Money, Banks and Democracy: The reality beneath the ideological fantasies and spin

"Power follows property."

The Golden Rule, as cynically applied by the financial elite: "He who holds the gold makes the rules."

Of course, if you can dispense with the need for gold, and still make the rules, that's even better.

I think the evidence is enormously strong that democratically elected governments need to have greater control over their national currencies, not less. The "independence" of a privately owned central bank means economic policies which benefit the private bank's shareholders, rather than the people of the nation.

There is simply overwhelming evidence to support this view. Without democratic control of national currency, via democratically elected bodies such as Congress, sovereignty becomes an impossibility. We need to be dealing with reality here, not ideology.

Central banks that are privately owned - that is, controlled by large corporations or small groups of financial elites - tend to damage national economies while benefiting the financial elite, and more critically, undermine all ability of democratic governments to hold real power on behalf of the people, giving power to the bankers and corporations, and removing effective power from parliament or Congress.

Allowing private empires, such as those who control the FED, to "manage" the nation's money is pretty much letting the wolves guard the hen house. Democratically elected governments have the right, the mandate and the power to print and control the nation’s currency.

To forgo this right and pass this power to highly concentrated financial dynasties, is both unwise and highly dangerous. Jefferson, Jackson and Lincoln knew this, and fought to prevent the handing over of control of the nation's currency to a private bank. They were far more prescient than most people or politicians today. Their advice on keeping the central bank public and democratically controlled should have been heeded. Having failed to heed their warnings, we must today correct our mistake. The issue of control over national currency is absolutely central. All talk of freedom or democracy is meaningless and hollow if this is not addressed.

William Lyon Mackenzie King

Once a nation parts with the control of its currency and credit, it matters not who makes the nations laws. Usury, once in control, will wreck any nation. Until the control of the issue of currency and credit is restored to government and recognized as its most sacred responsibility, all talk of the sovereignty of parliament and of democracy is idle and futile.

Thomas Jefferson

I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their money, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them (around the banks), will deprive the people of their property until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered.

“I am a most unhappy man. I have unwittingly ruined my country. A great industrial nation is controlled by its system of credit. Our system of credit is concentrated. The growth of the nation, therefore, and all our activities are in the hands of a few men. We have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated Governments in the civilized world - no longer a Government by free opinion, no longer a Government by conviction and the vote of the majority, but a Government by the opinion and duress of a small group of dominant men.”
-President Woodrow Wilson

Lord Acton

The issue which has swept down the centuries and which will have to be fought sooner or later is the people versus the banks.

James Madison

History records that the money changers have used every form of abuse, intrigue, deceit, and violent means possible to maintain their control over governments by controlling the money and its issuance.

Mayer Amschel Rothschild

Give me control of a nation's money and I care not who makes the laws.

Napoleon Bonaparte

When a government is dependent upon bankers for money, they and not the leaders of the government control the situation, since the hand that gives is above the hand that takes. Money has no motherland; financiers are without patriotism and without decency; their sole object is gain.

Franklin D. Roosevelt

The real truth of the matter is, as you and I know, that a financial element in the large centers has owned the government of the U.S. since the days of Andrew Jackson.

Lord Acton

Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Marcus Tullius Cicero

A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself. For the traitor appears not a traitor; he speaks in accents familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments, he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men. He rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of the city, he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist. A murder is less to fear.

David Rockefeller writes on pages 404 and 405 of his memoirs:
"The anti-Rockefeller focus of these otherwise incompatible
political positions [across the political spectrum] owes
much to Populism. 'Populists' believe in conspiracies, and
one of the most enduring is that a secret group of
international bankers and capitalists, and their minions,
control the world's economy. Because of my name and
prominence as the head of the Chase for many years, I have
earned the distinction of 'conspirator in chief' from some
of these people…Some even believe we are part of a secret
cabal working against the best interests of the United States,
characterizing my family and me as 'internationalists' and of
conspiring with others around the world to build a more
integrated global political and economic structure - one
world, if you will. If that is the charge, I stand guilty,
and I am proud of it."

