Founding Fathers @ MindSay 
What was fascinating to me while perusing this book was the idea, back then, that newspapers were SUPPOSED to be opinionated. No "fair and balanced" was actually ever expected. The editor of the paper generally paid for it through his own pocket (and the pockets of advertisers and subscribers) and felt it was his right to say what he wished, how he wished.
There is a sharp difference between the perceptions we often have of literary men of the day when compared to how they approached this medium.
If you are at all interested in early American history, early American journalism, or how public opinion shaped and was shaped hundreds of years ago, I recommend this book. It is easy to read, confines itself to a certain sphere and does so creditably and has a great title.
I read that it sells for $15.95 online. I got my copy on the sale table in Colonial Williamsburg's visitor center. For only $6.98.
:)
By Congressman Ron Paul
A Statement to the Joint Economic Committee, February 28, 2008
Mr. Chairman,
In recent months the undeclared war in Iraq seems not to have been on the minds of most Americans. News of the violence and deprivation which ordinary Iraqis are forced to deal with on a daily basis rarely makes it to the front pages. Instead, we read in the newspapers numerous slanted stories about the how the surge is succeeding and reducing violence. Never does anyone dare to discuss the costs of the war or its implications.
There are the direct costs of the war, the costs of maintaining bases, providing food, water, and supplies, which the administration vastly underestimated before embarking on their quest in Iraq. These costs run into the tens of billions of dollars per month, and I shudder to think what the total direct costs will add up to when we finally pull out.
Then there are the opportunity costs, those which decision makers in Washington almost never discuss. Imagine that the war in Iraq had never happened, and the hundreds of billions of dollars we have spent so far were still in the hands of taxpayers and businesses. How many jobs could have been created, how much money could have been saved, invested, and put to productive use?
Unfortunately, it appears too many policymakers in Washington still cling to the broken window fallacy, long since discredited by the 19th century French economist Frederic Bastiat, that destruction is a good thing because jobs are created to rebuild what is destroyed. This pernicious fallacy is unfortunately widespread in our society today because those in positions of power and influence only recognize what is seen, and ignore what is unseen.
Running a deficit of hundreds of billions of dollars per year in order to fund our misadventure is unsustainable. Eventually those debts must be repaid, but this country is in such poor financial shape that when our creditors come knocking, we will have little with which to pay them. Our imperial system of military bases set up in protectorate states around the world is completely dependent on the continuing willingness of foreigners to finance our deficits. When the credit dries up we will find ourselves in a dire situation. Americans will suffer under a combination of confiscatory taxation, double-digit inflation, and the sale of massive amounts of land and capital goods to our foreign creditors.
The continuation of the war in Iraq will end in disaster for this country. Parallels between the Roman empire and our own are numerous, although our decline and fall will happen far quicker than that of Rome. The current financial crisis has awakened some to the perils that await us, but solutions that address the root of the problem and seek to fix it are nowhere to be found. There must be a sea change in the attitudes and thinking of Americans and their leaders. The welfare-warfare state must be abolished, respect for private property and individual liberties restored, and we must return to the limited-government ideals of our Founding Fathers. Any other course will doom our nation to the dustbin of history.
By David Gordon
Freedom Under Siege is even more important today than when it first appeared twenty years ago. America today is threatened with a severe economic crisis. The Federal Reserve Board, in an effort to prop up the stock market, has followed for a long time an "easy money" policy. As a result, the dollar’s value has sharply fallen, threatening a key element in American financial world dominance. As if this were not enough, the housing market is in very poor shape. Why are we in such a bad position? Ron Paul has the answer, and, even better, knows how we can escape from trouble.
Paul, a close student of Ludwig von Mises and Murray Rothbard, explains clearly and cogently the Austrian theory of the business cycle: in this theory lies the explanation of our present plight. As Mises, F.A. Hayek, and Rothbard have pointed out, an expansion of bank credit that lowers the monetary rate of interest below the natural rate, determined by time preference, generates an artificial boom. Businesses, responding to the new credit available, lengthen the structure of production. When the credit expansion ceases, the monetary rate of interest rises to accord with the natural rate. The structure of production contracts. The ensuing liquidation of unsustainable investments is precisely the depression. "With credit injections, the Fed lowers interest rates causing businessmen to invest in new capital equipment. They produce goods that consumers can’t afford, and eventually they find that their plans don’t pan out. This process spreads throughout the economy and creates ever-growing waves of booms and busts." (p.116)
If a policy of credit expansion cannot in the long run be successful, why then do governments and central banks continually resort to it? As Paul makes clear, some people do benefit from this policy, however detrimental its overall effects. A "major reason we have a powerful central bank that maintains monopoly control over credit is that those in charge of policy are granted overwhelming political and economic power. The individuals who, behind the scenes, pull the monetary strings are very much aware of the power they have. . . .Economic benefits accrue to those knowledgeable about Federal Reserve policy. [Fed Chairman] Paul Volcker once admitted to me [Paul], to my surprise before a banking committee hearing, that leaks did occur regarding secret monetary policy." (pp.131–32). In addition, of course, banks earn considerable profits on the loans that a fractional reserve banking system makes possible.
