Chapter 4, Central Banking and the Rise of the Money Power is now available here on this website, complete with end notes, along with previously published chapters 1, 2, and 3. Click on the links below to access the text and the audio narration directly. Additional chapters will be posted as they are completed here. Watch for Chapter 5 to be posted in about two weeks.
As always, your comments and suggestions will be welcomed. Thomas
Chapter 3, The Contest for Rulership—Two Opposing Philosophies. is now available. You can find it on my website, complete with end notes, along with previously published chapters 1 and 2. Click on the links below to access the text and the audio narration. Additional chapters will be posted as they are completed here. I expect to complete Chapter 4 and post it around the end of this year.
As always, your comments and suggestions will be welcomed, Thomas ___________________
I feel sorry for the Ukrainian people, not only have they been conscripted to fight a proxy war for the US against the Russians, a war in which despite massive financial and military support they are being slaughtered; they have now been selected to be a demonstration project for a US-created information system that gives the Kiev government all the information it needs to control every aspect of their people’s lives. Little by little, place by place, Big Brother is enslaving the masses.
I asked Bing Chat to give me a summary of the history, development and capabilities of the Diia phone app which is the heart of the system now being deployed. Here is what it gave me:
Generated by Bing Chat, Monday, October 2, 2023
The Diia app is a mobile application, web portal, and brand of e-governance in Ukraine that was launched in 2020 by the Ministry of Digital Transformation of Ukraine . The app allows Ukrainian citizens to use digital documents on their smartphones instead of physical ones for identification and sharing purposes. The Diia portal allows access to over 50 government services, and the government plans to make all kinds of state-person interactions available through Diia.
The name “Diia” is an acronym for “State and Me” in Ukrainian. The app was built in partnership with the USA and is poised to be shared with other countries. In fact, at the 2023 World Economic Forum in Davos, USAID Administrator Samantha Power said that the US hopes to replicate the success of Diia in other countries.
Diia was first presented on September 27, 2019, by the Ministry of Digital Transformation of Ukraine as a brand of the State in a Smartphone project. Vice Prime Minister and Minister of Digital Transformation Mykhailo Fedorov announced the creation of a mobile app and a web portal that would unite in a single place all the services provided by the state to citizens and businesses. On February 6, 2020, the mobile app Diia was officially launched.
In April 2020, the Ukrainian government approved a resolution for experimental usage of digital ID-cards and passports which would be issued to all Ukrainians via Diia. On October 5, 2020, during the Diia Summit, the government presented a first major update of the app and web portal branded “Diia 2.0”. By the end of 2020, the app had more than 6 million users, while the portal had 50 available services.
Please note that while I have tried my best to provide accurate information based on my sources, some details may be outdated or incomplete.
Ukraine has been at the forefront of government digitalization. The country became the first one in the world to allow a digital ID on a smartphone to be universally accepted as an alternative to a paper one. The Diia app can serve as a legally-recognized document for:
ID card
Foreign passport
Student card
Driving licence
Vehicle registration document
Vehicle insurance certificate
Tax identity
Birth certificate
IdP certificate (identity-management system)
The Diia app also provides access to over 70 government services, allowing citizens to do things like register as self-employed within the app in just 15 minutes.
Image from Behance.net
Further, according to one source, the government has already announced that the payment of benefits will be conditional on the presence of a Covid-19 vaccination certificate. While the use of the app is for the moment voluntary, do not for one moment think that it will remain so, or that similar systems won’t be imposed in other countries around the world as US officials have already stated their intention to do so. It’s a giant step forward in the agenda toward greater centralization of power and wealth and the elimination of democratic government. Any astute observer can see that right and left politics have been integrated into a global despotic “uniparty” under elite control. As Klaus Schwab, founder of the World Economic Forum has clearly stated, they have trained and placed in positions of power in countries around the world, people, like Justin Trudeau (PM of Canada) and Emmanuel Macron (President of France) who will promote their agenda. He has also told us, “You will own nothing…” Neither will you be allowed to do anything without the permission of Big Brother.
The Tyranny that is the Global Money System My new video has emerged out of the power point slide presentations I gave earlier this summer. It is a greatly improved description of the tyrannical nature of the global political money regime, how it has evolved, how it operates, and how we can free ourselves from its grip. Based on my more than 40 years of research, experience, and innovation in the realm of value exchange and finance, it succinctly reveals the truth about the money power, and more importantly, outlines tried-and-true exchange mechanisms by which people, businesses, and communities everywhere can transcend their dependence upon political money and bank borrowing by taking control of their own credit and using it in ways that can bring about a world of peace, justice, and freedom in which everyone can thrive.
