Responding to Gary North
Far from dispelling anything claimed in our article, Gary North as a first hand witness corroborates major elite funding of Libertarianism.
Gary North responded to ‘Proof Libertarianism is an Illuminati ploy‘
Gary North’s main function in the Libertarian movement is to maintain internal party discipline. By lashing out at people opposing Austrian Economics’s many glaring failings, the more feeble minded multitude within Libertarianism are discouraged from asking too many difficult questions. After all, who wants to be called a crackpot by Gary North, right?
That’s why he opens his ‘rebuttal’ by trying to insult both me and Ellen Brown with “Let me say, before I begin, that the author of this article is the only person I have come across who could profitably study with Ellen Brown.”
He can rest assured. I have studied Brown and benefited immensely from it, like millions more. I always read her latest articles, providing insight into the dynamics of the banking industry and their minions. Here is her latest excellent piece of work, exploring some of the dynamics behind the Euro Crisis.
North at alia need this kind of juvenile stuff, because you can imagine the discomfort when people start messing up the jolly good time we’re all having together with questions like ‘are you sure Gold is not completely controlled?’, or ‘how about interest on the money supply, shouldn’t we be getting rid of that?’, or ‘why are we calling for deflation, hurting debtors, while everybody is drowning in debt and while we claim this is the problem?’.
Peter Schiff is another one of their gatekeepers. Just look at this video:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJj6og-IJQI]
Does this remind you of anything? For instance how the MSM handle opposition? What has this got to do with dialogue and a fair exchange of ideas aimed at mutual growth?
This is just a hitpiece, trying to murder Brown by not letting her talk. Evading the issues, impolitely interrupting, scoring points instead of trying to understand what she’s actually saying.
Intellectual dishonesty is one of the hallmarks of the leaders of Libertarianism. How can it be otherwise? They have to claim Bankers hate Gold, otherwise nobody would buy their specie. They have to downplay the importance of interest on the money supply, otherwise nobody would be listening to them. They have to circumvent the deflation issue, because it makes them look so bad in the eyes of everybody who knows what they’re talking about. They have to blame the State and ignore the Money Power, otherwise they lose their sponsors.
So it is in this context that we should consider Gary North’s uncivilized and dishonest way of debating.
These issues show in his response to ‘Proof Libertarianism is an Illuminati Ploy‘ too.
North’s ‘detailed research’
Gary North is well known not only for his foul mouth, but also for his ‘detailed’ work. He has no problem writing 30 books about one.
I’m not going to go into all of that, because all this ‘meticulousness’ aims only to distract from the bottom line, which we will get to shortly.
But just for the fun of it, however, let me ask you this: spend 30 seconds on Google and try to find Otto Kahn’s quote that I provided in the article.
Here it is again: “You say that Marxism is the very antithesis of capitalism, which is equally sacred to us [The Money Power] It is precisely for this reason that they are direct opposites to one another, that they put into our hands the two poles of this planet and allow us to be its axis. These two contraries, like Bolshevism and ourselves, find their identity in the International.”
Otto Kahn, Investment Banker
Please tell me: did you succeed? Did you find the source? So how come Gary North and his meticulous research comes up with the conclusion ‘there is no source’?
Also funny to see North quote Volker’s biography. Yes, a really good Christian family, not? Well, perhaps this is the level of thinking in the circles that Gary North hangs out with, but where I come from we have a little problem with this fairy tale: The Money Power does not care about religion and Marrano Jews have been among those messing up our affairs for quite some time.
The Dialectic
More worrying is North’s apparently rather shaky conceptual grasp of the dialectic. In his response he makes a number of remarks indicating he does not really get the point.
First he comes up with this: “Anyway, the author believes in Marx’s dialectic. This indicates a certain lack of perception on his part. The Marxian dialectic had some tough times back in 1991. You may have read about this. The Communist Party did the unforgivable. It committed suicide.”
Ahum? North is telling us Marxism is dead? Is he serious?
