Gravity Quest

A SIMPLE EXPLANATION

I have certainly never thought of myself as intelligent, and if I can understand this stuff anyone can. But I realise that some of the things I rant about may sound complicated and difficult to people who haven't either the time or the facilities to do the their own research. So I thought I would put together a concise outline of the reasons behind what has been called the 'credit crunch' by our government and other interested parties who profit directly from keeping YOU from the truth. I have no party political leanings and I offer this only because it is so very important and is affecting people who do not deserve to be treated in this way. Only when we understand the problems, can we begin to build a better future.

After what has been called the 'great depression' in 1930's America, the American government quite rightly decided to restrict the damaging behaviour of the banks as this was seen as the cause of the problems. They did this by bringing in strict new laws. Incidentally these measures were very similar to those which our government is now proposing since the 'credit crunch' began to badly affect our economy.

Because this heavily restricted the banking industry at the time and the way it was allowed to make money, they fought long and hard to get the laws changed. They eventually succeeded in the mid 1990's by putting people who agreed with them in positions of power in the government. These people could then keep a close eye on anything the banks didn't agree with and could change or resist them accordingly.

Since then it has been perfectly legal for the banks to invent money. I know this might seem wrong, but this is absolutely true. Most people have only a rough idea how banks work, thinking they lend you their own money or money they are looking after for us, in the form of our wages and savings etc. This is completely wrong. If you ask your bank for a loan they do not look in some big concrete vault to see if they have 'enough left' out of all the money they're looking after for us. What they actually do is just write the number/amount into your bank account, if they think you can pay it back. And so, they 'invent money'.

Unfortunately, because the government should be the only people who can create our 'money' or currency, this has a very bad effect on anything they try to do to control the costs of running the country, as it leads directly to inflation (which is when our money loses its value). In fact every time the banks invent money, the value of all the other money in existence must drop to even things out.

Of course, the banks don't just lend out money for our benefit, they add 'interest' which is their profit on the deal. Now the thing is, they have invented so much of this money that there is not enough 'real' money to pay back all the loans that they have created. Not least because, as the creation of money causes inflation, the value of the money we earn is worth less. So we have a kind of vicious circle. Obviously there's a little more to it than that, but bear with me.

This has made it very difficult for businesses and the government, and consequently us, to prosper leading directly to the situation we are now in. Where businesses go bust because they cant keep up with the increasing costs of just doing business or their customers cant afford to pay them for the work they've done. Which wouldn't be so bad if it just stopped there, but due to the ever increasing amount of workers losing their jobs the government does not receive enough in taxes to pay for the running of the country. Things like building roads and running the health service etc. This is what the government calls 'the budget deficit'. A situation where they have to borrow money just to pay the bills, and who do they borrow it from? Yep you guessed it, the banks. Money which, as I have shown, can only lose value leading to, as I said earlier, a very vicious circle indeed.

Now this is where it all gets a bit naughty, if it wasn't naughty enough already. Because the government has to borrow money with interest to pay the bills and the value of money can only decrease, the budget deficit can only increase. So the only action they can take is drastically cutting the amount they spend. Which they call austerity measures and is where you and I come in. We are being asked to accept without question or comment cuts to any benefits we receive (and I don't just mean social support as in unemployment benefit and welfare.) so that the government can afford to support the system the banks have created which in their opinion must not be allowed to collapse, as it would if it was a normal business (I will leave you to imagine why that might be).

As you may have noticed, and this is not just scaremongering, everything around us has gone a bit wrong. We are seeing cuts in welfare and services that often we have paid for, and increases in council tax and everything we buy. All caused because basically the banks were greedy. Not only that, but our government can't do anything about it because, as I have tried to show, they're not in charge of the money supply, the banks are. To add insult to injury some of them are not even aware of this.

So when you are now asked by your government to help get your country back on its feet, by working harder and longer for less wages, or told that due to 'the markets' you will not be getting the pension you were promised, you will hopefully understand why. And its worth remembering that this is not politics, its economics run by the banks. So whoever you vote for, whatever they may tell you, they are going to find it very difficult to do anything about these problems, apart from asking you to pay more to support the illegal, self-serving, and cynically destructive actions of a small number of banking corporations.

Its up to you now, what are you going to do about it?

Reverend Launceston P. Holsworthy (retired)