It’s funny how the Milk Nazi’s are on the war path against raw milk, but Monsanto gets a free pass. Fox news completely ignored the research and “human health concerns” of rBGH Milk in favor of advertising dollars from Monsanto. This 10 minute clip, from the original reporters, tell the story of how Monsanto attempted to silence the reporters and bury the story. The story tells how Monsanto and the FDA played fast and loose with the facts to make money at the risk of public health. What this also shows is further evidence of the connection between the federal government and the corporate dollar / power which we discussed here.
In the furore around Home on the Range dairy, statements from Health Authorities resulted in headlines such as “Raw milk hazardous to health”.
They’d have you believe that ‘every glass of raw milk is seething with bad germs’. Which is utter nonsense. In fact, as it comes from a healthy grass-fed cow, raw milk is one of the purest foods of all. How milk is handled from then on determines whether it contains bacterial harmful to humans. Read More at The Bovine.
It has been said that every life is bookmarked by two dates. There is the date you were born and the date you die. In between is a dash… that is our life.
That always seemed to be a good reminder of just how short and insignificant our lives are in the scope of history, and how valuable each day is. While, that thought can help to keep us humble, it can also as a motivator to live each day to the fullest as it will never be repeated.
Johnny Cash perhaps understood that in a way many of us never will due to his fame and notoriety. Yet, as an older and wiser man, this song is what he had to say about it all.
This is the most absurd propaganda piece I have seen in years. I use to get upset when the evening news would cover a prolife event we were participating in and talk about us while showing clips of the purple haired tattooed one-world socialist tree hugging save the starving third world co-dependent lesbian whales crowd. (HT George Grant for the run on slur). But this is about as flagrant as the so called media can get. The real concern is what possible reason can they have for stoking the fires of racial tension??? Enjoy the clips.
Thomas Moore, the chairman for the Southern National Congress, wrote a great essay late last month, that is well worth sharing. He gives a great high level fly over of the root problem in the corporate food industry. It doesn’t matter if the new laws, such as the Food Safety and Modernization Act of 2009 or the Food and Drug Administration Globalization Act, intend to curtail an individual’s right to purchase, trade, or consume healthy food grown from their own land, that is the effect.
In fact, we are already seeing many tyrannical “enforcement” activities on other less intrusive laws that are being used to intimidate and curtail the efforts of small family farms. The existence of an organization called the “Farm to Consumer Foundation” who’s sole purpose is protecting small family farms against this abridgment of our rights by the federal and state government should tell us something of the times in which we live.
In fact Mr. Moore, declares that in these times planting our garden is a revoutionary act:
Today I committed a revolutionary act. It had nothing to do with firearms or marksmanship training. I didn’t organize a protest march or join the Underground. In fact, it had nothing to do with politics, except in the broadest possible sense. But it was revolutionary nonetheless. Today I finished spring planting.
How can such a benign activity be revolutionary, you may ask. In a sane and normal world it wouldn’t be. People have grown their own food from the beginning of the world. Agriculture has always been the foundation of civilization and the farmer a benefactor of mankind. But today we don’t live in a sane and normal world. The criminal Regime we live under is not content just to rob us of our liberty, our property, our dignity and humanity. It also seeks to control us by controlling the food supply. It seeks to strip us of food self-sufficiency and make us dependent, first on the central state, through food stamps, for example; and second, on the state’s real masters, the giant agri-businesses who determine Federal food policy. I call this process food fascism.
Read more of this revolutionary article here and commit your own revolutionary act by planting your garden today!
Here is another movie that just opened on the 12th, called Food, Inc. We haven’t seen the entire movie yet, but we will. Based on this interview, I’m sure there are parts of the movie that we will disagree with, such as a solution to the problem which includes “Changing Walmart” or other corporations. Having said that, it sounds like the producer does a great job of identifing the problem with our food supply.
Check out this interview:
Then you can check out the trailer of the film here:
Some of your favorite foods may be fakes. Foods masquerading as something else — a more nutritious something else — have been big news in the past two years. Chinese food companies in particular have been blamed for making deadly alterations to dairy, baby and pet foods by adding melamine. The chemical makes it appear that the food or beverage has the required level of protein.
But what about food producers in this country? What fraudulent foods do U.S. consumers have to fear from American companies?
It goes on to explain how your olive oil isn’t really olive oil and your honey isn’t really 100% real honey. This doesn’t surprise me. I could never understand how a loaf of bread could contain 29 ingredients including words that were unpronounceable in the English language. I mean, really, how hard is it?
