'Government Sachs' and so much more

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If you believe that the government of the U.S. or the Anglo-American international system in general is controlled by a cabal or oligopoly of very rich, Macchiavellian bankers and their associates, then you are insane and a conspiracy theorist. The following is evidence of your insanity. :cool:

(gold color = position at Goldman Sachs; regular black titles = government positions; italicized black titles = important non-governmental positions)

Mark Patterson
Chief of Staff for Treasury, V.P. Government relations, Obama administration

Hank Paulson
Treasury Secretary, CEO, Bush

Edward Liddy
Appointed CEO of AIG by Secretary Paulson, Board member, Bush

Niel Kashkari
Head of Office of Financial Stability for Treasury, Vice President, Bush, Obama

Niel Levin
Head of NY State Insurance Department, Member Council On Foreign Relations, Vice President, Bush, Obama

Gary Gensler
Head of CFTC, Partner, Obama

Duncan Niederauer
Chief Executive Officer of NYSE, Partner and Managing Director, Bush, Obama

Stephen Friedman, Chairman of NY Federal Reserve Bank, Chairman of National Economic Council, Chairman of President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, Chairman Emeritus of Brooking's Institute, Member of Council of Foreign Relations, CEO, Bush, Obama

William Dudley, President of NY Fed, Board member of FSB of BIS, Partner and Managing Director, Bush, Obama

Robert Zoellick, President of World Bank, Member Council on Foreign Relations, Vice Chairman International, Bush, Obama

Mark Carney, Bank of Canada, Board Member of Bank of International Settlements, Managing Director, Bush, Obama

Mario Draghi
Chairman of FSB of BIS, President Bank of Italy, Board Member at the Brooking's Institute, Partner, Bush, Obama

Joshua Bolton
White House Chief of Staff, Member Council on Foreign Relations, Executive Director, Legal and Government Affairs, Bush

Edward Forst
Consultant to Paulson re Fannie and Freddie bailout, Executive Vice President, Bush, Obama

Reuben Jeffrey
Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Interim Chief Investment Officer for TARP, Member Council on Foreign Relations, Member World Economic Forum's Council on Systemic Risk, Managing Director and Partner for European Financial Institutions Group of Goldman, Bush, Obama

Steven Shafran
Sr. Advisor to Secretary of Treasury, Member Council on Foreign Relations, Partner, Bush, Obama

Robert Rubin
Treasury Secretary, Co-Chairman Council on Foreign Relations, Chairman, Clinton

Timothy Geitner
Treasury Secretary, NY Fed President
Rubin Protege and employee, Member Kissinger Assosciates, Member Council on Foreign Relations, Bush, Obama

Larry Summers
Director National Economic Council, Deputy Treasury Secretary under Rubin, Member Council on Foreign Relations, Rubin Protege and employee, Bush, Obama

John Whitehead
United States Deputy Secretary of State, Chairman of the Board Federal Reserve Bank of New York, Member Council on Foreign Relations, Chairman

John Corzine
U.S. Senator, Governor of New Jersey [also helped script Sarbanes-Oxley act], Member Council on Foreign Relations, Chairman and CEO

Robert Steel
Under Secretary for Domestic Finance at the United States Department of the Treasury, Vice Chair

John Thornton
Member of the Council on Foreign Relations, Boardmember at Brooking's Institute, President, COO

Randall Fort
Assistant Secretary of State for Intelligence and Research, Member Council of Foreign Relations, Co-head of Global Security

This was a small sample of the interconnected world of high finance, government, and the foundations/thinktanks. Frankly, I'm exhausted, so this is all for now. I will periodically update this list as I find new people or connections. If anyone is interested, the same thing can be done with the major defense contractors, the major pharmaceutical companies, and so on. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the Brooking's Institute or the Council on Foreign Relations, I'll post some explanation at a later date, along with further connections. The world of the foundations and thinktanks is incredibly complex and even more incredibly incestuous and at some point I'm going to post an exhaustive list demonstrating that.

Until then, consider this quote of H.G. Wells (a member of the related Fabian Socety of London), from his non-fiction book, The Open Conspiracy, in which he advocates the creation of a world government.

