To Tom Feb 2015
Thanks for your gracious thought-out recommendations for the way I should appeal or argue. They are in the direction I aspire to, and I think I have followed in part.
Notice I have asked questions profusely in the past, in hopes of flushing out your thinking more exactly about the common meanings we can count on for things like substance, measure, value, and "thing". How often do you ask me questions about how I see the fine points of what you are explaining. Don't expect you to go back and look now, I will try more of the same in your following treatise. You could glance back at this and see how many questions I used, for example.
http://www.keepandshare.com/discuss/27246/what-makes-punishment-for-a-crime-right?srch=y.%28%20==%20%27y%27%20&&%20%20?%20%27&dn=y%27%20:%20%27%27%29
(your closing remarks first)
If the above argument/understanding is correct, and you are resisting adopting it, or resist reversing your position out of fear of being seen as being wrong/inconsistent, that is pride.
If you do understand and agree with the above, or you don’t understand but are sincerely interested in how you might understand, that is humble.
It is entirely possible that you are seeing something no one else sees. You have thought about the nature of matter, for instance, more than anyone I have ever talked to (except Dr. Shaw, from my old church, he has built machines that measure billionths of a second, and is very widely read in Physics and Electronics – but not such an original thinker as you and Doug, I don't think). I have never heard anyone else explain and recommend the scenario you construct. You are the minority view. You are the sole explainer of the model you like. I have never read anything like it anywhere else. You will demonstrate your true grasp of the subject by being able to clearly explain things with tight, consistent definitions, as well as demonstrate that you understand the opposite view, and know how to use questions to help your opponent see for himself where the inconsistencies/contradictions lie. I'm ready.
I encourage humility. I encourage that you truly try to understand this line of reasoning.
I do my best to think out the construct and try to see how it answers the necessary questions, how it relates to as many factors I can think of, and how it compares with the opposite.
I believe both you and I are in a rarefied atmosphere of intellectual/economic discussion, and I do not believe most people would be able to follow, or be interested in such flows of logic.
It does get pretty deep sometime, and most folks are bored or offended.
But, God has brought you across my path, and I feel a great deal of affinity toward you, and I believe I do understand something that can help you and change your life.
I'm impressed that you seem to grasp the theonomic principle in more areas better than most folks I have talked to.
Please sincerely attempt to understand what it is that I am saying.
If you can, please try to avoid trying to disprove what I am saying. Try to stick mostly to questions.
Instead, if you can, please ask me to explain how what I have said is true.
If you disagree with what I’ve said, start with the assumption that the above is true, but that you just don’t understand it yet. Really try to get it.
Questions will show what I don't understand – but sometimes the question takes a set-up. Try to be patient.
I pray that you will be able to come to an understanding of money that will restore your family and church fellowship.
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John, I largely agree with what you are saying. (I’ve made it to page 9 of your longer document.) It is very well written. I’m sorry to hear that your wife does not take your writing seriously, and treat you with respect. That is her duty as a wife, to treat you with respect, even if she disagrees with you. That is very sad to hear. That must be very painful for you.
I believe that there may be errors in your reasoning or definitions, or limits to your economic understanding, but I believe you have engaged the subject in good faith. I do not see pride in your writing. Thanks for sharing it.
There is one concept that has helped me with understanding money. I have probably said this before, but I shall say it again to bring it to the forefront.
Here goes:
Money can be either be a token representing value that has already been produced (this is the case with money as gold),
By 'token' do you mean anything other than the Federal Reserve Notes (1-100)?
Since the 1,2,5,10,20,50, & 100’s units on the FRN’s do have electronic representations and writing in the paper ledgers of the world (to the tune of about 2 trillion units) – showing that there is both a physical, tangible token distinct from the accounting record, do the other 15-18 trillion dollars in bank accounts in the world (for which no corresponding FRN exists) have a similar “token”, distinct from their accounting record, or do they lack a token?