In a local based economy, it’s not difficult. In a market where bread is shipped 1,000 miles to the grocery store to sit on the shelf for 3 weeks…some kind of unknown chemicals have to be added to keep it from spoiling. Big corporate food companies aren’t concerned about wholesome ingredients…it’s about profits. It shouldn’t shock us that they cut corners.
Intermixed with real food, the store is full of fake food. Fake butter, fake milk, fake cheese, fake sour cream, fake sugar, fake meat, fake extracts. Companies are now advertising the fact that they do indeed use real food. Why doesn’t it bother us when we see a package advertising “REAL CHEESE!” –as if fake cheese should ever be an option.
I think I’ll go look at my gardening catalog and finish planning a real food garden.
In part two of this series, I joked about northern auto workers moving south as carpetbaggers, but the truth of the matter is the south is no different in her positioning during these hard economic times. This is shown by our southern leaders who talk with a draw, but spend our tax money like they are on a shopping trip in Manhattan with someone else’s credit card. See these southern Senator’s votes on the other bailout packages. With the new auto numbers released today, I fear the stand a few southern Senators are taking is less likely to be based on a moral high ground and more likely to be jockeying for position and holding out until funds can be added for their constituents as well.
Clearly the big three auto makers, bogged down with the overhead of socialistic unions, are loosing big, but all the automakers, including the foreign companies now located in the south are sinking fast. Toyota said they will be halting production for 11 days next month due to the sales numbers and as the chart below indicates every one took a loss in the latest numbers.
The real difference between the two groups seems to be business models that plan for rainy days verse business models that build in an exaggerated expectation of a federal safety net. In the end, the safety net, built upon the future prosperity of our children, will be extended to all that ask. This is the nature of the economic system we have, it can be no other way.
Of course the real problem is us. We may be late to the game and slow to learn but we are beginning to awake to the mess we have before us. That happens when our investment and retirement accounts take a 40%-60% hit.
You see the “thought leaders” in our country tell us there must be a federal bailout to save this industry or that industry and they play on our emotions showcasing all the workers and families that will suffer if our tax dollars do not bail them out.
While, it is sad to see people forced to look for new work, that is a fact of life. That is the nature of the economic system we have. When you sell yourself to someone else to make a living you are dependant on the business practices they have and their ability to keep you employed. Even most self-employed folks are dependant upon the corporations spending money with them. We are tied to this American economic system and as it collapses around us, it causes us to readjust our priorities.
Because we are re-adjusting our priorities the government must take our tax dollars and bailout the corporations. The consumers are not going to bail them out by continuing to spend hard earned dollars on over priced low quality products. As we look to the future we stop spending for today. Consider the following from the article:
U.S. household debt, which has been growing steadily since the Federal Reserve began tracking it in 1952, declined for the first time in the third quarter of 2008. In the same quarter, U.S. consumer spending growth declined for the first time in 17 years.
That has resulted in a rise in the personal saving rate, which the government calculates as the difference between earnings and expenditures. In recent years, as Americans spent more than they earned, the personal saving rate dipped below zero. Economists now expect the rate to rebound to 3% to 5%, or even higher, in 2009, among the sharpest reversals since World War II. Goldman Sachs last week predicted the 2009 saving rate could be as high as 6% to 10%.
As savings increase, economists say, spending is likely to contract further. They expect gross domestic product to decline at an annualized rate of at least 5% in the fourth quarter, the biggest drop in a quarter-century.
“The idea that the American family will quickly spend us out of this recession is a fantasy. It won’t happen,” said Elizabeth Warren, a professor of law at Harvard University who last month was named chair of the Congressional oversight panel tasked with overseeing the distribution of the government’s Troubled Asset Relief Program funds.
What kind of false economic premise are we operating under that would be damaged by families saving money? As Gary North points out in Closet Keynesians Emergepublished last Friday, this is Keynesian economic theory. He summarizes it great in the section entitled, Wealth Through Thrift:
To tell American consumers that they can improve the productivity of the economy merely by going out and spending money is Keynesianism. It is utter nonsense. The only way to increase the productivity of the economy is through thrift. The money generated by this thrift must then be invested wisely, in terms of future conditions, so that the company or fund making the investment can reap a profit. If economy cannot do this through increased productivity, it will eventually find itself incapable of raising additional capital. Without additional capital, there can be no increase in productivity.
