investfarm

The Coming Depression: See It Clearly Through Historical Eyes

Thx....appreciate any thoughts on my last comment in this thread (related to swindlers in years past & history repeating itself)


On Feb 23 09:05 PM old trader wrote:

> investfarm,
>
> WOW!!! Having attended college in the late 60's, your comment brings
> to mind some of the more euridite members of the SDS (Students for
> a Democratic Society) I ran into.

The Coming Depression: See It Clearly Through Historical Eyes

Economy & Physical Time

The discovery of universal gravitation by Johannes Kepler established implied evidence which brought the achievements of Johannes Kepler to the verge of the related discovery of the principles of physical space and physical time. The obstacle to that further discovery was, chiefly, the grabbing of political power over science by the circles associated with the leadership provided by Paolo Sarpi, most notably Sarpi’s relevant leading lackey, Galileo Galilei.

The most crucial aspect of that wrecking of modern science, was the introduction of the mechanistic method in mathematics for which Galileo was merely typical, together with the spread of the influence of the hoaxsters Rene Descartes and the avowed Cartesian of Paris-based, Venetian pedigree, Abbé Antonio Conti. The most crucial of the sly tricks involved in these hoaxes was the hysterical insistence, by the opponents of Kepler, Fermat, and Leibniz, on the empiricist’s presumption that the “infinitesimal,” as defined by the Leibniz discovery of the calculus, did not exist.

Although the entirety of the cult of the black-magic specialist Isaac Newton documented no physical research at all, the overt admission of the fact that was the issue of the followers of Sarpi against competent science, which was uttered by a series of Eighteenth-century hoaxsters associated with the notorious Leibniz-hater Voltaire, such as France’s Abraham de Moivre, D’Alembert, Leonhard Euler, and Euler’s protégé Joseph Lagrange. As de Moivre himself formulated the hoax’s pivotal assertion, the argument was that the efficient physical infinitesimal of Leibniz’s discovery of the catenary-cued, universal physical principle of physical least action, depended upon the evidence of an allegedly “imaginary” magnitude. Euler’s argument to this effect, in supporting the hoax by de Moivre and D’Alembert, was the most obvious case of crude, barefaced lying of the most blatant sort. Euler’s hoax led to that of the Duke of Wellington’s sometime assets, Laplace with his silly “three-body” concoction and the hoaxster, and plagiarist (as, explicitly, of the original work by Niels Henrik Abel) Augustin Cauchy.10

However, to understand how that fraud of the Eighteenth-century empiricists came into being, one has to look back toward the actual roots of empiricism in the work of Sarpi, Sarpi’s resurrection of the slop of that medieval irrationalist William of Ockham. This is a typical case of the type in which a criminal incriminates himself by leaving behind thorough evidence of not only his criminal act, but proof of the criminal intent which preceded the act.

In the history of known Egyptian and European science since the program of Sphaerics associated with the Pythagoreans, Socrates, and Plato, the concept of leading science, had been discovery of universal physical principles validated by methods of what Riemann was to identity as unique experiments, experiments whose success defines universal and closely related principles of scientific work. In contrast to that competence, the fraud Laplace sought to simply destroy existing scientific evidence by unproven methods, an incompetence he sought to evade by manufacturing the hoax called “the three-body problem” - - perhaps a celebration of the Duke of Wellington, Laplace, and Cauchy, all in the same bed.

In the comparable clinical case, of Sarpi’s embrace of the medieval Ockham, Sarpi excluded physical-experimental proof (as such proof was exemplified by the work of such Cusa followers as Leonardo da Vinci and Kepler), in favor of certain types of apparent coincidences. If the concocted scheme could be caused to appear to be plausible, and Sarpi and his accomplices chose to profess that they admired it, it could be adopted, by aid of richly lying assertions contrary to reality.

The idea of “proof” which Sarpi’s Ockhamite followers, the empiricists, employed came to be mathematical formulas decreed to be self-evidently plausible in the opinion of an influential set of hoaxsters, without any reference to experimental or comparable proof of principle. The entirety of all of what was claimed as “original work” of the Newton school and its Eighteenth and Nineteenth centuries’ followers, was of that cast. Thus, mathematical formulas were crafted and employed as substitutes for crucial kinds of experimental principles. On the basis of that method, actual principles, such as the principle of universal gravitation discovered by Kepler, were denied in a completely arbitrary way.

The most consequential aspect of such frauds by the empiricists, mechanists (such as Ernst Mach), and worse positivists (such as Bertrand Russell, Norbert Wiener, and John von Neumann), have that common feature.

It was the latter reductionist methods, which came to political power through the establishment of Sarpi’s influence expressed in the contemporary ideology of the virtually world-wide British (drug-pushing, financier-oligarchical... empire, which used that power of imperial financier practices, such as the financial-derivatives frauds which have bankrupted the world’s financial-monetary system today, to achieve world empire of Venetian-style oligarchical-financier power.

From the standpoint of natural law, the crucial feature of the imperial system which has recently entered the final phase of its existence as a breakdown-crisis of the present world financial system, is its prohibition against any systemic consideration of the principles of physical economic practice on which the immediate continuation of civilized life upon this planet now immediately depends.

A Viewer's Guide to Bank Nationalization

Like the famous Ali Baba crying "Open Sesame" before the cave, the association of the more than forty thieves of America are crying "Nationalize the Banks!" In other words, bring down the U.S. government of President Barack Obama.

The test of both the sanity and morality of any specialist in finance today, is their willingness to support nothing other than a general placing of the remnants of what had once been, prior to the infamous Dodd-Frank swindles, the great chartered private banks of the nation under reorganization under conditions of Federal bankruptcy protection,however the Forty Thieves of America Club have worked to sabotage this.

Under such Federal bankruptcy protection, the accounts, including mortgages, which qualify under the standard of Glass-Steagall chartered banks, are awarded immediate bankruptcy protection, and will be protected, thus, to return the essential business of daily life, and keep their true savings deposited there, to approximately normal operations conducted under Federal Bankruptcy protection. It is the gamblers who must eat the losses which they, and they alone, have earned.

Under that arrangement, Federal banking and the U.S. Treasury will be freed from the currently operating, inherently larcenous grip of "bail out" of gamblers and thieves, and the Federal government's support activities will be to promote the restoration and growth of what have been traditionally, maintenance of, and investment in productive employment and essential services.

