2008 capitalism died: Money Scam, cornerstone of our slavery

[TonyGosling]

As I keep banging on in this thread - like an annoying interloper - is that when you have land, ie. a home and space to grow things and collect firewood etc. You are far far less reliant on money. To such an extent that banks would begin to collapse.

Money's power comes from our landlessness. If money is the cornerstone of our oppression then, to continue the analogy, land is the foundation.

The True Levellers Standard Advanced - Gerrard Winstanley - Digger - 1649

[acrobat74]

...so is ownership of the central banks 'beside the point'?.....that's like saying that who these people are and their aims and objectives are beside the point.

I see what you mean kbo, but please bear with me.

- Central banks are stewards of the overall system and are mainly preoccupied with controlling inflation. No matter what their ownership is, if it wasn’t for the fractional reserve banking system then commercial banks would not control finance, and hence subsistence, to the extent that they do today.

- The Bank of England is in public ownership nowadays; does that change the characteristics of the money system or the power structures behind it? No.

The point I’m trying to make is that even though the ownership of central banks is significant to understand the overall context (e.g. it is quite provocative that the Fed is in private hands), what is at fault is the money system itself; the real power today lies with commercial banking for very real, technical reasons: if commercial banks stop lending, thus injecting debt into the economy, a recession will occur as the money supply will shrink and it will be mathematically impossible for all debtors to find the interest they need to repay on their loans.


Tony, more angles on the subject = more perspective = more richness.

[TonyGosling]

The secret shareholders have the power to appoint governor and directors which is a lot of power whether or not they're all masonic cultists

Actually does anyone know exactly how the governer and directors are appointed?? - not by the chancellor surely - maybe they give him a list of (unknown to the treasury maybe) cultists to choose from?

- The Bank of England is in public ownership nowadays; does that change the characteristics of the money system or the power structures behind it? No.

The point I’m trying to make is that even though the ownership of central banks is significant to understand the overall context (e.g. it is quite provocative that the Fed is in private hands), what is at fault is the money system itself; the real power today lies with commercial banking for very real, technical reasons: if commercial banks stop lending, thus injecting debt into the economy, a recession will occur as the money supply will shrink and it will be mathematically impossible for all debtors to find the interest they need to repay on their loans.

Tony, more angles on the subject = more perspective = more richness.

[acrobat74]

http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/newsroom_ ... _06_08.cfm

4. Under the Bank of England Act 1998 the Governor of the Bank of England is appointed by Her Majesty the Queen on advice from the Prime Minister, who is in turn advised by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The appointment is for a period of five years.

Actually does anyone know exactly how the governer and directors are appointed?? - not by the chancellor surely - maybe they give him a list of (unknown to the treasury maybe) cultists to choose from?

- The Bank of England is in public ownership nowadays; does that change the characteristics of the money system or the power structures behind it? No.

The point I’m trying to make is that even though the ownership of central banks is significant to understand the overall context (e.g. it is quite provocative that the Fed is in private hands), what is at fault is the money system itself; the real power today lies with commercial banking for very real, technical reasons: if commercial banks stop lending, thus injecting debt into the economy, a recession will occur as the money supply will shrink and it will be mathematically impossible for all debtors to find the interest they need to repay on their loans.

Tony, more angles on the subject = more perspective = more richness.

[acrobat74]

Although the problem is more systemic than personal, some names would put things in more context.

Source:
'Tragedy and hope' by Georgetown professor Dr. Carroll Quigley.
A .pdf of the book can be downloaded from here: http://www.4shared.com/file/20002322/67 ... igley.html

The names of some of these banking families are familiar to all of us and should be more so.
They include Baring, Lazard, Erlanger, Warburg, Schroder, Seligman, Speyers, Mirabaud, Mallet, Fould and above all Rothschild and Morgan.

Even after these banking families became fully involved in domestic industry by the emergence of financial capitalism, they remained different from ordinary bankers in distinctive ways:
1) they were cosmopolitan and international;
2) they were close to governments and were particularly concerned with questions of government debts, including foreign government debts, even in areas which seemed, at first glance, poor risks, like Egypt, Persia, Ottoman Turkey, Imperial China and Latin America;
3) their interests were almost exclusively in bonds and very rarely in goods since they admired "liquidity";
4) they were fanatical devotees of deflation (which they called "sound" money from its close association with high interest rates and a high value of money) and of the gold standard;
5) they were almost equally devoted to secrecy and the secret use of financial influence in political life.

These bankers came to be called "international bankers" and were known as "merchant bankers" in England, "private bankers" in France and "investment bankers" in the United States.

Everywhere, they were sharply distinguishable from other, more obvious, kinds of banks, such as savings banks or commercial banks.

One of their less obvious characteristics was that they remained as private unincorporated firms offering no shares, no reports, and usually no advertising to the public until modern inheritance taxes made it essential to surround such family wealth with the immortality of corporate status for tax-avoidance purposes.

This persistence as private firms continued because it ensured the maximum of anonymity and secrecy to persons of tremendous public power who dreaded public knowledge of their activities as an evil almost as great as inflation.

