Why does God permit Evil?

This is, of course, a difficult question, but I do think there are a few answers to which we can avail ourselves.  We are told in Genesis that God has made man in his own image and likeness, that in a very real sense we are, though certainly not fully, equal to God in certain respects (that may sound a little blasphemous, but it certainly is not meant as such), or we are, at least, proto-divine beings.  If this is true and if this is what God desired to bring into existence, it would make little sense for him to have created us as little robots, perfectly fixed to always do as God intends.  Indeed, if we are to approach or to approximate a divine nature in away, it seems humanity would have to be given some leeway regarding what it can and cannot do.  If we consider this aspect of humanity from God's perspective, we can see that it would be of very little ultimate value (speaking loosely) to a God that enjoys morality, not only for morality's sake, but because it is indeed superior to immorality, to create beings fixed perfectly as moral, as they, due to their limited nature, would have no concept of the bad.  Such beings so fixed would live in a world of perfect goodness, but would never be able to conceive of it as such, only seeing that world as what is and must be.  Thus, these beings would be seriously deficient to a God intending to create beings in his own image and likeness; for they would never understand the concept of morality in the same way as their own God.  The key to morality, then, is choice; for without choice, there is only what is and never what ought to be; and choice necessarily entails the ability to choose wrongly.

Thus, if we have justified the existence of evil in our world, as I believe we have, we now have to consider our relationship as individuals to that evil.  

“My question…asks about those instances in which we do succumb to sin. In those instances, did God know you would falter?”

Because of what I see as the unconquerable continuity in existence, briefly, that all actions have an equal and opposite reaction and that the entire universe, from the moment that God set it in motion, is merely the culmination of all of the various and sundry reactions to that original action, and seeing that there exists a scientific regularity dictating how such reactions take place, it seems impossible, if we accept that God is truly omniscient, to say that he would not have known you would falter.

“If so, why would he put these obstacles in front of you?”

I think the answer to this question is found chiefly in the first paragraph above.  It is important to consider, I think, that God did not desire to put obstacles in front of you as much as he wanted to give you a free will and choice, which necessarily entailed such obstacles.

“Thus, if He controls everything, and knows the future.. how can he send a person to hell, when all the sins he committed were a result of God placing before him "tests" which (in all-knowing fashion) He knew that person would fail?”

This is the most difficult question asked so far.  I think part of the answer to this question lies in the unsatisfactory notion of someone being “sent” to Hell, and the commonly used imagery that depicts an angry God actively pursuing the evildoers in this way.  While I will not claim that there is no basis in reality that justifies the use of this imagery, I will say that it ought to be tempered with the theological discussions of Hell, that depict Hell less as an active, desired punishment from God and more as the necessary result of our own choices.  How can God justify any kind of punishment for a creature whose actions were determined long before that creature came into existence?  I’m not sure if ‘punishment’ is an accurate term for our discussion, as it relates to a situation in which an outside force intervenes to attempt, by providing a negative feedback, to modify our behavior.  Again, I don’t think God, if we conceive of him as recognizing the dignity of humanity, created in his image and likeness, would be much into behavior modification.  He is, if we allow that his goal is to give us the ability to choose good and that this better than merely being good and entails necessarily bad choices, forced to take a more hands-off approach.  And thus, the warnings from God about being “sent” to Hell are more an attempt to fully inform us about the necessary consequences of our actions than to actively punish us in order to demand a change in our behavior.

I think, then, if we think of God in this way, not as attempting to punish those whom he knew could do no better, but merely attempting to fully inform us as to the consequences of our actions, we can see that there remains a dignity for even the person that chooses wrong, as his choice is respected in this manner.

I concede I have not really answered your question, but only tried to reframe it.  It remains to be explained how God can justify consequences for actions it seems one had no ultimate control over.

Briefly, while I think that our actions are indeed determined, this does not negate for us the reality of choice.  And thus, our choices remaining valid, the justice of the consequences of our actions is not undone.  If you find the discussion in this note in any way unfulfilling, if any questions remain, do voice them, as I think this issue is of the utmost importance and would like to be made aware of the deficiencies in my own understanding of it.