Any different policy would have the same effect as treason or worse than treason. The greedy maniacs who used persons such as Dodd and Frank and complicit tools in the Federally supported robbery of America, must be removed from the table and the equations of government, in order that the great general welfare principle of the Preamble of the Federal Constitution shall prevail, and the financial swindlers of all persuasions left to moan.

Defend that principle as if your family's life and future depend upon it. They do.

Privatize the Banks, Already

Enemies of the state has launched an all-out offensive to stampede the Obama Administration into dramatically expanding the bailout of the Empire's bankrupt monetary system, under the marketing slogan of "bank nationalization." The sales pitch is that the government would temporarily take control of the big banks and buy their worthless assets, so that the banks would once again be able to make new loans. This "new and improved" scheme is really just the same old swindle, new packaging for having the government, and thus the taxpayer, bail out the speculators under the guise of saving the banking system. Among its numerous vocal proponents are Nobel economist Paul Krugman, and that genius of economic science, Sir Alan Greenspan.

The leading edge of this push is the assault on Citigroup, which is being hammered by British-directed short-sellers in order to provoke the Administration into nationalizing the bank to keep it from collapsing. Citigroup has been targetted because it is what the Brits call a "national champion," a bank which tends to view itself as a U.S., rather than an imperial, bank, and must thus be destroyed. Until recently, it was the largest bank in the U.S., and is active in more countries than any other bank in the world. As such, it is the chief rival domestically of the British-directed J.P. Morgan Chase, and the chief international rival of HSBC, the flagship of the British Empire. (That is, the Anglo-Dutch Liberal empire whose operational headquarters is the City of London.) Blowing up Citigroup and tricking the U.S. Government into nationalizing it would seal the doom of Citigroup, and more importantly, seal the doom of the United States.

The danger that the Obama Adminstration might fall for such a trap was made clear by a joint release from the Treasury, the Fed and other regulatory agencies, in which the government reiterated its "determination to preserve the viability of systemically important financial institutions" and promised "additional capital" as needed. Such pro-bailout fantasies are as dangerous as they are foolish. Even worse was the specific technical measure they are adopting, of converting government "preferred shares" in the banks to "common equity shares," which effectively makes the government not just a lender, but a part-owner--a step in the direction of Britain's policy of "nationalization."

Continuing down this bailout path means fascism in the United States. Bailing out the parasites is bad enough, but the austerity that will be imposed to cover the costs of the bailout will be deadly: social services will be cut to the bone and beyond, while taxes and fees will go through the roof. Such cuts can only be administered at the point of a gun.

We can see indications of that in the insane suggestion by Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood that the U.S. consider taxing its citizens for the miles they drive, a plan which would involve tracking the movements of every vehicle in the United States. The model for this Big Brother police-state operation is Britain, which is rapidly turning itself into the most degenerate surveillance society on Earth. It is a return to the feudal "Lords and peasants" model, in which the peasants have to pay the Lords for their very existence.

The Obama Administration should give up the silly notion of "stress tests" for the banks, which is nothing more than a stalling measure to delay the necessary implementation of a Homeowners and Bank Protection Act. The banks are broke, and the Administration knows it. Shut them down! No more bailouts, in any form! No more Big Brother! No more stalling!

"In the annals of CNBC cluelessness, this morning’s outburst by the channel’s Rick Santelli is up there with the worst." (Columbia Journalism Review)

I would lean more towards helping homeowners (due to the economic cost of not helping and that fact that many homeoweners were sold snake oil.

With regards to Home Owners:

1. Congress must establish a Federal agency to place the Federal and state chartered banks under protection, freezing all existing home mortgages for a period of however many months or years are required to adjust the values to fair prices, and restructure existing mortgages at appropriate interest rates. Further, this action would also write off all of the speculative debt obligations of mortgage-backed securities, derivatives, and other forms of Ponzi Schemes that have brought the banking system to the point of bankruptcy.

2. During the transitional period, all foreclosures shall be frozen, allowing American families to retain their homes. Monthly payments, the equivalent of rental payments, shall be made to designated banks, which can use the funds as collateral for normal lending practices, thus recapitalizing the banking systems. These affordable monthly payments will be factored into new mortgages, reflecting the deflating of the housing bubble, and the establishment of appropriate property valuations, and reduced fixed mortgage interest rates. This shakeout will take several years to achieve. In the interim period no homeowner shall be evicted from his or her property, and the Federal and state chartered banks shall be protected, so they can resume their traditional functions, serving local communities, and facilitating credit for investment in productive industries, agriculture, infrastructure, etc.

3. State governors shall assume the administrative responsibilities for implementing the program, including the "rental" assessments to designated banks, with the Federal government providing the necessary credits and guarantees to assure the successful transition.

This should helping in halting a "tsunami" of foreclosures, keeping millions of American families in their homes to avert social chaos, and protecting chartered lending banks of the United States and the states.


We are in a breakdown crisis, urgent measures that must be adopted immediately, to save nations and economies from total ruin. The present post-Bretton Woods system is hopelessly bankrupt and cannot be saved. But that is not a problem. You can always create a new financial system, following a bankruptcy reorganization of the old, dead system. The simple fact is: Many bankers are going to have to eat the losses, especially those financiers who built up the approximately $1.4 quadrillion dollar derivatives bubble.

There are people who are trying to save the derivatives swindlers, at the expense of current and future generations of American taxpayers. In my view, these people are thieves, who gambled criminally with other peoples' money. They lost, and nobody in their right mind can justify bailing them out, on the backs of working American families. But isn't that exactly what Hank Paulson proposed? Isn't that what Nancy Pelosi, Chris Dodd and Barney Frank are still proposing?

I am very concerned that enemies of the United States, including some people who are trying to mis-advise President Obama, are blocking the urgently needed bankruptcy reorganization.

Whats need to be done is to put the banking system under protection in bankruptcy; we put the Federal Reserve system into bankruptcy. We take, and proceed to enact, a national banking act where we put all the essential functions of banking under protection of a national banking act system: a Hamiltonian National Bank. We use the National Bank as an instrument of credit, which absorbs the Federal Reserve System. Because the Federal Reserve System is bankrupt! And it needs bankruptcy protection.

Then we take national credit. We take what is worthless, and we call it worthless; we classify it as worthless, as in bankruptcy. We put it out of its misery. And banks which are bankrupt, but which are useful in their function as chartered banks, we'll keep their doors open, we'll maintain their functions, and we will generate Federal credit, as a source of lending power, to get the economy moving again. We will build agriculture, we will build infrastructure--especi... infrastructure.

