True Reform
A popular retort to the gold bugs, those people who insisted that all the world’s problems stemmed from fiat money, was that a government so corrupt you needed hard money to control it, was so corrupt it would find a way around hard money. The point of the expression was mostly to cut off discussion about the dangers of fiat money, as there was never any point in discussing it with the gold bugs. Like all fanatics, they saw only that which confirmed their fanaticism.
There was a subtle truth in the expression. That is, the nature of money is a reflection of the ruling class that created it. Even with hard money, there is a connection between the type of coin and the type of ruler. Hard money is the product of private government, so it reflected the interests of private government. When Kings Offa and Charlemagne adopted coinage, they did so because it increased their power. Seigniorage is a great benefit to the person who controls the minting of coins.
The reason hard money lost favor in the 20th century is the nature of government changed in the West. We had moved from private government to public government, so the value of money to the ruling class changed. The king liked hard money as it was good for him. In liberal democracy, fiat money benefits the ruling elite. Now that we are in a post-national world, credit money is the coin of the realm. In other words, money is a consequence of the ruling class, not a cause of it.
This is an important point to keep in mind when thinking about the current crisis. The institutions are not the cause of bad government, but a byproduct of the corrupt people infesting the ruling class. In most cases, the institutions have not changed all that much over the last century, but how they are wielded has changed. The current ruling class has no respect for the intent of those institutions. They see them only as tools that they can wield to their personal benefit.
The courts are a great example. In the course of a couple generations, the legal system has gone from a safeguard to civil order to a threat to it. The courts themselves have not changed in any major way. The structure of the legal process and the laws themselves are mostly the same. There has been no change to the Constitution in generations. Yet, the same court that would have laughed homosexual marriage out of the room a generation ago declared it a sacred right.
The same can be said of the mass media. Before the current ruling class took over the media, there was bias, but there was also a respect for the need to inform the public about current events. Newspapers took it as a duty to do things like local news and offering some platform for alternative opinion. It was not ideal, but the ruling class still respected civic virtue enough to try. The radicalized subversive, who control the media today, see the media as a weapon to use against the people.
This is why talking about reform misses the point. Those who think we can constrain this ruling class with changes to the structure of society are embracing a mechanistic view of society. They see society as a machine that can be tuned to make the people better within it. It is the mindset of communists and libertarians, who ultimately believe humans are infinitely malleable, even those who rise to the top. It is also a conceit by people who think they have the key to reaching paradise.
The fact is, no reform that would work against the interests of the ruling class will ever see the light of day. These people are soulless and degenerate, but they are not stupid or naive. They understand perfectly well how they remain in power and it sure as heck is not by allowing social reformers to strip them of their authority. Any reform they cannot prevent, will ultimately be subverted, as that is their nature. Just a dog returns to his vomit, this ruling class will subvert orderly society.
On the other hand, the people in charge love talking about reform, because it keeps any opposition to them busy on fool’s errands. You’ll note that Washington is full of reform plans and people peddling them. Every politician promises to be a reformer. Our elections are nothing but pitch men promoting the latest reform potion. The whole point of these distractions is to keep the public from noticing that after every election, the same people remain in charge and the polices never change.
The hard truth of this age is that the ruling class is beyond reform, because they are no longer us. We cannot appeal to their better natures, because they don’t share our nature or see us as them. Just look at the presidential race. One side is full of candidates promising to really stick it to white people. On the other hand, Trump is endlessly touting his efforts for Israel and various categories of non-whites. A political class that proudly hates white people is not going to listen to the appeals of white people.
Reform, if it is going to come, will do so in front of the hang man and be championed by the billionaires who control the political class. Just as the anarchist bombings scared the rich into ending immigration from Eastern Europe, some crisis will have to scare the global pirates, who run the West, into hiring a new political class. If that does not happen, then we are headed for a revolutionary moment when this order is violently overthrown as a matter of survival.
The people can not be all and always, well informed. The part which is wrong will be discontented in proportion to the importance of the facts they misconceive. If they remain quiet under such misconceptions it is a lethargy, the forerunner of death to the public liberty. we have had 13 states independent 11 years. There has been one rebellion. That comes to one rebellion in a century and a half for each state.
What country before ever existed a century and a half without a rebellion? What country can preserve it’s liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to facts, pardon and pacify them. What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is it’s natural manure.
–Thomas Jefferson, Paris 1787
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