We have talked many times about token vs. the thing-the-token-points-to, and Representative vs. The-Thing-the-representative-object-represents. Why does the “thing” (or substance in my QMS model) have to be something men have “produced”? Why can’t it just be something God has created, whether men have “worked on” it or not? And what difference would that make?
Are penalties greater if the borrower does not demonstrate that he has built/produced something?
How should he be penalized if he only pays the loan back in the units of money without doing some exact, specified accomplishment to trade for the money that he will use to pay back his loan?
If he is not “delivering the house” back to the creditor as payment for the loan, but only paying in money, will there be a punishment?
What is it about the contracts you talk about that cares about what the borrower must do to trade to get the bank-credit needed to exchange back to the loaning bank to cancel the principal?
token that represents value:As always, this word “value” is always problematic in our discussions. Much damage is done to the understanding, because this word can be used with two very different meanings that can hid the truth about the nature of things.
“value” can pretend to mean the substance valued by men, or it can be used to mean some average of how much some marketplayers might value that substance, as in how much that measure of substance might generally trade for in the marketplace, expressed in a quantity. If Chase Bank says they will be happy to say they owe US Bank/me instead of my employer – that gets me my paycheck. If US Bank says they will be happy to say they owe Fred Meyer instead of me – that gets me my groceries. Because I value the groceries, I value the charade of pretending there is substance involved, but there doesn’t have to be substance to make it all work, it just takes faith in (what I claiming to you is) a lie, and you say is a truth.
or as a token that represents value that is promised to be produced (this is contracts to pay at a later date for goods received now, bonds, paper money, or fiat money).
I’m not sure what you mean by the above words [token, value, or contracts, goods, bonds, or paper money].
I understand that we are trying to help each other see the following in a true light:
When Man says he is increasing the quantities of his fiat money – when he says “let there be…” – does anything get created or not?
And
When these additional quantities are reckoned as such in the central banking system is this being honest, is it theft, and is it beneficial to the economy and helpful to all trading partners?
I’m a little confused if you are saying tokens and contracts are the same thing, or just that the contract represents that money (whatever it is), will be loaned now and paid back later……
Contracts/Fiat money allows men to begin to consume goods/services while in the process of the assembly of capital goods, prior to having produced anything yet.
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I don't yet understand what you are doing with this 'contracts'/fiat money' concept. Are you saying contracts are fiat money, or Fiat Money are contracts? Contracts are open-ended and can promise anything lawful [as surely as Yahweh lives, I will do thus and so] and provide for sanctions [May God do to me and more also if I fail to perform this promise or my side of the trade, and this is what will happen among men, by God's revelation of law if I fail]. But the contract has to be honest about what will be traded or constructed, or delivered or paid. It needs to be honest about the “what” that will be traded, and about what unit of measure will be used to measure the substance/definition of what is traded, then it needs to be honest about how those measures are counted. Help me see how your use of the word: “value” satisfies this capability of being honest.
As far as I know, contracts can be valid whether you are working with:
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pure QMS like silver or gold coins,
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or paper certificates that honestly are representing gold/silver coins and the issuer retains 100% reserve coins for full redemption at any time;
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or if you are honestly promising to loan and pay in the form of legally-transferred title to God-created substance, even if nothing in the form of paper certificates or tokens are used at all. All that is needed is honesty and redeemability of those real Substances. This does assume records will be kept of transactions, but the numbers will have meaning, because the quantities will be of real measurements, and you will be measuring something definable.
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The contract, itself, can even be valid and things can function if the consideration units named on the money- side of the trade are non-existent, totally imaginary, and partners are just pretending to trade units.