But then he comes up with this: “Austrian theory has about at much impact on mainstream economists as it had on Alan Greenspan, the bubble master.”
Well, as readers of this site know all too well: Alan Greenspan is actually a leading Austrian Economist. In his famous essay ‘Gold and Economic Freedom‘, published in Ayn Rand’s ‘Objectivist’ newsletter, Greenspan opened with:
“An almost hysterical antagonism toward the gold standard is one issue which unites statists of all persuasions. They seem to sense — perhaps more clearly and subtly than many consistent defenders of laissez-faire — that gold and economic freedom are inseparable, that the gold standard is an instrument of laissez-faire and that each implies and requires the other.”
And don’t think for a minute this was just youthful vice. Here’s the grand old man in 2007, explaining we need a Gold Standard:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=z5MVsm2cpc0]
So how can this be? Well, let’s ask Otto Kahn: “You say that Marxism is the very antithesis of capitalism, which is equally sacred to us [The Money Power] It is precisely for this reason that they are direct opposites to one another, that they put into our hands the two poles of this planet and allow us to be its axis”
Yes, Mr. North. Both opposites are owned by the same people. Your side is owned by the same people.
But these things are not important. What matters is this:
1. “Migchels: The Volker Fund would finance all the leading Austrian Economists and would have a substantial impact on the ‘Chicago School of Economics’, including Milton Friedman.
North: This is true. I even had a summer job there in 1963. It was the best salaried job I ever had. They paid me to read.”
2. “Migchels: Many readers may be surprised to learn the extent to which the Graduate Institute and then Mises himself in the years immediately after he came to United States were kept afloat financially through generous grants from the Rockefeller Foundation. In fact, for the first years of Mises’s life in the United States, before his appointment as a visiting professor in the Graduate School of Business Administration at New York University (NYU) in 1945, he was almost totally dependent on annual research grants from the Rockefeller Foundation.”
North: This is true.”
3. North: “Mises was without a job from 1940 to 1946. New York University never paid him a dime. Rothbard worked for very little salary for most of his academic career at a school that did not have an economics department, Brooklyn Polytechnic. Highly connected?”
The point was made in the article, that Mises didn’t need a job, because he was maintained by the Rockefeller Foundation and Volker Fund. North in his response acknowledges both points.
He tries to downplay it by stating “The Volker Fund under Luhnow paid a tiny staff middle-class wages. It did help fund Hayek and Mises, because the University of Chicago and NYU did not pay the two any money.”
We understand, of course, that the Volker Fund was not a UN type of bureaucracy. But we’re talking about a propaganda outlet here, disseminating ideas. One does not need a massive staff to equip libraries with books and manipulate the debate by having people like North and Rothbard read stuff, to use their conclusions to decide which ideas will be funded and promoted further.
Conclusion
North did nothing to dispel the notion of elite financing of Austrianism.
It’s just the usual dig at stupid Greenbackers, this author being so stupid he could actually learn from Ellen Brown. It’s just the usual downplaying of the facts.
The Volker Fund got a wonderful return on their 1963 investment paying North 500 bucks per month to read their drivel.
He has been promoting the same boring crap ever since.
In the mean time, I’m still awaiting a meticulously researched and detailed response to What Gary North is not telling you about Interest.
Related:
In Defense of Ellen Brown
Top Ten Lies and Mistakes of Austrian Economics
How the Money Power created Libertarianism and Austrian Economics
The Catholic Arm of Libertarianism
Well done Anthony.
Anthony Migchels wrote:
“But just for the fun of it, however, let me ask you this: spend 30 seconds on Google and try to find Otto Kahn’s quote that I provided in the article.
Here it is again: “You say that Marxism is the very antithesis of capitalism, which is equally sacred to us [The Money Power] It is precisely for this reason that they are direct opposites to one another, that they put into our hands the two poles of this planet and allow us to be its axis. These two contraries, like Bolshevism and ourselves, find their identity in the International.”
Otto Kahn, Investment Banker
Please tell me: did you succeed? Did you find the source? So how come Gary North and his meticulous research comes up with the conclusion ‘there is no source’?”
