What is there to celebrate, Nobel?
What is there to celebrate, Nobel?
Tim O’Connor – Center for the Preservation of Humanity – 10/10/2022
Who remembers the Great Recession? I remember watching a bunch of news clips of people being forced out of their homes. I remember wondering how that could happen. I remember the bank ‘bail outs.’ I remember the key players during that time and how Alan Greenspan decided to let the housing market bubble continue to grow and dumped the explosion part on Ben Bernanke. I remember the shady lending, the derivatives, swaps, and collateralized debt obligations which all played a part in screwing these people out of their homes. Some mortgage holders just walked out of their homes because they had depreciated in value so much. What was done about all of that?
A lot of things were not done which leaves the mess which created the problems in the first place a possibility. But one thing which WAS done in the aftermath of the recession – the United States volunteered to back of the global derivative market with our tax dollars. We all saw how that worked out for us before – the banksters stole our money and we got absolutely nothing in return for the more than $2 trillion we gave to them. That derivative market was puny compared to the one which exists now and it is in the QUADrillions. People, myself included, have a tough time really getting a grasp on billions versus trillions and this is a number in the 1,000’s of billions. 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 or 10^17 is a quadrillion. When that bubble bursts – watch out – none of us will have anything at all because the banks, you know, the one’s who make these messes in the first place, are all too big to fail.
During the Great Recession, it was Ben Bernanke who sat at the helm of the PRIVATE Federal Reserve system. In this capacity he had the ability to lessen the impact or completely avoid the Great Recession altogether. He did nothing but demand money from taxpayers to bail out the banks. Forbes scathingly described Bernanke in 2011:
“Bernanke typically is described as that rarest of combinations: a Republican yet also an Ivy League academic, a bureaucrat who's nevertheless respectful of markets, an expert on the Great Depression yet aware of the Fed's role in it, and above all a man supposedly wise enough to not let "it" happen again. Yet in 2008-2009 Bernanke did nearly let "it" happen again -- a banking collapse, a depression, deflation -- by bringing the U.S. financial system to its knees by roughly the same Fed policy adopted in the 1930s, followed by his blizzard of paper-money printing that has caused a dollar debasement unprecedented in U.S. history. The result has been a huge destruction of wealth, spreading fiscal chaos and stagflation as far as the eye can see.”
In my opinion we never fully got out from under the Great Recession’s destruction. Joe Biden merely fast tracked it’s return. Donald Trump helped get the US economy roaring but he didn’t do anything to reign in our printing and spending of money. ‘Covid-19’ payments (the national Universal Basic Income trails) did not help anyone at all. Obama did nothing except to make sure it could happen again and sign up US taxpayers to back the quadrillions in the global derivatives market. Ben Bernanke is most memorable in my mind as having destroying our money supply.
So what happened to Bernanke for his willing participation in this ponzi scheme? Surely he was put in prison, fined, and forced to not engage in economics anymore, right? No, he was never held accountable and has, as of today, won the 2022 Nobel Prize for Economics! I don’t know which is worse, the Nobel Peace Prize going to Obama or this Bernanke award.
“The Nobel Prize in economics was awarded to Ben Bernanke, Douglas Diamond and Philip Dybvig on Monday for their research on banks and financial crises.” Isn’t that cute, Ben Bernanke, an architect of destruction and collapse, or ruining retirements and home ownership, won an award for working on banks and financial crises. We now know Bernanke is a thief who belongs in prison banging out $2 trillion worth of licenses plates but who are these other two; Diamond and Dybvig?
Douglas Diamond has been a professor at the University of Chicago’s Booth School of business for nearly five decades. He has published many journal articles about his specializations – financial intermediaries, financial crises, and liquidity.
Philip Dybvig is a professor at Washington University in St. Louis. He has published two textbooks and 35 journal articles. He has a wide array of expertise and research interests related to the economic and financial world.
