Dear M,

I think I am with you on this one. It’s a sad, sad day when the democrats are starting to look like the fiscally conservative ones.

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I look at things in terms of where the money goes.

If McCain gets into office who knows what countries we’ll be invading and fighting. An endless round of fighting. After reading his book Faith of my Fathers it’s clear he just does whatever the hell he wants. But he’s going to cut pork barrel spending! Really? Then what about the other 99% of waste and wanton printing of money?

Only slightly less disastrous is Obama’s ex nihilo tax-the-hell-out-of-business something-for-nothing government-can-help-with-everything approach. Two examples:

1) In a forum I heard a questioner complain about how businesses were going overseas and what would he do about it. Answer: tax the businesses mercilessly. What?

2) Also, in his book he says that the privatization of Social Security (here’s another idea, let’s let people just keep their money) will create losers. Well, we can’t have that can we! The problem is the non-privatization of Social Security also creates losers, except the loser is the person who actually created the wealth.

I did the math: if the taxes I collect out of my worker’s checks were invested, they would each retire with about half a house. I wonder how that measures up with what they will (might) get back from the Social Security program.

I’m still doing a lot of reading and studying. It may not seem like it, but I may still come around to Eric’s point of view. I admit that other theories might turn out to be right.

Of course, it hardly matters what the candidates are saying now. It’s all a farce. The real objective is to part the commoners from their labor (through inflation/printing of money, income tax, and lawsuits). There is a class of people who are not producing anything of value. The system is designed to protect that group and assure their lifestyle.

Imagine a settlement where only barter is allowed. Let’s say a complex community of 10,000 people. A man walks into the pie shop. Give me two cream pies, please, he says. The pie shop owner asks what he has in value to give in exchange. Oh, nothing, he says, I’m on my way down to the lake to relax for the day, I don’t really have anything to trade.

I don’t think a reasonable person would give him the pies. In fact, I think this individual would be driven out of town on a rail in short order because the deception would be readily apparent. His sloth would be on display for all to see.

The system of paper money we have currently is extremely adept at hiding this man behind layers upon layers of exchanges that we accept as fair. In fact, the entire banking system is a farce designed to make a switcheroo of valuable and tangible goods for paper. But it’s paper that can be in turn switched out for other goods. It’s like a game of musical chairs, but every round a commoner is dropped off into poverty. Four lawyers retire to Villas in Italy while four hundred workers are ruined.

Even if that hypothetical town had gold-backed money it would be the same deal. Only slightly less transparent.

I’m not talking about welfare moms here, or food stamps. While I believe those programs would be better administrated by private charities run on donations, I am talking about the bailouts. Those are one thousand times worse.

I was reading yesterday about the Fed “pumping 70 billion into the economy”. Really? That’s amazing! They left their offices for the day, rolled up their sleeves and created 70 billion worth of goods that could be used to tangibly improve the lives of their fellowmen?! Why these must be gods on earth! That’s a real fish and loaves miracle.

Hey, I’ll bet the value of the dollar will go up now.

On the other hand, BTP has accomplished at least this one thing: I got one welfare mom off the dole. She just bought her first house this last month. I think I just got more actual work done than the Federal Reserve did by electronically creating 70 billion dollars of fake money.

OK, now another mental exercise. Make a short list of all the actual tangible things you have in your life that make it better (goods and services). I’ll start:

All of those things were produced by labor. If the government cut you a check for $200,000 and you went out and spent it on those types of goods and services, does that change where they came from? Where did that money come from? It came from Blue Table Painting. I have less of those things so that you can have more. My studio is smaller, my paycheck is smaller, my house payment is smaller, I can’t afford to go to the dentist.

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But I should stop complaining because I still have it pretty good, right? Tempting, but no.

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It’s because whenever my business is suppressed by taxation, it by association suppresses all the people that work for the company. And that really bothers me.

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Real wealth can only be created by honest work.

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