Documentaries Exposing the Federal Reserve

[IronRanger]

"Let me put the solution in perspective: if you jail and confiscate the wealth of every Federal Reserve owner, the economy would boom the very next day. The Rothschild family alone is estimated to be worth $500 trillion. If you redistribute that wealth, that is almost $100,000 for every person in the world.

How can one family own over half the world? The answer, as stated by the Rothschild family, is by controlling the monetary policy of nations. Being completely ruthless and secretive helped. It is the mother of all rackets, which relies on the naive nature of people."

http://newworldliberty.wordpress.com/2009/03/09/documentaries-exposing-the-federal-reserve/

[muldoon]

if you jail and confiscate the wealth of every Federal Reserve owner

The federal reserve does not have an owner.  It has a structure with 12 regional district banks.  Each of the district banks has a board of directors made up of people who are within the district. They are classed in 3 different tiers, directors type A, B and C.  Class A comes from big major banks, B from medium and C small banks. 

Member banks must buy shares of the federal reserve bank at the fixed price of 100 per share.  The price does not change nor does the stocks trade on an exchange.  The bigger the bank the more shares they must buy.  Consider this a fee every US bank pays.  (3% of their capital). 

Each district is therefore owned by the member banks in of the district, ie New York, Chicago, St. Luis, Dallas, etc. 

Aside from the 12 districts, there are 7 governors of the fed, appointed by the president and confirmed by the senate.  Therefore the answer is that congress owns the fed.  They put the people into power, they can annul the charter or scope at any time, the own the ability to appropriate or deny funding. 

--
I want to see them in jail too.  But please direct your anger where it belongs. 

[Squirl]

This was old Nazi propaganda.  It still pops up.  The Rothschild's were a Jewish nobility family in England and Austria.  They were involved in banking and helped fund the British vs. Napoleon and the Austrians vs. the Germans.  Hitler used them as a scapegoat for the Jews really controlling the worlds wealth.  He then came up with his "final solution." 

The Rothschild's are rich.  So was every nobility in Europe.  The difference is they were one of the only Jewish ones.  The problem with these conspiracy theories is they fall apart very quickly with just a few facts, like what Muldoon pointed out.  Since the U.S. Govt. came in and bought much of the shares of the U.S. banks in recent days, they have an even more direct ownership of the Federal Reserve.

[IronRanger]

I want to see them in jail too.  But please direct your anger where it belongs.

I'm looking for reactions, not directing anger.  That was the website owner's statement.

[MountainDon]

When it comes to politics in particular and many other subjects in general, there is a lot of biased information,  half truths, misinterpreted and in many cases completely false information and opinions found on the internet. It is difficult to sort the chaff from the wheat at times; easy to swallow what someone may be preaching.

[IronRanger]

Of course there is a lot of misinformation on the internet, but there's a lot of disinformation accepted as truth too. 

I started this thread because I didn't find a topic posted here on the subject.  The conspiracy angle usually gets the most attention. 

I've done my own research and know my position.  I'm curious what other CountryPlanners believe.

[Windpower]

G Edward Griffin

Author of The Creature From Jekyll Island

"The Fed is basically a banking cartel that operates with the protection of the Government."

"the purpose of the FR is to protect the interests of the member banks" (by making the taxpayers bail them out if they might lose money)


http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6507136891691870450

[muldoon]

I'm curious what other CountryPlanners believe.

rant on

I believe that conspiracy theories are BS.  I believe that starting controversial threads for the sake of getting a reaction is BS.  I believe that there many people out there that would rather believe some ancient cabal of european elites have ruled civilization for centuries than accept the facts.   And I think that is BS. 

The fact is that the people who are stealing from you are doing it in broad daylight.  They are on tv every day, and they openly do not care what you think.  It is not a conspiracy..  to think that somewhere some banker said lets destroy all the banks and thats the master plan is complete horsehsit. 

