In the midst of our economic slowdown, the U.S. Treasury Dept has issued what they are calling the “Blueprint for Financial Regulatory Reform”. The highlights, as given by an article on Yahoo!'s website, are as follows:
–designate the Fed as the primary regulator for market stability, greatly expanding its ability to examine any financial institution deemed to pose a risk to the stability of the system.
–shift the functions of the Office of Thrift Supervision to the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, although ultimately the plan envisions just one banking regulator.
–merge the Securities and Exchange Commission with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.
–create a national regulator for insurance companies, which now are largely regulated by the states.
–establish a commission to address the abuses exposed in the current tidal wave of mortgage defaults.
An executive summary of this document obstained by the NY Times can be found here. Soliciting comments.
We need to get more Ron Paul types out there telling the truth.
People - I want you to start writing letters to all of your legislators - your rep, your senators, and yes, your state legislators - and tell them to oppose more regulation and list the reasons why.
Contact with the local LP and the local Paulites and tell them to join in a letter-writing crusade against regulation.
I know it’s low-key lobbying, but something must be done, and that can only be done grassroots, with a small “vanguard” (hate to borrow Leninist terms) leading it.
I was about to post about this before I noticed someone had already done so. I think this is the beginning of the end of the . They would not be trying something this radical unless there were serious issues that they believe they “cannot ignore.” Of course their “solution” will only make matters worse but they understand there is a problem even if they do not understand how to handle the problem (i.e. by reducing regulations rather than creating more.)
Well, the Invisible Hand will strike back when the time comes and it is necessary for the market to correct all the distortions caused by the Fed. Then the US economy will go up in flames, taking the parasites that leech off it with it. It’ll be interesting to see what new forms of fascism will arise at this stage. No regulator is so powerful as to flout reality and escape unscathed. I just hope they suffer most for what they’ve done.
Freedom is slavery, ignorance is strength, and your money is doing just peachy as long as its value is controlled by a government-supported counterfeiter.
Normally I would scoff at the arrogance of the government and be ready to hold on for the bad times ahead but this actually scares me a little. Reason being I have a different prespective since I have three small nieces and one nephew these days. It just make me more and more angry at the ignorance of the politicians and their hubris to think they can just will economic facts away. Just imagine the awesome amounts of potential wealth and opportunity the state ruined before everyone on this forum was born. Now I cannot imagine they will devoid my nieces and nephew of new opportunities just to further their parasitic careers. It is unbelievable.
Everyday I go to the Secertary of State of Massachusetts and you will not believe the amount of poor minorities, immigrants as well as the average joe white guy these government officials ruin by regulating their businesses to the ground (of course mostly small business). On top of that they charge a very high annual extortion fee just to mantain your records so they can know how much and where they can tax every penny out of you, your employees or anything else. I am so sick of this ineffectual status quo. I have no idea where to begin to make a difference. Any ideas?
I am more and more of the opinion that the best way is to compete with the state. Create institions that can solve problems wihout needing to ask the state for anything. (Is agorism the term for what I mean?) We need to build these institutions NOW without waiting for the state to collapse. Doing so will create a network whereby anachocapitalists and other libertarians can ignore the state as much as humanly possible and the death of the state will not impact such people to the same degree as it will those who are less-aware of what is going on.