Economists are supposed to know this, but ever since the Great Depression and the publication of Keynes’s magnum opus, most economists have not believed this. They believe that we really can spend ourselves into prosperity, either through personal spending or through government spending. The Keynesian system is opposed to investing during recessions.
I can remember the slogan that was promoted by the government in 1958: “you auto buy now.” It was preposterous then, and it is preposterous now. The government today is lending money to Chrysler and General Motors because American consumers are not buying the output of those two companies. The government understands that it cannot afford to give every citizen enough money to go out and buy a new General Motors or Chrysler car, so it uses tax dollars to offer below-market loans to companies that would otherwise go bankrupt. This is the government’s alternative to relying on the general public to go out and spend money in a way approved by politicians…
You may have seen this spoof ridiculing the folly of the current line of thought as well. While Fred Thompson does not identify the economic theory he is poking fun at it is Keynesian economic policy:
Friends when we discover such an unjust system, that is harmed by people saving money, it needs to go. This system has been in place for a long time and has brought a promise and even an appearance of wealth. But as the curtain is being pulled back we are seeing for the first time the shackles that come with this system and the true value of the wealth it provides. It is going to be a hard road as the inflated prices for our goods are adjusted and many companies will fail. But this is the time to change directions. This is the time to throw off the shackles and to learn to walk in freedom once again. Freedom comes with responsibility for one’s self, and a duty to help your neighbor. You can only do that if you are financially free.
Gary North ends his article with investment advice to ”Save now. Buy later. Buy assets that will rise in price because of increased monetary inflation. ” Someone asked me what I thought those items might be. The thought that immediately comes to mind is the proverbial wheelbarrow of money to buy a loaf of bread in Russia when her economy failed.
Traditionally, the things that people buy when they have little capital is food, shelter, and clothing. The real estate debt bubble and the over building it produced will keep the shelter market prices down for years to come, and I think there are plenty of second hand blue jeans to go around. Although you can expect to see over reaching tyranical attempts by the government to limit the availability of second hand items so that people will be forced to “buy new”.
About the only thing you can not buy second hand is food. So the person who can produce food is going to be a popular fellow in his community. I mentioned previously, we invested this last quarter in tools for production. It may not produce huge profits as an investment, but I am hopeful it will feed the family and keep us on the farm.
It appears this may come to blows before it blows over. The Times Online picked up the heated name calling by the Yankee bailout proponents and have no doubt added more fuel to the fire by running this article. Here are a few highlights.
Almost 150 years after the American Civil War the struggle to save the country’s carmaking industry is once again becoming a battle between the Union and the Confederacy.
In this latter-day renewal of hostilities the union is the United Auto Workers (UAW) whose members are mostly employed in Northern states such as Michigan, the traditional heartland of US motor manufacturing….
Brian Fredline, who is head of the UAW branch in Lansing, Michigan, said: “This is almost like Confederate senators fighting against the Union Army of the North. The parallels are frightening, and it’s almost this mentality that the South will rise again. They hold hostage the economic recovery of anyone who lives north of the Mason-Dixon line.”
Reprisals have already begun. Kentucky’s Republican Senator Jim Bunning, who was once a baseball star in Detroit, was abruptly uninvited from appearing at an event for fans in Michigan at the weekend as punishment for voting against the bailout. And a retired GM engineer last week started a website urging a consumer boycott of Alabama until Mr Shelby is replaced by a senator “who has America’s best interest in mind”….
….Yesterday Mr Corker said that Capitol Hill negotiations on the rescue deal had been wrecked by the UAW’s refusal to accept the imposition of costcutting measures that would have forced the carmakers to operate on the same labour costs as the foreign-owned companies. He dismissed suggestions that self-interest had influenced his position, pointing out that he also had a GM plant in Tennessee which is “very important to my state”.
The UAW folks seem to think like the Gods of the Market Place, that every man should be paid for existing, but no one should pay for his sins. I applaud these few southern senators who are standing on this particular issue, but I lament their failure to preserve my money when banks, insurance companies, and investment houses lined up with their hands out.
No one deserves a forced handout, especially a corporation. As the Gods of the Copybook Headings tell us, “if you don’t work you die”. It appears over-sized debt dependant corporations are no longer working, to which we can only say, good riddance. May the American people north and south see the harsh task master automotive debt has been and may the shackles of debt slavery fall from the people’s pockets.
