The Tarboro Weekly May 31, 2017

Yankee Finance Capitalism Made Simple

 

Part One: Definitions and Origins

Money is a great mystery.  In my years of teaching economics courses and economic history nothing so confuses students, and their elders, as the subject of money.  Or rather I should say the subject of money and currency.  Some of this confusion is a result of the failure of economists to agree on standard definitions of money and currency, and thus the two are often confused and conflated in standard works on the subjects as well as by the “talking heads” on financial shows. The failure to nail these definitions down leads everyone to talk past each other.  So without further ado, let us begin with definitions.

Money is an abstract concept whereby certain characteristics and functions are attached to an object, but these characteristics and functions may not be exclusive to a particular object.  So in defining money, we need to focus first upon these vital characteristics and functions.  Something is money if it has all of the following characteristics: a store of value, portability, divisibility, and acceptance as a medium of exchange.  Let us have a closer look at each of these.  Something becomes a store of value when we are convinced that the object will maintain its utility for future purchases.  Thus we “save” the object.

Some economists refer to this as the asset demand for money, or view money in this function as a type of energy that is stored for future use.   It is all the same, we collect and save money because we believe it will hold the value it has today into the future as well.   When it comes time to use money for investment or purchases, it is most convenient to be able to carry it around, and to be able to divide it, that is to make change.  Finally, we hope that sellers will accept our money as a medium of exchange in payment for goods and services; it makes for a much more pleasant evening if we can pay with money an owner of a café for a meal rather than do dishes all night.  In general, gold and silver have best performed the functions of money, but other things can and have been used as money in the past: tobacco, cigarettes, sea shells, etc.

More @ The Abbeville Institute

Treason

 

Christian Mercenary

There is a division of the nation that cannot be repaired. While the media pretends that everything it does is out of concern for the nation, it is really out of concern for the advances toward collectivism that have been made under Barack Obama that piques their concern. The way that the media and the "deep state" cooperate to maintain those collectivist advances is startling, or would be, if anyone reported on it.

Understand that everything that has gone on since the election of Donald Trump has been to deny him the presidency, not so much the office, but the power of the office. This was evident when federal and appellate judges ruled against a clear and logical power of the President concerning national security when he signed executive orders to ban individuals from certain nations from coming to the United States largely because those individuals could not properly be vetted as to previous criminal or terrorist activity.

It is evident when certain cities refuse to obey federal law and governors and mayors openly vow to violate federal law to prevent Donald Trump from enforcing immigration laws.

It is evident when investigations into illegal acts of FBI and CIA directors, former Attorney Generals are ignored by the media and evidence withheld by the "deep state" actors while

This is more than just a difference of opinion, it is more than opposing Donald Trump as an individual. This is a rebellion against the republic in favor of a collectivist system, a government ruled society. In this nation, no matter how slim the vote totals, no matter how close the electoral college vote, whoever emerged as the President of the United States, was vested with all of the obligations, duties and power of the office.

This is an attack on the legitimacy of the election by a number of "deep state" actors determined to defend themselves from illegal actions committed under the Obama Administration. It is not a question of Donald Trump at all, except that it reveals the degree of corruption and collusion that exists between the establishment Republicans and Democrats to operate the offices of the American justice system to the detriment of the American people.

This collusion has grown into a hostile opposition to any elected official who attempts to disrupt the ongoing illegal activities of these "deep state" actors. They enlist the willing assistance of the media to demonize elected officials who seek reform. They use the media and the power of their offices to marginalize and demonize individuals who might expose their scandals or their illegal activities.

This is not to unprecedented or new by any means. What is new is that it is now open and in operational form. It is being used on a daily basis as a weapon against an "uncontrolled" President, one who has not been bought off and manipulated by the system. In a lot of ways, it is important for this president to engage this underground government and expose it for what it is: treason.

Trump administration to start social media vetting for visa applicants

Via Billy

The Trump administration has approved a new questionnaire for U.S. visa applicants that asks for social media handles and accounts used during the last five years and travel history, including the source of funding for trips, over the last 15 years, for more “rigorous” vetting.

The State Department requested expedited consideration and “emergency review” from the Office of Management and Budget on May 5 for the new visa application protocol. Fox News can confirm that OMB has approved the new measures.

The State Department proposed new measures for U.S. visa applicants worldwide in order to “more rigorously” evaluate applicants for terrorism or other national security-related visa ineligibilities.

More @ Fox

Monument dedicated to Father Ryan the Confederate poet-priest vandalized

Via Nancy

 

 

 Dated

An anarchist group called 'The Real Meow Meow Liberation Front' is taking credit for vandalizing a granite monument erected for a Confederate-era poet-priest.

On Wednesday, the group published a photo of the spray-painted monument on a blog called, "It's Going Down," a site that describes itself as an anonymous outlet for groups with "anarchist, anti-fascist, autonomous anti-capitalist and anti-colonial movements" to "publicize and promote revolutionary theory and action."

The monument was erected in 1949 by the Louisiana Division of the United Daughters of the Confederacy (UDC) in honor of Father Abram Ryan, a poet and chaplain of the South during the Civil War.

More @ WWLTV

A Veritable Social Revolution (shoes) in the South

 

FDR’s Secretary of Labor Francis Perkins belief that more Southerners wearing shoes would spark a consumer tsunami, is on par with New England’s early wartime belief that much good would come from giving former slaves land to cultivate on occupied Hilton Head and the Sea Islands. The logic was that the new-found wealth of the freedmen would be spent on Yankee notions and manufactured goods, and Northern industry would directly benefit.