I believe that the "wealth" of the last few decades was built on fraud and lies.  Bullshit stacked on bullshit so high it finally collapsed on it's own weight.  AIG writing 2.7 trillion dollars on 100 billion dollars in capital.  It was all fraud.  The dotcom, the subprime, the credit boom, everything most americans all benefitted from.  And why was that fraud accepted?  Because sometime back we adopted a "continual growth" mindset.  That every quarter, every month always had to grow.  Be bigger than before, increase sales, increase taxes, increase revenue, and after we hit the wall which could be maintained the fraud began.   It escalated for decades.  Madoff - theft of 50 billion didnt make a trade for 13 years.  How does an investment bank never make a trade with that much capital and it not get noticed?  Complete complicity and outright support.  The fraud permeates every layer.  It got soo ridiculously bad that the confidence was destroyed.  When a company CEO can go on tv on Friday and say they are healthy and they declare bankruptcy on Monday - you have to know they were full of shit,  To see it over and over and over, and to see our SEC and treasury at the helm making the same statements with them you have to wake up and realize the entire game is a sham.  Maybe it always was, but they at least used to hide it. 

You think some ancient jewish banker family did this to us?  Wake the hell up. 

Put some blame on the people who bought what they could not afford, the insurance salesmen that sold what they could not deliver, the appraisers that wrote whatever would fly, the banks that made loans that could not be repaid only because they were going to sell them to others, the people who bought those bonds paying 10% without asking questions.  Put the blame on the elected officials who changed the laws over the last two decades to allow this to happen (both sides).  Put some blame on tv, who need to sell advertising instead of telling the news, put some on yourself.  Put some on me.  But to stir up shit and point to some conspiracy theory moonbat horsehockey saying that some bankers who own the federal reserve bank designed this so they could get all the money to europe is lunacy.  Europe will burn before this is all said and done. 

Were are watching the very fabric unravel in front of us - and your off making up problems like we don't have enough in plain daylight.   This is not part of the solution. 

/rant

[MountainDon]

muldoon, if we had a smiley giving a standing ovation I'd be using it. 

[muldoon]

G Edward Griffin

Author of The Creature From Jekyll Island

"The Fed is basically a banking cartel that operates with the protection of the Government."

"the purpose of the FR is to protect the interests of the member banks" (by making the taxpayers bail them out if they might lose money)


http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6507136891691870450

Windpower,

I read that book as well a few years back.  It really got my blood pumping.  I have no doubts that some of it is based in fact, I would even go as far as saying alot of it is based in fact.  But the author gets a few things very very wrong. 

Yes, the federal reserve is a member based group that benefits the members.  So is the PTA my wife is a member of, a group of parents who participate at the elemntary school to see that their concerns are addressed.  So is our particular form of representative government.  Districts elect representatives to go to congress to represent us.  That by itself is not the problem.  The problem relates to the choices they have made, not necessarily the structure they are assembled into. 

I'll pontificate on a few things, I have heard over the years that our dollar is worthless, that the federal reserve prints out of thin air and its nothing behind it.  That doing away with the gold standard enabled them to do this. 

We were on the gold standard in 1929.  It had nothing to do with a credit collapse.  We were on the gold standard in 1910, didnt stop a credit collapse, same for 1909, 1901, 1894-6 (18% unemployment), 1890, 1873 (what my great great great grandmother nanny called the real great depression.)   Or 1866, or 1857 (which led to the civil war), or 1837 and the railroad collapse, or nearly every decade going back to 1760 when we declared independence because of the same problems and problem with taxatio0n without representation. 

We had a depression almost every 10-15 years befre the fed reserve act of 1913.   An outright banking panic.  some of them horrendous, in 1873 bankers were pulled from their offices and hung in the streets.  To say that economic downturns are because of the federal reserve is rediculous.  We have gone some 90 years without one (save a few bumps) with a federal reserve banking system.  While I do not defend their current actions in any way, I do believe the concept of a federal reserve bank to be valid.  Perhaps not this one, and I'll grant that but I cant agree the concept itself is flawed. 

---
Anyway, I strayed off again.  Jeckyll Island.  It makes the case that the fed prints money.  That by printing money it devalues the currency.   First off, the fed does not print money.  Every dollar in existance is based on debt.  It must be borrowed into existance.  The printing press does not exist at the fed.  (I'll clarify that in a second).  Our dollars (even today) must be created via china, saudi arabia, and elsewhere.  Those dollars must come from somewhere when the tax receipts are not available to cover them.   Think about how money flows.  It is NO SURPRISE the stock market is down every single damn day as the money is being sucked into treasuries.   Money flows like water.  If it goes somewhere it is being removed from soewhere else.  If it is being removed from on area it is going somewhere.  Always. 

