I decided to review each of these links and attachments and include them here a separate of biographical material for those interested in this subject. This task may take a long time, therefore, I will add them one by one over a week or two in this entry through successive edits.
A) The Zeitgeist Movement: Orientation Presentation
This is different from the famous Zeitgeist movie and it is a presentation analyzing in detail the symptoms of a society infected with the unsustainable wealth extraction parasite.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3932487043163636261
B) Turning the tables on Wall Street. It seems that North Dakota still practices a form of non (less) parasitic banking system as it was use in the Colonies, before the Banking Act of 1864:
http://www.webofdebt.com/articles/state_bank_option2.php
C) The Marxist/Socialist deception. Actually this is lecture given by Richard Wolff a professor of economics at UMass Amherst talks on the current "financial" crisis and capitialism in general. IMHO the symptoms and partial causes of the problem are correctly identified, the solution proposed is completely wrong. I believe that communists/socialists are offering the false solution of replacing the crony capitalist elite with a red elite that usually is far worse. But anyway, here is the lecture:Forty-six of fifty states are now reported to be so insolvent that they could be filing Chapter 9 bankruptcy proceedings within the next two years.1 Of the four that are not in that category, one is the isolated farming state of North Dakota. What does it have that other states don’t? The answer seems to be: its own bank. In fact, North Dakota has the only state-owned bank in the nation. It has avoided the credit freeze caused by the derivative schemes of the Wall Street bankers by creating its own credit, leading the nation in establishing state economic sovereignty.
North Dakota is an unlikely candidate for the distinction. As Michigan management consultant Charles Fleetham observed last month in an article distributed to his local media:
“North Dakota is a sparsely populated state of less than 700,000, known for cold weather, isolated farmers and a hit movie – Fargo. Yet, for some reason it defies the real estate cliché of location, location, location. Since 2000, the state’s GNP has grown 56%, personal income has grown 43%, and wages have grown 34%. This year the state has a budget surplus of $1.2 billion!”
The secret of its success seems to be the state-owned Bank of North Dakota, which was established by the state legislature in 1919 specifically to free farmers and small businessmen from the clutches of out-of-state bankers and railroad men.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7382297202053077236
(By the way, I can't stop thinking at the poor Russians who in order to escape the oppressive unsustainable wealth extraction of the Czar, they chose the wrong solution of Communism where they got more oppression, wealth extraction and incompetent management. Moreover after 70 of communism they made again the wrong choice and they got first wealth extraction form Yeltsin's oligarchs and now again wealth extraction by Putin's siloviki elite)
D)GRAND ILLUSION - THE FEDERAL RESERVE. Background on the Federal Reserve System.
E) The Creature of Jekyll Island. This is a classic and probably most of the readers for this blog have already watched it. I believe this is the best expose on how a hybrid banking cartel has been created in US in order to perpetrate unsustainable wealth extraction through banking.
F) The Money Masters. This movie is the grandfather of Zeitgeist, but IMHO has the best take on the causes of the problem and the best solution. For most of the people only the end (from 3:00:00) is worth watching offering an interesting (and historical) perspective (this documentary was made in 1995). It also contains a great historical review of the first and second central banks of the USA (for those who want to watch it all).
G) Now And The Future. The best site on internet to find unfudged economic data. Great charts.
H) Finster Dollar Index. From the economic underground, this is IMHO, the best inflation-deflation indicator that exists. Period.
(more links to follow)
3 comments:
Awesome posts, really made me think. Mainly about exactly WHO is doing the excessive wealth extraction. Would appreciate your insights.
See, I know that in many developing countries a handful of families control everything. Even The Economist acknowledged that recently.
However, it seems that for the advanced countries it is not that simple, see "gini" coefficients have been fairly stable for most countries (and yes, in the wealth distribution-data, the top 10% owns pretty much everything).
What keeps bugging me - and has been for a while - is that all those baby-boomers think they can save their way to retirement in general pensionfunds. In spite of the fact that when these funds pay out, there will be relatively fewer workers (in the country) compared to retirees. It just cannot work; I always figured there would simply be massive wage-inflation. Ouch, silly me.
Bottom line, in many countries huge sums are "saved" for retirement, and for paying off the house. I think to a large extend, it is these forced-savings-funds that have been trying to extract excessive wealth. And, my feeling is that this is the main place where all this "wealth destruction" has taken place. Even the rich dont have trillions to burn. Note that pension-benefits and (life/annuity) insurance promises are usually not included in wealth statistics.
(btw, it seems there is a relation between housing bubbles, and the extend to which there are forced private savings).
Thoughts?
I think you are correct. The retirement savings have been exchanged for illusory wealth in order to conserve the process of unsustainable wealth extraction. Basically retirement savings are 'bye bye' or badly looted, and the baby boomers shafted big time, at an age they can't start again from scratch.
This is why I was implying that in US we have just passed the inflection point of a modern S-curve (the hook curve). At this stage a jubilee is not possible anymore, and adding more illusory wealth in the system (through a new bubble) will buy only little time . There are only two options left:
a) redistribution of wealth by means of revolt and revolution
b) an exogenous influx of real wealth by looting some other country or countries: war and/or economic war.
So,... which one will be ?
Thanks! It's just so useful to realize who the biggest baddest bagholders are.
So in that case, we have a ton of old-ish people, who think they have retirement funds.
Should be fun. At least some have paid off the house, so they actually own something they can sell...
As for the others; they better have really good relations with their offspring, me thinks.
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