This page has been archived and commenting is disabled.
War Is The Health Of The State - Protecting Yourself From "Financial Tyranny"
Submitted by Claudio Grass via Acting-Man.com,
The Misfortune of Being Born Into a State
In an essay titled “The State”, Randolph Bourne, an American writer, made a distinction between a country and a state that I find crucial. He described one’s country as “an inescapable group into which we are born”. In his view, a country is “a concept of peace, tolerance, of living and letting live. But the State is essentially a concept of power, of competition; it signifies a group in its aggressive aspects. And we have the misfortune of being born not only into a country but into a State, and as we grow up we learn to mingle the two feelings into a hopeless confusion”.
Randolph Silliman Bourne: a lifelong enemy of the State and war. His great unfinished work “The State” was discovered after his death. Bourne’s odd physical appearance owed to tuberculosis of the spine, which he suffered in childhood. Jeffrey Riggenbach has published a great paean on the brilliance of Randolph Bourne at the Mises Institute.
Bourne continues to say:
“It cannot be too firmly realized that war is a function of States and not of nations. Indeed, that it is the chief function of States. War is a very artificial thing. It is not the naïve spontaneous outburst of herd pugnacity; it is no more primary than is formal religion. War cannot exist without a military establishment, and a military establishment cannot exist without a State organization. War has an immemorial tradition and heredity only because the State has a long tradition and heredity. But they are inseparably and functionally joined. We cannot crusade against war without crusading implicitly against the State. And we cannot expect, or take measures to ensure that this war is a war to end war, unless at the same time we take measures to end the State in its traditional form.”
Ludwig von Mises came to a similar conclusion, when he stated:
“As tax-funded monopolists of ultimate decision making, states can externalize the costs associated with aggressive behavior onto hapless taxpayers. Hence, states are by nature more prone to become aggressors and warmongers than agents or agencies that must themselves bear the costs involved in aggression and war.”
So, is there any truth to what Bourne and Mises believed? Is it applicable to today’s world? The short answer is: Yes. I would like to take the opportunity to explain why I am convinced that war and the State are inseparable, even today. I would like to draw your attention to some historical facts, since I believe that it is essential to understand history in order to understand the present.
Ludwig von Mises, probably the greatest economist of the 20th century. Mises was not an anarchist, but he was highly critical of the “force monopolist” government and harbored no illusions about it. His incisive analyses of government and bureaucracy are highly recommended reading.
Sutton’s Analysis of US Military Aid to Russia
Professor Anthony C. Sutton, a professor of history, economics and politics, who was born 1925 in London and taught at the Universities of London, Göttingen and California, had a huge impact on my beliefs. In 1962, he became a US citizen and worked as a research fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution from 1968 to 1973. In 1973, he published his first book “National Suicide – Military Aid to the Soviet Union”, in which he found that the Soviet Union received approximately 90% of its technology directly from the West, with the particular support of the US government and large US multinational companies. At the time, Sutton still believed in an open society and thought that these deals originated because of the ignorance, mental laziness and the incapability of an open society to understand the long-term implications of a totalitarian system. However, he never thought that a certain agenda by the US establishment stood behind the “military aid”.
British and American (he was born in London, but held both nationalities) economist and historian Anthony Cyril Sutton. Sutton has left us with a number of highly interesting books about the decisive events shaping the 20th century.
In 1974, Sutton published another book titled “Wall Street and the Bolshevik Revolution”, in which he wrote about the financial support that the Russian October Revolution of 1917 got from Wall Street. He exposes the “relief payments” the Russian revolutionaries received, as well as the trade with Russian gold for financing the Bolsheviks. The USA even supported revolutionary propaganda and employed pro-communist writers.
In summary: According to Sutton, major players in both the US economy and US government supported the communist revolution in Russia. Sutton believed that there were two reasons for the US support of the Bolsheviks. First, they believed that providing technology to Russia would reduce the technological development of the country and thus would minimize future competition from Russia. Second and more important, according to Sutton, was the fact that foreign companies were given access to the Russian market with quasi monopolies as long as they complied with the wishes of the Bolsheviks.
Lenin addresses a crowd in St. Petersburg shortly after his return to Russia from exile in Switzerland. It is surprising how much help the Bolsheviks received from the seemingly most unlikely sources. Germany’s Kaiser showered them with money because they promised they would end Russia’s participation in the war. Wall Street magnates decided that it would be advantageous if the Bolsheviks received a finacial shot in the arm from the citadel of capitalism as well. Apparently they had not listened when Lenin remarked that the capitalists would sell him the rope he would hang them with.
Sutton wrote several other noteworthy books including “Wall Street and the Rise of Hitler” (1976), were he describes the intricate relationship between Wall Street and the Nazi regime. He believed that without financing from Wall Street, the German war machine would not have been able to sustain itself.
Government Lies and their Cost
This leads me to another point: Most people don’t question what their government does, especially when it comes to foreign policy. This gives power-hungry politicians the opportunity to lie to the public, so that people willingly accept a war in a foreign country. A recent example is the Iraq war, where the public was led to believe that Saddam was hiding weapons of mass destruction and was an imminent threat to the United States. After the invasion, however, it turned out that Iraq had no WMDs and the threat was exaggerated to gain public support for the war.