Contracts work, and the partners commit no theft between the start of contract and the completion of it, provided the loaner reduces the quantity of imaginary, fiat, non-existent dollars (I know that is redundant) from some other account and relinquishes the “use” of units they have rightful title to during the period the borrower has not paid back the principal. Bear in mind this is what was called (or at least this is my term for it) 100% Reserve, Time-Contract loaning. It would be like the old CD’s, where the depositor’s money that is being loaned out to new borrowers is in an arrangement where the depositors have committed to a certain length of time before they withdraw their deposits. If they do have to withdraw early, the bank would have to borrow quantities from somewhere else, and incur extra costs, thus the diminished interest rate. This would be honest banking, even if the money itself is dishonest.
I suppose, if there is full disclosure that the trade partners are using nothing as units or measures or substance -- that they were just pretending – it would not even be dishonest. That doesn’t mean it is not stupid and offensive to God and man in other ways.
In a real contract someone might place an order and promise to pay a quantity of measurable substance if someone applies his labor to manufacture something or perform some laborious service for the consideration specified in the contract. The parties perform their well-defined functions of the contract, or they don't, and the sanctions of the contract come in to play.
Isn’t this production contract separate from the loan contract?
What is there about the production of new goods and services that requires a loan?
Can't goods and services be paid for by money that belongs to the buyer that is not borrowed?
Doesn’t the loan contract only specify that the ‘money’ needs to be paid back with interest?
Regardless, why does this relate to where the money comes from or what the money is?
We are disagreeing about the morality of why any of the contracts involved sterilize the fact that the bank is pretending money is there when there is none, and by doing so, there is a theft-effect if quantities are increased contrary to God’s law.
Why should banks receive the blessing of law to rent nothing and get paid for it, whereas any non-bank or person would be prosecuted for counterfeit-category Theft if they tried to do the same thing?
A bank can loan and a borrower can pay back and national production and economy can be blessed and increased in full accordance with the law of God, when they are honest and descriptive about what substances are used, relinquished, loaned and paid back whether QMS is used or fraudulent money. As long as the artificial increase/decrease of units is not in view, neither you nor I could assign blame to the loaner, or the borrower of this type of theft. The money could still be bad but the loaning and contracting would not be crime in themselves.
Why, then do you keep trying to justify inflation of the money supply by saying production of goods and services happens as a result?
Don’t we know that inflation is a blight on the economy, interfering with business planning and accurate, dependable investing – to the degree of its severity?
Don’t we know by now that it moves wealth from one owner to another, and that contrary to the Law of God?
What is so good and stimulating to the economy to have the banks increase their easy profits by this special monopoly privilege that is criminal for any other entity?
Why would the government Treasury not do this, itself, instead of blessing these huge profits to the banks, and suffering with the rest of the population (remember, the taxpayer has to pay this interest which would not be there if it was fiat-ed by the government directly)?
Would it not be better to have elected officials you could vote out of office if the population thought they were erring in the way they were inflating the money supply?
Since Americans (since the Civil War) have relinquished family stewardship of land, money, and the proceeds of their labor to the Federal Government anyway, would it not make sense for them to do this directly?
Also, Why did Abe Lincoln and John Kennedy get shot in such near proximity to issuing laws to accomplish this very thing?
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Spending fiat money (consuming goods-services produced by others in the market) requires faith that the borrower will spend the borrowed capital wisely, to produce goods and services in excess of those he has consumed.
Did you mean “loaning” instead of “spending” in the above sentence?
It seems like we are all spending our earned dollars back into the market place in order to get goods and services, without any knowledge or concern if any borrowers are wise or foolish, working hard or being lazy. All we care about is getting the most for the cheapest, and that is all that is necessary to force producers to be both wise and industrious. Producing goods and services in excess of what is consumed seems to say something about how hard and wisely someone labors, not about whether they are getting to rent money cheaper because it costs nothing to “create” or not. Isn't it cheaper to borrow by the same degree that inflation steals value from others?
Is it that, or is the only faith needed, that the borrower will be able, within the terms of the loan agreement to be able to get another bank to “say” that they are willing to switch from “saying” they owe borrower, to “saying” that they owe loaner?