Read the entire newsletter here or here, and you can Subscribe to receive my future occasional newsletters.
A heinous war crime is about to be committed by a country that purports to be the champion of democracy and human rights. Yes, the United States is preparing to send cluster bombs to the Ukraine for use in the war against Russia. Do you know the kinds of injuries these weapons cause, that they often fail to explode until much later when innocent civilians happen to accidentally set them off, and that these weapons have been banned by the Geneva Convention signed by 123 countries, but NOT by the United States.
Reading the story below from my friend and long-time correspondent Mike Boddington made me weep. It is a graphic description of the many tragedies that civilians suffer from unexploded weapons like the cluster bombs that President Biden now wants to send to Ukraine. Mike, who is British, made it his mission many years ago to go to Southeast Asia to do what he could to help people who have been maimed by unexploded ordinance (UXOs) that was scattered throughout that region by the US and during the Vietnam War.
Mike Boddingtin and Thomas Greco In Vientiane, Laos
I was introduced to Mike by a mutual friend, and in 2009 I visited him at his home in Vientiane, Laos where, in 1995, Mike had set up the office of COPE (Cooperative Orthotic and Prosthetic Enterprise), the NGO that he founded to warn people of the danger and to provide aid to the estimated 50,000 victims of encounters with UXOs, particularly those who have lost limbs. One of COPEs primary programs is providing prosthetic arms and legs.
Prosthetics provided by COPE to Laotian victims of UXOs
Mike has given me permission to publish his story here; we, in turn, invite and encourage you to distribute it widely in hopes of averting many more such tragedies. –THG
Laos Leaves June-July 2023: Issue 6.5 by Mike Boddington
This is an interim edition: a bonus, if you will. It is brought about as a result of hearing the news that the USA is to send cluster munitions to Ukraine, in order to continue the support of NATO and the west for that country in its battle against Russia. If this happens it will be the most evil and heinous crime. It will be the act of people who have no care or concern for the lives and welfare of others. By way of response, I am reproducing here and article that I wrote in 2021 entitled ‘An Experience in Your Life’ and which has had limited circulation, but has not aired in this medium. It offers a scenario of a regular, everyday person in SE Asia encountering an unexploded device – here referred to as a cluster sub-munition or bombie.
I came to Laos by way of Cambodia. Getting involved in the rehabilitation of unexploded ordnance (UXO) survivors in that country was harrowing – as it has proved in any country where I have met with the victims of those devices personally. What follows is from my experience in post-conflict countries – not in countries that are involved in active warfare. There has been war. It is over. Now we are in conflict-recovery mode. But the wounding and killing goes on – not amongst the combatants, the armed forces, but almost entirely amongst the civilian population. Not just the civilian population but very often the civilian population that was not even born at the time that the conflict was active. Those people had lost their limbs as a result of an encounter with an unexploded device of some sort. Here is a scenario for you, dear reader. This is about you – your experience.
The US dollar is rapidly losing its status as the global “reserve currency.” One after another, nations outside of the western coalition are waking up to the fact that dollars are needed only to pay for imports that come from the United States. In trades with other countries they are choosing to begin paying one another by using their own currencies, as reported in videos like this. They are recognizing that the real resources that they own are much more valuable than the empty promises that are embodied in inflated US dollars or other political currencies. The exploitation of weaker nations by the western powers that has been ongoing for centuries is coming to an end and the emergence of a multi-polar world order is now unstoppable.
The Bretton Woods agreement that established the post-war world financial order in 1944 was based on the promise that US dollars would be redeemed for gold at $35 an ounce. But the continuous debasement of the dollar over the years made that completely unrealistic, and ultimately its impossibility was formally recognized when President Nixon in 1971 “closed the gold window” and announced that the US government was reneging on that commitment. It would no longer give gold for dollars except at the prevailing market price. From that point on the fate of the dollar was sealed; it was just a matter of time. Despite the imposition of a series of extreme financial, economic, political, and military measures by the US and its western allies, time has run out on dollar dominance and the unipolar world order.