Let’s not forget it was the real estate debt that surfaced this problem to begin with. Debt bondage is the voluntary slavery of the 21st century! This, just like the slavery prior to the great war, extends to both the North and South.
The UAW may be concerned about it’s workers lossing their jobs in Detroit and how they will pay their debts, but there were no hand outs being offered to save the jobs of the 100,000 people who lost their jobs in December in the rest of the nation. My suggestion to all you folks in the big three auto corporations, get out now. You might head south to find work, but I have to warn you, the south has never really looked very favorably on carpetbaggers.
Here is a great look at the foundational principles of corporate buyouts. In her article entitled Uncivil War: Detroit Blames the South, Karen De Coster takes the UAW, Detroit News columnist John McCormick, and Michael Lind from Salon to task over their yankee ideology.
“Boom times and credit bubbles (and recent bailouts) have masked dead business models, considerable quality issues, and insolvency. Now that the veneer of phony prosperity has been stripped off the economy, the naked auto companies are a frightening sight to behold. And since Detroit came to rely so heavily on one industry, and put all of its eggs in that one basket, the region’s economy is starting to crumble.”
“In response, Detroit automakers and unions seek to use aggressive tactics against others to remain intact. The automakers sought, and received, the theft and redistribution of other peoples’ money in order to sustain their failed businesses. The UAW seeks to use legislative fiat to direct the terms of the bailout and extend their power by planting their gangs in the South. Some of the old guard still hold on to pipe dreams of an all-conquering Union.”
The entire article is a must read. It contains a sound look at our unsound national policies and identifies the root stock from which they came.
I know no one is really interested in the economy right now, but I thought this would be a worth while post anyway.Peter Schiff is burning up the economic talk show circuit and for once is being treated with the respect he deserves. Check out this quick montage of how he was treated before the economy tanked.
Mark 6:4 comes to mind:
But Jesus said unto them, A prophet is not without honor, but in his own country, and among his own kin, and in his own house.
In Mr. Shiff’s case we might add, those in his own industry. But who’s laughing now? This clip from Bloomberg, is a great vindication of Peter Schiff, and more importantly of the Austrian Economic Theory. It’s just under 20 minutes long, but a worthwhile investment if you are looking for a sound analysis of where we are.
I can’t say that I agree with his long term investment advice, but then again who has any money left for long term investments. Seriously, the principle is sound. He makes the case that Asia has production capacity and as such will be a good long term investment. That is the elephant in the room very few people, other than Ron Paul and Peter Schiff, are speaking of as we discuss America’s problems. We no longer produce anything in America but paper. Either paper money, or paper plans for items that will be built overseas.
My advice would be to learn to produce something. Think about the different times in history when economies and nations have failed. I don’t recall investing in a foreign country being the answer for a bad economic situation at home. Production of goods is always a way to build wealth. Production of food, shelter, and clothing is an even safer bet. I’ll share the top Vaughnshire investments for the last quarter in a separate post to give you an idea of where we think the nation is headed.
Lastly, Peter Schiff was Ron Paul’s economic advisor in his run for the presidency. I don’t suspect he needed the advice from Mr. Schiff, as Representative Paul has been standing as the lone voice in congress for decades. In this short Fox News clip Ron Paul baffles the talking heads with sound economic principles.
We have written many times on the Industrial Revolution and what a drastic change it has made to our economic, cultural, and political landscape. There are so many ramifications, that it is difficult to even identify them, let alone be able to understand their full impact on our lives. It may be questioned if we are even able to properly assess the different areas it effected; such as our economic system, our family structure, our church life, and even our very beliefs.
Mrs. Parunak has done an admirable job of identifying some of the challenges of parenting, specifically motherhood, that are a direct result of the industrial revolution.
Some people read an article critical of the industrial revolution and think because people are looking at the period with a critical eye, they are against any advancements in technology. Nothing could be further from the truth. The thing to examine with a critical eye is the impact of the methodology and the shift it brought to our culture. Advancements in technology, improvements in production, and the economic wealth of a nation are good things in general. But, one can not embrace the good without examining the cost.
That popular suffrage does not now really govern this country, that it is notoriously a marketable commodity, that the United States have really ceased already to be what they pretend, a federation of republican States, no clear sighted man doubts. Under a thin veil of radical democracy, the government has already become an oligarchy. Are not State conventions traded off by the magnets as openly as blocks of railroad bonds? Are not legislatures bought as really and almost as openly as cargoes of corn? Are not “corners” made in politics by which the weaker capitalists are sold out, as really as in the pork market? It is Washington or Wall Street which really dictates what platforms shall be set forth, and what candidates elected and what appointments made, not the people of the States.
