Once Upon a Time: Faery Law and Economics

By Julian Dunraven, J.D., M.P.A.

 

What is your favorite fairy tale?  Which character do you relate to most?  Is it a hero, or a villain?  I am quite serious, and the answers might surprise you.  You may scoff, but fairy tales are among our oldest and most venerable stories, many predating recorded history.  Each generation continues to retell them to the next because they encode some fundamental life lessons—important enough that they survive the ages.  However, not all retellings are equal.

According to my students, my own favorite tale and character should be Rumpelstiltskin, as portrayed in the modern retelling of old fairy tales, Once Upon a Time.  They claim he is my doppelgänger in both style and substance.  It is not every day I get compared to a faery imp, so when unrelated people started to make that comparison weekly, I grew alarmed enough to sample the series—and I am glad I did.  Once Upon a Time is an adorable and addictive family show that will delight Disney fans of any age.  Like the original fairy tales it draws upon, the show tries to present moral lessons to its audience.  However, as may be emblematic of our society in general, its portrayal of the heroic and villainous is sometimes confused, if not entirely reversed. 
 

For those of you who have not yet had the pleasure of seeing it, Once Upon a Time is an ABC television series about classic fairy tale characters (especially those from Disney) whom have been sent into our world via a curse, and are unaware of their fairy tale origins.  Rumpelstiltskin, played by Robert Carlyle, is a powerful sorcerer who, in our world, is a meticulously polite attorney, always impeccably dressed in a suit, sporting long hair, a walking stick, flashy jewelry, and ever willing to offer his considerable services—both legal and magical—with the understanding that everything comes at a price.  After seeing his character, I decided that I quite liked such an apt comparison.
 

What began to disturb me, though, was that the show portrayed him as a villain. Yet, in virtually every episode, he ends up saving whichever hapless characters manage to get themselves into trouble, usually due to their own ineptitude or foolish attempts to hide unpleasant truths from one another.  That would normally warrant heroic laurels.  However, it seems real heroes fly to the rescue with no expectation or thought of reward; they dedicate their power and efforts to the good of others simply because other people need them.  Rumpelstiltskin, on the other hand, has the temerity to demand payment for his aid.  The other characters inevitably run to him at the first sign of difficulty, each claiming that they have such deep needs and he has such enormous power, that it is his moral duty to help them.  He invariably refuses, and offers instead an exchange of value: a favor for a favor.  Although they usually accept, the other characters hate this, and spend most of their time attempting to weasel out of their side of the bargains, and vilifying him for expecting payment in the first place.  Perhaps even more offensive to the other characters is the fact that the few people Rumpelstiltskin does help without demanding payment are those few dear to his own heart—not those deemed most important to the greater good of the community. 

It seems strange that the ideas of individual liberty and free market exchanges, once the very foundations of the United States, would today find themselves representing villainy, whereas utilitarianism and communitarian obligation now stand for heroics.  Is this really the lesson the old fairy tales have to teach us?  I returned to the original source material to find out. 
 

There are many versions of the “Rumpelstiltskin,” story in just as many cultures.  It is widely thought to predate recorded history, with origins back in the oral tradition.  Like all such ancient and enduring cultural stories, it is meant to convey a few fundamental life lessons, as well as a few warnings. 

In most versions of the story, an arrogant miller boasts that his daughter is better than all others, as she can spin straw into gold.  The king or chief, hearing this, calls the miller’s bluff.  He seizes the girl, imprisons her in a room full of straw, and tells her that she shall either spin it into gold by the next day to prove her father’s boasts, or face execution.  Devastated, she falls to weeping at her impending demise.  It is at this point some impish creature out of Faery enters the room and inquires at the cause of such distress.  It then offers to help, and promptly spins all the straw into gold, then leaves before dawn.  The next day, the flummoxed chieftain insists upon another demonstration with yet more straw.  The imp once more returns, and repeats its earlier miraculous performance.  Now thoroughly impressed, the king offers to marry the girl and make her his queen if she can but repeat her feat once more.  Again, the fay appears and, this time, offers a deal: he will gladly repeat his transmutation of straw into gold provided she consents to let him raise her first born child.  Giddy at her imminent status elevation, she quickly agrees.  When the new queen gives birth, though, and the fae creature comes to collect, she balks, and asks to be freed from her contract obligations.  Moved to pity, the imp gives her three days in which to guess its name in order to be freed from the bargain.  Just before the third day, a woodsman overhears the creature boasting of its own strange name, one the queen will never guess, and kindly makes haste to inform the queen.  When the queen thus guesses correctly on the third and final day, the creature disappears, never to be seen again.   
     

