Here is what true experts say about Monetarily Sovereign entities like the United States government and the European Union:
Alan Greenspan: “A government cannot become insolvent with respect to obligations in its own currency.”
Alan Greenspan: “There is nothing to prevent the federal government from creating as much money as it wantsand paying it to somebody.”
Alan Greenspan: “The United States can pay any debtit has because we can always print the money to do that.”
Ben Bernanke: “The U.S. government has a technology, called a printing press (or, today, its electronic equivalent), that allows it to produce as many U.S. dollars as it wishes at essentially no cost.”
Quote from former Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke when he was on 60 Minutes: Scott Pelley: Is that tax money that the Fed is spending? Ben Bernanke: It’s not tax money… We simply use the computer to mark up the size of the account.
Statement from the St. Louis Fed: “As the sole manufacturer of dollars, whose debt is denominated in dollars, the U.S. government can never become insolvent, i.e., unable to pay its bills. In this sense, the government is not dependent on credit marketsto remain operational.”
Press Conference: Mario Draghi, President of the ECB, 9 January 2014 Question: I am wondering: can the ECB ever run out of money? Mario Draghi: Technically, no. We cannot run out of money.
Here is what people who are ignorant of Monetary Sovereignty say:
Although it’s volatile (like personal bank balances often are), the treasury’s cash pile of $57.3bn, recorded last Thursday, is by far the lowest figure for more than a year — and it’s well below the $150bn minimum that the treasury reportedly likes to keep as a buffer.
The X-date Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has said to lawmakers that the “X-date” — the date when the US can no longer guarantee its ability to pay bills— is June 1st.
If the US government does run out of money, the biggest problem is a default on its debt.
Most analysts agree that a default would lead to complete financial chaos but the reality is that it’s anyone’s guess, because it’s never happened before.
“Will someone please get me a longer rope, so I don’t have to kill myself.”
The current debt ceiling stands at a whopping $31.4 trillion, legally limiting how much the treasury can borrow.
Because the government has the infinite ability to create dollars, it never borrows dollars. Sadly, the public doesn’t comprehend that simple fact.
Talks between President Biden and Speaker Kevin McCarthy are set to resume today, as each side negotiates the latest fiscal package that would raise the limit, though both parties remain ideologically opposed on whether the new debt ceiling should come with deep cuts to, or caps on, federal spending.
The U.S. federal government has the infinite ability to pay its bills simply by pressing a computer key. It also has the infinite ability to raise the phony debt ceiling, which it already has done 94 times.
The spending that resulted in the current debt had been authorized by previous Congresses and previous Presidents. The current Republican House essentially is saying, “Even though the money already is spent, by both Democratic and Republican Congresses and Presidents — and even though we have infinite money to pay our bills — we aren’t going to pay what we owe.”
Sounds like something six-times-bankrupt Donald Trump would do. Despite being a billionaire, he has cheated many creditors, and now his party threatens to do what he has called “smart business.”
This is exactly what the 14th Amendment was written to stop.
(“The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned.”)
Now, the party of the biggest crook in Presidential history threatens to cheat our creditors unless the current President yields to their demands to raise your taxes (though not the taxes of the very rich) or to cut your benenfits (though not the benefits of the very rich).
Ironically, if President Biden invokes the 14th Amendment, the party that wants to cheat our creditors will claim that this is cheating the Constitution.
The question is, will the Democrats follow the Constitution and end the ridiculous “debt ceiling,” once and for all.
Then, we can leave it up to the right-wing SCOTUS, beholden to the “party-of-law-and-order,” to wriggle a way to claim that the Constitution really doesn’t say what it says.
Hey, they did it for the 2nd Amendment with regard to well-regulated militias; why not the 14th?
The “ticking time bomb” is the federal debt that supposedly is so big as to be “unsustainable.” You remember. It’s the “bomb” that has been sustained for 84 years.
If someone is wrong every year for 84 years, would you believe them? Unfortunately, some still believe the federal debt is “unsustainable,” a “ticking time bomb,” and should be combated with a debt limit.