Obviously the government now ascendant in the country while “Republican” in name and ultra-democratic in theory, is an oligarchy in fact….
…But we do not forget that other people have had other forms of government, aristocratic or regal, and under them have had their share of domestic virtues, of patriotism, of civilization, of Christianity. (But under the illicit and dirty oligarchy of which our present regime is a virtual specimen, no people has ever had or can have anything but corruption, ignominy, and vice)
Our best prayer for you is, that out of the present foul transition, a good providence may cause some new order to arise tolerable for honest men.
Dabney’s Discussions Volumn IV, The New South 1897 pages 13,14, & 16
Elections always seem frustrating to me. It is a time where we cannot avoid seeing how far we have fallen from being a Godly nation. It is a time where we see what our leaders think of our intelligence as the electorate. In short, it is a return to the Saturday afternoon, World Wide Wrestling Federation and all the scripted action that comes with it.
(in a deep booming voice) IN THIS CORNER…. we have the Republican candidate, who hails from the red conservative states… as he enters the ring with a prolife logo on his cape, he taunts the audience about family and smaller government…. And… IN THIS CORNER, we have the Democrat contender, the master of the left and right coasts, he talks boldly of the need for change, the oppression of the poor by the unfair tax burden, and how the government is failing to do for others what they refuse to do for themselves.
The match starts, the two contenders stomp as the enter the center of the ring with great animation and exaggerated movements. They clash, they return to their corners. They clash, they return to their corners. They clash, they return to their corners. They clash and one is declared the winner. They return to their corners.
The next day they both go to the bank to deposit their earnings checks for a fight “well fought” and our nation continues down this humanistic path, that not only has forsaken God, but kicks the dust in His face as we pursue what RC Sproul Jr. has called the gospel of Personal Peace and Prosperity.
What’s the Difference
The now old adage that there is “not a dimes worth of difference between the two candidates” has never been a more fitting epitaph.
There was one question that kept coming to mind as I watched the debates this political season (See, even our terminology confirms the event as some sports event. Like baseball season, we have the political season. I wonder what prime time advertising sells for during the presidential debates… but, I digress) … that question, which I often wanted to scream at the moderators and anyone else who would listen is simply this. “Is this the best our nation has to offer!” My God, My God, why have you forsaken us.
I often imagine I hear His reply, “it is not I who has forsaken”.
For those who disagree and actually think that it matters if the winner wears and R or a D on his cape today, I would challenge you to point to one solid and substantial difference between the two different parties over the last four election cycles. I don’t mean in rhetoric, but action. What bill has been passed, what appointment has been made, or what lives have been saved?
Has not Planned Parenthood, received it’s government funding from our tax dollars under both parties? While the rhetoric is loud, the same number of babies die under a Republican presidency as under a Democratic presidency.
How about on the size of government spending? Has not the spending increased under each proceeding presidency regardless of the R or the D?
How about the sodomite agenda? Even though the R’s like to talk about family values, what is actually the difference between “civil unions” and “sodomite marriage”?
Of course the one that effects all who seek to have their personal prosperity, is the economy. Now I’ll admit that this may be a little trickier to understand because the economy turns in larger cycles than our election cycles. But can we agree that the economic crisis that we are currently in, did not start eight years ago? The policies and practices are those set by the Federal Reserve that has actually been consistent across both parties.
On The Road to Socialism
So what is the over-riding ideology of our governmental system? What path is it they are leading us down? Is it not the dead end road of Socialism? Look at the headlines that will be eclipsed by the election coverage.
We are giving the government more control over our lives, or I should say the government is buying more control over our lives. As it becomes a “partner” in these corporations that provide services to us, it will have access to our lives in ways it never had before. It is one thing to be in debt bondage to the banks, it is another to be in bondage to the bank owned and operated by your government. What about your life insurance policy, or your investment broker?
Many talk about the danger of socialized medicine (While we as a people at large embrace it) and yet at the same time, we have just been given a major shift in our economic system where we have socialized banking. Yet, everyone is happy with this arrangement because the government had to come “rescue my investment/retirement account”.
