Jonathan Tirone - Sept. 7 2009

The dollar’s role in international trade should be reduced by establishing a new currency to protect emerging markets from the “confidence game” of financial speculation, the United Nations said.

UN countries should agree on the creation of a global reserve bank to issue the currency and to monitor the national exchange rates of its members, the Geneva-based UN Conference on Trade and Development said today in a report.

China, India, Brazil and Russia this year called for a replacement to the dollar as the main reserve currency after the financial crisis sparked by the collapse of the U.S. mortgage market led to the worst global recession since World War II. China, the world’s largest holder of dollar reserves, said a supranational currency such as the International Monetary Fund’s special drawing rights, or SDRs, may add stability.

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David Gordon - 8/27/2009

[A History of Money and Banking in the United States: From the Colonial Era to World War II. By Murray N. Rothbard, edited by Joseph T. Salerno. Mises Institute, 2002. 510 pages.]

Murray Rothbard had a remarkable ability to throw unexpected light on historical controversies. Again and again in his work, he pointed out factors that earlier authors had overlooked. After Rothbard has finished with a topic, we can never see it in the same way again. This talent is much in evidence in the present book, a collection of several long articles by Rothbard that together constitute a comprehensive look at American monetary history for the period indicated in the book’s title.

An example will illustrate Rothbard’s technique. Everyone knows Lenin’s theory of imperialism. Developed capitalist economies, Lenin maintained, characteristically produce more than they can sell domestically. To find an outlet for their surplus goods, capitalists seek markets abroad. Their endeavors bring about a struggle for colonies; thus, the “highest stage” of capitalism is imperialism.

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Matt Talbbi responds to Goldman Sachs’ response.

MATT TAIBBI - Jul 02, 2009

In Rolling Stone Issue 1082-83, Matt Taibbi takes on “the Wall Street Bubble Mafia” — investment bank Goldman Sachs. The piece has generated controversy, with Goldman Sachs firing back that Taibbi’s piece is “an hysterical compilation of conspiracy theories” and a spokesman adding, “We reject the assertion that we are inflators of bubbles and profiteers in busts, and we are painfully conscious of the importance in being a force for good.” Taibbi shot back: “Goldman has its alumni pushing its views from the pulpit of the U.S. Treasury, the NYSE, the World Bank, and numerous other important posts; it also has former players fronting major TV shows. They have the ear of the president if they want it.” Here, now, are excerpts from Matt Taibbi’s piece and video of Taibbi exploring the key issues.

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By Joan Veon
June 15, 2009
NewsWithViews.com

Excerpts taken from the book, The Coming Battle, by M. W. Walbert

There has not really been a time in which the United States has had her financial foundation questioned until now. However, it was the Reagan tax laws in the early 1980’s which substantially increased the amount of debt that government, industry, and individuals took on in order to keep the “Reagan Revolution” going. It was then that America began to rely more heavily on foreign countries to carry our debt.

The debt has continued to climb, and as a result of the 2008 Credit Crisis has caused our lenders to question our ability to repay. By the end of 2008, the federal debt grew to 41% of GDP. Both Russia and China have said that it is time to make other arrangements for the dollar. Recently, astute Chinese students laughed when our globalist treasury secretary stated that the $768B China has lent America was safe since 82% of its $2T in foreign reserves is in dollars.

As the credit crisis has continued, there has been a noticeable revolution of debt from the books of the international bankers onto the backs of the American tax-payers. At every turn, this rotation of debt has spread to include the credit card industry, the student loan industry, mortgages, the automobile industry, and soon, the commercial mortgage industry. The idea of piggybacking debt onto the backs of the American taxpayer began with the same type of financial maneuvers that occurred in the late 18thC.

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How the Financial Bailout Scams Taxpayers, Subsidizes Wall Street, and Props Up Our Broken Financial System

By Andy Kroll

On October 3rd, as the spreading economic meltdown threatened to topple financial behemoths like American International Group (AIG) and Bank of America and plunged global markets into freefall, the U.S. government responded with the largest bailout in American history. The Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008, better known as the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), authorized the use of $700 billion to stabilize the nation’s failing financial systems and restore the flow of credit in the economy.

The legislation’s guidelines for crafting the rescue plan were clear: the TARP should protect home values and consumer savings, help citizens keep their homes, and create jobs. Above all, with the government poised to invest hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars in various financial institutions, the legislation urged the bailout’s architects to maximize returns to the American people.

That $700 billion bailout has since grown into a more than $12 trillion commitment by the U.S. government and the Federal Reserve. About $1.1 trillion of that is taxpayer money — the TARP money and an additional $400 billion rescue of mortgage companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The TARP now includes 12 separate programs, and recipients range from megabanks like Citigroup and JPMorgan Chase to automakers Chrysler and General Motors.