Quote:

...an effective world control, not merely of armed force, but of the production and main movements of staple commodities and the drift and expansion of population is required. It is absurd to dream of peace and world-wide progress without that much control. These things assured, the abilities and energies of a greatly increased proportion of human beings could be diverted to the happy activities of scientific research and creative work, with an ever-increasing release and enlargement of human possibility. On the political side it is plain that our lives must be given to the advancement of that union.

That might sound reasonable to many people, but now read the details below.

Quote:

The desire for service, for subordination, for permanent effect, for an escape from the distressful pettiness and mortality of the individual life, is the undying element in every religious system. The time has come to strip religion right down to that, to strip it for greater tasks than it has ever faced before...The first sentence in the modern creed must be, not "I believe," but "I give myself...The human spirit has learnt love, devotion, obedience and humility in relation to other personalities, and with difficulty it takes the final step to a transcendent subordination, from which the last shred of personality has stripped.

[quote]The reasonable desire of all of us is that we should have the collective affairs of the world managed by suitably equipped groups of the most interested, intelligent, and devoted people, and that their activities should be subjected to a free, open, watchful criticism, restrained from making spasmodic interruptions but powerful enough to modify or supersede without haste or delay whatever is weakening or unsatisfactory in the general direction. A number of readers will be disposed to say that this is a very vague...[/quote]

Quote:

We repeat, the new directive organizations of men's affairs will not be of the same nature as old-fashioned governments. They will be in their nature biological, financial, and generally economic, and the old governments were primarily nothing of the sort. Their directive force will be (1) an effective criticism having the quality of science, and (2) the growing will in men to have things right. The directive force of the older governments was the uncriticized fantasies and wilfulness of an individual, a class, a tribe, or a majority

Does that system sounds familiar? Councils of experts working on an international level, especially leaders in economics. Remember social Darwinism: the idea that those at the pinnacle of society deserve to be there by virtue of having out-competed everyone else, and that they are superior to everyone else? That was popular among the elite of society in the late 19th - early 20th century; who says it disappeared? Who I wonder would the people in power at that time think was best suited to manage affairs, were they inclined to agree with Wells' proposal for a top-down, controlled global society?

I know that most people will react to this thread with dismay, as I've brought up the issue before. That's alright. I'll never claim to know with certainty anything. I don't know that what I'm suggesting is here true. However, if anyone who's reading this has read my other posts anywhere on this forum and feels that I might possibly be at least a moderately intelligent -and importantly, skeptical - human being, I ask only that you give a few minutes serious thought to the material contained in this thread. Maybe read through it a second time. And, of course, please post any criticisms, comments, or questions you may have about anything I've said.

Thank you Everyone who made it this far

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@BrightNoon,

Bright; That sure beats You got your peanut butter in my chocolate... You got your business in my government... Idnit crazy that anyone can call Obama a Socialist...They are all socialist when they tell the working class to git in the ration line... It is like appalacia.. Pull thousands of millions of tons of wealth out of the land for profit, and then tell America they have to help support those poor people... No one wants to take responsibility for the lives they take or the health the ruin... Everyone wants to hand of the unsupported poor to some one else... So do I...I want to hand the responsibility right back to those who took the support off from under them when the cost grew too high...

Two classes make up the government...It is pimps and whores, to keep you from guessing... And they are superior...

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@BrightNoon,

There are three places you can find people who know a lot about managing complex economic systems. One is career people like Geithner who have always been in public office. Two is people who have been in large private investing institutions, like Paulson. And three is people from academia, like Bernanke.

It is what it is. You want people who are entirely unconnected from this financial world managing our economy? You're not going to find anyone qualified to do it.

2 Replies

@Aedes,

Aedes;99985 wrote:

There are three places you can find people who know a lot about managing complex economic systems. One is career people like Geithner who have always been in public office. Two is people who have been in large private investing institutions, like Paulson. And three is people from academia, like Bernanke.

It is what it is. You want people who are entirely unconnected from this financial world managing our economy? You're not going to find anyone qualified to do it.