Samuel Adams

If men, through fear, fraud, or mistake, should in terms renounce or give up any natural right, the eternal law of reason and the grand end of society would absolutely vacate such renunciation. The right to freedom being the gift of Almighty God, it is not in the power of man to alienate this gift and voluntarily become a slave.

Charles A. Lindbergh

This Act (the Federal Reserve Act, Dec. 23rd 1913) establishes the most gigantic trust on earth. When the President (Woodrow Wilson) signs the Bill, the invisible government of the Monetary Power will be legalised... The worst legislative crime of the ages is perpetrated by this banking and currency Bill.

H. L. Birum, Sr.

The Federal Reserve Bank is nothing but a banking fraud and an unlawful crime against civilization. Why? Because they "create" the money made out of nothing, and our Uncle Sap Government issues their "Federal Reserve Notes" and stamps our Government approval with NO obligation whatever from these Federal Reserve Banks, Individual Banks or National Banks, etc.

Grace Commission

100% of what is collected is absorbed solely by interest on the Federal Debt ... all individual income tax revenues are gone before one nickel is spent on the services taxpayers expect from government.

Henry Ford

It is well enough that people of the nation do not understand our banking and monetary system, for if they did, I believe there would be a revolution before tomorrow morning.

Robert A. Heinlein

Secrecy is the beginning of tyranny.

Lord Acton

Everything secret degenerates, even the administration of justice; nothing is safe that does not show how it can bear discussion and publicity.

Thomas Jefferson

If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.

Samuel Adams

How strangely will the Tools of a Tyrant pervert the plain Meaning of Words!

Thomas Jefferson

Yes, we did produce a near-perfect republic. But will they keep it? Or will they, in the enjoyment of plenty, lose the memory of freedom? Material abundance without character is the path of destruction.

Buddha

Believe nothing merely because you have been told it. Do not believe what your teacher tells you merely out of respect for the teacher. But whatsoever, after due examination and analysis, you find to be kind, conducive to the good, the benefit, the welfare of all beings -- that doctrine believe and cling to, and take it as your guide.

John Adams

Be not intimidated... nor suffer yourselves to be wheedled out of your liberties by any pretense of politeness, delicacy, or decency. These, as they are often used, are but three different names for hypocrisy, chicanery and cowardice.

Samuel Adams

The liberties of our country, the freedom of our civil Constitution, are worth defending at all hazards; and it is our duty to defend them against all attacks. We have received them as a fair inheritance from our worthy ancestors: they purchased them for us with toil and danger and expense of treasure and blood, and transmitted them to us with care and diligence. It will bring an everlasting mark of infamy on the present generation, enlightened as it is, if we should suffer them to be wrested from us by violence without a struggle, or to be cheated out of them by the artifices of false and designing men.

"The ultimate authority ... resides in the people alone." - James Madison

"It is more honorable to repair a wrong than to persist in it." - Thomas Jefferson

John F. Hylan

The real menace of our Republic is the invisible government which like a giant octopus sprawls its slimy legs over our cities states and nation. At the head is a small group of banking houses generally referred to as 'international bankers.' This little coterie... run our government for their own selfish ends. It operates under cover of a self-created screen...[and] seizes...our executive officers... legislative bodies... schools... courts... newspapers and every agency created for the public protection.

Justice Felix Frankfurter

The real rulers in Washington are invisible and exercise power from behind the scenes.

Charles-Louis De Secondat

There is no crueler tyranny than that which is perpetrated under the shield of law and in the name of justice.

Major L. L. B. Angus

The modern Banking system manufactures money out of nothing. The process is perhaps the most astounding piece of sleight of hand that was ever invented. Banks can in fact inflate, mint and unmint the modern ledger-entry currency.

