Should Counterfeiters Go to Prison?

The above is a recent speech before the European Parliament.  And Mr. Bloom is right!

Central banking (including our Federal Reserve System) is nothing other than theft by stealth under the color of legitimacy.  We are being looted by our own banking system.  Finally, people are waking up to this.  This should be seen as a moral issue (rather than being treated as arcane politics or as simple disagreements about economic policy).  If the local grocer were constantly changing the value of his scales (defining a pound as a little bit less and less each day), or if the gas stations were to jimmy up their pumps so that each successive gallon is smaller than the last gallon, we would be calling for trials!

The dollar is likewise a standard symbol of measurement.

This is why when private citizens print valueless paper and pass it off as dollars, they are convicted of counterfeiting.  It is a serious crime that undermines the entire economy.  In fact, the reason your quarters and dimes have serrated edges is because in the days when these coins actually contained silver, and the edges guarded against crooks shaving some of the silver off of the coins.  The joke is on us - there is today no reason for edging on any of our coins (with the exception of the nickel, which ironically is smooth-edged, as it is still made of real metal - at least for the time being).  The reason is because every bit of precious, or even industrial metals, has been removed (again, with the exception of the nickel. for the time being).  It's almost wrong to call them coins when they are really tokens.

So, counterfeiting is a crime, but when government (at the behest of bankers) manipulates the currency (by means of removing the metal from the coins and printing banknotes backed by nothing out of thin air - thus devaluing the dollar to their own advantage), we're all supposed to treat this as moral and legitimate.  Why?  Because the government says so.

Even the Scriptures condemn such playing around with standards of weights and measures.

Of course, a lot of people turn to Romans 13 to argue that government can do just about anything, because by definition, if they are doing it, it must be legal.  Some will distort Luther's doctrine of vocation to attempt to bully people into submission and subjugation to the state, even when the state is committing immoral acts.  Indeed, as the analogy goes, a surgeon takes off peoples' clothes and cuts them with a knife - and within his vocation, this is legal.  If someone off the street, not a doctor, were to do the same thing, it would be a crime.  Some use this analogy to make the case that if a private citizen were to print banknotes on his printer, it would be counterfeiting.  But if this private citizen were part of a super-secret elite group of bankers in bed with government - than somehow the very same act of counterfeiting is ipso facto legal.

This is a gross abuse of Luther's doctrine of vocation.

Government does not have carte blanche.  Theft is theft, and when government does it, it only compounds the sin by adding corruption to stealing.  We should hold those in government - especially judges and politicians - to extremely high standards of morality, as they essentially can, by force, take from us that which is ours - our property and even our lives.  Agents of the government have the power to put innocent people in prison or even to death.  We no longer have the right to trial or the guarantees of the fourth amendment in some cases.  A corrupt government is almost impossible to fight - especially a government that increasingly encroaches on the rights and the constitutional protection of its citizens.

And the sad part is that schools do not teach about money, banking, and the federal reserve.  Nor do colleges and universities typically even broach the subject.  Very few theologians would even see this deliberate theft as a sin.  Many, in fact, will congratulate themselves on voting for candidates who give fiery speeches about Christian morality all the while approving (or even abetting) the manipulation of the currency to the detriment of honest people who work for a living.

Also sad is how partisan people are.  No, Republicans, you can't blame Obama for this.  No Democrats, you can't blame Bush.  This is a bi-partisan syndicate that is 99 years old.  Almost no-one in the federal government will say anything bad about it or even approach it as a matter of moral principal.  But that is starting to change, both in Europe and in the U.S.  China (which is the number two holder of U.S. debt, right behind the Federal Reserve) is buying massive quantities of gold.  Gold-backed currency cannot be manipulated by bankers anywhere near the ability to do the same with a central bank with government-run printing presses.  Could it be that the Chinese Central Bank knows something our own bankers and bureaucrats don't?  Namely: ponzi schemes eventually run out.

Mr. Bloom's speech above shows that this is becoming a front-burner issue around the world, as every currency on the planet is today managed by central banks and manipulated by cartels of bankers, politicians, and bureaucrats.  Some countries (like China) may well see the writing on the wall as they try to find an exit strategy out of holding U.S. dollars (the post-WW2 world reserve currency) in savings, and instead seeking something of real value (such as gold) to store value and issue notes against.

The current system - even when it isn't ending up in riots and civil strife as in Greece - creates bubbles and booms and busts, transfers wealth from the poor to the rich, bankrolls federal boondoggles and military quagmires (in which central bankers, politicians, and their children do not shed blood), discourage thrift and savings and encourage borrowing and debt.

It also makes us (Americans) dependent on other nations to bankroll the whole ponzi scheme - and if and when they decide to get out, we will be left holding the bag.

Should someone in Weimar Germany have gone to jail when an entire nation was impoverished through outright theft of the value of the Deutschmarks in people's pockets?  This is money that people earned at a specific rate and then were forced to spend at another rate (think: some people were in a position to do just the opposite, namely bankers and those who can spend the cheap printed money before it devalues with the passage of time).  This is money under which contracts were signed at one value, and which devalued exponentially in the middle of the contract.

The same thing (hyperinflation) happened recently in Argentina and Zimbabwe.

Should those who benefit from this go to prison (like Bernie Madoff, who did not have government "cover" for his crimes)?

Actually, the founding fathers of the United States (who warned repeatedly against central banks and "paper" money) did not think such people should be incarcerated.  They had another penalty in mind.

Will there come a day when currencies are again honest and constant in value?  I'm afraid things will get a lot worse before they get better.  But on the other hand, thanks to the lessening of government control of information thanks to the Internet, this issue is now on the table.  And it is an issue that is being looked at from across the political spectrum: from conservative investment firms, mainstream conservative thinkers, and even youthful Occupy Wall Street folks on the left.

Ending the Fed is something people from all across the political spectrum ought to be able to agree on.  There are few teachings more universal than the Seventh Commandment.  The Fed has been allowing institutional theft from the people of this country for a century.  It's nice to see this being recognized in the European Parliament as well.

Thank you once again, Mr. Bloom!

Consider an investment: not of money, but of time.  The following 42 minute documentary (or read the transcript here) explains the whole thing - including why this is relevant.  The film's style is dated (it was produced in 1996) - which is actually good.  You can see how things have gone since that time.  A lot has happened in the world's economy - especially since 2008.