So, where is your proof that Otto Kahn said that? It seems pretty clear, even after only 30 seconds of research, that there is NO proof he said that:
“In the book Geneva versus Peace (Sheed & Ward, New York, 1937), Comte de Saint-Aulaire, French Ambassador to Great Britain in the 1920s, discussed his meetings with Kuhn, Loeb, & Co. financiers. They had discussions regarding why they [the Kuhn, Loeb, & Co. bankers] financed the Bolshevik Revolution. One of them said (p. 80): “You say that Marxism is the very antithesis of capitalism, which is equally sacred to us. It is precisely for this reason that they are direct opposites to one another, that they put into our hands the two poles of this planet and allow us to be its axis. These two contraries, like Bolshevism and ourselves, find their identity in the International. These opposites, which are at the antipodes to one another in society and in their doctrines meet again in the identity of their purpose and end, the remaking of the world from above by the control of riches, and from below by revolution.”; and: “Our mission consists in promulgating the new law and in creating a God, that is to say in purifying the idea of God and realizing it, when the time shall come. We shall purify the idea by identifying it with the nation of Israel, which has become its own Messiah. the advent of it will be facilitated by the final triumph of Israel, which has become it’s [sic?] own Messiah.” This same financier also said (pp. 83-84): “… our essential dynamism makes use of the forces of destruction and forces of creation, but uses the first to nourish the second. … Our organization for revolution is evidenced by destructive Bolshevism and for construction by by the League of Nations which is also our work. Bolshevism is the accelerator and the League is the brake on the mechanism of which we supply both the motive force and the guiding power. What is the end? It is already determined by our mission. It is formed of elements scattered throughout the whole world, but cast in the flame of our faith in ourselves. We are a League of Nations which contains the elements of all others. …Israel is the microcosm and the germ of the City of the future.” Cf. Landovskiĭ, Iosif Maksimovich, and George Knupffer, Op. Cit.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Reed#References
Now, where’s the reference to Otto Kahn? Where’s your proof?
So Gary North was right, no? Why am I not surprised?
Sadly, this is the MO of your entire article. Unverified quotes, suppositions, lies and an overall lack of economic literacy or even comprehension of human action.
How come you need to misquote, distort and lie in almost every paragraph while at the same time claiming to be right and truthful?
Tell me, when “Austrianism” was financed by Money Power to advance elitist goals, how come Austrian Economics was ignored and ridiculed for decades, not taught in universities, not spoken about in the media? How come Austrian Economics is considered irrelevant in academia and mainstream media to this day?
How come Greenbackers and socialists now teaming up with Keynesians and mainstream media and other elitist mouthpieces regarding Austrian Economics?
Sure, Greenspan sweet-talked gold and applauded Austrian Economics at times, because he KNEW Austrians have it right. He may even earned loads of cash by applying Austrian analysis – for him and his cronies. But what did he DO when he was in charge of the FED? Multiplying the money supply at almost zero interest, thereby inflating two mayor bubbles, devaluing the Dollar further and dispossessing workers on fixed income, savers and bondholders in the process. He destroyed the lives of millions by his ACTIONS. How come you think that’s proof of genuine elitist support of Austrian Economics – not to speak of “creating” it in the first place?
How come Ellen Brown endorses Bernankes QE?
How come you endorse, regularly, the very perpetrators of our mess by proposing even more statist “solutions”, read: control, over entire continents for the elite via the state?
How come you think you will solve severe problems with even more application of the methods that caused the problems in the first place?
What are your goals anyway?
1. Well, you found the quote. You found out it was said by Kuhn Loeb bankers, of which one was Kahn. This is wikipedia’s quote: ‘One of them said’.
Henry Makow specified in his article:
http://www.henrymakow.com/geneva_versus_peace.html
2. Sadly, this is the MO of your entire article. Unverified quotes, suppositions, lies and an overall lack of economic literacy or even comprehension of human action.
