"Starve The Beast" - July 4th, 2009

I do alot of reading, chatting and checking forums on the net: mostly I hear whining, anger, criticism and fear - noone really has a plan to do anything about a future which seems bleaker and bleaker.

But I have always had a plan: I know exactly how to bring corporate and government corruption to a screeching halt. All it would take is 30% of the population (of any country) to stop spending money. Shut down the country. And make unified demands. This has to be done while there are still some consumers left with disposable income.

Sure, you might say, this will only make things worse. But only in the short run. The power of the people to control their own government will not be reinstated without some pain. Better make a potent effort now, or the consequences of allowing the Big Dogs to control our destiny will bring much more suffering than a week or two of shutting down government and corporate profits. There can be short term sacrifice now - or all will suffer long term. And better money than blood.

Here is the first article I have found that has a decent plan: keep your money in your pocket until government decides to serve those it is meant to serve - the people. Give the article a read and if you agree, please pass it on. WE ARE THE BOSS - TIME TO LET THE BIG DOGS KNOW IT!

I would add to the list below to include many other 'people before profit' demands not mentioned here. And my agenda would be a bit more radical; but, Mr. Denninger has the right idea.

"Starve The Beast" - July 4th, 2009

Karl Denninger
Source

Perhaps its time.

There have been a number of people on the forum talking about this, with one of the most recent converts being "iflyjetzzz".

Look, we can rant and rave about market manipulation and government-sponsored games. We can petition the SEC, the FBI and Congress. We can demand that they stop it all we want.

But they haven't and likely won't until and unless America gets pissed off enough to force them to act.

So how do we make that happen, yet remain within the law?

Its not that hard, and in the intermediate and longer-term it would be incredibly positive for our economy and nation.

We go on a consumption strike until and unless our demands are met.

What are our demands? Here's the list:

1. * All the financial fraudsters are investigated, indicted, and prosecuted. This includes the con artists in CONgress who got "special deals" from Mozilo and his "Friends of Angelo" program (and who are blocking a subpoena to BofA as it would implicate them), it includes those past and current members of Government Sachs, and it includes all those other financial "professionals" who deceived Americans and others with their sale of toxic exploding mortgage products along with the securities supposedly backed by them.
2. * Glass-Steagall is restored, in full, and all the firms that can't exist under it are broken up. Period.
3. * The insider-trading that has become blatant and outrageous is prosecuted where illegal and where not, is made illegal and then prosecuted, with the focus being on the size of the scam. This includes obvious circumstances such as August 2007 (Bernanke's phone logs were FOIA'd) where trading patterns made clear that "certain someones" had foreknowledge of the discount rate cut along with Congresspeople who were briefed on the TARP and within hours or days made significant stock trades. Today if you're Martha Stewart you're prosecuted where if you make millions in an hour by exploiting government information "leaks" the SEC and FBI look the other way.
4. * The Government withdraws all of its backstopping of financial firms who created this mess. All of it. If you're a bank or other firm and did something imprudent, you fail. Period. This is true whether you're a small regional bank (as is happening now; 5 in the last week) or a big behemoth like Citibank or Bank Of America. No "special deals", no "special guarantees", nothing of the kind. If the government wishes to avoid "systemic risk" then the government regulators can do their damn job.
5. * The Fed disgorges all of its improperly-acquired MBS and other related securities. If it doesn't have a full-faith-and-credit guarantee and was bought, it is disgorged - period.
6. * The Fed agrees to full annual audits without exception.
7. * Those people inside government who conspired with certain bankers to cook the books, along with those in the banks who did so, go to jail. Our own Office of The Inspector General in the government has confirmed that there was an active conspiracy to break the law within the OTS, but not one indictment has been issued.
8. * Those who committed fraud in the creation of this economic mess, whether they be mortgage lenders, those who packaged up securities while intentionally omitting credit information, those in the real estate industry to pressed for appraisal fraud and others are investigated, prosecuted and if convicted jailed. All of them.
9. * Losses are born by those who made bad decisions, not the taxpayer generally. Those who made good decisions get to reap the benefits, while those who made bad decisions eat the losses. No exceptions.
10. * Government cuts the annual budget deficit to zero. If government wants to blow the money it has to have the money. If they can't raise the money they don't spend it. It is time to live within our means and hold government to account for its profligate spending along with promises of "benefits" they know they cannot actually deliver down the road such as Medicare Part D.

