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Will America fall like Rome?
As we all are aware of Rome was the global trade network of the world thousands of years ago. It can also be debated that America is a prominent trade network ,today in comparison to other countries. Is it a matter of time before America falls as Rome did?
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Robert Winner 50+
Yuri Bezmenov laid out the plan that the USSR had set for the demise of the United States and step by step[ we have followed the plan to the letter. This can be seen on you tube.
In my opinion ... who ever won this election was in trouble, but there was still a chance of stopping the blood flow and revive the economy. By the end of the next four years the economy will be like that of Argentina and the fate the same. The lack of understanding of what was occuring to the US and our economy by the citizens has doomed us. To educate and involve the people is no longer a option. The class warfare we have entered was one of the final stages. The discrediting of religion was another. Check and check.
The movie Eva and the song by Madonna .. Don't Cry For Me Argentina ... were a warning that went unheeded.
The history of Argentina is available for you to validate my statements ... you make the compairson ... the rest is my opinion.
Bob.
Gail . 50+
You neglect to mention Germany, that went from the poorest nation with uncheckable inflation - major starvation - to the most economically stable and prosperous in only 2.5 years. How? It printed its own money rather than borrowed it into existence. After WWII, the banks came back into the picture, and now all are endangered.
As to religion being discredited, I'm glad you see that and surprised to see you admit to it.
John Frum 30+
pat gilbert 100+
I will say though that it has been done at least once that I know of in Canada.
Gail . 50+
America has been prosperous every time it issued fiat money, and has gone into decline every time it teemed up with the banks who issue debt as money.
I should have made the time frame clear. Sorry about that. :-)
John Frum 30+
"America has been prosperous every time it issued fiat money, and has gone into decline every time it teemed up with the banks who issue debt as money."
How do you define "prosperous"? If you were to look at the amount of disposable income, measured against a commodity (http://pricedingold.com/us-disposable-income/) you'll see that Americans now are less propserous than they were at the end of WW2! And things are only getting worse. If you were to measure "prosperous" in terms of USD, you'll get an entirely different impression.
Grace Greene 10+
Of course America is far less prosperous than it was in the 50s. Do you think that most people aren't well aware of that?
John Frum 30+
"Those dollars in your wallet are only promissory notes."
Sorry, that only works on the gullible. What is it that these dollar notes promise? If I were to give you 10 Frum Dollars that promise to pay the bearer 10 Frum Dollars, how impressed would you be?
"Our currency IS debt."
Try this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Credit_theory_of_money
Many people would say we have fiat currency, not debt currency. Now, do you understand why I do not discuss the term "debt based currency"? Use a more concrete term, and I'll happily discuss it.
http://www.ehow.com/facts_5062675_silver-certificates.html
"Since silver coins are significantly heavier than gold ones, the Treasury printed out promissory notes on paper that were legal tender redeemable in silver dollars. These were silver certificates."
"Of course America is far less prosperous than it was in the 50s. Do you think that most people aren't well aware of that?"
Pay attention to the comment I'm replying to. What awareness do you infer from TED Lover's comment?
Grace Greene 10+
When Hitler stopped borrowing money into existence, he created money without incurring interest on debt. That new currency became the currency of the realm because the currency before that had utterly and completely collapsed. In only 2.5 years, Germany went from destitute to thriving. After the war, the bankers re-instituted borrowing money into existence, and we have what we have today - an unstable and unsustainable economy that will never be able to pay off all the loans plus the interest that is never printed into existence.
Yes, our currency is backed by "faith", but it is borrowed into existence by private bankers. Hitler based the value of his mark on labor and production of the German people. We used to have a metal-backed currency. That is no longer true. Gold certificates and silver certificates are no longer exchangeable for gold or silver, which was their original purpose.
John Frum 30+
"Hitler based the value of his mark on labor and production of the German people."
This is untrue. The Wikipedia article I mentioned earlier indicates that the mark was first linked to the quantities of rye grain, and then to quantities of gold.
"...Germany went from destitute to thriving..."
Only because goods and services could then be honestly valued against each other in a stable manner. If I work today for 10$, and I spend the money today, I can buy 10kg of potatoes. If I choose not to spend this money today, but spend it next year, I'd probably be able to buy only 9kg of potatoes with it. 1. This means that the currency is unstable. 2. It encourages me to find work closer to the place where it is produced, so that I can reap its benefits before it trickles down to the others. This work, because it is decided by government policies and not inspired by market demands, will be, by definition, rather useless, but well-paying.
So, coming back to your original statements to me,
"You're not making a lot of sense here. You can't disregard the fed and national banks in a discussion of current fiscal models."
Whether you agree with my explanation or not, do you agree that I am trying to make a case that debt is of secondary importance to the problem? Do you agree that I am trying to make a case that a commodities-based currency is a step in the right direction?
Grace Greene 10+
Quote:
"We were not foolish enough to try to make a currency backed by gold of which we had none, but for every mark that was issued we required the equivalent of a mark's worth of work done or goods produced. . . .We laugh at the time our national financiers held the view that the value of a currency is regulated by the gold and securities lying in the vaults of a state bank."