The government cannot manage to wipe its own butt... In addition, all the good for which it was created, which is clearly stated in the constitution it has only accidentally approached, but in the meantime it has expeditied the exploitation of this populations and bankrolled the banks when they have glutted themselves on our ruin... There is a reason property has such protection under our government and it is because they ones paid the entire support of the government... They no longer pay for the protection they recieve, but we pay for the protection we are denied... So sure, have the cops get in bed with the criminals and don't worry about who is on top... Let those people with their economic invasions decide where the next war will be, and let us figure out how we will pay for it... If it were me, I would say we need government over business, and not business in government...I would say, give to all perfect freedom, and give the people control over all that which affects their lives... If you want to be free, then keep to yourself... Don't let your affairs become my affair if you wish to continue... The thing is, that so much that business does has an effect upon us, but we cannot have an effect upon business through our goverment because it has long since been corrupted...

It is not a complex economic system... The system is simple, but if the object is to confuse simple people it must be made to seem complex... Well, at lest they have fooled you... There is a triumph..

1 Reply

@Fido,

Fido;99988 wrote:

The government cannot manage to wipe its own butt...

That's quite a generalization. Medicare works pretty well, better than many private insurance entities -- the problem with Medicare has to do with the fact that people are living longer and the baby boom generation is large -- so the number of beneficiaries is therefore increasing. It's not a problem with how Medicare is run. I was just in Yellowstone National Park, and next week I'll be in Haleakala National Park. The National Park Service despite wretched underfunding is doing a great job.

So whatever. Hire experts to do expert-level work.

Fido;99988 wrote:

It is not a complex economic system... The system is simple.

Even running a store is a complex economic system, at least as far as systems science goes. The national and global economies are highly complex. Plain old Adam Smith theory presents far fewer variables than there are in reality.

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@Aedes,

Aedes;99985 wrote:

There are three places you can find people who know a lot about managing complex economic systems. One is career people like Geithner who have always been in public office. Two is people who have been in large private investing institutions, like Paulson. And three is people from academia, like Bernanke.

It is what it is. You want people who are entirely unconnected from this financial world managing our economy? You're not going to find anyone qualified to do it.

Firstly, we only need experts managing the economy if you believe that some central authority should be managing the economy, which I do not. But, ignoring that for the moment, assuming it is appropriate to have central planning and regulation, you don't see a conflict of interest here? Keep in mind this is nothing new. As indicated on the list, many of these people were in place well before the present crisis. They and the interests they represent made enormous amounts of money creating the bubble, which they knew would burst, and then profited from that bursting, all the while knowing that the companies themselves would not be allowed to go bankrupt - because they were the people in the government designing the bailouts!

But it's far more than that. In my opinion, having looked at a lot of evidence of 'conflict of interest,' and considering the public statements, speeches, and books of some of the key people in this fascist architecture, it is absolutely clear that they are conscious of what they are doing. In other words, it isn't that people with experience in the business world just tend to be placed in positions where that experience would be useful. No, they actively co-opt the government for theirt own purposes. If you only consider Goldman Sachs and the other banks and corporations in the club, then those purposes might appear to be nothing more than profit. But, if you look at the foundations and thinktanks, which were founded by/are managed by the very same personalities, you will find that most of them have a very radical political/social agenda. They are all internationalists ('global governance' is nothing but a euphemism for global government), they are all statists who want extreme control of virtually all aspects of life, and they are all anti-democratic, believing that society is best run by unelected experts meeting in secret. What you have to consider is that these people have very different ideas of what is 'best for society' than you or I might have.

