Wednesday 7 November 2012

When Two Worlds Collide: The State and the City

I find that as I take the train from Brighton to London the approach of the train into London Victoria to be be a quite breathtaking. London's skyline is quite something to behold.

Tall and impressive buildings are always monuments to something, whether it be commerce of some terrible tower block that makes you think of the Eastern bloc.

In fact, on the approach into Victoria you can see to the right the City of London and to the left some truly horrendous perpendicular examples of architecture designed for people to live in. Both appear to be designed to dehumanise.

Since the economic crisis hit us in 2008, however, more and more on the approach to London one senses the impact that the buildings to the right of the train have on the people to the left of it. We are constantly reminded in our media that we are living in 'difficult economic times' which call for 'difficult decisions', but seldom are we reminded that why this situation has come about. Perhaps it is because banks lend even newspapers and media moguls money and advertise in their papers. After an initial outpouring of contempt for the banking industry a few years ago, focus has turned relatively swiftly from directing vitriol against this community, from political and media quarters, to those who, apparently, single-handedly bankrupted the nation through their vices. It just so happens that these people are, apparently, politically apathetic and passive. Namely, this is the poor and people on benefits. Despite the fact that the economic crisis has been caused largely by very rich people lending recklessly to relatively and even very poor people, the very poor are to be made scapegoats for the calamity in which we now face uncertain economic futures.

Iain Duncan Smith has again reiterated his desire to curb people on benefits from gaining State help after their second child. This is an astonishing thing for a Catholic to say, since whether as a Catholic you believe that the State has a role to play in the welfare of its citizens in terms of Catholic social teaching, or not, an important part of Catholic social teaching is about the transmission of human life and the family. To be pro-life is to welcome life, not to view each child as an economic burden on society. To be pro-life is to encourage marriage and family life - not to place restrictions on the number of children allowed to be born to a couple by using coercive means through the State.

Tonight I had a friend over for a beer or three. He works in the Housing Benefits department at Brighton and Hove City Council, where I used to work. He mentioned to me that already attitudes are 'hardening' in the office towards claimants. From what I remember of my time there as a temp, attitudes towards claimants was already pretty hard. In general, attitudes towards claimants are hardening. I must confess, too, that my attitude towards people I know who I lend money to, also are hardening because I don't have the money to lend. I earn little and am in debt.

Why should I pay for my friend's electric meter when he earns more than me on benefit and wastes his money more recklessly than I do? Of course, I could tell him to 'get a job', but I don't have much work myself and he has a 'communicative relationship' with his own saliva (the walls of his flat tell the story of this relationship), so I don't think many employers will take him. He's a friend, I know its stark freezing cold, so I lend. Of course, he won't pay back. It's very easy for me, who am in debt, to consider this man to be an economic burden, especially when I don't have the money in excess to lend/give. Unless I pray, I could very well begin to despise him because even though I know he is mentally ill and budgets even worse than I, I could view him as an economic drain.

Think not of what the State can do for you, but what you can do for the State
Yet, the simple fact of the matter is that when I do have money, I am very happy to lend money to him and spend lavishly in general. So is he, in fact, which is why on 'payday', when he gets money from the State, all of his money disappears on the very same day. The reasons for this are varied, but, be assured, he gives quite a deal of his money away to poor people who have run out of benefit and are waiting for their 'payday'.

I guess that what I am trying to say is that we, as Westerners, factor into our lives a great many relationships which we deem as important - and they are. Hopefully, these relationships are human! Bloggers, beware of your computer. Yet, one of the most subtle and powerful relationships that we try to ignore is our relationship with our bank account and money in general. Personally speaking, I have an uneasy relationship with money and my bank account. I am most happy when I have less than nothing because even though this destroys my 'prospects', it means that I know I'm broke so I don't even bother looking at my bank account anymore. It allows me to deny responsibility. In a way it is a form of denial of the financial problem, but in another way, it enables me to feel that I am indifferent to money. If I don't look at the debt, I can be generous. If I don't look at my bank account, I can keep buying tobacco, pay various bills and buy my friend's electric and go and venerate Our Lady of Czestochowa in Westminster and not worry about the debt I'm racking up with the bank.

