HOW TO GO BROKE AND INSANE SIMULTANEOUSLY

Below is a small portion of an article out of MISES (Ludwig Von Mises Institute) http://mises.org/daily/4872

It is titled WHY THIS GIGANTIC APPARATUS?

I cut to the chase and narrowed it down so readers will get a small taste of the type of common sense that is found at the Mises Institute. If you are the kind of person who is interested in less "big" government and more personal freedom, then this institute would appeal to you. Enjoy reading the perfect financial planning lesson on "How to make a county financially (and perhaps morally) bankrupt:

Some 1,271 government organizations and 1,931 private companies work on programs related to counterterrorism, homeland security and intelligence in about 10,000 locations across the United States.

An estimated 854,000 people, nearly 1.5 times as many people as live in Washington, D.C., hold top-secret security clearances.

In Washington and the surrounding area, 33 building complexes for top-secret intelligence work are under construction or have been built since September 2001. Together they occupy the equivalent of almost three Pentagons or 22 U.S. Capitol buildings — about 17 million square feet of space.

Many security and intelligence agencies do the same work, creating redundancy and waste. For example, 51 federal organizations and military commands, operating in 15 U.S. cities, track the flow of money to and from terrorist networks.

Analysts who make sense of documents and conversations obtained by foreign and domestic spying share their judgment by publishing 50,000 intelligence reports each year — a volume so large that many are routinely ignored.

According to retired admiral Dennis C. Blair, formerly the director of national intelligence, after 9/11 "the attitude was, if it's worth doing, it's probably worth overdoing." I submit that this explanation does not cut to the heart of the matter. As it stands, it suggests a sort of mindless desire to pile mountains of money, technology, and personnel on top of an already-enormous mountain of money, technology, and personnel for no reason other than the vague notion that more must be better. In my view, national politics does not work in that way.

As Priest and Arkin report, "The U.S. intelligence budget is vast, publicly announced last year as $75 billion, 2 ½ times the size it was on September 10, 2001. But the figure doesn't include many military activities or domestic counterterrorism programs." Virtually everyone the reporters consulted told them in effect that "the Bush administration and Congress gave agencies more money than they were capable of responsibly spending." To be sure, they received more than they could spend responsibly, but not more than they were eager to spend irresponsibly. After all, it's not as if they were spending their own money.

DailyGlobeReview: Consider this a counter-revolution brainstorm #1.1 : california ballot initiative to recognizing the incorrigible illegality of the federal government

DailyGlobeReview: Consider this a counter-revolution brainstorm #1.1 : california ballot initiative to recognizing the incorrigible illegality of the federal government

here is one California mans suggestion to escape from a corrupt government. It is 2010, it might be interesting to watch what they next decade brings forward for a return to honest, accountable government. Or not.

I think there will be an entirely new industry created in the next decade or two. I call it the "industry of accountability", and it will be an entire system of specialties created to instill ethical behavior and integrity into a world which today is run on the premise that the man who lies the best wins. Or the man who steals the best wins. Or the man who destroys others the best wins.

Any number of situations, financial, political, business enterprise, all run the best by those who lie, cheat and steal the best. That simply must change. The industry of accountability is my hope for that change.

After our next great depression (which we are now creating) I hope that people in North America will have learned enough about letting foxes run the henhouse. I hope there is a huge backlash against people who choose self interest over the public interest. Yes, I know, we all do that, and there is no stopping it. But where it is done by our political leaders, business leaders, etc, we have the right to enforce breach of trust and negligence laws and put them in jail.

That is the industry of accountability. Instead of employing lawyers and accountants to help crooks to cheat the system, there will be an entire workforce of professionals employed in protecting the public interest, monitoring public servants, and holding them accountable and responsible for their lies and for their damages.

Just like today, we no longer accept and remain quiet about types of abuses. Just like today we question the Catholic church and how they hurt people. I believe that given time, north americans will have had enough of lying cheating stealing and "organized crime" by our trusted leaders. When we start to put these people in jail and take away their money and property, then we will begin down the road to a safer, more prosperous society.

That is my story and I am sticking to it. I am Larry Elford and I work in the industry of accountability. I am a financial investigator, specializing in investment abuses, and my work on behalf of the public interest can be found freely at www.investoradvocates.ca (industry tricks of the trade)

and

www.breachoftrust.ca (investment industry abusing employees and customers)

Alberta Finance Minister (new) Ted Morton, just cannot come any cleaner than his predecesor Iris Evans.