As I tried to demonstrate in another thread a while ago, these same interests, dominated by the Wallstreet banks, funded many of the worst totalitarian regimes of the 20th century, and were seemingly behind the near coup d'etat to oust FDR in the '30s, which was only averted by the partiotic actions of General Smedley Butler. If you haven't heard of that historical event, look into it. It's very telling. The most prominent presidential advisor, quasi-official, of the period before FDR and into the beginning of the presidency was a Texan turned banker named Edward Mandell House, known as 'Colonel House.' He was the driving influence behind Woodrow Wilson's foreign policy, including the entry into the war (which if you remember Wilson initially opposed) and most importantly he was one of the chief architects of the League of Nations, World Court, etc., which he adamantely wanted the U.S. to join. Fortunately, we still had a real, representaive government at that stage in history, and we didn't join. I ramble, but my point is that these same interests and institutions have for decades, about a century really, been working very hard toward one aim: world government of an authoritarian type. It's not so hard to imagine that the ultra-rich have motives for plying their influence other than money; what need does man with $5 billion or $20 billion or $100 billion have for more money? At that point, money is only a means. The end is power.

Orwell was deep into the British Civil Service in India and met many of the people that were part of this establishment at the time, which Caroll Quigley called the 'Anglo-American Establishment,' not because it was nationalistic, but because it's power was based in the old monied families of the East Coast and London. Aldous Huxley and his brother Julian, the entire Huxley familiy for several generations in fact, were very much related (both literally and figuratively) to some fo the most important English families. Obviously Orwell and Aldous Huxley wrote 1984 and Brave New World, which, once one looks at the facts of those mens' lives, may appear in a different light: more realistic than fantastic. And actually, there's some debate about whether or not Huxley's vision of the future was intended t be entirely dystopic. His brother was an integral part of the evolutionairy and other biological science of the time, which was in Britain and in the U.S. (until WWII) very much interested in 'racial hygiene' and other eugenical schools of thought that were merely applied, brutally, by the NAZIs; he received an award from the Lasker Foundation for his work regarding world population while he was member of the British Eugenics Society (actual title of it, not my words). This is another issue entirely, but in brief, control of population itself, control of breeding, has been an important part of every totalitarian system of the last century. As Wells said above, the new system needs to be not only economic and political, but biological.

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@BrightNoon,

In my field we are constantly required to reveal conflicts of interest.

There is nothing wrong with having a conflict of interest per se, so long as it is revealed so that everyone is clear on how these conflicts affect your work.

In other words, so long as ongoing financial relationships are disclosed fully and openly, then this is the best check and balance to ensure that COI is not affecting policy.

To be honest COI is a much bigger problem among people in the House of Representatives than in the treasury dept.

2 Replies

@Aedes,

Aedes;100039 wrote:

In my field we are constantly required to reveal conflicts of interest.

There is nothing wrong with having a conflict of interest per se, so long as it is revealed so that everyone is clear on how these conflicts affect your work.

In other words, so long as ongoing financial relationships are disclosed fully and openly, then this is the best check and balance to ensure that COI is not affecting policy.

To be honest COI is a much bigger problem among people in the House of Representatives than in the treasury dept.

How about everyone with an interest having a vote??? If what I do affects your life negatively shouldn't you have a veto... The profit of the rich is not a victimless crime.... It does not matter if both sides are truly willing... Some people may be born victims, and no one can stop that...But when people are unwilling to be made victims by a government in bed with business, giving them our money to ensure profit after bending every law in their favor, and the government prevent justice, and expedites injustice we are not bound by any oaths to either... The past must some day meet the future, and the moment is now when we should be building up new forms of relationship and turning our backs on the bankers and the dollar...Those people and that form are gone... Business is supposed to support the government, and it is the reverse...If business cannot suck enough out of us to pay for their cops, but need the cops to kick it out of us, and in the end rob the future of its hope to pay a moment's pleasure then it does not work...If it does not work for all it does not work...If even those most blessed by wealth live lives of deep dissatisfaction, and all rest a harried from one end of their lives to another to get ahead then there is nothing worse even in the imaginations of artists... This beast cannot be captured nor reigned in... Between them, government and business will kill anyone who stands in their way, or who challenges their supremacy... The form is most dangerous as it dies...

1 Reply

@Aedes,

Aedes;100039 wrote:

In my field we are constantly required to reveal conflicts of interest.

There is nothing wrong with having a conflict of interest per se, so long as it is revealed so that everyone is clear on how these conflicts affect your work.