"Since I entered politics, I have chiefly had men's views confided to me privately. Some of the biggest men in the United States, in the Field of commerce and manufacture, are afraid of something. They know that there is a power somewhere -- so organized, so subtle, so watchful, so interlocked, so complete, so pervasive -- that they better not speak above their breath when they speak in condemnation of it." - Woodrow Wilson

Carroll Quigley

The powers of financial capitalism had (a) far-reaching aim, nothing less than to create a world system of financial control in private hands able to dominate the political system of each country and the economy of the world as a whole. This system was to be controlled in a feudalist fashion by the central banks of the world acting in concert, by secret agreements arrived at in frequent meetings and conferences. The apex of the systems was to be the Bank for International Settlements in Basel, Switzerland, a private bank owned and controlled by the world's central banks which were themselves private corporations. Each central bank...sought to dominate its government by its ability to control Treasury loans, to manipulate foreign exchanges, to influence the level of economic activity in the country, and to influence cooperative politicians by subsequent economic rewards in the business world.

“They must find it difficult…those who have taken authority as the truth, rather than truth as the authority.” – Gerald Massey

“Where is the knowledge that is lost in information?

Where is the wisdom that is lost in knowledge?”

- T.S. Elliot

“Put fear behind and save the country.” – Simon Bolivar

“The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.”

- Eleanor Roosevelt.

“I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending
too much liberty than to those attending too small
a degree of it.” – Thomas Jefferson

"If there is anything which it is the duty of the whole people to never entrust to any hands but their own -- that thing is the preservation of their own liberties and institutions." – Abraham Lincoln

"The people of the United States are the rightful masters of both Congress and the Courts, not to overthrow the Constitution, but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution." - Abraham Lincoln

A diffusion of knowledge is the only guardian of true liberty. - James Madison

"I have the Confederacy before me, and the bankers behind me, and for my country I fear the bankers most." - Abraham Lincoln.

Enlighten the people, generally, and tyranny and oppressions of body and mind will vanish like spirits at the dawn of day. – Thomas Jefferson

Money, Banks and Democracy

For a tutorial on the nature of money and banking, see the excellent film: Money As Debt. You can find it on Google Video.

Money As Debt

For a critical look at Friedmanite economics, see Naomi Klein's Shock Doctrine. (2007 book, film, interviews on Democracy Now!)

The Shock Doctrine: Naomi Klein on the Rise of Disaster Capitalism - Democracy Now!

Other sources:

John Perkins on "The Secret History of the American Empire: Economic Hit Men, Jackals, and the Truth about Global Corruption" - Democracy Now!

Self-Described Economic Hit Man John Perkins: "We Have Created the World's First Truly Global Empire" - Democracy Now!

Free Market Fantasies, by Noam Chomsky 1/5

Monopoly Men (Federal Reserve Fraud)

Ron Paul on Federal Reserve, banking and economy

Ron Paul Challenges the Federal Reserve

Ron Paul of Texas - The End of Dollar Hegemony

Noam Chomsky - Emerging Framework of World Power

The Secret History of the CIA - John Stockwell

Former CIA agent Philip Agee on Permanent War

The Corporation

Life and Debt - Globalization and Jamaica

Noam Chomsky - Class War (Part 1)

America : Freedom to Fascism - Director's Authorized Version

The Power of Nightmares: BBC Dissects War on Terror - Part 1: Baby it's Cold Outside

*****“The End of America”: Naomi Wolf Warns U.S. in Slow Descent into Fascism - Democracy Now! |

“Liberal Democracy is moving toward a form of corporate dictatorship" - John Pilger on Propaganda, the Press, Censorship and Resisting the American Empire

Big Ideas That Changed The World : Democracy-Tony Benn

The Truth About Christianity: What Jesus Really Said

Jesus said, “The Kingdom of heaven is within you.”

I have come to show you the deeper things, which you have forgotten, and which now must be uncovered. It is time for the secrets to be revealed. And they were only ever secrets for two reasons: one, it was not Jesus who kept them secret, but those who would conceal or destroy the deeper teachings of Jesus, namely, the Roman Emperor Constantine and his collaborators; and more essentially, it has always been that the secrets will be revealed when you yourself learn to see. I will now tell you of the true history of the Christian church, and of the lost teachings.

