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To The Old Man of the Sea...

Herein lies some advise from some sages of our times. We dedicated this to The Old Man of the Sea , whom we often quoted in our arguments with William F. Buckley Jr., – the correspondence of which is addressed in this work. The Old Man of the Sea is a real person and not a fictitious being created for the purposes of the presentation. He is my neighbor, and we both live on the sea. Yesterday The Old Man of the Sea gave me a letter forcing the position that a Budget Deficit Reduction program would be disastrous (seemingly agreeing with Mr. Buckley!), saying:

...I have always taken issue with you on your emphasis of the budget and its deficit as the culprit you make it out to be. A culprit, a nasty one too, but maybe if we get rid of this demon it will be replaced by others much worse. I think it would be folly at this time to try and eliminate the deficit (even though Clinton is making noises in that direction). I have enclosed some articles that tend to support my point of view...

This reflects the point of view of many conservatives in our government who are afraid to press our present economy by trying to pay off the debt their generation created, whose interest payment is now like a winepress squeezing our people. As in all debts, our National Debt of $4.3 Trillion Dollars carries an annual interest payment which is now about $300 Billion.

This compares to $300 Billion paid out for Social Security, or the ~$270 Billion per year we spend on National Defense. While the debt may seen innocuous and involve a far off creditor who may not ask for his money in the near future, he must have the interest payment against the notes he carries with the US Government; and as all creditors are, he grows impatient and often violent when he fails to receive at least the interest serving the debt. Since he carries such a strong club as it were, he gets paid first, after which We the People get paid. The problem here is that we currently take in (the Clinton tax program has not yet been put into law at this writing) about $800 Billion in Revenues, through personal Income taxes (~$400 Billion) and another group of taxes, Social Security, excise, unemployment, customs, estate, retirement, etc. Out of these taxes, for instance, we pay about $151 Billion in welfare oriented expenditures. Our government and Deficit nonReduction soothsayers are willing to pay creditors (who live in fancy mansions and drive divinely wheeled, chauffeured, imported limousines) $300 Billion a year but groan and moan when it comes to funding jobs and providing for those who have been thrown out on the street from the lying, cheating, and excesses of the Reagan-Bush Estate, which we discuss herein (we argue on behalf of truth but money seems to be confused with it).

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Profiteers

There are people who are profiteering from our debt. We speak of those who own the bonds of the US National Debt. They have the loudest voices in arguing not to pay against the principal of the debt, knowing it would cause us to raise in addition to the $300 Billion per year interest, which is feathering their pockets, more revenues (taxes) to service the principal of the debt, which is $4.3 Trillion as noted. Spread over 40 years, payments against the principal of the debt would be spinal tapping! To make any Deficit Reduction program, we need to raise about $300 Billion per year plus another ~$120 Billion / year for the principal of ~ $4 Trillion. Scary huh? Count the apples, kids: 98 Billion apples paid per year for ten years = 980 Billion; thus, forty years (4x 980) will consume _______apples. Have your third graders figure it out...

Knowing that Democracies depend upon Truth in government, and since our Democracy is still managed by the very same people who ran up this horrifying debt-- thinking to pass it down to us, the next generation – we have a word for them: We're here ! And you laid a bone crushing debt upon us. In this work we describe the debt as fowl water which is sinking our Ship of State. And as we sink the rising water in our bilge will drag down our European and Oriental partners with us.

Shouldn't we warn the passengers ? I asked.

Redeemed by Truth

Many leading financiers have announced that we are now in a Depression like in the 1930's and a Senator recently said that the government is bankrupt. By the figures we just reviewed above no doubt most bankers would agree our government is bankrupt!

We don't know what the true situation really is. Thus we sent a letter to Mr. Buckley asking him to look into it and reveal the Truth about our financial condition (since our governors are afraid to tell us). We believe that We the American People can handle truth and come to a consensus on remedies needed to correct the problem: to get this country back on its feet again. We speak literally of the millions of homeless and jobless who wait, hunger and thirst, and despair over the things they had before Reagan and which sunk with their hopes of a good life. It reminds me of Lucian's book, Hired Companions : The miserable wretches thought their employers would have good will towards them! It's a story funnier and more true today than then, in 200 A.D.

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Those who wish to defer acting against the Debt – which, together with those who are managing it is a Leviathan of sorts – argue, we can only presume, that We the People have no need to know the real truth of the matter and, knowing the truth, perhaps, they fear we might panic: mutiny or jump ship for example. No doubt the final answer to this dilemma is the fact that to service more than the interest payments against our debt we need to raise taxes enormously, and since the homeless, jobless, and the working poor of this nation are already over-taxed and losing their homes too, it follows that the only ones who might be able to help We the People out on this matter are the filthy rich who have made fortunes in the stock and bond market and have had their tax burden reduced during the Reagan-Bush Estate. They would pay as little as possible, and while the economy continues its downslide no doubt they have already secured offshore forts to hide and protect their investments – avoiding the sudden crash, that is.

For those of you who are afraid to read about Economics or Politics, fear not. The bulk of this book dwells upon Truth: the need to tell it and the means by which we can coax those who know the truth to tell it. Again, just tell us the truth, whatever it is. My word, all these experts we contacted who made their living applying economic principals--for gain in the stock market, private enterprise, etc.--know the answers required to resolve our debt, remove the interest payment so that we can use that $300 Billion to invest in our economy--even help the poor find a roof and a job, mind you. But rather than tell us the truth they argue over the chaff: Congress stalled over $16 Billion to prime the pump of this economy, for instance, when all along they were not bothered by the $300 Billion in interest each year which has been sucking the economy dry. This is unforgivable, I think. Another Old Man , Lao Tzu by name, said,

The sage always excels in saving people, and so abandons no one; always excels in saving things, and so abandons nothing.

Then he said,

The court is corrupt, the fields are overgrown with weeds, the granaries are empty; yet there are those dressed in fineries, with swords at their sides, filled with food and drink, and possessed of too much wealth. This is known as taking the lead in robbery.

He was referring to the Chinese Government about 500 B.C., but I warrant it better applies to our own.

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This book has been drawing out sages who excel at saving people. We described this to our friend, The Old Man of the Sea, as fishing. He admonished me, however, to be careful that it is not I that is caught on the line.

In any event, focusing upon Truth, as we do herein, we know a Sage will be enticed to step ahead.

Until then we despair alone! Seeing our
poverty-stricken masses, & their
options for survival,
grow narrower &
narrower...

Mel West
June 17, 1993
Berkeley, Ca.

