Conan Parodies Ron Paul Ad

[ProdigyofZen]

Re: Conan Parodies Ron Paul Ad

Carig, you have a clear post here and concise but I would like to address some issues that I don't think you are understand about Paul's positions.

First, as EJ posted a picture back in 2008 of all the candidates running for President he said Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich were the only 2 anti-Fire candidates. The picture is posted below. So EJ sees policies in Paul that are anti-Fire.

2. The idea that corporations already pay Zero income tax is just that an idea. Do you really think the government gets all its revenue from individuals? Because that is what you are saying by stating that corporations already do not pay income taxes. Where do you suppose the revenue comes from for the government?

3. There are already family dynasties, I don't understand, have you not heard of the Kennedys, the Rockefellers the Bush's? They already have enough money and enough ways to escape estate taxes that abolishing the estate tax doesn't really matter to them. Abolishing the estate tax will help individuals who have 500k to 5 mil to give to their children not the small amount of individuals who have 100 Mil plus.

4. Ending capital gains taxes allows the average individual to make more money that capital gains tax already hurts more than someone who is "wealthy." If anything it helps the middle class but I would concede that I do see ways it could help wall street win as you say.

5. I think Paul understands this and he has said as much in interviews. He realizes that you cannot just close down certain government organizations without transfer plans and I believe he has thoroughly reflected on this and will phase out the organizations over a period of time. I would assume most of the 1 tril cut will come from the military industrial complex.

6. It does not invite problems when the states should have the right to sue another state which pollutes its waters or air. The same goes for property owners. As long as property rights are strong there should not be a problem. Will there be instances of abuse? Of course there will be just like there are now.

7. Our companies need capital because as much as the MSM is reporting that these companies are flush with capital over the last 3 years it is a mirage. http://www.usatoday.com/money/compan...les/51346848/1

They have actually taken on more debt at artifically low interest rates and at some point they will have to roll over that debt at most likely ever higher cost of capital. Will some of that money be paid out to executives? I have no doubt in my mind but I do know that most of that cash will be used to bolster their balance sheet and/or capital improvements.

8. Having Enrons and Worldcoms are healthy for any normal functioning economy. The problem becomes when we have long stretches of no companies going bankrupt then you know something is wrong or there is faulty accounting. We only had to enforce the laws that were already on the books which they were not enforced we didnt need more laws that creates artificial demand for lawyers and accountants. You seem to want a perfect world where there are no bankruptcies and you actually think the government can regulate all the corporations books so there are no more bankruptcies?

Capitalism without bankruptcy is like Christianity without Hell. Remember that.

9. I don't want to go into all the problems with the dodd-frank bill but it has put a lot of people in private business out of work while increasing the federal payroll. Federal employees are already paid the most income compared to percent of the total workforce. EJ touched on this in his last paper. Frank has no idea how to run a business or how the economy is run, he knows politics and that is how his bill is structured.

10. SS can be fixed relatively easy by raising the retirement age and shifting the curve which will allow it to be paid. SS I believe is a 14 trillion dollar off balance sheet obligation but that isnt the kicker, Medicare Part D which has only been around for 5 years is a 16 trillion dollar off balance sheet obligation that has no fix except to say sorry seniors you can't get your drugs. This is the red herring that no one talks about, why? Because they don't look at the freakin numbers!

Back to # 1. This is what EJ predicts. The next congress stops spending which begins the start of the recession 1Q 2013 sending our output gap lower. This is hard to stomach because we have to cut the Federal debt as well as the private debt. The problem is we should have never allowed the asset bubbles to have been created in the first place. Ron Paul is the only candidate that understands this.

I for one would rather go through another 5 years of economic contraction to wipe the debt clean than to continue to push it off and risk the US losing its status as the worlds reserve currency and possibly having a currency event/sudden stop/hyper inflation or default. Although a defauly is unlikely.

We shall see what happens.

Paul is the only candidate that has a chance ( I am not saying he can or will do it) to stop the FIRE economy interests and to end the Fed Reserve. I believe the Fed is the root of our keynesian economic problems. I would rather have severe recessions that last for 1 to 2 years (like we did before the depression and the Fed reserve) than prolonged balance sheet recessions that last for 10 years.

[dcarrigg]

Re: Conan Parodies Ron Paul Ad

Carig, you have a clear post here and concise but I would like to address some issues that I don't think you are understand about Paul's positions.

Hi PoZ. I'll try to explain better where it is I'm coming from below. Perhaps we can come to some mutual understanding and a better idea of where we differ through this process. I will start by explaining myself as a pragmatist. I put faith in neither government nor free market, but rather in our ability as individuals and societies to find solutions problems that are realistic and workable.

You may find my lack of faith in "The Market" disturbing. But if so, that is simply because experience has taught me that there are bad people out there - predators who must be policed. Since the market consists of individuals transacting deals, some individuals (not all or even most) are inevitably predators. This one basic fact probably is the genesis of our philosophical divide.

Put another way, anarchy works great, if not for all the a**holes.

First, as EJ posted a picture back in 2008 of all the candidates running for President he said Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich were the only 2 anti-Fire candidates. The picture is posted below. So EJ sees policies in Paul that are anti-Fire.

You may be right there. He may be the closest thing we have to that. But why the elimination of capital gains, estate tax and financial regulation if you're anti-FIRE? I've noticed a subtle change there in the RP 2012 website. Maybe I'm wrong...who knows?

2. The idea that corporations already pay Zero income tax is just that an idea. Do you really think the government gets all its revenue from individuals? Because that is what you are saying by stating that corporations already do not pay income taxes. Where do you suppose the revenue comes from for the government?

Actually, I don't need to suppose where revenue comes from. The IRS documents it. Here, I took the picture from the Heritage Foundation, just so I can't be accused of being a lefty on this one:



The corporate tax is minuscule compared to what individuals pay. This is because lots of the biggest corporations pay 0 in taxes. That's what's unfair. The little guy and little corp get screwed. The big ones win.

3. There are already family dynasties, I don't understand, have you not heard of the Kennedys, the Rockefellers the Bush's? They already have enough money and enough ways to escape estate taxes that abolishing the estate tax doesn't really matter to them. Abolishing the estate tax will help individuals who have 500k to 5 mil to give to their children not the small amount of individuals who have 100 Mil plus.

Here's what I know. The estate tax exemption is already $10M for a married couple. It only helps people passing on more than $10M to their children who are not creative enough to put it in trust. Put simply, the estate tax does not ever effect anyone passing on less than $5M no matter what. Repelling it does not help anyone in the middle class. I don't understand, when the middle class is hurting so much, why this has so many defenders.

If you want to eliminate a tax, why not start with the income tax and ramp up the others to compensate? Why are the only taxes anyone proposes to eliminate basically taxes that only affect the very affluent? It seems agenda driven to me. And that agenda seems clear. Dismantle the middle class.