Another example. We all know that the CIA and other intelligence services have been involved in questionable activities for ages. My initial motivation for this article was a video with the title “The War Against The Third World” describing America’s foreign interventionism and the expansion of the military-industrial complex. The video shows a speech by John Stockwell, a former Marine and CIA paramilitary intelligence case officer. The video has several different aspects, but I will only mention a few. One of the most shocking excerpts was the section where Stockwell talks about the Church Committee investigation:
“Senator Church said that in the 14 years before he did his investigation he found that they had run 900 major operations and 3000 minor operations. And if you extrapolate that over the whole period of the 40 odd years that we’ve had a CIA, you come up with 3000 major operations and over 10,000 minor operations. Every one of them illegal. Every one of them disruptive of the lives and societies of other peoples and many of them bloody and gory beyond comprehension, almost.”
Church committee hearing in 1974 on the CIA’s activities.
Another important aspect is how Nixon and Kissinger “secretly” bombed neutral Cambodia for 14 months in 1969, unleashing 110,000 tons of bombs on the country. The irony of this story is that Kissinger actually received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1973 for his “honorable” actions to resolve the Vietnam War. Such covert action was easier in the past, because the government controlled radio, TV and newspapers. As we will show later, this is becoming increasingly difficult, due to the fact the Internet has become an independent news source for many.
A late 1974 newspaper headline (New York Times) on the CIA’s operations against anti-war activists and other political dissidents
Are the Elites Implementing a “Divide and Conquer” Strategy?
“Divide and Conquer” is one of the oldest strategies used by the ruling powers. The focus of this strategy is to turn people against each other so that they don’t turn against the establishment itself. This division can take on different forms, such as dividing by race, religion, nationality, poor vs. rich or East vs. West.
When I look at the world today and see what is happening, it is obvious that racism is accelerating and tensions between Christians, Jews and Muslims are increasing tremendously. Europe is currently being flooded with a wave of refugees from the Middle East and Africa who have nothing to lose. I remember the conversations I had while living in the Middle East for two years.
A bust of Philipp II of Macedon, whom the strategy of “divide et impera” is ascribed to. It was later successfully implemented by the Roman Empire and has been a staple of politics ever since. How do you rule over people? Divide them, and make them fight among themselves.
Back in 2004 the overwhelming majority of the people I spoke to in Syria thought that Europe was a kind of “Promised Land”. They believed that they would live a picturesque life, similar to what they see on TV, if they only made it to Europe. Now their dream has been destroyed within seconds. The “Promised Land” turned out to be nothing more than a mirage. They are ending up in refugee camps and the majority will not even be allowed to work.
With no way of working or supporting their families, I am confident they will become vulnerable to radical ideas they hear in some mosques from extremist Wahabis and Salafists. Therefore I am certain that the situation can and will lead to social tensions. Additionally, the European welfare state is essentially broke and unsustainable.
When we take the economic weakness into consideration it becomes clear that most refugees will not find the “European Dream” they were looking for. Ironically, most of the refugees currently fleeing war or oppressive regimes are fleeing situations which Western governments have created or at least endorsed in the first place.
Refugees arriving on Italy’s shores
Ever Expanding State Power at Home
All this meddling in foreign affairs does not only impact foreign countries, but also affects domestic policies. War is often used by the State to further restrict individual liberties and increase the power of the police apparatus. In the essay we mentioned earlier, Randolph Bourne summed up the impact of war on domestic policy as follows:
“With the shock of war the state comes into its own again. It is the reason given for high taxes, internal revenue bureaucracies, pervasive spying, censorship, military conscription, the abolition of civil liberties, heavy debt, an explosive growth of government spending and borrowing, extensive excise taxation, nationalization of industries, socialist central planning, massive public indoctrination campaigns, the punishment and imprisonment of dissenters to the state’s rule, the shooting of deserters from its armies, the conquest of other countries, inflation of the currency, demonization of private enterprise and the civil society for being insufficiently “patriotic”, the growth of the military/industrial complex, a vast expansion of government pork barrel spending, the demonization of the ideas of freedom and individualism and those who espouse them, and a never-ending celebration, if not deification, of statism and militarism.”
Additionally, today terrorism is increasingly being used to increase the government’s powers at home. According to John Whitehead from the Rutherford Institute, North Dakota has become the first state to make it legal for the police to fly drones equipped with everything from rubber bullets to pepper spray to tear gas, sound cannons and tasers. He expects 30,000 drones to be airborne in American airspace by 2020.
I would like to mention a statement by Prof. Carroll Quigley in his book “Weapons Systems and Political Stability”. He claims that as weapons become more sophisticated and professional, the government employing them becomes more totalitarian.
America’s increasingly militarized police forces have a new toy – and soon it will be armed.
How can you Protect Yourself in such an Environment?
I am confident that physical Gold and Silver can protect you to a certain extent from government tyranny. Let me start by explaining the reason why I work in the gold business. First, I am confident that with a monetary system based on free banking, the system of today could not possibly exist. This is because most people would not carry out transactions in a fragile and debt based currency. Second, I learned from history that gold is money – everything else is credit!
Gold has been money for over 5000 years. On the other hand, our current monetary system has been in place for only slightly over 40 years. I believe economic prosperity is not possible when the money that we use can be created out of thin air. Since 2008, global debt has increased from 140 trillion to 200 trillion dollars. Our economy is in shambles and the newly created money goes to the state and its allies, generally bypassing the real economy. I don’t think that we will ever see a real recovery until we return to a system of sound money. We have to choose between freedom or slavery. Only with free markets and the potential of individual minds as a source of inspiration can we build the basis for a free society.
An ancient Anglo-Saxon gold coin, depicting Coenwulf, King of Mercia (796-821).
