The only one who really “gets” the extent of the institutionalized corruption that is the Federal Reserve is Ron Paul. I have not read his books, but this point seems clear enough. If you really step back and look at the big picture, it the fragility of our financial system, and systemic theft enabled by the fractional reserve banking system–that in turn is enabled by the Fed–that makes us vulnerable.
When we got hit on 9/11, it caused finanacial instability and an economic downturn the world over. This is a slick machine that is not robust. It appears to go fast, but it falls apart just as quickly. There are too many gears and wheels that are interdependent, and too many single points of failure.
I will not say that the wars we have fought in Afghanistan and Iraq were not worth it, but I will say that far more Americans have died in those wars than died on 9/11. Had we not fought those wars, it is far from clear that we would have lost 6,000 or more Americans–whatever the combined deaths from both those wars and the ones off the books–in terrorist attacks. Nor is it clear that such attacks would have cost the amount of money we have spent on these wars.
In my view, our financial system should be constructed such that a nuclear detonation in New York would be horribly tragic, but not crippling. Economies needs to be more local and more robust. Ending the Fed and the Fractional Reserve Banking System will do that.
We lost a lot of good people when Pearl Harbor was hit, but the situation was different. We faced an aggressive foreign power intent on conquering large sections of the planet, and possessing the military power to do it. At some point, there was plausibly reason to believe we would not just lose Hawaii but face foreign attacks on our own soil.
We face no such threat from the Islamists. They can kill people, and this is bad, but in my personal view they lack the capacity to inflict mass casualties on us, absent the help of a major foreign power, like Russia. Yes, several attacks have been averted over the last decade, and others not, like Maj. Hassan’s treasonous and shameful jihad on his own comrades, but in sum if they had all taken place, would we have lost more people and more money than we have in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan? It is impossible to say, but those who would argue no do so from a very defensible position.
Me, I don’t know. Are we preventing terror attacks originating in Afghanistan being there? If you argue, as I have, that the 9/11 hijackers had to have had the help of a major intelligence service, then it becomes clear that we have grossly overestimated the actual capabilities of these terrorists.
Are we containing Iran? Maybe, to some extent. We were doing better when Bush was President. We have a platform to attack them, if need be. But are we willing to do that? Should we do that? Candidly, if they start posturing like they are going to use their nuclear weapons–which they will have, sooner or later–our best military play is a first strike. We have the weapons, and this risks no American lives.
I used to care more about the lives of Iraqis than I find myself able to now. We have lost a lot of people, and spent a lot of money to get them to this point. And we are in any event drawing down, so this one is more or less already in the history books.
If we bring most of our troops home soon, I think that would be a good thing.
Few musings.