But, again, as you say, God knew what you would choose and yet created you; so I have not really addressed the idea that it may, in this sense, be said that God is responsible for your actions more than yourself. Or, at least, 

I think this notion that because God has created you, and knew exactly what you would do, we are somehow deprived of all responsibility for our actions is a little fallacious.  As you indicated, you did not desire to do away with a notion of personal responsibility, but

We could say,  then that in a way Hell exists not so much for those who are "punished" but to save those who are not. ("Punishments remain, even in the case of determinism, an effective determent to crimes.")

Though, it is important to recall that Hell is not so much a punishment, as something that naturally follows from our actions.

It is thus the same in any situation: I must balance the value of doing something [bad] now, with the disvalue of the lack of something later (i.e.suffering separtion from God ever after, after death). Since we are not objective (which is to say, I think necessarily, omniscient beings), our subjective evaluations of this proposition will differ from the objective (God's) view. If we were objective beings like God, and knew exactly the pain that Hell entails, we would choose good all the time, because we would know definitively that this is the optimal choice. But, alas, we are not God, and the nature of our condition allows us choice...

exactly because we are not perfectly aware of the full effects of our choice and God ultimately respects that choice and the dignity and sovereignty it entails, even though he endeavors greatly to make it clear (most notably through the sacrifice of his own son) that we remain free to change our minds at any time and accept him fully and that this is, our human notions aside, indeed the optimal choice.

The question may arise as to why God did not create us as omniscient beings; but omniscience, it seems to me, requires omnipresence, and thus omnipotence. In other words, God would have had to create us exactly as He is Himself. I do not think this is something God could've done. That's not so say God is not all powerful, but that there is no power that can undo the nature of existence, i.e., what is. When God was asked for his name by Moses, God said that his name is "I am that I am." ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_am_that_I_am ). I do not think that we, as we are (i.e., created beings), could ever be what is, without having been along with God from the beginning and thus we would've been God himself, and thus have no need of a "creation," for we ourselves would be the creator.

So, there are certain restrictions, I think, that not even God can overcome as they are an inherent aspect of what it means to be God in the first place.

Thus, seeing that we are not God, and thus necessarily not omniscient, but we are at the same time not like, e.g., rocks, totally without consciousness, we find ourselves in a grey area of partial knowledge and self-awareness, which entails the ability to choose, as outlined above.

Enough.

Everything I Learned in School

is summarized in this video:

Get out as quickly as you can.

Feminism Defined

Gender Equality. Hey, it's her body.

Dear Leader

I will start by saying that I took no part in trying to get you elected. In fact, I did everything within my power to see that you didn’t succeed. Throughout this election I chose to stand with a principled man, a man who truly wants freedom for the individual, not for the government. I chose to write-in Dr. Ron Paul as my choice for president. Before you claim that I have wasted my vote because the man will not win, let me say that I agree with part of that statement. As much as I wish it weren’t the case, he will not win, but my moral compass will not allow me to vote for the lesser of two evils, and that is what I believe you to be. To understand why I feel this way, it doesn’t take much effort on your part. I’d like to introduce you to two men I’ve gotten to know quite well over the last five years, pre-election Obama and post-election Obama. Pre-election Obama promised me hope and change and post-election Obama left me hoping  he’d stop changing  his mind. Pre-election Obama promised me transparency; he promised that the public would have five days to review a bill online before it was passed. Indeed, it was Nancy Pelosi herself who said we had to pass Obamacare so we could know what was in it. Pre-election Obama promised me that all of our troops would be out of Iraq within 16 months. Post-election Obama changed his mind and sided with former president Bush by keeping the same timeline for withdrawal that Bush had put in place. Now it was not just pre-election Obama and post-election Obama who had their differences. Post-election Obama promised to veto the atrocious piece of legislation known as the NDAA, only to sign it in to law and continue the destruction of our civil liberties. While I could continue on infinitely, it would seem as you are probably fabricating some lie to someone somewhere as I type this, I will not. I am tired of having my freedoms destroyed by liars. You promised you’d be different than former president Bush, I hope this time around you will fulfill that promise. I hope you work to repeal the NDAA and the patriot act. I hope you bring more of our troops home. I hope you focus on cutting our debt instead of adding trillions more to it. I have zero faith that any of these things will get done, but I really do HOPE this time around you do CHANGE.

