Hey guys I'm cruising through the book, The Creature from Jekyll Island, and I'm back with another breakdown. Today's breakdown is from Chapter 5 and is named, Nearer to the Heart's Desire. Links to prior chapters will be listed below. Lets get to it...
The chapter starts off by talking about the 1944 meeting in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire. This meeting included some of the world's most prominent socialists and their plan to establish the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the International Bank for Reconstructions and Development, AKA The World Bank, as mechanisms for eliminating GOLD from world finance. Their hidden agenda...WORLD SOCIALISM. The Federal Reserve would play a big role in bringing this about. Through a complex tangle of bank loans, subsidies, and grants, the Federal Reserve is becoming the "lender of last resort" for virtually the entire planet.
The World Bank was to make loans to war-torn and undeveloped nations so they could build stronger economies. The IMF was to promote monetary cooperation between nations by maintaining fixed exchange rates between their currencies. The method to achieve these goals was to terminate the use of gold as the basis of international currency exchange and replace it with a politically manipulated PAPER STANDARD. In other words, it was to allow governments to escape the discipline of gold so they could create money OUT OF NOTHING without paying the penalty of having their currencies drop in value on world markets.
Prior to this conference, currencies were exchanged in terms of their gold value, and the arrangement was called the "gold-standard exchange." This is not the same as as "gold-standard" in which a currency is backed by gold. It was merely that the exchange ratios of the various currencies (most of which were not backed by gold) were determined by how much gold they could buy in the open market. Their values were determined by supply and demand. Politicians and bankers hated the arrangement because it was beyond their ability to manipulate. The establishment of a world central bank would create a common fiat money for all nations and then require them to inflate together at the same rate. The theoreticians who drafted this plan were the well known Fabian Socialist from England, John Maynard Keynes and the Assistant Secretary of the US Treasury, Harry Dexter White.
The Fabians originally were an elite group of intellectuals who formed a semi-secret society for the purpose of bringing socialism to the world. Whereas Communism wanted to establish socialism quickly via violence and revolution, the Fabians preferred to do it slowly via propaganda and legislation. The word "socialism" was not to be emphasized. Instead, they would speak of benefits for the people such as "welfare, medical care, higher wages, and better working conditions" (any of this sound familiar today?). In this way, they planned to accomplish their objective without bloodshed and even without serious opposition. To emphasize the importance of gradualism, they adopted the turtle as the symbol of their movement.
In order to achieve the goal of World Socialism these central planners needed to create a world currency, a world central bank, and a mechanism to control the economies of all nations. In order for these things to happen, the US would of necessity have to surrender its dominant position. The World Bank was seen as a vehicle for moving capital from the US and other industrialized nations to the underdeveloped nations, the very ones over which MARXISTS have already had the greatest control.
The IMF appears to be a part of the United Nations, much as the Federal Reserve appears to be part of the US Government, but it is entirely independent. One of the routine operations at the IMF is to exchange worthless currencies for dollars so the weaker countries can pay their international bills. It's a kind of international FDIC which rushes money to a country that gone bankrupt so it can avoid devaluing its currency. The transactions are seldom paid back.
It was illegal for American citizens to own gold at that time, but everyone else in the world could exchange their paper dollars for gold at a fixed price of $35 per ounce. That made it the "de facto" (in fact) international currency because, unlike any other at the time, its value was guaranteed. So, at the outset, the IMF adopted the dollar as its own international monetary unit.
In 1970, the IMF created a new monetary unit called the Special Drawing Right (SDR). SDRs are based on "credits" which are provided by the member nations. These credits are not money. They are merely promises that the governments will get the money by taxing their own citizens should the need arise. The IMF considers these to be "assets" which then become "reserves" from which loans are made to other governments. Money is created out of nothing and handed to 3rd World Dictators with inflation resulting in the country where the currency originated. Wealth is transferred from the public to the debtor nation. And the debtor DOESN'T REPAY.
There was still one obstacle. As long as the dollar was the primary currency used by the IMF and as long as it was redeemable in gold at $35 per ounce, the amount of international money that could be created would be limited. If the IMF were to function as a true world central bank with UNLIMITED issue, the dollar had to be broken from its gold backing as the first step toward replacing it completely with something else equally free from restraint, such as the SDR.
On August 15, 1971, President Nixon signed an executive order declaring that the US would NO LONGER redeem its paper dollars for gold. So ended the 1st phase of the IMF's metamorphosis. It was not yet a true central bank, because it could not create its own world currency. It had to depend on the central banks of its member nations to provide cash and so-called credits; but since these banks themselves could create as much money as they wished, from now on, there would be no limit.
In the world of politics, the greater the failure, the greater the pressure to EXPAND the program. So, when the dollar broke loose from gold and there was no longer a ready standard for measuring currency values, the IMF merely changed its goal and continued to expand its operation. The new goal was to "overcome trade deficits." A trade deficit is a condition that exists when a country imports a greater value of goods than it exports. In other words, it spends more than it earns in international trade. The process cannot be sustained unless:
Earnings are increased- the best solution and in fact the only solution for the long haul. All else is temporary at best
Money is taken out of savings- virtually NO Government in the world today has any savings
Selling of assets- the only government asset that is readily marketable is GOLD, and few countries today have a stockpile from which to withdraw
Money is counterfeited- only available if a country happens to be in the unique position of having its currency accepted as the medium of international trade, as has been the case for the US. By creating money out of thin air, the US has been able to spend more money than it earned in trade by having the Federal Reserve create whatever it needed. However, once the dollar tumbles and foreigners no longer want it, the free ride will be over. The flood of dollars will bid prices up and we will finally experience the inflation that should have been caused in years past, but which was postponed because foreigners were kind enough to take the dollar out of our economy in exchange for their products.
Money is borrowed- borrowing is where most of the action is today for most of the world and where the IMF positioned itself in 1970. Its new mission was to provide loans so countries can continue to spend more than they earn, but to do so in the name of "overcoming trade deficits." These loans go into state-owned and state-operated industries which are constipated by bureaucracy and poisoned by corruption. Doomed to economic failure from the start. This also takes away money that would have been available for investments in the private sector or as loans to consumers and retards the economy at large.
When money comes from government, goes to government, and is administered by government, the result will be the expansion of government. In reality, the IMF is an engine of socialist waste and a fountain of abundance for corrupt leaders who rule. The IMF/World Bank is the protégé of the Federal Reserve. It would not exist without the flow of American dollars and the benevolence of American leadership. The Fed has become an accomplice in the support of totalitarian regimes throughout the world. It is an instrument of totalitarianism and the vision of the New World Order.
Well there you have it. That concludes Chapter 5. At the time of writing this post, BTC is looking GREAT! $3350 per BTC with a total market cap at around $113 billion. Lets see if a decentralized currency and blockchain technology are enough to break the chains of the evil Federal Reserve (which is neither Federal nor has Reserves).
Here's a link to real time crypto prices https://coincap.io/
Take care and stay safe out there,
Pete