Printing is done at the local bank.  Your bank that handles youre pachecks and pays the bills.  They accept your deposit and then loan it out.  However, they only keep 10% of what you deposited on hand.  The rest goes to new debt.  That is the printing press.  Thats it.  Thats the magical printing press.  Loans, debt, new obligations.  Have you noticed anything about new construction loans lately?  How about new car loans?  Home equity lines of credit?  ..  there is no printing press.   We are not zimbobwe.   

Yes, some would be wise to call out that rise in M1 or M' (prime) of a few billion dollars.  And please tell me how that works out with the loss of 50 trillion in credit or wealth loss in this.  A rise of 1 or 2 trillions cannot offset that loss. 

Jeckyll island is flawed because it does not accurately portray the relationship between governemtn debt and the concept of "printing".  It assumes that the government has the option to print.   

Quantitive Easing?  Yes, the fed buying down the long end of the curve in order to cap treasury yields, a form of printing no?  Ok, I see that point.  However go back and look at Japan circa 1990 when they began the same chain of events.  They have never left delfation.  Go back to 1940, when the fed was actually tied to the treasury legally and were forced to do QE, it did not go to hyperinflation then. 

The Jeckyll book is very propagandaish in my opinion because it fails to look at history in a fair light.  It represents a one sided look at the data.  While I wont argue with the facts, I also do my own research and see the other side of the coin. 

I'm been drinking a bit tonight and should probably just stop posting on this now.  I have strong feelings on whats going on and dont wish to rub anyone the wrong way. 

[harry51]

I certainly don't claim to have the answer to all our financial ills. Fiat currency has its pros and cons, as does metallic money. The following is from President Andrew Jackson's farewell address, and his insight certainly deserves our consideration:

"There is, perhaps, no one of the powers conferred on the federal government so liable to abuse as the taxing power. The most productive and convenient sources of revenue were necessarily given to it, that it might be able to perform the important duties imposed upon it; and the taxes which it lays upon commerce being concealed from the real payer in the price of the article, they do not so readily attract the attention of the people as smaller sums demanded from them directly by the tax gatherer. But the tax imposed on goods enhances by so much the price of the commodity to the consumer; and, as many of these duties are imposed on articles of necessity which are daily used by the great body of the people, the money raised by these imposts is drawn from their pockets.

Congress has no right, under the Constitution, to take money from the people unless it is required to execute some one of the specific powers entrusted to the government; and if they raise more than is necessary for such purposes, it is an abuse of the power of taxation and unjust and oppressive. It may, indeed, happen that the revenue will sometimes exceed the amount anticipated when the taxes were laid. When, however, this is ascertained, it is easy to reduce them; and, in such a case, it is unquestionably the duty of the government to reduce them, for no circumstances can justify it in assuming a power not given to it by the Constitution nor in taking away the money of the people when it is not needed for the legitimate wants of the government.

Plain as these principles appear to be, you will yet find that there is a constant effort to induce the general government to go beyond the limits of its taxing power and to impose unnecessary burdens upon the people. Many powerful interests are continually at work to procure heavy duties on commerce and to swell the revenue beyond the real necessities of the public service; and the country has already felt the injurious effects of their combined influence. They succeeded in obtaining a tariff of duties bearing most oppressively on the agricultural and laboring classes of society and producing a revenue that could not be usefully employed within the range of the powers conferred upon Congress; and, in order to fasten upon the people this unjust and unequal system of taxation, extravagant schemes of internal improvement were got up in various quarters to squander the money and to purchase support. Thus, one unconstitutional measure was intended to be upheld by another, and the abuse of the power of taxation was to be maintained by usurping the power of expending the money in internal improvements.

You cannot have forgotten the severe and doubtful struggle through which we passed when the Executive Department of the government, by its veto, endeavored to arrest this prodigal scheme of injustice and to bring back the legislation of Congress to the boundaries prescribed by the Constitution. The good sense and practical judgment of the people, when the subject was brought before them, sustained the course of the executive; and this plan of unconstitutional expenditure for the purpose of corrupt influence is, I trust, finally overthrown.