The Argument Pressed

I was given a terrible task by a wise old man who lives on the sea, whom I call The Old Man of the Sea . I had been communicating with Captain Buckley--a man well versed in the matters of the sea himself – about our National Dilemma having to do with an extraordinary debt which has been consuming our Great Society. My first letter to him was put in a Tiny Book, "Financial Institution Credit Watch," and following this and his answers (his letters are quoted in their entirety herein) I composed a Tiny Book called "The Trial of a President" (a portion of which is quoted herein) and now this one, all of which link together with other [Tiny] books already forged in a chain against Leviathan.

We had been using an allegory of being on a ship which had been stove in and now had such high waters reaching into its bilge there were no doubts – as far as Captain Buckley and I had assessed – that we were probably sunk. It is a prophetic observation based upon calculated evidence: this nation will sink into an abyss no less terrifying nor final than the deep into which the Titanic plunged. I, for my part, as well as my counsellor, The Old Man of the Sea, believe that there is still a chance to save the reeling hulk.

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Our allegory refers to the National Debt and most particularly the annual Deficit (composed in principal by a current $292 billion interest payment) which is growing, not subsiding...

Taking the matter up with The Old Man of the Sea , and showing him Captain Buckley's two letters and my draft letter in response, he answered: You haven't said anything! This letter has no meaning. You must explain why this nation should be terrified over the debt !

With a shredded soul I began this book, recognizing the impossible task at hand. For The Old Man of the Sea appended to his admonition above: but they will probably not respond. At these words my soul came apart at the seams, for The Old Man of the Sea had observed what I had been writing about in my other Tiny Books : how hard-hearted the American People had become (see What Price Justice and The Miracle of Zer Anpin , for openers). He had charged me to do the impossible, for I had already seen myself as one in Nazi Germany complaining to the Germans (and the world) about the abuses of its people, grabbing at coat- tails as it were, with nary an answer. In sum, the American people have become a nation which minds other people's business but will not get involved in defending their own people's rights (we refer to the millions of homeless people who have been scuttled in our streets who are rather than being provided for are more often than not resented and shamed for their failure to succeed in our dog eat dog society).

Noting that the cause of the hard-heartedness and the drowning of our people (in debt) comes from the same source, I referred to this thing as a Leviathan from the deep.

Leviathan

The first mention of Leviathan is perhaps in the Book of Job, considered one of the oldest books of the Bible; but Leviathan, and two other mythical creatures with him, were also allegories in Sumer-Akkadian clay tablets and cylinder seals as early as 2500 B.C. The Leviathan was matched against two other creatures: Behemoth and the Unicorn. Legend has it that the Unicorn – an allegory of the Messiah – was the first creature named by Adam. To understand our allegories, then let us take up those scriptures dealing with these particular creatures:

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Job 40.15 Behold now behemoth, which I made with thee; he eateth grass as an ox.
40.16 Lo now, his strength is in his loins, and his force is in the navel of his belly.
40.17 He moveth his tail like a cedar: the sinews of his stones are wrapped together.
40.18 His bones are as strong pieces of brass; his bones are like bars of iron.
40.19 He is the chief of the ways of God: he that made him can make his sword to approach unto him.
40.20 Surely the mountains bring him forth food, where all the beasts of the field play.
40.21 He lieth under the shady trees, in the covert of the reed, and fens.
40.22 The shady trees cover him with their shadow; the willows of the brook compass him about.
40.23 Behold, he drinketh up a river, and hasteth not: he trusteth that he can draw up Jordan into his mouth.
40.24 He taketh it with his eyes: his nose pierceth through the snares.
(Leviathan:) 41.1 Canst thou draw out Leviathan with an hook? or his tongue with a cord which thou lettest down?
41.2 Canst thou put an hook into his nose? or bore his jaw through with a thorn?
41.3 Will he make many supplications unto thee? will he speak soft words unto thee?
41.4 Will he make a covenant with thee? wilt thou take him for a servant forever?
41.5 Wilt thou play with him as with a bird? or wilt thou bind him for thy maidens?
41.6 Shall the companions make a banquet of him? shall they part him among the merchants?
41.7 Canst thou fill his skin with barbed irons? or his head with fish spears?
41.8 Lay thine hand upon him, remember the battle, do no more.
41.9 Behold, the hope of him is in vain: shall not one be cast down even at the sight of him?
41.10 None is so fierce that dare stir him up: who then is able to stand before me?
41.11 Who hath prevented me, that I should repay him? whatsoever is under the whole heaven is mine.
41.12 I will not conceal his parts, nor his power, nor his comely proportion.
41.13 Who can discover the face of his garment? or who can come to him with his double bridle?
41.14 Who can open the doors of his face? his teeth are terrible round about.
41.15 His scales are his pride, shut up together as with a close seal.
41.16 One is so near to another, that no air can come between them.
41.17 They are joined one to another, they stick together, that they cannot be sundered.
41.18 By his neesings a light doth shine, and his eyes are like the eyelids of the morning.

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41.19 Out of his mouth go burning lamps, and sparks of fire leap out.
41.20 Out of his nostrils goeth smoke, as out of a seething pot or caldron.
41.21 His breath kindleth coals, and a flame goeth out of his mouth.
41.22 In his neck remaineth strength, and sorrow is turned into joy before him.
41.23 The flakes of his flesh are joined together: they are firm in themselves; they cannot be moved.
41.24 His heart is as firm as a stone; yea, as hard as a piece of the nether millstone.
41.25 When he raiseth up himself, the mighty are afraid: by reason of the breakings they purify themselves.
41.26 The sword of him that layeth at him cannot hold: the spear, the dart, nor the habergeon.
41.27 He esteemeth iron as straw, and brass as rotten wood.
41.28 The arrow cannot make him flee: slingstones are turned with him into stubble.
41.29 Darts are counted as stubble: he laugheth at the shaking of a spear.
41.30 Sharp stones are under him: he spreadeth sharp pointed things upon the mire.
41.31 He maketh the deep to boil like a pot: he maketh the sea like a pot of ointment.
41.32 He maketh a path to shine after him; one would think the deep to be hoary.
41.33 Upon earth there is not his like, who is made without fear.
41.34 He beholdeth all high things: he is a king over all the children of pride.
(Unicorn) 39.9 Will the Unicorn be willing to serve thee, or abide by thy crib?
39.10 Canst thou bind the Unicorn with his band in the furrow? or will he harrow the valleys after thee?
39.11 Wilt thou trust him, because his strength is great? or wilt thou leave thy labor to him?
39.12 Wilt thou believe him, that he'll bring home thy seed, and gather it into thy barn?

