inclined towards any particular administration. During the presidential campaign trail, then Candidate Trump stated that he’d renegotiate trade deals to stop other countries from ripping America off. Following the election, for the first year of his presidency, it appeared there wouldn’t be any trade wars as promised. This belief existed because Trump met with Chinese President Xi Jinping last May in which he negotiated a deal to open…
One of the biggest generational differences which causes a disconnect between baby boomers and millennials is student debt. Many baby boomers are confused why college graduates don’t immediately move out of their parents’ house like baby boomers did. The issue is that once a student graduates, they become debtors. It’s a vicious cycle which turns compound returns against borrowers. For example, say you graduate with $40,000 in debt and you owe a 4% interest rate for 15 years. While the federal government expects the loans to be paid back in 10 years, it takes the average Wisconsin graduate 19.7 years…
Now that I have several children, I’m often in the company of other parents who talk about the way things “used to be.” When the issue of child safety comes up, I hear parents sadly shake their heads and say things like “it’s not like it was when we were kids … the world is so much more dangerous now.” Usually, the sentiment behind this idea is that there are more murders now than there used to be. Now, I’m not exactly known for being a Pollyanna, but I am willing to admit when things are not, in fact, getting…
Investors are trying to get a reading on where inflation will go in the next 12 months because it’s a key variable for forecasting asset prices and the Fed funds rate. As you can see from the chart below, the year over year core CPI will hit near 2.5% in late 2018 if the month over month increase is 0.16% in February and 0.19% going forward.
According to the usual news sources, Donald Trump’s new budget proposal “envisions steep cuts to America’s social safety net” and will “gut social programs.” Most of the cuts were proposed to pave the way for more Pentagon spending. In truth, Trump’s proposal doesn’t matter, and Congress will set to work piling on more deficit spending for both social programs and for the Pentagon. But, the debate of “gutting” social programs will no doubt be used to perpetuate, yet again, the myth that the United States is ruled by libertarian social Darwinists who ensure that no more than a few pennies are spent via…
We’re going to dedicate another article to re-discovering the relationship between the 10 year bond and the stock market. With bond yields skyrocketing in the 4th quarter of 2017 and the first 2 months of 2018, it’s more important now than ever to understand the relationship. The confusing aspect, which started during the correction in early February 2018, is that the financial media headlines blame yields going up for the stock market decline, but the yields and stocks often act in correlation. In a previous article, we discussed that historically when the 10 year bond yield gets to 5%, stocks…
Some analysts speculated if the Fed would try to keep rates low to support the government’s spending binge. However, instead of worrying about the debt, the $400 billion spending plan and the tax cuts are being used as an excuse to raise interest rates and let the government bonds on the Fed’s balance sheet expire. At a conference on February 27th, which was right after Powell’s first Congressional testimony, Yellen and Bernanke were asked about the biggest risk factor facing the economy. Bernanke said geopolitical events and Yellen worries about how the Fed balances growth versus inflation. While these are…
With the first stock market correction in over a year, having occurred in early February, there were many media narratives about what caused the selloff. We think it was driven by the unwind of the short VIX trade. Buying protection wasn’t considered important with the VIX at record lows in 2017. However, when nobody thinks there’s a need for protection, it’s probably a good idea to buy some especially since it’s cheap. Shorting the VIX is shorting protection. The stock market was like a car driving 80 miles per hour where the riders were betting against the need for air…
We’ve discussed the price to income ratio of housing in a previous article. This gave us an idea of how expensive housing has become. We’ll discuss some of best points why real estate is too expensive and then provide the counterpoint explaining why housing isn’t in a bubble.