How come you need to misquote, distort and lie in almost every paragraph while at the same time claiming to be right and truthful?””
Could you please name one ore more examples of this accusation?
3. “Tell me, when “Austrianism” was financed by Money Power to advance elitist goals, how come Austrian Economics was ignored and ridiculed for decades, not taught in universities, not spoken about in the media? How come Austrian Economics is considered irrelevant in academia and mainstream media to this day?”
Well, of course they were not plugged as much as Keynes and his friends. But I think it is quite clear that Austrianism has always been a notable fringe, even in the academic world.
Eight noble prizes, remember?
And think about this: There is no problem for people holding professional positions and calling for a Gold Standard.
Now consider this: what would a leading academic or journalist or politician expect to see happen to his carreer if he starts plugging interest free currency?
4.”Sure, Greenspan sweet-talked gold and applauded Austrian Economics at times, because he KNEW Austrians have it right. He may even earned loads of cash by applying Austrian analysis – for him and his cronies. But what did he DO when he was in charge of the FED? Multiplying the money supply at almost zero interest, thereby inflating two mayor bubbles, devaluing the Dollar further and dispossessing workers on fixed income, savers and bondholders in the process. He destroyed the lives of millions by his ACTIONS. How come you think that’s proof of genuine elitist support of Austrian Economics – not to speak of “creating” it in the first place?”
Like North, you are missing the basic idea of the dialectic as put forward by Kahn.
Scott Fitzgerald: “The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind
at the same time and still retain the ability to function.”
5. “How come Ellen Brown endorses Bernankes QE?”
Does she? I don’t. I don’t speak for Brown and she does not speak for me.
We don’t agree on everything.
6. “How come you endorse, regularly, the very perpetrators of our mess by proposing even more statist “solutions”, read: control, over entire continents for the elite via the state?”
Do I? Or is this one those favored Austrian clinchers to put down people calling for monetary reform at Govt level?
7. “How come you think you will solve severe problems with even more application of the methods that caused the problems in the first place?”
Do I? I’m missing out on that.
8. “What are your goals anyway?”
To destroy the Money Power’s strangle hold over us all by her control of the Money Supply.
http://realcurrencies.wordpress.com/2012/01/17/budget-of-an-interest-slave-2/
You ask “how come Austrian Economics was ignored and ridiculed for decades, not taught in universities, not spoken about in the media?”
Imperial economics to an extent “rides the herd”, so you’ll get a certain flavor of demagogy that makes sense to the time period. Marxism was introduced to derail the socialist/nationalist fervor of the late 1800s. “Austrianism” was initially an imperialist reaction to the totalitarian character of Nazism – it made no sense in 1930s America, where most people were totally supportive of the New Deal, and the few that weren’t wanted nazism!
The Rockefellers and DuPonts funded all this crap because they wanted to destroy the New Deal, which regulated their banks, and sent surplus income to farms and factories. Did you know Reader’s Digest, then the US’ most read publication, published an abridged version of Hayek’s “The Road to Serfdom” in 1945 – the height of the New Deal?
Find me anyone, other than the elite, who wanted free trade just before or during WW2. It was a totally ridiculous idea then (as now), in nations like the US and Germany where protectionism and public works turned desperate depressions into economic miracles.
Austrianism started gaining steam in the 50s almost in an inversion of how and why Marxism took hold in the wake of Lincoln and Bismarck. When “anti-communism” took hold, and the US economy was in good health due to FDR’s reforms, people were more susceptible to paranoia about tyranny than their earlier fears of starving to death.
On the other end of the dialectic, Keynesianism was promoted as a step away from the New Deal’s focus on protectionism and production, and toward free trade and use of monetary policy. There are parts of Keynes that make sense, parts of Marx, parts of von Mises. The point is, they all make a lot LESS sense than the programs put in place by FDR, Lincoln and others. They push the focus away from production and protectionism, and toward Wall Street-dominated finance capitalism.
The quote has been removed from wikipedia on that same day. Interesting.