Moby Dick

The great American novel by Herman Melville, Moby Dick, picks up on the challenge against Leviathan. While I had not read the novel since I first read it when I was nine years old, suddenly I found myself communicating with Captain Buckley about America's problems in terms of the allegory of Moby Dick. By way of introducing this work we needed to refer to the above scriptures and Melville's work, filling in the background, as it were, for a letter to Captain Buckley having to do with the subject of Leviathan, which we now quote in full:

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---

February 26, 1993

Dear Mr. Buckley,

Thank you for your forthright offer of February 19, 1993 and consideration relative to our correspondence. I accept your generous conditions.

My word! How terrible it must have been for you to live with the knowledge of being stove in all these years. Like you I knew we were sunk and I took your letters to The Old Man of the Sea and asked him his view of this. He answered: I must warn the others; the only problem, he added, would be that the people will probably not respond, for historically a nation does not respond to its prophets (we, of course are not prophets, I think, but rather men who have knowledge of rising water in our bilge, a large hole by which it has entered, and the probable Leviathan which caused it).

When The Old Man of the Sea  answered me, my whole soul was rent, as yours must be also. For I do not know of a case where a people changed after receiving such a message as we own, except in the case of Jonah and Nineveh. I have no idea how Jonah persuaded Nineveh, do you? Thus, my quandary, my despair. I am sharpening my harpoon in any case.

Not being the first nor the last to be honed by your wit--I'm in stitches!--in answer I graved a Tiny Book called, Against Leviathan, on the sighting of Leviathan. It contemplates how one might cause him to raise his ugly head out of the sea so that not only the people will recognize him (before he hits us again), but, as experience has taught me, also that one might put a well fitted blade between his beady eyes. Already having been contemplating this problem for some time, I enclose two other Tiny Books which link to Against Leviathan. The homeless have been using my Tiny Books to raise money for themselves. I size them this way so to make them easy reading in the head, where one's spirit can munch on them without interference.

Seeing the hole in our hull – I myself am not yet fit for sea chowder – and being reminded by The Old Man of the Sea , my main concern is for the crew and passengers, for there are many lives at stake. Millions have been washed into the raging deep already...

A rhetorical thought: are we on the Pequod or the Titanic? Pequod, you will no doubt remember, was the name of a celebrated tribe of Massachusetts Indians, now extinct as the ancient Medes.

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Explain why they should be terrified over the debt! was [incidentally] the answer The Old Man of the Sea laid on me.

As I said, all of this has been making me sick; I need to fall off just a bit to locate some fresh air and muse on The Old Man of the Sea's charge, but remain ever so,

Sincerely yours,

M

encl: Against Leviathan, What Price Justice ,
The Miracle of Zer Anpin

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I was worried, having received Captain Buckley's letters, since they had almost persuaded me to become a Republican (since he and I are so much in agreement). I faltered, none the less, because most of the Republicans whom I have seen are the type who first jump ship; some, having spotted the monster from the deep [Leviathan], already headed for safer havens.

I do agree with Captain Buckley's terse view of the situation at hand (I lament I lack his skill!): "After that [Reagan's submission of his first Budget] we were probably sunk." To confirm my sighting with his and any others who may have seen it I ask of all who read this: was it a huge shadowy thing, like an iceberg, which stove us in or was it surely the sinister Leviathan? Speaking for myself, I can confidently say I saw Leviathan, which I hope to express, with deep trepidation, my account to you now.

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Lighting the Warning Lamp

As said, knowing we were bludgeoned beforehand, I thought to take the matter up with The Old Man of the Sea , since it appeared to me that the people aboard our ship ought to be warned of the danger to them and The Old Man of the Sea knows much about such things, timing, etc.

Having received The Old Man of the Sea's answer as mentioned, to point out quite appropriately, dealing justice to the subject I have to show why Leviathan will do deadly harm to our nation; and I must do it in such a way that they don't panic and move to one side of the ship or the other, offsetting it; or begin jumping overboard themselves, or worse, riot, or even worse – God forbid it happen – mutiny.

That's why my first thought was to shoot out a warning in an orderly sort of way, following, as it were, the ethics of the sea.

Ethics of the Sea

There comes a time when every Captain must heed the commands of his crew and make hard decisions necessary to save his ship. Seeing a hole in his ship he has to do something to avert the disaster. In our case we aren't sunk yet; only destined for it if Leviathan takes another hit at us. So I believed the hole could be repaired and there is still time to save those who are still able and alive, keeping in mind the words of the sage writing in the Dead Sea Scrolls (Theodor H. Gastor's translation, Anchor Books, New York) which said:

(Book of Hymns)
The Heavens shall thunder loud,
and they that now do dwell
on the crumbling dust of the earth
be as sailors on the seas,
aghast at the roaring of the waters;
and all the wise men thereof
be as mariners on the deep
when all their skill is confounded
by the surging of the seas,
the seething of the depths,
as high over the swirling tides
the billows surge, the breakers roar,
while the gates of Hell burst open,
and at every step they take,
they face Perdition's shafts,
and only the raging deep
hears their cries.

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No doubt this sage had Captain Buckley and others like us who go down to sea in mind:

Wherefore on their account
I was as a sailor in a ship
when the seas do froth and foam.
All the breakers thereof
kept pounding against me,
and the whirlwind blew about me,
and there was no moment of calm
wherein to catch my breath,
neither could I steer
a course upon the waters.
The deeps echoed my groaning,
and I came near to the gates of death.

Getting the Helmsman to steer

When we take my boat to sea, I set forth certain rules to be obeyed by all on the ship. The first rule applies to the helmsman and goes something like this:

Assume the Helmsman is half blind, hard of hearing, and stupid. Don't assume he sees a danger, don't assume he hears a danger; and above all do not assume that he is smart enough to avoid the danger on his own.

Of course the rule applied mostly to me, since I am the Captain of my little ship; even so whoever is at the helm must obey the commands of those helping him to steer the ship. Sometimes, for the sake of safety one may have to get the skipper's attention through extraordinary means, even if it means relaying a command from the bow directly into his ear with such a force the helmsman will be sure to respond.

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The danger of not heeding one's own rules

Unfortunately, when I have been on other boats these rules I myself have failed to observe, and it got me into two precarious positions which I, for the sake of understanding better the Leviathan with which we are dealing, must now relate: One skipper cut on the left of a red buoy, when the rules of the sea said to go right, and we suddenly came to a stop on the rocks (near Red Rock in San Francisco Bay, if you know it). I could have saved us a lot of trouble, the ship and its skipper much grief and expense, had I--seeing the danger beforehand-- opened my mouth and reminded the skipper to keep to the right side of the buoy. The other passenger on the boat did not know any better in any case.