At the end of this match, when we leave the wrestling ring behind and head home, we still have to live under the governmental system we have in place and we still have to answer to the God who created us. If we are shallow enough to pledge allegiance to one of the two parties, we might even claim a victory in this, yet another “no holds barred” “steel cage” “match of the century”, we might even get to ride at the front of the train if “our team” wins. We can gloat to those of the other party affiliation, that we WON!
But our shallow, self serving, fearful, actions, that grant us the perceived privilege of sitting in the front of the train are not helping to change the direction of the train. Some have said the train is going off a cliff. I tend to believe it is on a direct course to met our maker. I fear, not trembling before men, but in a Holy fear of God, that we will learn the truth about ourselves when this nation has that encounter. The truth is we have no more depth than our leaders in the ring. We have sold our birth right of freedom and liberty for a mess of socialistic porridge that, while promising a life of great ease and wealth, will leave us in slavery.
What encouragement is there?
So what would Jesus do, today, the day of our election? Kevin Swanson has asked this question in a great sermon I would recommend as a opportunity for family devotion and discussion on this night. Also I would recommend Joe Morecraft’s Election Day Sermon for your review and encouragement along with Doug Phillips great maxim for how Christians might approach the ballot box biblically. As we remember that it is not against flesh and blood that we battle, we should know the answer to the troubled times our nation faces is not found in a man whom we might elect. It can only be found in the unchanging God who is sovereign over the nations.
In an extraordinary move for a nation proud of its financial prudence and stability, Switzerland was forced to take emergency measures yesterday to shore up its two biggest lenders to prevent a collapse in confidence in the country’s banking system.
The state will inject SFr6bn (£3.1bn) into UBS, its biggest bank, in return for a 9.3 per cent stake, and will allow UBS to unload $54bn (£31bn) of toxic assets, including sub-prime mortgages and Alt-A securities, into a fund controlled by the central bank.
Peter Fitzgerald, chairman of Chain Bridge Bank in McLean, said he was “much chagrined that we will be punished for behaving prudentlyby now having to face reckless competitors who all of a sudden are subsidized by the federal government.”
At Evergreen Federal Bank in Grants Pass, Ore., chief executive Brady Adams said he has more than 2,000 loans outstanding and only three borrowers behind on payments. “We don’t need a bailout, and if other banks had run their banks like we ran our bank, they wouldn’t have needed a bailout, either,” Adams said.
The opposition suggested that the government may have to continue to press banks to participate in the plan. The first $125 billion will be divided among nine of the largest U.S. banks, which were forced to accept the investment to help destigmatize the program in the eyes of other institutions.
In rolling out the program, Treasury said it would make the rest of the money available to banks that requested it. Officials said they expected thousands of banks to participate.
But both the American Bankers Association and the Independent Community Bankers of America said that they knew of few banks that planned to participate.
“I’m not sure we’ve heard from any that want to participate,” said Karen Thomas, vice president for government relations at the community bankers group, which represents about 5,000 banks. “That said, if any community banks do enroll, we anticipate it will be just a small minority.”
Federal regulators said they did expect some banks to volunteer, though none stepped forward yesterday. But they added that they would not rely on volunteers. Treasury will set standards for deciding which banks can be helped, and the regulatory agencies will triage the banks they oversee: The institutions faring best and worst will not receive investments. The institutions in the middle, whose fortunes could be improved by putting a little more money in the bank, will be pushed to accept the money from the government.
As I predicted on the 10th, the government is now in the banking business.
I expect an announcement that we will no longer be a free market nation, but in fact will move further down the socialist road, similar to what we saw in Iceland yesterday. The government will seize control of the banking industry and the people will sigh a sigh of relief not realizing the noose just got tighter around our necks.
I don’t want to sound like the sky is falling because, it is only fake money anyway. But it is that fake money that most people buy their food and housing with.
I’d like to call it creeping socialism, but I think our government has put on the black boots of communism. Read a few of these quotes from the New York Times and decide for yourself. Here is the Communist Manifesto and here is what our government did yesterday.
First, who asked for the governments help?
Kenneth D. Lewis, the chairman of Bank of America, also pushed back, saying his bank had just raised $10 billion on its own…
In an interview on Monday, before the meeting, John J. Mack said his bank, Morgan Stanley, did not need capital from the Treasury. It had just sealed a $9 billion deal with a large Japanese bank…
Secondly, who had a choice in the matter?
