Ron Paul and Ben Bernanke and Who screwed up the Economy
 

Nice to see that Ron Paul "gets" it.

Cliff Notes:

1. The Federal Reserve creates money. When money is created, interest rates go down. The Federal Reserve is supposed to create money when the economy slows down (to boost economic growth), and take money out of the system when the economy is strong (to prevent inflation).

2. Too much cheap money creates asset bubbles (dot com stock market bubble of the late '90's early '00's, and the latest residential real estate bubble).

3. Former Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan pumped a ton of paper money into the system to bail out Wall Street on a number of occasions.

4. When there is too much paper money floating around, the value of it drops relative to the currencies of other nations.

5. When the dollar drops, things that we import, like crude oil, get a lot more expensive.

6. Alan Greenspan, that retard of a f*ck, helped mess up this country.

See Ron chat here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yAwvlDJgJbM

Great stuff here. I've already forwarded this to everybody I know :hee:

-spence

I just watched that video. Wish I understood more about economics. I'm retired and I'm getting "a little nervous". Hope the powers to be are :eyes: out for our interest. You two guys are doing a fine job---keep it up! :spin::claps:

ron paul is the best one as i see it.....i have researched for what he stands for and i like it.........

I'll second what Gary b said.

Need a FishPooPoo translation
 

Yes, we do.

For us Chance the Gardner types.

thanks for posting that B-

when you create too much paper money that isn't backed by anything of real value (like gold), bad things happen.

1. the previous federal reserve dude (Alan Greenspan) printed too much new paper money, because he's an idiot.

2. the u.s. government has been spending more than it has been taking in in tax dollars and fees. so it has to borrow. when it borrows, it creates more funny paper money (in the form of IOU's backed only by the full faith and credit of the U.S. government). you think it's bad now ... wait until medicare spending starts to explode.

3. the u.s. consumer is borrowing too much and not saving enough. when he borrows on his credit card, he creates more funny paper money.

4. the u.s. consumer is buying way too much from overseas.
when he imports more than he exports, he creates more funny paper money (the difference has to be financed with an IOU). China has a lot of IOU's from us, to the tune of $1.3 trillion. all that was created from ... thin air.

what happens when we have too much paper money floating around that gets created out of thin air?

A) inflation and asset bubbles. lots of hot money chasing questionable investments. remember the dot.bomb stock bubble of the late '90's? remember the housing boom? do you know why plugs are selling for $50 now?

B) the dollar becomes increasingly worthless vs. other currencies. so we have to spend more to import things like oil and all other commodities (which, by convention, have been historically priced and traded in U.S. dollars). that's partly why oil has been going through the roof. this itself is inflationary!

we're f*kked, thanks mostly to Alan Greenspan, thanks to the idiots in Congress who can't balance a budget (the Prez is undisciplined too), and thanks to American consumers who have no discipline.

now I see why you want to buy gold

I wish I had when I wanted to 15 - 20 years ago

Did Greenspan do this on his own? or was there no choice or a gun to his head? WTF I don't like where this country is heading
time for a revolution

why am I the only one that thinks things are going well?

pretty much. he opened the floodgates when a hedge fund - Long Term Capital Management - blew up in 1998. there was a lot of wall street money tied up in that thing, and wall street was clamoring for greenspan to help bail wall street out. these insitutions should have been forced to take losses. that's capitalism. you take a risk, you reap the rewards or loss. if the fed bails you out by loaning you easy money, that's socialism for wall st.

this helped spur the dot.bomb stock mania a few years later. and then he slammed on the brakes too hard trying to cool it down. idiot.

then right after 9/11 he opened up the floodgates again. causing this housing mess (cheap money = everybody wants to flip real estate).

there's more, but that's the long and short it.

sure, if you think $5 / gallon gas is okay.

Maybe because you have a great job and have owned your home for years.

Why is it that in todays world, a home costs 6 to 7 times an average yearly salary when back when our parents bought a home it only cost about 3 times a yearly salary? We are getting screwed, don't you see it?:wall: Medical costs rising everyday, insurance goes up. Oil rises, everything goes up. When the hell is it going to get back down?:smash:

it will go down when people make less money or there are less people.

People 'make' less money every year. cost of living (expenses mentioned above; housing, oil, health care etc) are rising, but are salaries rising at an equal level?

well, we could envision a scenario where healtchare continues to go up, oil continues to go up (remember: China and India are just starting to drive cars), and the u.s. economy goes DOWN.

in other words, stagflation.

I thought personal income was at an all time high?

I guess that was more of a question. What I know about economics fits in a very small hat!

doesn't mean jack if the average person's purchasing power has been eroded substantially over time. great. wages are up 5%.

the gov't says inflation excluding food and energy prices is about 2%-3%. what a crock.

it's your personal inflation that matters. how much more are you paying in fuel (heating and gasoline/diesel), medical expenses, and now, food than you were a few years ago? betcha it's a f*ckload more than 2-3% / year. Try like 10-20% annually.

sounds about right. my vehicle gas expense for my wife and i is close to $400

That was my point/question.
If thats your fuel costs alone, did your salary bump accordingly, or is your net now less?

Very true Fishpoo. The whole "market basket" of consumables that goes into calculating inflation is weighted too heavily toward food and clothes and not enough to energy. Inflation is here big time.