To be fair, some welfare policies have the same effect (why work making less than $40k per year if you loose $40k/yr worth of benefits)? If the benefits scaled better to encourage work, safety nets would probably be a lot more effective.

It seems to me that one side protects the affluent the other protects the poor and the middle always seems to get lost in the shuffle. It doesn't have enough interest groups advocating for it. Meanwhile, the people in it are more concerned with helping either the wealthy, who they aspire to be, or the poor, who the pity, than themselves.

4. Ending capital gains taxes allows the average individual to make more money that capital gains tax already hurts more than someone who is "wealthy." If anything it helps the middle class but I would concede that I do see ways it could help wall street win as you say.

I don't understand the first part here. The average individual pays almost nothing in capital gains taxes, because the average individual has almost no investments, save for the 5 figures in the retirement account and the one house that don't get hit with cap gains anyways.

Reagan tied cap gains and income taxes to the same rates. It was probably a smart move. When the government treats investment income preferentially to labor income, it encourages speculation and discourages work and productive investment.

Again, why should the government favor one form of income over another? Why should they not be treated equally?

5. I think Paul understands this and he has said as much in interviews. He realizes that you cannot just close down certain government organizations without transfer plans and I believe he has thoroughly reflected on this and will phase out the organizations over a period of time. I would assume most of the 1 tril cut will come from the military industrial complex.

If this is true, he should be more explicit about it. Many people, including me, would feel better about his candidacy. But he did talk explicitly about just shutting down 5 government departments. It can be done, but better explaining how and why is important to me, anyways. I need reasons other than the "we're broke" argument one always hears. Perhaps that will come with time as he refines his policy positions.

6. It does not invite problems when the states should have the right to sue another state which pollutes its waters or air. The same goes for property owners. As long as property rights are strong there should not be a problem. Will there be instances of abuse? Of course there will be just like there are now.

Perhaps. But without regulations governing Federal standards I could just as easily see a "race to the bottom" with state environmental standards. E.g. "We'll move jobs to your state if you eliminate pollution controls." To some extent this does happen now. The EPA is not perfect.

This is not the biggest sticking point in my mind either. But sometimes federal standards make it easier to operate businesses too rather than keeping track of 50 differing standards. It could lead to many cases along the lines of Bibb vs. Navajo Freight Lines. The courts would likely work through this in time, but it would take a good long while of growing pains.

7. Our companies need capital because as much as the MSM is reporting that these companies are flush with capital over the last 3 years it is a mirage. http://www.usatoday.com/money/compan...les/51346848/1

They have actually taken on more debt at artifically low interest rates and at some point they will have to roll over that debt at most likely ever higher cost of capital. Will some of that money be paid out to executives? I have no doubt in my mind but I do know that most of that cash will be used to bolster their balance sheet and/or capital improvements.

Regardless, they're certainly not lining up to hire folks. And nothing I've heard from any candidate realistically addresses this fact or has any sort of workable proposed solution to that problem. RP would say that it's not the government's job to help spur job growth. At least that's an honest answer as far as he's concerned.

But I'd like to hear something outside of the box. How about student loan forgiveness for entrepreneurs that hire? How about a varying corporate tax rate based on the number and average salaries of jobs created? How about renegotiating trade deals that bleed jobs (particularly with Asia - these trade deals are not just "free" - they were all negotiated)? These are just a few ideas off the top of my head. They may not even be very good ideas, but at least they're addressing the jobs problem. I've heard nothing so creative from any candidate, including Obama's jobs act (which equals more bad trade deals, underfunding social security and medicare, and that's about it).

8. Having Enrons and Worldcoms are healthy for any normal functioning economy. The problem becomes when we have long stretches of no companies going bankrupt then you know something is wrong or there is faulty accounting. We only had to enforce the laws that were already on the books which they were not enforced we didnt need more laws that creates artificial demand for lawyers and accountants. You seem to want a perfect world where there are no bankruptcies and you actually think the government can regulate all the corporations books so there are no more bankruptcies?

Capitalism without bankruptcy is like Christianity without Hell. Remember that.

No. No. No. This is probably my biggest sticking point in this debate. No. Enron and Worldcom are not healthy for any normal functioning economy. They are criminal enterprises brought forth by greed. They willfully cooked the books. The executives were wolves posing as shepherds. They were criminal. They destroyed enterprises for personal gain at the expense of employees and stockholders.

Criminals are not healthy for any part of society, never mind the economy. Bankruptcy is one thing, criminality is another. But even bankruptcy laws have been skewed to protect derivatives holders and punish students. It wasn't this way 10 years ago. Get bankruptcy law right first, then maybe this works. But as it is, Chapter 11 is often merely an excuse to reneg on labor deals. Look at American Airlines. There's an example of a CEO taking a moral stand on the issue and stepping down.

Sometimes Chapter 11 is necessary. There is nothing wrong with some companies going bankrupt sometimes. This is especially true for startups. But often the penalties for going bankrupt are not stiff enough. Especially in a big old corporation whose directors are merely bureaucrats (not entrepreneurs). They didn't start the company, and in the case of Worldcom/Tyco/Enron etc. they didn't care about it either. They just wanted to milk it for personal gain. They broke the law to do so. They are bad Americans. They are criminals.

Criminals belong in jail. This seems simple to me.

9. I don't want to go into all the problems with the dodd-frank bill but it has put a lot of people in private business out of work while increasing the federal payroll. Federal employees are already paid the most income compared to percent of the total workforce. EJ touched on this in his last paper. Frank has no idea how to run a business or how the economy is run, he knows politics and that is how his bill is structured.

The bill has its faults, but prove to me the causal relationship between the bill and people being out of work. I will bet you cannot. This is because most of the layoffs in during this crisis (80-90%) happened before Dodd-Frank was enacted. They happened because of the subprime crisis. Again, google Daniel Sadek. The line that Dodd-Frank caused the employment problem is utter partisan nonsense.

Point me to the actual provisions of the bill that caused an employment problem.

The major problem with the act is that it was not simple and strong and it left too much to the executive branch.

As for the argument for laying off Federal workers during high unemployment, we'll probably have to agree to disagree here. I tend to think it's bad. With a wage and FTE freeze already in place, laying these people off means more competition for limited private sector jobs. This drives wages down and hampers recovery. That's at least the way I see it. The time to lay off public sector workers is when the private sector is healthy, not the other way around, I think.

10. SS can be fixed relatively easy by raising the retirement age and shifting the curve which will allow it to be paid. SS I believe is a 14 trillion dollar off balance sheet obligation but that isnt the kicker, Medicare Part D which has only been around for 5 years is a 16 trillion dollar off balance sheet obligation that has no fix except to say sorry seniors you can't get your drugs. This is the red herring that no one talks about, why? Because they don't look at the freakin numbers!

Agreed. Medicare is a big problem. Part D is a big part of it. SS is not a problem. At least we're on the same page here.