I have no polite words to describe those people. Sadly, I now must tell you about “the world’s largest Ponzi scheme,” which, by no coincidence, also is the federal debt.
Peter Schiff
“Ponzi” is the latest term used by people who either don’t understand Monetary Sovereignty or don’t want you to understand Monetary Sovereignty.
With the U.S. reaching its debt limit of $31.4 trillion on Jan. 19, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen urged lawmakers to increase or suspend the debt ceiling.
Janet Yellen reveals that she knows the debt ceiling is unnecessary, useless, and harmful. Otherwise, she would ask that the debt be paid off.
She knows, however, that federal finance makes that not just unnecessary but impossible simply because the federal government is not the debtor.
That thing called “federal debt” isn’t federal debt. The actualfederal debt is the amount the federal government owes to vendors of goods and services purchased by the federal government but not yet paid for.
In short, the real federal debt also is known as “Accounts Payable” plus Interest Payable.
The actual federal debt is in the billions, not the trillions, and it is paid reliably every day.
Treasury securities, T-bills, T-notes, and T-bonds are deposit accounts, similar to bank safe deposit accounts that the government never touches.
When you invest in a T-security, you put dollars into youraccount from which only you can withdraw. Just as the contents of your bank safe deposit box are not the debt of your bank, the contents of your T-security account are not the debt of your federal government.
The government didn’t borrow those dollars. It merely holds them separately for safekeeping until you take them back.
Her plea was taken by Peter Schiff, famed investor, and market commentator, as an “official admission that the U.S. is running the world’s largest Ponzi scheme.”
Sadly, Schiff doesn’t seem to know what a “Ponzi scheme is. Quoting from Wikipedia:
A Ponzi scheme is a form of fraud that lures investors and pays profits to earlier investors with funds from more recent investors.
The scheme leads victims to believe that profits come from legitimate business activity (e.g., product sales or successful investments), and they remain unaware that other investors are the source of funds.
A Ponzi scheme can maintain the illusion of a sustainable business if new investors contribute new funds. Most investors do not demand full repayment and still believe in the non-existent assets they purported to own.
Federal T-securities have none of these characteristics.
They are not fraud.
Payment does not come from more recent investors but rather from each depositor’s own deposits and the federal government’s infinite ability to create its sovereign currency.
There is no claim that funds come from any business activity, legitimate or otherwise.
The government does not rely on new investors, nor does it rely on new depositors. The government does not have to accept deposits. Even if every T-security owner demanded payment, the government could comply today.
Peter Schiff merely is using a scare tactic to fool the public. Rather than being a Ponzi scheme, U.S. T-securities are the safest investments known to the world and will continue to be safe so long as no political party is foolish enough to enforce the ridiculous debt limit (aka the “screw-depositors-to-make-political-points” action).
A political stand-off over the debt ceiling has been raging since Republicans regained control of the House of Representatives in the 2022 midterm elections.
President Joe Biden beseeched Congress not to hold the item hostage, suggesting a default could be “calamitous.”
His warnings hit deaf ears in the case of opposing Republicans who used their votes on an extension as leverage to seek spending cuts.
The debt limit has nothing to do with spending cuts because it deals with past spending, not future spending.
The Republican extortion attempt just as easily could be directed at any federal laws, even those having nothing to do with federal finances.
How about enforcing the debt limit unless women Senators wear long dresses, Trump’s rioters are released from prison, or the Capital is painted purple.
All of those have as much relevance to a debt limit as demanding cuts to future spending. The debt limit is a child’s game of, “I’ll hold my breath until I get my way.”
The Treasury can use “extraordinary measures” in the coming months to cover its many financial obligations, including Social Security and Medicare disbursements, but these emergency funds are limited.
At the end of the day, the U.S. simply must borrow more money, as it has done many times before.
The notion that the creator of the U.S. dollar needs to borrow dollars from the people who use the dollar is obviously ridiculous. Where would the so-called “lenders” get the dollars to “lend” if the creator is precluded from creating dollars?
Congress has set the limit for federal borrowing since 1917, raising it over time as government spending and borrowing needs have increased.
