Was the 2008 Financial Collapse An Inside Job?
Politics / Market Manipulation Aug 20, 2009 - 01:44 AM GMTBy: Robert_Singer
Maybe it’s the smoke from Mt. Vesuvius that keeps Arianna Huffington and the financial community from seeing that the economic collapse has nothing to do with the Fed "missing" the warning signs leading up to the October meltdown.
“Things do not happen. Things are made to happen.” John F. Kennedy
The Fed didn’t miss anything; the October meltdown was an inside job.
Capitalism never made sense
Professor Ebeling, the Ludwig von Mises professor of Economics at Hillsdale College, understood something was wrong when he wrote: "the perverse development and evolution of historical capitalism, the institutions necessary for a truly free-market economy have been either undermined or prevented from emerging."
But when he claimed, "it is the principles and the meaning of a free-market economy that must be rediscovered" in order to overcome the burden of historical capitalism and save liberty, he should have written that principles must be rediscovered in order to prevent the planet from attempted murder (ecocide).
American "capitalism" and our consumer economy never made economic, environmental or common sense—unless the goal was ecocide.
Capitalism and a not-so-free market economy based on consumer products, that is, products we are manipulated to want, not need, was never sustainable. Consumers consume…the resources of the planet.
Who is responsible?
Arianna said it’s time to "recognize the natural order of things: that is, the very people responsible for the economic collapse not only are still in power, but are still lining their pockets with outrageous windfalls -- courtesy of the American taxpayer.”
The people responsible for the October collapse, our Federal Reserve, also get credit for the windfalls of “Monopoly Money”, created out of thin air, which financed our consumer society.
They are the private credit monopoly of rich and predatory moneylenders that “prey upon the people of the United States for the benefit of themselves.” [1]
For the Benefit of the “middle class” is a more accurate statement.
Those predatory moneylenders gave the middle class the highest standard of living in the world.
Recall when the American economy appeared headed into a recession at the end of the dot-com bubble, the Federal Reserve began slashing short- term interest rates until they reached a historically low one percent. The move re-inflated the economy by allowing homeowners to extract $750 billion in equity from their homes—up from $106 billion in 1996—and apply the dollars toward a multitude of consumer items and other credit card debt.
As interest rates plummeted and alleged home equity artificially soared, buyers were able to afford first and second homes, and they did it by taking out risky mortgages with "teaser rates" similar to those offered by the credit card industry. Even as interest rates adjusted upward, the sponsoring banks used complicated financial derivatives to resell the risky mortgages as "asset-backed paper."
As housing prices edged downward and mortgage rates inched upward, the recession was put on hold with the help of an astonishing 10 to 12 credit card offers per month being delivered to some consumer mailboxes. The credit card companies issued 1.5 billion cards to 158 million cardholders and promised an improbable zero percent interest—some deals for up to 18 months. (Similar to mortgage debt, the credit card debt is put into pools also known as derivatives that are then resold to investment houses, other banks and institutional investors.)
Thank those rich and predatory moneylenders for the short-term interest rates and the liquidity that allowed the debt to be pooled, sold and resold.
But blame them because our hyper-shopping has wreaked havoc on the planet.
Who is Behind the Federal Reserve?
Rockefeller, Kuhn, Loeb and Morgan—all connected to the House of Rothschild’s global financial empire, direct the Federal Reserve to create money out of thin air.
The process that the Federal Reserve, or any bank, uses to create money “consists of making an entry in a book, that is all,” said Graham Towers, governor of the Bank of Canada. “Each and every time a bank makes a loan (a debt) . . . new bank credit is created—brand new money.”
Money used to pay for the Industrial Revolution, orchestrate the Great Depression, the stagflation of the 1970’s and the dot-com and the housing market bubbles, all of which resulted in 60 years of unprecedented prosperity for the middle class.
These scoundrels, all connected to the House of Rothschild, at the beginning of the 20th century, owned or controlled one-sixth of the world’s real wealth: raw materials, commodities, copper, iron ore, petroleum, lead, silver and gold.
So how do they get rich exchanging real wealth for about $500 trillion of the Monopoly money they printed?
They don’t, they are the losers, not the middle class!
Remember those trees we chopped down so just about anyone in America could afford their dream house, or those mountains we blew up so we could have that fat station wagon in our driveway? All of those resources “now used up”, were once owned or controlled by the scoundrels of our history books.