Not taking advantage of that lesson, a few months later I found myself on a boat in the Sacramento Delta (coming from Spinnaker Marina to Moore's River boat, if you know the area); and again I watched that skipper cut on the wrong side of the red buoy. We were in a classic sedan cruiser (upon which Humphry Bogart nailed Greta Garbo the owner said – these are his words not mine), and suddenly we took a heavy hit on the bottom, as if Leviathan himself were raising his frightening aspect. Moments later the skipper's brother, having stepped down into the main salon, cried out, "Skipper, there's a lot of water down here!" It was past midnight, having partied the whole evening, and we had about a mile to go. We had hit, it turns out, an underwater piling which once was part of a barrier which the old river boats used to bounce off of to navigate the tight bend in the river. The now rotten piling knocked out a plank about 5 inches wide and four feet long in our beautiful vessel. God apparently was smiling on us, as we did make it to Moore's River boat, with worried brows and spirits well reconciled to their maker; and as we tossed a couple of lines to the dock cleats we watched the engine voice its final grumble, a cough and a gurgle, as the waters overflowed the deck; then that magnificent cruiser sank into the inky black before our eyes. I cried. Fortunately, by then pumps brought by the Harbor Master were in operation on the dock and hid the appearance of my tears. The skipper dove into the submerged wreck in spite of the cold, muddy waters, and came up with some strange possessions: worthless papers and a now useless small stereo.

There is a happy ending to this story (in spite of my self-inflicted shame for not having shouted out the danger beforehand), for the cruiser was raised the next day and her skipper – as those who know the boat have reported – has her restored in better shape now than she was before she went down. The boat was not insured.

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I mention this as experience in these matters one can better appreciate the feelings loaded upon one when a ship is claimed by the roaring deep. And we all know that often a ship goes down because the skipper – or even his crew – weren't altogether there, if you know what I mean.

High Water in our Bilge

Knowing the high water in the Bilge and our experience over the years of seeing boats claimed by the sea and many of the creatures from its deepest troughs, I know you will agree with me that Captains and crew have a duty to the ship and its passengers to help it survive. Thus, I took the occasion to write Captain Buckley on this matter, composing this in the process, knowing that among those of us who go down to the sea, with The Old Man of the Sea, an appropriate course could be charted to not only seal up the hole in our bilge but ascertain a means of dealing with Leviathan so to prevent him from holing us again.

Identifying the immediate problem. Surely we can agree that the National Debt (and its Interest Payment) is the water which has been entering our ship of state's already overburdened holds. Surely we can agree that it is not the water which entered the hold which is our problem, but rather the Leviathan which knocked the boards out of our hull. In the meantime, until we find a suitable means of sealing up the hole (I know Captain Buckley and others like him are not ones to easily abandon a ship) I repeat our need to at least warn the others about the rising tithe in the bilge [sic. the $292B+ interest payment]. It has been deferred year to year and it seems to be rising on the same exponential lines as the National Debt which itself is doubling every five years:

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(from the Bureau of Public Debt; see also The World Almanac 1993)

National Debt	Interest	Deficit
$314 Billion, 1960	$9 Billion	$0 (+ $.3 Billion)
$620 Billion, 1976	$37 Billion	-$.7 Billion
$1,142 Billion, 1982	$117 Billion	-$128 Billion
$2,152 Billion in 1986	$190 Billion	-$221 Billion
$4,200 Billion in 1992	$292 Billion	-$320 Billion
Our (1993) proj.: $8,000 Billion ~1997 (8 Trillion) (1) Note: Cost cutting, Clinton's record tax increase, stealing from Social Security funds (which will soon require a hike in SS taxes), and other fancy book-keeping practices may have mitigated these effects, but who knows the true numbers?	$600 Billion	$1,000 Billion

The problem that nobody cares

– until it's too late. Often those who see the danger have to educate the passengers – even the skipper – as to the needs at hand. More often than not, particularly in the affairs of states, the people simply don't give a damn until they themselves are as it were boomed or thrust into the murky waters. Unfortunately in the case of our ship [of state] the media are mute on the issue of the High Waters of our debt (surely its a dirty Commy Conspiracy); and whenever they comment on the Deficit they seem reluctant to confess that its major component is an annual interest payment. How endangered we are: President Clinton is using the same charts as Presidents Reagan and Bush and the thing which is dashing us to pieces will (like Freddy Kruger – forgive me for mixing aphorisms) be back, with screaming terror, every year. (1)

Lacking a responsible Media

– or perhaps in view of the fact that they might be part of a dirty Commy Conspiracy or even, God forbid, themselves keepers of Leviathan, the job of countering the danger becomes somewhat rhetorical and impossible. I can now bring into view Captain Buckley's assessment of the situation – to illustrate the depths of our despair – and quote his letters in full (the first answering my argument that Presidents Reagan and Bush endangered us in increasing our debt and our creditors now are collecting most of the personal tax monies in lieu of the common welfare – see Financial Institution Credit Watch on this):

February 2, 1993

Perhaps we ought to divide the argument. Whether the government is properly engaged in the business it funds with debt, and whether the costs of those businesses are lower than their benefits, is one question. Whether the people whose money the government borrows to fund those businesses are sociopaths because they make money by lending it, is quite another. Not even people who make more than $200,000 per year can compel the feds to borrow. If debt service is growing too high too fast, then the tax-and-spend-and elect crowd in the congress are the sociopaths.

Yours cordially,

Wm. F. Buckley Jr.

---

 

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Agreeing with Captain Buckley

(I say, the Leviathan stoving us in is Congress and our Presidents), I offered data which showed that President's Reagan and Bush essentially got every appropriation they asked for out of congress and were the leaders of the sociopaths (see The Trial of a President ); Captain Buckley replied:

February 19, 1993

You may quote my letter of February 2 in its entirety, if you wish; but I have to decline to give you latitude to excerpt. As to the Presidents' budget requests, I said at the time they were too high. I still say so. President Reagan might possibly have succeeded with a lower one, the first time out. After that, we were probably sunk.

Yours cordially,
Wm. F. Buckley Jr.

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Why should we be terrified over the debt?