Notice the arbitrariness of the above sentence. It correctly assumes Congress can, at its discretion, increase the “debt limit” without regard to the wishes of so-called lenders.” If it were a real debt, the “borrower” could not, at whim, decide to borrow unlimited amounts.
“The U.S. Treas. Sec. has admitted the only way to avoid a default on the National Debt is to raise the #DebtCeiling so the Govt. can borrow from new lenders to repay existing lenders,” Schiff, CEO and chief global strategist at Euro Pacific Capital tweeted on Jan. 16.
“This is an official admission that the U.S. is running the world’s largest Ponzi scheme.”
Oh, the ignorance! Oh, the lies. The “U.S. Treas. Sec.” admitted no such thing. The real way to avoid default is to eliminate the useless debt ceiling. We didn’t always have a debt ceiling. Why do we have one now? Taken from Wikipedia:
In 1979, noting the potential problems of hitting a default, Dick Gephardt imposed the “Gephardt Rule,” a parliamentary rule that deemed the debt ceiling raised when a budget was passed.
This resolved the contradiction in voting for appropriations but not voting to fund them. The rule stood until it was repealed by Congress in 1995.
Get it? When Congress voted for an appropriation, it also voted to fund them.
So, if Congress said, “We authorize spending a billion dollars on a dam,” that meant a billion dollars immediately became available to build a dam.
Makes sense to any normal person. Apparently, though, it was too logical for Congress.
In 1995, Congress said, “When we authorize spending a billion dollars to build a dam, we really don’t authorize paying a billion dollars to build the dam.”
And if that makes sense to you, you should run for Congress. Since that convulsion of childish illogic, Congress has plagued the nation with repeated debt limit crises.
The US raised its debt ceiling (in some form or other) at least 90 times in the 20th century.
The debt ceiling was raised 74 times from March 1962 to May 2011, including 18 times under Ronald Reagan, eight times under Bill Clinton, seven times under George W. Bush, and five times under Barack Obama.
In practice, the debt ceiling has never been reduced, even though the public debt itself may have been reduced.
It should be noted that never has the arbitrary increase of the debt ceiling caused any sort of financial difficulty. There has been no time bomb explosion, fraud, or Ponzi scheme.
In his podcast, Schiff claimed the U.S. government is in a doom spiral where it cannot pay its current lenders back, so it borrows from new lenders repeatedly.
And, oh yes, no “doom spiral.” Though the so-called “debt” has risen from $40 billion to $26 trillion, a 65,000% increase, the federal government still has no difficulty paying its bills.
“Why do people willingly participate? It’s because they don’t realize it’s a Ponzi scheme,” Schiff says.
It’s not.
“They think they’re going to get paid back. When they realize they’re going to be paid back in monopoly money, they’re not going to want to lend.
“Monopoly money”? Is that a scare term like “Ponzi scheme” and “ticking time bomb”?
“In fact, they’re not going to want to hold on to these Treasuries, and the only buyer is going to be the Federal Reserve. And that’s when the printing press is going to overdrive, and the dollar is going to fall through the floor.”
Gee, Schiff, exactly when is that going to happen. It didn’t happen while the printing press was running every day, every week, every month, and every year for the past 84 years. Why are things different now?
As Congress fights over the debt ceiling extension, U.S. credit rating and financial markets are at risk – but here are three assets that Schiff likes as hedges against economic volatility.
And here it comes, the real reason Schiff is serving up bushels of BS:
Wealthy young Americans have lost confidence in the stock market — and are betting on these assets instead. Get in now for strong long-term tailwinds.
Gold. Schiff has long been a fan of the yellow metal.
“The problem with the dollar is it has no intrinsic value,”he once said. “Gold will store its value, and you’ll always be able to buy more food with your gold.”
Except, Schiff neglects to tell you that gold has very little intrinsic value. Gold has less intrinsic value than aluminum, iron, copper, or paper. Gold isn’t used for much other than decoration.
A few teeth fillings, some electronics, that’s about it. Rather than intrinsic value, gold has demand value. People want the stuff mainly because it’s pretty.
As always, he’s putting his money where his mouth is.
