From the Summit of the Moral High Ground

Money = Debt and Slavery I don't know about you, but I've always hated money. Statistics reveal that the majority of our problems are caused because of money alone. Thanks to money, we are forced to deal with greed, corruption, debt, and many other issues. We all need money to live though, right? That's what the banks want us to believe, but you see, where there is money, there will inevitably be debt. We have debt because we have money. Where does this money come from? The Central Banks create our money, and then loan it out to other banks on interest. So, technically any money that is "created" needs to eventually be paid back to the banks plus interest. In actuality, there was never any money in the first place, and there also wasn't money within the system to cover the interest the banks require. The monetary system ensures that people will always be in debt because our money is created through debt. As if that wasn't bad enough, we a...

Yesterday I discussed what exactly growth was, and why it was only important to governments. But because it is important to governments it has been enforced through a series of social developments implemented within legislation and enforced through the slavery of debt. In the modern age to have a 'good job' it is mandatory to have a 'good education'. A degree of some sort is required for almost every job that leads to a good standard of living. But now in order to have a 'good education' there is a degree of inevitability that all but the most well off will leave university with some degree of indebtedness. With the recent tripling of tuition fees it is estimated that the average student leaving university in the UK will be approximately $60,000 in debt. Somewhere along the way the government seems to have forgotten that an education is an aim in and of itself and is not tied simply to the desire to maximise future potential earnings. However this level...

Another thought provoking point raised by Tom Joad has led to the following post, I hope this fully demonstrates that I firmly believe that the welfare and happiness of workers is fundamental to a business' success. The much touted 'growth' that all nations seem to be extolling the virtues of, as the 'alternative' to austerity is a funny thing, which has never quite been defined and remains a buzz word. To truly understand what growth means, we need to understand what it is that is 'growing' and that is the arbitrary measure of the economic value of a nation's activities. There are four ways, within the purview of government, that growth can be achieved: 1) Increase the number of people working 2) Increase the notional value of each person's activity 3) Increase the level of taxation and activity by government employees 4) Inflation (increase in the money supply) None of these represent 'real' growth. There are three ways of de...

The BRICS nations You may have seen the news that Britain is going to lend £10 billion to the IMF to prop up the Euro along with a number of other countries to make a total fund of £400 billion (or thereabouts). The two 'abstainers' are the US and Canada. First it is important to realise that the £10 billion is entirely hypothetical. It is simply an entry in a ledger somewhere saying DEBIT IMF loan, CREDIT Creditors, there is no actual money changing hands and no one will have to pay anything it is all just an electronic intangible. Britain once and within my life-time found itself in a position where it was forced to borrow money from the IMF, extract taken from  nationalarchives.gov.uk Devaluation of the pound  The left wing of the Labour Party defeated the Public Expenditure White Paper in the Commons in March 1976. Subsequently, Harold Wilson resigned and James Callaghan took over as Prime Minister. Around this time, investors became convinced that ...

Advocate Robin Morris has a reputation in legal circles as, well, not a particularly good lawyer. I have not yet received the transcript of my appearance in the Magistrate's Court, ahead of my appeal to the Royal Court but I have had the opportunity to prepare the case that I will represent. The main issue that Advocate Morris seemed to have had was, 'what was I when I was not a person'. The answer to Advocate Morris' question is found in the  Universal Declaration of Human Rights.  I am not entirely sure that Jersey has signed up to this since it is not a 'country' or a 'nation' in its own right, but our rights as British citizens, are ensured by the British government. Article 1 - Innate Freedom and Equality All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood. Article 6 - The Right to Legal Personality Everyone has the right ...

Boris will be Mayor of London The Telegraph reports "The Conservatives are reeling from a series of political setbacks, many of which have their origins in last month’s controversial Budget, while their coalition partners, the Liberal Democrats, are expected once again to pay a high price for coalition unpopularity.  Labour should be taking full advantage of the Government’s mid-term blues, but despite healthy opinion poll leads, Ken Livingstone looks set to lose to Boris Johnston in London’s mayoral poll - while the party is also under threat from the Scottish nationalists north of the border.  As well as two other mayoral votes (in Liverpool and Salford), 10 cities will be staging referendums on whether to have mayors. Some 5,000 council seats in 180 councils will also be up for grabs on 3 May." Recent elections around the world have shown that there is a deep dissatisfaction with the established parties. In the United States Business Insider Reports ...