Until then the position of those who wish to join is simple: No non-essential purchases of anything are made. Period.

What's an essential purchase? Here's the list:

• * Enough food to eat at home. No more eating out.
• * Rent and utilities.
• * Essential medical services.
• * Enough fuel to get to and from work.

In addition any "excess withholding" is stopped; if you are getting a big fat refund from the IRS every year you are loaning the government your money at zero interest until April. Stop that; its stupid. Change your W4 so you get exactly nothing back or owe a tiny amount; if you pay estimates pay only that which you must and not one dime more.

Note that it is unlawful to use your W4 to intentionally under-withhold, but you are in fact not obligated to pay one more dime in tax than you actually owe. There is nothing wrong with adjusting withholding to match (as close as you reasonably can) your actual tax obligation.

Put the money you save (it will be a lot!) into a non-TARP Credit Union if you have one available to you, or a non-TARP local bank if you do not. Spend none of it.

If we pledge to do this and not resume normal spending habits on wants as opposed to needs until and unless the budget is balanced, the bailouts are rolled back and those who committed fraud go to prison the government will be forced to act as they will simply run out of money.
They cannot force you to buy that new iPOD or flatscreen TV, or to take an expensive vacation.

Consumer spending is 70% of the economy.
This is a consumer weapon that is more powerful than any other means of peaceful protest. Strangling the government and private business' ability to steal from us all by cutting off their revenue will force reform, and has the additional benefit of being exactly what this nation needs to provide a strong capital formation base when that reform is complete.

If businesses want my money they can join in the chorus of voices demanding that government stop the looting and start prosecuting.

Will any of us be perfect in this endeavor? No. There will be the occasional indulgence I'm sure no matter who we are. But I'm willing to bet we can shrink consumption - each and every one of us - by at least 10% without any real personal pain at all, and if we do so it will send an indelible message to those in government and business: cut that crap out!

The truth about central bankers and the Feds

It has taken me years to figure out exactly what a central bank is. And it hasn't been easy to understand. As a matter of fact, it tooks years just to figure out that I that I didn't understand the entire concept of the Feds, and how this establishment was actually detrimental to the people it claims to 'serve'.

Probably the best examination of central banking I have seen lately was presented in the movie Zeitgeist - the Addendum. I highly recommend viewing at least the first half of this movie for those who wish a crystal clear idea of what the Feds (and other central banks) do in plain no-nonsense language. The dangers of the concept of the Feds are expressed very well in the article below - exactly how do the people lose?

Truth, By George

By Rand Clifford
2/14/09
Source
Truth in our time has become so muddied, the first thing we need in any search for fundamental, unambiguous truth is a good working definition. Something to clutch as a certain cruciform against vampires…a touchstone to help us better navigate lies.

truth \’trüth\ n. : That which is true

Hhmmm….so precisely what is “true”?

Truth. Truth is true.
That Möbius strip leads nowhere. Could a better understanding of truth as an aide to our search for it be found by examining the opposite of truth—by examining untruth?

American life floods us with one particular very tried and true untruth: Everything our federal government tells us, either officially, or through mainstream corporate media. So, a reliable working definition of truth here could be: “Exactly what government does not tell”. Certainly they tell occasional superficial truths, but those always have tendrils merging into the massive and nearby body of deceit.

Let’s test drive the definition—not conventionally as one would with perhaps a list of lies, specific lies, that’d set us on another Möbius strip since ultimately it’s all the same, or has only one side, lies. No, let’s take a spin through authority, some entrenched establishment symbolism.

The Fed
What might evoke more bedrock images of federal government than the Federal Reserve (Fed), our central bank (which is not actually a bank, and has no reserves)? Simmering in its deep heritage of untruth…the Fed is in no way a part of the federal government, but is instead a private corporation. The Fed’s ultimate agenda orbits profit for a mostly foreign banking cartel. It is a private money making machine disguised as a part of “Government of the People, by the People and for the People”, creating “money” by simple data entry, then bleeding the people by loaning it to the government at interest. How in the name of government, in disgusting violation of the Constitution, did this happen? Rep. Ron Paul tells us. He introduced the Federal Reserve Board Abolition Act (HR 2755), in June 2007.