As mentioned, Captain Buckley, The Old Man of the Sea, and I know that our debt has been dragging us down into the deep. We all know that the dollars of the Deficit mentioned in our table above could have been used to maintain jobs, our health, and our happiness, rather than paying off impatient creditors. Not to blame the creditors but to say that the main purpose of our government, according to its Constitution, is to provide for the common welfare. Picking up from there the United Nations Charter and associated Covenants (see What Price Justice for a summary of them) concluded that the common welfare of a people must include the protection of their Human Rights and their Dignity. And what we now see seems to be a shift in American policy, where its citizens are being thrown out onto the streets and treated – pardon my blunt edge – like dog shit (see The Miracle of Zer Anpin on this). No doubt you have seen many homeless people kicked aside from shop keepers' doors, more often arrested; and at least in San Francisco and Berkeley they are prevented from raising tents over their heads, access to latrines, or even being fed by concerned citizens taking food out to them in the streets and parks (It's still legal to feed the birds and squirrels, however). Having worked with the Homeless (they use my Tiny Books to raise food money) it is apparent that the conditions they face in the United States are not far removed from those conditions the Jews recently endured in Germany's ghettos. Because of this multitude alone surely if we can't get the American People to attend to them we ought in good conscience – recognizing the failure of our government to observe established international covenants – ask the United Nations to intervene! Someone estimated that there are about 3 million of our refugees alone in California; God only knows the total number across this great nation (others mentioned 30,000 in New York City); surely they exceed in number the Kurds or Somalis for whom we've raised tents and fed!

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The Poor know the deficit ate their job

For my part whenever I hear a Media Pundit mention the Deficit, my teeth get on edge, my fingers tingle, and I have a compulsion to reach for my harpoon. For everybody keeps talking about the interest payment on our National Debt in confounded ways, often citing it without knowledge as $200B when we all know that the last time the interest payment was that amount was in 1987 ($195B); in 1991 it was $286B. The problem here, as with Congress and our current leadership, is that those making decisions which have been destroying jobs and those necessities to protect our Human Dignity (our Human Rights have already been shot to hell) are so detached from the communities who elected them we would do better to address our complaints in a graveyard than to their scaly, deadened hearts. For the crux of our situation is identical to that of Nazi Germany in its early days of reallocating their wealth.

You can pay me now or pay me later!

We know that there were some Germans, British, and Americans who protested the Nazi treatment of the Jews in particular and the Nazi designs in general. But their concerns fell entirely on deaf ears and blind sighted faces. So speaking out on the harm of our National Debt, and the multitudes it has spewed out of its mouth onto our streets--speaking against the way, more so, how they are being abused--is no more effective in America than it was in Berlin in 1939. "The Catholic Church and Nazi Germany," by Guenter Lewy, McGraw-Hill Book Co., 1964, carries a shocking study of this phenomena as it developed in Germany. We can sum his conclusions thusly: All the churches, nay all the people, sold their soul to power and greed: the Aryan Creed, might makes right, and all that dribble. Fortunately the Germans left some ruins standing as a continuous reminder of error, how Mephistopholes himself tempted them with the sinister words:

You can pay me now or pay me later...

We of course have not been stove in by that creed, but a similar one which not only condemns millions to homelessness but shames them for failing in the American pursuit of power and money. While a few people passing the homeless sitting in the streets may take pity on them (they don't need pity; they need a job), most of whom I have watched believe that the homeless deserve their fate. It's kinda sorta like an I got mine to bad you didn't get your's sucker attitude. Shame on them for not being employed! our people exclaim.

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It seems to me that we are all in this together--wondering which programs to cut, or which citizens must be thrown overboard – to pay our creditors; like those on the Titanic we were already doomed: drowned as it were by the ice (I speak of cold-hearted magnates) underlying our own greed. Perhaps this is all a bad dream – like maybe the night of the living dead? – and when we all wake up all will be well.

Lifelines:

– where to hide from the Pleb's. As mentioned, I took the draft of this letter to The Old Man of the Sea who answered that I haven't said what is wrong [sic. not what went wrong with the debt]. The Old Man of the Sea explained the need for a punch line of sorts, keeping in mind our aversion to a general panic, where people begin jumping overboard before the boiler blows. So for the benefit of others we must pursue this course a bit further, and, to do so, bring to bear some comments about what went wrong. Rather than follow other weighty books already written on the subject from most of its horrible aspects and sides, to simplify our view I need only dilute my own history in the matter.

Shooting for the moon

We had no deficit in 1960 and again in the Johnson administration, yet we paid for all kinds of public welfare programs which have long since been carried off by the winds [sic. smoke and mirrors] of the Reagan-Bush Estate. I can speak of my own case as being a victim of President Reagan. I, for instance, received through night school a free college education in the sixties. In 1969/70 Ronald Reagan was governor of California and shut off the spigot of my free college. I had one class to go to obtain my Bachelor's Degree in Political Science (minor Economics); and facing a lay-off opted not to continue. I had by then engaged in an intensive self-study program, in Anthropology, Primitive Mythology, Ancient History, etc. and was then writing books on those subjects. During the sixties, reaping the boon of that age, I was trained in--and proudly participated in--those skills needed to put a man on the moon for the first time. Many things had to be invented to accomplish that mission, the most familiar of which is teflon: now a necessity for our household pots and pans. I went on in my Aerospace career to become a Proposal and Program Manager for many multi-million dollar projects. Today all that investment America made in me languishes, wasting away, as if I were an unpopular ship's scullion marooned on a desert isle.

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As I mentioned to Captain Buckley, there are many others like me who are wheezing at the rails of our tossing ship of state, who have been leaning on the life lines and now are, as it were, treated as excess cargo; then, being expunged from the ship altogether [sic homeless], treated like dog shit. Woe is me! I've been out of work since a year ago and can't even get a job at minimum wage; and because of my age (just turned 50) I seem unsuitable for many positions in need of my experience and background (which prefer people in their thirties). So for me and others like me who invested in, and were invested in, this Great Society, the jobs which were formally available when we had no deficit and a rather small and manageable Public Debt, no longer exist. To recreate them will require no doubt an effort on the order of putting a man on the moon (no pun intended).

Checking pulses

We use to joke back in the early sixties how North American Rockwell, my employer in the early sixties, needed only to check pulses for new hires, as then they needed living, educated bodies (of which there was a shortage) who were capable of learning how to put a man on the moon somewhat quickly (deadline 1969). Our problem then was not a lack of good jobs, I can assure you. That venture, from 1960 to 1970 only increased our Public Debt 6 billion dollars, from $264B to $370B. Cheap! What a deal! America not only paid for my college and gave me wonderful medical and retirement benefits, she trained me to help put a man on the moon! They did it using a sound purse to boot! (which had no holes in it)! So for those of you who are listening in on Captain Buckley's, mine, and The Old Man of the Sea's conversation, the stuff we had in our ship of state – all those wonderful benefits of the sixties and seventies (in spite of the Vietnam War)--have been carried out to sea through the hole stove in by a Leviathan:

Leviathan's appetite

An over-grown government is like Leviathan coming up from the murky depths to sink its razor sharp fangs in everything around it. In our case, he munched on the extended credit cultivated by the Reagan-Bush Estate. We all know that too much credit (sic. credit cards) is always accompanied by hefty interest payments. Again we must be reminded of Leviathan's smooth words: You can pay me now or pay me later. We know that he is also pictured as a dragon-like beast with a fiery mouth who always collects double on everything with which he tempts us. Usually this means stripping us naked. For instance, since 1981 we have been borrowing to pay the interest payment on our debt, increasing the debt exponentially, creating higher interest payments, and leaving us with no money to finance education, jobs, health, or just to provide basics for the common welfare. The proof of this is of course on the streets: millions of homeless (more beggars than in Somalia) with far more numbers of degrees and skills than one dares even to contemplate.

