Web of Debt: The Shocking Truth About Our Money System and How We Can Break Free (Paperback): The Thom Hartmann Recommendation for BuzzFlash Readers for April
Ellen Hodgson BrownBuzzFlash.com's Review (excerpt)
THOM HARTMANN'S INDEPENDENT THINKER REVIEW OF THE MONTH FOR BUZZFLASH: April, 2009
Each month, BuzzFlash is privileged to have nationally syndicated progressive talk show host Thom Hartmann review a progressive book or DVD exclusively for BuzzFlash. See other progressive premiums at BuzzFlash Progressive Marketplace.
Thom Hartmann's Review for April, 2009:
Web of Debt: The Shocking Truth About Our Money System and How We Can Break Free
“Economics is a dry and forbidding subject that has been made intentionally complex by banking interests intent on concealing what is really going on. It is a subject that sorely needs lightening up, with imagery, metaphors, characters and a plot.” writes Ellen Brown in the introduction to her masterpiece book “Web of Debt.”
And it's a mission she sets for herself and then accomplishes in the book.
For example, most constitutionally literate Americans know that our Constitution, in Article I, Section 8, says:
“The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States
“To borrow money on the credit of the United States
“To coin Money, regulate the Value thereof
“To provide for the Punishment of counterfeiting the Securities and current Coin of the United States”
But most Americans don't realize that the way this has been construed since 1913 is that the only “Money” the United States government creates are our coins. They are actual draws against the US treasury, issued by the US Treasury, and redeemable by the US Treasury. All of our paper money – and the trillions of dollars in circulation not as paper but as digits in computers all around the world – are created by a private corporation and loaned at interest to our nation to use as money. [Although but ever since the 1960s, when Wright Patman tried to get the Fed nationalized, it has rebated the interest to the government except for its costs. Last year it rebated 85% of its profits. But the law doesn't require it.] This private corporation is known as the Federal Reserve, although it is not federal, and it has no reserves.
Although its chairman is appointed by the US President, and it was brought into being as a private corporation by an act of congress (as are all federally-chartered corporations; “normal” corporations like those traded on the NYSE or the small businesses in your town are brought into being by state corporate charters), the Fed is actually owned by its 12 member banks, which, in turn, are owned by their member banks – all for-profit corporations – which are owned by private stockholders, and according to Senator Bernie Sanders, about a third of the stockholders don't even live in the United States.
Another thing most Americans don't realize is that it's not our government that “creates money” – it's banks. Private banks. For-profit banks. When a bank lends money, it literally creates money out of thin air. And, ironically, it creates enough money for the principle [principal] to be repaid, but not the interest. The result of this is that our fractional banking system resembles a game of musical chairs: When the music stops, there won't be enough chairs (money) for everybody, and those stuck with the bill or the interest will be out of the game.
This is a system that has produced a lot of billionaires, and a lot of interesting conspiracy theories.
Read the full Thom Hartman Independent Thinker Review by clicking below.
Read The Full Review >>>
http://www.buzzflash.com/store/reviews/1551Other Reviews
From the publisher:
"EXPLODING THE MYTHS ABOUT MONEY Our money system is not what we have been led to believe. The creation of money has been "privatized," or taken over by a private money cartel. Except for coins, all of our money is now created as loans advanced by private banking institutions -- including the private Federal Reserve. Banks create the principal but not the interest to service their loans. To find the interest, new loans must continually be taken out, expanding the money supply, inflating prices -- and robbing you of the value of your money. Web of Debt unravels the deception and presents a crystal clear picture of the financial abyss towards which we are heading. Then it explores a workable alternative, one that was tested in colonial America and is grounded in the best of American economic thought, including the writings of Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln. If you care about financial security, your own or the nation's, you should read this book."
Learn More >>>
http://www.buzzflash.com/store/items/1551