Page 53

Firms like Morgan, like others of the international banking fraternity, constantly operated through corporations and governments, yet remained itself an obscure private partnership.

See: http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2008 ... irjpmorgan

At the core of English financial life have been seventeen private firms of "merchant bankers" with a total of less than a hundred active partners including Baring Brothers, N.M. Rothschild, J. Henry Schroder, Morgan Grenfell, Hambros and Lazard Brothers.

These merchant bankers had a dominant position with the Bank of England and, strangely enough, still have retained some of this, despite the nationalization of the Bank by the Labour government in 1946.

[acrobat74]

Interesting article in the Economist the other day about a book on the global ruling class:
http://www.economist.com/books/displays ... d=11081878

More importantly, a very articulate comment on the article eloquently summarizes the problem with the money system:

A quick history of money

1) Once, gold and silver were considered the only ''real'' money, but it was heavy and risky to carry around...

2) So people paid goldsmiths to store the money, and got paper receipts for it...

3) After a while, people used the receipts like money, and left the gold in the bank most of the time. So the bankers got clever and came up with a scam...

4) The banks printed off receipts for more gold than they actually had, and ''loaned'' those receipts out to charge interest on it. As long as everyone didn't redeem their receipts gold at the same time, this let them make a lot of money charging interest, because they could charge interest on MONEY THEY DIDN'T HAVE.


An analogy can be made using property and titles. Here's the scam in another way:

Step 1: Acquire a vacation home,
Step 2: Sell the title to the home to one person,
Step 3: Sell the title to the home to a DIFFERENT person,
Step 4: Hope they both don't show up on the same weekend!


Fractional reserve banking lets a bank say to a depositor that all his money is safe and sound at the bank, while at the same time they get to loan most of it out to someone else to charge interest on it. So there are two people with a legitimate claim to the same pile of money. So whose is it, really? And where is it?

It gets stranger: When you receive your loan, if you deposit it into a bank, this bank can loan your loan money out again. This process can be repeated indefinitely, and if you do the math you find that much more money is on deposit in all the banks than existed in the first place. This begs the question... where did all this extra money come from? It had to come from somewhere, right? This would be true if all money were physical objects, but today money is a concept, an idea, a number. The answer is - it is created by the bank!


What does this mean?

1) Loaning money while claiming it is still on deposit increases the money supply, essentially creating more money (otherwise deposits would vanish). In essence, for the bank to have your cake and loan it too, it must create more cake. This increase in money supply is the cause of inflation.

2) Almost every dollar that exists is owed to a bank somewhere, because at some time in history, it was created when it was loaned out.

3) The amount of money owed to banks is more than all the money in existence! So we cannot possibly get out of debt under this system. The bulk of this debt is in the form interest, which is an arbitrary amount of money banks demand in return, but never gave.

4) There is no money, in the real sense. Just checks, data stored on computers, and promises. It is all created by typing on a keyboard, and signing signatures. The only tangible assets in regard to money anymore is the collateral we pledge when we ask for a loan. The money they loan you comes from nowhere, but the assets you lose in foreclosure are real!

5) Because the US government borrows from the Federal Reserve, bankers have the power to influence our society and government by controlling finance. They decide to create (or not create) money depending on who's asking, and for what. They choose what projects get funded, and let other needs wither on the vine by starving them of working capital. This subtle yet immense power is more than enough to undermine democracy, and guide the course of a nation's history.


So what's the solution?

Simple. The public must demand that money must not be created by loaning it into existence. It must be something that is openly and publicly controllable, issuable, accountable, and interest-free.

Otherwise, a class of parasites will rise to power in society by cleverly disguising the fact that the money they are creating, spending, and buying the world up with is...

Money that isn't even real.


"The modern banking system manufactures money out of nothing. The process is perhaps the most astounding piece of sleight of hand that was ever invented." - Major L. L. B. Angus

"By this means government may secretly and unobserved, confiscate the wealth of the people, and not one man in a million will detect the theft." - John Maynard Keynes - "Economic Consequences of Peace"

"I am afraid that ordinary citizens will not like to be told that the banks can, and do, create and destroy money; and they who control the credit of the nation direct the policy of governments and hold in the hollow of their hands the destiny of the people." - Richard McKenna, Chairman, Midland Bank London

"When you or I write a check there must be sufficient funds in our account to cover the check, but when the Federal Reserve writes a check there is no bank deposit on which that check is drawn. When the Federal Reserve writes a check, it is creating money." - "Putting it Simply" - Boston Federal Reserve Bank

"Banks lend by creating credit. They create the means of payment out of nothing." - Ralph M. Hawtery, British Sec. of Treasury

Two other important points are:

- if all debts (mortgages etc.) are repaid, we will be left without any money (in the same way that issuance of debt creates the money supply, debt repayments 'un-create' it)

- to maintain a functioning society with a low rate of foreclosures, we are absolutely dependent on an ever-increasing money supply, i.e. we absolutely need more and more debt to be taken on (hence governments get very worried when, for example, banks & other lenders become reluctant to give out mortgages)


This Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago document (Modern money mechanics) gets into the tech-y details:
http://landru.i-link-2.net/monques/mmm2.html

[blackcat]

Are you reading this James C ???