Our current monetary system is the root cause of many evils of today. Let’s take war, a topic we discussed in this article, as an example. Without a monetary system that creates currency out of thin air, most of the wars that we have had and still have would simply not be financeable. This system is controlled by a few, who change the rules to their own benefit. And as we have seen they use their privileges to finance wars and to bribe politicians.
By holding your wealth in precious metals you are rejecting the current system and also protecting yourself from “financial tyranny”. This includes: capital controls, expropriation, bail-ins, bailouts, negative interest rates, market manipulation on a wide scale and massive paper currency fluctuations. The jurisdiction where you keep your precious metals is also essential in my view. I personally feel safe having my metals stored in Switzerland, a neutral country that doesn’t intervene in international affairs.
The Internet is the Light at the End of the Tunnel
Although things don’t look very positive at the moment, I’m convinced that sooner or later with the help of the Internet, people will start to understand the principles of freedom and appreciate what it means to be free. Broadcasting and distributing information that is accessible from all over the world and uncontrollable by the establishment is helping to spread better ideas. You probably wouldn’t be reading these lines if it weren’t for the Internet. The Internet is already making it increasingly difficult for governments to cover up their actions.
However, more importantly, the Internet will not only change the way we access information. It will also change the financial system. We are standing at a crossroads and I am convinced that the crypto currency movement will change the currency landscape in the foreseeable future. We will have different digital currencies, some of them are even based on gold. They will all compete freely on the market. Cash, checks, and other forms of “money” should gradually disappear. I am certain that taking away the government monopoly of money would lead to a safer world, as governments wouldn’t be able to print money out of thin air to finance their never ending wars.
Never forget that we always have a choice, even if the establishment is telling us otherwise. I personally choose voluntarism and a free market, what would your choice be?
* * *
This is an article reprinted from Global Gold’s Outlook Report (subscribe on www.globalgold.ch)
»
- 23589 reads
- Printer-friendly version
- Send to friend
- advertisements -
Fuck you yellen
An interesting thread on "Economic Totalitarianism":
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1049048.0
How do we escape?
Is that a fonestar stack you have there?
Too many words, pictures were ass.
Who is that Dr Loveless looking fuck at the top of the article?
obama's character.
As usual, these types of articles are filled with half truth and the other half is a bunch of mental masturbations of coniving minds with an agenda.
(yawn)
Your quip was the only bright spot. ;)
Infinite printing by the Fed ensures eternal war. Gold-backed currency limited your war making capability.
Note that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan will cost more than $6000 billion compared to $738 billion for the Vietnam war in 2011 dollars. The Vietnam war forced the US to go off the gold standard on August 15, 1971. America's current wars will decimate the dollar. But, at least, the droner-in-chief will still be the most admired man in this world in Gallup polls.
The decade-long American wars in Afghanistan and Iraq would end up costing as much as $6 trillion, the equivalent of $75,000 for every American household, calculates the prestigious Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government.
Crash JPM - Buy SIlver
^^^ There's never been a better war cry
;)
Coenwulf, King of Mercia (796-821)
Sounds like a German Jewish name. Nice coin.
I want the author to show me a 5000-year old gold coin that circulated as money.
He can't.
He could, however, find a picture of a 5000-year old derivative contract that circulated as money (Sumeria or 12th Dynasty forward in Egypt)... if he were intellectually honest.
LOL. And I'll bet that 5000 year old contract is pretty valuable too, although not for it's stated redeemable value in gold.
So I take it that you'd gladly part with an Anatolian stater for melt value? The Shang dynasty was even earlier, but that was Dr. Copper money, but perhaps the most enduring documented potential store wealth is actually a Paleolithic era siltstone dildo. Any object with an infinite shelf life can be an indefinite store of value.
Gold has no competition. Malable, divisible, non corrosive, no dry rot, easily exchangeable, recornizable, beautiful, easily stored, highest weight per volume, lowest volume per price. (bar printer ink and shafron) I can go on and on.
Of course gold has competition.
More importantly, when someone blindly parrots propaganda lies they expose that not only are they not an expert in the subject at hand, but they demonstrate that they are not even competent in the basic history and fundamentals of the subject. Why should such a person be trusted, much less with someone's hard earned savings or future?
When someone writes that gold has been money for 5000 years (or that Iran hasn't invaded any other country in 200 years) they expose that 1) they are ignorant of basic facts and 2) that the sum total of their knowledge and experience is the propaganda of only one side to an issue. They simply cannot be an expert in the subject they pretend competence in.
To actual experts and professional advocates of sound money (or peace in the Middle East)- not calling out these frauds for their propaganda and welcoming them into some "big tent" of opposition merely facilitates the establishment's job of discrediting the opposition.
However on ZH and in life as a whole people tend to naturally engage in a popularity contest and they easily bore with exploring the intricacies of reality.
And I gladly collect down-votes from my intellectual inferiors, as if it changes anything with regards to their inevitable subjugation by them.
No one brings down the man, the system, or whatheaveyou by ignorance of their enemy and the battlefield. One can succeed with imperfect knowledge and intelligence, but without competence the only victory they will ever achieve is in their own mind, or the minds of their cult followers.
That's right, and pigs can fly under the right circumstances.
I saw one fly once - horse kicked it.
ZH has told us – the Po-Po are Highwaymen.
Today’s Dilbert explains it best.
http://l3.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/ouzZJ9HqxC1IIjT53Axwyw--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld...
More gold bug nonsense. If you want to convert to PM fine, just do it, but stop infecting others with this false data. Or do you need to know that others are doing as you are to make you feel more confident?