The main questions now are, 1) to what further extremes will the western empire resort in its desperate effort to forestall the inevitable political reordering, and 2) what sorts of new monetary and financial arrangements will be established to supplant the old Bretton Woods arrangement?
Regarding the first of these, the past several decades have seen a succession of both covert and overt interferences designed to weaken or neutralize monetary dissidents and potential political and economic rivals. Notable among the former have been Saddam Hussein, who in 2000 began selling Iraqi oil for Euros instead of dollars, and Muammar Gaddafi the Libyan leader who had plans to launch a pan-African currency called the Gold Dinar to free Africa from American domination. As a consequence, both men were murdered and their countries destroyed. Following the NATO invasion of Libya, and the murder of Gaddafi, then Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, disgustingly and arrogantly boasted, “We came, we saw, he died!”
But nuclear armed Russia and China are not so easy to push around and brought to heel. When their Russian puppet Boris Yeltsin chose Vladimir Putin to succeed him as prime minister, the globalist western oligarchs thought they could continue to rape Russia and exploit its vast resources for their own purposes. But Putin surprised them with his loyalty to “Mother Russia” and his unwillingness to betray the Russian people to the globalists. Whatever we in the west might think about the man, his stance has clearly endeared him to the Russian people.
When the Soviet Union collapsed, the western powers promised not to move NATO farther to the east, but they have reneged on that promise, and one by one have brought the former Soviet republics into the western fold. [Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has elaborated on this point in his recent speech and highlighted the importance of respect for Russia’s legitimate security concerns if ever there is to be peace]. Then, in 2014 the CIA engineered the overthrow of the elected government in Ukraine and replaced it with their own puppet government to further pressure the Russian government to play ball. The perceived existential threat of NATO weapons, even nuclear ones, on their very doorstep, was too much for Russia’s leadership to bear. It should have come as no surprise to anyone that the Russians reacted as they did to counter that threat by launching their “special military operation.” Putin had stated repeatedly that he hoped to negotiate a deal that would respect Russia’s national security interests but the US government has chosen to perpetuate the war in order to weaken Russia and force it to submit. Former nuclear weapons inspector, Scott Ritter, with his military experience and vast knowledge of the region provides a much more nuanced picture of that siltation than the biased sound bites one typically gets from the mainstream media.
Farther to the east, China a major economic, political and military power, has also balked at submitting to a New World Order in which the Western Empire calls all the shots. So now the globalist oligarchs who control the US government see China as a major obstacle to their plan for establishing a trans-human, technocratic utopia under the control of the elite Super Class. Hence, we see continual saber rattling, military and political provocations, and endless prating about the “Chinese threat.”
Regarding a new system of exchange and finance, I expect that we may soon see the emergence of a multilateral system for clearing credits among nations, one that will be more along the lines of the Bancor plan that John Maynard Keynes proposed at Bretton Woods in 1944. Not that Keynes should be the last word on the matter, but he at least proposed a way of preventing trade deficits from becoming perpetual as they are now, by imposing a levy (interest) on positive balances, as well as negative balances, that would seem to eliminate the debt trap. Professor Perry Mehrling provides a brief description of the Bancor plan in this video.
I expect eventually to see the complete depoliticisation of money and the broader application of credit clearing directly among buyers and sellers at the level of individual traders, as they have been doing for decades through the scores of commercial trade exchanges that have been operating around the world. Money is, after all, merely an information system about credits and debits that enables goods and services that are sold to pay for other goods and services that are bought. Further, the settlement of accounts will be done not only through reciprocal exchange, but also through cooperative support and forgiveness of debts, which will bring with it greater fairness and finally a peaceful world. Indeed, there may someday be a world government, but it will not be imposed by force, nor will it be the product of greed and materialistic human minds.
# # #
Addendum: In this excellent article, America Has Just Destroyed a Great Empire, Prof. Michael Hudson offers a history lesson that underlines the points I’ve made in my article.
Here is a small excerpt:
Having endowed the region’s cosmopolitan Temple of Delphi with substantial silver and gold, Croesus asked its Oracle whether he would be successful in the conquest that he had planned. The Pythia priestess answered: “If you go to war against Persia, you will destroy a great empire.”
Croesus therefore set out to attack Persia c. 547 BC. Marching eastward, he attacked Persia’s vassal-state Phrygia. Cyrus mounted a Special Military Operation to drive Croesus back, defeating Croesus’s army, capturing him and taking the opportunity to seize Lydia’s gold to introduce his own Persian gold coinage. So Croesus did indeed destroy a great empire, but it was his own.