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Douglas_Reed&diff=next&oldid=478307292
That’s incredible.
Thanks for finding out and reporting.
8. “What are your goals anyway?”
To destroy the Money Power’s strangle hold over us all by her control of the Money Supply.
And give that power to whom?
Please read the Goal of Monetary Reform for my position on that important question:
http://realcurrencies.wordpress.com/2012/01/04/the-goal-of-monetary-reform/
“And give that power to whom?”
At present, given my understanding (however I’m willing to learn other choices), there are two choices:
The Money Power or Government.
I understand my fellow Americans and I will have very limited ability to control or influence the Money Power. Contrasted to having some influence and control over government. At least that’s the theory in a democratic republic under a constitutional framework. Yes, I know it’s not so neat and clean in practice, as it is in theory, and government can be subverted by special interests (like the Money Power), but with government, at least, the People can explicitly assert control, by the Rule of Law, however imperfect, while there is no provision, whatsoever for the People to have any control or influence with the Money Power. And, the creation of money or credit and the regulation, thereof, are explicitly granted to Congress, the People’s representatives, in the U. S. Constitution.
As Lincoln stated so eloquently, the supreme creative power, is the power to create money and credit, and power over the money supply and credit is the supreme power to preserve a nation’s independence & sovereignty.
I don’t subscribe to the idea that a private Money Power should have that supreme power over a Nation’s independence & sovereignty by delegating this power into private hands.
And, if your answer to that is “no one will have that power because it will be the impersonal ‘market'”, I point to history, where history has shown the Money Power, it always seems, in the end gets the power to create money “out of thin air”.
As Churchill said, democracy is the worst form of government except for everything else!
“Democracy is indispensable to Socialism.” – V. I. Lenin
“Socialism leads to Communism.” – Karl Marx
“Those who vote decide nothing. Those who count the votes decide everything”
Josef Stalin.
Democracy (Demon-ocracy) is a hoax and has never existed.
Here are Ron Paul’s top contributors from opensecrets.org. The most famous champion of Austrian Economics. Hardly a sign of money power backing.
US Army $81,423
US Air Force $60,739
US Navy $58,267
Google Inc $34,191
Microsoft Corp $24,698
US Dept of Defense $22,821
IBM Corp $21,898
Boeing Co $20,986
Liberty PAC (Ron Paul) $20,000
Corriente Advisors $20,000
Northrop Grumman $17,804
US Marine Corps $16,490
US Government $16,128
Intel Corp $16,091
Lockheed Martin $15,766
Mason Capital Management $14,000
Verizon Communications $13,636
US Coast Guard $12,868
Cisco Systems $12,762
Chevron Corp $12,701
Here is Mitt Romney’s top contributors. Maybe the money power got confused on who the austrian was?
Goldman Sachs $521,180
JPMorgan Chase & Co $356,400
Morgan Stanley $297,550
Credit Suisse Group $296,160
Citigroup Inc $280,050
Bank of America $245,900
Kirkland & Ellis $225,202
Barclays $217,150
HIG Capital $188,500
PricewaterhouseCoopers $185,550
Blackstone Group $178,050
Bain Capital $151,500
Wells Fargo $148,950
UBS AG $140,650
EMC Corp $128,300
Citadel Investment Group $123,625
Elliott Management $123,500
Bain & Co $112,800
Sullivan & Cromwell $106,650
The Villages $97,500
This list has not been updated with Thiel’s 900k yet.
Keep in mind that most of the money comes from people reading the Alternative Media.
The ALternative Media is dominated by Libertarian Outlets (in)directly related to Volker Fund Think Tanks.
“The shepherd drives the wolf from the sheep’s throat, for which the sheep thanks the shepherd as his liberator, while the wolf denounces him for the same act as the destroyer of liberty. Plainly, the sheep and the wolf are not agreed upon a definition of liberty.” — Abraham Lincoln
Hat tip to deadeyeblog for the quote.
Libertarians seemingly don’t recognize this reality of human nature mostly because it is a utopian ideology. There are basic conflicts between private individuals where government will have to take sides to preserve Justice (Natural Law).