In other words, so long as ongoing financial relationships are disclosed fully and openly, then this is the best check and balance to ensure that COI is not affecting policy.

To be honest COI is a much bigger problem among people in the House of Representatives than in the treasury dept.

Honestly, I don't know how to respond to such a statement. Nevermind then? If you feel that Goldman Sachs (among others) is not weilding influence in Washington in order to achieve its own ends at the expense of the public, then everything is lolipops and dandelions I supppose. We have the best and brightest experts in charge. I'm sure that these, the same people who created the crisis, will have no trouble fixing it. :sarcastic:

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@Fido,

Fido;100108 wrote:

How about everyone with an interest having a vote???... But when people are unwilling to be made victims by a government in bed with business, giving them our money to ensure profit after bending every law in their favor, and the government prevent justice, and expedites injustice we are not bound by any oaths to either

I don't get it -- this libertarian rant about how the government is corrupted by relationships with business, yet at the same time ranting that private enterprise should rule the world. You can't have it both ways.

---------- Post added 10-27-2009 at 04:16 PM ----------

BrightNoon;100166 wrote:

Nevermind then?

Didn't say that.

I agree that all relationships should be disclosed.

I do not agree that such a relationship is in principle disqualifying.

BrightNoon;100166 wrote:

We have the best and brightest experts in charge. I'm sure that these, the same people who created the crisis, will have no trouble fixing it.

Our financial system is currently represented by people from Goldman Sachs et al, i.e. Paulson, the Fed i.e. Geithner, and Harvard et al i.e. Bernanke.

Fine, it's all corrupt. But where else are you going to find expertise? Are you going to hire someone from the IMF? From the London School? It's all the same -- the population gets pretty thin and that highest echelon of expertise.

I know, you're probably going to say that this is evidence that our economy needs to fundamentally simplify if we're even talking about how to recruit this kind of expertise. But that's a different conversation and the fact is that it's not going to change much. There isn't going to be some massive upheaval, some 1989 or some 1917 or some 1789. It's going to be similar, and if we want good stewardship we need smart, experienced people. I'm in academia, I'm a fan of it, but at a certain level it's impractical, and you can't have starving professors run the entire government.

So where do we get our next chariman of the Fed from? From here?

3 Replies

@Aedes,

Aedes;100178 wrote:

Fine, it's all corrupt. But where else are you going to find expertise? Are you going to hire someone from the IMF? From the London School? It's all the same -- the population gets pretty thin and that highest echelon of expertise.

Some of the positions held in government in the OP aren't even finance related. I mean, what expertise did Joshua Bolton have to become White House Cheif of Staff that couldn't be found in someone else who was not associated with Sachs?

Seems kinda corrupt to me.

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@Aedes,

Aedes;100178 wrote:

I don't get it -- this libertarian rant about how the government is corrupted by relationships with business, yet at the same time ranting that private enterprise should rule the world. You can't have it both ways.

---------- Post added 10-27-2009 at 04:16 PM ----------

I didn't say private enterprise should rule the world... I will say that even when society was very communistic that people still used their freedom to assert their individuality, their unique place in their communities... Private initiative is not all bad, but the community ought to have a veto against anyone who injures the public to enrich themselves...The presumption now is that if some one sees a way of making a profit that no one else has managed, then they are doing good by doing well...Nothing could be further from the truth...It is up to the inventer and entrepeneur to make a positive defense of their actions...Is what they do a good??? Now they have the benefit of a doubt... Later they may be happy with a fair hearing...

Consider that the goals for which our government was constituted were clearly laid out, and they have never been repudiated... They say nothing about the support of business or the insurance of profit...That is the effect of ideology on reason... Even Aristotle said that governments are formed for good... Where is the good in supporting an evil that cannot support itself???

---------- Post added 10-27-2009 at 08:45 PM ----------

Quote:

Aedes;99991 wrote:
That's quite a generalization. Medicare works pretty well, better than many private insurance entities -- the problem with Medicare has to do with the fact that people are living longer and the baby boom generation is large -- so the number of beneficiaries is therefore increasing. It's not a problem with how Medicare is run. I was just in Yellowstone National Park, and next week I'll be in Haleakala National Park. The National Park Service despite wretched underfunding is doing a great job.