[GVideo]http://video.google.co.uk/videoplay?doc ... 0464808778[/GVideo]



http://www.deepcapturethemovie.com/

[James C]

Are you reading this James C ???

And what is it I am meant to be reading?

I am very well aware, as I have already told you, that the banking system is corrupt, not least in the US. But to criticize the banks is only half the story since it is us who are eager to obtain that debt if it means our lives are substantially improved. I don't hear too many people calling for the banks to revert back to a system where they only give loans and mortgages to those people who can put down large deposits (like our parents and grandparents had to). It would be seen as an attack on our rights in a modern society where we must have that car or plasma TV or house TOMORROW.

A couple of years ago, George Monbiot was on the radio discussing second homes which he condemned as a sign of greed and consumerism gone mad. The response from the listeners was overwhelmingly against him, most of whom cited their rights to own and do whatever they liked with their (the banks) money. Never mind that it has pushed up house prices and destroyed the hopes of thousands of first time buyers unable to afford homes in their own towns and cities, something Monbiot tried to point out. So it just shows you how greed prevails which is something the banks are very happy to fund.

I take it that you are all for a deposit banking system which doesn't loan or provide mortgages? I certainly am since it would prevent corporate corruption, help reduce greed and ensure all paper transactions are backed by real money although it would also be as detrimental to the economy and our freedoms as very high oil prices.

[blackcat]

I don't hear too many people calling for the banks to revert back to a system where they only give loans and mortgages to those people who can put down large deposits (like our parents and grandparents had to).

I hear it all the time!! I have been hearing it for decades now as the overpricing of houses was caused by the ridiculously easy mortgages available. Even the easy credit didn't stop millions of people from being unable to afford a home especially in major cities. The banking system is a pyramid scam based on debt and is inevitably bound to collapse. Like a grotesque game of musical chairs, when the music stops only the rich can find seats. Gilded thrones for them, shanks's pony for the masses.

[acrobat74]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree ... tconfusion

The British property market is one of the greatest pyramid selling schemes the world has ever seen. And it depends on gulling those coming in at the bottom to borrow ever-increasing amounts of money to enrich those at the top. As Martin Weale, the director of the National Institute of Social and Economic Research, told me, it is a process of state-sanctioned and endorsed inter-generational robbery; a form of wealth redistribution against the young towards the old.

The money that people are said to have "made" on their properties - this wasn't free cash that fell off the money tree; it was earned by first-time buyers, or at least, they pledged it in promissory notes, debts, to earn over the course of a lifetime. Britain is going to be living with the consequences of these debts for decades yet to come. This is very far from free money.

[blackcat]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zbdtTGYQBMU[/youtube]


Ten minute video that gives an insight into why oil prices have soared.

[kbo234]

Very interesting indeed. I wish I fully understood what this professor is telling congress....but I get the general idea......I'd already guessed it actually...


......loopholes, deregulation, manipulation and fraud.

Isn't it just that the financial markets have moved from raping the property markets to tying down and shag*ing the commodities markets?

Shouldn't government be in the business of chastity belts?

Is this too cynical a suspicion?

Is it too simple-minded?

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zbdtTGYQBMU[/youtube]


Ten minute video that gives an insight into why oil prices have soared.

[James C]

So what he's saying, amongst other things, is that $20 to $30 of the oil price is down to speculation on the futures market. Assuming he is suggesting these amounts are based on the current price of crude at $130 (now a bit higher) then it equates to 15-20%.

So what is the other 80-85% down to? Could it be good old fashioned supply and demand concerns tallied with rising production costs?

He also pointed out that the role of regulators is to ensure that the price of commodities is fair. Given that oil has been cheaper than water for the past 150 years allowing us to squander it for our own means, creating greed, waste and pollution beyond an imaginable scale, I'd say that the current price is fair.

[blackcat]

[youtube]http://youtube.com/watch?v=O7pnjzCuSv8&feature=related[/youtube]


Milton Friedman explains role of gold in Great Depression.
(and how the bankers deliberately caused the Great Depression!!!)

[acrobat74]

Nice video, thanks.

Friedman (rightly imho) believed the Fed caused the Great Depression, but as far as I know never said that it did so deliberately.

It's nicer to let the reader reach his/her own conclusions.

Most of the readers will stick to the convenience of the 'incompetence' argument (rings a bell with Iraq?).

[Alexander]

Very interesting 50 minute Scott Horton interview with Lew Rockwell on the Federal Reserve, war, inflation and much else...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xgcBNKjd ... playnext=1

[jason67]

Very interesting 50 minute Scott Horton interview with Lew Rockwell on the Federal Reserve, war, inflation and much else...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xgcBNKjd ... playnext=1

Very good interview, thanks for posting Alexander

[acrobat74]

Nice interview, thanks!

With government interventionism and collectivism rearing their ugly heads, Austrian economic thought is like a beacon in the darkness these days.