Precious metals won't protect your wealth. Look at history! Gold is fiat too if its value is based on a fiat currency or if a government decides what its value is. How many times has this been said. Governments can regulate, tax or confiscate your gold and silver anytime they want to, and they will do so in a crisis. When their currency tanks, they are not going to let a sector of people turn out to be "winners" just because they hoarded gold. They will always maintain the power. They define what is legal tender. Whatever they accept as payment of taxes and as payment for products and services is what is legal tender.
In very bad times of deflation, no one will have money to buy your gold. They won't accept it for their products or services either because they'll want to trade for things that they can use, eat or drink. They won't be able to make change either.
Your only true security and wealth is your skills, abilities and knowledge that you can trade for needed products and services. Next to that in bad deflationary times the real money is food, water and energy.
Stupid ass goldbugs, always infecting people with their false, myopic BS that gold is the answer to a financial crisis. What about all the times in history when it wasn't?!
Obviously you need an education. .1 grams buys a loaf of bread TODAY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jt15F21jpN8
Everyone on Q99X2 knows that if you want to end war you have to end the war criminals providing the money for war.
Arrest Lloyd Blankfein for treason.
Gold will protect protect wealth over time - a $20 dollar gold coin from the last century will cost you $1200 today, a $20 dollar bill from the last century is worth $20 today (maybe a little collector value but gold coins can also carry significant collector value).
The Chosenites love chaos and war - always have, always will.
You obviously ignored what I just said and refuse to even consider it. Typical gold bug.
I'm not a bug, and speaking of investments, I'm diversified. Gold and silver can be very lucrative at the right time, so can real estate, stocks, bonds, and value added businesses.
Real estate is what put me in a postion to invest in the first place. My personal path has been historic properties in good locations (sweat equity). It allowed me to speculate on other things, such as silver in 2003 @spot $4.86 that I held until 2011 and sold @ spot $47. It just sat there and did nothing, until it did what I speculated it would. I'm buying again, both gold and silver. You do what you want.
"most of the wars that we have had and still have would simply not be financeable"
There really ought to be a limit to how historically ignorant one can assume one's readership to be.
The very first thing the colonial powers did with all of their acquired territories was forcibly impose peace by establishing their monopoly on violence, putting an end to the interminable wars that are endemic to all human populations (with casualty rates that would make the Red Army high command faint) everywhere. But how is that possible, given the indigenous populations did not have private debt-based fiat currency and banking!?!?!?!
More fact-free bullshit.
I don't completely follow your post.
What the author might be trying to say is that if the monetary base were backed by gold, it could not have been expanded by a factor of about 5 since 2008. That is about 26% per year compounded. The gold supply only increases by about 2% per year. Increasing the monetary base like the Fed has done has retired government debt by about $3 trillion (counting MBS purchases), since most of the interest the Fed receives gets sent back to the Treasury. Furthermore, increasing the monetary base supresses interest rates, saving the government even more money.
Without these savings he's claiming the US, among others, couldn't have afforded our foreign wars.
(edited)
Notice that gold coin above is STAMPED with law. It has the Kings stamp. It is not a blank coin, it is embossed with an image of Government.
If you go to the bank and take out a loan, you are creating credit money. When you spend that money, it increases money supply. If people are paying down their loans faster than they are making new loans, then money supply is under drain pressure….it is deflationary. Notice that spending this credit is going into the commons, and since others use it, it must have common law.
If people are hypothecating new loans faster than drain, and goods/services cannot keep up with demand, then new credit is inflationary.
Gold as money floats in money supply, and hence is not under any velocity pressure. Therefore, it likes to hide as savings. This then makes money supply contract, and goods/services providers are forced to sell their goods and wares for cheap.
Gold is shiny and doesn’t oxidize, and hence it can be stored and can wait-out providers of goods. Perishable goods go bad in time, with some goods like milk and eggs, and some grains going bad quickly. This means that holders of gold in a money system have a usurious advantage over producers. Gold holders just out wait producers and then extract their gains.
Non gold floating money can be created by law. This type of money would match goods and services so that it doesn’t take rents in unequal exchange relation.
If a sovereign issues sovereign treasury money debt free, then it floats in the money supply to become savings. Another 40 percent or so of the money supply should be sovereign credit, and this credit can be adjusted in interest rate, to then compete against anybody who would like to take gains on their fellows by hoarding money supply. Also credit of this type can be a drain knob to prevent inflation. And, credit of this type can be targeted into the commons, to then multiply productivity.
Gold cannot do the things needed for a modern economy. It cannot flex to the normal S shaped curve of most economies, because its volume is relatively fixed. Volume needs of a supply should be able to adjust as needed relative to goods and services production at full employment. It cannot be channeled easily into productive modes.
During post Bretton woods period up till 71, gold served pretty admirably as a medium for doing international trade. It was limited to a circulatory path related to international exchange ONLY. But, goods/services exchange between nations is only barter, and other means of marking barter can be employed to better effect, for example the bancor.
As I’ve pointed out here on ZH before, only a couple of times in history has metal money been made to work , the rest of the time it was deflationary, or was used to take rents. For example, east/west caravan routes run by Jews for thousands of years, took rents on populations with exchange rate games. (exchange rate between silver and gold.) This mechanism also passed to Portuguese, which is why they got rich so quick after Vasco de Gama discovered southern route. Credit as money was invented by the Gold-men. Private control of money power is the desire; this in order to take rents. They don't care if it is gold or credit, as long as they hold the money power. Usurious rent seeking gains are the goal, to then enrich a ruling oligarchy.
Did Portuguese suddenly become more productive upon secretly taking over east/west mechanism, or was their wealth really extractive? It was extractive.