The Great Depression is a sinister example of the Fed’s untruth. One of their “duties” is to stabilize the money supply, but Sirens of personal accumulation dictate their “mission”. Leaked documents and defector testimony reveals their zeal over how many thousands of banks and farms they hoped to acquire for pennies on the dollar…. The Great Depression was a coup by the financial elite to seize more wealth for themselves at the expense of the working class—one of history’s more hideous refrains. Please note that before their coup of ‘29, these elite controlled only a majority of banks in the Northeast; afterward they dominated American capital from coast to coast. Ben Bernanke, the Fed’s current head, even admitted when squeezed: “Regarding the Great Depression. We did it. We’re sorry. We won’t do it again.”

Considering the Fed’s seamless legacy of untruth…one might suspect that they actually are doing it again—note how much of the current “bailout” money is being used for acquisition…banks swallowing other banks, trillions in debt passed to future taxpayers. Try explaining something like this to your child.

The Bushes
Shaking the Bushes is an unlikely way to flush out truth, but it seems a blue moon can make both Georges spontaneously stray into actual truth.. Is it a ploy to further confuse us, or merely a wrinkle in perception management?

One of George II’s most germane chucking of beans: “Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we.”

George I once told reporter Sarah McClendon that, “If the American people really knew what we had done, we would be chased down the streets and lynched.”

Then in 1992, when asked what Iran-Contra was really all about, George I replied that it was done for “…the continuous consolidation of money and power into higher, tighter and righter hands.”

Talk about hitting pay dirt! In that simple nonchalance of George I, the fundamental truth underlying the foundational untruth of not only the Fed, but the federal government, corporate mainstream media—and owners of all of the above—the financial elite, is revealed.

Yes, the government is owned by our nemesis, the financial elite. They own our free press, they own you…they own the world. The common good is as irrelevant to our owners as the future of humanity, and what they want is all they’ve ever wanted: more. Will we simply keep swallowing their effluent until the Republic is dead?

All we really need to know, something we’ve had our noses rubbed in a very long time, is that the government deals exclusively in untruth. If it ever mattered even a little, truth has been absolutely and permanently supplanted by perception management, which, when it comes to the people, is the government’s only genuine concern (in Bush jargon, one American = OFU, or “one fodder unit”). The people have been so incredibly dumbed-down chemically and socially and every possible way in between that in the breadlines and soup kitchens, major-league baseball will probably be the hottest topic…or the Superbowl, or Brittney and Brad and Jen or the latest Superhero movie….

Perpetual Sheep, Perpetual Slaughter
A very wise woman said, “You can lead sheep to enlightenment, but you can’t make them think.”

Evolution has given women special insight to survive in a world where men dominate physically, do most of the slaughtering, and blaze where humanity would be better off not going. So what has a majority of the slaughter throughout history been motivated by? “…the continuous consolidation of money and power into higher, tighter and righter hands.” If George I spoke only two truths in his whole wretched infliction upon us, that one rules.

“…the continuous consolidation of money and power into higher, tighter and righter hands” drove the fraudulent presidential installation of George II, twice. Same thing for 9/11…for the absolutely mind-defying War on Terror! Oil wars, shock-and-awe, wanton slaughter of millions. War on the Biosphere, Great Depression redux, American concentration camps for Americans, American troops deployed against Americans on American streets, false flag terror, martial law. Suspension of the Constitution, death of the Republic…. Inhumanity American “leadership” has inflicted on the rest of the world for over half a century is now coming home.

Why?
“…the continuous consolidation of money and power into higher, tighter and righter hands.”

That’s the foundational truth everything can be distilled down to, the bottom-line truth we’ve been looking for—and what an unlikely place to find it…what eerie irony. From the forked tongue of George I.

“…the continuous consolidation of money and power into higher, tighter and righter hands.”

It’s the driving force behind everything in Planning Central, the only thing that matters. And with the face of the beast exposed…if we still have time, will we ever muster the will—and especially find the leadership—to turn back toward the humane?

Rand Clifford is a writer living in Spokane, Washington, with his wife Mary Ann, and their Chesapeake Bay retriever, Mink.. Rand’s novels CASTLING, TIMING, VOICES OF VIRES, and PRIEST LAKE CATHEDRAL are published by StarChief Press: http://www.starchiefpress.com

Posted by thomaspainescorner on February 15, 2009

For the opposing point of view click here.