The result of this decision has been felt in the rapid extinguishment of the public debt and the large accumulation of a surplus in the treasury, notwithstanding the tariff was reduced and is now very far below the amount originally contemplated by its advocates. But, rely upon it, the design to collect an extravagant revenue and to burden you with taxes beyond the economical wants of the government is not yet abandoned. The various interests which have combined together to impose a heavy tariff and to produce an overflowing treasury are too strong and have too much at stake to surrender the contest. The corporations and wealthy individuals who are engaged in large manufacturing establishments desire a high tariff to increase their gains. Designing politicians will support it to conciliate their favor and to obtain the means of profuse expenditure for the purpose of purchasing influence in other quarters; and since the people have decided that the federal government cannot be permitted to employ its income in internal improvements, efforts will be made to seduce and mislead the citizens of the several states by holding out to them the deceitful prospect of benefits to be derived from a surplus revenue collected by the general government and annually divided among the states. And if, encouraged by these fallacious hopes, the states should disregard the principles of economy which ought to characterize every republican government and should indulge in lavish expenditures exceeding their resources, they will, before long, find themselves oppressed with debts which they are unable to pay, and the temptation will become irresistible to support high tariff in order to obtain a surplus for distribution.

Do not allow yourselves, my fellow citizens, to be misled on this subject. The federal government cannot collect a surplus for such purposes without violating the principles of the Constitution and assuming powers which have not been granted. It is, moreover, a system of injustice, and, if persisted in, will inevitably lead to corruption and must end in ruin. The surplus revenue will be drawn from the pockets of the people, from the farmer, the mechanic, and the laboring classes of society; but who will receive it when distributed among the states, where it is to be disposed of by leading state politicians who have friends to favor and political partisans to gratify? It will certainly not be returned to those who paid it and who have most need of it and are honestly entitled to it. There is but one safe rule, and that is to confine the general government rigidly within the sphere of its appropriate duties. It has no power to raise a revenue or impose taxes except for the purposes enumerated in the Constitution; and if its income is found to exceed these wants, it should be forthwith reduced, and the burdens of the people so far lightened.

In reviewing the conflicts which have taken place between different interests in the United States and the policy pursued since the adoption of our present form of government, we find nothing that has produced such deep-seated evil as the course of legislation in relation to the currency. The Constitution of the United States unquestionably intended to secure to the people a circulating medium of gold and silver. But the establishment of a national bank by Congress with the privilege of issuing paper money receivable in the payment of the public dues, and the unfortunate course of legislation in the several states upon the same subject, drove from general circulation the constitutional currency and substituted one of paper in its place.

It was not easy for men engaged in the ordinary pursuits of business, whose attention had not been particularly drawn to the subject, to foresee all the consequences of a currency exclusively of paper; and we ought not, on that account, to be surprised at the facility with which laws were obtained to carry into effect the paper system. Honest and even enlightened men are sometimes misled by the specious and plausible statements of the designing. But experience has now proved the mischiefs and dangers of a paper currency, and it rests with you to determine whether the proper remedy shall be applied.

The paper system being founded on public confidence and having of itself no intrinsic value, it is liable to great and sudden fluctuations, thereby rendering property insecure and the wages of labor unsteady and uncertain. The corporations which create the paper money cannot be relied upon to keep the circulating medium uniform in amount. In times of prosperity, when confidence is high, they are tempted by the prospect of gain or by the influence of those who hope to profit by it to extend their issues of paper beyond the bounds of discretion and the reasonable demands of business. And when these issues have been pushed on from day to day until the public confidence is at length shaken, then a reaction takes place, and they immediately withdraw the credits they have given; suddenly curtail their issues; and produce an unexpected and ruinous contraction of the circulating medium which is felt by the whole community.

The banks, by this means, save themselves, and the mischievous consequences of their imprudence or cupidity are visited upon the public. Nor does the evil stop here. These ebbs and flows in the currency and these indiscreet extensions of credit naturally engender a spirit of speculation injurious to the habits and character of the people. We have already seen its effects in the wild spirit of speculation in the public lands and various kinds of stock which, within the last year or two, seized upon such a multitude of our citizens and threatened to pervade all classes of society and to withdraw their attention from the sober pursuits of honest industry. It is not by encouraging this spirit that we shall best preserve public virtue and promote the true interests of our country.

