Posted on 03/23/2009 5:12:20 AM PDT by GoldStandard
Pension trustees and insurance company portfolio managers look away now. Your increased commitment to government bond holdings in recent times is about to blow up spectacularly.
At least, that is the view of Ron Paul, the US congressman who ran against John McCain in last year’s Republican Party presidential nomination.
His is a minority view. Yields on government bonds worldwide have been falling fast over the past few months and in the UK, the commencement of “quantitative easing” this month sent bond prices soaring.
But the credibility of both western governments and their currencies is waning, and has been ever since the gold standard was abandoned in 1971, says Mr Paul. And that means even “safe” investments are far from safe, he claims.
“People will start to abandon the dollar as current and past economic policies create a steep rise in interest rates,” Mr Paul says.
(Excerpt) Read more at ft.com ...
Ron Paul believe in small Government except for giving money to the Shrimp Industry..
Can you post the rest please.
Yes, and the pollyannas who hold the majority view are the same fools and touts who "didn't see this crisis coming" and who said there was no real estate bubble, financial geniuses were running the hedge funds, these new instruments actually lessened systemic risk etc etc etc.
So who should we believe now? The Ron Pauls, or the totally, consistently wrong fools and touts?
BTW, on your home page, is that a MAC10 in the photo on the left?
Yep, in 9mm, with a Sionics suppressor. Courtesy of the USN.
If only the rest of the Republicans with earmarks didn’t vote for the spending bills, too.
Anyone who didn’t see this coming doesn’t know how to do linear regressions.
Here’s a graph I made from data on the Federal Reserve Flow of Funds Report released in 4Q2008.
It shows the economy heading toward the cliff as early as late 2005. There was more going on than issues with the housing market. What that is exactly isn’t entirely clear to me as I haven’t found any data that looks glaringly like a smoking gun, but perhaps some day I will.
William Strauss and Neil Howe’s book, The 4th Turning released in the 90’s, predicted a several major crisis beginning in the middle of this decade and lasting 20 years.
The based their prediction on the cycle of American generations and how similar events often repeat themselves.
It is a great read.
Ron Paul is optimistic. Until this notion that carbon dioxide is somehow bad, and this notion of global warming is entirely the fault of mankind, there will not be much movement toward ending the recession.
Wealth is the result of converting stored energy into useful products, using whatever materials at hand. For centuries it was the burning of wood, then coal, that fueled the growth and expansion of the industrial base that forms the means by which greater and greater numbers of mankind may be sustained on earth. In the mid-19th century, the discovery and refining of petroleum as a power source fueled the greatest surge in wealth and civilization the world has ever seen, greatly exceeding even the wealthiest of kings in all previous historical times.
The divine right of some of humanity to be set as the rulers of other humanity was simultaneously set aside, as the hereditary office of king was abolished, to be replaced by individuals who had shown the capability to lead. But to lead, the new head of state had to in some way be responsive to the demands and needs of those over whom he had been set to guide and inspire. This was the incentive and reward for personal effort, a concept that cannot be overlooked in the continuous struggle for survival against the array of odds stacked against every organism on the planet.
Only when the right to fail, and the concomitant right to the fruits of one’s efforts, are both offered to every individual and corporation out there, is there room for advancement of humanity (as opposed to “progresivism”, as practiced by the now failing nascent obama regime).
It is not “progress” to reward failure.
Congressman Paul may be an optimist.
The last Great Depression worsened because of the “New Deal” policies of Franklin Roosevelt that Obama wants to emulate. It only ended because the industrial base of our trading partners was bombed flat, either by our enemies or by us. For the next 25 years or so American industry reigned supreme - because there was no competition. Then the competition recovered and we permitted ourselves to become dependent on foreign oil. It’s been down hill ever since for American economic dominance.
So assuming we don’t bomb the competition flat again, how does Congressman Paul think things will be turned around in just 15 years?
Unless of course Mr. Paul thinks that Obama’s plans will lead to a global war that will destroy our trading partners and somehow leave us standing. American leftists are driven by their feelings and are not good at anticipating the unintended consequences of their moronic schemes. So... maybe this is the path we are on.
these new instruments actually lessened systemic risk etc etc etc........
That was Greenspan’s mantra. That old bag loved derivatives. Actually he was clueless about them and praised them to look hip and happening.In sync with young Wall Street wizards
And good luck on the books....unfortunetly for the country, in these times the ways and means to keep Free is a growth industry.
Check your PM, you MUST read the long article from Rolling Stone linked by 321gold today!!!!!!!!
I’m doing what I can....
Read, “The Big Takeover” at Rolling Stone online, MUST READ!!!!!!! Best financial crisis article yet!!!!!!
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/26793903/the_big_takeover/
Thanks...I will look at it!!
Just posted it...looks good but have only skimmed it so far
Excerpt-—>>
Another member of Congress, who asked not to be named, offers his own theory about the TARP process. “I think basically if you knew Hank Paulson, you got the money,” he says.-——
Policies that include your ~$400M of earmarks in the recent spending bill? Ron Paul, YOU ARE A PHONY!!
Recessions have always rather rudely exposed entities that have put themselves in untenable situations, either through fraud, stupidity, or whatever kind of motiviation.
The thing I don’t like about this article is that it assumes that the question regarding the chicken and the egg aspect of this situaion has already been decided, but doesn’t provide any foundation for that assumption. There’s no pun intended here, but it sounds more like a chicken little kind of article, putting forth a decided outcome and supporting it with irrelevent facts. It’s designed to appeal to emotion, and I really don’t think this is what anyone needs right now.
AIG did not cause the recession, neither did any of the other financial institutions. The ones that had untenable situations were exposed and their houses of cards fell over with some domino effect, and they did runs on each other for their on demand deposits. It’s one of the weaknesses of the fractional banking system we have and it was exacerbated by the compleity of the instruments they were using to generate cash flow that all of a sudden had no value.
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