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Deficit Spending – against our youth

The original religion behind our debt was called Deficit Spending; and the idea here was that America could pass one's debts onto her children. Her children are now grown up, as has grown the debt from Deficit Spending.

Emaciated labor force

Interestingly enough, Leviathan's comment about paying me later seems to be snagging our fathers who created Deficit Spending--whose Social Security and health benefits are being nibbled on by Leviathan. Leviathan has been feeding on people of my age as well: who can't seem to find a job because they've passed the prime hiring age (those who are in their thirties, cheap labor and aggressive); and now he is feeding on our youth who cannot afford college (at $20,000 per year) and who have no opportunity to obtain skills because of the lack of skilled jobs which now rest offshore. So among our homeless, whose opportunities have been consumed by Leviathan, we see all ages and all races: little old ladies and men whose monthly Social Security checks don't cover the cost of rent; highly skilled and educated middle-aged men and women, many isolated on the streets through divorce and the inability to meet the costs of housing; and youths barely able to read and understand our Tiny Books. As the younger generation are ushered onto the streets, because we lack jobs and an ability to invest in jobs and education, because our $292B interest payment has supplanted those items in our budget, our pool of skilled workers on the streets – still struggling on the life-lines – will continue to deteriorate. In contrast, in the 60's, when we reached for the moon, we already had a skilled and educated work force left over from World War II and growing: cultivated by parents who wanted us to have a better life than they (but we'd have to pay for it).

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Leviathan's world-wide tentacles

In the search for profits our leaders moved what was once a thriving industrial economy offshore, where laborers could be found who now, alone on the Mexican border, live in sloughs, cardboard huts, and work in beautiful, clean factories for an average of 50¢ per hour, which in turn has set a new International Wage Standard.

Facing the more difficult mission of an international economy under the above cited conditions, Americans now compete as Service workers, which I can say quite confidently--in contrast to the current dogma--do not require much retraining for those of us who put a man on the moon. In my career I adapted to all technological challenges: from not only the Apollo project but the great grand-daddy of the Cruise Missile, MIRV's, Electronic Warfare, Flight Controls and Safety Systems and many others. From those disciplines I shifted into a career as a Home Furnishings Representative and finally took a dive into Publishing. Unbeknownst to the crowd who are running our still surviving manufacturer's of technology – such as Lawrence Berkeley Laboratories where I have these past two years submitted many employment applications in vain – I and many others like me haven't forgotten our skills. [An aside: perhaps I'm not politically correct for Lawrence Berkeley Lab?] Yet, one walking through their halls would suppose that we had gone blank, since the only age group seemingly needed in their treasured technology vaults and vestibules are those who have not yet gone over the hill, as it were. Surely there is need for training programs, but there are enough of us still alive to run any course of which our government sees fit to lay upon us. We need jobs. We went to the moon, and passing from it the Reagan-Bush Estate turned us in another direction, dead-headed to nowhere. Who needs the dead-heads now? answered Leviathan.

Strike

Long ago The Old Man of the Sea mentioned that I haven't struck my point home, that the tax money – the sacrifice, blood, sweat, and tears – was completely wasted away by the Reagan-Bush Estate. Every bit of it (he referred in principal to our enormous Defense expenditures) went to fighting something between the shape of a paradigm of dominos and a phantom.

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Doing your part

Many were doing their part in fighting the enemies of capitalism; Captain Buckley, for instance, in addition to other works helping to keep us safe and free, records that he sent out messages in champagne bottles as he crossed the Atlantic Ocean, hoping that they would be found and aid in overcoming the menace of Communism. While it is too early to tell – as all the reports are not yet in – one of his Champagne Messages may very well have ended up as a candle holder on Yeltsin's kitchen table. The proof of this rumor, of course, is in the bottle and reliable bards have noted that the wax on the surface of the bottle is too thick to sing out the hazy name of the vintner. If true, in any event it only adds to our observation that sometimes the weight of a message is best contained in a few words; we must not over-state, of course, how easy it is to bring down a tyrant when one puts one's mind to it. This is particularly so if such an inclination is from a note like Captain Buckley's!

I too was doing my part to fight communism. I had secured a position managing proposals on Electronic Warfare devices fitted on the RF-14 and B-52's. Cloak and dagger stuff. I was then working at Electronic Specialty Co. (a spin-off of disgruntled Litton Industries, Inc. engineers) in Glendale, California; then about 1969 my glory days of fighting communists were doused when a gentleman named Robert Vesco walked through our plant as our new owner from a leveraged buy-out-- one of the first Corporate Raids in American history. Then Electronic Specialty Co. had about eight divisions (one of the fastest growing High-tech industries) with about $114 million in sales. Nothing to sneeze at. My division alone had about 7,000 people working in it.

Soon after Vesco walked through the plant a lay-off was announced, I moved to another Division, and then another lay-off was announced (in spite of the fact that our Division was extraordinarily profitable, the meat of the company as it were). This was in 1970 and seeing as I had then planned to marry a lady in San Francisco, I took a voluntary lay-off and cashed in what was left of my emaciated stock (which plunged in value after Vesco got his hands on it). Ten years later I met our old Electronic Specialty Co. Quality Assurance manager at the San Francisco Airport and he said that he was still with the company – now located in Sacramento, California, but it then had only about eight employees or so, still lagging in spite of Vesco's raids on that once prosperous company's assets. There are many sad companies like this which fell under the heels of men like Vesco, who prospered--later begat as Multinational money makers – during the Reagan-Bush era. About a year ago a FW Magazine interview quoted a major Multinational C.E.O. saying to the effect that his job is to produce profits and no company in his business can afford to have loyalty to any nation--nor its workers, might we add. Today men like him are changing full time jobs to part time jobs--to eliminate benefits altogether – and then, having consumed their hosts with their bloody teeth, their scaly arms cast their plants to cheaper states and most particularly off shore. This is Capitalism? It's Leviathan. Leviathan is a near-sighted creature which consumes its hosts; often in the darkness because it hates light: thus its eyes are tiny and beady as surely noted.