Back to # 1. This is what EJ predicts. The next congress stops spending which begins the start of the recession 1Q 2013 sending our output gap lower. This is hard to stomach because we have to cut the Federal debt as well as the private debt. The problem is we should have never allowed the asset bubbles to have been created in the first place. Ron Paul is the only candidate that understands this.

Perhaps. I don't know that we have to cut the Federal debt so hard so early, though. Hunger for T-Bills has not subsided yet, regardless of S&P. In an unpredictable world, the U.S. still seems like a good bet to me.

I for one would rather go through another 5 years of economic contraction to wipe the debt clean than to continue to push it off and risk the US losing its status as the worlds reserve currency and possibly having a currency event/sudden stop/hyper inflation or default. Although a defauly is unlikely.

I guess this is where we differ too. Default just means setting up new rules to the game. The US is still the big dog on the block. What are the consequences of it? A new fiscal/monetary system? Who will force austerity on us? Dare anyone do it at the barrel of a gun? I don't think so.

Loosing status as the world's reserve currency would be problematic, but what would replace it? Would the US not force consequences on those who move to do so? I don't think we're in as weak a position as all that. In fact, I'd venture to say the US is the nation in the best position in the world to rack up debt then default with little consequence. It may not be a good "moral" lesson, but it's the reality of the situation.

Inflation is probably already baked in. What I fear is high inflation in tandem with wage deflation. Regardless of whether Paul, Romney or Obama's at the helm, I think that's what we're getting. And it's scary. What happens when filling the oil tank in the winter is a month's pay? I fear we shall find out this winter.

We shall see what happens.

Indeed.

Paul is the only candidate that has a chance ( I am not saying he can or will do it) to stop the FIRE economy interests and to end the Fed Reserve. I believe the Fed is the root of our keynesian economic problems. I would rather have severe recessions that last for 1 to 2 years (like we did before the depression and the Fed reserve) than prolonged balance sheet recessions that last for 10 years.

History, my friend, does not bare this out as the inevitable consequential choices resultant from the lack of a Federal Reserve.


In fact, this time reminds me of the 1880s in many ways. It's worth looking up.

Thank you, PoZ, for the thoughtful response.

[lektrode]

Re: Conan Parodies Ron Paul Ad

Been holed up with a broken leg and surgery. Just got switched from the heavy stuff to lighter painkillers, and I feel as though I can think again.....

whew! ouch dc = sorry to hear but glad to see yer 'up and about' once again...

now if we can just get you to clean out yer inbox....

[lektrode]

Re: Conan Parodies Ron Paul Ad

see what i mean about touching the itulip 3rd rail, PoZ ?

you just got a tingle from dc here, would expect a return jolt or 2 from mr c1ue..... any time now.

but seriously, Poz... altho i sense you learn much quicker than most (me, anyway) dc and c1ue happen to be a couple of the best debaters here and nobody puts more up on the various 'tulip forums than mr c1ue (well maybe 'sides Don) -
and there's few who can out-search, copy/paste, compile and type, never mind put up hard-data to drive home a point, like both these dudes can and will (at the drop of a hat ;)

but eye can see that you aint no slouch yerself = welcome aboard! glad to have ya (since it can get pretty damn challenging round here to keep up with the 'loyal opposition' is all i'm gonna stick my neck out with - beyond that, yer on yer own, good luck...

[lektrode]

Re: Conan Parodies Ron Paul Ad

I have real respect for you, c1ue, but I find myself in agreement with mikedev10 here.

+2
but methinks maybe mr c1ue is going to come back with a doozy of a reply
that is if he isnt still working with D&G over on the ag land bubble issue...
or hey! he might even still be working
(and some of us are kinda vaguely reminiscing on that concept... working, i mean - like for pay?)

[WildspitzE]

Re: Conan Parodies Ron Paul Ad

History, my friend, does not bare this out as the inevitable consequential choices resultant from the lack of a Federal Reserve.


In fact, this time reminds me of the 1880s in many ways. It's worth looking up.

Looks like a fine and elucidating conversation is brewing between the two of you; don't intend to get in the middle of it or derail it. Just have an observation based on the quote above and the original thought that it is in response to, because it points to something that I've noticed.

Most of the contemporary or public End the Fed conversations that I've seen revolve around, well, just ending the Fed. Does this seem incomplete to you? Or is the conversation a short-hand for broader implied reforms?

For example, it is rare for me to see a conversation about this topic that includes the convention or construct that gave birth to the Fed. Its raison d'etre was justified largely by the failures of fractional reserve lending and its kin (and the leverage associated with it). We had depressions (and a gold standard) before the Fed and without addressing the root causes we would probably see it rise from the ashes again years from now. The Fed is the third central bank to be created in the US; would there be a fourth?

Also as Ending the Fed approaches certainty, don't underestimate the interests vying for a shot at creating or being the replacement. The process is glazed over. This will not be an easy discourse and the results may actually be worse (not necessarily a deterrent to reform, but we should go in with our eyes open if we do). Most people suffer from the illusion of control, so this process would make for interesting theater!

Mr. Paul seems to read and be advised on these topics, so I'm sure that he knows all of this. It's probably why his main focus has been to simply push for a Fed audit.

He probably believes the results of which will open a monster sized can of worms (whether he is elected or not).

[ProdigyofZen]

Re: Conan Parodies Ron Paul Ad

I know well the history of the Fed and the history of Central Banking in the United States. You are correct the Fed is the 3rd Central Bank but it is night and day different from the first two. Mainly the fact that the first two had 20 year charters that the people aka Congress could vote on and end or not renew the charter.

This is the reason why the first bank ended because the people decided it was not a productive institute. The second charter ended as well under Andrew Jackson and he made it his crusade to end the bank. That is when we entered the free banking era of the United States where we had the greatest prosperity of any nation until the Fed was introduced in 1913.

The reason the Fed was introduced in 1913 was due to the Panic of 1907 (there is a good book out about this) where liquidity dried up on the stock exchange and there was no margin to trade on. In summation, supposedly this was told to John Pierpont Morgan who went to the trading "post" aka stock exchange and told the traders that tomorrow there would be margin to do trades. That night he rounded up the heads of the top 20 banks and persuaded them to lend capital so that trading could continue.

JP Morgan along with the Warburgs and a few other banking family dynasties got together with Senator Aldrich to draw up the plans for the Federal Reserve in 1911 in Jekyll Island Georgia. The main difference the Fed was granted compared to the other CBs of the US was that they had free reign and could not be abolished by an act of Congress. It became a quasi public-private institution.

We were never supposed to have a bank like the Fed and the founders of this nation knew that Central Banking would destroy us. They drew upon the events of France, namely John Law's foray into money printing in France.

I am for a 20 year charter like we had before on a CB and that the people and Congress should vote on this institution.

Thomas Jefferson said "The central bank is an institution of the most deadly hostility existing against the Principles and form of our Constitution. I am an Enemy to all banks discounting bills or notes for anything but Coin. If the American People allow private banks to control the issuance of their currency, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the People of all their Property until their Children will wake up homeless on the continent their Fathers conquered."