But if your currency continues as exclusively paper as it now is, it will foster this eager desire to amass wealth without labor; it will multiply the number of dependents on bank accommodations and bank favors; the temptation to obtain money at any sacrifice will become stronger and stronger, and inevitably lead to corruption which will find its way into your public councils and destroy, at no distant day, the purity of your government. Some of the evils which arise from this system of paper press, with peculiar hardship, upon the class of society least able to bear it. A portion of this currency frequently becomes depreciated or worthless, and all of it is easily counterfeited in such a manner as to require peculiar skill and much experience to distinguish the counterfeit from the genuine note. These frauds are most generally perpetrated in the smaller notes, which are used in the daily transactions of ordinary business; and the losses occasioned by them are commonly thrown upon the laboring classes of society whose situation and pursuits put it out of their power to guard themselves from these impositions and whose daily wages are necessary for their subsistence.

It is the duty of every government so to regulate its currency as to protect this numerous class as far as practicable from the impositions of avarice and fraud. It is more especially the duty of the United States where the government is emphatically the government of the people, and where this respectable portion of our citizens are so proudly distinguished from the laboring classes of all other nations by their independent spirit, their love of liberty, their intelligence, and their high tone of moral character. Their industry in peace is the source of our wealth, and their bravery in war has covered us with glory; and the government of the United States will but ill discharge its duties if it leaves them a prey to such dishonest impositions. Yet it is evident that their interests cannot be effectually protected unless silver and gold are restored to circulation.

These views alone of the paper currency are sufficient to call for immediate reform; but there is another consideration which should still more strongly press it upon your attention.

Recent events have proved that the paper money system of this country may be used as an engine to undermine your free institutions; and that those who desire to engross all power in the hands of the few and to govern by corruption or force are aware of its power and prepared to employ it. Your banks now furnish your only circulating medium, and money is plenty or scarce according to the quantity of notes issued by them. While they have capitals not greatly disproportioned to each other, they are competitors in business, and no one of them can exercise dominion over the rest. And although, in the present state of the currency, these banks may and do operate injuriously upon the habits of business, the pecuniary concerns, and the moral tone of society, yet, from their number and dispersed situation, they cannot combine for the purpose of political influence; and whatever may be the dispositions of some of them their power of mischief must necessarily be confined to a narrow space and felt only in their immediate neighborhoods.

But when the charter of the Bank of the United States was obtained from Congress, it perfected the schemes of the paper system and gave its advocates the position they have struggled to obtain from the commencement of the federal government down to the present hour. The immense capital and peculiar privileges bestowed upon it enabled it to exercise despotic sway over the other banks in every part of the country. From its superior strength it could seriously injure, if not destroy, the business of any one of them which might incur its resentment; and it openly claimed for itself the power of regulating the currency throughout the United States. In other words, it asserted (and it undoubtedly possessed) the power to make money plenty or scarce, at its pleasure, at any time, and in any quarter of the Union, by controlling the issues of other banks and permitting an expansion or compelling a general contraction of the circulating medium according to its own will.

The other banking institutions were sensible of its strength, and they soon generally became its obedient instruments, ready at all times to execute its mandates; and with the banks necessarily went, also, that numerous class of persons in our commercial cities who depend altogether on bank credits for their solvency and means of business; and who are, therefore, obliged for their own safety to propitiate the favor of the money power by distinguished zeal and devotion in its service.

The result of the ill-advised legislation which established this great monopoly was to concentrate the whole money power of the Union, with its boundless means of corruption and its numerous dependents, under the direction and command of one acknowledged head; thus organizing this particular interest as one body and securing to it unity and concert of action throughout the United States and enabling it to bring forward, upon any occasion, its entire and undivided strength to support or defeat any measure of the government. In the hands of this formidable power, thus perfectly organized, was also placed unlimited dominion over the amount of the circulating medium, giving it the power to regulate the value of property and the fruits of labor in every quarter of the Union and to bestow prosperity or bring ruin upon any city or section of the country as might best comport with its own interest or policy.