If the amount of fiat money issued (to borrowers who promise to return payment plus interest) is at greater rate than savings, then the increase in money supply (whether issued as new debt by the Fed or by FRB), the increase in money supply will cause inflation (provided there is no liquidity trap preventing the money issued from producing a price pressure on goods/services), as there will be more claims to goods/services than goods and services available for consumption. The key to the prevention of inflation when there is an increasing supply of money is thus, Saving. Saving is the method by which gratification is delayed, and thereby the price pressure of increased money supply does not produce inflation. Thus, the consumer can exert some control on inflation by adjusting his % of savings.
This last sentence is important. An individual account-holder can reduce how much banks say he owes them, in comparison to how much banks say they owe him. If his checking and savings accounts (which are loans to banks) add up to more than any loans from banks – that individual is contributing to deflation.
Have you realized yet, that – across all account-holders – this is not possible? In a universal sense (since the USD went completely imaginary in 1971) every dollar anyone can ever have in a checking or savings account – only exists because someone, somewhere borrowed that dollar into existence (via fractional-reserve loaning) from FedCentralNY or one of its branches, and hasn't paid it back yet. This is what led one Federal Reserve Officer to exclaim:
"We are completely dependent on the commercial banks. Someone has to borrow every dollar we have in circulation, cash or credit. If the banks create ample synthetic money we are prosperous; if not, we starve. We are absolutely without a permanent money system.... It is the most important subject intelligent persons can investigate and reflect upon. It is so important that our present civilization may collapse unless it becomes widely understood and the defects remedied very soon." -- Robert H. Hamphill, Atlanta Federal Reserve Bank 1935
It is in this sense that money printed by the Fed is real, in that it is giving token money to the borrower, who has contracted to produce value and thereby return the tokens in equal number plus interest. The borrower in such a scenario has traded his word as a contract for the right to consume goods-services by the gatekeeper of credit. If he is trustworthy/faithful he will have produced value and sold it for a profit, and thus repaid both principle and interest, and supported family and self on that profit.
Several problems with the above paragraph:
1. What kind of ink is printed on what kind of paper by FedCentralNY? I know of none, nor have I read of anyone else describing this. Why is the verb “printing” used by people talking about money unless to deceive and obscure? The Fed denies that is is printing dollars. The Bureau of Engraving and Printing is very clear that they are not printing dollars. The Fed does pay the Bureau dollars for their printing costs, but that is dollars going to the Bureau, instead of Bureau to Fed. Member banks do trade dollars to FedCentryNY in exchange for the FRN's that have come from the Bureau, but, again, that is dollars going in the opposite direction from “what is printed”.
2. What is the token loaned to the borrower? Does he get a suitcase full of FRN's, or does he get a change in his account statement of his checking account that says the bank now owes him more dollars we have yet to define? Assuming there exists any token separate from the FRN's, what is it that the token represents, and who is responsible for redeeming token for the thing represented?
3. Why do you say “right to consume” as if this contains some magic difference over trading any thing else in the marketplace? I have a right to consume anything the owner of that thing I want to consume gives me that freedom to consume. What is there about your “tokens” that would make this unique over any of the other types of reasons an owner of a thing might give me what I want? And why would anything an owner might accept in trade have to be borrowed – in order for this exchange to happen? Why not just trade something I own, instead of trading something I have borrowed? Why are we to think the economy is growing and good things are happening just because I do not own something to trade to another for what I want?
4. If you are going to equate money with value, then why is the worker-who-borrows even needed? The banks produce value when they create money – if they are the same. The worker after he has produced his goods and services, has to give them up in exchange for money, which goes back to the bank and is destroyed again so it no longer exists. How is this growing the economy?
5. If men produced and worked for profit for the first 4,700 years before fractional-reserve loaning of imaginary money, why does the last 300 years suddenly require this as a way for economic growth, when it has always resulted in the abandonment of that particular name of money unit after about 40 years? Don't these tenures always end in an hyperinflationary crash? What makes you think the dollar, or the imaginary units of every nation on earth, right now, will be any different? Are men wiser now? Are they gooder?
