We at CFIF have consistently highlighted the peril of federal, state and local government efforts targeting…
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New Study Shows How Overregulating Short-Term Lenders Harms Consumers

We at CFIF have consistently highlighted the peril of federal, state and local government efforts targeting the short-term consumer lending sector.

Less than two years ago, we specifically sounded the alarm on a New Mexico law artificially restricting interest rates on short-term consumer loans.

Well, a new study entitled "A New Mexico Consumer Survey:  Understanding the Impact of the 2023 Rate Cap on Consumers" that surveyed actual borrowers confirms our earlier warnings:

Key findings include:

•Short-term,small-dollar loans help borrowers manage their financial situations, irrespective of the borrower’s income.

•The rate cap has failed to improve the financial wellbeing of New Mexicans, specifically those who had previously relied on short-term, small-dollar loans.

•…[more]

November 27, 2023 • 03:57 PM

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Foreign Policy
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31 Biden Should Make China Pay

President Joe Biden heads to Europe Wednesday to meet with European leaders. He says the goal is to work together to "deliver real results" on critical issues, like climate change and cybersecurity. Biden is ducking the most important issue – the cause of the pandemic. He should be marshaling allies to act in unison by squeezing…

32 What Does Putin Have on Biden?

Only a few months ago, the Biden administration argued that Nord Stream 2, a proposed natural-gas pipeline running from Russia to Germany, was "a bad deal" that "exposes Ukraine and Central Europe." White House press secretary Jen Psaki had noted at the time that any new pipeline carrying the fossil fuel on the continent "goes…

33 Bob Dylan’s “Neighborhood Bully” – an Underappreciated, Timely Pro-Israel Masterpiece

I’m just old enough to remember Ronald Reagan’s election, and the earliest days of his administration.   Among those early memories, which returned to the fore this week amid renewed conflict between Israel and Hamas, is Israel’s daring June 7, 1981 attack on Saddam Hussein’s nuclear reactor using American-made F-…

34 Why Does the Left Seemingly Hate Israel?

With more than 3,000 rockets having been fired into Israel by Hamas recently, the Democratic Party seems paralyzed over how to respond to the latest Middle East war. It is not just that they fear that "The Squad," Black Lives Matter, the shock troops of antifa, and woke institutions such as academia and the media are now unapologetically…

35 How to Start a War

Wars often arise from uncertainty. When strong countries appear weak, truly weaker ones take risks they otherwise would not. Sloppy braggadocio and serial promises of restraint can trigger wars, too. Empty tough talk can needlessly egg on aggressors. But mouthing utopian bromides convinces bullies that their targets are too sophisticated to counter…

36 China Continues to Show Its Contempt for the U.S.

Last week in Anchorage, Alaska, Chinese diplomats dressed down Secretary of State Antony Blinken and national security adviser Jake Sullivan. Both seem stunned by the broadsides. Not since newly elected President John Kennedy was humiliated at the Vienna summit in June 1961 by USSR strongman Nikita Khrushchev have American diplomats been so roughly…

37 Goodbye to 'Peace Through Strength'?

President-elect Joe Biden named his national security team last week. Antony Blinken will be nominated for secretary of state; Jake Sullivan for national security adviser; Avril Haines for director of national intelligence; and Alejandro Mayorkas for secretary of homeland security. All but Sullivan will require Senate confirmation. How that goes depends…

38 CFIF Urges Trump Admin to Protect Assets and Operations in Venezuela By Renewing General Licenses Waiving Sanctions

October 28, 2020   The Honorable Donald Trump Office of the President of the United States The White House 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue Washington, D.C. 20006  Re:  Renewal of U.S. Business Licenses to Protect Assets and Operations in Venezuela  Dear Mr. President:   Over the past four years, your administration…