The Next Stage in Human Devolution is Here

President Obama vows to continue his policies in a second term.

In the spirit of a bygone era, Obama announced to a crowd of early voters, "We choose to go to Hell! We choose to go to Hell... [interrupted by applause] we choose to go to Hell in this decade and ignore the other things, not because they are difficult, but because Dancing With Stars will be on in a few minutes..."

Upon hearing a recording of the President's speech on her government provided smart phone, the Obama-phone creature did not react.

The president vowed to continue and build upon the policies of his first term which will promote a culture of infertility and sleaze, greater budget deficits, higher taxes, more attacks on the rights of the people to defend themselves, greater dependency on federal welfare programs and the dismantling of the rule of law.

The Conspiracy Theories Handed Down From Our Pontiffs

Before Alex Jones, before the masonic takeover of Mexico, before the devolution of the Catholic Church during and after Vatican II, there was a pope that predicted it all:


By Blessed Pope Pius IX in Etsi Multa, November, 1873:

Venerable Brothers, it is surprising that in our time such a great war is being waged against the Catholic Church. But anyone who knows the nature, desires and intentions of the sects, whether they be called masonic or bear another name, and compares them with the nature the systems and the vastness of the obstacles by which the Church has been assailed almost everywhere, cannot doubt that the present misfortune must mainly be imputed to the frauds and machinations of these sects. It is from them that the synagogue of Satan, which gathers its troops against the Church of Christ, takes its strength. In the past Our predecessors, vigilant even from the beginning in Israel, had already denounced them to the kings and the nations, and had condemned them time and time again, and even We have not failed in this duty. If those who would have been able to avert such a deadly scourge had only had more faith in the supreme Pastors of the Church! But this scourge, winding through sinuous caverns, . . . deceiving many with astute frauds, finally has arrived at the point where it comes forth impetuously from its hiding places and triumphs as a powerful master. Since the throng of its propagandists has grown enormously, these wicked groups think that they have already become masters of the world and that they have almost reached their pre-established goal. Having sometimes obtained what they desired, and that is power, in several countries, they boldly turn the help of powers and authorities which they have secured to trying to submit the Church of God to the most cruel servitude, to undermine the foundations on which it rests, to contaminate its splendid qualities; and, moreover, to strike it with frequent blows, to shake it, to overthrow it, and, if possible, to make it disappear completely from the earth. Things being thus, Venerable Brothers, make every effort to defend the faithful which are entrusted to you against the insidious contagion of these sects and to save from perdition those who unfortunately have inscribed themselves in such sects. Make known and attack those who, whether suffering from, or planning, deception, are not afraid to affirm that these shady congregations aim only at the profit of society, at progress and mutual benefit. Explain to them often and impress deeply on their souls the Papal constitutions on this subject and teach, them that the masonic associations are anathematized by them not only in Europe but also in America and wherever they may be in the whole world.

"Our predecessors, vigilant even from the beginning in Israel, had already denounced them to the kings and the nations, and had condemned them time and time again."

Does the Holy Father seem to indicate, as Alex Jones et al does, that these conspiring actors trace their foundations even back to times before Christ? Does "our predecessors" here refer to the chosen race of God, the Jews, of whom the Catholic Church is merely the fullest culmination and most recent iteration in God's plan?

If you do not believe the Pontiff could be correct in his assertions, please watch.

A Catholic Revolution: The Final Cut.

See local listings: http://www.ecclesiadei.org/masses.cfm

A Catholic Revolution: The Trailer.

Occupy The Womb!

Great Blog.

It Has Been Some Time

It has been some time since I have felt compelled to write. I can feel the skill slowly slipping from my fingers, and so I should write if for nothing else than to preserve my ability to express myself diligently into the future.

