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FEATURE ARTICLE |
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Are US Taxpayers Bailing Out Greece?
Powell Gammill Date: 02-16-2010 Subject: Legislative Mischief Last week we were reminded that ours is not the only country suffering from severe economic turmoil. The Greek government is the latest to come close to default on their massive public debt. Greece has insufficient funds in their treasury to make even the minimum payments that are now coming due. Their
debt level is about 120 percent of their gross domestic product and
their public sector absorbs what amounts to 40 percent of GDP. Any
talk of cutting costs and spending is met with violent protests from
the many Greeks heavily dependent on government payments. Mounting fears of default have sent shockwaves through their creditors and all of the eurozone countries.
But
there have been statements made by the European Central Bank to calm
fears and give assurances that Greece will get the aid it needs. Details of agreements are not forthcoming.
Is it possible that our Federal Reserve has had some hand in bailing out Greece? The
fact is, we don’t know, and current laws exempt agreements between the
Fed and foreign central banks from disclosure or audit.
Greece is only the latest in a series of countries that have faced this type of crisis in recent memory. Not too long ago the same types of fears were mounting about Dubai, and before that, Iceland. Several other countries (Spain, Portugal, Ireland, Latvia) are approaching crisis levels with public debt as well. Many
have strong ties to Goldman Sachs and the case could easily be made
that default could have serious implications for big US banking cartels. Considering
the ties between the Fed and these big banks, it is not outlandish to
wonder if the US taxpayer is secretly bailing out the entire world,
country by country, even as our real unemployment tops 20 percent. Unless
laws are changed to allow a complete and meaningful audit of the
Federal Reserve, including its agreements with foreign central banks,
we might never know if this is occurring or not.
This global financial crisis is a predictable result of secretive central banking and unsound fiat currency. Governments
are entirely committed to this system of fiat money and fractional
reserve banking for obvious reasons: it enables them to do what they
love most, namely, spend hoards of money with near impunity. Without the limitations of sound money, governments will spend without limit. They
will spend money to hire their cronies, pay off special interests, give
out favors, create dependence and generally distract from the terrible
job they do at their chief mandate, which is to protect the liberties
of the people. Fiat money is a blank check to
government, which is very dangerous, and we are witnessing the death
throes of the system as the bills come due and the underlying capital
is squandered away.
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