Euro Pacific Asset Management’s latest 13F filing shows that as of Sept. 30, Schiff’s company held 1.655 million shares of Barrick Gold (GOLD), 431,952 shares of Agnico Eagle Mines (AEM), and 317,495 shares of Newmont (NEM).
In fact, Barrick was the firm’s top holding, representing 6.8% of its portfolio. Agnico and Newmont were the third and sixth-largest holdings, respectively.
Right. He’s promoting his holdings, trying to get suckers to buy gold.
Gold can’t be printed out of thin air like fiat money, and its safe-haven status means demand typically increases during times of uncertainty.
Except, we always are in times of uncertainty, and gold can be mined out of thin air.
The biggest problem with gold is it costs money to ship, costs more money to store, and costs even more money to insure. And the stuff pays no interest or dividends.
Gold is the classic “bigger fool” investment. Fools buy it hoping to sell it to bigger fools. If you are looking for absolute safety, with no shipping, storage, or insurance costs, plus income, buy T-securities.
Other than that, your best bet is one of the big stock funds. based on the S&P index or similar. And stop worrying about the misnamed federal “debt.” It’s not federal, and it’s not debt, and it’s not a ticking time bomb.
It’s just privately owned, federally guaranteed depositories of U.S. dollars. The only way the “ticking time bomb” can explode is if the debt nuts push the “debt limit” button.
The cure for the “debt limit crisis:” Simply return to the Gephardt Rule. Simple.
See the amazing penniless federal government. It’s poor. It’s destitute. it’s impecunious. Would I lie to you?
Even if the above laws actually exist, their foolishness pales in comparison to this one, the ultimate law for the ignorant:
Democrats Press Ahead With Debt-Limit Vote Amid Standoff With GOP Kristina Peterson, Kate Davidson
WASHINGTON—A partisan fight over raising the government’s borrowing limit is expected to ratchet up this week, with Democrats moving ahead with a vote in the face of strident GOP opposition, raising doubts about whether Congress will take action before the federal government runs out of cash.
Yes, we’re talking about the “Debt Ceiling,” that ultimate law for the ignorant.
The federal government, being Monetarily Sovereign, has the unlimited ability to create its own sovereign currency, the U.S. dollar.
The federal government has been creating dollars since the 1780s when it created the very first dollars from thin air.
It created as many dollars as it wished and gave those dollars the value it wished, imply by creating laws, also from thin air.
Since then, the only limits on federal dollar creation have been placed on the government by . . . the government.
Nothing limits the government’s ability to create laws, and nothing prevents those laws from creating dollars.
Interesting that no one complains about a law deficit, but people complain about a dollar deficit, when it is the laws that create the dollars.
GOLD STANDARDS
Intermittently in America, there have been periods of “gold standards,” in which the government declared, in essence, “We will create dollars only up to the amount of gold we have.”
But what does that limitation mean?
Assume the U.S. owned ten kilograms of gold. How many dollars would a gold standard allow the U.S. to create?
__________$10 million
__________$100 million
__________None of the above
__________All of the above
__________Whatever number Congress and the President want
See the problem? The answer depends on how many dollars per kilogram are allowed by U.S. government laws.
So, the answer is #5. All gold standards rely on Congress and the President to create laws that will determine the circumstances by which dollars will be exchanged for gold.
Through the decades, the government amended its laws that changed this exchange value many times, or when convenient, rid itself of a gold standard until, in 1971, President Nixon did away with all gold standards, on a permanent basis it is to be hoped.
Given that the government has the unlimited ability to create the laws that create dollars, and to endow these dollars with any value vs. gold it wishes, of what purpose is a gold standard?
Contrary to popular myth, gold never has “backed” the U.S. dollar, if “backing” means to give value or security to the dollar. The government, arbitrarily and without notice, can change the dollar/gold exchange rate, so exactly what value does gold provide to a dollar? None.
The U.S. dollar is a debt of the federal government.All debts are backed by collateral. Most debts have two or more levels of collateral: A physical item plus the full faith and credit of the debtor.
For instance, the collateral for a house mortgage is the value of the house plus the full faith and credit of the borrower. Together, they comprise the “backing” for the mortgage.