We are not left to conjecture how the moneyed power, thus organized and with such a weapon in its hands, would be likely to use it. The distress and alarm which pervaded and agitated the whole country when the Bank of the United States waged war upon the people in order to compel them to submit to its demands cannot yet be forgotten. The ruthless and unsparing temper with which whole cities and communities were oppressed, individuals impoverished and ruined, and a scene of cheerful prosperity suddenly changed into one of gloom and despondency ought to be indelibly impressed on the memory of the people of the United States.

If such was its power in a time of peace, what would it not have been in a season of war with an enemy at your doors? No nation but the freemen of the United States could have come out victorious from such a contest; yet, if you had not conquered, the government would have passed from the hands of the many to the hands of the few; and this organized money power, from its secret conclave, would have directed the choice of your highest officers and compelled you to make peace or war as best suited their own wishes. The forms of your government might, for a time, have remained; but its living spirit would have departed from it.

The distress and sufferings inflicted on the people by the Bank are some of the fruits of that system of policy which is continually striving to enlarge the authority of the federal government beyond the limits fixed by the Constitution. The powers enumerated in that instrument do not confer on Congress the right to establish such a corporation as the Bank of the United States; and the evil consequences which followed may warn us of the danger of departing from the true rule of construction and of permitting temporary circumstances or the hope of better promoting the public welfare to influence, in any degree, our decisions upon the extent of the authority of the general government. Let us abide by the Constitution as it is written or amend it in the constitutional mode if it is found defective.

The severe lessons of experience will, I doubt not, be sufficient to prevent Congress from again chartering such a monopoly, even if the Constitution did not present an insuperable objection to it. But you must remember, my fellow citizens, that eternal vigilance by the people is the price of liberty; and that you must pay the price if you wish to secure the blessing. It behooves you, therefore, to be watchful in your states as well as in the federal government. The power which the moneyed interest can exercise, when concentrated under a single head, and with our present system of currency, was sufficiently demonstrated in the struggle made by the Bank of the United States. Defeated in the general government, the same class of intriguers and politicians will now resort to the states and endeavor to obtain there the same organization which they failed to perpetuate in the Union; and with specious and deceitful plans of public advantages and state interests and state pride they will endeavor to establish, in the different states, one moneyed institution with overgrown capital and exclusive privileges sufficient to enable it to control the operations of the other banks.

Such an institution will be pregnant with the same evils produced by the Bank of the United States, although its sphere of action is more confined; and in the state in which it is chartered the money power will be able to embody its whole strength and to move together with undivided force to accomplish any object it may wish to attain. You have already had abundant evidence of its power to inflict injury upon the agricultural, mechanical, and laboring classes of society, and over whose engagements in trade or speculation render them dependent on bank facilities, the dominion of the state monopoly will be absolute, and their obedience unlimited. With such a bank and a paper currency, the money power would, in a few years, govern the state and control its measures; and if a sufficient number of states can be induced to create such establishments, the time will soon come when it will again take the field against the United States and succeed in perfecting and perpetuating its organization by a charter from Congress.

It is one of the serious evils of our present system of banking that it enables one class of society, and that by no means a numerous one, by its control over the currency to act injuriously upon the interests of all the others and to exercise more than its just proportion of influence in political affairs. The agricultural, the mechanical, and the laboring classes have little or no share in the direction of the great moneyed corporations; and from their habits and the nature of their pursuits, they are incapable of forming extensive combinations to act together with united force. Such concert of action may sometimes be produced in a single city or in a small district of country by means of personal communications with each other; but they have no regular or active correspondence with those who are engaged in similar pursuits in distant places. They have but little patronage to give the press and exercise but a small share of influence over it; they have no crowd of dependents about them who hope to grow rich without labor by their countenance and favor and who are, therefore, always ready to exercise their wishes.

The planter, the farmer, the mechanic, and the laborer all know that their success depends upon their own industry and economy and that they must not expect to become suddenly rich by the fruits of their toil. Yet these classes of society form the great body of the people of the United States; they are the bone and sinew of the country; men who love liberty and desire nothing but equal rights and equal laws and who, moreover, hold the great mass of our national wealth, although it is distributed in moderate amounts among the millions of freemen who possess it. But, with overwhelming numbers and wealth on their side, they are in constant danger of losing their fair influence in the government, and with difficulty maintain their just rights against the incessant efforts daily made to encroach upon them.