- Adolf Hitler, quoted in "Hitler's Monetary System,"
The Wikipedia mention of rye wheat-backed currency is the only reference of such that I have been able to find. If you follow this history of the mark, you will see that for most of the time you mention, Germany was on the gold standard. Before that, it was the papermark for a time. It was America that forced Germany into that horrible depression. And the Great Depression was caused by the federal reserve.
Just because you read it on the Internet does not mean it's true. Anyone can write an article and post it on Wikipedia.
John Frum 30+
"The Wikipedia mention of rye wheat-backed currency is the only reference of such that I have been able to find.... Just because you read it on the Internet does not mean it's true. Anyone can write an article and post it on Wikipedia."
Are your search skills are supposed to be a reflection on me? Hint: German documents are not in English. Try http://www.bundesarchiv.de/aktenreichskanzlei/1919-1933/1000/str/str1p/kap1_1/para2_9.html
Gold or rye, my point about commodities remains the same. Though I consider gold a superior backing for currency, that is beside the point here.
But I confess, the initial omission of time period kept me thinking of a different time-frame from that point on. Coming to Hitler, his price-control policies worked only for a short period of time. Is it really worth studying as an example of successful monetary policy? Inflation soon caught up to him.
Lars Mews
In that time period you talk about we had two currencies besides each other, the so called "Rentenmark" (more or less official, but highly accepted and trusted by the population) and the official "Reichsmark".
The Roggenmark was only an idea how to stabilize the currency, but this was solved sucessfully by the Rentenmark. She was quickly followed by the Reichsmark, but the Reichsmark was not trusted that much by the people, to avoid "new old problems" they simply let the Rentenmark survive as a second currency inside germany, not really official, but also not illegal.
The Rentenmark was not touched by the inflation (because the ammount was fixed, they never printed new money of that currency), that is why it survived so long even it was already "unofficial".
By the way, what pat gilbert mentions below is true, "we" germans hate inflation, but love the idea of deflation. Its of course only a feeling, as both have negative effects on economy, but germans are scared only by inflation, even today. If you tell us a coming deflation, we appear pretty relaxed, and most of us secretly dream of a coming deflation, as this reminds us of better times (this "trauma" is emminent, even my generation cries about the loss of the D-Mark, as the "felt inflation" was non-existent in our view, because we connect freedom and increasing wealth with the D-Mark, whilst we connect raising poverty and EU-dictatorship with the new Euro currency).
Its a diffrent understanding, but very simmiliar on the other hand.
pat gilbert 100+
Since in essence a culture is an agreement the Germans will never have inflation because this is the agreement in Germany just as America will never have deflation because this is the agreement in America.
John Frum 30+
Lars Mews
but anyhow, even the english wikipedia could have told you this.
"In August 1923, Karl Helfferich proposed a plan to issue a new currency (Roggenmark) backed by mortgage bonds indexed to market prices (in paper Marks) of rye grain. His plan was rejected because of the greatly fluctuating price of rye in paper Marks. The Agriculture Minister Hans Luther proposed a different plan which substituted gold for rye and a new currency, the Rentenmark, backed by bonds indexed to market prices (in paper Marks) of gold.[25]"
The currency of a state is a historical fact, and you can trust wikipedia pretty much about historical facts that have such a big importance like currencies do have. If your english wikipedia does not mention a currency for germany, than it is pretty obvious we did not have or had it in use.
John Frum 30+
pat gilbert 100+
How much credit would you give to Yuri and how much would you give to this is the natural order of things?
John Frum 30+
Robert Winner 50+
I think that the answer is probally natural order but the Russians sped it along and understood it better than us. Heck the Greeks understood it 2000 years ago better that our current leaders. That is a sad thing to have to say.
Was the answer : Argentina correct and was that accurate?
pat gilbert 100+
I heard the other day that the current leader lowered the voting age to 16, ostensibly to garner more votes.
The thing about Argentina that I find interesting is that it has been going on for so long similar to the U.K. I realize the debt is hard to deal with but the part that blows me away is that the people have not changed. Which makes your point about Yuri even more relevant.
Funny probably 80% or better of just the TED people think we are whack jobs or just poor ignorant victims of Fox news...
Matt Ridley talks about how the evolution of Neanderthal man's physical make up occurred faster than the evolution of the tools he used. He stated that the main difference between Neanderthal and modern man was the ability to exchange ideas. I ran a survey on why people who voted for Obama voted for him and the answers were less than profound. I guess that to really get this stuff you have to look at the devil in the details and the majority doesn't want to be bothered... The products of the free market have evolved a thousand times faster than man's thinking and that truly bums me out.
Grace Greene 10+
YOu say that there was nothing profound learned through your question of why people voted for Obama. But in your own thread within that question, you said, "What stuns me is that the voters put social issues above financial issues" Sounds like you learned something profound after all.
pat gilbert 100+
Is that profound or deep?
peter lindsay 30+