39 Why Trump's Mideast Peace Deals Matter

After Israel's resounding victory over the Egyptian, Jordanian and Syrian armies in 1967, the Jewish state again offered the Arab world peace in exchange for recognition. And it was again rebuffed. Instead, the Arab League convened in Khartoum to formulate a consensus response that became known as "The 3 Noes" – no recognition…

40 Greek-Turkish Rivalry Again Near the Boiling Point

Almost daily, Greek and Turkish aircraft and ships fight mock battles over disputed oil and gas rights in the eastern Mediterranean. Since the loss of much of the Christian Balkans to the Ottomans in the 15th century, Greece and what would later become modern Turkey have been rivals, outright enemies and often at war. Mutual NATO membership and shared…

41 History Keeps Proving John Kerry Wrong

It took approximately 20 seconds for former Secretary of State John Kerry to drop the first flagrant lie in his Democratic National Convention speech on Tuesday, when he claimed that the Obama administration's so-called Iran deal had "eliminated the threat of an Iran with a nuclear weapon." It didn't get any better from there. Kerry knows…

42 A Sort-Of Goodbye to Germany?

President Trump recently ordered a 12,000-troop reduction in American military personnel stationed in Germany. That leaves about 24,000 American soldiers still in the country. A little more than half of the troops being withdrawn will return home. The rest will be redeployed to other NATO member nations such as Belgium, Italy, and perhaps Baltic and…

43 Pandemic Is But One of America's Security Concerns

The world was a dangerous place before – and will be after – the coronavirus pandemic. While Americans debate the proper ongoing response to the virus and argue over the infection's origins, nature and trajectory, they may have tuned out other, often just as scary, news. Many Americans are irate at China for its dishonest and…

44 The United Nations Once Again Proves Its Anti-Semitism

The depraved totalitarians, nefarious barbarians, two-bit gangsters, odious scoundrels and bigoted scum who run the United Nations recently set up a new "database" to help anti-Semites around the world target Jewish businesses in the disputed territories of Judea and Samaria – businesses that not only offer economic opportunities…

45 Is Trump's Unorthodoxy Becoming Orthodox?

When candidate Donald Trump campaigned on calling China to account for its trade piracy, observers thought he was either crazy or dangerous. Conventional Washington wisdom had assumed that an ascendant Beijing was almost preordained to world hegemony. Trump's tariffs and polarization of China were considered about the worst thing an American president…

46 The Israeli-Palestinian Peace Plan Is a Much-Needed Dose of Reality

It's unlikely that Donald Trump's new Israeli-Palestinian peace plan will succeed. Yet, it's the best of any recent offerings because it dispels poisonous fictions that have held back negotiations for decades. The reality is that there will never be a Palestinian "right of return" to Israel, since such a policy would destroy the Jewish character…

47 The Israel-U.S. Model Has Been a Resounding Success

Whether by accident or by deliberate osmosis, Israel and the U.S. have adopted similar solutions to their existential problems. Before 2002, during the various Palestinian intifadas, Israel suffered hundreds of deaths and thousands of injuries from suicide bombers freely crossing from the West Bank and Gaza into Israel. In response, Israel planned…

48 Iran's Options in Showdown With America Are All Bad

After losing its top strategist, military commander and arch-terrorist, Qassem Suleimani, the Iranian theocracy is weighing responses. One, Iran can quiet down and cease military provocations. After attacking tankers off its coast, destroying an oil refinery in Saudi Arabia, shooting down a U.S. drone and being responsible for the killing and wounding…

49 Don't Impeach Trump. He Puts America, Not Ukraine, First.

Democrats are trying to impeach President Donald Trump for holding up military aid to Ukraine after Congress voted to provide it. Trump put a hold on the aid on July 18, and it wasn't released until Sept. 11. What the Dems and the media are not telling you is that Trump also delayed aid to Pakistan, Gaza, three central American countries and 10 aid…

50 Untenable Alliance Is No Turkish Delight

There are about 5,000 members of the U.S. military, mostly airmen, stationed at the huge, strategically located air base in Incirlik, Turkey, northwest of the Syrian border. The American forces at Incirlik are also the custodians of about 50 B61 nuclear bombs. Data on these weapons is classified, but at their maximum yield each is 10 times more powerful…