Bernhard Thuersam, www.Circa1865.com   The Great American Political Divide

A Veritable Social Revolution in the South

“Some years ago Secretary of Labor Francis Perkins raised the temperature of many Southerners to fever height by suggesting that if the people of that section could be persuaded to wear shoes a veritable “social revolution” would result. The mass-production system of the United States, the secretary told a welfare council in May, 1933, depends upon purchasing power, the proper development of which would lead to prosperity beyond anything we “have ever dared to dream of.”

If the wages of the millworkers of the South could be raised to such a level that they could afford shoes, a great demand for footwear would result. Indeed, said the secretary, when it is realized that “the whole South is an untapped market for shoes” it becomes clear that great “social benefits” and “social good” would inevitably come from the development of our “mass-production system” to meet this latent consuming power.

Southern editors and speakers indignantly denied the canard that Southerners bought no shoes and retorted that such comments were only what might have been expected from a woman, especially one who knew nothing about the South.

It was even suggested that should all the inhabitants of the South suddenly wake to wearing shoes the resultant wear and tear on streets, sidewalks, and hotel carpets might cause grave financial loss to the area.

That was in 1933 . . . [and it was maintained that] Markets can only exist where there is demand; demand comes close upon the heels of knowledge. Knowledge, or education in the ways of the West, has therefore been considered essential if “backward” peoples are to be induced to purchase western goods. [Henry M.] Stanley, the African explorer, in an address before the Manchester Chamber of Commerce, published in 1884 [asserted] that if Christian missionaries should clothe naked Negroes of the Congo, even in one dress for use on the Sabbath, “320,000,000 yards of Manchester cotton cloth” would be required . . . Should they become sufficiently educated in the European moral code to feel the necessity for a change of clothing every day, cloth to the value of [26 million pounds] a year would be necessary.

When the natives have been educated they would abandon their idleness and sloth, [John Williams, missionary to Tahiti said in 1817], and become industrious workers. Then, he asserted, they will apply to our merchants for goods . . . “

[When FDR called for a New Deal in the South] He certainly must have been aware of the implications of the thesis that the poorly housed, undernourished, and ill-clad Southerner must be given greatly increased purchasing power to enable him to better his economic condition, thus strengthening the demand for manufacture products and consequently improving the economy of the nation as a whole.

It is also certain that the concern which Secretary Perkins felt for the shoeless Southerner was not without precedent. When the armies of Grant and Sherman liberated the Southern Negro, the economic implications were not lost on the people of the victorious section. Following in the wake of the Union armies a host of teachers and missionaries flocked to the South, determined to Christianize and educate the freed Negro . . . with a decidedly abolitionist tinge, to be sure.

[These] people, their robes of self-righteousness wrapped firmly around them . . . carried with them the New England school, complete with curriculum, texts and method, but they also took with them the attitudes and beliefs of the social reformer and, specifically, the militant abolitionist. Politically, the teachers and missionaries became the tools of the [Republican] Radicals in their program of reconstruction . . .

Sensing in the alphabet and the book the key to the white man’s position of dominance, the open-sesame which would unlock the magic door of equality and wealth, the Negro, like the Polynesian, flocked to the church and the school. As one observer wrote, the “spelling book and primer” seemed to them Alladin’s [sic] lamp, which will command over all the riches and glory of the world. In brief, they believed that education was “the white man’s fetish,” which would guarantee wealth, power, and social position.

Some of the teachers [and missionaries] understood the inevitable result of the extension of freedom, Christianity, and education to the Negro – the development of a vast new market for northern goods, which would result in great profits to northern mills.”

(Northern Interest in the Shoeless Southerner, Henry L. Swint; Journal of Southern History, Volume XVI, Number 4, November 1950, excerpts, pp. 457-462)

Teen in Polish Parliament on the EU

Via Billy

Kalashnikov USA: AK Shotguns Now Shipping to Dealers!

 

Kalashnikov USA has begun shipping out its AK shotguns to dealers around the country!

The KS-12 and the KS-12T should be hitting the shelves of your local brick and mortar gun shop any day now, if they haven’t already. The company said that these models will be followed by the KR-9 9mm platform by the end of summer.

“We have finally reached the point of being more than satisfied with the remarkable quality and reliability of these products,” said Kalashnikov USA CEO Brian Skinner in a press release obtained by GunsAmerica.

“These firearms are truly worthy of the Kalashnikov name,” he added. “We are extremely proud to introduce these to the market, and are confident of their success in the AK arena.”

More @ Guns America

The most unusual MiG killer: the Skyraider air-to-air victories on North Vietnamese MiG-17s

 

The last propeller U.S. Navy attack aircraft to disappear from the decks of the flattops was the Douglas AD Skyraider.

This airplane had a unique capability: even when it carried its full internal fuel of 2,280 pounds, a 2,200-lb torpedo, two 2,000-lb bombs, 12,5 inch rockets, two 20 mm guns and 240 pounds of ammunition, the Skyraider was still under its maximum gross weight of 25,000 pounds.

Entered in service just in time to take part in the Korean War, the Skyraiders in the improved A-1H version were quite slow; nevertheless in spite of performance not even comparable to those of the other assets in the air wing’s strike group, the propeller-driven attack aircraft managed to shoot down two MiG-17s during the early part of the Vietnam War.

In fact, some of the most unusual kills of the conflict did not come from the F-4s, F-105s, or F-8s, but from the Korean War-era piston-engine Skyraiders, thanks to the four M3 20 mm fixed forward-firing cannons capable of firing 800 rounds per minute, that fitted the A-1Hs.

The first of these victorious engagements took place on Jun. 20, 1965, when a flight of Skyraiders from the Strike Squadron 25 (VA-25) Fist of the Fleet, took off from the USS Midway (CVA-41) supporting the rescue of a downed USAF pilot in the northwest corner of North Vietnam were attacked by a flight of MiG-17s.

More @ The Aviationist