Ed and Ted’s Adventures

Recent news revealed a world renowned institution caught “protecting itself”, instead of “protecting its victims”. I see identical hubris with our premier and finance minister.

Over one billion dollars of Albertan’s money is missing in toxic investments. Two western Canadians are dead by suicide. You would think that Ted and Ed would be honest with the public, but no. They act similar to how my two year old nephew does when he has a bathroom “accident”. First try to hide it. Then deny it. Then perhaps put on an angry face of indignation. This forgiveable behavior for a two year old, but for Ted and Ed? It seems evident of persons who should not be in leadership nor trusted with money.

For those who are out of the loop, this investment paper turned out to be junk that was sold by investment salesmen, and the assets were then pledged to foreign banks (Deutsche bank in our case), in a complicated insurance process called a credit default swap. Not many people know or care what a credit default swap is, but imagine if you and your friends could buy insurance on your neighbors home. Then imagine if someone were to burn that home so that you and your friends could collect the insurance money. Apply that pathology to finance and you know the basics and the dangers of credit default swaps. They can be financial weapons of mass destruction.

$32 million of city tax revenues were lost in these by our city treasurer. Another billion or so from other Albertan’s.

Ed and Ted’s excellent financial regulators gave investment firms permission to sell this toxic junk in Alberta. It granted them permission to violate Alberta Securities Laws to do so. It has given several thousand such permissions without a single notice to the public. And neither Ed nor Ted is willing to tell us why. After all it is only billions of your money. Ted has not lost a nickel so why should he care? Ted now informs me that he will not answer this question of “why”. Nor will he tell why secret deals like this are done without any public notice. An accident Ted? Hiding something from the public?

Contact the writer at lelford@shaw.ca if you would like to become part of the solution.

Larry Elford

The industry of accountability would pay for itself. An entire league of accountants, lawyers, police, investigators., etc, would be employed to rein in rampant and runaway damage to our planet and the people on it, by those who are a bit over-enthusiastic in the accumulation of money. Overenthusiastic to the point where they will hurt others in order to get ahead. That must be curtailed. The industry of accountability would pay for itself in savings by those who today get away with rampant greed, and rampant destruction of the environment. We are now paying billions if not trillions to support an industry of greed, of fraud, of ruin. We just need to take this excess "energy" and see it spent on positive, proactive and protective measures, rather than on selfish, self destructive measures.

On the other hand, people who want to help others, make a fortune, improve the planet, etc, are welcome to become as wealthy as the world allows. No limits. Complete freedom, just as Milton Freidman would have wanted. It just has to be done without making others suffer.

That is my wish for capitalism today. Not, as Michael Moore might suggest, that it needs to be put to sleep. Not that we need convert to socialism, communism, alcoholsim or any other form of ism that might make us feel good for a day. We might just start with the part that Milton left out. With freedom.......comes responsibility. Starting now.

Humanism. A new form of capitalism

The name is HUMANISM.

The game is how to improve Capitalism so that it can function as it should, without resorting to so much financial cannibalism of each other. So much greed, and so much financial abuse.

We have seen Communism. We have seen Socialism. We have seen Capitalism. They could all be defined this way:

In the first one, man is allowed to exploit his fellow man. In the other two it is just the opposite.

Humanism, on the other hand, is where human beings and human lives are given a place of importance. A priority if you will. How?

Humanism is Capitalism with accountability. With responsibility for ones actions. Not simply the kind we have now were the man with the most lawyers beats up the other man with the least. But real, societal support for fairness, and accountability. Where when one man is beaten or abused by another by capitalistic means, the entire society acts in a manner to correct this. Where predators are not simply allowed to prey on the weakest members of society at will.

Milton Freidman, the Nobel winning economist, with his "FREE TO CHOOSE" motto, left only one small item out. That item is the fact that with freedom comes responsibility. As we all tell our 16 year old when we first give him the keys to the family car. We need to put together a world where every one of us is told the same thing; "with economic freedom, comes a responsibility to behave in a manner appropriate". If you do not, you will be held to account.

Greed is good.......but not it if is used to hurt others. It all too often is allowed to.

Accountability means an entire new industry being introduced. An industry to ensure responsible humane behavior. To curtail the financially insane. To hold them to account for the damage done to other humans, or to the planet. It is an attempt to make our economy sustainable, and sustainable for more than just the top 1% of the population.