But here's the thing. I buy my friend's electric and I don't expect the money back. I certainly don't demand interest. I don't expect the money to come back based on previous experience and the fact that he's got a communicative relationship with his own spit and Jim Morrison speaks to him. Meanwhile, while Jim Morrison talks to the man, I'm 'breaking on through to the other side' in the psychology of debt, knowing the debt gets larger, but going through the psychological barrier that says, 'No, sorry, I can't afford to give you anything, since I have less than nothing'. It's called the psychology of the overdraft. Well, that's what I call it anyway. Here is Jim, breaking on through...



Now, you might say, why are you telling me this? 'I've got debts too!', I hear you cry. Yes, you probably do, though, unlike me, you may have been more sensible with your money and saved for a 'rainy day'. The reason I'm relating this story to you is because if you accept this is my situation, imagine, then, what the situation is to the British State and presumably every European nation, and, exponentially, in the US in which a man who has racked up more debt than the last US President on things worse than tobacco consumption and electric, like war, for example, as well as caring for the welfare of his people through abortion, will most likely be re-elected, thanks largely to his Wall Street backers and friends in the Wall Street owned media (and yes, I know Wall Street back both candidates!)


So, here's the thing. I know my friend won't pay me back. I know the Lord loves a cheerful giver and I know (please God) the Lord will provide. I don't want anything back from him. I hope and trust that my reward will be in my soul. I trust in the Lord, or, 'In God, I trust'. This, however, is most likely not the attitude of those incredibly wealthy banking institutions (and families who own them) to whom the entire Western world is in debt to the tune of trillions. Perhaps an economist can help me here, but trillions of pounds, or 1 trillion, like that of the UK, might just be a debt that is impossible to pay back while this seemingly unending recession continues. Who knows, maybe if we sell everything we own and give it to the Rothschilds Group and Barclays, we'll be free of debt?


Now, despite his personal unpopularity, we see why Obama is able to win this Presidential race. President Obama is a deeply unpopular President. Americans sense that he is possibly a tyrant in the making and if they cannot see that they are blind. By all accounts he should be Jimmy Carter Mark II, but Obama is counting on his record, not as someone who will salvage the economy, or stop invading nations, or confront the banks, but who will 'look after the people'.

Romney, however, as we can see from his record at Bain Capital Investments, is prepared to make hard decisions, sack loads of ordinary people and make money out of the whole bargain for his huge firm in the process, enriching himself and his Wall Street friends at the expense of ordinary citizens.

And in all of this, it is very hard to see exactly what 'doing the right thing' means. What does it mean for future generations of Americans if the rug is pulled from those 'dependents' on the State payroll? What does it mean if these people are told they can't breed on benefits? What does it mean if Obama rolls out sterilisation for 15-year-olds without parental consent because he 'cares' so much for people? For ordinary people, in the US and the UK, it means hard, grinding poverty, dehumanization and begging if there is little or no work available, or if, in fact, like my friend, no employer wants to know you. Both of these men, Obama and Romney, will crucify you somehow, it is just a matter of time and manner. One will add more and more to the national debt by enrolling more people onto welfare, thus destroying your economy. The other will be hard and cruel in the short term and enact policies that might, possibly, lead to a stronger recovery in the long term, though, it has to be said, that is one large debt you have there in the US. Anything I can do in terms of financial mismanagement, the State can do a hundred thousand fold worse.

Yet neither of these two candidates, in the US, nor any of our politicians in the UK, will think of reforming those powerful institutions which have enabled this financial collapse to take place. Like it, or not, citizens in the UK and the US will have a bigger relationship with the State, but the enduring relationship that marks us in the UK and the US and Europe out, is our relationship with the Banking Sector. The point is that it is not just me, nor you, who looks at their finances and cacks their pants. It is the Government also. The Government knows it is in a deep cavity of debt from which there is no escape and the Banks are calling all the shots. Whatever the Governments do, in terms of cuts, they still need to borrow more and at interest. There is no way out of this debt. The debt is unpayable and the interest on the debt, I guess, is not negligible, especially when the debt racked up is so great.