Fast-forward to today’s drive by the Biden administration to extend American military power against Russia and, behind it, China. The president asked for advice from today’s analogue to antiquity’s Delphi oracle: the CIA and its allied think tanks. Instead of warning against hubris, they encouraged the neocon dream that attacking Russia and China would consolidate U.S. control of the world economy, achieving the End of History.
But that’s not the way it’s working out. Please read the full article.
____________________________ The Emerging New Civilization
Is our civilization collapsing? If so, what can be done about it? Can it still somehow be saved? If, not, what will be the impact on people in various places and cultures? What sorts of new systems and structures will emerge to take the place of the old?
These are some of the questions that my longtime friend and correspondent, Prof. Jem Bendell, addresses in his new book titled, BREAKING TOGETHER – a freedom-loving response to collapse. Having received and read an advance copy, I’ve been deeply impressed with the depth of Jem’s research and clarity of vision, and moved by his personal story of mind-change and commitment to advancing the common good. Far from doom and gloom, the message of this book is hopeful and inspiring.
In his introductory chapter, Recognising and Responding to Collapse, Prof. Bendell addresses these topics:
Finding our bearings in a world that’s lost
What is collapsing?
Why is this perspective not widely known?
Allowing the emotion of it all
From repentance to radicalization
Freedom from the failing of fables
Freeing humanity to our true nature
Breaking together
I strongly recommend that you listen to a reading of that chapter at SoundCloud. For information on purchasing Prof. Bendell’s, book, or to receive a free copy as an e-book, go to his website.
“Backlash against the COVID-19 fiasco of the last three years is building among a public that is slowly waking up to the unprecedented power grab and wealth transfer that took place under cover of a pandemic.”
“Can a coalition be built in a divided and suffering population to combat the political and economic nexus — namely the corrupt merger of state and corporate power — that is ruining the health of the people and the planet, and trampling our rights and freedoms in the process?”
“He (Prof. Jem Bendell) writes (in his new book, Breaking Together) that “climate concern is being highjacked by a mix of corporate profiteers and authoritarians, so that ineffective and counterproductive policies are being implemented and thereby generating a backlash against any kind of concerted action.”
His proposed solution is to reboot environmentalism into an “eco-libertarian” movement that seeks to protect both our freedoms and the environment from big corporations, corrupt governments and Davos elites.”
“In the overlap between the Left and Right versions of the popular revolt against the corrupt merger of state and corporate power, laid bare by the glaring abuses of the COVID-19 era, there may be room for unexpected political bedfellows to build a broad-based movement that appeals to significant segments of the electorate.”
Indeed, I’ve been seeing the emergence of what may become “a new grassroots populist majority that transcends the old boundaries of left, right, and green, liberal and conservative, rural and urban.” If we are to save democracy, the environment, and our very humanity, and build a just and equitable “new civilization,” we must overcome our knee-jerk reactions, listen deeply to each other, look at all the evidence, and build new alliances that transcend old labels and political rivalries. ____________________________ Fifth generation warfare and Sovereignty
“Fifth generation warfare is a war of information and perception,” and you are the enemy. In his excellent presentation, Dr. Robert Malone outlines the strategies, tactics, and technologies that are being used by “the national security state” to manipulate people’s emotions, and shape our thoughts, attitudes, values, and beliefs. He states that, “In fifth generation warfare your mind is the battleground,” and gives us guidance on how we can shield ourselves and ultimately win.
In this interview, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. recounts some essential history of his uncle’s Presidency, including his continuous battle with and the CIA and “the military-industrial complex” that President Eisenhower warned us against. Kennedy says flatly that “…the case against the CIA in the assassination of my uncle is beyond a reasonable doubt.” You can view a one minute video of his assertion from the New York Post.
The Most Dangerous Man in America is a documentary film about Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers. I first viewed it prior to its release in 2009 and then, a few days ago I got together with some friends and watched it again (on Kanopy). In light of what has transpired in the interim, it seems even more important now for people to be aware of it and grasp the significance of its message. In this interview with The Guardian (UK), looking back 50 years, Ellsberg says, “I’ve never regretted doing it.”
