Perfect April fool’s day joke from Jonathan Lebed of Lebed.biz
Apr 1, 2010 Federal Reserve, Gold and Silver, Jonathan Lebed, economy, investing, politics
For those who don’t know Jonathan Lebed’s positions on the U.S. economy and monetary policy, this won’t be funny. But for the rest of us, hilarious.
As most of you know, I have been bullish on gold/silver now for many years. Starting in late/2005-early/2006 I urged you repeatedly in countless email alerts to get out of Real Estate (which I predicted would crash into the ground) and accumulate gold (which was around $450 per ounce at the time).
I have remained bullish on gold/silver consistently and never flip-flopped once… until now. Today, I officially am a bear on gold/silver and believe we have a gold/silver bubble.
There is nothing really special about gold and silver. You can’t eat it. You can’t even go to the store and buy anything with it. Americans have become used to fiat currencies and I doubt we will ever go back to the “stone age” of bartering with gold and silver.
Bernanke, Paulson and Geithner did an amazing job at solving the financial crisis of 2008 and we should all bow down and salute them, we owe them a lot. It took a lot of courage from Bernanke to expand the Fed’s balance sheet as much as he did with his brilliant quantitative easing, and it took equally as much courage from Paulson and Geithner to bailout “too-big-to-fail” banks like Citigroup, Bank of America and JP Morgan, but we are all now better off because of it.
Unemployment may be high at 9.7%, but we would likely have 15% or higher unemployment right now if Bernanke, Paulson and Geithner didn’t do what they did. Today, we are on a road towards recovery.
Obama is now making it his main focus to reduce our budget deficit and I predict within a few years we will have a balanced budget. Obama is already taking steps to freeze government spending and I am sure the debt ceiling won’t ever have to be raised again.
I am also extremely confident that Bernanke’s exit strategy will work and he will be able to successfully mop up the excess liquidity before the U.S. experiences hyperinflation. In fact, there are absolutely no signs of inflation anywhere and we might even experience deflation in the years ahead.
With gold up $12 today to $1,126.50 per ounce and silver up $0.429 today to $17.955 per ounce, today could be the perfect exit point and a top for precious metals before a decline similar to what we experienced in late-2008.
The U.S. economy isn’t out of the woods yet, but as bad as things are in the U.S. they are worse everywhere else. China needs the U.S. to police the rest of the world and I am sure the Chinese will continue propping up the U.S. dollar forever because they need Americans to consume their goods. Without the U.S., where would the Chinese export to? Europe? Give me a break… with the crisis in Greece, the Euro is a lot more fundamentally flawed than the U.S. dollar.
The U.S. dollar will always remain the world’s reserve currency. Gold and silver are pretty much useless.
I think this takes the cake for the best April fool’s day 2010 joke.
Tags: barack obama, ben bernanke, economy, gold, Henry Paulson, Jonathan Lebed, silver, Timothy Geithner
Health care bill passes senate (HR 3590)
Mar 21, 2010 Federal Reserve, barack obama, economy, financial, news, politics
What a historic day. Today, in the halls of congress, our Senators drove the last nail in the coffin of the US economy. It is logical to believe that since the government has never been correct in their cost estimates, the health care bill, also known as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, will cost hundreds or even thousands percent more than estimated. In 1966, Medicare was estimated to cost $12 billion per year in 1990. Instead, it cost $107 billion, and today costs $408 billion per year. The Iraq war was estimated to cost $50-$60 billion, and today has cost more than $713 billion – and rising. Why should we believe that this health care bill will be any exception?
If indeed the true cost of the health care bill follows the historical pattern, we could see $10 trillion or more added to the already staggering $12.67 trillion. Tax receipts will not even pay for the interest on public debts. We are already at a point where even if the government taxed Americans 100% of their income, it would not be enough to balance the budget. Rather than taxing Americans 100% of their income, or cutting 100% of spending and entitlement payments such as Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security, the government will more likely keep borrowing money from the federal reserve in order to monetize the debt – which will cause hyperinflation.
Expect double digit inflation by 2014. This is the new reality – no more fun and games America!
Tags: barack obama, economy, Federal Reserve, financial, health care bill, hr 3590, news
Why we should end the fed
Mar 2, 2010 Campaign for Liberty, Federal Reserve, Ron Paul, constitution, financial, politics
The answer is simple: we don’t need the fed – we never have. America was far more prosperous without having a privately owned bank issuing our currency (congress has the power to coin money constitutionally – why not restore that power?). We The People are now paying interest on the debt owed to bond holders and private fed member banks – interest that already amounts to half a trillion dollars PER YEAR OR MORE. The fed is robbing us blind, and it seems as if republicans and democrats alike are intent on maintaining the status quo.
Efforts are made by the bankster controlled media to hide the issue of massive debts being purchased by the federal reserve. Mainstream media constantly talks about the debt owed to China – which is important and needs to be addressed – however, foreign investors (foreign central banks, etc) only own roughly 20% of US debt – while the federal reserve owns the other 80%. Shouldn’t the media be talking about that?
The federal reserve, through its inflationary monetary policy, imposes a hidden tax on the people by diluting, or devaluing, the money. Since only the middle class is governed by capitalism and the rich and poor are governed by socialism (the poor receive entitlements and the super rich have access to the fed’s easy credit before the inflationary effects), the middle class is in danger of being destroyed by the fed’s policies.