Nobel Prize’s website states of the winners:
“The Great Depression of the 1930s paralysed the world’s economies for many years and had vast societal consequences. However, we have managed subsequent financial crises better thanks to research insights from this year’s laureates. They have demonstrated the importance of preventing widespread bank collapses.”
To further explain the reason that these three won this award, Nobel Prize’s explanation reads:
“This year’s laureates in the Economic Sciences, Ben Bernanke, Douglas Diamond and Philip Dybvig, have significantly improved our understanding of the role of banks in the economy, particularly during financial crises. An important finding in their research is why avoiding bank collapses is vital.
“Modern banking research clarifies why we have banks, how to make them less vulnerable in crises and how bank collapses exacerbate financial crises. The foundations of this research were laid by Ben Bernanke, Douglas Diamond and Philip Dybvig in the early 1980s. Their analyses have been of great practical importance in regulating financial markets and dealing with financial crises.
“For the economy to function, savings must be channelled to investments. However, there is a conflict here: savers want instant access to their money in case of unexpected outlays, while businesses and homeowners need to know they will not be forced to repay their loans prematurely. In their theory, Diamond and Dybvig show how banks offer an optimal solution to this problem. By acting as intermediaries that accept deposits from many savers, banks can allow depositors to access their money when they wish, while also offering long-term loans to borrowers.
“However, their analysis also showed how the combination of these two activities makes banks vulnerable to rumours about their imminent collapse. If a large number of savers simultaneously run to the bank to withdraw their money, the rumour may become a self-fulfilling prophecy – a bank run occurs and the bank collapses. These dangerous dynamics can be prevented through the government providing deposit insurance and acting as a lender of last resort to banks.
“Diamond demonstrated how banks perform another societally important function. As intermediaries between many savers and borrowers, banks are better suited to assessing borrowers’ creditworthiness and ensuring that loans are used for good investments.
“Ben Bernanke analysed the Great Depression of the 1930s, the worst economic crisis in modern history. Among other things, he showed how bank runs were a decisive factor in the crisis becoming so deep and prolonged. When the banks collapsed, valuable information about borrowers was lost and could not be recreated quickly. Society’s ability to channel savings to productive investments was thus severely diminished.
“‘The laureates’ insights have improved our ability to avoid both serious crises and expensive bailouts,’ says Tore Ellingsen, Chair of the Committee for the Prize in Economic Sciences.”
Does the Nobel Prize committee go out there and look for complete idiots to give a bunch of money and accolades to? Their entire idea is that all banks are too big to fail and the government should step in and shore up banks in the events of runs. Meanwhile the banks have grown massive. The top five banks as of January 2022 have assets totaling $8.9605 trillion. The top ten had $11.004 trillion. The total assets held by all banks in January 2022 was $22.5 trillion. The top ten banks control half of the assets of the United States. That means that when these banks, in particular, go screwing around with people’s money by investing in garbage and loaning massive amounts to projects that are absolutely going to fail (Enron? - where are you Enron?) investors will not only lose their money, the banks will take tax dollars from the government to shore themselves up so they can run their scam all over again.
This isn’t to say that banks are bad. This is to say that the system proposed by Diamond and Dybvig is stupid on it’s face. I say let all of the banks fail, especially when they lend way to much money to even try to pay those who want to make withdraws. Depositors should be financially literate and banking shouldn’t have a de facto mandate that people must use in order to live. A case in point is that if I choose to have a paper check issued to me by my employer I should be able to not only receive payment in that method, but be able to cash it without fees at the bank they issued the check from.
Overall, the Nobel Prize committee decided to find some Keynesian’s who, through their writings, have decided that banks are more important than people. They rationalized the socialization of banks. What are the long term effects? We are all watching it right now! The FED just prints money, loans the money to the banks at interest, and the banks turn around and expand the money supply even more by making loans to businesses, other banks, and individuals also at interest, and when too many entities default on paying back these worthless scraps of paper, the banks can go to the government with hat in hand asking for it to be filled up. In any scenario, people, normal individuals and normal small businesses end up getting scammed in a legalized ponzi scheme. Either the banks make millions in interest payed back from lenders or we all end up paying banks billions to prevent them from collapsing.
