Thursday, November 26, 2009

The Decline: Geography of a Recession


For an extraordinary animated map of the spread of the cancer of the Federal Reserve as manifested by one tragic result of the current boom-bust cycle that causes real pain to real people (thanks to the Fed's paper money and meddling with the market through artificially low interest rates), click here and hit "play."

We will remain on this rollercoaster ride (and likely mostly in a downward spiral) until we abolish the Federal Reserve, fire the Socialist central economic planners, bind the federal government strictly to its constitutional limits, and restore the republic.

Though we face misery now and in the immediate future, this return to sound money and Constitutional liberty will not happen overnight. There is no short-term pain-free fix. We Americans need to be willing to say with Cicero: "Defendi rem publicam adulescens, non deseram senex."

5 comments:

Ted Badje said...

Fr. Hollywood, I tend to disagree on the Fed. Reserve. The Fed did help greatly in stemming the recessions since the early 80's with it's money policies. You can blame the current recession on people overextending themselves, corporations no longer increasing productivity by hiring people but leveraging debt through hedge funds and other risky vehicles, and the CRA act. Entitlements like Social Security, Medicare, and the Health Care package will greatly exacerbate the economic problems we have now.

Rev. Larry Beane said...

Dear Ted:

I think the Fed only put off the inevitable in the 1980s, and made the current bubble worse.

The Fed operates on the principle that money can be created from nothing and that a central planner can set interest rates (the price of money) better than the free market.

The reason businesses and individuals overextend themselves is that the Fed, by keeping the interest rates artificially low, discourage thrift, encourage borrowing, and it results in false signals being sent to the market. It creates bubbles and booms and busts.

It has also eroded the dollar to where it is now worth less than a nickel as compared to 1913.

And, the Fed gets to do all of this in complete secrecy, with no oversight, and completely outside the Constitution.

It is basically a criminal enterprise, a legal counterfeiting scheme that is used to keep the other government ponzi schemes going.

It can't go on indefinitely. You can only devalue and debase the currency so long until you have hyperinflation.

I'm absolutely convinced that the Australian economic school is spot on, and the Federal Reserve is our own version of Soviet economic planning. It is as doomed as the USSR.

Mark Herpel said...

We can't save the world by changing big government, it's too big to fix. A few people wanting change over the billions of dollars given to gov. officials each month is an impossible task.

We can make our everyday lives better and those or our neighbors by working in our neighborhoods and communities. Local currencies are a good start, Time Banks, LETS (Local exchange trading systems) and barter. All of these products help reduce our dependence on big government, boost employment, build self worth, and fill the gaps that big gov. and big corporations leave in our everyday lives. Start local, start with your town and build a stronger more self sufficient community..that's real change.

The bill to audit the Fed H.R. 1207 has already been gutted to the point it will not accomplish what the creators wanted, big gov/big money is almost impossible to fight.

Mark Herpel
editor@ccmag.net
http://www.twitter.com/dgcmagazine

Rev. Larry Beane said...

Dear Mark:

I like your ideas! As the people's confidence in big government wanes - especially in the currency - people will find workarounds, such as local currencies, barter, home farming, and other forms of self-sufficiency.

These ideas all amount to a kind of "personal secession" from Big Government.

Thanks for writing!

Rev. Larry Beane said...

Dear Mark:

As a footnote, check this out: http://imperialtwilight.blogspot.com/2009/11/replacement-not-capture.html