If your premise is true, have you thought about how one of the biggest borrowers out there (Fed Gov) is the opposite of you ideal? There are not producing but destroying goods, services, and the incentive for men to produce such in general. Nor is there any hope of that huge borrower ever paying any of that principle back without borrowing more to pay the old debts down. Do you realize how long it has been since they were borrowing 2.5 a net billion more each day than they were receiving in income? And that is just on a Cash Accounting basis. Add about 10 billion each day for the extra accruing of future obligations.
I think when you look at money this way, as a contract between men, where one man issues the contracts (the Fed), and the other man repays the terms of the contract, that the idea of creating money ex nihilo resolves.
Where does this put the men who wish to rent their own money to stimulate production in the marketplace? Note they are having to rent it at a rate that guarantees steady loss of their principal, because the ravages of the rise in prices caused by fiat fractional-reserve increases in money over available goods and services in the marketplace – is reducing the value of their repaid principle.
This leaves only the banks making a profit by loaning. Which leads to a major question that would help me the most if you would answer:
How do banks make a profit when the interest they charge to rent money is less than the average loss in purchasing power of the money units?
Why were all these men so foolish as to not appreciate the good effects you are defending of having the banks create new imaginary money so as to grow an economy better?
Daniel Webster: “Of all the contrivances for cheating the laboring classes of mankind, none has been more effective than that which deludes them with paper money.”
James Madison: “History records that the money changers have used every form of abuse, intrigue, deceit, and violent means possible, to maintain their control over governments, by controlling money and its issuance.”
Frederic Bastiat: “It is impossible for society to render more services than it receives, and yet a belief to the contrary is the chimera which is being pursued by means of the multiplication of coins, of paper money, etc.”
Daniel Webster: “We are in danger of being overwhelmed with irredeemable paper, mere paper, representing not gold nor silver; no sir, representing nothing but broken promises, bad faith, bankrupt corporations, cheated creditors and a ruined people.”
John C. Calhoun, 1836: “A power has risen up in the government greater than the people themselves, consisting of many and various powerful interest, combined in one mass; and held together by the cohesive power of the vast surplus in banks.”
John F. Hylan, Mayor of N.Y., 1911: “…the real menace of our republic is the invisible government which, like a giant octopus, sprawls its slimy length over our city, state and nation. At the head is a small group of banking houses, generally referred to as ‘international bankers.’”
Thomas Jefferson: “The trifling economy of paper, as a cheaper medium, or its convenience for transmission, weighs nothing in opposition to the advantages of the precious metals...it is liable to be abused, has been, is, and forever will be abused, in every country in which it is permitted.”
So, after all this, consider that first presentation where I contrast your paragraph where you mention how men have assigned power, authority, and the ability to create over to the Fed as opposed to the triune God of the Bible:
Society has authorized the Fed to be the point of ultimate accountability in the issuance of credit. This is not a God-like function, this is more like being a father, or king, a person to whom one is responsible to for keeping his vow/contract. The Fed is essentially a custodian, a steward, an authority figure, that society has given the responsibility to for authorizing a man to go out and use the resources of society to create more resources. This function is not the same as being a thief or God. The Fed (in its properly executed function of trying to offer credit to the society at a rate that the market can absorb without inflation) is simply executing a position of trust that it has been given by the society. That job is to judge the trustworthiness of men to use society’s goods/services (resources) and thereby produce an increase in goods/services by the faithful execution of the contract to produce an increase.
Dt 6:13 You shall [e]fear only the Lord your God; and you shall [f]worship Him and swear by His name.
Dt 8:17 Otherwise, you may say in your heart, ‘My power and the strength of my hand made me this wealth.’ 18 But you shall remember the Lord your God, for it is He who is giving you power to make wealth, that He may confirm His covenant which He swore to your fathers, as it is this day.