Please see the attached picture. This is the first instance of the "vampire squid" right click and select open in new window or tab. I believe this picture is very sagacious.

[jiimbergin]

Re: Conan Parodies Ron Paul Ad

There is a very interesting book on the FED that I know many itulipers have read. http://www.amazon.com/Creature-Jekyl...4396178&sr=8-1

[lektrode]

Re: Conan Parodies Ron Paul Ad

I am for a 20 year charter like we had before on a CB and that the people and Congress should vote on this institution.

Thomas Jefferson said "The central bank is an institution of the most deadly hostility existing against the Principles and form of our Constitution. I am an Enemy to all banks discounting bills or notes for anything but Coin. If the American People allow private banks to control the issuance of their currency, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the People of all their Property until their Children will wake up homeless on the continent their Fathers conquered."

+1
and then some, esp ole TJ = truer words have never been spoken.
and normally i'm all for having 'the people' vote on most all matters of consequence, in fact i think it ought to be REQUIRED somehow (using the means, as per The X Factor), with maybe something along the lines of:
want to keep your drivers license? you MUST vote/express your opinion on certain matters that are then compiled and presented to congress for further deliberation.

but until something like this comes to pass, having most people in The US get anywhere near 'voting on a central bank' scares the livin crap out of me, as most people - too many anyway - cant seem to grasp even keeping their checkbooks balanced (as evidenced by the dust up re overdraft fees and ATM charges) never mind getting in over their heads with car payments, mortgages, HELOC's, .edu loans
(the banksters marketing tactics and RE fraud aside, you get my point)

"...at the tone, please deposit .02..."

[c1ue]

Re: Conan Parodies Ron Paul Ad

c1ue, i don't understand how you can blame these things on the libertarian view of a free market (while none of them appear to be)

What is the definition of a free market?

A free market is defined as a market absent regulation or any other type of control other than supply and demand. Specifically, unrestrained by government interference, regulation, or subsidy.

Now for the examples...

education - and i'll assume we're talking about college here - my understanding is that student loans cannot be discharged in bankruptcy, and that they are also 100% guaranteed by the federal government. i do not even understand how sallie mae can lose money under that system. rather than lend to much like housing and get bailed out, they seem like they are incented to never worry about lending too much because they have a built in perpetual bailout. what does any of this system have to do with what a libertarian believes is a free market though?

In education - you can say that government subsidy is affecting the price of education via loan guarantees, but this is confusing the cause.

The cause is that a university education is a monopoly bottleneck for young people to get better jobs.

Why do I say so? Because governments in Europe and Asia equally, or even more so, subsidize education for their youth. Yet they don't have the ridiculous price dynamic we're seeing here in the US.

Thus is the problem the government student loan guarantee or is it something else?

We have other ways of looking at this problem: for one thing, Sally Mae and the government student loan setup is a relatively recent phenomenon. It was created in 1972.

Was Harvard affordable for everyday people in 1970?

Not really.

http://www.thecrimson.com/article/20...tuition-hikes/

In 1970, Harvard cost $4,070, which was less than half of the median family income, then $9,870.

Sure, it is less affordable now in median income terms, but it was never cheap.

The primary effect of Sallie Mae was to simply put the already existent college education oligopoly on steroids - it was not the cause.

health care - the price discovery mechanism is broken, people don't use health insurance as a catastrophic risk mitigation device - they use it for that and as a prepaid service and use it differently because it is tied to employers rather than themselves, a tie apparently made as the result of ww2 wage free tax exemptions passed to allow companies to compete for talented labor via benefits. this still doesn't sound all that free markety to me?

While it is true that the existing form of the payments side of the health care system was skewed toward employer-sponsored health care plans for the working, and Medicare for the aged, this dynamic doesn't explain why the cost of health care is so ridiculously high.

Under "free market" theory, no matter where the payments come from, there should always be enough competition to provide health care services such that prices will be kept low. After all, this cost dynamic does not exist in auto insurance, life insurance, or pretty much any other form of insurance?

The price discovery aspect is broken as you say, but why? In any and every other nation, there is no problem with price discovery. You can find it in the newspaper. You can find it on the Internet. You can call and get an answer from the providers.

Yet you cannot do this in the US - even trying hard to do so yields little result.

So is the government preventing this? I think not.

Markets can as easily evolve into oligopoly as they can evolve into monopoly. What we have now is clearly oligopoly - and the government had nothing to do with it.

As I've said over and over again - merely because government is not involved doesn't mean it is a 'free market'. Such a structure exists primarily in theory because sooner or later the competitors realize that there's more profit in sharing and shearing the customers than squeezing each other.

housing - weren't ultra low interest rates for an ultra long time the result of the choice of men, not of markets?

Saying that ultra low interest rates were the cause of the housing bubble ignores the many other factors: the mortgage interest deduction. The President of the US touting an ownership society and the Chairman of the Federal Reserve touting adjustable rate mortgages. The FHA. Trump and Kiyosaki. etc etc.

Were these the 'free' choice of men or were these the result of actions by the real estate industry?

From my view, while the government was involved in pumping up the housing bubble, the proximate cause was the real estate industry and banks: lobbying for lower interest rates, lobbying for less regulation, lobbying for tax breaks, making bad loans, ratings agency pay for play, etc etc.

Let me put this another way:

If we could wave a magic wand and make all 3 areas above into the 'free market' in fact fix anything?

Would killing off government loan guarantees and removing the student loan lifetime attachment suddenly make college affordable?

Would removing Medicare and employer sponsored health insurance make health care suddenly affordable?

Would raising interest rates make housing affordable?

The answer in all 3 cases is: No

Free markets make the following series of assumptions which rarely prove out in practice:

1) That no competitor gains an insuperable edge over the competition and thus dominates the market.

You can see examples where this hypothesis failed even in actual practice: The JP Morgan buyout of Carnegie to form US Steel. Carnegie's innovation was literally crushing all other steel makers; rather than Carnegie growing to dominate the steel market in the US and/or competitors adapting/adopting, JP Morgan LBO'd Carnegie Steel.

2) That competitors in a given industry don't decide to collaborate rather than compete

We have innumerable examples here.

3) That a given market is predisposed toward monopoly or oligopoly.

Microsoft is an example, so are things like bridges and hospitals.

That is when we entered the free banking era of the United States where we had the greatest prosperity of any nation until the Fed was introduced in 1913.

Right, except for the 19 recessions and depressions from the end of Jackson's Presidency until 1913:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of..._United_States

This included the Long Depression, which in many respects could be considered worse than the Great Depression.

But of course you seem to have conveniently ignored these facts.