The Christian church lost its deeper teachings when in the 4^th century the emperor Constantine decided to edit the scriptures. There was no official cannon at that point. There were a number of scriptures, but no official cannon. Constantine took it upon himself, as holy emperor, to decide that this scripture stays, this one goes. “Mark, I like, Thomas, no.” Having selected the scriptures he liked, he set out to purge the land of the scriptures he didn’t like. The scriptures he didn’t agree with were burned, wherever they could be found. Those who held them or spoke of them were killed. It was a religious cleansing, through state terrorism, backed by the newly minted Christian church, as a church hierarchy formed around the emperor Constantine. This is the creation of the official gospels. This is the beginning of Christianity as most people have come to know it. But this is only a chapter.

At that point, when a church hierarchy formed around the emperor, and selected scriptures were enshrined as cannon, while others were burned and destroyed, Christianity lost its depths, or most of it, and went into literalism. It was at that point that the deeper teachings of Christianity were buried. Literalism triumphed with Constantine, very early in the history of Christianity, less than four hundred years after the death of Jesus.

Also at that point, the newly created orthodoxy of the Christian church aligned itself with the empire – essentially, aligned itself with a police state of vast proportions. You do not maintain your integrity when you align yourself with a police state – you lose it. (This is an important point to remember today as well.) What is surprising, in light of the Christian church aligning itself with a bloody, brutal empire, is not that Christianity was corrupted, which would seem to have been inevitable, given such a choice as to unite with the empire, but that there remained any integrity at all. The fact that the teachings of Jesus can still, to this day, cut through two thousand years of fog and smoke and mirrors, is almost amazing.

The laity and the monks and nuns, in spite of the church hierarchy, kept alive as much as they could of the original spirit and teachings of Jesus. It is they, not the clergy, who deserve the credit, although, to be fair, there have always been the best and the worst among the clergy, and the failings of Christianity are tied in some very significant degree to ordinary Christians, and not only to the hierarchy of church institutions. (The Crusades, the Inquisition, the witch trials, the conquest of the Americas, the slave trade, the pogroms, the protection of Nazi war criminals, the continuing and present support for empire and wars of conquest, the silence on the current war of robber barons against the people of the earth….)

On the whole, however, the spirit and teachings of Jesus have been kept alive by the hearts and minds of the people, in spite of the failings of the institution, ever since the time of the great conversion of that holy editor under God, Constantine. The priests and ministers, with few exceptions, as Jesus said, have been “dogs that lay in the manger,” then as now, ever since 325 AD and Constantine’s declaration of holy war on the scriptures – “for they do not eat, and they do not let the cattle eat.”

Here is what the church forgot to tell you – and in most instances, it has become the case, and has been the case for a very long time, that they don’t know themselves, and are not so much concealing something, as they are simply ignorant.

If you want to know the whole truth, and particularly, the deepest truths, go, immediately, and find this book. It is the most important of the missing gospels, which has now been found, was found in a desert cave some sixty years ago. It is the Gospel of Thomas. I will say no more, but let the scripture speak to you directly. You decide.

“I took my stand in the midst of humanity, and I wept for them, for they came into the world blind, and they seek to leave the world blind.”

“Knock and the door will be opened.”

“Those who have ears, let them hear.”

“Those who have eyes, let them see.”

“Seek ye first the kingdom of heaven.”

“The kingdom of heaven is spread out upon the earth and men see it not.”

“The kingdom of heaven is within you.”

“Split a piece of wood and I will be there. Lift a rock and I will be there.”

“See what is before your nose and all will be revealed.”

“When the two are made one, the male and the female, the above and below, the inner and the outer, then you shall see.”

“The priests are like dogs that lay in the manger, for they do not eat, and the do not let the cattle eat.”

Christianity is now in crisis. Either it will rediscover its deeper teachings, or it will die. Fundamentalism is not the answer. More fervent clinging to a shallow literalism is not the answer. The answer lies in your heart, where it has always been, and nowhere else.

“Now when He was asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, He answered them and said, “The kingdom of God does not come with observation; nor will they say, ‘See here!’ or ‘See there!’ For indeed, the kingdom of God is within you.” - Luke 17: 21

See what is before your nose and all will be revealed.

J. Todd Ring,

February 1, 2008

We Have it in our Power to Begin the World Again

The Gospel of Thomas: The Hidden Sayings of Jesus