The alternative to this approach, is to permit the banking system to collapse into chaos. That is exactly what happened when that traitorous Democrat Andy Jackson destroyed the Bank of the United States in 1836, an act which, in the name of ``helping the little people,'' wreaked absolute havoc with the credit and livelihoods of the vast majority of the American people, especially in rural communities. Today, given the global nature of the crisis, and the fact that it's occurring after 40 years of destruction of the physical economy of the planet, failing to replace the current banking system with an American-style national bank will unleash a process of genocide.

Finally, we need to instigate criminal investigation into the Banksters who intentionally caused this crises. Anew Pecora Commission,to probe the causes of the now-onrushing greatest financial crash in modern history.

Between 1932-33, the U.S. Senate Banking Committee staged high-profile hearings into the causes of the stock market crash of 1929, and dragged some of Wall Street's top bankers, led by JP ``Jack'' Morgan, before the American people, to account for their crimes. The Committee's lead counsel, Ferdinand Pecora, led the probe, which gave President Franklin D. Roosevelt the political leverage he needed, to push through sweeping regulation of the financial sector, including the Glass-Steagall Act of June 1933.

The recent revelations of Madoff's Ponzi Scheme have only served to further highlight the criminal folly of the previous Bush Administration and Congress' efforts to bail out the quadrillions of dollars in unregulated derivatives, that cannot and must not be paid.

We cannot afford to waste any more time ! We need a new Pecora Commission, with full subpoena powers, to get to the bottom of this worst financial debacle in history. Whether you start with the Madoff Ponzi Scheme, or the illegal and unregulated activities of the offshore hedge funds, or the role of the rating agencies, the mortgage brokers, and commercial banks in the sub-prime mortgage bubble, is of less importance than the need to act promptly, and with full public transparency.

`Given the horrible condition that states and cities find themselves in, I call on state legislatures, the city councils, the mayors' and governors' offices, to contact your Congressional delegations, and get them to act, now. The Obama Administration needs to borrow this leaf from FDR. Give the American people what they demand: Answers to how it was that the the biggest financial bubble in history--a bubble that already burst in late July 2007--was created. Hold those responsible for this to account. Only by placing a very large public spotlight on the crimes of the recent past, can we build the political support for genuine solutions.

Give the Obama Administration the same kind of leverage that the Pecora Commission afforded Franklin Roosevelt, so that the urgently needed bankruptcy reorganization and economic rebuilding can be launched, without interference.

PS

An for those that believe Austrian economists such as Murray Rothbard,
that proclaimed FDR's policies actually lengthened the Depression. Well, we need a little historical context - The Japan attack on Pearl Harbor had been planned by the British, Japan, and others during the early 1920s. The intended action led by the British was intended to ruin the growing U.S. naval power of World War I and the early 1920s. The
result was a U.S.A. responsive war-plan of which the 1920s General Billy Mitchell was a part. Certain elements in the British Govt and their pro-fascist admirers inside the Coolidge-Hoover-Morgan gang inside the U.S.A., and caused the court-martial of Mitchell.

However, after Hitler double-crossed his British friends by invading France, Britain (includng Churchill), which had backed the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union, changed sides to consider Hitler the greater danger to it, and begged for assistance from FDR. In the meantime, FDR et al, had prepared for the threat of the attack from London and
Tokyo; Mitchell's conception of an aircraft-carrier fleet was built up under FDR - - as Midway illustrates the point.

However, when Hitler double-crossed the British with help
of a fascist government in France, and overran France,
Churchill suddenly saw Hitler as "the greater danger, and came screaming to FDR for help. Britain's erstwhile ally, thus, switched sides; but, Japan, which had been Britain's ally against the U.S.A. since
1894, remained tied to Britain's and its own former
backing of Hitler. So, Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, exactly
as Britain and its Japan ally had planned Japan's
assignment to take out the U.S. base at Pearl Harbor. So,
the fascist elements in Wall Street (e.g., J. P. Morgan et al.)
, who were forced to abandon their backing of Hitler on
Dec. 7, 1941 (or, like George W. Bush, Jr.'s grandfather)
with some months later, abandoned the offices of the pro-
fascist organizations inside the U.S. financier community,
in order to hide themselves in new organizations of the
same long-term, pro-fascist outlook.

Today, those "former" fascist organizations are the chief promoters of
the myth that FDR accomplished nothing; I know those organizations with their fascist traditions, name by name, of today - - mostly Chicago-centered, and including all of the treasonous, pro-fascist organizations with which you associate the name of Murray Rothbard.

CNBC's Santelli Speaks for All of Us

The people who are responsible for this catastrophe are enemies to the US (quite possibly facists). They are the main opponents of the sensible option of top-down bankruptcy reorganization.

We are in a breakdown crisis, urgent measures that must be adopted immediately, to save nations and economies from total ruin. The present post-Bretton Woods system is hopelessly bankrupt and cannot be saved. But that is not a problem. You can always create a new financial system, following a bankruptcy reorganization of the old, dead system. The simple fact is: Many bankers are going to have to eat the losses, especially those financiers who built up the approximately $1.4 quadrillion dollar derivatives bubble.

There are people who are trying to save the derivatives swindlers, at the expense of current and future generations of American taxpayers. In my view, these people are thieves, who gambled criminally with other peoples' money. They lost, and nobody in their right mind can justify bailing them out, on the backs of working American families. But isn't that exactly what Hank Paulson proposed? Isn't that what Nancy Pelosi, Chris Dodd and Barney Frank are still proposing?

I am very concerned that enemies of the United States, including some people who are trying to mis-advise President Obama, are blocking the urgently needed bankruptcy reorganization.

Whats need to be done is to put the banking system under protection in bankruptcy; we put the Federal Reserve system into bankruptcy. We take, and proceed to enact, a national banking act where we put all the essential functions of banking under protection of a national banking act system: a Hamiltonian National Bank. We use the National Bank as an instrument of credit, which absorbs the Federal Reserve System. Because the Federal Reserve System is bankrupt! And it needs bankruptcy protection.

Then we take national credit. We take what is worthless, and we call it worthless; we classify it as worthless, as in bankruptcy. We put it out of its misery. And banks which are bankrupt, but which are useful in their function as chartered banks, we'll keep their doors open, we'll maintain their functions, and we will generate Federal credit, as a source of lending power, to get the economy moving again. We will build agriculture, we will build infrastructure--especi... infrastructure.