[ProdigyofZen]

Re: Conan Parodies Ron Paul Ad

Hi PoZ. I'll try to explain better where it is I'm coming from below. Perhaps we can come to some mutual understanding and a better idea of where we differ through this process. I will start by explaining myself as a pragmatist. I put faith in neither government nor free market, but rather in our ability as individuals and societies to find solutions problems that are realistic and workable.

You may find my lack of faith in "The Market" disturbing. But if so, that is simply because experience has taught me that there are bad people out there - predators who must be policed. Since the market consists of individuals transacting deals, some individuals (not all or even most) are inevitably predators. This one basic fact probably is the genesis of our philosophical divide.

Put another way, anarchy works great, if not for all the a**holes.

Actually Carig, I agree with you that the world is full of predators and that they should be policed. In fact I have no problem with a police force and states/cities being able to tax the citizens to establish a police force. This is the way things were suppose to work. But as we have seen no Federal organization can stop a Madoff. He kept the game going for well over 10 years and 99.9% of people did not even have a c1ue including the Federal regulators.

How is more regulation going to stop the next Madoff when it is the same regulators who were tasked with finding the original Madoff? What is this mythical regulation that everyone speaks of but humans acting on their own hunches or information they have received? People think because you add another layer or more regulators that you will find more fraud. It is preposterous and a function of Senators/Congressmen trying to write legislation that shows "they care" and are "doing something" about X event. Most of the time the solutions become the problem.

You may be right there. He may be the closest thing we have to that. But why the elimination of capital gains, estate tax and financial regulation if you're anti-FIRE? I've noticed a subtle change there in the RP 2012 website. Maybe I'm wrong...who knows?

RP actually advocates the elimination of the Federal Income Tax but has stated before that he cannot eliminate the Income Tax until we cut government to a minimum level. I believe he would gradually lower the Fed Income Tax as he brings the level of spending and size of the government down. Again it is a process not an event. Sometimes people continue to think as a suddent event than as a gradual process. Politicians do a horrible job of managing this expectation.

RP is for the elimination of most taxes on everyone, not just the wealthy. The states on the other hand should be allowed to tax which is part of creating competition between the states. Again this is not idealistic, this is the way our Republic was originally established.

I would rather work toward a closer conceptualization to that Republic Ideal than to work toward more government and more tyranny or social and economic intrusion.

Actually, I don't need to suppose where revenue comes from. The IRS documents it. Here, I took the picture from the Heritage Foundation, just so I can't be accused of being a lefty on this one:



The corporate tax is minuscule compared to what individuals pay. This is because lots of the biggest corporations pay 0 in taxes. That's what's unfair. The little guy and little corp get screwed. The big ones win.



Here's what I know. The estate tax exemption is already $10M for a married couple. It only helps people passing on more than $10M to their children who are not creative enough to put it in trust. Put simply, the estate tax does not ever effect anyone passing on less than $5M no matter what. Repelling it does not help anyone in the middle class. I don't understand, when the middle class is hurting so much, why this has so many defenders.

If you want to eliminate a tax, why not start with the income tax and ramp up the others to compensate? Why are the only taxes anyone proposes to eliminate basically taxes that only affect the very affluent? It seems agenda driven to me. And that agenda seems clear. Dismantle the middle class.

To be fair, some welfare policies have the same effect (why work making less than $40k per year if you loose $40k/yr worth of benefits)? If the benefits scaled better to encourage work, safety nets would probably be a lot more effective.

It seems to me that one side protects the affluent the other protects the poor and the middle always seems to get lost in the shuffle. It doesn't have enough interest groups advocating for it. Meanwhile, the people in it are more concerned with helping either the wealthy, who they aspire to be, or the poor, who the pity, than themselves.

Carig, you took my bait here. I expected you to look up where the government derives its revenue and to realize that large corporations pay less tax because they are politically connected in ways that a small corporation is not.

This is the reason that RP advocates elimination of corporate taxes because he knows that he will help small corporations or small business 10x the amount it will help large corporations since they already pay minimal taxes! I will not address the individual tax levels because I did so in the previous paragraph.

It seems I am in error and did not know the estate tax is for 10mil+. But again the concept here is that taxes should be at minimal levels on most individuals. Maybe a solution could be set up where once you make X (say 5mil) amount you pay 10% of your income in taxes but I could see caveats with that.

This is where RP comes in because as I stated above he wants to eliminate all the taxes he can on the individual, he is not working for either side he is working on the ideal that was the original constitution.

Federal Taxes only exist to legitamize the Federal Reserve. Ask yourself what year was the Fed created and what year were Federal Income Taxes made a permanent fixture with the 16th amendment and tell me that they are not directly correlated!

"

In 1913, the 16th Amendment to the Constitution made the income tax a permanent fixture in the U.S. tax system. The amendment gave Congress legal authority to tax income and resulted in a revenue law that taxed incomes of both individuals and corporations. In fiscal year 1918, annual internal revenue collections for the first time passed the billion-dollar mark, rising to $5.4 billion by 1920. With the advent of World War II, employment increased, as did tax collections—to $7.3 billion. The withholding tax on wages was introduced in 1943 and was instrumental in increasing the number of taxpayers to 60 million and tax collections to $43 billion by 1945.

Read more: History of the Income Tax in the United States — Infoplease.com http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A00059...#ixzz1h5kFtDrk"

It wasn't enough that Congress now had full authority to tax at X level but both parties also wanted to eliminate the gold standard in order to deficit spend into oblivion for the military complex and for the welfare state. It is statists of all persuasions who want to continue the status quo and to create more money to spend on X products. Please read this article by Alan Greenspan titled "Gold and Economic Freedom."

http://www.321gold.com/fed/greenspan/1966.html

EJ actually linked to this article. I cannot say it any better than Greenspan did in 1966.

In my view if you are agaisnt a form of gold standard than you are agaisnt liberty and freedom for a nation. This is why I oppose the Federal Reserve. I will touch more on this at the end of my writing.

Actually BOTH sides protect the rich and neither side protects the poor or middle class. I would be weary of anyone who said to me I am from the government and I am here to help. There is a reason why Democrats have controlled the inner cities of out nation for the last 80 years and yet they have only become progressively worse.

When one party comes out and says "We are the party of the common man and we are the party that protects the poor" that is akin to a car salesman saying " I have the best used cars and 100% satisfactory rating with no lemons!"

I have great distrusts for most Liberals who state this because they have an agenda and their agenda is power and control by keeping the poor POOR! If they enacated policies that really helped the poor and helped them create their own business and rise into the middle class than naturally they would lose their voting block. When people own their own business usually they are republican.

Remember politics are about who can get the most votes and power. Liberals are incentivized to keep their voting block poor and non-white.

I don't understand the first part here. The average individual pays almost nothing in capital gains taxes, because the average individual has almost no investments, save for the 5 figures in the retirement account and the one house that don't get hit with cap gains anyways.

Reagan tied cap gains and income taxes to the same rates. It was probably a smart move. When the government treats investment income preferentially to labor income, it encourages speculation and discourages work and productive investment.