WASHINGTON – The chief executives of the nine largest banks in the United States trooped into a gilded conference room at the Treasury Department at 3 p.m. Monday. To their astonishment, they were each handed a one-page document that said they agreed to sell shares to the government, then Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. said they must sign it before they left…
…What happened during those three and a half hours is a story of high drama and brief conflict, followed by acquiescence by the bankers, who felt they had little choice but to go along with the Treasury plan to inject $250 billion of capital into thousands of banks – starting with theirs.
…”It was a take it or take it offer,” said one person who was briefed on the meeting, speaking on condition of anonymity because the discussions were private. “Everyone knew there was only one answer.”
How where the bank’s concerns handled?
Among their concerns were: How would the government’s stake affect other preferred shareholders? Would the Treasury Department demand some control over management in return for the capital? How would the warrants work?
With the discussion becoming heated, the chairman of the Federal Reserve, Ben S. Bernanke, who was seated next to Mr. Paulson, interceded. He told the bankers that the session need not be combative, since both the banks and the broader economy stood to benefit from the program. Without such measures, he added, the situation of even healthy banks could deteriorate.
- was that a threat of some sort from the federal reserve chairman?
Lastly, what was the total cost of this elaborate plan to further enslave the American tax payer?
The president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, Timothy F. Geithner, then proceeded to outline the details of the investment program. When the bankers heard the amount of money the government planned to invest, they were stunned by its size, according to several people…
…Mr. Paulson announced the plan Tuesday, saying “we regret having to take these actions.” Pouring billions in public money into the banks, he said, was “objectionable,” but unavoidable to restore confidence in the markets and persuade the banks to start lending again.
In addition to the capital infusions, which will be made this week, the government said it would temporarily guarantee $1.5 trillion in new senior debt issued by banks, as well as insure $500 billion in deposits in noninterest-bearing accounts, mainly used by businesses.
All told, the potential cost to the government of the latest bailout package comes to $2.25 trillion, triple the size of the original $700 billion rescue package, which centered on buying distressed assets from banks. The latest show of government firepower is an abrupt about-face for Mr. Paulson, who just days earlier was discouraging the idea of capital injections for banks.
For a look in real dollars at how much debt we are in, check out the current total of the national debt clock compared to the picture posted just three days ago! This does not include this new $250,000,000,000.00 bank bailout.
For further review check out the national debt clock faq. Or if you ever wondered who we owe all this money to, check out the list on the US treasury site, or their faq. It’s always fun to read the government sites.
Thanks to Kevin at Generations for reminding us of this great peom by Kipling:
AS I PASS through my incarnations in every age and race,
I make my proper prostrations to the Gods of the Market Place.
Peering through reverent fingers I watch them flourish and fall,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings, I notice, outlast them all.
We were living in trees when they met us. They showed us each in turn
That Water would certainly wet us, as Fire would certainly burn:
But we found them lacking in Uplift, Vision and Breadth of Mind,
So we left them to teach the Gorillas while we followed the March of Mankind.
We moved as the Spirit listed. They never altered their pace,
Being neither cloud nor wind-borne like the Gods of the Market Place,
But they always caught up with our progress, and presently word would come
That a tribe had been wiped off its icefield, or the lights had gone out in Rome.
With the Hopes that our World is built on they were utterly out of touch,
They denied that the Moon was Stilton; they denied she was even Dutch;
They denied that Wishes were Horses; they denied that a Pig had Wings;
So we worshipped the Gods of the Market Who promised these beautiful things.
When the Cambrian measures were forming, They promised perpetual peace.
They swore, if we gave them our weapons, that the wars of the tribes would cease.
But when we disarmed They sold us and delivered us bound to our foe,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: “Stick to the Devil you know.”
On the first Feminian Sandstones we were promised the Fuller Life
(Which started by loving our neighbour and ended by loving his wife)
Till our women had no more children and the men lost reason and faith,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: “The Wages of Sin is Death.”
In the Carboniferous Epoch we were promised abundance for all,
By robbing selected Peter to pay for collective Paul;
But, though we had plenty of money, there was nothing our money could buy,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: “If you don’t work you die.”
Then the Gods of the Market tumbled, and their smooth-tongued wizards withdrew
And the hearts of the meanest were humbled and began to believe it was true
That All is not Gold that Glitters, and Two and Two make Four
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings limped up to explain it once more.
As it will be in the future, it was at the birth of Man
There are only four things certain since Social Progress began.