The only — ONLY — collateral for the U.S. dollar is the full faith and credit of the U.S. government. Nothing else ever has backed the dollar, not the Grand Canyon, not the Great Lakes, not the Missippi River, not the “amber waves of grain,” and not gold.
The acceptance of the dollar worldwide is based solely on the full faith and credit of the U.S. government, which fools in Congress now are determined to destroy.
The standoff has alarmed Wall Street analysts and business leaders, who in recent weeks have issued warnings about a rising risk of a technical default, in which the government might be unable to make all of its regular payments in full and on time.
The threat of such a default could derail markets and hit U.S. economic growth.
There never is a time when the government is unable to make its payments. That “technical default” merely means the government would be unwilling to make its payments.
If you owe $100 that contractually is due for payment this coming Friday, but today, Wednesday, you decide you are not going to pay any more bills this week, does that mean you are unable to pay or actually are unwilling to pay?
Activating the so-called “debt limit” or “debt ceiling” merely means Congress arbitrarily has decided not to pay any more bills, even though it has the unlimited ability to create dollars.
The debt ceiling is not a budgetary method. It is not a way to rein in spending. It does not demonstrate fiscal wisdom. It demonstrates spiteful idiocy, the desire by one political party to damage the other political party, the American economy be damned.
The budgets and spending already have happened. The debt limit is nothing more than a method for stiffing creditors.
All those who favor the debt ceiling, knowingly or unknowingly, want the United States of American to become a (take your pick) a welcher, a moocher, a deadbeat, a freeloader, a sponge, a parasite, or a reneger.
Employing a debt-ceiling is not a sign of thrift or prudence. It is the mark of a crook.
House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D., Md.) said Friday that the chamber would vote this week on a measure to suspend the debt limit and a short-term measure extending the government’s funding beyond its expiration at month’s end.
The correct wording for the above paragraph should be, “House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D., Md) said Friday that the chamber would vote this week for the U.S. government to pay its bills.”
It’s a disgrace that the House actually has to vote on whether or not the government should pay what it legitimately owes. What next? A vote on whether or not to hold elections in the future? A vote on whether or not to create sensible laws?
The House will “ensure that America pays its bills on time,” Mr. Hoyer said in a letter to House Democrats Friday.
How very reassuring.
Raising the debt limit doesn’t authorize new spending, but rather allows the Treasury Department to issue new debtto cover spending that Congress has already authorized, including payments to bondholders, Social Security recipients and veterans.
Republicans have said they won’t help Democrats raise the borrowing limit, as a protest over the trillions of dollars in new spending the party is moving through Congress.
Then we come to that oft-misused word, “debt.” In federal lingo, “debt” means T-bills, T-notes, and T-bonds, none of which are debt as you know it, and not even “bills,” “notes,” or “bonds.” And it definitely isn’t “borrowing.”
In the usual sense, borrowing is what one does when one wants money for some use. But the federal government always has had the unlimited ability to create dollars. So, it has no need to borrow.
Rather than “borrowing,” those T-securities represent deposits. When you invest in any T-security, you open a T-security account in your name and then make a deposit into that account.
The government — the so-called “borrower” — never touches those dollars as a borrower normally would. I doesn’t need your dollars.
Some time later, usually upon maturity, you take your money from that account. This erroneously is referred to a “paying off the debt,” but it actually merely means closing out your account and receiving your money.
Think of a bank safe deposit box. The bank never touches the contents. That is how T-security accounts operate.
Republicans have said they won’t help Democrats raise the borrowing limit, as a protest over the trillions of dollars in new spending the party is moving through Congress.
Again, it’s not “borrowing.” And it’s not frugality.
Let’s tell it like it is: The sole function of the debt ceiling is for the minority to obstruct the majority. There is no other purpose.
The “debt ceiling” has nothing to do with debt. It has nothing even to do with finances. It strictly is a political game, a dangerous political game, strictly played to thwart the opposing party.
It’s a game of “chicken,” with the future credit of the United States at risk.
“Let me be crystal clear about this: Republicans are united in opposition to raising the debt ceiling,” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) told reporters last week.