I have given up two years of my life pursuing a woman so tepid that one measured rebuke of her careless manner of speaking can send her into a fit of doubt, confusion, and insult. In nearly two years of a relationship a period longer than a week has never passed without an argument. As Christ calls me, I am in this world, but not of it. I am not above the desire for a family, nor should I be. But truly are things as bad as pagan times. So difficult is it to find a woman committed to her family above all else that one must settle for gently guiding the only slightly confused woman off the path on which the culture of death has placed her. Habits and thoughts formed through public school and even through as insidious a thing as a Novus Ordo parish - which teaches a lighter version of the same cultural tendencies as public school but with the facade of theological and moral legitimacy - are apparently tremendously difficult to break, such that two years of extreme effort has yet to dig away enough of the crud so as to find a stable foundation on which to build and rear a family.

I must turn again to the search for someone else. This is her choice not mine, as she has demonstrated time again that while she has the ability to speak as though her thoughts are upright, consistent action directed towards the same end (i.e., uprightness), again for a period longer than a week, is too much for one such as I to ask.

I need now the faith of Saint Anne, whose earthly desires were fulfilled in a way incomparable to all except the mother of God herself. In long-suffering was a child delivered to her. The spiritual and physical fulfillment which the delivery of the this child gave Saint Anne must have exceeded anything she could have wished for in her many years of childlessness.

Hail, Holy Queen, Mother of Mercy, our life, our sweetness and our hope, to thee do we cry, O poor banished children of Eve, to thee do we send up sighs morning and weeping in this valley of tears. Turn then, most gracious advocate, thine eyes of mercy toward us and after this our exile show unto us the blessed fruit of thy womb, Jesus. O clement, O loving, O sweet virgin Mary.

Pray for us O Holy Mother of God that we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ.

An Open Letter to Whole Foods

Sent to: Walter.robb@wholefoods.com, Libba.Letton@wholefoods.com

Dear Mr. Walter Robb,

Year to date, I have spent $5021.91 at your store per my records kept by the Microsoft Money software program. That is more than 10% of my annual income. While I realize you are a business man and must make your decisions accordingly, I am writing to make you keenly aware that the same applies to me. I have happily spent this money in firm belief that I am supporting one of the last bastions of legitimate, sustainable and safe agriculture practices in our nation, if not our world. This belief is now dreadfully challenged through the GMO scandal the poor management of your company has brought to fruition (see http://www.infowars.com/nothing-artificial-ever-whole-foods-caught-in-gmo-marketing-deception-proof/ , amongst others).

As a consumer entirely opposed morally, philosophically, scientifically and economically to the monetary support and consumption of many GMO products, I am forced to reduce my spending at your store to send a message that those watching only your bottom line can understand: I will not shop at a store that presents itself as a safe place to eat but does not back up that promise with actions. I will shop at other organic stores and other local produce outlets that are cheaper, because you have failed to differentiate yourself from them. While I may in some circumstances continue to support your store, I will not do so with the pride I once had in being a “Whole” Foods customer, realizing now that the corn I may be consuming is not whole at all but violated with the genetic code of other living organisms.

If either your conscience or your bottom line are sufficiently bruised by the actions of me and other like-minded former customers, then these are the steps I would take to re-imbue your brand with the trust it deserves:

1)      Make a large donation to Proposition 37 in California.

2)      Announce a timeline requirement for all foods sold through Whole Foods to be labeled with their GMO content.

3)      Proactively educate Whole Foods employees and customers about the reality of genetically modified foods being sold throughout the stores.

Sincerely,

The author of Actual Anarchy.

Livin’ In A Bankster’s Paradise

Originally penned on October 3, 2008.

The state is the ultimate criminal enterprise.  Many of you may interpret my superimposing of gangster rap lyrics over the images of state officials as my own idiosyncratic form of humor, but there is more to this than meets the eye.  Take a listen to Coolio’s “Gangsta’s Paradise,” (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mVVmxFnn53o ) and you could just as easily be listening to a description of the trepidations of the state and its rulers, as the description of the life of a pettier gangster.  Some will disagree from the beginning with my description of the state as a criminal enterprise.  But how else can you refer to organizations, the Mafia and the state foremost among them, that believe it is legitimate to kill without provocation and steal?  Indeed, as a Father of the Catholic Church relates:

St. Augustine tells the story of a pirate captured by Alexander the Great, who asked him “how he dares molest the sea.” “How dare you molest the whole world?” the pirate replied: “Because I do it with a little ship only, I am called a thief; you, doing it with a great navy, are called an Emperor.” (http://www.ameu.org/page.asp?iid=162&aid=422&pg=1 )