51 Hey, Congress: Take Back Your War Powers

If you want to stop Donald Trump from making unilateral decisions regarding war and peace, then stop letting all presidents make unilateral decisions about war and peace. It's really quite simple. Trump can abruptly pull back U.S. troops from northern Syria because Congress, having abdicated its foreign policy responsibilities long ago, has no leverage…

52 Pope Calls Out Foreign Aid Farce

Year after year, Congress votes to spend tens of billions of dollars on foreign aid. It's money down a rat hole. Congress should take a page from Pope Francis. On Friday, Pope Francis blamed foreign aid for corruption and destitution in Mozambique, a sub-Saharan country where he was preaching to thousands in an outdoor arena. Despite the country's…

53 China's Chemical Warfare

President Donald Trump got slammed by all sides — Democrats, the media and European politicians — for suddenly escalating economic war with China on Friday. But for Americans who have lost a family member or friend to the Chinese-made street drug fentanyl, Trump's harsh pivot is the right move. He hiked tariffs on Chinese goods…

54 A Bad Deal, 80 Years Ago

Some 80 years ago, on Aug. 23, 1939, Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union signed the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, formally known as the "Treaty of non-aggression between Germany and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics." The world was shocked — and terrified — by the agreement. Western democracies of the 1930s had counted…

55 U.S. Can Afford to Stay Calm With Iran

President Trump recently ordered and then called off a retaliatory strike against Iran for destroying a U.S. surveillance drone. The U.S. asserts that the drone was operating in international space. Iran claims it was in Iranian airspace. Antiwar critics of Trump's Jacksonian rhetoric turned on a dime to blast him as a weak, vacillating leader afraid…

56 U.S. Holds All the Cards in Showdown With Iran

In May 2018, the Donald Trump administration withdrew the United States from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action with Iran, popularly known as the Iran nuclear deal. The U.S. then ramped up sanctions on the Iranian theocracy to try to ensure that it stopped nuclear enrichment. The Trump administration also hoped a strapped Iran would become less…

57 Trump: The Diplomat-In-Chief

Critics call President Donald Trump a diplomatic wrecking ball, while his supporters admiringly watch him take on foreign policy challenges that previous presidents chose to ignore or left to diplomatic "experts." Who's right? This week, the rubber meets the road. Trump's highly personal approach to negotiating with foreign powers &…

58 Meanwhile, Trump Is Crushing Iran

This deserves to be front-page news.  Amid the constant headlines announcing the latest manifestation of a roaring U.S. economy, however, not to mention ceaseless media pearl-clutching over everything down to President Trump's morning breakfast selections, it hasn't received the attention and celebration that it merits.  Simply put, Trump…

59 In China, 'Free Trade' Means Steal What You Want

What can Democrat Chuck Schumer, Republican Marco Rubio and President Donald Trump agree on? Almost nothing, but they agree China is robbing America blind and has to be stopped. When the president slapped a punishing 25 percent tariff on $50 billion worth of Chinese goods starting July 6, his least likely GOP ally, Senator Marco Rubio, applauded the…

60 On North Korea, a President Who Tried Something Different

Reaction to President Trump's summit with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un has broken down along the usual Trump-anti-Trump divisions. The truth is, it will take a while before it's clear whether the summit achieved anything or not. But give the president credit for trying a new approach to an intractable problem. Trump had no electoral mandate…

 
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Notable Quote   
 
"The Biden administration has outpaced other recent presidents in issuing significant regulations that place a financial burden on taxpayers, according to a report from the Competitive Enterprise Institute.Under President Joe Biden, the federal government completed 89 economically significant rules in 2022, defined as those with at least a $100 million economic impact, which is higher than any point…[more]
 
 
— Will Kessler, Daily Caller News Foundation
 
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