“If they want to do all of this on a partisan basis, they have the ability and the responsibility to ensure that the federal government not default, and they will have to take care of that,” Mr. McConnell said.
Democrats have pointed out that they voted with Republicans to suspend the debt limit three separate times during the Trump administration, including in the fall of 2017, when the GOP sought to advance tax cuts using budget reconciliation.
“We didn’t play games. We didn’t risk the credit of the country. We did it,” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) told reporters last week.
McConnell is a traitor in every sense of the word. He repeatedly has been willing to damage America if he feels that will benefit the Republican party.
Yet, you perhaps would be more impressed with the Democrats’ “holier than thou” position if they simply had voted to eliminate the useless, misleading, dangerous, downright stupid debt ceiling, altogether.
In a Sept. 13 letter, the heads of several financial-services industry trade groups urged congressional leaders to raise or suspend the ceiling and emphasized the vital importance of the U.S. Treasury market for investors around the world.
A coalition of real-estate and mortgage-industry groups sent a similar letter Sept. 16 warning about potential instability in the housing market stemming from a debt-limit impasse, and permanently higher borrowing costs.
Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has said her agency could run out of cash to keep paying the government’s bills some time in October.
Unless Congress raises the ceiling, the Treasury might need to halt more than 40% of its payments, including some to U.S. households, they estimated.
“With no clear path toward debt-limit resolution over the near term, we are at the point where this could begin to impact financial conditions,” they said in a note to clients.
The White House on Friday issued a more blunt warning: Failing to suspend the debt limit could lead to a recession, at a time when the Delta variant has already clouded the economic outlook.
The Republicans again demonstrate more loyalty to party over country, so a recession prior to the next election would be exactly what they want.
And guess which payments would be the first to be halted. All payments that benefit the poor and middle classes. The”Party of the Rich” will do nothing to hurt the rich.
And that’s what this game of chicken is all about.
Raising the debt limit wouldn’t facilitate future spending, and Congress would still need to raise the debt limit this fall even if no new major spending programs are enacted.
That is because Congress has already approved spending and tax policies that result in large budget shortfalls, which the Congressional Budget Office projects will total $12 trillion over the next decade.
In recent years, those budget gaps were driven by large bipartisan budget deals, a GOP tax cut and more than $5 trillion in pandemic relief.
The debt ceiling is the ultimate law for the ignorant. It is a con job on you, an innocent public, to make you believe it is a way for Congress to be thrifty.
But the whole notion of “thrift” for an organization that has the infinite ability to create money, makes no sense and is in fact dishonest. It is especially dishonest for the Republican party which specializes in giving tax breaks to the rich.
Sadly, by misusing words like “debt,” and “borrow,” and by equating the Monetarily Sovereign federal government with monetary non-sovereign states, counties, cities, business, and you, the two political parties have managed to convince you the government can’t afford to provide you with benefits.
So, no free Medicare for you and everyone. No free Social Security for you and everyone. No free college for your children. And, there are all those needless federal income taxes you pay, year after year.
You are being conned by the ultimate con job. Hello, sucker.
Gap Psychology describes the common desire to distance oneself from those “below” in any socio-economic ranking, and to come nearer those “above.” The socio-economic distance is referred to as “The Gap.”
Wide Gaps negatively affect poverty, health and longevity, education, housing, law and crime, war, leadership, ownership, bigotry, supply and demand, taxation, GDP, international relations, scientific advancement, the environment, human motivation and well-being, and virtually every other issue in economics.Implementation of Monetary Sovereignty and The Ten Steps To Prosperity can grow the economy and narrow the Gaps:
The largest one is in Washington DC and there is one in Skokie, IL. I’ve visited both.
The museums publish a magazine titled, “Memory & Action, the fall, 2017 edition of which contained an article titled, “History speaks to us for a reason.” It describes the neo-Nazi rally in Charlottesville, VA and the dangers of accommodating such loathsome and unAmerican attitudes.
A key sentence in the article was:
“The holocaust teaches us the dangers of unchecked hatred and that while it may start with the targeting of one group, it always spreads.”