Again, why should the government favor one form of income over another? Why should they not be treated equally?

But the average individual should aspire to invest and save for the future. The problem is we tax them then we tax their investments and they think they can never get ahead so they don't save and invest.

Sorry but a house is not an investment or a nest egg, I would hope people would realize this by now.

Correct the government should not favor one income over another, they should both be taxed at Zero just like RP says. Again this happens as a process not an event.

If this is true, he should be more explicit about it. Many people, including me, would feel better about his candidacy. But he did talk explicitly about just shutting down 5 government departments. It can be done, but better explaining how and why is important to me, anyways. I need reasons other than the "we're broke" argument one always hears. Perhaps that will come with time as he refines his policy positions.

Obviously RP has reasons other than "we don't have the money for it anymore." It is in the Constitution NOT to have all these agencies. It is as simple as that. The other night Jay Leno asked RP who his favorite president was and you want to know RPs response?

He said Groover Cleveland, and you want to know why? Because Cleveland vetoed bills at an astronomical pace compared to all other presidents and he loved the Gold Standard. He was also a democrat.

Watch this video from the other night on Jay Leno. RP on Jay Leno. I would watch all 4 parts.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pykFc...ture=endscreen

Listen to the reactions he gets from the crowd and I would say most of that crowd at the Leno show are Democrats. He will easily beat Obama in a general election, it is the primary he will have a hard time winning.

If you want you can fast forward to 5:20 on the video where RP starts talking about taxation, welfare state and policing the world. He says that we cannot eliminate Fed Taxes without eliminating those first!!!

I don't believe most people are really listening to what Paul says.

Perhaps. But without regulations governing Federal standards I could just as easily see a "race to the bottom" with state environmental standards. E.g. "We'll move jobs to your state if you eliminate pollution controls." To some extent this does happen now. The EPA is not perfect.

This is not the biggest sticking point in my mind either. But sometimes federal standards make it easier to operate businesses too rather than keeping track of 50 differing standards. It could lead to many cases along the lines of Bibb vs. Navajo Freight Lines. The courts would likely work through this in time, but it would take a good long while of growing pains.



Regardless, they're certainly not lining up to hire folks. And nothing I've heard from any candidate realistically addresses this fact or has any sort of workable proposed solution to that problem. RP would say that it's not the government's job to help spur job growth. At least that's an honest answer as far as he's concerned.

But I'd like to hear something outside of the box. How about student loan forgiveness for entrepreneurs that hire? How about a varying corporate tax rate based on the number and average salaries of jobs created? How about renegotiating trade deals that bleed jobs (particularly with Asia - these trade deals are not just "free" - they were all negotiated)? These are just a few ideas off the top of my head. They may not even be very good ideas, but at least they're addressing the jobs problem. I've heard nothing so creative from any candidate, including Obama's jobs act (which equals more bad trade deals, underfunding social security and medicare, and that's about it).

Look I think the jobs issue and the economy is addressed on this site a lot. Again the problem is we should have never allowed the bubbles to exist in the first place and I am confident that Paul as President would foresee this because he has.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A5nGCpzel6o Ron Paul predicting the housing bubble back in 2002.

The only solution currently in my mind to fix the economy is to cut the debt at least 50% across the board. This will cause the capitalist class who were supposed to take the losses to actually take the losses! Capitalism is about loss plain and simple.

No. No. No. This is probably my biggest sticking point in this debate. No. Enron and Worldcom are not healthy for any normal functioning economy. They are criminal enterprises brought forth by greed. They willfully cooked the books. The executives were wolves posing as shepherds. They were criminal. They destroyed enterprises for personal gain at the expense of employees and stockholders.

Criminals are not healthy for any part of society, never mind the economy. Bankruptcy is one thing, criminality is another. But even bankruptcy laws have been skewed to protect derivatives holders and punish students. It wasn't this way 10 years ago. Get bankruptcy law right first, then maybe this works. But as it is, Chapter 11 is often merely an excuse to reneg on labor deals. Look at American Airlines. There's an example of a CEO taking a moral stand on the issue and stepping down.

Sometimes Chapter 11 is necessary. There is nothing wrong with some companies going bankrupt sometimes. This is especially true for startups. But often the penalties for going bankrupt are not stiff enough. Especially in a big old corporation whose directors are merely bureaucrats (not entrepreneurs). They didn't start the company, and in the case of Worldcom/Tyco/Enron etc. they didn't care about it either. They just wanted to milk it for personal gain. They broke the law to do so. They are bad Americans. They are criminals.

Criminals belong in jail. This seems simple to me.

Unfortunately you cannot legislate criminals away, the same way you cannot legislate murderers away or stop them from murdering.

This is a fallacy. My position is that no human can stop a firm from being faudalent or from committing fraud for the most part. If they want to do it they will do it.

You have to change the people and the culture of people but we ALL must accept that there are adulterous, vile, evil, criminals, murderers, happy, sad, energetic, hard working and saintly people.

This is what makes us human and you cannot take that away. This is also what provides variety in life. There are supposed to be monumental failures and successes. There should be fraud, you cannot take it away and once you accept this fact people will sleep better at night. All of these things are healthy for a society.

Please read this paper on Risk by Nassim Taleb. http://www.fooledbyrandomness.com/ForeignAffairs.pdf

Part of the reason there are so many problems in the Middle East is the fact that we propped up dictators that surppressed the fundametalist view of a portion of the citizens in those countries. So natually when that dictator is ousted the group who takes control is the radical fundamentalists! Like what you see happening in Egypt.

The bill has its faults, but prove to me the causal relationship between the bill and people being out of work. I will bet you cannot. This is because most of the layoffs in during this crisis (80-90%) happened before Dodd-Frank was enacted. They happened because of the subprime crisis. Again, google Daniel Sadek. The line that Dodd-Frank caused the employment problem is utter partisan nonsense.

Point me to the actual provisions of the bill that caused an employment problem.

The major problem with the act is that it was not simple and strong and it left too much to the executive branch.

As for the argument for laying off Federal workers during high unemployment, we'll probably have to agree to disagree here. I tend to think it's bad. With a wage and FTE freeze already in place, laying these people off means more competition for limited private sector jobs. This drives wages down and hampers recovery. That's at least the way I see it. The time to lay off public sector workers is when the private sector is healthy, not the other way around, I think.

http://reversemortgagedaily.com/2011...-report-finds/

Look I can tell you that GS, MS, JPM have all shut down their prop trading part of the broker dealers due to Dodd Frank. I have personal experience with it. But read that article.

FYI I never said the Dodd-Frank bill caused the employment problem because it didnt. But I will say that it is affecting employment in the financial services industry now.

Agreed. Medicare is a big problem. Part D is a big part of it. SS is not a problem. At least we're on the same page here.

we agree here. but SS is a ponzi scheme and I disagree with it fundamentally.