That the Dog returns to his Vomit and the Sow returns to her Mire,
And the burnt Fool’s bandaged finger goes wabbling back to the Fire;
And that after this is accomplished, and the brave new world begins
When all men are paid for existing and no man must pay for his sins,
As surely as Water will wet us, as surely as Fire will burn,
The Gods of the Copybook Headings with terror and slaughter return!
I’m curious as we look at the recent events in America, how many realize the foundational belief system these things are tied to? When we discuss Palin and the feminist / egalitarian nature of the modern evangelical, do we realize that it is Marxist theology that most evangelicals are spouting when they defend their position?
When we talk about the economy; both the troubles and the foundation of our system, do we see that it has been, since it’s inception, a move towards a socialist world order, based on Marxist ideology?
I wonder how many evangelicals have ever read the short Communist Manifesto to understand the ideas Frederick Engels and Karl Marx outline as their vision of the world economic system. I must recommend it to everyone who, on one hand claims the name of Christ, and on the other is not self aware concerning their beliefs. Epistemological self-consciousness is a requirement for Christians. We are to take every thought captive to the obedience of Christ. In other words we must know why we believe what we believe and where those beliefs come from.
Understanding that Karl Marx and Engels where against the industrial capitalism put forth by America, I would recommend a review of their short manifesto as a means of understanding where much of the modern evangelical thought has its roots. The capitalist are the bourgeois they rail against. But these are not the same capitalist that we have today. The capitalist of today as you will see looking over the points below are very much in line with Marx and Engels. The original capitalist would be the ones who believe in free market economics. The capitalist of today, believe in government bailouts and the illusion of free market economics.
It is interesting to review the points quoted below from the Communist Manifesto and then watch some of the recent media about Palin or about the Economy. You will see there is very little difference in the modern capitalist, political leader, or media pundit and Marxist thought. Of course the greater tragedy is that there is very little difference between today’s evangelical church leaders and Marxist thought. Here is a link to the entire manifesto, which is a short read and highly recommended as we seek to understand the challenges our nation faces. The quotes below should be enough to encourage a thorough study of the material.
The communist revolution is the most radical rupture with traditional relations; no wonder that its development involved the most radical rupture with traditional ideas.
But let us have done with the bourgeois objections to communism.
…Of course, in the beginning, this cannot be effected except by means of despotic inroads on the rights of property, and on the conditions of bourgeois production; by means of measures, therefore, which appear economically insufficient and untenable, but which, in the course of the movement, outstrip themselves, necessitate further inroads upon the old social order, and are unavoidable as a means of entirely revolutionizing the mode of production…
Nevertheless, in most advanced countries, the following will be pretty generally applicable.
Abolition of property in land and application of all rents of land to public purposes.
A heavy progressive or graduated income tax.
Abolition of all rights of inheritance.
Confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels.
Centralization of credit in the banks of the state, by means of a national bank with state capital and an exclusive monopoly.
Centralization of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the state.
Extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the state; the bringing into cultivation of waste lands, and the improvement of the soil generally in accordance with a common plan.
Equal obligation of all to work. Establishment of industrial armies, especially for agriculture.
Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries; gradual abolition of all the distinction between town and country by a more equable distribution of the populace over the country.
Free education for all children in public schools. Abolition of children’s factory labor in its present form. Combination of education with industrial production, etc.
When you hear our leaders talking about the government taking over the home mortgage industry or the banking industry you are talking about a move towards the Marxist vision for the world. It has been stated here that this was part of our system from the foundation. When the government sanctioned corporations and trading pools they took production and wealth out of the family structure and placed it, by means of regulation, into the hands of the civil government. This is a departure from Biblical thought where the example is production exists in the family, and a move towards Marxist thought where production resides in the hands of the state.
I expect an announcement that we will no longer be a free market nation, but in fact will move further down the socialist road, similar to what we saw in Iceland yesterday. The government will seize control of the banking industry and the people will sigh a sigh of relief not realizing the noose just got tighter around our necks.
But perhaps I’m wrong. Perhaps President Bush as the leader of our nation will repent of the unjust and wicked laws we live under and will call for a national day of prayer and fasting and then announce that our economic system is a sham and we are going work towards putting the United States back on a Gold standard. Of course this is a physical impossibility as a) we have sold most of our gold reserves, and b) we have way too much paper currency floating around the world to call it in.
It should be an interesting press conference; historical to say the least.
Of course the real problem is us. We may be late to the game and slow to learn but we are beginning to awake to the mess we have before us. That happens when our investment and retirement accounts take a 40%-60% hit. 
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