I love Taibbi’s coverage of the financial industry, but I’m always disappointed with his continued faith in greater government intervention to resolve the problems. Taibbi doesn’t get into his prescriptions here, so it’s a great interview that shows just how untouchable and corrupt the banks are.
Watch money. Money is the barometer of society’s virtue. When you see that trading is done, not by consent, but by compulsion - when you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing - when you see that money is flowing to those who deal, not in goods, but in favors - when you see that men get richer by graft and by pull than by work, and your laws don’t protect you against them, but protect them against you - when you see corruption being rewarded and honesty becoming a self-sacrifice - you may know that your society is doomed. Money is so noble a medium that it does not compete with guns and it does not make terms with brutality. It will not permit a country to survive as half-property, half-loot.
When a government is dependent upon bankers for money, they and not the leaders of the government control the situation, since the hand that gives is above the hand that takes. Money has no motherland; financiers are without patriotism and without decency; their sole object is gain.
“I was in court yesterday, in criminal court in Brooklyn. I saw somebody come out of—come into court who had just been overnight in jail for walking from one subway car to another in front of a policeman. You can do real time in jail in America for all kinds of ridiculous offenses, for taking up two subway seats in New York City, if you fall asleep in the subway. People go to jail for that all the time in this country, for having a marijuana stem in your pocket. There are 50,000 marijuana possession cases in New York City alone every year. And here we have a bank that laundered $800 million of drug money, and they can’t find a way to put anybody in jail for that. That sends an incredible message not just to the financial sector but to everybody. It’s an obvious, clear double standard, where one set of people gets to break the rules as much as they want and another set of people can’t break any rules at all without going to jail. And I just don’t see how they don’t see this problem.”
A 60 minute BBC biography of Hayek, his battle with Keynes, and his lessons for the present economic crisis. While incomplete, it is as fair as can be expected by such a mainstream source. Definitely worth watching.
I wanted to share some resources by economist and historian Thomas DiLorenzo. In the following two videos DiLorenzo focuses on the historical origins and purpose of central banking in the United States.
In this lecture DiLorenzo focuses primarily on the quarrel between Hamilton and Jefferson and the financial and political interests behind the first national banks.
In this lecture DiLorenzo focuses on the relationship between war and central banking.
The following is a copy of DiLorenzo’s short testimony before the U.S. House Subcommittee on Monetary Policy and Technology in which he describes how the Fed contributes to unemployment.
I’m not expecting that an Austrian perspective will be included in this film, but based upon the number of experts contributing to it, it should be worth watching.