Banking on the Culture of Death

Our politicians are never going to deal with this because, even were they to be good men (they'd get shot), they would not last long in their jobs if they did speak out. But we, as citizens of the United Kingdom, we have to ask ourselves the question whether, in this financial crisis, we are becoming pawns of some very rich and powerful people and no matter who gets elected in the US and the UK and Europe, we will continue to be viewed as commodities worth betting on and sacrificing for a particular project. We are part of a game, a gamble and the game is spread betting. In fact, right now, if you look at this site, even the Presidential election is part of the 'game' which takes place between 'investors'.

In America, as in the UK, it doesn't matter who wins the election because the victor is always, whether s/he likes it or not, inheriting a Government that is now and has been for a long time, at the service not of the people, but the people to whom that Government is in debt to the tune of millions, billions and now trillions. That Government is in debt to the banks and to those prestigious families who own the banks who need not be named.

So we see that when we elect someone, even more in the US, but too, in the UK, we are electing someone who, upon assuming power, realises that there are forces at work within and without Government to whom they ultimately answer: the banks who fund, lend to and ultimately enslave Government by means of usury - just as they do to ordinary citizens who are either incapable of managing their finances or do not want to do so for the sake of expediency. This is true for the Government and us.

Happily for Ian Duncan Smith, there is money in the treasury for him and his family, since he is employed by the State at the service of the banking industry. Unhappily, for those on benefits, the elderly, sick, mentally ill, poor families, there is no money in the treasury for them, since they are not employed by the State at the service of the banking industry. They are, apparently, 'parasites', unlike the leeches who sucked the UK economy dry only to be bailed out by you, for as long as you and your progeny shall live. Happily, for Obama, there is money in the long since emptied treasury for Obamacare and the expansion of the abortion and sterilisation of teenagers industry in the US, but there is no money in the kitty for promoting the family and life, even if he believed in them (which, happily for him, he doesn't).

Yet, in spite of all the political posturing that our elected leaders in the US, Europe and the UK insist on performing, the root of what is now happening to the citizens is grounded in the financial collapse and the debt. Remember that whole banks were bailed out by Government - that is, by taxpayers of today and the future, in order to protect their 'savings' (the savings and pensions which banks gambled on and lost). Yet, it is to the same banks that Governments are in debt to the tune of billions, trillions.

We know that because the Government debt is so very high that the cost of this enormous debt is one that is passed on to you and I and families for years, maybe generations to come. The only question is, and we really need to look at this, exactly what is going to be the human cost of this enormous debt in the years to come? Here is a clue:


Above is a video of 50 million pennies, each penny representing an unborn child who died at the hands of an abortionist. A penny seems so small and valueless, but when you put them all together, don't they just all add up? Here is another clue as to the human cost of our debt. It's called the Liverpool Care Pathway. It knocks off elderly and sick people before their time and even pays hospitals extra to do it.


Here is another clue. It's called Universal Credit (and the 'Bedroom Tax'), and if you lose your job, which you very well might, you might very well be on it.


Here is another clue as to the human cost of our debt since for reasons known to them, banking institutions, like Barclays and Coutts are funding and supporting this campaign, as Cardinal O'Brien knows only too well.


Here's another clue:


I could go on all night. The important thing is that all these things are either already in operation or planned to be put into practice according to the policies of the politicians in the US and the UK and it does not matter for which party or politician you vote. The reason they are here is because our value is no longer deemed to be noble because we are created in God's image and likeness. We are, unless we are productive to the economy - the 'City' if you like, consumers, tax payers and commodities. If we are not these things, then we are deemed to be nothing. The State cannot afford us anymore (as if it could in the first place) when we are not economically contributing or producing. The State is enslaved to banks and our politicians know it. So when they place the blame for the UK's stagnation and decline on the poor, on the elderly, on our population, on the benefits claimants, the disabled, the weak, the unproductive or 'unfit' for 'purpose' and trample human dignity into the dust in the process, remember to whom they will, ultimately, render an account. Them, and us. Not to the banks to whom the entire State is indebted though they are obviously terrified of them. No, not to them, but to Almighty God Himself of Whom they have no fear.