“The man who exposed US lies about the Vietnam war says the culture of official secrecy is worse today. But he urges whistleblowers: ‘Don’t wait years till the bombs are falling and people have been dying’”
____________________________ My Recent Interviews and Posts
In this interview I provide a succinct description of the present central banking, interest-based, debt money system and its dysfunctional nature, the global crisis that it has resulted from it, and what we can do to transcend it.
In this conversation we discuss our collective predicament and what people are doing to preserve our freedoms, assert our rights, and build a better world.
This post will be of particular interest both to monetary and economic researchers, and to practitioners. It describes my sizable and unique collection of books, pamphlets and other print materials, many of which are available in digital format, and announces a couple important additions, specifically, Ralph Borsodi’s, Inflation is Coming and What to Do About It, and, Hugo Bilgram’s, A Study of the Money Question.
____________________________ Finally, I have agreed to present at an Anti-authoritarian gathering in Switzerland on the 21st of July. I will most likely participate remotely to avoid depleting my strength with a long intercontinental journey. The gathering is billed as Anarchy 2023, but don’t be put off by that label. Oligarchs and despots have sullied the word “anarchy” by equating it with chaos, but the true meaning of the word “anarchy” is “without rulers,” it raises the question of the true locus of sovereignty and seeks the empowerment of people instead of kings, emperors, presidents and “representatives” that inevitably become repressive and tyrannical.
In this conversation we discuss our collective predicament and what people are doing to preserve our freedoms, assert our rights, and build a better world.
In this interview I provide a succinct description of the present central banking, interest-based, debt money system and its dysfunctional nature, the global crisis that it has created, and what we can do to transcend it.
Last year (2021) I gave a three part webinar presentation for The Henry George School of Social Science. In case you missed it, here is the description and the link to the recorded sessions. For each part you will find a list of recommended resources and references.
A critical look at the present global system of money and banking, how it has evolved, why it is problematic, and where it is trending.
The series will also look into past, present, and future exchange and payment alternatives, like Depression-era script, local and private currencies, commercial trade exchanges and LETS systems that apply the “credit clearing” process, and the more recent emergence of crypto-currencies and blockchain ledgers and their potential role. It will include discussion of how these have evolved, their advantages, limitations and future potential and what needs to be done to take them to scale, their political and economic implications, and innovations that are making conventional money obsolete.
WHAT is money?
WHY do we need money?
WHAT is wrong with our money system?
Can we live without money?
HOW can business be conducted without money?
What are the economic, social and political implications of monetary policies and systems?
What is the likely impact of present day monetary innovations?
May 21 – Session 1 provided an overview of the present system of money and banking, how it has evolved, how and why it is problematic, and where it is trending. I spoke about the interest-based debt-money system, how it causes the growth imperative and the politicization of finance and exchange, and the political and economic consequences of its continuation. I outlined the fundamental concepts of exchange and finance and the principles upon which sound and sustainable systems are being developed. Participants were asked to read or listen to some specific materials in preparation of the subsequent sessions.
June 4 – Session 2 was more interactive and provided ample opportunity to discuss questions that were evoked by the previous session and the assignments, including topics like inflation, depressions, asset bubbles and busts, the savings and investment functions, and government responses to shocks like the 2008 financial crisis and the more recent pandemic. This lead into discussion about possible solutions to the problems caused by the present system, and the role of local currencies and other alternatives for the exchange of value.
June 18 – Session 3 concentrated on past, present, and future exchange and payment alternatives, like Depression-era scrip, local and private currencies, commercial trade exchanges and LETS systems that apply the “credit clearing” process, and the more recent emergence of crypto-currencies and blockchain ledgers and their potential role. It included discussion of how these have evolved, their advantages, limitations and future potential and what needs to be done to take them to scale.
To round out your education you can also read my recent articles.
The first edition of my book, The End of Money and the Future of Civilization, was published by Chelsea Green Publishing in 2009. While it remains as relevant today as it was when first published the printed book has been out of print for several years. But, having had the rights reverted to me by my publisher, I am making the entire book available for free in PDF format. You can read it or download it HERE. If you would like a hard copy of the first edition used copies can still be found on Amazon.com, Abe books, Thrift books and elsewhere.
Better still, you can avail yourself of the new revised and expanded 2024 edition which I have been working on for almost two years and is almost complete. Eighteen chapters have already been posted and can be freely read or download HERE.
My previous books, as published, may be freely accessed in digital format by clicking the title below.