Their real wealth, not yours or mine has been "cut, mined and hauled away so Americans could trash the planet with houses, second houses, cars, RVs, TVs and DVDs— the cheap stuff we associate with the good life that put the planet on the downward spiral to ecocide.
The middle class should be thanking those scoundrels for all that "stuff"—but blame them for conning us into trashing the planet.
The Story of Stuff
The Story of Stuff, an animated video about the underside of our consumer society, believes the scoundrels are a bloated corporation sporting a top hat with a dollar sign etched on its front.
Film narrator, Annie Leonard argues our environmental damage is the result of the greedy corporations externalizing costs (shift them onto the public and the environment) so they can make more money.
But that premise is contradicted on film when Annie stands in line to buy a radio for $4.99 and correctly realizes the price couldn’t possibly capture the cost of the radio but incorrectly concludes that the greedy corporations pollute the environment so they can make more profit. [2]
If profits were the motive, then why wasn’t the radio $5.99? A price anyone would consider a "throw away" or loss leader.
We have come to believe that everything wrong in America is about someone getting rich while we are getting swindled.
That our economy runs on profits is a true statement, but imagine how much those moneygrubbers would have made if the radio was $5.99.
That $1.00 would be 100% pure profit.
The swindlers and scoundrels downward-manipulate the costs, that is, they manipulate the prices lower, not higher as you would expect, so the corporations can still make a profit selling you a radio for $4.99. [3]
Annie should be asking herself why those scoundrels intentionally sold their raw materials cheaply so just about everyone could afford the
American Dream, a nightmare for the Planet.
Ecocide Results in Cognitive Dissonance
The premise that anyone would intentionally damage the planet, which future generations will inherit, results in Cognitive Dissonance (CD). CD is the discomfort felt at the discrepancy between what you already know or believe, and new information or interpretation that contradicts a strongly held belief system.
But what if the murder of the environment was the goal from the beginning and not the unintended consequence, then we were "conned" into shopping for stuff to intentionally weaken the planet? [4]
Now the world around you will finally make sense.
Hot, flat, and crowded Thomas L. Friedman will finally know what planet George W. Bush is on.
Bush lost the war on terrorism and the war in Iraq, but is winning the war waged on the environment.
Dubya was deadly serious about Ecocide when, after rejecting the global climate change targets of the July 2008 G8 summit, he said, "Goodbye, from the (then) world's biggest polluter." [5]
Ecocide Eliminates the Stupid Explanations
We see the collapse of GM and Chrysler as the result of failed public policy, government action, inaction and conclude the leadership is inept, arrogant or just "stupid" because only Ecocide could explain an industry that failed to keep up with the competition and adjust to new market demands.
Did Detroit forget the Volkswagen Beetle was the most successful car in history?
An incredible 21,529,464 Beetles were produced with the same body style and the same taillight. [6]
The policies and decisions for the last 31 years aren’t inept or stupid if the goal was pollution.
The Beetle as a mobile pollution device was a failure. Its effects on the environment were minimal compared to the Detroit lineup of egocentric gas-guzzlers, all designed with a different taillight and eco-unfriendly accessories.
The “Evil” Federal Reserve made sure that shiny new automobile with the V8 engine, chrome wheels and bumpers was so cheap just about everyone in America could afford the mobile pollution device of their dreams.
Ecocide Explains Why Alaska is in the Picture
Most analysts point to the oil shock of the mid-1970s, set off by the Arab oil embargo of 1973 as the turning point for the US economy and automobile industry.
Why didn’t our then-President Richard Nixon and the rest of the U.S. government promote mass transit, renewable energy, and high-mileage vehicles?
Because the objective that makes the most sense was to disturb 800 miles of the most pristine country in Alaska with the Trans-Alaska Pipeline.
In 2008 we had a similar shock when $4.50 a gallon gasoline convinced Americans they should give up their last Arctic wilderness. [7]
Ecocide Explains why Electricity is so Cheap
Electricity radically transformed and expanded our energy use. To a large extent, electricity defines modern technological civilization and made the Industrial Revolution and therefore our consumer society possible.