Power and the Money, Money and the Power

Although the American Empire certainly does its share of naked molestation of the wider world, the domestic portion of this molestation, the theft that too often funds molestation elsewhere, is often more subtle to make it more palatable to the public.  The primary mechanism by which the American government hides its theft from the American people is the Federal Reserve System.  Listen again to the Augustinian parable altered only slightly:

We have the story of a counterfeiter captured by the Secret Service, who interrogate him.  “How dare you print thousands of new hundred dollar bills,” they ask.  “How dare you print millions of the same,” the counterfeiter replies, “because I do it with one printing press only, I am called a criminal; you, doing it with an entire Bureau of Engraving and Printing, are called a provider of liquidity.”

In prior articles I have mentioned the Federal Reserve’s manipulation of the interest rate; the mechanism by which the Fed is capable of manipulating the interest rate is the dumping of newly printed money on the loan markets.  The Fed uses this money primarily to buy U.S. Treasury bonds and thereby funds the expenditure of the U.S. government.  The U.S. government and those who benefit from government largesse use these newly printed dollars to bid away the savings of everyone else.  Notice, printing new money does not create new oil, tractors, shoes, or carrots, but new money can be used to bid these products away from savers, resulting in higher prices.  Although difficult to see and easily blamed on “greedy capitalists” in order to justify even greater expansions of state power, increasing prices are actually a direct result of this fraudulent system of government finance.

The banking system, for its complicity in this freely counterfeiting setup, gets its own kickback.  Banks are only required to keep on hand roughly 10% of their depositor’s funds; the rest, 90%, they can lend out for interest.  Your bank only has approximately 10% of your total balance on hand for immediate withdrawal.  If you went down to your local U-Store-It (http://www.ustoreit.com/ ) and deposited your old record collection, you’d expect all your records to be there when you returned.  If only 10% were there, you’d be rightly outraged.  Yet, many entrust something far more valuable, their life’s savings, to an inherently fraudulent fractional reserve banking system.  Just as a U-Store-It that consistently lent out 90% of its depositor’s possessions would quickly find itself without customers, so too would our current banking system fail a real market test.  The state as it exists, much dependent upon inflationary financing, and the current bankers, similarly dependent upon the intervention of the state (e.g., FDIC, liquidity injections, bank holidays, etc.), have merged into a state-banking nexus, aptly described by NYU Scholar Chris Matthew Sciabarra here:  http://www.nyu.edu/projects/sciabarra/notablog/archives/001540.html .  This system based on deceit may be justly described as a banker-gangster’s paradise.  

It’s goin’ on in the kitchen, but I don’t know what’s cookin’

In addition to the undermining of savings caused by inflation, the consistent dumping of newly printed money on the loan market has even more deleterious consequences.  On a free market, the market set interest rate helps to efficiently distribute savings to borrowers.  Entrepreneurs, using this rate as a guide, embark upon projects such as building houses and factories, which are dependent upon the loaned savings of other people.  An unhindered, free market set interest rate will, due to the very nature of voluntary transactions, always indicate the actual amount of savings; an unhindered rate will also help entrepreneurs decide which out of all the possible housing and factory projects to actually undertake.  Again, voluntary and non-fraudulent transactions on the marketplace, as manifested by an unhindered interest rate, will always accurately reflect the true preferences of the consumers, else consumers would not engage in these transactions in the first place.  

However, thanks to the state-baking nexus, the Fed has the power to set the interest rate.  Because the market interest rate occurs naturally outside of any action by the Federal Reserve, any newly printed money, which again does not represent any actual savings, lent under the auspices of the Fed will modify the interest rate in way that does not conform to consumer preferences.  This causes entrepreneurs not only to believe that more savings are available than actually are - this period is usually called the ‘boom’ - it also causes them to choose particular projects to the exclusion of other possible projects.  It is only later, when inflation picks up, since this is all newly printed money can result in, that entrepreneurs realize they have started on too many of the wrong projects.  A bust is the result.  The business cycle, then, is yet another feature of living in a banker-gangster’s paradise.

So, we see, the state knows where the action’s at in terms of acquiring the savings of other people, but it is clueless when it comes to setting the proper interest rate.