How did we get from having a currency backed by gold and silver, as mandated by the constitution, to having a fiat, paper currency issued by a private bank which won’t even allow the American people to know its monetary policy? The answer is that we let a group of private banks trick us into thinking that we needed them to stabilize our currency. The truth is, the exact opposite has happened, and the fed has devalued our currency to 5% of its original purchasing power. Sound money, which can only be money that is backed by a hard asset such as gold and silver, is the basis for a true free market economy and no fiat currency will ever bring stability to any economic system, ever.
End the fed, restore prosperity.
Tags: audit the fed, ben bernanke, constitution, end the fed, Federal Reserve, gold, inflation, mises.org, monetary policy, national debt, Ron Paul, silver, sound money
Bill O’Reilly supports the disarming of Americans
Feb 25, 2010 constitution, news, politics
While interviewing Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes, Bill O’reilly justifies disarming American citizens, in direct violation of the 2nd amendment, during a “national emergency” such as hurricane Katrina – because of the looting and chaos that took place. We know that in New Orleans, weapons were confiscated from everyone, not just armed looters and people in the streets. Police forcefully entered homes and confiscated weapons from homeowners, even in upscale neighborhoods of the city. O’Reilly said that he supports the suspending of the constitution when authorities “can’t control the city”. Furthermore, O’Reilly asserts that it is a “pretty extreme position” to oppose unconstitutional policies during a “state of emergency” (which, I might add, is always vaguely defined and seems that lately, can be declared at any time, for any reason and under any circumstances that authorities feel is appropriate).
O’Reilly interviewed Steward Rhodes because of the statements of Mark Potok in a previous interview. Potok claims, in the interview, that members of the Oath Keepers are dangerous because they are joining as a reminder that they took an oath to first and foremost defend the constitution. I would argue that it is people like Potok who are dangerous – people who think that the Constitution only applies in situations where everything is peachy. Well, Potok, I have news for you – the Constitution applies at all times – not just when you or any other lawyer or government official thinks it does.
Tags: constitution, disarmament, Katrina, Mark Potok, martial law, oath keepers, police state, Stewart Rhodes
Debra Medina for Texas Governor
Jan 18, 2010 Debra Medina, Texas Politics, constitution, politics
There is only one real choice for the Governor of Texas, and that is Debra Medina – the liberty minded candidate taking on incumbent Rick Perry and Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison (and the democratic candidates including Kinky Friedman and Bill White).
Debra Medina is not a career politician like Rick Perry and Kay Bailey Hutchison. She is a business woman, rancher, wife, mother, and a homeschooler. Her only concern is to take care of Texans (a true stateswoman) and NOT for political gain.
If you live in Texas (or even if you don’t) do yourself a favor and go do some reading: Debra Medina for Texas Governor. Then, do Texas a favor and vote for Debra Medina.
Big sister is watching you, health care propaganda
Oct 8, 2009 barack obama, investing, news, politics, trading
This is old news to some, but on the official white house blog, Linda Douglass, the communications director for the White House’s Health Reform Office, wants for you to report your neighbors to flag@whitehouse.gov if something they say sounds “fishy” regarding Barack Obama’s health insurance reform. The blog post features a video in which Linda Douglass uses Drudge Report as an example of what is misinformation. The Drudge Report linked to a video in which Barack Obama explains how his health care plan will eliminate private insurance. I’ve seen the video, and Obama clearly states that he happens to be “a proponent of a single payer universal health care plan”. How Linda Douglass thinks that statement could be interpreted in any other way, I’m not sure. Granted, in the video, Obama doesn’t really explain how his health care plan will eliminate private insurance, but he hints that he would like to see private insurance plans be phased out over the next 15 to 20 years and replaced by a single payer plan.
Why We Don’t Have a Right to Health Care
Sep 19, 2009 bill of rights, commentary, constitution, politics
We have a right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Does health care fit into any one of these categories? Those are derived from biblical principles by our founding fathers – the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are inalienable rights which are in turn outlined in the bill of rights. They cannot be taken from us by any person, government, or organization.
Health care, on the other hand, is not guaranteed. The reason is that someone has to provide the service, who in turn has to provide for his or her family using the payment for his or her services. By saying that I am entitled, or have the right to, his or her services means that even if I cannot pay for said services, he or she still has to treat me anyway. Thus, I am robbing him or her of their pursuit of happiness and the wages for their labor, which is wrong.
Liberals would say (in a very indirect manner) that I have a right to health care, even if I cannot pay for it – but those providing the health care should not have to work for free. That means that if I need health care and can’t pay for it, I am going to have to take money from someone else to pay the health care provider. That brings us back to the scenario of robbing the provider, but now I am robbing someone else who also has their own happiness to pursue.
The government has done a fantastic job of convincing people that when they get money from the government, it was absolutely free. Thankfully people are beginning to wake up to the fact that “free” money causes inflation through the expansion of the money supply. Inflation, in essence, is a hidden tax because every time a dollar is printed it lowers the purchasing power of all the dollars that you and I have in our pockets… so we have in effect paid a tax to allow the government to fund some new deficit spending project, like universal health care, for example. So again, everyone who traded in their clunker and got $4500 for it, was subsidized by the rest of us. We won’t see any of that money back, and our money is worth less now. Do you think that is right?
Along the same lines, do huge banks have a right to survive if they’ve been managed poorly? The effect on the money in the bank is the same: the value deteriorates! It seems far more innocent to give free health care than to bail out a bank, but both require taking money from someone else..something the founding fathers never envisioned for a free America.
Tags: bill of rights, constitution, health care, universal health care