Dt 10:12 “Now, Israel, what does the Lord your God require from you, but to [c]fear the Lord your God, to walk in all His ways and love Him, and to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, 13 and to keep the Lord’s commandments and His statutes which I am commanding you today for your good? 14 Behold, to the Lord your God belong heaven and the [d]highest heavens, the earth and all that is in it.
20 You shall fear the Lord your God; you shall serve Him and cling to Him, and you shall swear by His name.
Rom 11:34 For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who became His counselor? 35 Or who has first given to Him [m]that it might be paid back to him again? 36 For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory [n]forever. Amen.
Col 1:16 For [x]by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things have been created through Him and for Him. 17 He [y]is before all things, and in Him all things [z]hold together.
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From Tom: Mar 19
Rick, I think the comment on the fallacy by the Indian, about making a blanket longer, is similar to an extent to the problems with monetary policy. But, there is some distinction, in that the principle of hope and expectation, as well as contract, can modify the result to an extent. The problem with loaning money when there is no real demand, is as always, the problem of malinvestment – people do a worse job at judging market demand when there is money easily available (i.e. at no personal risk, enforced demand, with no corresponding production) to provide a service – people seem willing to do whatever pays, not necessarily what is fundamentally needed/wanted. (Getting paid for doing something is fundamentally difficult, since people have to value the thing that I do for them as much as much as the thing that they do for me.) I think the most corrosive of all economic policies is government programs. No one would fund them if they were not coerced in their financing (in terms of taxes or QE/fiat money printing) and their implementation (policy/enforcement). This is an almost sure prescription for creating malinvestment. If people are not motivated to buy (i.e. trade $ for the goods/services produced by the government), they will not be motivated to work to produce goods and services to produce income to spend on the goods/services produced by the malinvestment. Such is the formula for a stagnating economy – people unwilling to work, because there are no goodies being produced that motivate them to get out of bed in the morning and sweat for 40 hrs. a week so that they can have them. Who wants to work that hard so that other people can retire, and be treated with expensive medical procedures and side-effect producing drugs? That is malinvestment on a scale so grand that even Goebbels would have been shocked by the size of the lie.
T.
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From John: Mar 19
Tried to understand the WSJ article, but flavor wasn't clear. Appears that powers that (shouldn't) be are beating up on Japan, having the Govt/Bank partnership plunder the productive japanese population so that US/UK doesn't bear the brunt of their own inflation quite so bad.
As per our prev conversations about how the dollar is not there, does not exist/is imaginary/has no substance, I could see a scenario where the int'l bankers spook all the sheep into the tall grass / put all their money into the "dollar", and then "surprise" there is not dollar / We gotcha!
Remember the Wall Street Journal is the
Wall Street Journal - unrepentantly.
I was looking in the article and in you'all's comments if there was any sign of anyone stealing anything from anyone else, what restitution was going to be required, and what God would do to the society if this just/righteous (per God's law) restitution was not coerced -- but couldn't make it out.
May have to explain it to me better.
This is very packed with geopolitical/money/banking info.
Don't agree with all of his stuff, but he seems to be more accurate than most bloggers...
Even if you get 60 %, I believe it will be profitable
Andrew Hoffman/Miles Franklin
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LewHxEEnJbg&feature=youtu.be
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From Tom: Mar 20
John, I did get your document, and I wrote a very lengthy reply to it, but did not send it. Always more that needs to be said and clarified. Maybe someday. Pretty much fully occupied now with the construction project here in Kalilispell. I could devote a significant portion of my life to addressing the issues/objections you raise, but other life obligations do not permit this. I only have limited resources to devote to this project.