Does medicare work well... So long a insurance companies can cherry pick, the government is left paying for all who cannot pay, and that is why their costs are exceeding their ability to pay...Did it escape your notice that the park service sell concessions... Can you believe that it is not supported better??? Consider that in Australia the government is paid a 10% royalty for every mineral taken out of the ground... Here, if you own the land you generally own the minerals beneath... Yet is it public property, and much of the land was public and was sold for nothing when that revenue was supposed to support the natives, and the government... Jackson set a precedent of selling native lands off from under them to settle the national debt, and the rich have run up the debt again and again to have more and more of the commonwealth as private wealth...
The government was sitting on its thumb during Katrina, and before...It was sitting on its thumb for 911, and thumbing it when it got into Iraq and Afghanistan... It watched and encouraged this meldown of the economy...It encouraged to realestate bubble when it helped to force down wages and quit taxing property for the full support of the federal government...

1 Reply

@Fido,

Fido;100226 wrote:

Consider that the goals for which our government was constituted were clearly laid out, and they have never been repudiated... They say nothing about the support of business or the insurance of profit...

That's because the authors of the constitution couldn't create a document for what the country would look like 100-200-300 years later. If they had known what we're fighting about, perhaps they'd have been even clearer.

---------- Post added 10-27-2009 at 08:45 PM ----------

Fido;100226 wrote:

Does medicare work well... So long a insurance companies can cherry pick, the government is left paying for all who cannot pay

Sorry Fido, but that's not how you get into Medicare. 100% of American adults over 65 are eligible for it. And we pay into it -- it's why there's a line that says "Medicare" on your pay stub.

Fido;100226 wrote:

and that is why their costs are exceeding their ability to pay...

Incorrect.

Fido;100226 wrote:

Did it escape your notice that the park service sell concessions... Can you believe that it is not supported better?

Your point? How much money does the Grand Canyon make from selling bumper stickers and coffee mugs? It's not enough to reverse what the Glen Canyon Dam has done to the Canyon. The t-shirts they sell at Great Smoky Mountains hasn't exactly eradicated the woody adelgid, and the Yellowstone-labelled huckleberry toffee doesn't put out forest fires or repave roads.

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@BrightNoon,

Regulatory capture has always been an issue for economists, and has been written about extensively for at least 60 years now. A logical solution to this problem is to pursue an economic policy where both the government and corporations or other private trusts have little to no influence over the market. But, most people are willing to accept a bit of corruption and elitist plotting in exchange for the 'security' of having the 'experts' controlling economic policy. And as Aedes said, we all consider experts to be in high finance, government, or academia.

One idea is that people who are appointed to public servant positions need to be kept to incredibly high standards...they want to serve as an extension of the state, so they should essentially be owned by the state so long as they are supposed to be serving the public interest. Meaning, a moderate standard of living, where they and their families are provided for, but private income, the accumulation of capital wealth, and anything similar should be strictly forbidden. By acting as a public servant, they temporarily lose many private rights. This way, only those who truly want to serve would be motivated to office, as surely the corporate world would reward them much more handsomely for their services. Of course, it would still be difficult to prevent conspiracies, kick backs after a person has left office, etc. And then you deal with more problems of regulatory capture when trying to regulate the regulators...oh boy.

Reminds me of that Will Smith movie, "Enemy of the State", at the end, where someone asks, after hearing on the news about a new watchdog committee forming in Washington, "And who's going to monitor the monitors of the monitors?"

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@BrightNoon,

The difference between socialism and capitalism is simple to state: With socialism government governs business, and with capitalism, business governs government...

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@Aedes,

Aedes;100178 wrote:

Our financial system is currently represented by people from Goldman Sachs et al, i.e. Paulson, the Fed i.e. Geithner, and Harvard et al i.e. Bernanke.