[blackcat]

http://www.webofdebt.com/

EXPLODING THE MYTHS ABOUT MONEY

Our money system is not what we have been led to believe. The creation of money has been "privatized," or taken over by a private money cartel. Except for coins, all of our money is now created as loans advanced by private banking institutions — including the private Federal Reserve. Banks create the principal but not the interest to service their loans. To find the interest, new loans must continually be taken out, expanding the money supply, inflating prices — and robbing you of the value of your money.

Not only is virtually the entire money supply created privately by banks, but a mere handful of very big banks is responsible for a massive investment scheme known as "derivatives," which now tallies in at hundreds of trillions of dollars. The banking system has been contrived so that these big banks always get bailed out by the taxpayers from their risky ventures, but the scheme has reached its mathematical limits. There isn't enough money in the entire global economy to bail out the banks from a massive derivatives default today. When the investors realize that the "insurance" against catastrophe that they have purchased in the form of derivatives is worthless, they are liable to jump ship and bring the whole shaky edifice crashing down.

Web of Debt unravels the deceptions in our money scheme and presents a crystal clear picture of the financial abyss towards which we are heading. Then it explores a workable alternative, one that was tested in colonial America and is grounded in the best of American economic thought, including the writings of Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln. If you care about financial security, your own or the nation's, you should read this book.

Reviews

American Free Press:

This may well be one of the most important books you will ever read. . . . Ms. Brown has taken two subjects considered boring – history and monetary policy – and turned them into a book as thrilling as any Tom Clancy novel, except that this book is true. . . . If you are looking to have an understanding of the monetary mess we are in, this is an excellent historical overview with some truly elegant and ingenious ideas about correcting the problems we presently face. As you read this book you may find yourself feeling like "Neo" in The Matrix, newly awakened from the slumber of ignorance and deceit. Best of all, she offers viable solutions to the problems that have plagued our planet for millennia.

– John Tiffany, American Free Press, April 21, 2008


Nexus Magazine:

Ellen Brown, JD . . . diagnoses the problems with the monetary system and prescribes a solution for the people to take back their power. . . . Her prescription can be written internationally to liquidate unfair and repressive Third World debt with "the click of a mouse." The need is urgent, and Brown has a vision of government without taxes or debt. This well-researched book offers a way to navigate these troubled times.

– Nexus Magazine, "Reviews," November-December 2007

[blackcat]

http://www.counterpunch.org/nader07022008.html

July 2, 2008

Greed Without Accountability

Economic Domino Theory

By RALPH NADER

The worst top management of giant corporations in American history is also by far the most hugely paid. That contradiction applies as well to the Boards of Directors of these global companies.

Consider these illustrations:

The bosses of General Motors (GM) have presided over the worst decline of GM shares in the last fifty years, the lowering of GM bonds to junk status, the largest money losses and layoffs of tens of thousands of workers. Yet these top executives are still in place and still receiving much more pay than their successful counterparts at Toyota.

GM’s stock valuation is under $7 billion dollars, while Toyota is valued at over $160 billion. Toyota, having passed GM in worldwide sales, is about to catch up with and pass GM in sales inside the United States itself!

GM’s executives stayed with their gas guzzling SUVs way beyond the warning signs. Their vehicles were uninspiring and technologically stagnant in various ways. They were completely unprepared for Toyota’s hybrid cars and for the upward spiral in gasoline prices. They’re cashing their lucrative monthly checks with the regular votes of confidence by their hand-picked Board of Directors.

About the same appraisal can be made of Ford Motor Co., which at least brought in new management to try to do something about that once famous company’s sinking status.

Then there are the financial companies. Top management on Wall Street has been beyond incompetent. Wild risk taking camouflaged for years by multi-tiered, complex, abstract financial instruments (generally called collateralized debt obligations) kept the joy ride going and going until the massive financial hot air balloon started plummeting. Finally told to leave their high posts, the CEOs of Merrill-Lynch and Citigroup took away tens of millions of severance pay while Wall Street turned into Layoff Street.

The banks, investment banks and brokerage firms have tanked to levels not seen since the 1929-30 collapse of the stock market. Citigroup, once valued at over $50 per share is now under $17 a share.

Washington Mutual – the nation’s largest savings bank chain was over $40 a share in 2007. Its reckless speculative binge has driven it down under $5 a share. Yet its CEO Kerry Killinger remains in charge, with the continuing support of his rubberstamp Board of Directors. A recent $8 billion infusion of private capital gave a sweetheart deal to these new investors at the excessive expense of the shareholders.

Countrywide, the infamous giant mortgage lender (subprime mortgages) is about to be taken over by Bank of America. Its CEO is taking away a reduced but still very generous compensation deal.

Meanwhile, all these banks and brokerage houses’ investment analysts are busy downgrading each others’ stock prospects.

Over at the multi-trillion dollar companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the shareholders have lost about 75 percent of their stock value in one year. Farcically regulated by the Department of Housing and Urban Affairs, Fannie and Freddie were run into the ground by taking on very shaky mortgages under the command of CEOs and their top executives who paid themselves enormous sums.

These two institutions were set up many years ago to provide liquidity in the housing and loan markets and thereby expand home ownership especially among lower income families. Instead, they turned themselves into casinos, taking advantage of an implied U.S. government guarantee.