Paul presents a detailed account of the genesis of the Federal Reserve System, using Austrian theory as an interpretive guideline. The notorious Jekyll Island Conference is of course a highlight of Paul’s account. He sums up with a devastating quotation from the eminent historian Gabriel Kolko: "The entire banking reform movement, at all crucial stages, was centralized in the hands of a few men who for years were linked, ideologically and personally, with one another. . . the major function, inspiration, and direction of the measure [the Federal Reserve Act] was to serve the banking community in general, and large bankers specifically." (p.115)
The profits and power that go to the financial elite come at the expense of the general public. The expansionary policy inevitably collapses; and here, as Paul perceptively notes, the consequences may extend far beyond the narrowly economic. Sharp economic downturns may generate social unrest; and groups that the public, rightly or wrongly, blames for their financial straits may find themselves at considerable risk. "In periods of significant inflation, the people are not only disturbed by the untrustworthiness of the system, they become angry at certain groups that benefit or appear to benefit from inflation." (p.127)
How can we be rescued from this morass? Again following Mises and Rothbard, Paul defends a gold standard. Only if money is treated strictly as a commodity, immune from government manipulation, can we avoid the vagaries of the business cycle. "Money, according to Mises, must originate in the market as a useful commodity in order to function properly. The most acceptable liquid commodity always becomes money. The particular commodity has varied from culture to culture, but gold has been overwhelmingly chosen as the favorite with silver a close second." (p.117) With a gold standard, the government has no opportunity to expand monetary credit, since the supply of money is strictly limited to the stock of gold on hand.
When Paul talks about a gold standard, he means a genuine gold standard. In particular, the pseudo-gold standard favored by the supply-siders – fortunately less influential now than in 1987 – must be rejected. "The supply-siders, as led by Jack Kemp and Arthur Laffer, have advocated a type of gold standard, but in truth it is a pseudo-gold standard. It is actually a gold price rule whereby the Federal Reserve adjusts monetary policy dependent on the gold price." (p.140)
Paul, the foremost Misesian in politics, aptly brings out the importance of the gold standard for a free society. Lack of economic freedom leads a society to tyranny; and money free of government control is essential to a free economy: "When a society accepts irredeemable fiat money, one can be sure the fundamentals of freedom are being threatened, and it’s only a matter of time before an abusive dictatorship emerges that controls all aspects of our lives if the concept of fiat money is not rejected." (p.118)
This is no mere theoretical speculation. According to Hayek, inflation, combined with rigid price control, was a principal component of Nazi economic policy: "There is something much worse than an open inflation and I’m [Hayek] afraid that’s what you’re headed for, a continued increase in the quantity of money with government prohibitions against price rises – ‘repressed inflation’ as I like to call it. . .Hitler followed this practice throughout his regime. Despite the colossal monetary expansion, prices remained constant because people were shot if they raised prices." (p. 119)
Besides his expertise in Austrian economics, Paul has also studied closely the great political philosophers. He points out that John Locke emphasized the connection between individual freedom and sound money: "For Locke, the right to possess, use, and to store up money is fundamental. Like the ownership of property, it is not conferred on the individual by society, but rather civil society has been established to protect this right." (p. 123, quoting S. Herbert Frankel)
Paul assails fiat money with a formidable variety of weapons. Not only is fiat money economically unsound, it is also unconstitutional. Where does the Constitution grant the federal government the right to issue paper money unbacked by gold or silver? "Congress is explicitly given power to coin money in Article 1, Section A, but no similar power was given to print fiat money." (p.100)
Throughout his career in Congress, Ron Paul has trenchantly criticized America’s interventionist foreign policy, assailing it as a gross departure from the wisdom of Washington and Jefferson. In particular, he has resolutely opposed the Bush Administration’s disastrous and immoral Iraq War. If we had a sound monetary system, aggressive wars of this sort would be rendered difficult, if not outright impossible, to undertake. If the government wanted to launch an aggressive war, it would have to obtain the money to do so through tax increases or borrowing. It could not disguise the immense costs by the use of inflation, as it does now.
In his Foreword to Freedom Under Siege, Lew Rockwell aptly remarks: "We have not seen Ron Paul’s like in Washington since the days of the Founding Fathers. . . .On the economy, civil liberties, the IRS, foreign policy, the draft, and the Power Elite, he takes the hardcore libertarian position. He is the 20th century’s Thomas Jefferson." (p. x) Ron Paul’s campaign for President offers us an unprecedented opportunity to promote freedom.
Here is a great piece on Ron Paul by Justin Raimondo of www.antiwar.com.
Ron Paul responds to an article written about his foreign policy in the Union Leader.
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