Too much television watchin’ got me chasin’ dreams

As I’ve pointed out previously, the media is only too happy to justify the Fed’s every move.  When a bust inevitably and rightly follows a boom, we hear a clarion call to re-inflate, provide liquidity, stabilize bad projects, etc.  Silent during the boom, or in CNBC’s case, complicit, the media does not

“address…the real problem, i.e., why houses became so overvalued in the first place, the media only addresses their made-up problem of the re-emergence of normality: how can we keep housing prices from falling? Thus, we repeat out mistakes. The Federal Reserve has once again excessively lowered the interest rate, which is what exactly caused housing prices to get too high in the first place, in order to prevent housing prices from returning to normal levels.” (http://www.new.facebook.com/home.php?ref=logo#/note.php?note_id=31130029179&id=7911319&index=8 )

The call for re-inflation plays right back into the hands of the banker-gangsters.  The Fed now has a pseudo-scientific justification for its continuing inflation, i.e., the stabilization of bad projects undertaken during the boom, and the banks that bankrolled these bad projects will be the first in line to receive some of the newly printed cash.  The consumers, on the other hand, are forced to wait longer and work harder in order to achieve the standard of living they would have achieved much sooner in an unhampered market place.  They must take a look at their savings and realize there’s nothing left, ‘cause Ben Bernanke’s been inflating and laughing so long that even Jim “Mad Money” Cramer thinks his mind is gone.  (http://blog.mises.org/archives/008680.asp ) 

 I’m an educated fool, with money on my mind

Yet, state action is not without its veneer of pseudo-intellectual propaganda.  Go to a major university, and they will teach you “Economics,” although it will sound little like what I’ve outlined here.  Growing up, I do recall much contemplation of the apparent dichotomy between common sense and expertise.  The longer one went to school, it seemed, the less one seemed to know about the basic structure of reality.  Or as William F. Buckley, with whom I agree only on rare occasions, is said to have quipped, ‘I would rather be governed by the first four hundred people in the Boston phonebook, than the entire staff of Harvard.’  We see that “educated fool,” then, is a key oxymoron.  Much of modern economic theory is more about providing pseudo-scientific rationalizations for the Fed’s manipulation of the money supply and the current state of our banking system and less about uncovering the fundamental truths highlighted in this article.

Why are we not taught that the nature of the Federal Reserve and the banking system based upon it is inflationary, disruptive, and fraudulent?  So many are taught instead that the actions of the Fed are stabilizing and anti-inflationary (see http://homepage.smc.edu/brown_bruce/HLPPT/Ch14.ppt ).  How can this be? Hans Hermann Hoppe provides an explanation:

Yet how can one persuade the majority of the population to believe this? And the answer is: only with the help of the intellectuals. Now how do you get the intellectuals to work for you? To this the answer is easy. The market demand for intellectual services is not exactly high and stable. Intellectuals would be at the mercy of the fleeting values of the masses, and the masses are uninterested in intellectual, philosophical concerns. The state, on the other hand, can accommodate the intellectual's typically over-inflated egos, and offer them a warm, secure, and permanent berth in its apparatus.

…You must become a monopolist. And this is best achieved if all educational institutions, from kindergarten to universities, are brought under state control, and all teaching and researching personnel is state-certified.

But what if the people do not want to become educated? For this, education must be made compulsory. 

…Now, none of this guarantees correct statist thinking [on the part of intellectuals], of course. It certainly helps however, in reaching the correct statist conclusion, if one realizes that without the state one might be out of work, and may have to try one's hands at the mechanics of gas-pump operation, instead of concerning oneself with such pressing problems as alienation, equity, exploitation, the deconstruction of gender and sex roles, or the culture of the Eskimos, the Hopes, and the Zulus. ( http://mises.org/Community/blogs/ayrnieu/archive/2008/07/15/the-state-the-intellectuals-and-the-role-of-anti-intellectual-intellectuals.aspx )

Education as it stands, then, is not exactly synonymous with the pursuit of truth.  Our education system produces way too many educated fools, again to the delight of the banker-gangsters.