The Fannie and Freddie bosses created another guarantee. They hired top appointees from both Republican and Democratic Administrations (such as Deputy Attorney General Jamie Gorelick) and lathered them with tens of millions of dollars in executive compensation. In this way, they kept federal supervision at a minimum and held off efforts in Congress to toughen regulation. These executives are all gone now, enjoying their maharajan riches with impunity while pensions and mutual funds lose and lose and lose with no end in sight, short of a government-taxpayer bailout.

Over a year ago, leading financial analyst Henry Kaufman and very few others warned about “undisciplined” (read unregulated) and “mis-pricing” of lower quality assets. Mr. Kaufman wrote in the Wall Street Journal of August 15, 2007 that “If some institutions are really ‘too big to fail,’ then other means of discipline will have to be found.”

There are ways to prevent such crashes. In the nineteen thirties, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt chose stronger regulation, creating the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and several bank regulatory agencies. He saved the badly listing capitalist ship.

Today, there is no real momentum in a frozen Washington, D.C. to bring regulation up to date. To the contrary, in 1999, Congress led by Senator McCain’s Advisor, former Senator Phil Gramm and the Clinton Administration led by Robert Rubin, Secretary of the Treasury, and soon to join Citibank, de-regulated and ended the wall between investment banks and commercial banking known as the Glass-Steagall Act.

Clinton and Congress opened the floodgates to rampant speculation without even requiring necessary and timely disclosures for the benefit of institutional and individual investors.

Now the entire U.S. economy is at risk. The domino theory is getting less theoretical daily. Without investors obtaining more legal authority as owners over their out of control company officers and Boards of Directors, and without strong regulation, corporate capitalism cannot be saved from its toxic combination of endless greed and maximum power—without responsibility.

Uncle Sam, the deeply deficit ridden bailout man, may have another taxpayers-to-the-rescue operation for Wall Street. But don’t count on stretching the American dollar much more without devastating consequences to and from global financial markets in full panic.

Consider the U.S. dollar like an elastic band. You can keep stretching this rubber band but suddenly it BREAKS. Our country needs action NOW from Washington, D.C.

Ralph Nader is running for president as an independent.

[kbo234]

http://www.webofdebt.com/

EXPLODING THE MYTHS ABOUT MONEY

Our money system is not what we have been led to believe. The creation of money has been "privatized," or taken over by a private money cartel. Except for coins, all of our money is now created as loans advanced by private banking institutions — including the private Federal Reserve. Banks create the principal but not the interest to service their loans. To find the interest, new loans must continually be taken out, expanding the money supply, inflating prices — and robbing you of the value of your money.

Not only is virtually the entire money supply created privately by banks, but a mere handful of very big banks is responsible for a massive investment scheme known as "derivatives," which now tallies in at hundreds of trillions of dollars. The banking system has been contrived so that these big banks always get bailed out by the taxpayers from their risky ventures, but the scheme has reached its mathematical limits. There isn't enough money in the entire global economy to bail out the banks from a massive derivatives default today. When the investors realize that the "insurance" against catastrophe that they have purchased in the form of derivatives is worthless, they are liable to jump ship and bring the whole shaky edifice crashing down.

Web of Debt unravels the deceptions in our money scheme and presents a crystal clear picture of the financial abyss towards which we are heading. Then it explores a workable alternative, one that was tested in colonial America and is grounded in the best of American economic thought, including the writings of Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln. If you care about financial security, your own or the nation's, you should read this book.

Reviews

American Free Press:

This may well be one of the most important books you will ever read. . . . Ms. Brown has taken two subjects considered boring – history and monetary policy – and turned them into a book as thrilling as any Tom Clancy novel, except that this book is true. . . . If you are looking to have an understanding of the monetary mess we are in, this is an excellent historical overview with some truly elegant and ingenious ideas about correcting the problems we presently face. As you read this book you may find yourself feeling like "Neo" in The Matrix, newly awakened from the slumber of ignorance and deceit. Best of all, she offers viable solutions to the problems that have plagued our planet for millennia.

– John Tiffany, American Free Press, April 21, 2008


Nexus Magazine:

Ellen Brown, JD . . . diagnoses the problems with the monetary system and prescribes a solution for the people to take back their power. . . . Her prescription can be written internationally to liquidate unfair and repressive Third World debt with "the click of a mouse." The need is urgent, and Brown has a vision of government without taxes or debt. This well-researched book offers a way to navigate these troubled times.

– Nexus Magazine, "Reviews," November-December 2007

I am reading this book at present. It tells me loads of things I never knew including the purpose and meaning of the 'Wizard of Oz' fairytale. The whole thing appears to have been a metaphor for the conflict between the government of the USA and the central bankers that effectively controlled them.

Brilliant.

[blackcat]

I am reading this book at present. It tells me loads of things I never knew including the purpose and meaning of the 'Wizard of Oz' fairytale. The whole thing appears to have been a metaphor for the conflict between the government of the USA and the central bankers that effectively controlled them.