The tale is meant to be cautionary.  It warns against the dire consequences of arrogant boasting.  It also warns that nothing comes free, and that one must be careful and very clever in negotiations—or else dependent upon luck and the kindness of others.  While the faery is certainly the adversary in these tales, it is by no means villainous.  Rather, it is actually rather generous.  First, it offered miraculous help no one else could have provided.  It offered its services for a fair and honest bargain, to which the girl agreed.  Even when she tried to wriggle out of her obligations, rather than simply enforce the contract it had, it generously granted her a new bargain—and it always remained true to its own word.  The warning in this tale is not aimed at the wily fay, but at the arrogance and impulsiveness of humans—an enduring truth that may explain the story’s universalism and longevity.  

Rumpelstiltskin is not the only ancient faery with lessons to teach humanity, but his behavior is emblematic of most faery interactions.  In all the old fairytales, whenever the fae enter, they represent idealized concepts of either good or evil, but always an aspirational step above mortal humans.  Through their divine blessings, curses, and contests, we frame our own struggles for perfection and illustrate important concepts of ethics, morality, and sometimes just practical advice.  This might be clearest in stories from the Celtic tradition, in which the faeries are nothing short of old deities finding new form in a Christian culture—but still teaching important lessons.
 

In Celtic tradition, the fae all seem to follow a few universal rules, to which Rumpelstiltskin, and his more Celtic incarnations of Tom Tit Tot or Whippitie Stourie, are no exceptions.  It is easy to dismiss these rules as mere cultural fantasy.  However, if one keeps in mind that the fae represent an idealized divine aspect to our cultural stories, the rules that govern such divine beings take on new importance: they represent a culturally enshrined vision of the divine.  How we think the gods interact tells us a lot about how we think our own societies should behave—and indeed, there is much to admire.

Perhaps the first, and most easily recited rule of Faery is that faeries never lie.  Given that they are all practically immortal, this makes sense.  In such a society of eternal beings, anyone dealing dishonestly would quickly find themselves permanently distrusted.  This is not to say the fae are completely honest; they are quite selective with how much truth they reveal in order to gain advantage, and thus favor cunning and cleverness.  Certainly, this is borne out in the tale of Rumpelstiltskin.  Both the human miller and his daughter lie about her abilities, and she lies again in making her contract for aid—but the fae never lies.  His mistake is one of arrogance, in thinking he would not be overheard in his gloating—another important lesson.

The second rule of Faery is an absolute respect for individual sovereignty.  Despite their incredible power, the fae never use force in their mortal dealing unless directly attacked or trespassed upon.  To fall under fae power, one must either enter into their territory or consent to it in negotiation—either way as a result of one’s own will.  The fae might use glamour and clever language to influence that choice, but it remains free all the same.  As in the case of Rumpelstiltskin, a fae may appear with an offer in a time of desperate need, but as they do not create the circumstances of that need, the bargains they offer remain freely chosen opportunities, not forced impositions.  Even in attempting to regain their own property, such as the seal-skins of a selkie, the comb, mirror, or hat or a merrow, or any number of other enchanted items from an endless variety of fae creatures, despite the clear ability to smite a human with their power, the fae are inclined to negotiate rather than use force.

Even so, the concept of property, and negotiations over it, is integral to all fae interactions and fundamentally connected to their idea of sovereignty.  Indeed, even the monarchs of Faery exercise such authority only within the bounds of their own sidhe or hill.  Go but a little further on and some solitary fae crone in her hut will negotiate as shrewdly and exercise all the same authority as a king in his court. The lands of Faery have no discernable government or overarching authority.  Rather, each exercises sovereignty over his own property and labor.  As a semi-divine and immortal bunch that, in various tales, has the power to transmute gold, create bountiful foods, or spawns any number of other objects out of sheer will, money holds no great value for them.  Rather, their currency is in their property, time, and service.  Hence, the ubiquitous favor for a favor that all fae creatures seem to delight in negotiating.
  