The mischief springs from the power which the moneyed interest derives from a paper currency which they are able to control; from the multitude of corporations with exclusive privileges which they have succeeded in obtaining in the different states and which are employed altogether for their benefit; and unless you become more watchful in your states and check this spirit of monopoly and thirst for exclusive privileges, you will, in the end, find that the most important powers of government have been given or bartered away, and the control over your dearest interests has passed into the hands of these corporations.

The paper money system and its natural associates, monopoly and exclusive privileges, have already struck their roots deep in the soil; and it will require all your efforts to check its further growth and to eradicate the evil. The men who profit by the abuses and desire to perpetuate them will continue to besiege the halls of legislation in the general government as well as in the states and will seek, by every artifice, to mislead and deceive the public servants. It is to yourselves that you must look for safety and the means of guarding and perpetuating your free institutions. In your hands is rightfully placed the sovereignty of the country and to you everyone placed in authority is ultimately responsible. It is always in your power to see that the wishes of the people are carried into faithful execution, and their will, when once made known, must sooner or later be obeyed. And while the people remain, as I trust they ever will, uncorrupted and incorruptible and continue watchful and jealous of their rights, the government is safe, and the cause of freedom will continue to triumph over all its enemies.

But it will require steady and persevering exertions on your part to rid yourselves of the iniquities and mischiefs of the paper system and to check the spirit of monopoly and other abuses which have sprung up with it and of which it is the main support. So many interests are united to resist all reform on this subject that you must not hope the conflict will be a short one nor success easy. My humble efforts have not been spared during my administration of the government to restore the constitutional currency of gold and silver; and something, I trust, has been done toward the accomplishment of this most desirable object. But enough yet remains to require all your energy and perseverance. The power, however, is in your hands, and the remedy must and will be applied if you determine upon it.

While I am thus endeavoring to press upon your attention the principles which I deem of vital importance in the domestic concerns of the country, I ought not to pass over without notice the important considerations which should govern your policy toward foreign powers. It is unquestionably our true interest to cultivate the most friendly understanding with every nation and to avoid by every honorable means the calamities of war, and we shall best attain this object by frankness and sincerity in our foreign intercourse, by the prompt and faithful execution of treaties, and by justice and impartiality in our conduct to all. But no nation, however desirous of peace, can hope to escape occasional collisions with other powers, and the soundest dictates of policy require that we should place ourselves in a condition to assert our rights if a resort to force should ever become necessary. Our local situation, our long line of seacoast, indented by numerous bays, with deep rivers opening into the interior, as well as our extended and still increasing commerce, point to the Navy as our natural means of defense. It will in the end be found to be the cheapest and most effectual, and now is the time, in a season of peace and with an overflowing revenue, that we can year after year add to its strength without increasing the burdens of the people. It is your true policy, for your Navy will not only protect your rich and flourishing commerce in distant seas, but will enable you to reach and annoy the enemy and will give to defense its greatest efficiency by meeting danger at a distance from home. It is impossible by any line of fortifications to guard every point from attack against a hostile force advancing from the ocean and selecting its object, but they are indispensable to protect cities from bombardment, dockyards and naval arsenals from destruction, to give shelter to merchant vessels in time of war and to single ships or weaker squadrons when pressed by superior force. Fortifications of this description can not be too soon completed and armed and placed in a condition of the most perfect preparation. The abundant means we now possess can not be applied in any manner more useful to the country, and when this is done and our naval force sufficiently strengthened and our militia armed we need not fear that any nation will wantonly insult us or needlessly provoke hostilities. We shall more certainly preserve peace when it is well understood that we are prepared for War.