Remember those words, “unchecked hatred” and “targeting of one group.” Some may feel safe with the hatred of blacks, browns, immigrants, gays, Muslims, or Jews. Some may even join in the hatred if they themselves are not part of the scapegoated group.
But it always spreads. When hatred is officially approved it knows no boundaries.
Another article in the magazine was titled “Why I Went to Auschwitz.” It was written by former all-star pro basketball player, Ray Allen, Jr. It was one of the most moving articles I ever have read.
It included these passages:
Why do we learn about the Holocaust? Is it just so we can make sure nothing like this ever happens again? Is it because six million people died? Yes, but there’s a bigger reason, I think.
The Holocaust was about how human beings — real, normal people like you and me — treat each other.
We shouldn’t label people as this thing or that thing. Because by doing so, you create these preconceived notions, which is how we get into these horrible situations in the first place.
Ray Allen recognizes the danger of people like you and me labeling other people as this thing or that thing. Today, the label is “illegals.” It is the label by which we justify hatred.
When a nation’s political leader labels Mexicans as criminals and rapists, and labels Muslims as terrorists, and claims Nazis and white supremacists are no worse than liberals, and labels Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) children as criminals and murderers, it marks the beginnings of that nation’s moral fall.
In yet another article, this one titled, “An Act of Faith,” we read these lines:
“The Nazis’ persecution of Jews and other minorities is inconsistent with the Christian commandment to love one’s neighbor,” said Father Charles Callagher.
“And yet radical church leaders like Father Charles Coughlin were able to sway vast numbers of Catholics toward antisemitism.”
How did people of faith reconcile their beliefs with a political ideology of hatred?
How indeed, could the “religious” excuse the words and actions of a philandering, lying, hate-mongering politician, and still call themselves righteous?
It is typically is one-sided, including such lines as:
“Senate Democrats barrel the United States of America toward a government shutdown at midnight.”
The Democrats are pushing for this shutdown because they are hellbent on getting amnesty for a significant population of illegal aliens who were recipients of the unlawful Barack Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) executive amnesty program.
The White House and congressional Republicans have been more than willing to offer a deal and proposal to handle this problem, but the Democrats have been unwilling to give up chain migration, the visa lottery, and funding for President Trump’s planned border wall.
The Schumer Shutdown is already proving to be very politically painful for Senate Democrats.
“Instead of voting to support our military and to ensure vulnerable children have access to health insurance, Baldwin went along with Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi to pick Washington over Wisconsin,” Alec Zimmerman, spokesman for the Republican Party of Wisconsin, said
The article goes on and on and on, devoting more than 15,000 words (!) to saying just two things:
The DACA children are illegal aliens who deserve no protection, and
The shutdown is all the Democrats’ fault.
Because the DACA children have been stigmatized as “illegal” and “alien,” they are perceived as non-human, foreign beings, to be shunned, deported, or worse.
In response to this shameful article, I wrote this comment:
Have you folks ever visited a Holocaust museum? There’s a big one in DC, a smaller one in Skokie, IL, and many others around the country. You should visit.
In these museums, you will see what cruelty does.
You will be amazed at how similar the Nazi’s hatred of the Jews is to some American’s hatred of undocumented immigrants. The same words are used to describe the scapegoats.
The German government falsely accused the Jews of all sorts of crimes; the purpose of these accusations was to justify the cruelty.
Now Trump accuses the immigrants of crimes to justify the incredible cruelty of deporting these men, women, and children.
Shall we kick down their doors, cram them into boxcars and ship them to misery and death. Has that become the American way, now?
Is that who we now are — today’s Nazis?
The similarities between Trump and Hitler are chilling — the boastful hatred of a group, the hatred of media who dare to criticize, the never-ending lies, the appeals to base instincts.
Equally chilling are the similarities between the German people who believed Hitler and the American people who believe and follow Trump. The same sarcasm, the same anger, the same false claims, the same rabid defense of the leader. The same cruelty masquerading as “defense of country.”
Some people say it can’t happen here, but it is happening already. It is happening. The most cruel and selfish among us are leading us now.
I pray we wake up before we become Nazi German, Nazi Poland, Nazi Romania, Nazi Austria and all of WWII Europe.