Perhaps. I don't know that we have to cut the Federal debt so hard so early, though. Hunger for T-Bills has not subsided yet, regardless of S&P. In an unpredictable world, the U.S. still seems like a good bet to me.

Yes we are the least ugliest duckling in the pond for now. We shall see what happens but I do know in the next 2-3 years the US will have the worst balance sheet term structure of any nation in the world.

Every 1% increase in the cost of capital increases our debt by 140 Bil and it gets exponentially worse after the first 1% increase. We roll over 50% of our debt every year and if we have X amount of our debt rolled over at ever lower interest rates then when interest rates do rise (if they can or do) then we will have to renew more than 50% of our debt at ever higher interest rates.

I guess this is where we differ too. Default just means setting up new rules to the game. The US is still the big dog on the block. What are the consequences of it? A new fiscal/monetary system? Who will force austerity on us? Dare anyone do it at the barrel of a gun? I don't think so.

Loosing status as the world's reserve currency would be problematic, but what would replace it? Would the US not force consequences on those who move to do so? I don't think we're in as weak a position as all that. In fact, I'd venture to say the US is the nation in the best position in the world to rack up debt then default with little consequence. It may not be a good "moral" lesson, but it's the reality of the situation.

Inflation is probably already baked in. What I fear is high inflation in tandem with wage deflation. Regardless of whether Paul, Romney or Obama's at the helm, I think that's what we're getting. And it's scary. What happens when filling the oil tank in the winter is a month's pay? I fear we shall find out this winter.

Look EJ has already addressed this in his paper on The Boston Fed Meeting. The Fed is in an improbably position. If you havent read it I suggest you go read it. The Fed needs inflation and ultra low interest rates but the problem because when they arent able to control that inflation aka raise interest rates above the inflation rate when needed. This could cause a bond collapse in the US.

Indeed.

History, my friend, does not bare this out as the inevitable consequential choices resultant from the lack of a Federal Reserve.


In fact, this time reminds me of the 1880s in many ways. It's worth looking up.

Thank you, PoZ, for the thoughtful response.

Look I have read about all the panics including the first panic of 1819. I understand that under a gold standard there are panics and severe devaulations.

The long depression was really just a recession the real depression was in the 1930s, it is funny how the names change over time. This is currently being called the Great Recession but in the future it may be called the Longest Depression, who knows.

I never stated that there werent recessions or severe collapse before the Fed. I am saying our current problems are directly caused by the Feds monetary policies. In fact right now I am reading a large analytical write up on Fiat Money Inflation in France to get an understanding of what may transpire here. Obviously we need higher inflation but I am not sold on the Fed being able to control it before it reaches a hyperinflationary event.

The problem with my statement above is "control" There should be no CB controlling the money supply.

It was Mayer Amschel Rothschild who said

"permit me to issue and coin the money of a nation and I care not who makes the laws"

This was sagacious writing for his time. Congress is supposed to coin the money of our nation NOT the Fed.

The Fed is the root of our deficit spending and ever increasing money supply coupled with going off the gold standard.

Here is a chart I created to illustrate the problem. This is the CPI data from 1800 until now. I think the chart will speak for itself.

[ProdigyofZen]

Re: Conan Parodies Ron Paul Ad

lektrode I agree. Please read my long reply to Carig and hopefully it is up to standard for this site .

I will battle to the end of our elegant prose!

[lektrode]

Re: Conan Parodies Ron Paul Ad

Put another way, anarchy works great, if not for all the a**holes.

+1
dunno about anybody else dc, but eye have missed you!

Actually, I don't need to suppose where revenue comes from. The IRS documents it. Here, I took the picture from the Heritage Foundation, just so I can't be accused of being a lefty on this one:

oh no worries there, big guy - some of us (kinda righty types) will VOUCH, SOLIDLY, for you on that one = no sweat.

but this graph brings me to a very interesting question (and point)

if income taxes are considered too low (and i'm swayable on that, mostly due to having been in the '25% bracket', if only recently... and quite briefly, much too briefly in fact - and realizing that '25%' meant a total take of almost 50%)
and they bring in (or TAKE OUT, depending on ones perspective) 'only 41.6%' of revenue, could someone please explain to me WHY IS THE "PAYROLL TAX" (aka: the source of 'entitlement funding') CONSIDERED TOO HIGH? (never mind when socsec is going broke, we have a temp reduction of it called a "tax cut" ?? - and never-even mind that - this temp reduction expiring is now being called a "tax increase" by the dems?? how much wierder can things get....)

and sorry for the digress/rant, (mr astonas ;) but my question is:
how is it that the income tax brings in just slightly more than the payroll tax, when there is such a range/disparity in the rates?

and more importantly, since 'the entitlements' are supposed to be the Number One Budgetary Issue, and considering my preference for targeted user fees for _all_ .gov services: WHY IS THE PAYROLL TAX CAPPED AT only 106k?
if we are going to have an honest debate about taxes vs entitlements/spending, then i think we need to have this one on the table: upping the cap to account for the fact that while the top10%'s income has skyrocketed, their share of the 'payroll tax' has stagnated/declined even - considering it hasnt kept up, nowhere near in fact, with even the fraudulantly calculated CPI

and if the entitlements (socsec, medicare/caid) are The Problem? then lets raise the USER FEES - or more correctly - the INSURANCE premiums for this service - this then TARGETS the tax to the LOAD on expenditures

and THIS is where/why it should begin:

In fact, this time reminds me of the 1880s in many ways. It's worth looking up.

personally, i think its absurd that we have people pullin down high-hundreds of 1000's to hundreds of MILLIONS and only have to kick-in on the 'payroll tax' for the 1st 106k?
and never mind that - when they have upper5 to 6figures+ in 'retirement' ? all also 'entitled' to collect social security?
(which should otherwise be referred to as 'retirement insurance' as we all end up there, just like dying, but a lot of us might not survive merely becoming un-employed vs "retired" in our 60's - never mind in our 50's...)

this to me is a fundamental disconnect from 'fairness' if there ever was one.
(never mind the fact that C-class (ceo) incomes have gone up to an unprecedented 300-400 times the typical wageslave's)

History, my friend, does not bare this out as the inevitable consequential choices resultant from the lack of a Federal Reserve.

and whooo baybee, that we're even close to that situation is damn scary enough and we surely are getting there, if havent already arrived, but for the money printing and the 'safety net' - whose holes are getting bigger/more noticeable by the day.

Thank you, PoZ, for the thoughtful response.

yes +1 to that.
and he's good, isnt he dc?

[WildspitzE]

Re: Conan Parodies Ron Paul Ad

I know well the history of the Fed and the history of Central Banking in the United States. You are correct the Fed is the 3rd Central Bank but it is night and day different from the first two. Mainly the fact that the first two had 20 year charters that the people aka Congress could vote on and end or not renew the charter.