It is disputed that TWOO is about the monetary system and the exploitation of American workers by financial institutions, but there are too many things in the film that are analagous to the times for it to be a coincidence imho.
Some interesting reading and links at this site.

http://thewizardofoz.info/

and particularly this link http://www.amphigory.com/oz.htm

what is the meaning behind The Wizard of Oz? Is it a fantasy quest where the goal is to get out of the fantasy? Is it a search for courage, intelligence, and passion, or a search for the true self? Is it the story of fraudulent politics in a media age, or a coming of age story where a girl finds her real power in her shoes? Is it the story of incomplete men in a post-feminist age, or a quest for home, for wholeness, for magic -- things we already have but just don't see? The most gripping answer, which most people seem to have heard about, seems to be that Baum wrote it as some sort of political manifesto -- except no one can agree as to which turn-of-the-century politics the story is talking about! The answers, such as they are, are here in this website, but until I can create a page devoted to the many, many different interpretations of the story (none of which, I might add, can be considered the "true" meaning), these links will have to do.

[kbo234]

and particularly this link http://www.amphigory.com/oz.htm

Thanks. Interesting.

[TonyGosling]

Amazing front page lead headline on today's Daily Mail.

Banks 'use credit crunch to milk borrowers of £3bn'
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... s-3bn.html

On the one hand we're being told the banks are in trouble.

On the other hand they're making a mint. Of course they are a mint and always have been able to make as much as they want until they own everything. There is a natural limit though to the power of money as the banks are discovering right now.

One of the best on the entire subject if anyone can be bothered to go through it all is Wizards of Money which is here in audio format for the bicycle or car's mp3 player!
http://www.radio4all.net/index.php/program/3550
One of the best is Part 4 - Wizards and Warlords (15.79MB) for example
http://mbanna.radio4all.net/pub/archive ... wizom4.mp3

[acrobat74]

An excellent article:

Understanding interest rates in one lesson
by David Van Der Klauw
September 4, 2006

http://www.financialsense.com/fsu/edito ... /0904.html

Visualising a counterfeiting machine in every bank is a excellent way of viewing the govt low interest rate policy. It demonstrates the stupidity, short sightedness and injustice of the scheme. It also explains why the money supply expands so fast and prices rise so much during and after a low interest rate period.

Every voter who asks for low interest rates should stop thinking about lower repayments in the short-term and start thinking about the damage of all that counterfeit-like inflation money in the long-term. Every smug voter who would laugh at the ridiculous idea for counterfeit machines in banks should make sure they know precisely how the current scheme works and precisely how it is any better.

Today when govt gives voters low interest rates it does not place a money printing press in every bank. Govt does not even print every extra dollar and send it to the banks via armoured car. Govt only prints a small portion of the extra money. The banking system creates the extra money "out of thin air" via the fractional reserve bank deposit system and this is what is used to get those interest rates down (at least in the short-term).

...

Govt and their banking cronies work to take wealth from citizens in a similar way to a small time pilferer or embezzler. They naturally want to steal as much as possible, yet realise it can only continue so long as the victim does not notice or take action to stop the theft. If the thief gets too greedy, the victim will notice the loss, figure out what is going on, and put a stop to it. Make no mistake. Voters can easily stop inflation by withholding their vote from inflationist politicians and parties. Before this can happen they must notice the damage, figure out its cause, and decide to stop it. Today's Australian voters are so far from that point it is not funny. In fact at the last election many voted purely on the hope of getting a low interest rate i.e. they voted FOR inflation.

If we examine the way govt and bankers benefit from monetary inflation then we can better understand their motivation.

Govt and banks benefit from inflation in many ways:

* when govt prints new cash, or issues bonds which are "purchased" by the central bank, then govt gets to spend this new money on popular vote-winning programs without having to collect money via unpopular direct taxes.
* banks collect interest on any new inflation money multiplied by the fractional reserve multiplier.
* inflation-caused wage rises force citizens into higher income tax brackets.
* inflation-caused house price rises cause govt to get more money from higher land valuations and stamp duties, etc
* inflation-caused asset price rises cause citizens to have greater taxable capital gains. Even if the entire price rise is due to inflation and the citizen has made no real gain in purchasing power, govt still collects more taxes on the "profit".
* inflation-caused house price rises will please some voters and displease others. The current fad is to consider expensive housing to be wealth. Old people feel that their expensive house makes them rich and young people hope their house will become more expensive and make them rich too. These nongs wish for more house price inflation and continue to vote for a govt that causes it.

[outsider]

Brasscheck 'Money as Debt':

http://www.brasschecktv.com/page/135.html

How the banks create 'money'; as 'Ollie' North would say,
'Neat trick'!!

(Just realised, this is where 'Acrobat' started this thread!!)

[acrobat74]

Brasscheck 'Money as Debt':

http://www.brasschecktv.com/page/135.html

How the banks create 'money'; as 'Ollie' North would say,
'Neat trick'!!

(Just realised, this is where 'Acrobat' started this thread!!)

Worth repeating though outsider, such a good film.


As for the current crisis: it will be a good day when the markets squash the likes of Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs.


Governments of course found the culprits...short-selling speculators...lol

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2008 ... editcrunch


Let's see what Jim Rogers had to say about this nonsense a while ago...watch from 03:43 onwards:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rcIBFLSmVGA[/youtube]


Now why would the markets think that the business model of banks is broken?