Whilst the two 'front-runners' are talking about increasing economic growth, as if that is something that has ever been or will be within the control of Government, some candidates are addressing the key issue affecting the modern world. Namely that by following the rules of subsidiarity and returning power to the lowest competent authority which is the individual wherever possible the greatest gains are to be made and the struggle against those who would seek to consolidate power in the hands of the few. The exit polls: François Hollande 28.4% (PS) Nicolas Sarkozy 25.5% (UMP) Marine le Pen 20% (FN) Jean-Luc Mélenchon 11.7% (Left Front) François Bayrou 8.5% (MoDem) Eva Joly 2% (Green) Nicolas Dupont-Aignan 1.8% (Arise the Republic) Philippe Poutou 1.2% (New Anti-Capitalist) Nathalie Arthaud 0.8% (Workers Struggle) Jacques Cheminade 0.2% (Solidarity and Progress) A second round between the two leading candidates will now proceed on the 6th May. Th...

California is one of more than a dozen US states where marijuana is legal for medical purposes, even though those states' laws are a violation of federal drug policy. Federal authorities have renewed a crackdown on state-sanctioned medical marijuana facilities despite promises by Barack Obama, the president, to keep the issue low on his list of priorities. Local authorities are now also trying to stop people from making money off the medicinal cannabis industry, as it is meant to be a non-profit venture, of course the States still raises tax revenue. This of course follows in the wake of a discussion which took place between all the American nations where the US stood out as the only nation not in favour of some degree of de-criminalisation, but as it is an election year it probably was not the best time for radical and therefore risky new ideas. Al Jazeera's Rob Reynolds reports from Oakland, California in the following video... During the last election I was deli...

The State Bank of Vietnam is instituting a de facto nationalisation of Vietnam’s gold market, in an effort to restore confidence in the country’s currency – the dong. Vietnam is suffering from a growing current account deficit and record-high inflation. The government's new measures will have unpleasant side effects, as more than 2,000 Vietnamese gold traders might have to close their businesses. However, private citizens will retain the right to buy gold. From May 25 the State Bank of Vietnam will in effect be the sole controller of gold trading in the country. Rules passed last year pushed many small gold traders out of business, and these new gold rules means that after the May 25 deadline, only companies with minimum capital of 10 billion Vietnamese dong, yearly tax payments of 500 million Vietnamese dong and with branches in a minimum of three provinces will be allowed to trade gold and import gold bars. Currently, the only company able to comply with these requirements i...

The preparation of sashimi (raw fish) from the blowfish is a historic tradition in the nation of Japan. The trouble is that parts of the blowfish are highly poisonous causing paralysis and death by suffocation. Still it is a popular dish and as recently as 2009 seven people fell victim to the poison in Tokyo following a poorly prepared batch and ended up eating the testicles of one fish. Recently the regulations have changed and chefs will no longer have to complete the full two years training in order to serve this dish to the public. The Japanese have likewise made plans to cover the area irradiated by the Fukushima nuclear plant in tents and will start burning radioactive debris. Of course you cannot destroy radioactive debris in this way, but it will spread it around the globe having released the settled debris from the ground back into the air. The tents will have the effect also of funnelling the radioactivity straight into the air. But radiation is no...

A geothermal plant in Iceland  Energy security has become a big issue with first Germany signing Greece up to become its solar power farm and now British authorities say they are in talks that could see electricity generated in Iceland from the country's volcanoes and geysers powering British homes. U.K. Energy Minister Charles Hendry will visit Iceland in May to negotiate an agreement to lay hundreds of miles of cables underwater to satisfy Britain's energy needs, Sky News Online reported Friday. The cables, known as interconnectors, would carry energy harvested from Iceland's geothermal sources and could provide a third of Britain's average electricity demand, Hendry said. "We are looking to a low carbon economy. I think the best way is to get a number of different inter-connectors first," he said. To reach Iceland the copper cables would need to be around 930 miles long, the longest such cables in the world. Iceland is keen to export energy after ...

GOP nomination battle renewed in the wake of Santorum's exit  Rick Santorum has “suspended” his campaign. All the pundits tell us that the real race for the White House can begin. But I wonder if that’s true. Maybe there is more Republican Party insider fighting coming alongside the general. I say this because, in watching Santorum and other conservative and religious Republican leaders talk about what Santorum’s suspension means, I am not hearing unconditional support for Mitt Romney. The evangelical community began reaching out to Paul almost immediately after Rick Santorum dropped out of the presidential race. The Republican Party has had a gruelling primary season, highly fragmented. Among the tribes in the party, we have the establishment Republicans who coalesced around Mitt Romney as the most likely candidate to give President Barack Obama a good run for his money in November, though the latest polls show Paul as the winner in a head to h...