The alternative to this approach, is to permit the banking system to collapse into chaos. That is exactly what happened when that traitorous Democrat Andy Jackson destroyed the Bank of the United States in 1836, an act which, in the name of ``helping the little people,'' wreaked absolute havoc with the credit and livelihoods of the vast majority of the American people, especially in rural communities. Today, given the global nature of the crisis, and the fact that it's occurring after 40 years of destruction of the physical economy of the planet, failing to replace the current banking system with an American-style national bank will unleash a process of genocide.

With regards to Home Owners:

1. Congress must establish a Federal agency to place the Federal and state chartered banks under protection, freezing all existing home mortgages for a period of however many months or years are required to adjust the values to fair prices, and restructure existing mortgages at appropriate interest rates. Further, this action would also write off all of the speculative debt obligations of mortgage-backed securities, derivatives, and other forms of Ponzi Schemes that have brought the banking system to the point of bankruptcy.

2. During the transitional period, all foreclosures shall be frozen, allowing American families to retain their homes. Monthly payments, the equivalent of rental payments, shall be made to designated banks, which can use the funds as collateral for normal lending practices, thus recapitalizing the banking systems. These affordable monthly payments will be factored into new mortgages, reflecting the deflating of the housing bubble, and the establishment of appropriate property valuations, and reduced fixed mortgage interest rates. This shakeout will take several years to achieve. In the interim period no homeowner shall be evicted from his or her property, and the Federal and state chartered banks shall be protected, so they can resume their traditional functions, serving local communities, and facilitating credit for investment in productive industries, agriculture, infrastructure, etc.

3. State governors shall assume the administrative responsibilities for implementing the program, including the "rental" assessments to designated banks, with the Federal government providing the necessary credits and guarantees to assure the successful transition.

This should helping in halting a "tsunami" of foreclosures, keeping millions of American families in their homes to avert social chaos, and protecting chartered lending banks of the United States and the states.

Finally, we need to instigate criminal investigation into the Banksters who intentionally caused this crises. Anew Pecora Commission,to probe the causes of the now-onrushing greatest financial crash in modern history.

Between 1932-33, the U.S. Senate Banking Committee staged high-profile hearings into the causes of the stock market crash of 1929, and dragged some of Wall Street's top bankers, led by JP ``Jack'' Morgan, before the American people, to account for their crimes. The Committee's lead counsel, Ferdinand Pecora, led the probe, which gave President Franklin D. Roosevelt the political leverage he needed, to push through sweeping regulation of the financial sector, including the Glass-Steagall Act of June 1933.

The recent revelations of Madoff's Ponzi Scheme have only served to further highlight the criminal folly of the previous Bush Administration and Congress' efforts to bail out the quadrillions of dollars in unregulated derivatives, that cannot and must not be paid.

`We cannot afford to waste any more time !We need a new Pecora Commission, with full subpoena powers, to get to the bottom of this worst financial debacle in history. Whether you start with the Madoff Ponzi Scheme, or the illegal and unregulated activities of the offshore hedge funds, or the role of the rating agencies, the mortgage brokers, and commercial banks in the sub-prime mortgage bubble, is of less importance than the need to act promptly, and with full public transparency.

`Given the horrible condition that states and cities find themselves in, I call on state legislatures, the city councils, the mayors' and governors' offices, to contact your Congressional delegations, and get them to act, now. The Obama Administration needs to borrow this leaf from FDR. Give the American people what they demand: Answers to how it was that the the biggest financial bubble in history--a bubble that already burst in late July 2007--was created. Hold those responsible for this to account. Only by placing a very large public spotlight on the crimes of the recent past, can we build the political support for genuine solutions.

Give the Obama Administration the same kind of leverage that the Pecora Commission afforded Franklin Roosevelt, so that the urgently needed bankruptcy reorganization and economic rebuilding can be launched, without interference.

2 Goals for the Banking Bailout System

Treasury Secretary Geithner to shoul apologize to President Obama for the horrible mistakes he has made, or resign.
Geithner's continuing efforts to devise a scheme to save the hopelessly bankrupt U.S. banking system. Sources close to the Obama economic team have reported that Geithner is ``soft on the banks,'' and that his proposal last week for a public-private partnership to buy up the toxic waste on the books of all of the big U.S. banks is subterfuge, to hide the fact that he would otherwise have to go back to Congress to ask for $2-3 trillion in additional bailout money. He has gone too far out on a limb.

The obvious alternative, is to put the entire Federal Reserve System through top-down bankruptcy reorganization, as our Federal Constitution provides. So far, Mr. Geithner has shown no willingness to take that vital action.

Mr. Geithner can either say he was mistaken, apologize to the President, and immediately change policy. Otherwise, he should resign. If he does choose to resign, it would be for the sake of the President. President Obama needs to be strengthened. He must be free to act, properly, to deal with this worst financial crisis in the history of our nation. The President must have the clear support of the relevant Cabinet members, for the kind of drastic policy change that this crisis demands. If Mr. Geithner cannot provide that clear support for the declaration of a national and global economic emergency, and the implementation of a bankruptcy reorganization, then I am afraid his continuing presence will only drag the President down.

On Foxes Guarding the Banking Hen House

The FBI is targetting 38 major firms for fraud "directly related to the current economic crisis," according to a top FBI official, and ultimately the number could rise into the hundreds. "These are companies, businesses that everybody knows about," said John Pistole, the FBI's Deputy Director.

He described the investigations as "large, complex," and similar to the Enron investigation. On other occasions, federal officials have fingered Lehman Brothers, American International Group, Countrywide Financial, and Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac as under criminal investigation.

Several criminal cases are underway against firms involved in the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), testified the Special Inspector General for the TARP program, Neil Barofsky, who added that he is working closely with other agencies, the New York State Attorney General, Andrew Cuomo.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, who chaired yesterday's hearing on corporate fraud, told the witnesses that "I want to see people prosecuted," adding, "I want to see people who have committed such fraud and the havoc it's caused to this country -- frankly, I want to see them go to jail."