Eventually the government will run out of other people’s money to give to the banks and the ponzi scheme will be finished. This is why there is such a push for UBI and programmable digital currencies. Economics has been weaponized to be used as a prominent control mechanism and the Nobel Prize went to three of the monsters who assisted the weaponization in the first place. The biggest banks are the worst offenders and I avoid these banks at all costs. Why would I want to fund my own destruction?
The banks are using false measurements. God has demanded that we keep measurements that are fair as written in Deuteronomy 25:13-16:
“‘You are not to have in your pack two sets of weights, one heavy, the other light. You are not to have in your house two sets of measures, one big, the other small. You are to have a correct and fair weight, and you are to have a correct and fair measure, so that you will prolong your days in the land Adonai your God is giving you. For all who do such things, all who deal dishonestly, are destestable to Adonai your God.’”
Later, in Micah 6, the topic of weights and measures also arises:
“So listen now to what Adonai says: “Stand up and state your case to the mountains, let the hills hear what you have to say.” Listen, mountains, to Adonai’s case; also you enduring rocks that support the earth! Adonai has a case against his people; he wants to argue it out with Isra’el: “My people, what have I done to you? How have I wearied you? Answer me! I brought you up from the land of Egypt. I redeemed you from a life of slavery. I sent Moshe, Aharon and Miryam to lead you. My people, just remember what Balak the king of Mo’av had planned, what Bil‘am the son of B‘or answered him, [and what happened] between Sheetim and Gilgal — so that you will understand the saving deeds of Adonai.” “With what can I come before Adonai to bow down before God on high? Should I come before him with burnt offerings? with calves in their first year? Would Adonai take delight in thousands of rams with ten thousand rivers of olive oil? Could I give my firstborn to pay for my crimes, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?” Human being, you have already been told what is good, what Adonai demands of you — no more than to act justly, love grace and walk in purity with your God. The voice of Adonai! He calls to the city — and it is wisdom to fear your name — “Listen to the rod and to him who commissioned it. Are there still ill-gotten gains in the house of the wicked? still the detestable short eifah-measure? Should I declare innocent wicked scales and a bag of fraudulent weights? The rich men there are full of violence, the inhabitants tell lies, with tongues of deceit in their mouths. “Therefore, I am starting to strike you down, to destroy you because of your sins. You will eat but not be satisfied, with hunger gnawing inside you. You will conceive but not give birth; if you do give birth, I will give him to the sword. You will sow but will not reap, you will press olives but not rub yourself with oil, likewise you will press grapes but not drink the wine. For you keep the regulations of ‘Omri and all the practices of the house of Ach’av, modeling yourselves on their advice. Therefore I will make you an object of horror, the inhabitants of this city a cause for contempt; you will suffer the insults aimed at my people.””
Again, weights and measures are mentioned in Hosea 12:8-11:
““A huckster keeps false scales, and he loves to cheat. Efrayim says, ‘I have gotten so rich! I have made me a fortune! And in all my profits no one will find anything wrong or sinful.’ “But I am Adonai your God, from the land of Egypt. Again I will make you live in tents, as in the days of the established festival. I have spoken to the prophets; it was I who gave vision after vision; through the prophets I gave examples to show what it would all be like.”
Think about these verses. I am unsure about whether the prophesy in Micah or Hosea has yet to be fulfilled. I am not aware of any time in which all of Israel lived in tents and booths since the time of the Exodus. Whether or not the prophesy has been fulfilled; the lesson remains the same. The banksters, the three laureates, and the Nobel Prize committee would do themselves well to recall and practice these Biblical lessons. Not abiding by them leads to disaster, as the world has seen, is seeing, and will likely continue to witness.
Bless God and God bless.