All money is law. Money is not metal. Austrianism is junk economics.
Insisting money is metal is propaganda and hypnosis in action. Who funds mises crowd? Seems like they have deep pockets…hypnotism doesn’t come cheap.
Before stamping coins with the King’s imprint, metal by weight was issued. Metal was original issued by Temple Priests, they had a ready supply as gold jewelry was donated when people died. Gold could be found originally in alluvial plains, and it was fashioned into jewlery to be adorned by women.
Usually a chunk of metal was cut off by priests and then weighed. This was in barley weights as measured on balance scale, which is why coins are in “grains.” Barley was medium of exchange prior to metal by weight. In this case, temple priests decided exchange rates for labor, so ancient Mesopotamia metal by weight was already law. Temple priests were a type of government in those days as they decided when to plant crops, and who went to jail, etc.
www.sovereignmoney.eu
Provocative, make me think a little and want to actually surf for more data and info. Thanks.
A law limiting the expansion of the monetary base by the Fed, to say 3%/year, might do the trick, and if so would make a gold standard unnecessary. Then in the 2008 financial crisis, the banks couldn't have been bailed out, and they would have failed. The equity owners would have lost all their investment, and bondholders would have taken a big haircut. That;s what should have happened.
you're joking, right?
why should the fed, a private for-profit institution owned by large banking corporations, be given the power to control the money supply *at all*?
and how is this arbitrary figure of 3% increase per year going to solve anything? 3% per year is still exponential growth.
You're obviously a smart guy and know a lot of history. This is why gold has value:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EQyqvFVe4Y4
Following the discovery in the 16th century of large deposits of silver at the Cerro Rico in Potosi, Bolivia, an international silver standard came into existence in conjunction with the Spanish pieces of eight. These silver dollar coins played the role of an international trading currency for nearly four hundred years.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silver_standard
Imagine that. A stable monetary system for nearly 400 years.
However, in 1158, King Henry II introduced Tealby penny. English currency was almost exclusively silver until 1344, when the gold noble was put into circulation. However, silver remained the legal basis for sterling until 1816.
So that makes more than 600 years on a silver standard. Which fiat reserve currency even comes close?
The primary issue is not about money. The primary issue now is what it was some +230 years ago..
NO TAXATION WITHOUT REPRESENTATION.
By forcing prices higher, that is taxation without representation. Or by forcing prices lower in deflation, that is stealing from producers - a hidden tax.
If a money system has hidden rents, that then cause prices to be extractive for one class over another, how is that better than taxation?
Is it only better for our ruling betters, because they are sneaky and are pulling a fast one on the population? They then blow smoke screens with their ill gotten gains, to then add a shiny patina on their crime. They may even pretend they are victims, when in fact they are the victimizers.
Tax law can be done in advance and with high agreement amongst civilized peoples. That many taxes are bad, there is no question there. But, good taxes will tax away ill gotten rental gains.
Sneaky rents via the money system, to then enrich oligarchs, to then take over government is the actual mechanism of modern history. Austrian junk economics does nothing about rents, nor is it concerned that contracts between creditors and debtors are even handed. Austrianism is all about Creditor superiority in all relations, at all times, which is usury. Usury used to be considered a mortal sin, akin to murder. How far we modern humans have fallen.
So you're telling me that Austrianism is all about Creditor superiority in all relations, at all times? You're trying to tell me that a person with a gold coin, copper coin, available labor standing in line, would hold out to try to obtain the best deal possible with the producer? The person holding that gold coin, copper coin, or available labor is also a producer. Sounds like fair trade to me. I want a deal and the other trader wants a deal. Fair enough! What is this Austrianism is Junk nonsense? Have you even studied it?
Any object with an infinite shelf life can be an indefinite store of value.
If it is indefinately stored, how then can it be a medium of exchange?
During the great depression produce lay on the ground, rotting - because there was no money available to pay labor to harvest.
During the dark ages, Gold was consecrated to the vaults, and land was enclosed.
Austrian theory is simply dazzling in its brill...er, contradictions.
Good Point MEFO
Any of those Syrian refugees who had a few fractionals of gold could buy their way passage to freedom. It's basic human nature. Hisotrically, Jews, Cambodians, Chinese, Russians, etc have bought their freedom with a few pieces of gold to customs, soldiers, whomever to grant them passage. It's an international language, so-to-speak.
Who said money should actually be a store of value over indefinite time? Whether money is actually an asset is an interesting philosophical and semantic accounting debate.
I'm an engineer; not an economist but for the ingorance in me of the subject, please explain why the instrument of measure and exchange (Govt mandated US Fiat scrip - called our MOE) of every good and service in an economy should not be forced, under greatest penalty of law in the rule book, to remain constant? Oh, and the Constitution not be strictly enforced wrt Govt Deficit Spending which is the obvious similar subversive process?
My simple mind is doing cartwheels thinking how this type analysis might apply to physics and engineering and how the fuck would any engineer ever advance a theory, much less build a bridge or drill a well, were our units of measurement allowed to be so manipulated and variable as our US Scrip is.
TIA....
Wars are easier since the Federal Reserve finances them. And, ahem, he was Antony Sutton. The power to issue money is the power to destroy...
Well and then there are secret wars, secret armies, proxy armies, private military companies, private military armies, and the banking end.
