Twitter: @rodgermitchell; Search #monetarysovereignty
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Mitchell’s laws:
•Those, who do not understand the differences between Monetary Sovereignty and monetary non-sovereignty, do not understand economics.
•Any monetarily NON-sovereign government — be it city, county, state or nation — that runs an ongoing trade deficit, eventually will run out of money.
•The more federal budgets are cut and taxes increased, the weaker an economy becomes..

•Liberals think the purpose of government is to protect the poor and powerless from the rich and powerful. Conservatives think the purpose of government is to protect the rich and powerful from the poor and powerless.

•The single most important problem in economics is the Gap between rich and the rest..
•Austerity is the government’s method for widening the Gap between rich and poor.
•Until the 99% understand the need for federal deficits, the upper 1% will rule.
•Everything in economics devolves to motive, and the motive is the Gap between the rich and the rest..
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By tradition, reason and by constitution, American’s don’t like dictators (unless they are our dictators). After all, we began our history by freeing ourselves from an English dictator.

To prevent our becoming a dictatorship, our Constitution incorporates three offsetting branches of government, and that system almost works, except when it doesn’t.

What works even better is the comparatively recent 2-term limit on the Presidency, which should be matched by term limits for Congress. (Unfortunately, that never will happen. The Presidential term limit Amendment came during the time when the then President — Harry Truman — favored it. Congress never favors term limits for itself.)

Because we don’t like dictators, we feel it incumbent upon ourselves, as the epitome of righteousness, to rid the world of those dictators we don’t control or who otherwise aren’t nice to us.

Unfortunately, deposing dictators often leaves a power vacuum, and as everyone knows, vacuums suck.

President George W. Bush decided that to make his name in history, he needed to outdo his father, and what better way than to finish what dear old Dad didn’t finish: Depose the President of Iraq, Saddam Hussein.

So he told some lies about the dangers to America posed by Saddam, and in 2003, as Bush, The Younger’s, self-serving, ego inflating sign said, “Mission Accomplished.”

Unfortunately for dubya’s Presidential ratings, he did not take into consideration the fact that Iraq was the single most important bulwark against Iranian power expansion.

He also did not consider what would be done about the power vacuum in Iraq, when Saddam was hanged.

That vacuum has drawn in all manner of miscreants including, but not limited to al-Qaeda, ISIL, Hamas, Tawhid and Jihad, The Sheibani Network and assorted other nasties, and today, after thousands of young Americans unnecessarily have lost their lives and limbs, the situation in Iraq still sucks.

Then, having learned nothing from the Bush debacle, President Obama thought he would try his hand at regime change, this time in Libya:

Moammar Gadhafi Warned U.K.’s Tony Blair That Ousting Him Would Open the Door to Jihadis
Truthdig, Posted on Jan 11, 2016

Transcripts of two fraught telephone conversations between the U.K.’s Tony Blair and Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi in 2011 show Gadhafi warning that his removal from power would enable jihadi groups to seize control of Libya and use it as a staging ground to attack Europe.

Blair, who was not Britain’s prime minister at the time, reportedly decided to act as an intermediary between Gadhafi and the West because of the contact the two men had while Blair was in office. Blair confirmed that both London and Washington, D.C.—presumably meaning Hillary Clinton, then-secretary of state and current Democratic presidential candidate—were aware of the calls.

In the first call, at 11.15am on 25 February 2011, [Gadhafi] gave a warning in part borne out by future events: “They [jihadis] want to control the Mediterranean and then they will attack Europe.”

In the second call, at 3.25pm the same day, the Libyan leader said: “We are not fighting them, they are attacking us. I want to tell you the truth. It is not a difficult situation at all. The story is simply this: an organization has laid down sleeping cells in north Africa. Called the al-Qaida organization in north Africa … The sleeping cells in Libya are similar to dormant cells in America before 9/11.”

[Gadhafi] added: “I will have to arm the people and get ready for a fight. Libyan people will die, damage will be on the Med, Europe, and the whole world. These armed groups are using the situation [in Libya] as a justification – and we shall fight them.”

Three weeks after the calls, a Nato-led coalition that included Britain began bombing raids that led to the overthrow of [Gadhafi]. He was finally deposed in August and murdered by opponents of his regime in October.

Well, that went just fine — for terrorists like ISIS, Ansar al-Sharia , and friends. (Save Libya from terrorists) Not so good for us or the Libyan people.

And please don’t ask about our fight against the dictator of Syria, Bashar Hafez al-Assad. There, we don’t know who to bomb next. The Shiites, the Sunnis, the rebels — If it’s Thursday, let’s bomb ISIS. Bombs, like guns, always seem to be America’s first talking point.

The only near question is: If and when al-Assad goes, and leaves the inevitable vacuum, which terrorist group will replace him?

The long-range question is: What are we trying to accomplish with our repeated efforts at regime change?

1. Is it that our leaders actually believe in American exceptionalism — that we are a “shining city upon a hill, the light of the world” to which all nations and all peoples aspire? Do our leaders truly believe the world would be a better place if only everyone could be just like us?

2. And do our leaders actually believe the vacuum left by a departing dictator will be filled via a democratic election of a noble, progressive, empathetic president — a leader who will follow American policy wherever it leads?

3. Or do our leaders actually believe we arbitrarily can replace the dictator with the above-mentioned president, and set him upon a willing, even eager, populace — a populace that in their sheer gratitude, will embrace America’s puppet?

4. Or, do our bribed leaders simply kowtow to the military industrial complex, which promotes war as the economic best of worlds?

This last idea certainly works here in the U.S., where the gun manufacturers not only rule Congress via unfettered bribery (Thank you right-wing Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision), but have infused a gullible public with the astounding belief that more guns on the streets makes Americans safer. (Ask anyone living in the slums of Chicago’s west side.)