I like Russia Today, but I also like Al Jazeera. They have produced a forty seven minute debate on whether the Drug War should be called to an end in advance of the meeting of the presidents of the American continent. The President of Guatemala has bought forward a proposition for all Presidents to get together to stop spending $100 billion on fighting the drug war and make educated decisions on how the trade can be regulated. At least 80 MPs in the UK support discussions of this nature, but the US does not agree with regulation although it has agreed to come to the table. Of course he suggests another solution - compensation for the drug crops and has faced criticism that perhaps this is just a means of getting arms and aid from the United States. The discussions were one of the key issues at the recent summit of the Americas. 'Central Americans are paying with blood for a war they did not choose'. But Obama in an election year as expected did not move ...

The Ten Candidates for President of France  On April 21 2012 the French nation will go to the polls to elect their next president and the BBC suggests that for the first time in history Sarkozy may not serve a second term. Fortunately being able to read French I am not dependent on the BBC for my understanding of the race as we have a very much sanitised version of the debate that is taking place presented to us. Just as the BBC have yet to cover Ron Paul, the most influential candidate of all, in their coverage of the US elections the BBC have chosen to concentrate on the main parties. Now I understand that the euphemistically termed 'other-hopefuls' are unlikely to win, they do not have the party machinery behind them to achieve such a success and the media of course is pushing the propoganda that it will be either of the two parties in a self-fulfilling prophecy that we in Jersey are all too aware of. But equally the official candidates of the two main parti...

What an incredibly complex confusing and treacherous month. It can be safely said that 80% of the activity is almost totally kept from the public. The financial system is breaking in an accelerated fashion. Compare to some grisly horror movie where a man is strapped in a chair. The more he moves, the tighter the bindings pull on his gasping throat and pressed nether stones. The most significant two factors at work are the Iran sanctions and their powerful backfire, and the futile efforts in Europe to stem the banking center collapse. The anti-USDollar federation that spans widely across the globe is gathering strong momentum. Financial aggression is being met by financial alternative development. As Greece moved off the daily news fabrication factory, the reality of a collapse in Spain and Italy has moved to the front center of observations.  Meanwhile, the American nitwits continue to argue over Quantitative Easing when it never stopped, and in fact, went global under t...

Many thanks to Tom Joad for his comments, I have decided to respond by way of a full post to explain why Corporations are not necessary and perhaps are not even useful in the new world that many social entrepreneurs are trying to build from the ashes of the old which has died, but just has not accepted it yet. Designed by many, available to all At a competitive price of $25,00 or less if you can find someone else to make it from a freely available blueprint There is absolutely no need for limited liability to exist, if you aren't prepared to take the risk, don't take it. Many of our problems now are specifically caused by people who could take risks with no consequences, that includes bankers, but also includes government employees (or did until the commercial lien came into play). In fact it includes anyone who hides behind Limited (or Vicarious) Liability, either as a director (or an employee). Libertarianism simply removes all that rubbish and leaves you persona...

This is awesome. It shows when the people DO STAND UP they have more power and win against the corrupt bankers and politicians of a country. Iceland is forgiving and erasing some of the mortgage debt of the population. They are putting the bankers and politicians on the "Bench of the Accused." Which means I assume they are putting them on trial for corruption. Now the rest of people of the world need to start doing the same thing. We all need to stand up and against all the corruption and fraud of the banks and politicians that are puppets of the banks and corporations. This move differs greatly from the approach taken by other European nations which is to tax the people and cut public services to ensure that interest payments continue to be made.

A US soldier defends an Opium field Today Sir Pip finally made a statement I could agree with, Jersey needs to be more independent. I read on however and I found that we differ in both the definition of Jersey and the definition of independent. What Sir Pip was referring to as Jersey was not the people of Jersey nor the island of Jersey but the Government of Jersey. Whilst I believe that the people of Jersey need to be more independent of the Government of Jersey, he believes that the Government of Jersey needs to be more independent of international control (or as I prefer to call it 'sanity'). In his mind he appears to truly believe that the Government of Jersey is 'good' and that it serves the people of Jersey to the best of its ability. THIS IS A DELUSION ON THE PART OF SIR PIP I serve myself better than anyone, I know the right decisions to make for me, I do not know what is best for you. What might be best for me at a given place in a given ti...