- 1972, BCCI Bank created
- 1972, Watergate Scandal, with ties to CIA
- 1973, Family Jewels Reports commissioned about CIA
- 1974, CIA Slapped with Investigations of Practices, they decide to Outsource & Subcontract (Church Committee, Nedzi Committee, Pike Committee
- 1975, Rockefeller Commission to investigate CIA Activities within the USA
- BBC Timetravels Video, Operation Gladio, is in English and shows Interviews with Fascist and Nazis who were recruited to make up a Stay Behind Army, for NATO, to fight a possible Communist Invasion, and of course to add to the power and control of Right Wing Groups within the Military,... yeah the Italian Investigation came clean and apologized for Terror Attacks.
But as they say that is not the whole story.
Financing is done with bankers on the sly, sometimes it is done this way, sometimes that way, the trick is to use front companies and brow beat real government officials and managers so they always claim the high ground, innocence, and highest values.
SECTION 7
-
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS
THE NATURE OF WAR War is not, as is widely assumed, primarily an instrument of policy utilized by nations to extend or defend their expressed political values or their economic interests. On the contrary, it is itself the principal basis of organization on which all all modern societies are constructed. The common proximate cause of war is the apparent interference of one nation with the aspirations of another. But at the root of all ostensible differences of national interest lie the dynamic requirements of the war system itself for periodic armed conflict. Readiness for war characterizes contemporary social systems more broadly than their economic and political structures, which it subsumes.
Report from Iron Mountain, I guess.
Can't copy and post. Pain in the ass.
The power to issue money is the power to destroy...
Banks issue money upon loan hypothecations. Banks are the money factory, and they issue money with a profit motive.
The Federal Reserve is a creation of the banks. They wanted FED to help them keep their balance sheets "in balance."
The so called money printing by FED in QE is actually double entry mechanics. The double entry ledger is swapping TBills for newly created keyboard money. In effect, they are unprinting TBills, not making new money.
New credit comes with a new debt instrument. In the case of QE, it is existing debt instruments being swapped. Banks system is primary, while FED is an adjunct.
During Greenback era, the Treasury NEVER created more money than was allowed by law.
Governments allowed themselves to be usurped by private bankers, in a back scratching relationship. But, creditor is usually always over debtor, therfore money power actually controls government.
"In effect, they are unprinting TBills, not making new money."
They're doing both, the monetary base is certainly money. Treasuries are a money substitute, but the longer the duration the less of a substitute they are. Isn't the average duration of Fed Treasuries about 7 years? See my previous reply.
MEFOBILLS this is very sophisticated sophistry that has been rebutted many times by others smarter than me. Please read the article at this link. A Greenback and or a social credit system is just a whole other way to use the money printing game and finance wars. Why do you think the US went off the gold standard during the Civil War? Or the UK and European countries during WWI? And again during the crisis years of the 30s and 40s. Please dont tell me you came to this realization by reading the Web of Debt by Ellen Brown. I read that book and found it gravely lacking. Please provide sources for your in depth knowledge of the Great Depression. Crops did not sit in fields and die because there was no money to pay labor to harvest. There is a price for everything including the labor to harvest a field in a time of high unemployment. Crops sat in the fields at the direction of GOVERNMENT to fight deflation under some crazy idea that you could raise prices by willfully destroying supply. The US Govt still does this today, paying crony farmers not to farm.
http://www.garynorth.com/public/department141.cfm
Before I buy any gold or silver: I'd pay off all debt; invest in more skills and knowledge; store food, water, guns, ammo, fishing gear and survival equipment; buy a farmette with out-buildings and create a community so that you don't have to depend on government for water, food or energy; BEFORE I'd buy any gold and silver (which would still only be 10% of my asset allocation, since it is only good as insurance for the collapse of government, which isn't very likely in my lifetime). Gold/silver is low on the list of priorities if one wants to survive a major social or financial crisis.
CIA Technique: Recruit people that feel entitled, empowered, and the best educated. Then they feel unstoppable. They feel advantaged and smarter than most people. In fact the first peoples recruited by the CIA and the OSS were Ivy League, but only some of them proved to be great agents or managers.
Today, who knows. The CIA might like foreigners, people with natural language skills from their parents similarly to the US Army/US Army Intelligence.
But they always need bankers.
Probably the CIA, NSA, and other agencies focus on recruiting new bankers from the Ivy League.
https://www.cia.gov/careers/opportunities/analytical/economic-analyst.html
and since people logged into ZH might not want to click that link...
Economic Analyst ApplyWork Schedule: Full Time Salary: $50,864 – $99,296* Location: Washington, DC metropolitan area
*Higher starting salary possible depending on experience level.
The CIA's Directorate of Intelligence (DI) seeks economists to assess foreign economic, trade, and financial issues that affect US security interests. They work closely with political, leadership, and military analysts throughout the Intelligence Community to produce written intelligence papers and briefings for US policymakers and other US officials. Economists working in regional offices focus on the range of macroeconomic and microeconomic issues facing the country or region they cover, to include foreign policies or practices that are of potential concern to US national security. Economists working transnational issues take a broader, global approach to such matters and tend to delve more deeply into technical details, particularly in terms of macroeconomic stability and finance. Economic analysts may also assess illicit financial activities, including terrorist and criminal networks, money laundering, or foreign corruption. Economists with strong regional studies backgrounds and special expertise in the international trade or financial system, impact of sanctions or energy issues are of particular interest.
Agency analysts are encouraged to maintain and broaden professional ties through academic study, attendance at professional meetings, foreign travel, language training and analytic and management training.