Electric power arrived barely a hundred years ago, but high costs and the Great Depression dried up most investment capital and delayed electric service to rural Americans until President Franklin Roosevelt signed into law the Rural Electrification Administration (REA) in 1935.
The REA loaned money created by the Federal Reserve at low interest rates and helped to set up electricity cooperatives.
Historically, energy is priced below its actual environmental and social cost in order to create excessive demand and discourage conservation. In other words such pricing diminishes the value of energy to users and causes them to use it irresponsibly and increase the amount of pollution coal-fired plants generate.
Why is electricity priced so cheap that "only the rich can afford to burn candles"?
Because cleaner alternatives like wind, solar or even natural gas don’t require mining companies to use dynamite to blast away 800 to 1,000 feet of 500 mountaintops and bury over 1200 miles of rivers and streams. [8]
Ecocide explains why 54% of electricity comes from the most abundant raw energy, coal and is the dirtiest source of power for much of the world. Coal-fired plants harm wildlife, generate smog, soot, acid rain, global warming, toxic air emissions and require billions of gallons of our most precious resource—water.
He ruined the Country
The private credit monopoly of rich and predatory moneylenders do not “prey upon the middle class” to get rich.
You don’t become wealthier by exchanging gold, silver and raw materials for about $500 trillion of the Monopoly money you print.
Moneylenders created the middle class and then conned us into trashing the planet because Ecocide was the goal not the unintended consequence.
American "capitalism" and our consumer economy make perfect sense if the goal was the attempted murder of the planet.
Maybe ecocide is what Wilson meant when he confessed that he "ruined the country."
Footnotes:
[1] Congressman Louis T. McFadden, Chairman of the House Banking & Currency Committee, speech on the floor of the House of Representatives, June 10, 1932.
[2] Corporations Rule the World, David Korten (1995): “If some portion of the cost
of producing a product are borne by third parties who in no way participate in or benefit from the transaction, then economists say the costs have been externalized and the price of the product is distorted accordingly.
[3] Downward manipulation is an uneconomic aberration discovered in the precious metals market by the noted silver analyst Ted Butler. We are conditioned to believe that prices are always inflated so the greedy corporations can make more money but Ted Butler’s research confirmed the price of silver has been manipulated to stay at the $4-5 price range for years. The beneficiaries of this type of manipulation are the consumers since industrial users can sell their products cheaply and still make a profit the customers get to buy a lot more “radio” for their dollar. Silver, but No Silver Lining, Robert Singer.
[4] Ecuador Approves New Constitution: Voters Approve Rights of Nature, Mari Margil, Associate Director The Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund.
[5] China is now the world’s biggest polluter, Meat, Milk and Motors: The New China Syndrome, Robert Singer.
[6] World's 5 Most Successful Cars, http://www.cartype.com/pages/272/worlds_5_most_successful_cars
[7] An Economy in free fall, Why is the ANWR in this picture?, Robert Singer
[8] On March 25, Democrats introduced legislation that would prohibit the dumping of mining waste into streams. More than one million acres of Appalachia have already been affected by this practice, Senator Alexander says, "An estimated 1,200 miles of headwater streams have been buried under tons of mining wastes. More than 500 mountains have been impacted, and homes have been ruined and drinking water supplies contaminated." By Red Green and Blue - Red Green and Blue
By Robert Singer
Robert Singer is an Entrepreneur and the author of a forthcoming book on the Federal Reserve. His articles cover politics and the financial and environmental implications of our consumer society. The articles have been main headlined and can be found on numerous popular websites: Marketoracle, Silverseek, Goldseek, Daylife, LAprogressive, Canadafreepress, Opednews, Daily.pk and many of the Wordpress sites. Richard Daughty, The Mogambo Guru, proclaimed him a Junior Mogambo Ranger (JMR)
Dem Bones is Connected To De Debt Bone by Robert Singer, an analysis of the Federal Reserve, can be found on numerous popular websites including G. Edward Griffin’s Unfiltered News. Edward Griffin is the author of,the definitive work on the Federal Reserve, The Creature from Jekyll Island.
Meat, Milk and Motors: The New China Syndrome by Robert Singer, an essay about China first released in February 2009 has been widely posted and read on the Internet. Quotes from the article can be found in The Wall Street Journal Digital Network and the essay was the Top World Story on the Pakistan Daily website for over a week.
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