Hi All,
Been laying low for a while. Too much bad Juju in the air.
To the OP, great thread. There's no better way to rile the "free market capitalists" than by suggesting we should kill Democracy.....or some such
nonsense.
OK folks, here's the deal. There has been no such thing as a free market since the days of Thomas Jefferson. Period. (Even then, things were
squirrelly[think SLAVERY]). Only a cursory look at a few current financial blogs will reveal
LINK,
LINK, and
LINK.
The majority of these sites have articles with headlines straight from Apocalypse central. "$2 Trillion $ in credit markets shrinking", "Market
collapse this fall", "Oil at $200.00/bbl".
This is not conspiracy theory. This is not tin-foil-hat central. This is the financial blogosphere. These are not fringe nut-jobs. These people hold
down "good day jobs".
What we are seeing today is the deflation of one of the biggest Ponsi schemes ever created. I must digress. Check out these videos if you haven't
yet:
Money as Debt (47 min)
The Un-Constitutional Federal Reserve (A long one)
So here's my take. We have been taken to the cleaners since 1913 [Britain MUCH longer]. By the folks who brought us 'money'. Instead of allowing
the Congress to mint money (as was allowed, and encouraged by the Constitution!) we have been duped into giving that power to the Fed. Since then
we have accrued over 9 TRILLION Dollars of debt (as USURY interest). All of it has been to pay for WAR and debt for WAR. Since the 1970's we have
also acquiesced to the removal of our regulatory structures (think
Glass Steagall Act )
Those laws, passed in the 1930's, were put in place to keep th "Investor class" from F$%^&*G the worker class. Those laws were repealed by Bubba
Clinton (I voted for him twice, unbeknownst). Globalization and the continuation of the FIRE economic model (Finance, Investment, and Real Estate) has
brought the world to where we are.
So here we are. America has stopped building and making things. We have become a "consumer" culture. Our M3 (Look it up!) money supply has outpaced
our productivity. Our banking system is BANKRUPT. The value we have been 'paying forward' is no longer valuable. We are at the end of capitalism as
we know it. The next 6-24 months will be enlightening-to say the least.
To get back to the OP, think of 'money' as "value-frozen-in-time". We, as a society, need to confront what we value (beyond the Jingoistic,
Patriotic, Racist, Flag-waving nonsense we've come to expect from the MSM). I am sick do death with the privatization of profit at the expense of
socialization of cost(failure of bad bets!). Bear Stearns, and their Ilk should be left to die on the killing floor. These folks (Ben Bernanke, Hank
Paulson, et al) need to find new ways to get out of my wallet(put the $ back on a Gold standard!). I would be open to a system of Capitalism that
didn't involve inflationary market shennanigans. Silly me. I would also be amenable to tying the currency to the value of work produced, forget gold
and silver, I want a truly market driven currency.
Wait...What was the question?