Got the tin in my hand, and the gleam in my eye

Something must be said as to how we arrived in this situation.  When the Federal Reserve was created in 1913, the money supply was still directly tied to gold.  A system wherein gold serves directly as money cannot suffer inflation wrought by the banker-gangsters, as it is impossible to print more gold; the supply of gold is greatly limited, unlike the supply of paper dollars.  Murray Rothbard explains what happened:

In the United States, the Federal Reserve Act compel[led]…banks to keep [a] minimum ratio of reserves to deposits and, since 1917, these reserves could only consist of deposits at the Federal Reserve Bank.  Gold could no longer be part of a bank's legal reserves; it had to be deposited in the Federal Reserve Bank.

The entire process took the public off the gold habit and placed the people's gold in the none-too-tender care of the State - where it could be confiscated almost painlessly. ( http://mises.org/money/3s8.asp )

It would be only a matter of time before all gold would be confiscated by the government and Federal Reserve notes would no longer be redeemable for and thus directly tied to a supply of gold:

On April 5, 1933, Franklin D. Roosevelt ordered the confiscation of gold from US citizens, in one of the most heinous acts of mass-robbery imaginable. ( http://blog.mises.org/archives/002627.asp )

As Murray Rothbard also points out, if, as popular nostrums suggest, gold is obsolete or worthless as money, why would the government feel the need to confiscate and horde the people’s gold?  Indeed, the purpose was not to replace a lesser form of money, gold, with a greater form of money, Federal Reserve Notes, but to replace a greater form of money, gold, with an easily counterfeited and thus lesser form of money, Federal Reserve Notes.  Thanks to this inaugural theft, the banker-gangsters began an era of counterfeiting that has yet to cease.

I’m 232 now, but will I live to see 233?  The way things is goin’, I don’t know…

America celebrated its 232^nd birthday last July fourth.  Albeit the most powerful state in existence since the beginning of mankind, America, like all empires, faces greater and greater military obligations that will eventually way her down.  As I outlined in my justification for a Texan independence movement:

America will find itself increasingly in need of proving that its superpower status remains and increasingly having to resort to exercising military action in order to do so. This need will increase faster as goodwill continues to decline. This is the path all empires face, and they eventually pay for their military conquests with, among other things, a devaluation of their currency.  (http://www.new.facebook.com/profile.php?id=7911319&ref=name#/note.php?note_id=14848804179&id=7911319&index=12 )

An empire, in essence, lives life do or die.  Historically, empires have constantly expanded in order to bring a larger tax-base under its control in order to help it avoid excessive inflation from military spending and other government largesse, but in order to secure a larger and larger tax base, greater and greater military efforts must be undertaken.  History has shown that eventually the costs of empire outweigh an empire’s ability to generate more wealth.  

Things are more subtle for America, as it is the proprietor of the world’s reserve currency.  However, this economic scheme is also slowly coming unglued.  America pays for the defense of countries that can easily afford to defend their selves – i.e., South Korea, Germany, France, England, Japan, Saudi Arabia, Israel, Kuwait, Italy and so many others – and in return, we export part of our inflation. In other words, these countries keep U.S. dollars as reserves. This is an informal ‘agreement’ to be sure, but it has been the de facto international order since the collapse of Bretton Woods in the 1970s. The problem is, we are abusing our Imperial position like all empires are prone to do; we are printing too many dollars and the value of these holdings are decreasing markedly. Many countries will soon begin to bolt from the dollar for their own selfish reasons.

If America continues down its current path of empire, its inflationary actions will result in a more rapid destruction of the dollar, which in turn will likely lead us to lash out militarily against weaker countries that unpeg their currencies and exports from the dollar – like Iran and Iraq, for example. These vast and new military expenditures will only hasten this process, and the U.S. Empire will collapse messily with war, bankruptcy, and hyperinflation.  Undeserved power breeds arrogance; this is the Achilles’ heel of the banker-gangsters.  Unfortunately, they may take the rest of us down with them.

Under the current system, the American consumer will continue to suffer from avoidable increases in prices and the unemployment caused by unnecessary fluctuations in business activity, as the banker-gangsters continue to defraud us.  Until we, like President Andrew Jackson, “kill the Bank,” we will keep spending most our lives living in a bankster’s paradise.