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via Cannonfire

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Something strange is stirring. Even the young are joining the chorus of concern that this tarnished giant is part of a financial oligarchy that holds the US in its grip, writes Stephen Foley in New York

Independent - 3 May 2009

Something strange is afoot when Popbitch – provider of a weekly email beloved of students, stuffed full of celebrity tittle-tattle and links to the silliest miscellany of the web – breaks off from such glorious trivia to encourage readers to support GoldmanSachs666.com, a deadly serious website measuring the political tentacles of the mighty investment bank.

Something strange, too, when Simon Johnson, a former chief economist at the International Monetary Fund, becomes a hero of the internet and the satirical comedy-show circuit on cable TV, promoting his theory that the US is in the grip of a financial oligarchy.

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Olga Chetverikova - April 23, 2009

As the world financial and economic crisis comes into its own, the Western political leaders and elites are seeking to impress on mankind the idea that this upheaval will end up ‘turning the world into something different’.

Even though the picture of the ‘new world order’ remains vague and fuzzy, the main idea is quite clear: A single global government, goes the argument, has to be established if we don’t want general chaos to prevail.

Every now and again, Western politicians mention the need for a ‘new world order’, a ‘new world financial architecture’, or some kind of ‘supranational control’, calling it a ‘New Deal’ for the world. Nicolas Sarkozy was the first to say so, while addressing the UN General Assembly in September 2007 (that is, before the crisis).

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Vincent Gioia - April 3, 2009

AIG has been in the news a lot these days. At the beginning of the AIG saga the Fed said it was too big to allow it to fail and so billions were given to “save” the company. Of course this failed and still more money was thrown their way. When it was “discovered” that AIG had contractual obligations to give serious bonuses to key employees, congress was irate. Even after it became known that a Democrat, Senator Chris Dodd, inserted a provision in the Stimulus bill to protect these bonuses at the request of the Treasury Department, the jackals that passed, but didn’t read, the bill were still furious.

With all the attention given to AIG I think it is interesting to learn a little more about the company.

First of all, some may be surprised to learn that AIG is a subsidiary of American International Corporation (AIC) and the parent has a most interesting history. AIC has succeeded in remaining invisible and does that by relying on secrecy because that’s how its founders liked it. John D. Rockefeller, Sr., of Robber Baron fame, started the company in 1910. Other Barons of industry joined John D.; Andrew Mellon, J.P. Morgan, and Andrew Carnegie. Other American industrialists and bankers also joined the AIC venture. The reason such an illustrious group of giants came together was that knew the financial clout they could exert together would bring them even more wealth, but more importantly, power; at a time when there were few government restrictions interfering with business.

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Engdahl: Obama must confront the oligarchical power of Wall Street to solve crisis

NEW YORK (Dow Jones)–The head of a United Nations expert panel discussing solutions to the financial crisis on Thursday welcomed the debate over a new global reserve currency and said it would be best managed by a brand new institution.

Just days ahead of the Group of 20 heads of state meeting in London, several key players have weighed in with solutions to resolve the current financial crisis and to prevent future recurrences. One of the most sensitive subjects is the creation of a new de facto global reserve currency to replace the U.S. dollar.

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The Report: Recommendations by the Commission of Experts of the President of the General Assembly on reforms of the international monetary and financial system

The crash has laid bare many unpleasant truths about the United States. One of the most alarming, says a former chief economist of the International Monetary Fund, is that the finance industry has effectively captured our government—a state of affairs that more typically describes emerging markets, and is at the center of many emerging-market crises. If the IMF’s staff could speak freely about the U.S., it would tell us what it tells all countries in this situation: recovery will fail unless we break the financial oligarchy that is blocking essential reform. And if we are to prevent a true depression, we’re running out of time.

by Simon Johnson

One thing you learn rather quickly when working at the International Monetary Fund is that no one is ever very happy to see you. Typically, your “clients” come in only after private capital has abandoned them, after regional trading-bloc partners have been unable to throw a strong enough lifeline, after last-ditch attempts to borrow from powerful friends like China or the European Union have fallen through. You’re never at the top of anyone’s dance card.

The reason, of course, is that the IMF specializes in telling its clients what they don’t want to hear. I should know; I pressed painful changes on many foreign officials during my time there as chief economist in 2007 and 2008. And I felt the effects of IMF pressure, at least indirectly, when I worked with governments in Eastern Europe as they struggled after 1989, and with the private sector in Asia and Latin America during the crises of the late 1990s and early 2000s. Over that time, from every vantage point, I saw firsthand the steady flow of officials—from Ukraine, Russia, Thailand, Indonesia, South Korea, and elsewhere—trudging to the fund when circumstances were dire and all else had failed.

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