Why Markets Dissed the Geithner Plan

Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner claimed that "we are fundamentally reshaping the government's program to repair the financial system." The plan he described, however, fell far short of that aim--far from being a fundamental change, it is more of the same old crap. There are changes, but they are irrelevant. The necessary first step in any meaningful recovery plan is to put the dead financial system through bankruptcy, writing off the quadrillion-dollar-plu... derivatives market, freezing the rest of the unpayable debt, and reorganizing the banking system into a new, highly regulated system where speculation is not allowed. It is a step the Obama Administration is obviously reluctant to take.

The plan unveiled by Geithner is basically a continuation of the failed Bush Administration bailout policy. It relies heavily on the money-printing capability of the Federal Reserve, which is already hopelessly bankrupt and should be shut down, and it at least pretends to rely heavily on private funding, which is drying up with increasing speed. The multi-part plan will inject even more capital directly into the banks; increase the use of Federal subsidies in an attempt to restart the dead securitization markets; and use a combination of government and private funds to buy toxic waste from the banks. The Obama plan will also change the name of the Troubled Asset Relief Program to the Financial Stability Program. It will not work.

There are those inside the Obama team who know that these measures are insufficient.

Radical Solution to Housing Mess

Sorry TereasaE - i clicked thumbs down in error (should be thumbs up)

Radical Solution to Housing Mess

1. Congress must establish a Federal agency to place the Federal and state chartered banks under protection, freezing all existing home mortgages for a period of however many months or years are required to adjust the values to fair prices, and restructure existing mortgages at appropriate interest rates. Further, this action would also write off all of the speculative debt obligations of mortgage-backed securities, derivatives, and other forms of Ponzi Schemes that have brought the banking system to the point of bankruptcy.

2. During the transitional period, all foreclosures shall be frozen, allowing American families to retain their homes. Monthly payments, the equivalent of rental payments, shall be made to designated banks, which can use the funds as collateral for normal lending practices, thus recapitalizing the banking systems. These affordable monthly payments will be factored into new mortgages, reflecting the deflating of the housing bubble, and the establishment of appropriate property valuations, and reduced fixed mortgage interest rates. This shakeout will take several years to achieve. In the interim period no homeowner shall be evicted from his or her property, and the Federal and state chartered banks shall be protected, so they can resume their traditional functions, serving local communities, and facilitating credit for investment in productive industries, agriculture, infrastructure, etc.

3. State governors shall assume the administrative responsibilities for implementing the program, including the "rental" assessments to designated banks, with the Federal government providing the necessary credits and guarantees to assure the successful transition.

This should helping in halting a "tsunami" of foreclosures, keeping millions of American families in their homes to avert social chaos, and protecting chartered lending banks of the United States and the states.

Is JPMorgan Immune from Investigation into Spring-Loading of Options Grants?

Three U.S. Senators are moving to create a "9/11 Commission on the financial crisis" which would conduct a one-year investigation of who caused it and how, issuing reports to Congress and the President and referring criminal wrongdoing to U.S. Attorneys and state attorneys' general as necessary. The legislation, S-298, was introduced on Jan. 22, after calls for "a new Pecora Commission" modeled on the 1932-24 Senate Pecora hearings which exposed the scandals of Wall Street banks triggering the Great Depression collapse.

Republican Sens. Johnny Isakson and Saxby Chambliss of Georgia and Democratic Sen. Kent Conrad of North Dakota are seeking more sponsors of the Financial Markets Commission Act of 2009, hoping to pass it "rapidly after the stimulus bill." It would set up a 7-member bipartisan commission with investigative staff and subpoena power to "examine all causes, domestic and global, of the current financial and economic crisis in the United States, including the collapse of major financial and commercial firms," including investigating the role of a series of government regulatory agencies, and of the government bank bailouts themselves.

Under current circumstances, the proposal is "a stalling tactic, which would lose momentum." A new Pecora Commission must start up immediately. Such hearings and exposures are "needed as leverage during the fight for bankruptcy reorganization."

The original Pecora Commission hearings of the Senate Banking Committee focussed the great anger of the American people then against Wall Street bankers, whom President Franklin Roosevelt had just called "the money changers who have fled form their high seats in the temple of our civlization." Chief investigator Ferdinand Pecora mobilized that anger in a way that helped make FDR's "100 Days'' recovery and regulation legislation possible.

A Tale of Two Suntech Powers

Every time someone mentions wind or solar power as the answer to our energy needs, the image that should form in your mind is that of 1 billion or more dying and starving children. If you do not yet understand why this is the case, you are forgiven. By the end of this piece you shall have been given the essential concepts and facts both to understand this ugly truth, and to act to prevent it.

Begin with this. To maintain a global population in a condition resembling a modern 21st Century standard of living will require an installed electrical generating capacity of at least 3 to 5 kilowatts per capita. Today only the United States, Japan, and a few countries of western Europe even approximate this level of generating capacity. Let us understand the meaning of this more clearly, before moving on to the crucial question of how we shall generate this power the world so desperately needs.

Kilowatts are a measure of electrical power, the amount of work that can be done per unit of time. One of the first means of measuring power was to compare it to that of a working horse. The standard horsepower is equivalent to about 750 watts of electricity. That means that it takes 750 watts of electricity, driving a motor or other device, to do the same work as a standard working horse. Thus, 1 kilowatt (1,000 watts) of electricity, is equivalent to the work of about 1.33 muscular horses of the working type. The horse cannot work all day, however, but only perhaps for one third of it, after subtracting the time for meals and rest. Thus one kilowatt of electrical generating capacity, available all day and night, could do the work of 3 times 1.33 horses equals 4 horses.

Here in the United States, we have about 3 kilowatts of electrical generating capacity available per capita—much less than we need to be a truly productive economy, but still something that most of the world comes nowhere near. Thus we could say that every person in the United States, on average, has the work of 12 horses available to him every hour of the day and night, in the form of electricity.[1] Without electricity, the work of those silent horses must be done by men and women, laboring to turn pumps, to carry water on their heads, to spend a whole day scrubbing clothes and another heating irons on a fire to press them, while such simple requirements as water and sewage treatment, refrigeration, even the light bulb, go wanting. Such and worse remains the condition of a majority of the world's population--some 1.7 billion people, who are entirely without electricity, and several billion more for whom the supply is intermittent and deficient.