Minimum requirements: A bachelor's or a master's degree in economics, finance, business administration, international management, or economic crimes management or a related area, with a strong concentration on international finance or international business. Candidates with a strong macroeconomic background, excellent financial analysis skills and analytical skills, and foreign area expertise will also be considered. Foreign language capability is desired. A minimum GPA of 3.0 on a 4-point scale is required. Competitive candidates typically will have higher GPAs, relevant experience, and strong verbal presentation and writing skills, including the demonstrated ability to write clear and concise text.
The following items must be attached to your online application:
All applicants must successfully complete a thorough medical and psychological exam, a polygraph interview and an extensive background investigation. US citizenship is required.
To be considered suitable for Agency employment, applicants must generally not have used illegal drugs within the last twelve months. The issue of illegal drug use prior to twelve months ago is carefully evaluated during the medical and security processing.
Important Notice: Friends, family, individuals, or organizations may be interested to learn that you are an applicant for or an employee of the CIA. Their interest, however, may not be benign or in your best interest. You cannot control whom they would tell. We therefore ask you to exercise discretion and good judgment in disclosing your interest in a position with the Agency. You will receive further guidance on this topic as you proceed through your CIA employment processing.
To Apply:
Make a note of the position(s) that interest you, as you can apply for up to four positions in one application. DO NOT submit multiple applications; this will only slow the review of your application, and delay processing. Please read the Application Instructions carefully before you begin the online application process.
Application Instructions
An equal opportunity employer and a drug-free work force.
ApplyPosted: Apr 21, 2007 05:38 PM
Last Updated: May 14, 2015 10:29 AM
And if a person was VERY HIGHLY qualified but not a US citizen or resident?
They go to work for a contractor like Booze Allen and get "subcontracted" back to the CIA (after an even lengthier clearance investigation).
Can't go wrong my Dad says with a decent supply of guns and gold.
[and some booze, coffee, and food to hold you secure during the seige]
Consider: If those Syrian refugees had been armed how easily would isis/cia/saudis been able to invade their homelands? Look at the Swiss; every adult male has an AR in his closet ready to defend. I don't remember anyone trying to invade Switzerland 'cause door-to-door fighting would cause the invading soldiers heavy casualties.
They're doing both, the monetary base is certainly money
The monetary base is government deficit spend. This is money created as credit but never redeemed.
The other monetary base is people going bankrupt.
Banks don't create the interest upon loan hypothecation, it has to come from somewhere else. It can either be exogenous to the money supply (coins can be created as seigniorage to money supply by treasury), or it an be deficit spend, or bankruptcy.
A lot of TBills have been swapped for dollars; the TBill ends up on Fed Balance sheet, and former holder of TBill now holds cash. It was a liquidity swap.
There isn't much of a transmission path for QE to put money into the economy, otherwise there would be roaring inflation. Former debt holders are typically banks, shadow banks, foreign banks, mutual funds.
Endogenous money created by private banks always returns to ledger for destruction. Fed supports endogenous money creation by private banks. Exogenous money is either debt free Treasury money, or deficit spend never redeemed. Monetary base used to be gold, which was dug out of the ground, hence it was exogenous.
Addendum:
It can get complex. For example, a TBill created and sold into secondary market would swap for existing "credit." A Tbill sold in primary market can find a new loan from a TBTF bank, and that loan is paid off out of reserve accounts. In this case there is a transmission path. Banksters do sneaky things as they are not really beholden to law, as the money itself is not really lawful, it is bank credit.
"The monetary base is government deficit spend. This is money created as credit but never redeemed."
True, but I tend to look at it as retired government debt. From John Hussman's June, 2012 annual report:
"A second approach is “monetization,” where the central bank creates currency and bank reserves in order to purchase and effectively retire government debt."
"Banks don't create the interest upon loan hypothecation, it has to come from somewhere else."
If banks spend the interest they receive as fast as they get it, there is no need for additional money to pay interest. That may not happen as a practical matter, however.
"There isn't much of a transmission path for QE to put money into the economy, otherwise there would be roaring inflation."
There is roaring asset inflation, look at the stock market, which has tripled since the Fed started QE. Around here home prices have doubled since the low, people have made millions piggybacking on the Fed supression of interest rates. Rents have also gone up substantially, partially supporting the asset appreciation.
"The other monetary base is people going bankrupt."
don't understand
"for QE to put money into the economy" -- whether one is talking about the real economy or the financial economy is a critical distinction. The Federal Reserve clears over one quadrillion dollars per year in financial transactions. GDP may be an utterly flawed measure of real economic activity, but the velocity of money within the financial economy is orders of magnitude higher than in the real economy. In the real economy inflation is relatively contained, appreciation of housing is a localized phenomenon and broad inflation in food and healthcare is offset by deflation in wages, energy and technology. Of course if you look at inflation from the micro perspective of a wage earner in a locality with rising real estate, the little guy is triple fucked "for the common good".
repayment extinguishes credit money..........if one defaults on ones loan, the money never gets re-payed..........or extinguished...
A bank loan which is written-off... is extinguished in the money supply by the write-down against the bank's capital account.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luca_Pacioli
SoCal gives good examples in Stawk Mkt adn Housing of two actual transmission mechnaisms. Other transmission mechanisms are what created in my industry the Shale PONZI. The TBTF WS Banksters with their infinite access to free monies created Shale Portfolio Cos where the Banksters stacked the boards with their guys and hired out the C-Ste to give the faux facade of independence.
This same thing occured in Hollywood followed by Dot-Com. It is THE HOLLOWING OUT of America by the TBTF WS Banksters and it has destroyed the country and economy by killing the entreprenuer / small biz guy who can not participate in the PONZI as he has no access to the free infinite debt as well as the taxpayers and savers who ulitmately are left with the peices and financed it all thru financial repression, respectively.