Libertarianism can be viewed as Illuminati in that it provides an ideological framework and moral justification for allowing the Law of the Jungle to arbitrate between private parties, and the Law of the Jungle is where the “state withers away” as expressed as the final goal of Libertarianism.
One can easily see why the Illuminati would be very happy with Libertarianism’s endorsement of the Law of the Jungle.
As for the documentation that Libertarianism is an Illuminati ploy, there is some evidence, perhaps not ‘proof beyond a reasonable doubt’, however, the evidence that does exist shows that powerful people, who have previously been identified as Illuminati, did support Libertarianism in its formative stages (when the growth, development, and penetration into the marketplace of ideas for a particular ideology needs the most support).
Obviously, in terms of the ‘truth movement’ and its support of Libertarianism, the consciousness that Libertarianism, taken to it ideological extreme, is a tool and justification of the Money Power, international bankers, and other Illuminati, it would cause cognitive dissonance for low-level libertarians (not so much for those at the top). But if you implicitly support a Law of the Jungle ideology, know that the strongest, the most ruthless, those willing to cheat and steal, are secretly supporting that same ideology — and who would that be?
Why the Illuminati, that’s who.
This basically says it all Jimbo, great stuff!
Liberty is a benefit privilege granted to slaves as in seamen when the leave ship whilst still in the employ of the ship’s master. Liberty is not freedom.
Brown and the interviewer are so far “in the box” some one should fetch some sticky tape and finish the job off. The FED and The Bank of England should be closed down – period.
Meanwhile, the value of gold and silver keep up pace with the money printing in this world. Paper money gets debased every day. Plain facts.
Gold and silver are roughly where they were in 1980 (silver hit ~$50, gold ~$850), when the cost of housing and most commodities was less than half of what it is now. Meaning we’ve had a decrease in the value of gold and silver relative to the money supply, also known as DEFLATION.
No, Gold is appreciating much faster than inflation.
The appreciation is not due to inflation fears, it is because a lot of the powerful (and smart) money is betting Gold will be currency again.
When it will, it will go to the 20k/40k territory.
In the short term, certainly – but neither gold nor silver are yet approaching the 1980 historical high, in terms of real dollars. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Silver_price_in_USD.png and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Gold_price_in_USD.png
There are prices available from ~1850, but I can’t find any showing real dollars, pounds, etc.
I’m not an investor (other than the ~$10 in interest I earn every year from my savings account), and am not informed enough to argue about what’s really going on in terms of short-term speculation vs. long-term bets, or will happen to gold prices in the event of a gold standard – plus who knows how much gold there really is, what percentage of the currency it will back, etc?
What I’ve read of European economic history would suggest that a gold standard doesn’t increase the real value of gold so much as debase the value of the currency – meaning 1 oz. of gold will buy you the same number of potatoes as before, but now you need more bank notes, which if you’re lucky will be issued to you in a wheelbarrow.
In any event, I would contest the Austrian claim that; 1) we are experiencing inflation of anything but speculation (wages and production costs have been deflating for 60 years), and 2) that a gold standard is the cure for inflation. A gold standard would cause a shocking hyperinflation of the cost of living, and would wipe out savings. Then when everyone is living in sod houses, we’d get a nice “non-inflationary” feudal system.
If you’re right, gold bugs will be sitting pretty on top of a trash heap of their own making. If you’re not, they’ll all lose their arses when the bubble pops.
Plain facts are that pretty much ALL commodities have a higher price than they did before, because that’s exactly what inflation does.
Even in a gold standard, most money is not gold. In fact, most gold would form the “monetary base” and is not part of the money supply.
Most money is, and always has been, credit which is created by banks every time they make a loan.
http://www.ces.org.za/docs/what%20is%20money.htm
Time and again “Austrians” prove that they do not understand the nature of money and banking, and that Libertarianism is mostly a cult mindset unsupported by any fact.
Reblogged this on Recovering Austrians.