America, the America that makes us proud, is disappearing, and being replaced by a dark, shameful America. Don’t let this happen to you.
The response was typical, predictable, and inadvertently proved exactly what I said. Here are some word-for-word examples:
“If by ‘living among us’ you mean displacing US workers, lowering wages, and sponging off of our tax dollars. If you were under employed or unemployed by these illegals then maybe you too would see them as ‘MONSTERS’, (your word). Let them go back to their shΐthole countries and eat garbage. I DON’T CARE.”
“We have to be relentless in hanging this on Chuck Schumer and the DEMONRATS and their RINO comrades. NO DACA! BUILD THE WALL! DRAIN THE SWAMP!”
“Shut it down AND ensure that welfare bums get no checks. The leftist scum will be calling their congressman on their Obama phones and crying LOUD!
Bring on the shutdown leftist scum!!!”
“This Democrat shutdown is over AMNESTY. Democrats demand our President DROP TO HIS KNEES and kiss their arses to SCREW THE AMERICAN PEOPLE and give amnesty to illegal aliens. NO MORE AMNESTY. F__ Amnesty and F__ Democrat Liars and F__ MSM “journalists”. To HELL with the DC Shithole. Bring on November!”
“If they don’t fund the government by 10PM, then Republican Senators should end the filibuster, deport them all, and fund the wall.”
“Pelosi snuck out to the dog park to have a big DogShyte Sundae…Two scoops for Nasty !! #releasethememo !”
“He’s the delusion idiot. #1 these aholes are not citizens are was the Jews. #2 An ethnic group is not being targeted even if the majority of them are #3 It’s only about enforcing laws, not ethnic cleansing. Bu then you lame ass lefties love the distortion and hyperbole of propaganda and slinging analogies that don’t fit. You and your whole ilk are pathetic losers!”
Some of the above may come from Russian bots. Reportedly, their online comments are more numerous than real comments, so it’s hard to know which are which.
But, if ever you go to Breitbart, or any other extreme, right-wing site, you will see essentially the same language. You will see the “unchecked hatred” and the “targeting of one group” the Holocaust Museum warns us about.
You will see the labeling and the preconceived notions Ray Allen lamented about.
While any nation always has latent bigotry and xenophobia lurking in the background, there have been only a few times in recent American history where this has come to the fore.
Democrat Franklin Roosevelt’s wartime mass detention of Japanese American citizens is a permanent stain on our history. It was caused by war hysteria beginning with the Pearl Harbor bombing.
Roosevelt offered no proof that American citizens of Japanese descent offered any danger to America, but his words appealed to a frightened populace, all-too-ready to hate an “enemy.”
Shortly after the war, during Democrat Harry Truman’s administration, Republican Senator Joseph McCarthy gained power and notoriety for labeling his enemies as “communists,” and to a lesser degree, as “homosexuals.”
He had no proof of these claims, but he had a loud megaphone, and his words appealed to the weak-minded who wished to blame someone, anyone, for their own failings.
The rampant xenophobia McCarthy created cost many of his victims their jobs; they both personally and financially often were ruined.
Today, it is happening here again: A politician gains followers and political power by railing against supposed “aliens,” or “enemies of the state.” Those who protest against the lies and unfairness are themselves labeled as “soft on crime, “soft on aliens,” or soft on whatever the politician wishes to stigmatize.
In every case, innocent men, women, and children are injured unfairly by the politician’s lust for greater power. In every case, America is damaged, not only by the loss of good people, but by the loss of reputation.
We Americans like to think of ourselves as the model for all other nations, the place where the rest of the world aspires to be. But with each McCarthy wannabe, that reputation is damaged.
As a result, never since the beginning of World War II, has America been held in such low esteem. We have become pariahs on the international stage.
And the fault is our own. No excuses. No lies. We did this, and we continue to do this to ourselves.
It’s time to take down the Statue of Liberty as a meaningless sham. We have lost what it once stood for.
America no longer is the brave “golden door.” We are bigots and cowards now.
“Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”
#Monetary Sovereignty - Mitchell 