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
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
Ben Bernanke re-nominated for Fed chairman; why do Obama and Congress love Bernanke so?
Aug 31, 2009 Peter Schiff, economy, financial, politics
It is official, Obama re-nominated Ben Bernanke for chairman of the federal reserve. Bernanke still has to be confirmed by the Senate, but that is likely to happen. Why? Why do Obama and the Congress love Ben Bernanke so much?
Obama and the Congress love Bernanke because he makes their lives very easy. Obama can’t run his huge deficits without Bernanke. Congress doesn’t have to cut spending with Bernanke. Obama wants desperately to keep Bernanke around in order to run his socialized health care system. All of the deficit spending is possible because unlike Paul Volker, Ben Bernanke is letting Obama and Congress off the hook by monetizing all the debt.
Politicians hated Paul Volker because he raised interest rates to over 20% during his chairmanship. They all wanted him to resign because they could no longer run deficits that they thought they needed to get re-elected. Alan Greenspan, often heralded as the greatest Fed chairman ever, lowered interest rates to 1%, effectively monetizing debt through the expansion of the money supply via wide open credit from the Fed. Ben Bernanke is doing the same thing – delaying the inevitable economic pain and suffering – by lowering interest rates to a staggering all time low of 0%. Of course Obama and the Congress love Bernanke! They can continue to spend, spend, spend, with no short term consequences. The consequences are delayed and transferred to our children, who will inherit the debt and won’t be able to repay it.
See Peter Schiff’s great video below.
Tags: ben bernanke, congress, economy, Federal Reserve, Peter Schiff
Alan Grayson grills Ben Bernanke on Foreign Lending
Jul 22, 2009 Ron Paul, economy, financial, news, politics
Following Ron Paul and Bill Posey grilling Ben Bernanke, Alan Grayson grills Ben Bernanke on lending to foreign central banks. He mentions that before 2007, there had been absolutely no lending to foreign central banks and brings up a great point – whether there is actually a provision in the federal reserve act (which was enacted illegally anyway) that allows this type of lending? He also says, correctly, that the constitution states that “no money shall be drawn from the Treasury but in Consequence of Appropriations made by Law”. Bernanke seems to think that provision doesn’t apply to the Federal Reserve, even though the loans to the foreign central banks are in the form of treasury bills.
Tags: Alan Grayson, ben bernanke, constitution
Bill Posey questions Ben Bernanke on federal reserve transparency
Jul 22, 2009 Ron Paul, economy, news, politics
During a hearing of the House Financial Services Committee, following Ron Paul, Bill Posey questions Ben Bernanke on inflation and Federal Reserve transparency. My favorite part of this video is when Ben Bernanke says, “because, we have to be extraordinarily careful that the markets and the public don’t think that congress is trying to influence monetary policy decisions”. Bernanke is showing just how scared he is that the fed is soon going to be opened up to a FULL GAO audit as per the language in HR 1207. Why Bernanke feels that the PEOPLE should not be able to influence monetary policy, through their elected representatives, is far beyond me.
Watch and enjoy.
Also watch Ron Paul’s questioning of Ben Bernanke on the same day.
Tags: audit the fed, ben bernanke, Bill Posey, economy, Federal Reserve, HR 1207, monetary policy, Ron Paul
The Federal Reserve slashes interest rate to 0, throws gas on the fire
Dec 18, 2008 Ron Paul, economy, news, politics
Ben Bernanke
On December 16, 2008, the Federal Reserve cut its key interest rate to a range between 0 and .25%, the lowest since 1954.
Why does the Federal Reserve, a group of wealthy private bankers who were unconstitutionally given a monopoly on the creation of money in the United States, think it can solve this economic crisis by doing the very thing it did to create the problem in the first place? By lowering interest rates, the Federal Reserve is attempting to inject liquidity into the market by making lending more attractive to member banks, and their member banks, all the way down to the consumer trying to buy a car or house he/she cannot afford. As if the massive debt realized by this process is not bad enough, the money that the Fed issues is printed out of thin air, and thus debases the dollar.
I suppose there is some good news: the Federal Reserve cannot lower interest rates any more! When this last ditch effort to mend the economy fails, which it is bound to do, everyone will (finally) understand that the Federal Reserve cannot simply print wealth. Everyone will understand that deficit financing and monetization of debt can only last so long. Everyone will understand what happens when an organization like the Federal Reserve is allowed to operate with no oversight, regulation, or transparency to the people of the United States of America. Everyone will finally understand that the unlimited production of fiat currency is a system that is inherently flawed and destined for failure.
Everyone will realize that Ron Paul, Peter Schiff, and so many others were right after all.
Tags: ben bernanke, economy, Federal Reserve, inflation, Peter Schiff, Ron Paul