What is remarkable about this is that, unlike human reality, the fae never break their contracts.  Indeed, doing so would amount to dealing in bad currency, a dishonesty that would be ruinous in  such a society.  Neither, though, do they resort to theft or force when they cannot get what they want through negotiation.  They seem to recognize that all value must be exchanged for value.  Even in the occasional story of the fae making off with some household item, unless they are recovering what belongs to them in the first place, they always leave something of equal or greater value in exchange. 

For Rumpelstiltskin, a being able to appear and disappear at will, taking a child to raise would be no great feat.  Yet, rather than force his way, he negotiated a miraculous service for the miller’s daughter in exchange for her parental rights.  When she then met his further terms for dissolution of the contract, he departed in peace.  This reverence to individual sovereignty, property interests, and free negotiation is truly astonishing in an entity portrayed with such terrifying power—and something I fear few humans equally equipped would emulate.

Perhaps the strangest and most foreign idea out of Faery is its treatment of gifts.  In almost all stories, the fae give and accept gifts with great caution.  Unlike a contract, whose terms are well defined and finite, a gift caries unspecified and open obligations to the giver.  It imposes a debt burden that must be repaid similarly.  As a result, simply thanking the fae for a gift is a great insult, which frequently results in their abrupt departure and withdrawal of all favors.  It diminishes and dismisses the effort of the gift with mere words.  Instead, the fae demonstrate gratitude by repaying something of value in kind.  Thus, a gift, far from being free, stands as an invitation to an open and ongoing exchange of debt obligations—the fae expression of a relationship, and perhaps more honestly expressed than our own.

All of this should be encouraging to any lover of liberty.  It means that deep within our cultural psyche is a libertarian (and maybe libertine) paradise called Faery.  Many of these ideas could have as easily come from Immanuel Kant, or Adam Smith.  As we discern the shadows of law and economics the old stories reveal about such a place, we can also perceive the outlines of the free society the Western World has attempted create to since the Enlightenment.  Apparently, we have been planting the seeds of it into the minds of our children for many centuries—through the faeries of fairytales.  

All in all, Faery seems to be a vibrantly free land, full of anarcho-capitalists who all govern themselves according to Kant’s categorical imperative in a state humans have always aspired to but have never quite achieved.  Yet the fae exist in our tales to remind us of that ideal.  Rumpelstiltskin, certainly represents this, both in his fairy tale and in Once Upon a Time, but the show vilifies him for it. 

Contrary to the principles of the old stories, ABC presents the wild freedom represented by the fae as exactly why such beings should be feared.  For the characters of Once Upon a Time, any power and ability exercised for one’s own benefit is evil.  Instead, all such ability should be limited to serving only the needs of others—freely.  Concepts of sovereignty, property, and compensation are selfish obstacles to the greater good of the many—and should be set aside to meet their needs. 
 

To this end, the heroes it casts display an unrelenting and ruthless tendency to break any bargain, take anything they need, violate any sovereignty, and even sacrifice any life--so long as they think it serves the greater good—as defined by them.  After witnessing the callous disregard of all rights practiced by heroes such as Prince Charming and Princess Snow White, one can easily see the dangers of monarchs and dictators of all stripes.  Yet their incessant justifications for such vile deeds do not draw upon royal right, but rather sound remarkably close to the old communist creed: from each according to his ability to each according to his need.  If anyone gets hurt along the way, well, the needs of the many outweigh the injuries to the few.  The intent is good, and for that, sacrifices must be made. 

That particular story was told by the USSR and its satellite states.  Although they lasted for less than a century, they used it to justify mass murder and bloodshed on a scale never before seen in human history.   It is not a tale that should be told again as anything but a dire warning.  For ABC, however, it still seems to hold some appeal.  Consequently, Once Upon a Time frequently suffers from an inability to make any clear principled distinction between good and evil at all.  As the final song warns in another modern retelling of old fairytales, Into the Woods, “Careful the things you say, children will listen.”  Despite my initial aversion to being compared to the fay imp, Rumpelstiltskin, I now take it as a great honor.  It seems these strange creatures of our cultural psyche have been trying to teach us about liberty for millennia.  I would much rather children hear that tale than the one of dreary sacrifice and subjugation to the neediest offered by the modern retellings. 