And what does this have to do with the central bank-induced credit expansion?


Again, the best thinking around comes from the Austrians:

http://mises.org/story/3111

The current economic disaster is the result of the combination of negligence, hubris, and wrong economic theory.
For decades, an economic and monetary policy has been practiced based on the illusion of, "It doesn't matter."
At first it was, "Deficits don't matter." From that, the policy of "it doesn't matter" got extended to money creation, the credit expansion, the stock-market bubble, and the housing boom.
Now, we're being told that buying financial junk by the central bank to beef up banks and brokerages also doesn't matter.


The current financial crisis is not of a cyclical nature. The financial turmoil is the symptom of the structural imbalances in the real economy. Over decades, expansive monetary policy has gone hand in hand with implicit and explicit bailout guarantees, and this has distorted the process of capital allocation. Under such perverted conditions, those investors will win most who cast away the restraints of prudence. It is a game that can go on for a long time — up to the point when the irrationality has become systemic.


In the Austrian theory of the business cycle, the distinction is made between the "primary" and "secondary" depression. The secondary depression is what catches the eye: the turmoil in the financial markets. Yet the underlying cause is the distortion of the economy's capital structure: the primary depression.

The simple fact is that the US economy is burdened with a highly lopsided capital structure as the consequence of a wide discrepancy between consumption and production, which, in turn, is the result of monetary policy. Persistent trade imbalances are the symptoms of this discrepancy. This means for the US economy that lower interest rates and government incentives aimed at boosting consumption work as pure poison. Instead of more consumption, more savings, less consumption and fewer imports are needed.

The current financial crisis reflects that many debtors have reached their debt limit and that creditors are lowering that limit. From now on, business and consumers, governments and investors must work under the restraints of lowered debt ceilings.

Economic policy as it is currently practiced is in a fix: lower interest rates may temporarily help to alleviate the financial crisis, but they exacerbate the fundamentals that are the cause of the financial crisis.

Oh and a special message to all the ex-masters of the universe investment bankers:

What a waste, all these long hours you put in for giants with paper legs...obliterated in a matter of hours...doesn't look very real now does it?

[outsider]

And here's another beauty from Brasscheck:

This is a long story, but if you have any interest in what's going on in the financial markets, I think you'll find it a more useful analysis than you're likely to find anywhere else. Also, it's an important set-up for today's video. Without this article, you'll still get value from the video, but with it, you'll REALLY know what's going on better than most people on earth...including financial news reporters. I encourage you to invest the five minutes it will take to read this. If not, you can skip to the link at the bottom. - Brasscheck ========================================= ***
A short explanation of how we got to where we are Today's banking crisis is the THIRD trillion dollar plus US-caused financial meltdown in the last twenty years. Each one of these crises came into being through the same basic mechanism...the fraudulent over-valuing of financial assets by Wall Street - with a "wink and a nod" (and sometimes a lot more) from the White House and Congress. The fraudulently valued assets stimulate the economy, impart the illusion of health and then, inevitably, the fraud goes too far and the whole house of card comes painfully crashing back to earth. The three trillion dollar plus frauds were:
Fraud #1: The so-called "Savings and Loan Crisis" of the late 80s
Fraud #2: The so-called "Tech Bubble" of the late 90s
Fraud #3: The so-called "Credit Crisis" of today
*** How the scam works
The mechanism of these frauds is simplicity itself... ...Take a shaky financial asset and blow up its valueand then sell as much of it as you can.
In the "Savings and Loan Crisis," the instrument was junk bonds. In the "Tech Bubble" it was Internet stocks.
In the "Credit Crisis" it was individual mortgages collected into pools and then re-sold to investors. In each case, normal, well established "bread and butter" financial principles were consciously thrown away by Wall Street with no hint of protest from federal regulators.
***The "Savings and Loan Crisis" dissected Junk bonds caused the Saving and Loan crisis whichresulted in the US taking over the assets of hundreds ofbanks and selling them back over time to the marketplaceat fire sale prices. Junk bonds, which caused the "Savings and Loan Crisis" were shaky bonds that were pumped up by deliberate misrepresentation and what I call "staged dealing." Bonds get their value from two things: the amount of interest they pay and how safe they are. "Junk" bonds have to pay higher interest because they are lesssafe. Therefore, until the "Savings and Loan Crisis," savingsand loan banks banks were not allowed by law to buy them and callthem assets. Reagan/Bush changed all this and then a group of Wall Streetfraudsters used the new loophole to kick off an orgy of junk bond creation and junk bond selling to banks and insurancecompanies. The crooks would deal the junk bonds back and forthamongst themselves thereby establishing their "value"and then they'd sell them to outsiders. The bondsthen became "assets" which could be borrowed againstand leveraged to buy even more bonds. When the bonds failed, the banks failed and in stepped theUS government to "fix" the problem that it created at the costof at least one trillion dollars to US tax payers. Deja vu, eh? ***The "Tech Bubble" dissected The instrument of fraud in the "Tech Bubble" was Internetstocks, start ups in particular. A stock gets its value from the underlying company's sales, its growth and its overall prospects for the future. Pre-tech bubble, companies used to have to prove themselvesby being in existence for several years before they couldbe sold on major exchanges. That standard was thrown away during the tech bubble. To pump of their values, the companies engaged in"staged dealing" just like the junk bond crooks. Company #1 would "sell" 20 million dollars in bannerads to Company #2 which would in turn "sell" 20 millionin banner ads to Company #1. In fact, nobody sold anybody anything. Company #2 ranads for Company #1 and billed it for them. Company #1ran ads for Company #2 and billed for an equal amount. These should have been called media trades not sales, butWall Street was happy to claim them as legitimate cash salesand then use the sales numbers to fraudulently value thesecompanies - many of them totally worthless - in thehundreds of millions and sometimes even the billions. ***The "Credit Crisis" dissected By now, you see how the scheme works. It's not complicated at all. You take near worthless pieces of paper (junk bonds, stockof start up Internet companies, etc.) and declare them tobe good as gold. Then you create as many junk bonds and Internet start upstocks as you get and sell them as fast as you can. In the case of our current crisis, the instrument of fraudwas so-called sub-prime mortgages. Previously, sub-prime mortgages had very little trading value. Only people in the sub-prime industry itself dealt in them and forgood reason. They're tricky to value and packed with financialperil. But Wall Street changed all that. Wall Street said: "If we take LOTS of these mortgages and assemble them into large pools and then slice and dice the pools in various ways, we can sell the slices to banks and other investors as AAApaper." It sounds crazy, doesn't it? If the underlying pieces of paper are garbage, how does assemblinga whole bunch of garbage into one place make it "better?" It doesn't, of course, and this is a principle even a three year old child can understand. But greed and the need to pump up a shaky economy for propagandapurposes are two very strong motivators. Banks created these mortgage pools, sold them to each other,and they by virtue of these "staged sales" declared them valuable. Do you recognize the pattern now? If you do, then you are now smarter than all the assembled j@ck@sses who do financial reporting because they apparently can't - or won't. This is the THIRD trillion-dollar plus fraud driven financial meltdown in twenty years and apparently no one in the financial news media can see how it happened. ***But there's more... Junk bonds were mass manufactured as fast as the crooks could invent them. Ditto for Internet stocks. But how did hundreds of billions of dollars worth of "toxic" mortgages suddenly come into being? Why did the mortgage industry change its lending standards soradically and so suddenly to make their creation possible? And why did real estate lending regulators in all 50 states - because real estate lending is a STATE-level issue not a federal - go along with it? Here's where it gets very interesting... The fact is state-level lending regulators were VERY concerned about what was going on. They have been for years. And they not only expressed their concern clearly, they also took SERIOUS concerted legal action to stop lenders from making bad real estate loans to their citizens. (Most of the sub-prime loans in the news so much today were designed to screw the people who borrowed the money and can rightly be called "predatory" loans.) Guess who stopped the states from enforcing their own time-proven real estate lending laws and thus created the raw material thatmade the current "Credit Crisis" possible? *** The trillion dollar plus question If you're a US taxpayer, you're going to pay for this fraudso you might as well know who did it to you. His initials are GB. You know him well. But perhaps more interesting is the name of the person who single-handedly rallied first state attorneys general and then fellow governors to fight the creation of these loans and who in the process became Public Enemy #1 to the Bush Administration... His initials are ES. If you follow "silly" US political scandals, you'll recognize his name instantly when you hear it. And you will *finally* understand why he was quickly and permanently assassinated politically earlier this year. Had ES been allowed to "live," he would have been in position to remind everyone every day of who made the current meltdown possible. Instead, he was silenced very effectively. Not with a bullet in the back of the head, but the net effect was just the same. So effective was his assassination that no one can evenmention his name in connection with today's crisis withoutrisking ridicule, or worse. Last note: The crisis this fraud has created is *exponentially* biggerthan the S & L and Tech Bubble combined. It's not going to be resolved by a quick "patch up" and will likely have the same impact on the current generation that the depression of the 1930s had on its parents, grandparents and great grandparents. On that cheerful note, here's the big story everyone missed this year and now you'll finally know what REALLY happened and why: http://www.brasschecktv.com/page/291.html
- Brasscheck P.S. If you find Brasscheck TV valuable, please share our e-mailand videos with friends and colleagues. That's how we grow. Thanks.

[mr freedom]

This banking conspiracy is very interesting... I am confused about something though. Much is made of this fractional banking, but which banks can/do engage in this?

My "understanding" is that when a high street bank lends me money, they borrow it themselves, from the market, isn't this what Northern Rock were doing? Northern Rock were not lending money they "created", they were lending money they themselves had borrowed??

[outsider]

This banking conspiracy is very interesting... I am confused about something though. Much is made of this fractional banking, but which banks can/do engage in this?

My "understanding" is that when a high street bank lends me money, they borrow it themselves, from the market, isn't this what Northern Rock were doing? Northern Rock were not lending money they "created", they were lending money they themselves had borrowed??

I don't know if this question was to me, but I don't know the answer - probably someone on the thread can answer you. I just know they are a bunch of crooks, not the detail.