China for example, which produces a great part of the manufactured products consumed in the U.S.A., had only 0.3 kilowatts of generating capacity available per capita in 2005, which increased by 2008 to an estimated 0.5 kilowatts. Well over half of this electricity goes to power Chinese industry, the product of which is primarily exported. Thus, the amount available per person for use in China is less than 0.25 kilowatts, about one-third of a horsepower. Taken over the full 24 hours, we can say that the average person in China has available to him the work of one horse, compared to the 12 horses available in the U.S. The source of most U.S. manufactured products is the low-wage labor of millions of Chinese, many of them from families with no access to even the electric light. In India, Egypt, most of the rest of Africa, and large parts of South America it is far worse. In Mexico, another major source of U.S. manufactured goods, the electricity available per capita is about the same as China. Such an injustice cannot continue for long. How then will we remedy it?

No one can seriously propose that the world energy shortage can be solved with windmills and solar panels. The proponents of these systems have never addressed the world need, except to propose such patronizing and pathetic schemes as solar-powered refrigerators for African villages, which only work, if at all, when the Sun is shining. But even the proposals to use solar and windmills in the developed countries are a chimera. They have never proven economically or technologically feasible, despite the enormous public expense in tax credits and subsidies which they have drawn upon.

To bring the present world population of 6.7 billion people up to a level of just 1.5 kilowatts of electrical generating capacity per capita will require that we build 6,000 gigawatts[2] (6 million megawatts) of generating capacity. The only feasible way to accomplish this is to embark now on a crash program to build nuclear power plants making use of our limited existing capabilities, and gearing up for a serial production capability for the new breed of fourth generation, high-temperature helium-cooled reactors, among other models.

Could solar or wind power possibly address the world electricity deficit? The largest existing solar power plant, the solar concentrator known as Nevada Solar One, produces less than 15 MW of power, averaged over the course of the day.[3] The largest solar plant using photovoltaic panels, is in Jumilla in southeastern Spain. It is rated at 23 megawatts maximum capacity. Divide this by four, and you have the actual average output of less than 6 megawatts! A single large nuclear power plant can produce 1,000 megawatts (1 gigawatt) or more of electrical power. It can do this all day every day, not just when the Sun shines, and on a land surface area hundreds of times smaller than the equivalent solar plants or wind farms.

What Is Energy Density?

But wind and solar power are “free” people say: The energy is there, a bounty of nature, we just have to use it. Yet once one analyzes such an argument, one sees that is meaningless sophistry, even on the face of it. Coal, oil, and uranium are “free” in the same sense. A certain amount of work has to be done to mine them and bring them to the place where they will be consumed, but work also has to be done to utilize wind and solar, a very great deal of work compared to the benefit received.

Instead of such loose use of language let us examine the two most important concepts in evaluating a power source, energy density and energy flux density. By the energy density of a fuel or power source, we mean the amount of useful work that can be derived from a given mass of the substance. By energy flux density, we mean the transformative power which can be obtained from that fuel source.

Let us examine the first term first, and see what we can learn from it.

Over the course of human history, there have been several progressive increases in the energy density of the fuels employed. The transition from wood burning to coal (which is almost four times more energy dense than wood), took place in Europe in the 18th century. The higher temperatures and regulation that could be achieved with coal fires permitted the introduction of new technologies related to smelting of ores, steelmaking, and other techniques. Until the 1950s, coal was the primary energy source for industry and transportation, and it remains the principal fuel used for electricity generation in the U.S.A.

Oil is about half again as energy dense as coal. The advantage of oil over coal as a fuel for powering steam ships became a factor in geopolitics at the close of the 19th Century, with the conversion of the British Royal Navy from coal to oil-fired steam boilers. The weight advantage of oil, and its ease of handling, not requiring manual stokers to feed the fire, increased the range and efficiency of warships. The lighter derivatives of petroleum, such as gasoline, benzene, and kerosene, are among the most energy-dense liquids, which made them desirable as a transportation fuel--as long as they last.

But each of these improvements in the energy density of fuels was dwarfed by the discovery of atomic energy. As illustrated in the accompanying diagram, a barely visible speck of uranium fuel, when fully fissioned, is equivalent to 1260 gallons of fuel oil (weighing 4.5 tons), 6.15 tons of coal, or 23.5 tons of dry wood. When compared by weight, the advantage of uranium fuel over the older types is as follows:

Advantage per unit weight of Uranium . . . . [4]

. . . over Wood: 11.5 million times

. . . over Coal: 3.0 million times [5]

. . . over Petroleum: 2.2 million times

We shall be modest and note that these figures are derived assuming that all of the fissionable uranium in the fuel pellet is burned up (fully fissioned). The fuel burn-up rate in many presently operating reactors, may be only about 4 percent, though it is higher in advanced reactor designs. Thus the figures above need to be divided by 25, giving nuclear power, in the worst case scenario, an energy density advantage over wood, coal and petroleum of only 88,000 to 460,000. However, with fuel reprocessing, a form of recycling, the burn-up rate is greatly increased. Because of the production of extra neutrons in the fission reaction, new fuel can be created by nuclear transmutation as the old fuel burns up. The full nuclear fuel cycle, employing reprocessing and fuel breeding, is a virtually limitless cycle. Nuclear is the only fuel that replaces itself as it burns.

Energy Flux Density

To progress from the concept of energy density to energy flux density, it is necessary to have a deeper conception of the notion of work. In physics textbook terms, energy is the same as work. It was one of the great achievements of 19th Century physics, to demonstrate the equivalence of heat, electricity, and mechanical motion, resolving all these forms of energy (work), and others, to a common measure. Thus, the technical definition of energy flux density would simply be the amount of energy passing across a given surface area in a unit of time. An example of a higher energy flux density could be had by comparing the capability of a sharp knife to a dull one. Holding the sharper knife, the same work exerted by the hand is concentrated over a smaller surface area. The energy flux density is greater and the sharp knife is able to cut where the dull one cannot.

By that method of accounting, the energy flux density produced by the fission of a single uranium atom can be shown to be from about 20 million to 20 quadrillion times greater than that gained by burning a molecule of an energy-dense fuel, such as natural gas.[6] However, even this astounding numerical advantage does not yet comprehend the essential difference. To understand energy flux density in the context of physical economy, a higher conception of work is required. It is not sufficient to regard work, as we do in physics, merely as the expenditure of energy measured in calories, joules, kilowatt-hours, or electron volts. Rather, when considering a physical economy, we must look at the transformative power of the work. Something akin to the skilled worker’s maxim “don’t work hard, work smart” is appropriate as a first approximation of the concept. Implied in the saying is the idea, that by application of the human mind, the same expenditure of effort can be made more efficient, perhaps by use of a different tool, or by the improvisation of a new one, or by organizing the process in a different way. In the case of nuclear, as opposed to chemical or mechanical processes, a higher order sort of innovation is at work. Here we are dealing with the introduction of a new discovery of universal physical principle, the revolution in physical chemistry which began with the Curie’s separation of the first gram of radium, and proceeded through the identification of the radioactive decay process, nuclear transmutation, the energy-mass relation, the nucleus, the isotope, the neutron, the accelerator, the discovery of fission, the chain reaction, and so forth.