Whether the banks and the families who own the banking institutions intend for the drastic depopulation of the West and its incorporation into a province of China, I leave up to you to decide, but we are, because of our enslavement to a banking system built on a tissue of lies and deceit, headed towards a perfect synthesis of the State and the City in which the politicians who tell us we are to blame because we don't work hard enough ('work makes you free') may just as well be chairmen of the Board of Directors. Recall, for instance, that the same Tony Blair who left Downing Street making enemies of a whole country found friends in JP Morgan who gave him a job and rewarded him handsomely. The US election, which Barack Obama appears to have won, saw the spending of $2 billion. The majority of these donations came from Wall Street. What, other than incalculable human carnage, will Wall Street receive in return? Americans, sadly, have signed their own death warrant. I am sure that President Obama will be only too happy to perform the execution. For the culture of death, as well as being funded by banks, is also in turn funded by the citizens.

And, incredibly, the price of the debt owed to banks, isn't trillions. No. The price, ultimately, is indeed inestimable. The price of the debt is your liberty, my liberty, your family, mine, your home, your employment, mine, your fertility and mine, your unemployment benefits and even, the cost of your living expenses, mine, as you and I become less valuable and less 'productive' in the eyes of a banking State, your very life itself and mine. The Government are now and are to be treated as slaves, for this is, indeed, the 'Servile State'.
Indeed, were we to be divided into groups and assigned different demeaning roles in labour camps for the next 100 years for a small banking class and its politicians, the debt would still remain unpaid. It cannot be 'worked off', but that is, if you look at what Government is saying, more or less the general direction in which we are being led.

The debt we owe to Our Lord and His Blessed Mother is higher, of course, a debt we can never pay. But unlike the State and the banking class it serves, they love us more than we can possibly comprehend! The State and the banks to which the State and we are enslaved will doubtless inspire a degree of loyalty and service from many over the years to come, since they hold all the cards. They know they are held in contempt, but feared. They will never inspire our love or devotion. That is why the Servile State must and will eventually fall. Be assured that Our Lady must surely know this and she surely knows that only she and her Divine Son can help us, for the crossroads have long since been and long since gone. The coming years will bring a storm upon us, all of us, that will make Sandy appear a breeze. Keep the Faith. Share the Faith. Never give up Hope. Pray. She and her Immaculate Heart will triumph in the end. Obama and those he serves may be moving 'Forward', but God knows the end of wicked.


6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Good morning, Laurence.

As usual, good post. No need for publication of my comment but, just wondering whether anyone from the Guild has come across this:-

Catholic teaching: The new zeitgeist for Britain’s Left

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-20154986

God bless.
Sonia

Anonymous said...

A further link to that Radio 4 Boradcast on the "new Zeitgeist" or better referred to as "Politicians Pulling Our Legs".

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01npjpk

God bless
Sonia

John said...

Sorry if you cover this later in the post, but perhaps it's best to read about national debt online for a while then reconsider the point. You appear to equate national debt with consumer debt. Look, if I lend you ten pounds on the understanding that I will get 12 back, that is a debt to me of twelve pounds. When people say the state has a trillion pound debt, they didn't just go out and say 'lend us a trillion quid' to the Rothschilds (who, in any case, don't have a trillion to lend. The various scions of the dynasty have relatively modest personal wealthy - at least compared to uber-rich Russian magnates - and the bank is now largely owned by shareholders). The 'debt' of the nation must not be understood as a strict analogue of personal debt. When you were born the state instantly went into 'debt', because, presuming you live to see 65, they will pay you a pension and cover your health care. They are probably already paying a good deal of your rent. That is 'debt' in the sense that it's money they don't currently have but must find from somewhere, but it's debt to itself, not debt to an external creditor. The state is at once the debtor and creditor, it must raise the money to pay its obligations. So, when you come to 65 and claim your pension, or have your heart operation, or get your new hip then, presuming you haven't paid anything in to the system (or nowhere like as much as it costs 'the state', i.e. the rest of us who pay in, to provide for you) then 'the state' (again, that's all of us, not some shadowy puppet master) has to make up the difference. This difference is debt. In the short term it is borrowed on the international markets, in the medium term it is covered by raising taxes. Now, you may say 'ah, see! It IS borrowed from a third party - the international bond markets'. Well, this also isn't strictly speaking debt. There are two reasons for this:

1) The state (i.e. the electorate, including you) have an interest in services being provided on time. If old Mrs. England falls down and hurts her knee, she needs to go to a hospital. That hospital has high running costs. If the state has spent too much on pensions and benefits for the unemployed, it can't just say 'sorry, I'm not going into the red, close the hospital down'. It can't do this because a) 'the state' doesn't decide this - we decide it. We would kick out any government that did this. b) even then 'the state' would have to pay the contracts of the doctors, nurses and suppliers off, so it wouldn't save anything (the costs of a hospital are simply the fixed labour costs, these will be met even in the event of closure). So, 'the state' can't avoid debt. It is mathematically impossible for any modern state to consistently avoid debt, the planning of future expenses vs future income is just too complex. Managing the income/expense sheet of something as large as a government is like maneuvering an oil tanker. You can't just hit the brakes on spending and expect it to come to a halt - there is always a time lag between cause (cutting back on services) and effect (spending being reduced)

John said...

2) The bond market from which 'the state' (your pension pot) borrows money is not a loan. It's not like going to quick quid. The bond is a financial document that can be subsequently resold. A bond issuer agrees to pay a dividend per year for the life of the bond and then subsequently repay the bond at the end of its term. The idea here is to allow countries to handle the oil tanker of its finances more smoothly. If a nation has more obligations for the coming years than it has cash, it can borrow money and pay out a comparatively small dividend for the privilege. It then cuts spending and waits for the medium to long term effects to hit (i.e. reduced outgoings). Then the bond can be successfully repaid at the end of its term. Not a perfect system, but there is actually no other way to have schools, hospitals, roads, pensions, disability allowance etc. The problem for the UK is it has planned rather poorly by cutting at the wrong time, which means its tax receipts fall faster than its obligation, making it necessary to cut even further to pay back its bonds. Well, bad planning it is, but I'd be amazed if they got things right every time. And I'm sure they had (at least in some small way) the electorate's best interests at heart. After all, most people who do the math here are not elected politicians, they are market analysts employed to ensure (or try to) that you can still go to hospital in twenty years time, that you will still have a pension, and that you won't end up living in Greece.

Well, that's my two pennies worth. It's easy to complain, perhaps you can outline a sensible and financially measured alternative system of government? Communist was such an alternative. The basic (economic) idea was that the state would be, as far as possible, entirely responsible for its financial balance. To ensure this balance, the production of workers was calculated in advance (the 5 year plan) so that it could exactly match necessary spending and hence circumventing the need to issue or buy bonds (though they still did). I guess you don't need me to tell you that didn't really work so well. Again, the math is just too complex, they got things wrong so frequently that they ended up deeply in debt they couldn't repay (no one wanted a currency that had its value tied to a five year plan since there was no ability to make gains from speculation - you pretty much knew it would underperform your own currency in any given situation). Well, maybe you've got a new idea. I hope so, there's nothing worse than a whinger who lives by making facile and factually unfounded of the world he depends on for his sustenance.

Paul Stilwell said...

"...who, in any case, don't have a trillion to lend."

Isn't that kind of the whole thing about the money-changers called the banks? That they manipulate money itself in order to make money, to consolidate assets?

Fractional Reserve Lending, which in its present form legally has no limit?

The Bones said...

Well quite!

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