We already have bitGold
Without a monetary system that creates currency out of thin air, most of the wars that we have had and still have would simply not be financeable. If you want to stop the war, stop Goldman Sachs. Arrest Lloyd Blankfein for treason. I don't think any nation out there will actually issue arrest warrants but they should. Maybe North Korea will. Also the State today is the Global Economic Interlinking Corporations and Organizations. It is a global state and it is here now.
Gang of Four - Capital (it fails us now) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-7y65DdAco
I'm all for stacking as a hedge. Go for it.
People like it and they want it, and therefore it is valuable.
But, gold as money is not scientific, and if mankind is to move forward, he has to NOT cherry pick history to make the case that Gold is a panacea. It is not.
On the eve of WW2 the Gold system collapsed as there was not enough gold to redeem all the credit.
During Civil War, Congressman Spaulding actually said, "lets stop lying to ourselves and pretend that there is enough Gold in the vaults to redeem the bank credit." Gold was always a false standard.
Paper gold receipts were fraud, today the gold market is fraud.
It did work ok for international trade as I've said above.
As long as people pretend that money is metal or it is credit, then lawful money will never come into play. The few times it did make an entrance, the bankers went beserk and put the world into war.
At one time in the U.S. Greenbacks were 60% of the money supply. They were so popular there was a greenbacker movment to make them a permanent inheritance to posterity. They lost. The power to create credit is truly an awesome power. The money power should be put in a box and surrounded by constitutional law.
Pretending that making money metal to then somewho be volume controlled is not the answer. What actually happens is that gold gets stored and it is depressionary.
"On the eve of WW2 the Gold system collapsed as there was not enough gold to redeem all the credit."
And this would be different how if we used silver or copper or anything else with an indefinite shelf life for money as you mentioned, or even better unlimited paper money. Congratulations you've discovered the flaw of fractional reserve banking. There is absolutely nothing in a greenback system which changes this dynamic.
"It did work ok for international trade as I've said above." Actually it didnt because it allowed the US to export our inflation to the rest of the world until of course we couldnt anymore because the world started demanding gold. It did allow for tremendous growth during the 1950s before the sytem collapsed but it was doomed because of uncontrolled money printing. Outlawing private ownership of gold is a direct affront of liberty and our rights as citizens and was the ultimate undoing of the Bretton Woods system, and allowed wealthy cronys to purchase gold in Europe to protect themselves which the American people were not allowed to do.
Be careful around people who tell you "gold is good" and "dollars are bad" therefore you should "give us YOUR dollars for OUR gold". All I can say is... hmmm.
Blasphemer, heretic, you speak of sacrilege. How dare you question the religion of gold bugs.
Funny how the bugs never think about the fact that if gold is the ultimate possession, then why are so many people selling it?
Im ok with people being heretical with any belief, questioning assumptions is a vital function in a free society, but MEFO is sophist. First get your facts straight then attack the assumptions. There is no such thing as a functioning inflationary monetary system, and I dont care wheter its bitcoins or greenbacks or social credit or FRNs.
"I personally feel safe having my metals stored in Switzerland, a neutral country that doesn’t intervene in international affairs."
Ill' beg you to update your database Sir. As far as I know, for personal knowledge, they are nothin more nothing less than the weiter of USA.
Forza e coraggio.
Tonin
You are right . Today, financial totalitarism reigns all over the world . Banks are too big to jail and can steal your money legally . Any government in the world can steal their citizens savings directly from their bank accounts as they did in Cyprus . At any moment of financial crisis, governments can suddenly decide, like Roosevelt, to deprive their citizens of their physical gold. In the post-1929 financial crisis, on April 5th, 1933, Roosevelt suddenly edicted the Citizens' Gold confiscation Act, still valid, and the Americans were obliged to give to the nearly bankrupt Federal State all the physical gold they owned ( it had suddenly become "illegal gold ") and received a paper certificate for it .
If you hide your physical gold from the banks ( banksters are the state's partners),at home or in the garden, beware of passers-by !
In France, the government became officially the banksters''partner in the1970s, allowing them to rob poor workers and employees of their salaries. The new law obliged ( and still obliges) all the employers to deposit their employees'salaries only on their bank accounts . Before 1970,, small salaries in France were given in cash to the workers and most of them did not have any bank accounts . Now, legally, you do not own your money any more when it is on a bank account . Now the banks own your salaries,, do what they want with your money, give it back to you when they choose to give it back and can even limit against your will what part of "your" money you can take back . With the felon law, you become the mere creditor of the bank (the new owner) and you lose your money like all the creditors if the bank is bankrupt. It is an organized robbery of the salaries.
Thus, you had better take your salaries back home as soon as they arrive in your bank accounts even if the banksters keep your salaries illegally in their banks, far from your wallets, at least for a few days. Buy immediately what you need for the month, pay everything in cash and use the rest ( however low) to buy some tools and areas of forest (for wood-stove heating) and farmland ( now very cheap ) with your frends and families to grow together your own vegetables and fruit at the weekends and even camping there together for free during summer holidays , and even feed your poultry for good eggs if you can. The times are going to be hard for unprepared families.
"Ludwig von Mises, probably the greatest economist of the 20th century."
Who really gives a shit?
Let's talk about the greatest palm-reader of the 20th century too, astrologer, phrenologist?
Snake oil is snake oil. Have another glass.
Mises makes me miss Ms. Cleo.
Conquer: To overcome by force; to rape, pillage and plunder; to brutally slaughter the opposition; to enslave.