Apart from the questions of cost and efficiency, the fallacy of saying that wind and solar can be made to generate electricity, just as nuclear power can, is that it leaves out the transformative power which the application of this new universal physical principle permits. Nuclear energy works smarter, vastly smarter, than wind, solar, or fossil fuels ever can. The reason is not merely its superior energy flux density, measured in caloric terms, but the transformation in the physical economic process as a whole which it can accomplish.

With the fission of each uranium nucleus, several tiny entities, part particle and part wave, are released at velocities approaching that of the speed of light. These particle/waves, which we call neutrons, have the ability to penetrate the nucleus of another nearby atom and to transform it into a new element, a process known as transmutation. But this is only the beginning, for that new element may, in turn, spontaneously transmute into another, and another, producing a family of byproducts (isotopes) which finally settle into a stable form. By mastering the chemistry of these transformations, we have the ability to make new materials, some known and some yet to be discovered, which will be of benefit to future human life. We have also the benefit of the rays these isotopes give off, at least three different types, and each one at a different strength. Their uses in diagnosis and treatment of an array of dangerous diseases are proven, and every day brings new possibilities.[7]

Nuclear for Fuel and Water

In many parts of the world, including some of extremely high population density, such as the east coast of India, the supply of clean water is running out. Ground wells are becoming contaminated as the fossil water supply within the ground becomes exhausted. Substantial regions of the United States, including southern California and the American Southwest are also reaching critical water supply limits. Producing drinking water by desalination of seawater is a proven process. Presently, 40 million cubic meters of water a day are produced by desalination, mostly in the Middle East and north Africa. The leading methods are reverse osmosis, using electric-powered pumps to force salt or brackish water through a specially designed membrane, and flash distillation. However, desalination is an energy-intensive process.

The feasibility of using nuclear power for large-scale desalination was first demonstrated nearly 40 years ago in Soviet Kazakhstan. For 27 years, the Aktau fast reactor produced 80,000 cubic meters per day of fresh water, and up to 135 megawatts of electric power at the same time. Japan has operated 10 demonstration desalination facilities linked to nuclear reactors, and India in 2002 set up a demonstration desalination plant at the Madras Atomic Power Station in the southeast with a 6,300 cubic meter per day output. Windmills and solar panels will not supply the large amounts of electric power required to produce fresh water in dry areas of the world, but nuclear plants can do it.

Nuclear power also offers the solution to the dependency on imported oil. The key is the two atoms of hydrogen contained in every molecule of water. Hydrogen is a fuel, which can be utilized on its own, or combined with carbon sources to produce liquid fuels quite similar to those we know use. Hydrogen can be obtained from water either by electrolysis or by thermo-chemical splitting. At the higher temperatures available from the new generation of modular helium-cooled reactors, the efficiency of both these processes is greatly increased. Nuclear-produced hydrogen or hydrogen-based fuels, combined with ample electricity for battery vehicles, will provide a stable local supply of the transportation fuel the nation needs. Instead of enriching the Anglo-Saudi oil cartel by shipping petroleum across thousands of miles of ocean, we can produce our own, cleaner fuel at domestic nuclear power plants, while also providing our electricity and other needs.

These are the things we as a nation need. They are also the things the world needs. They are but some of the immediately knowable practical advantages of the use of this new physical principle, which has defined the 20th century revolution in science. Much more lies ahead, waiting to be discovered. Some breakthroughs, such as the practicable development of thermonuclear fusion energy, are almost now within our grasp. Others are yet to come. To deny its application to our economy, and to return to 18th century and earlier modes of power generation, is to stop human progress.

--end

Appendix 1:



Calculation of Energy in Electron Volts from Burning a Fossil Fuel [8]

(Example is methane, the principal component of natural gas)

Heat of combustion of methane (CH4) = 891 kilojoules/mole …

(8.91 x 102 kJ/mole) / (6.02 × 1023 molecules/mole)

= 1.48 x 10-21 kilojoules/molecule of methane

1 kilojoule = 6.24150974 × 1021 electron volts …

(1.48 x 10-21 kJ/molecule) × (6.24 x 1021 eV/kJ)

= 9.24 electron volts per molecule of methane [9]

The energy released in the fission of a single uranium atom is 200 million electron volts, making the simple advantage of uranium fission over combustion of natural gas about 20 million to 1. However, the figure does not include the surface area over which the work occurs. In comparing nuclear to chemical reactions, we must consider the ratio of the surface area of the nucleus (about 10-24 cm2) to that of a molecule (about 10-15 cm2 for methane). Thus an additional factor of 109 (1 billion) must be factored in, bringing the potential energy flux density advantage of nuclear fission over fossil fuel burning to approximately 20 quadrillion to 1. This advantage is not yet realized in the present design of nuclear reactors, but demonstrates the potential still contained within this new regime of energy production.



[1] A useful pedagogical device that used to be found more often at science museums and other public displays was the bicycle-driven generator. By mounting on the bicycle, the student could discover just how much work, in the form of pedaling, was required to keep a single 100 watt light bulb glowing, thus getting a sensuous appreciation for the labor-saving efficiency of modern electrical power generation.

[2] 1 gigawatt = 1 thousand megawatts = 1 million kilowatts

[3] Beware of labeling. The plant has a peak power output of 64 megawatts. But like all solar plants, that is the amount it can produce at high noon. As the Sun falls in the sky, the output of the solar plant falls with it, until, for half the day, the solar plant produces no power at all. When shopping for a solar power plant, divide the manufacturers claimed output by four to five, and you will have a clearer idea of the con-job you are about to buy into. Also remember, that for most of the day, solar concentrator plants require back-up power from natural gas-powered heaters to keep the working fluids flowing. And don’t forget that the Sun doesn’t shine every day. In order to integrate such an erratic power source into the grid, requires sophisticated planning, electronic circuitry, and maintenance work, the cost of which is rarely considered.