American Conservative Union communications director Ian Walters, ACU chairman Matt Schlapp, and the ACU-sponsored Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) are being accused of racism due to Walters’ comments at last Friday’s Ronald Reagan dinner. These phony charges deserve rejection and scorn. I attended that banquet and watched Schlapp invite Walters to the stage for an unexpected honor — a sort of lifetime-achievement award that startled Walters and surprised the crowd. Visibly stunned, Walters observed that conservatives struggled to respond to Obama’s election in 2008. “That was a hill we got over,” Walters ad-libbed, “and it was something we were all…
With pressure on both the administration and congressional leaders to move forward with gun policy reforms, it was no surprise that Monday’s White House Press briefing received a myriad of questions regarding President Trump’s position on various gun policy proposal. President Trump has met with students and parents of Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School, state Governors, and NRA leader Wayne LaPierre to discuss the initiation of safer schools and communities. According to Press Secretary Sarah Sanders, the goal of the administration is to “protect the rights of law-abiding Americans, while keeping guns out of the hands of those who pose a…
It was a small solemn room in which many were seated with serious expressions. Around me sat clergy of many faiths, from Nuns to Coptics to Evangelicals. All gathered to hear a panel at the Faith and Freedom Coalition Conference in DC centered around on a little recognized epidemic. The daunting discussion was on the Human Sex Trafficking of young women, girls and boys across the United States and the world, paramount to a new sexual slave trade ensnaring millions. The stories shared brought shock or sadness to some and seething anger to others. A Coptic Orthodox Priest with a…
You might have had the privilege of taking a course on Friedrich Nietzsche or Martin Heidegger in the Philosophy Department here at Cal – or perhaps you had the good luck of studying H. P. Lovecraft or D. H. Lawrence in an English course. If you were lucky, you might have heard tell of Arthur Schopenhauer or Oswald Spengler’s influence on these writers and philosophers. Undoubtedly their politics came up in passing – and certainly you heard them dismissed as racist, nativist, sexist, and every other slur under the sun. But did your professor or graduate student instructor have you…
Believe me: I’d love to write a movie review of director Alex Garland’s brand-new sci-fi flick Annihilation where I could address its retro-futuristic score, kaleidoscopic graphics, and thought-provoking ideas – but instead of judging the film based on its artistic merits, I’m forced to take a skeptical look at its politics. Alex Garland had shown himself to be something of an ‘indie’ director with his debut film Ex Machina (2015), which was well-received by critics for its exploration of the subject of artificial intelligence. So I wasn’t expecting a radical departure from his independent cast of thought and an excessive…
In the wake of all mass shootings, the predictable exhortation from the conservative corner of our national discourse is to wait before injecting politics into the discussion. It’s out of respect for the dead, it’s an instinct to not use these tragic victims as political footballs. This isn’t a competition between dueling ideologies. The Left has no such qualms about instantly leaping to their emotionally charged conclusions and maybe they have a point. Maybe it’s more disrespectful to the victims to not politicize their untimely deaths. Maybe the most respectful thing we could do is to leap directly into action.…
Thanks to the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, Republicans are on a roll. So, why is President Donald Trump praising a gas-tax hike to finance his infrastructure plan? Despite House Democrat leader Nancy Pelosi’s complaints that the GOP tax-rate reductions are “Armageddon, “crumbs,” and — as of Tuesday — “unpatriotic,” Americans are growing fond of tax reform. Tax-relief promises helped boost GDP growth from 2016’s 1.5 percent (under Obama) to 2017’s 2.3 percent (under Trump). Unemployment is just 4.1 percent. And some 3.8 million Americans at 377 companies are enjoying bonuses, higher wages, lower power bills, and other post-tax-cut benefits. Survey Monkey has watched the tax cut’s popularity…
2017 may have been the worst year for homicide in Mexico since the government began keeping track in the 1990s. It’s a safe bet that the homicide rate isn’t coming anywhere near what it was in the years surrounding the revolution. But it may be the worst rate in several decades.
In what has become a grim routine, some sickeningly look to capitalize on the mass outpouring of anger and grief following mass shootings to push a political agenda – namely, the implementation of so-called “common-sense” gun control. Debates on the issue, much like the recent town-hall discussion hosted by CNN, regularly devolve into kangaroo courts where those who oppose “common-sense” reforms are interrogated, bullied, and demonized. “If you’re not with us, you’re with the child murderers,” is their slogan of choice.