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Driving up the Cost of Survival

This brings us back to the Interest of our argument. Under the Reagan-Bush Estate the motive was profits, and quick profits at that, breeding Money Privateers and Corporate Raiders who together depleted our competitive ability, by not only not investing in America but moving America's resources overseas (even the patents filed in our Patent office are becoming more and more foreign owned). This has been driving up the cost of our survival as a nation.

Colonized again – my God it's Leviathan!

When the British Empire was at its height, it was often pictured as a huge, evil octopus spreading its tentacles from the rising sun to the setting sun. This was then described as Leviathan. Again we've been colonized, since our net worth (I speak of indebtedness) is as a people (called Serfs by Rome), who serve foreign powers and who can survive on hamburgers; who can make a living at making hamburgers, and who assist in shuttling the fruits of this nation (I speak of its forests, minerals, and ideas) into the holds of ships headed overseas, which, following the old Spice Trade routes, return our wonderful resources in the form of manufactured goods to our Supermarkets and Department Store Chains. My word, The Old Man of the Sea just reminded me that perhaps it's time for Paul Revere to ride again; no doubt the British have again landed! We suspect this because the old tea tax is back (tea kept the early colonists going, as oil keeps us going today); the problem is today we can't afford even tea let alone the tax. Furthermore, if you were to compare the complaints sketched herein you'd conclude that they are graver by far than those listed by Jefferson in our venerated if not holy Declaration of Independence against King George!

Money does not beget money – only poverty: [Roger Owens, who taught me how to prune, helpfully pointed out that money does not beget value, which we noted in The Second Coming of the American Revolution ]. Says who ? queried President Reagan, as he was signing our wealth over to Leviathan's ships. I took Reagan's proofs to The Old Man of the Sea . But The Old Man of the Sea maintained his position: money does not beget money. Clinton himself, following in Reagan's footsteps, is vigorously attempting to prove this maxim wrong as well; in spite of Presidents Reagan's and Bush's own phony arguments – citing the evidence of the Roaring Eighties (when the stock market was roaring though the jobless were howling) – to disprove this old aphorism. The proof is in the pudding they say: look at all the people who raked enormous heaps of money by using other people's money, through leveraged buy-outs, raids, etc. Of course along with this, remembering my own dousing by Vesco, we must also recall that no era in our history was served by greater corruption than the Reagan-Bush Estate.

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Millionaires nurtured during the Reagan-Bush Estate made most of their money from the cultivation [I mean manipulation] of money! The real evidence here is that money begetting money does not beget jobs. This is where Leviathan took the big bite out of us, and having gotten such a great chunk of us, recognizing his insatiable jaws, once he starts feeding we know he cannot stop! Because of Leviathan there are no jobs--except for service jobs (for these we need retraining? I must repeat!) – therefore the great wealth of this nation must really be in those money things which have been begetting money.

Now for the big bite

Leviathan has chased all of our wealth into one chamber where it is most susceptible to foaming seas. We speak of the stock and bond markets: paper money. The centralization of our wealth in paper is further evidenced in our foreign trade deficits, the plunge of the dollar against our main trading partners (as much as 50%), shaky holdings loaded in the empty crates of bankrupt farms, hemorrhaging airlines, many fallen giants (and elfs), and still falling corporations like IBM and Boeing; floundering Real Estate, suddenly abandoned when companies leave their host, etc. But even with all this there is good news [I feel like I'm selling off boxes of soap] for we have inherited a new and improved Stock Market, new opportunities with tax free bonds, NOL's, etc. This, of course, doesn't offer any greater job prospect for myself. Finally, our shift in reliance upon small business (80%), replacing what was once an Industrial Base, gives us the greatest sign of concern, that where Leviathan bit us was right in the mid-section. I speak of our Industrial Beltways, like Detroit, California, New England, etc.

Return to Cottage Industry?

Small businesses are great; they ought to be encouraged. But does anyone own anything any more? Where Leviathan hit us no one really seems to own anything; there is just a lot of paper to whom others are in debt and they themselves are in debt, most being engaged in new ways to service the foreigners who are selling us manufactured products. With all this the Government is itself equally in debt, like Brazil and other small countries previously consumed by Leviathan, without the ability to even service its interest payments, unlike the days when we put a man on the moon.

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Banks that own quicksand

Like the days of the Great Depression, the banking industry is reeling next to me at the rail of our overburdened, rolling, bilge busted ship (being overstocked in muddy Real Estate). The FDIC reserves are essentially bone dry – in January 1992 they were a negative $7 billion. When other $70 billion banking giants fall (weakened by having already absorbed the burden of acquiring the S&L failures) more homes and farms will be repossessed, jobs will be lost, and more teeth will begin to chatter as Leviathan's teeth reach for the hides of those who thought they were safe. But these are really choice assets to the greedy gullet of Leviathan; he just had to chomp through the many small items we listed (like chasing the big fish into a net) to get to them!

Run on the banks?

Nahh, to shake off Leviathan, the government can borrow another hundred billion (though it could eat up funds available for industry and home loans) this year if it needs to when it closes down the shaky banks (see Financial Institution Credit Watch and the Lace Quarterly). Let's see. That would only make our interest payment go up $5-7 Billion. Clinton can offset that by dumping more bonds on the market.

Stretching money, rather than printing it

After all is said and done Leviathan has learned to feed on Elastic Money. But we can't stretch beyond our ability to service our debt out of our present income. We at the moment have stretched our creditability about as far as we can go without raising taxes or refinancing our debt as in the case of Brazil, etc. Our tax income runs about $800 billion per year ($400B in personal taxes). Let's see how President Clinton and Congress can really stretch: mandatory programs have been costing about $526B, Defense $270B and interest $292B. This alone is 1,088B. Using Ross Perot's figures, from his books, charts, etc., on the Mandatory Programs we pay out in Social Security $293 billion each year, as much as we pay in interest on the debt; unemployment benefits and family support of $71 billion, increasing as the economy slides downward; food and housing $52 billion; Pension and Veterans $83 billion; farm price supports and student loans $28B. Just to rid ourself of the $292B interest payment which we have been feeding to Leviathan (to fend him off) we can raise personal taxes 20% = $80B, setting aside 10% of that to fend off rioters; a tea [energy] tax (average a nickel a gallon) of $40B; doubling Corporate taxes (now 7% of the budget) will yield another $70B. Cheating [again] Social Security investors of their ($300B) funds, or with a 10% increase (they're too old to fight, having few teeth), will grab $30B. This leaves us short $72B for our interest payment for 1993. We, of course, can [again] rob Veterans Pensions or to be fair do a 20% cut straight across the board on Pensions and Veterans, Food and Housing, and Farm price supports = $33B. This leaves a $29B deficit; what the hell let's cut the pensions (Congress too!) and Veterans benefits altogether and balance the budget! Is this what Senator Dole (a major contributor to our Public Debt himself, collecting a salary and pensions which will shock you) and other members of Congress think they are addressing?