As a nation, we have been hypnotized by the films of wildly cheering French who after WWII, welcomed those proud, powerful, conquering American troops with flowers and coition.

But France is not Syria. Christianity is not Islam. World War II is not a Mid-east conflict.

Remember, it has taken Christianity nearly two thousand years to be dragged slowly, reluctantly from theocracy toward (though not yet “to”) democracy.

And even here, in America, every time we hear a bigoted politician claim “we are a Christian country,” and our own Supreme Court defends exceptions to secular law based on religion ( as in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby), visions of theocracy dance in our heads.

Many Christians still pull toward theocracy, so there is little wonder that Islam, being younger, has miles to go before its most powerful leaders can move away from sectarian bigotry and strife.

Attempts at regime change in Islamic nations are doomed to failure, if “success” is defined as a peaceful transition to a democratic state or even just to a state that likes us.

By trying to force it to happen, we assure additional hatreds heaped upon the existing hatreds. You can’t buy love with a bomb.

Finally, and this may be the most important point of all: Terrorism is not a big threat to America. It doesn’t even classify as a small threat..

The Middle East, with its raging crowds, its colorful threats, its beheadings and its incessant strife, may seem like a significant danger, but in reality it is a small, weak, fractured place.

The total population of all 17 nations in the Middle East is only about 6% of the world’s population.

It’s more than 5,000 miles away, far across a great ocean, and 16 of those nations (except Israel) are militarily puny. Not one of them has the military capability to cause more than a pinprick on the skin of America.

Despite what fear-mongering politicians like Donald Trump (“Kill their families”) and Ted Cruz (“The world is on fire”) say, you have a far better chance of being killed by lightening than by a jihadi terrorist.

So what’s a well-meaning President of the U.S. to do?

First, defend Americans. That means not just protect Americans from foreign attack, but don’t put Americans in harm’s way.

President Bush II is responsible for more American deaths and mutilations than all the terrorists who ever have lived. (See: <font color="#0000ff"Service Member Statistics, Page 6)

Second, do not encourage terrorist attacks against America by intervening in Middle Eastern wars.These ostensibly sectarian wars actually have very little to do with religion, and everything to do with power.

In a cynical, realpolitik way, these little wars are good for American security. The more the terrorists focus on each other, the less they will threaten us, which is one of the reasons why we should avoid injecting ourselves into their conflicts.

No more Vietnams. No more Pakistans. No more Afghanistans. No more Iraqs, Libyas, and Syrias. Not one of these unprovoked wars has accomplished anything other than to kill and maim our children and to incite hatred for Americans.

We were safer when Iran and Iraq fought each other than we are now.

The primary reason why the terrorists hate us is not because we are Judeo-Christian “infidels,” but because we keep bombing them, and killing and maiming their children.

Third: Protect the nations we consider allies: Europe, Israel, Japan, et al, by helping them financially and even by supplying them with weapons (making the arms makers happy), but don’t send troops (aka “advisors”) and don’t send bombers.

Fourth: Don’t create political vacuums and don’t try to install foreign leaders. A bad government is far better than no government. A bad leader is far better than no leader.

We in America have had many bad leaders and many bad governments. We’ve survived with our mores intact. But heaven help us if we ever fall into anarchy.

From a political vacuum, most often there emerges the meanest, most bloodthirsty, immoral murder machine.

In every way, a vacuum sucks.

Rodger Malcolm Mitchell
Monetary Sovereignty

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Ten Steps to Prosperity:
1. Eliminate FICA (Click here)
2. Federally funded Medicare — parts A, B & D plus long term nursing care — for everyone (Click here)
3. Provide an Economic Bonus to every man, woman and child in America, and/or every state a per capita Economic Bonus. (Click here) Or institute a reverse income tax.
4. Free education (including post-grad) for everyone. Click here
5. Salary for attending school (Click here)
6. Eliminate corporate taxes (Click here)
7. Increase the standard income tax deduction annually Click here
8. Tax the very rich (.1%) more, with higher, progressive tax rates on all forms of income. (Click here)
9. Federal ownership of all banks (Click here and here)
10. Increase federal spending on the myriad initiatives that benefit America’s 99% (Click here)

The Ten Steps will add dollars to the economy, stimulate the economy, and narrow the income/wealth/power Gap between the rich and the rest.
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10 Steps to Economic Misery: (Click here:)
1. Maintain or increase the FICA tax..
2. Spread the myth Social Security, Medicare and the U.S. government are insolvent.
3. Cut federal employment in the military, post office, other federal agencies.
4. Broaden the income tax base so more lower income people will pay.
5. Cut financial assistance to the states.
6. Spread the myth federal taxes pay for federal spending.
7. Allow banks to trade for their own accounts; save them when their investments go sour.
8. Never prosecute any banker for criminal activity.
9. Nominate arch conservatives to the Supreme Court.
10. Reduce the federal deficit and debt

No nation can tax itself into prosperity, nor grow without money growth. Monetary Sovereignty: Cutting federal deficits to grow the economy is like applying leeches to cure anemia.
1. A growing economy requires a growing supply of dollars (GDP=Federal Spending + Non-federal Spending + Net Exports)
2. All deficit spending grows the supply of dollars
3. The limit to federal deficit spending is an inflation that cannot be cured with interest rate control.
4. The limit to non-federal deficit spending is the ability to borrow.

THE RECESSION CLOCK

Recessions begin an average of 2 years after the blue line first dips below zero. There was a dip in 2015. Recessions are cured by a rising red line.

Vertical gray bars mark recessions.

As the federal deficit growth lines drop, we approach recession, which will be cured only when the growth lines rise. Increasing federal deficit growth (aka “stimulus”) is necessary for long-term economic growth.

#MONETARYSOVEREIGNTY