Fine, it's all corrupt. But where else are you going to find expertise? Are you going to hire someone from the IMF? From the London School? It's all the same -- the population gets pretty thin and that highest echelon of expertise.

Would you employ a master burgler, who had shown no signs of reform, to guard your most valuable possessions? Would you vote for a mob boss as president, who was infamous for murding his opponents in cold blood? Would you ask an unrepentent child molester to babysit?

If not, why would you entrust the nation's economic system to people who have time and time again manipulated that system for their own advantage? And when I say people, that is literally what I mean: i.e. not a party, not an organization, but individual personalities, e.g. Larry Summers. These people who have spent their lives in the wallstreet banks do not know some magical formula which escapes everyone else. There are plenty of intelligent people that understand economics at least as well and could fill the most important positions in the treasury, SEC, CFTC, etc. As I said before, I don't believe the government should intervene in the economy in this manner, but if we believe the opposite, why not employ people without massive conflicts of interest? Again, the fact that former career employees of major banks and corporations fill the most important offices in adminstration after adminstration, regardless of party, has nothing to do with a meritocratic dynamic, and everything to do with corruption and power politics. Frankly, I don't think 'conflict of interest' even adequately expresses what is happening; there is no conflict, these people planted in government are loyal soley to the commericail interests they represent and formerly worked for.

Quote:

I know, you're probably going to say that this is evidence that our economy needs to fundamentally simplify if we're even talking about how to recruit this kind of expertise. But that's a different conversation and the fact is that it's not going to change much. There isn't going to be some massive upheaval, some 1989 or some 1917 or some 1789. It's going to be similar, and if we want good stewardship we need smart, experienced people. I'm in academia, I'm a fan of it, but at a certain level it's impractical, and you can't have starving professors run the entire government.

So where do we get our next chariman of the Fed from? From here?

You're right, my solution is to eliminate the mechanisms for central planning and central control altogether, starting with the Fed. I find it rather sad that you think any debate re the validity of those mechanisms is futile and might as well not be had at all, because of the near certainty that the present system will endure regardless. I don't believe that we should simply surrender. If the trend in progress currently is too strong to halt, let alone reverse, then I still choose to fight it to the bitter end. I reject the practice of the choosing the lesser of two evils, which, on a related note, has been disastrously adopted by most of the voting public.

Even if we assume that central planning is appropriate, and that it is useful and effective, which are two giant leaps of faith, what makes you think that these 'experts' are using their expertise for the public benefit? If indeed they are not, as I contend, then, assuming the present system is impossible to abolish, wouldn't the best course of action be to work towards the appointment of incompetents? If the work is against the pubic interest, then wouldn't we want it in the hands of people who were not as capable of performing it?

Of course, this is a poor alternative to actually changing the system. So, to answer your last question - "So where do we get our next chairman of the Fed?" - I would say nowhere. Abolish the Fed.

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@BrightNoon,

BrightNoon;99981 wrote:

I know that most people will react to this thread with dismay, as I've brought up the issue before. That's alright. I'll never claim to know with certainty anything. I don't know that what I'm suggesting is here true. However, if anyone who's reading this has read my other posts anywhere on this forum and feels that I might possibly be at least a moderately intelligent -and importantly, skeptical - human being, I ask only that you give a few minutes serious thought to the material contained in this thread. Maybe read through it a second time. And, of course, please post any criticisms, comments, or questions you may have about anything I've said.

Thank you Everyone who made it this far

To me is seems like a far greater assumption to think that the suer wealthy would not try to consolidate power than to think that they are. Half of the worlds wealth is owned by a few hundred families. And they are just sitting idle with it? I don't think so.
However, I have a harder time to believe that we are on the cutting edge of these developments. That this is about to happen, but we can still prevent it. Humans have always thought that their time is the important one when the big thing is happening. This has driven generations of doomsday scenarios (and global warming plays to this human instinct).
What I rather think is that the one-world government has already happened and maybe a century ago. The world was as globally connected in 1913 as it first became again in 1970.
But I can't concentrate now because the plebs are making noise in front of my window. :big-guns::meeting:

0 Replies

'Government Sachs' and so much more

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