As you know, I do not believe in/agree with your concept/objection about the "Dollar not being there". The dollar is an abstract concept (just as love, trust, honesty...for which there are symbols that represent these abstractions) that represents value, with a physical representation (paper, electrons, or commensurately valued metal, or other rare/controlled-issue objects). The fact that the object of representation for value is not as valuable on the market as the object used to represent it, does not make the dollar an imaginary concept. Rather, it simply allows evil men to create lots of symbols of value, and purchase goods/services on an economy-level scale, and in turn influence the culture for their "other god" agenda.
The problem with the dollar symbol being fiat/incommensurate with the object for which it is traded, is that the symbols used for value can be printed/issued without much effort/cost to the issuing party. When men abuse their authority to issue symbols of value/money, they risk creating a catastrophic collapse of trust in the value represented by the symbols of value. It would be hard for honest men to judge the correct quantity of money to loan into an economy to prevent malinvestment. But, our problem is even worse, we have criminals and/or fools at the controls of the monetary system, issuing money, whose direction they can control, which allows them to direct the engines of production, and in turn direct the minds/hearts of the populace. It is my opinion that the monetary system is being directed by people who have an intent to create a new world, one of their imagination, that reflects the values of their god. The system of fiat money merely makes it possible for men in places of trust/authority to issue scrip/dollars/symbols of value to purchase goods/services at their own discretion, in amounts limited only by their sense of societal acceptance of their acts.
This unlimited purchase of goods/services that are unwanted/unauthorized by the people, is the essence of malinvestment. Malinvestment produces the retribution that God promises associated with theft. It's that simple. We don't have to appeal to God's supernatural retribution to expect that justice will be done with regard to the breech of trust/theft being perpetrated by the government-Central bank alliance. God's vengeance is hard wired into responses automatically produced by acting outside of His Law. The consequences of violating the Law are so deeply intertwined with the sequence of men's actions, and other men's response to those actions, that the Hand of God is invisible, yet He is there. It helps to address in overt discussion retribution as specified by the Law, but it is not necessary, since that equalizing action will occur without its acknowledgement.
We can eliminate the problem with men misusing the authority to issue symbols of value by going back to a gold-only money. But, again, this is not the central issue. The problem is that the society is not bowing its head to the Biblical moral-ethical system of honesty, fair measure for measure trade. The world is worshiping other gods, such as multiculturalism, sodomy, Allah, self-as-sovereign, (all which could fall under the rubric of political correctness). This will have bad consequences. The destruction of the faith of one man by another in the representation of the unit and symbol of value would be an extremely disruptive break in relationship, and could precipitate all manner of social chaos. Men are simply using their authority to issue symbols of credit to stimulate/enable the production/purchase of goods/services that further the goal of their "other gods" politically correct/multicultural agenda. The problem is men's hearts, not the substance used for money. Although, having said that, going to a value commensurate money (gold) would largely stop the ability of the "other god worshipers" to directly direct the power of the market to manifest their multicultural/other-god goals.
T.
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I answer 4/7
Another author echoing your designation that it is the heart of man that is the problem.
Helmut Schoek, in Envy (1966), called attention to the deadly role played in society by envy.
The same is true of modern man's approach to inflation: the evil one is Washington, D.C., the international bankers, or anyone other than themselves. Men whose lives are geared to inflationary living, and who run from one conference to another, unconcerned about the destruction to their country by inflation but eager to learn of a new way to make money out of inflation, will with consummate hypocrisy sit back and blame the politicians or bankers for inflation. True, politicians and bankers have their guilt, but who demands inflation from them by their envy, their debt-living, and their heart full of larceny? Is it not the voters?
Inflation begins where there is larceny in the heart. The only long-term cure for it is honesty in the heart. Impossible? Our Lord said, "With men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible" (Matt. 19:26). Political cures only worsen a situation. For a changed society, changed men are necessary. If men discount this answer, we are entitled to suspect that they want the virtues of Phariseeism, the "right" to condemn the Federal Government for its inflationary policies, together with the "right" to operate freely with larceny in the heart. Of such is not the Kingdom of God.