In presenting to you, my fellow-citizens, these parting counsels, I have brought before you the leading principles upon which I endeavored to administer the Government in the high office with which you twice honored me. Knowing that the path of freedom is continually beset by enemies who often assume the disguise of friends, I have devoted the last hours of my public life to warn you of the dangers. The progress of the United States under our free and happy institutions has surpassed the most sanguine hopes of the founders of the Republic. Our growth has been rapid beyond all former example in numbers, in wealth, in knowledge, and all the useful arts which contribute to the comforts and convenience of man, and from the earliest ages of history to the present day there never have been thirteen millions of people associated in one political body who enjoyed so much freedom and happiness as the people of these United States. You have no longer any cause to fear danger from abroad; your strength and power are well known throughout the civilized world, as well as the high and gallant bearing of your sons. It is from within, among yourselves--from cupidity, from corruption, from disappointed ambition and inordinate thirst for power--that factions will be formed and liberty endangered. It is against such designs, whatever disguise the actors may assume, that you have especially to guard yourselves. You have the highest of human trusts committed to your care. Providence has showered on this favored land blessings without number, and has chosen you as the guardians of freedom, to preserve it for the benefit of the human race. May He who holds in His hands the destinies of nations make you worthy of the favors He has bestowed and enable you, with pure hearts and pure hands and sleepless vigilance, to guard and defend to the end of time the great charge He has committed to your keeping.

My own race is nearly run; advanced age and failing health warn me that before long I must pass beyond the reach of human events and cease to feel the vicissitudes of human affairs. I thank God that my life has been spent in a land of liberty and that He has given me a heart to love my country with the affection of a son. And filled with gratitude for your constant and unwavering kindness, I bid you a last and affectionate farewell."

://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/print.php?pid=67087

[Squirl]

Muldoon,
That is one of the most concise and well understood answers that I have found of the current economic system.
What I believe.  I believe that the current problem was made up of a system, and when millions of people made what seamed like rational choices to them, the compounding effect of those choices led to problems.  It was the politician that made short term choices to keep him elected or get him a job when he leaves.  It was the banker who was handed a bunch of money (the Chinese, Indian's, and Saudi's) and told to get the best return possible.  It was the mortgage brokers who had faith in the constant increasing value of the rise in home prices.  It was the home owners that took out home equity loans or bought houses to keep up with the Jones'.  All what seemed rational to them.  There was no central puppet master pulling the strings.  There may have been larger players in the game with more weight making their choices, but it was still a myriad of independent choices, based on imperfect information.  It is just easier for people to believe in one central person to hate than the thousands of choices made by many different people acting in their own self interest.

[Jens]

Wow, that is a long speech when written!  I will read it when I have more time.  Had an idea though...what if IRS bought Starbucks?  $4 from every purchase would go directly to taxes, as their coffee is about that much overpriced.  Then, everybody that can't live without their two coffees a day, would actually be paying almost $3000 a year in tax revenue!

[ScottA]

The problem with money based on debt is that there is always more money owed than actualy exists. Because of this constant growth is required to generate the new money needed to pay off the intrest on the old. Any time growth stalls there will be a near instant shortage of money in the system because with every loan payment made money is distroyed. Growth creates the new money to replace the money being distroyed. With less money available to compete for goods and services prices fall and business models fail. This is why debt based money is bad. One could also argure that this cycle of borrowing and repaying causes the "business cycle" of boom and bust. The same thing can happen with gold based money the only difference is there is less of it to begin with. When banks or investers horde money it has the same effect of creating a money shortage. When they loan or invest it creates a boom. A better way IMO would be for the government to spend money into existance and use the power of taxation to keep the money supply from growing to large. It would work if the government wasn't run by crooks. Hell the fed system would work better if not run by crooks. And here's where we get to the real problem. Too much power in the hands of too few people. The federal government is too big and wields too much power.

[IronRanger]

I started this thread for a Sociology assignment.  The instructor thought it was a good idea to see people's views on conspiracy theories concerning money, since the economy's on most people's minds.  I wanted honest reactions.  Most of the class went directly to conspiracy theory forums, I chose this moderate forum. 

I think ScottA's got an interesting idea.  Through representative government spending and control, set it up so that they can be voted in and out of power.  I'd bet we'd see record voter turn-out.  It seems the eligible voting majority show-up when the economy's in trouble.  I'll have to think about this whole idea more. 

Thanks for everyone who contributed and sorry for any hurt feelings.

[sparks]

muldoon, if we had a smiley giving a standing ovation I'd be using it. 

I'll second that!!...........could we have one that makes a clapping sound also??


hurt feelings?..........no pain , no gain.




sparks