[4] Derivation of figures in this table:

Weight of oil equivalent (at sp. gr. = 0.9):

30 bbls × 42 gals/bbl × 7.2 lbs/gal × 453.6 grms/lb. = 4.12 × 106 grams

Weight of coal equivalent:

6.15 tons × 2000 lbs/ton × 453.6 grms/lb = 5.58 × 106 grams

Weight of wood equivalent:

23.5 tons × 2000 lbs/ton × 453.6 grms/lb = 2.13 × 107 grams

Dividing these weights by 1.86 grams of uranium, which when fully fissioned is equivalent to the energy content of the above weights of oil, coal, and wood, gives the results shown in the table . (Derived from graphic by Dr. Robert J. Moon, 1985)

[5] The weight comparison to coal is not academic, as coal accounts for nearly half the tonnage carried on U.S. railroads. Gradually replacing coal-fired plants with nuclear power will be an important step in creating a viable rail freight transportation system.

[6] See appendix 1 for calculation.

[7] Alas, the United States is falling far behind in the use of medical isotopes, because we have nearly shut down our capability to produce all but the commonest of them, and now must import more than 90% of what we use. The chances for survival of certain types of cancers are far greater in a hospital in Europe than here, because U.S. doctors do not make use of the relevant targeted radioisotope therapies.

[8] An electron volt is the work required to move an electron through a potential difference of 1 volt.

[9] Calculated per atom, the advantage for uranium increases somewhat more. This may be seen by dividing the result for methane by 5 (the number of atoms contained in the molecule), resulting in 1.85 electron volts per atom. For ethane, the figure would be 2.02 eV/atom and so forth, the figure increasing with the molecular weight of the hydrocarbon in question.

The Next American Revolution: Main Street vs. Wall Street

Clam75 the reference to Pearl Harbor is a tell-tale clue. The Japan
attack on Pearl Harbor had been planned by the British,
Japan, and others during the early 1920s. The intended
action led by the British was intended to ruin the growing
U.S. naval power of World War I and the early 1920s. The
result was a U.S.A. responsive war-plan of which the
1920s General Billy Mitchell was a part. The British
and their pro-fascist (e.g., Mussolini-lover Winston
Chirchill) admirers inside the Coolidge-Hoover-Morgan
gang inside the U.S.A., and caused the court-martial of
Mitchell.

However, after Hitler double-crossed his British friends by
invading France, Britain (includng Churchill), which had
backed the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union, changed
sides to consider Hitler the greater danger to it, and begged
for assistance from FDR. In the meantime, FDR et al, had
prepared for the threat of the attack from London and
Tokyo; Mitchell's conception of an aircraft-carrier fleet
was built up under FDR - - as Midway illustrates the point.

However, when Hitler double-crossed the British with help
of a fascist government in France, and overran France,
Churchill and other pro-fascists suddenly saw Hitler as "the
greater danger, and came screaming to FDR for help.
Britain's erstwhile ally, thus, switched sides; but, Japan,
which had been Britain's ally against the U.S.A. since
1894, remained tied to Britain's and its own former
backing of Hitler. So, Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, exactly
as Britain and its Japan ally had planned Japan's
assignment to take out the U.S. base at Pearl Harbor. So,
the fascist elements in Wall Street (e.g., J. P. Morgan et al.)
, who were forced to abandon their backing of Hitler on
Dec. 7, 1941 (or, like George W. Bush, Jr.'s grandfather)
with some months later, abandoned the offices of the pro-
fascist organizations inside the U.S. financier community,
in order to hide themselves in new organizations of the
same long-term, pro-fascist outlook. Today, those
"former;y" fascist organizationss are the chief promoters of
the myth that FDR accomplished nothing; I know those
organizations with their fascist traditions, name by name,
of today - - mostly Chicago-centered, and including all of
the treasonous, pro-fascist organizations with which you
associate the name of Murray Rothbard.



On Feb 03 04:23 PM clam75 wrote:

> If you study any of the Austrian economists such as Murray Rothbard,
> you will learn how FDR's policies actually lengthened the Depression.
> In short, massive governmental borrowing and spending caused misallocation
> of needed savings/capital. Moreover, a cornerstone of FDR policies
> --- the Agricultural Adjustment Act (seekingalpha.com/symbo...)
> --- was the very definition of government foolishness; millions of
> piglets and thousands of pregnant cows were slaughtered in an effort
> to raise meat prices while Americans were going hungry. Even worse,
> the AAA's Thomas Amendment was the vehicle used by FDR when he ordered
> that the gold content of the dollar be reduced to 41%. And these
> are only some of FDR's economic policies; I haven't even begun to
> address FDR's provocation of the Japanese that eventually led to
> disaster at Pearl Harbor.
>
> On Feb 03 09:54 AM investfarm wrote:

In This Global Depression, Gold Is a Safe Haven

The entire world monetary-financial systems, including those of Russia and China, are already, if only momentarily, hopelessly bankrupt, at the brink of plunging into a global "new dark age" of proportions far worse than struck Europe during the middle of Europe's Fourteenth-century "New Dark Age." Only by putting the leading nations of the world into a cooperative form of defensive state of reorganization-in-fina... bankruptcy, could all of Eurasia, in particular, avoid a virtually immediate plunge into a deep and long, chain-reaction-type breakdown-crisis from which many leading nations of Eurasia in particular, would virtually cease to exist in short order.

Without measures to establish an emergency system of international trade credit under virtually a fixed-exchange-rate system, the world as a whole can not be prevented from plunging into a general breakdown-crisis of the sort which would mean an immediate plunge of most nations of the planet into a prolonged, deep, and genocidal new dark age.

For example, in the exemplary cases of China and Russia, both nations would rapidly disintegrate if the trans-Atlantic community of western Europe and North America were to collapse as functioning markets for the exports of China and Russia. This means that, unless the debts and credit-systems of western Europe and North America remain fungible, China and Russia, among many other nations, are doomed to a genocidal plunge into a prolonged new dark age. Since the financial systems of North America and Europe are already bankrupt, only the generation of newly uttered credit through reorganization-in-bank... of current debts would provide the credit-based markets on which the continued existence of many nations, including Russia and China now desperately depend.

It is time for people in certain high places to return, calmly, to their senses, while they still have nations whose people they must defend.