I was largely writing to the proverbial "you" based on the topic you two were discussing, and my post was not intended to challenge or make you - specifically - feel as if I was challenging your knowledge of Fed history. I'm sure that you know the history of the Fed relatively well; given my audience (i.e. itulipers), I assume that such is the case. The current "version number" for our Fed was used as a literary - tongue and cheek - tool to illustrate one of my main points (and what I think is lacking from most public discourse). By delving into these "version" related details you missed (or at least didn't address) one of my questions for you all. That is, if we don't address the underlying causes and/or justifications used in the past to create the Fed, would we probably see it again in the future?

The main public justification for its creation basically was/is: the elimination of the risks that cause a "bank run" (and the associated crises that come with systemic loss of confidence, particularly in the banking system).

In other words, a backstop to the risks created by the flaws of fractional reserve lending (in the face of the business cycle).

Thus, to the crux, is simply "ending" the Fed enough? Or, do we need to eliminate fractional reserve lending (and its derivative forms) to actually eliminate the risks that the Fed purportedly ameliorates (and thus, end its need)?

The reason the Fed was introduced in 1913 was due to the Panic of 1907 (there is a good book out about this) where liquidity dried up on the stock exchange and there was no margin to trade on. In summation, supposedly this was told to John Pierpont Morgan who went to the trading "post" aka stock exchange and told the traders that tomorrow there would be margin to do trades. That night he rounded up the heads of the top 20 banks and persuaded them to lend capital so that trading could continue.

JP Morgan along with the Warburgs and a few other banking family dynasties got together with Senator Aldrich to draw up the plans for the Federal Reserve in 1911 in Jekyll Island Georgia. The main difference the Fed was granted compared to the other CBs of the US was that they had free reign and could not be abolished by an act of Congress. It became a quasi public-private institution.

Ah, I think that stock margin issues came after the bank (actually mostly trust) runs had started.

The Panic of 1907 - known as the Bank Panic of 1907 (colloquially known as the "Hey, where's my money at?!" Panic) - is one of the largest bank panics (and there were many) in US history (and largest pre-Fed). My recollection, and it is rusty, is that it was triggered by a failed attempt by Heinze (Mercantile Bank), Morse (who controlled several banks), and Barney (President of the Knickerbocker Trust) to corner United Copper [?] on the curb market. As the news of this failed scheme became public (conjecture points to JPM), the precursor of Commerce bank ceased clearing checks for Knickerbocker and Heinze had to quit Mercantile bank...this in turn set off the first runs on these two institutions (also runs on the banks that Morse controlled).

The stock market issues - namely, margin money liquidity drying up, etc - started days after the runs (as liquidity issues made their way through the system).

We were never supposed to have a bank like the Fed and the founders of this nation knew that Central Banking would destroy us. They drew upon the events of France, namely John Law's foray into money printing in France.

I am for a 20 year charter like we had before on a CB and that the people and Congress should vote on this institution.

20 year charter is an interesting idea to try again, as an attempt to build in "earn your place." Wonder how successful it would actually be now a days -- but wouldn't addressing the root causes be more productive?

Thomas Jefferson said "The central bank is an institution of the most deadly hostility existing against the Principles and form of our Constitution. I am an Enemy to all banks discounting bills or notes for anything but Coin. If the American People allow private banks to control the issuance of their currency, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the People of all their Property until their Children will wake up homeless on the continent their Fathers conquered."

Please see the attached picture. This is the first instance of the "vampire squid" right click and select open in new window or tab. I believe this picture is very sagacious.

Yes, the Jeffersonian and Hamiltonian saga did produce some great quotes.

[Eryximachus]

Re: Conan Parodies Ron Paul Ad

I read that article. Angry White Man. I even clicked on the Ron Paul Newsletters link to try and read the letters for myself but they were not to be found. That just about seems like the typical left wing progressive attacking a white man who they deem angry for pointing out certain non PC concepts. You sir can live in the fake vail of society that the media has created but I wish not to.

Everyone knows that black people are faster than whites or asians. How many 100m runners, that have won major competitions,do you know that are white or asian? In fact only one white runner in history has run a sub 10 second 100m and that was a frenchman in 2009. I believe the time was 9.98 or so. It is only good and correct science to realize that their are differences between the three major races. But let me guess you don't think race exists? I will tell you that it doesn't exist in regards to skin color, the skin color of a person is a function of the physical environment that they and their ancestors for the last 100,000 years developed in and it is the least issue to do with what makes someone part of a certain race.

You cannot deny those facts.

But sutter cane you can go back to voting for Obama because you harbour deep seeded white guilt. I get tired of individuals like you perpetuating myths for the sake of political correctness.

I believe it was the wife of JFK who wrote many many negative things about MLK, but she will get a pass of course because she is a liberal democrat and of course if you are a liberal democrat you could never be racist.

Wait I bet you think that only white people can be racist. I will say that the term racist is thrown around very cavalier in society. Most people are ethno-centric not racist. But keep believing in the myths and that all republicans are white racist males.

You have to understand that modern liberalism is a kind of neo-puritanism. It is an extension of the Protestant reformation. They believed all people are made in the image and likeness of god and can achieve salvation through a personal relationship with him. This is what laid the foundation for the egalitarian fantasy, that all humans are equal in ability.

The problem with all fantasies is they require extensive propaganda in order to make people believe them. This was of course why Socrates was executed - you couldn't have people going around saying democracy does not result in choosing wise leaders. And so to this is why people who discuss how intelligence is hereditary are persecuted, whether on this site or in many countries where it is a criminal offense to claim that some people are born stupid or worse that there are obvious measurable differences between people of different ethnicities or EVEN worse, races.

To an extent, you can sympathize with these neo-puritans. They look at the world, and obvious human suffering, and they believe the cause must be oppression. If all people are equal, what else can possibly be an explanation?

The real problem is the cost of maintaining the fantasy is just too high. Europeans are dwindling in number rapidly and will be effectively extinct by the end of the century. China and East Asia is basically the center of genetic studies, they are strongly nationalistic, and couldn't care less about the rest of the world, especially backwards nations. Just look at how China is "investing" in Africa today. Who will take care of these people who don't have the intellectual ability to plan for tomorrow and require complex bureaucracies in order to survive?

To me, political correctness is dead. It is a form of soft-totalitarianism that cannot be maintained any longer. Governments can certainly try even more restrictive measures, but such draconian censorship has never worked. Further, we're really quite close to identifying the genetic signatures that cause variation in intelligence and temperment. As egalitarianism is really the last philosophical relic of Christianity, it took science a bit longer to demolish its intellectual basis. Just as Galileo and Copernicus were persecuted, so too are modern geneticists everywhere outside of East Asia. It didn't work then, and it won't work now.

Humans are tribal by nature, and when the vast bureaucracies of the west cease functioning, such relationships will once again become the cornerstone of society. We will once again what we have always had: many thousands of different human societies that evolve and adapt to their environments. Some will succeed, and most will fail. This is evolution, this is life, and it will always be this way no matter how strong people may yearn for humans to be something that they are not.