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We still haven't funded any investments for jobs, our health, or our future. Let's follow Clinton's plan of laying off the Defense Force to the tune of $70B. This can finance retraining programs and the like and set aside a reserve fund to fend off more riots, probably first coming from among those millions of defense personnel without employment opportunities. I suppose some of the radar technicians could find jobs installing TWT's in microwaves: perhaps in Mexico, certainly in GE's offshore facilities. If our government Human Relations personnel are clever, I'll bet they can find offshore jobs for our military overseas and save us the cost of bringing all of them home!

Leviathan will be back next year with the same if not more vigorous appetite he had in 1992/1993, even if we manage to fend him off this year! Can we stand being hit the same again next year? The interest payment will return, stronger year to year munching what remains of us...

Clinton has a different proposal than the half-hearted chops we took to the US budget. He, like the fiery Bush before him, thinks perhaps it is easier to feed Leviathan than to feed the people. Following Bush's plans of stretching our credit (a new way of stretching paper money), suddenly we have a program which is no longer a $1 trillion and change budget but $1.5 trillion, being composed of $200B in increased taxes and reduced programs and at least $300B in Bush borrowing.

Bush Borrowing – as if there were no tomorrow!

This plan calls for paying dues on foreign escapades to keep up Leviathan's image, charities, and even wars through borrowing (the Marshall Plan upside down). Remember? Leviathan is best known for his Pride! Should I follow through on the pun on the Marshall Plan (1947)? Creditors refer to fools who try to sell their homes or cars, owing more on their loan than the property is worth, as being upside down.

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Pissed-off:

When people hear the Truth they get peeved. When I mention this to friends who trusted in Reagan more than they trust in God, and thought that their taxes were paying our way, when they were in reality being drained away to pay for our creditors' Mercedes', they get pissed, to put it mildly. Not that they have anything against people who loaned us money, as said before, but owing to the fact that they had been deceived into thinking that their hard earned cash has been used to pay for our common welfare, when in fact it hasn't: we're operating on borrowed money. For instance, when I mention how President Bush launched Desert Storm on borrowed money, they seem no less pleased. I'm surprised, however, that they haven't yet responded by raising barricades in the streets.

Chain Letter

The Old Man of the Sea explained what's going on in terms of a Chain Letter. The Elastic Currency System (Borrow, borrow, borrow) is like a Chain Letter. What will break it is when someone in the chain realizes that all the money being stuffed into the envelopes is going only to a few people at the top of the pyramid. Then the pyramid collapses.

Small things crashing on our head

Isn't it odd that the French Revolution began over a petty rumor about Queen Marie-Antionette, concerning her lavish necklaces and somewhat body pleasures in the court? Or our own Revolution began as a protest over a petty tea-tax? Of course the French people had a serious complaint against King Louis XVI. The masses were ragged, starving in the streets, and the king's wife was flaunting her wealth. So major changes in civilization often are stored in the very spots [Sybarites] where Leviathan feeds. And where he feeds is where we have disobeyed God. This is a paradox, I know, for, as the preacher in Moby Dick, "The Sermon," explained, if we obey God, we must disobey ourselves; and it is in this disobeying ourselves, wherein the hardness of obeying God consists. The first admonishments of God are to provide for the poor and the afflicted among us (recognizing the need because of Leviathan's appetite). The second admonishment of God has to do with money (being the root of all evil) but we concern ourselves here with his warning against Usury. It will eat you alive, the Bible says. It reminds me of a documentary which showed a family of hyenas (what terrible jaws they have) attacking antelope. A small Thompson's gazelle was brought down, paralyzed from the grip on his neck, but not suffocated as normal. The hyena began eating its rear quarter while the gazelle looked on. When I saw that I covered my mouth with my hand, seeing something of God in the photographer of that event. For he could not interfere though I know for the sake of Mercy he should have. This is what we mean by being eaten alive. Many of the homeless on our streets are, as I speak, being eaten alive. I speak not only of their horrible, sometimes emaciated conditions, but the fact that disease (tuberculosis is hitting them hard), lice, and vermin of all kind are literally eating them alive, as in other shipwrecks. I've seen many sores and scaby and oozing wounds on our people.

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As noted above, our capital is invested in a money begetting money Leviathan, so when the public realize that their jobs have been wasted because of his appetite, all of the things which have been feeding him will collapse in astonishment, making an enormous wave, and leaving no assets behind upon which to cling. I am speaking abtrusely of coffins...

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Notes:

(1) There is an irony in the entire 2 1/2 year conversation with Wm. F. Buckley Jr. Shortly after the conclusion of our correspondence in May 1995 Newt Gingrich announced a "New Contract with America" which featured a declaration by Congress to stop borrowing on the debt. No doubt they believed that such a measure would be devastating to President Clinton who had, as discussed in Against Leviathan, continued the excessive borrowing practices of the Reagan-Bush estate. But Clinton got converted to the idea of not only "no more deficits" but actually paying down the national debt. During the last years of the Clinton's administration there were no deficits and payments reducing the national debt had been achieved (see National Debt trend) demonstrating that a government can be run without borrowing. The irony of all this is that George Bush I had continued Reagan's borrowing which we believed under future administrations would grow the national debt from $1.5 trillion in 1992 to $8 trillion by 1997. Clinton staved off the trend through the national debt paydown but ironically George Bush II reverted to the old, irresponsible economic policies of his father and President Reagan.

The complaint in Against Leviathan was that irresponsible borrowing – causing huge costs in debt service, higher than other government outlays, such as Defense – was disastrous. Before Reagan became Governor of California, for instance, there were no homeless on the streets. He introduced the nation to the practice of not providing for those who could not provide for themselves, releasing a horde of people in medical institutions out onto the street, to beg. By 1985, after returning from overseas, I discovered in San Francisco the streets littered by homeless people. Today, according to a recent television documentary, San Francisco's public television station, KQED, the homeless in the US are estimated to be 350,000. And thanks to the present King George our national debt is expected to reach or exceed $9 trillion by the time his office ends. His excesses in other spheres far exceed those of former tyrants.

Mel Copeland
Berkeley, CA
July 3, 2006

  (Opening the Bastille)

Please beam me back up to Maravot's Homepage
Please send me to the National Debt Scandal
Please send me over to The Second Coming of the American Revolution
Please send me over to Duty and Profit

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