“Come away, O human child!

To the waters and the wild

With a faery, hand in hand,

For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand.”

—William Butler Yeats

No Economic Recovery; Prepare For Inflationary “Meltup”

By Julian Dunraven, J.D., M.P.A.

Honorable Friends:

Your government is lying to you. We are not in economic recovery. We are merely experiencing a cash bubble through printing—inflation—and every day that bubble is in greater danger of bursting. When it does, the American people will face national bankruptcy.

The following video comes to me on the recommendation of Gerald Celente, director of the Trends Research Institute, and The Trends Journal. For those of you who have not already subscribed to his journal, he is one of the best economic forecasters in the world.

To my friends in the Tea Party, this is why you are marching. Simply getting Republicans elected will not be enough to save this nation from economic collapse. Any politician, Democrat or Republican, who does not understand what is in this video must go.

In addition to Mr. Celente, this documentary, "Meltup," features some of the best economic experts available including:

• Peter Schiff, Austrian School economist, bestselling author of Crash Proof, owner of Euro Pacific Capital, former economic advisor to Ron Paul, and current candidate for U.S. Senate in Connecticut
• Dr. Ron Paul, Congressman from Texas , former presidential Candidate, bestselling author and voice of the Austrian School economists on Capitol Hill
• Marc Faber, renowned Austrian School economist.
• Jim Rogers, investor, author, and financial commentator
• Tom Woods, historian, bestselling author, and senior fellow at the Ludwig von Mises Institute.
• And several others.

The National Inflation Association has done a fine job in producing "Meltup." Our liquid fuels crisis, the manipulations and fraud in the precious metals markets, the debt problems and the looming threat of dollar collapse through inflation are all covered in detail. As Celente points out, we are on the verge of the second American Revolution. This video will give you a better understanding of what we face, and what the Tea Party and its supporters MUST achieve if it is to be successful.

Understand the Financial Crisis: The Lie of Recovery Will Devastate the Unprepared

By Julian Dunraven, J.D., M.P.A.

Honorable Friends:

At the People’s Press Collective Reeducation camp this past weekend, I was pleased to see so many people gathered to learn how to become more effective advocates for the cause of restraining government, promoting individual liberty, and restoring free markets. Truly, an army of Davids is indeed rising to oppose the Goliath of obscenely bloated government. Those who attended this camp hardly needed to be told that the U.S. government has become the biggest liar in the history of the world; they attended the camp to gain the tools needed to begin correcting that problem. They face an uphill battle, though. I was horrified to hear that at least a few of our government’s lies had penetrated even the PPC camp when one of the attendees claimed that, with the nation now in recovery, it is critical to elect Republicans so as to resist any further bailouts and allow the recovery trend to continue.

Make no mistake: whatever illusion of recovery we have entered into is just that—an illusion. Nothing has been altered in the fundamentals of our economic situation. In fact, we have done substantial damage to the soundness of our currency and the wealth of our people, leaving us in a much weaker position to face the problems quickly rushing toward us. Those who do not prepare themselves and their families now are likely to be ruined in the coming economic storms. The Obama Administration’s assurances that we are in recovery may be one of the most atrocious lies ever told in a long history of deceptions.

I wish I could agree with my honorable friend in thinking that merely electing Republicans will offer a solution to this problem. Yet, many in the Tea Party movement correctly understand that Republicans have been almost indistinguishable from Democrats in their profligate spending practices. Many of them voted in lock step with Democrats as Congress issued one bailout after another, assaulted our civil liberties, dismantled the free market, and shredded the Constitution.

While it is true that no Democrat will ever reform this obscenity, we can no longer afford the Good Old Boy mentality of deal making, back scratching, entitlement, and the politics of pull that has too long infected the GOP. We require men and women of true principle. Merely demanding principled politicians, however, will do nothing unless we understand the nature of the problem ourselves, and can hold our politicians accountable in how they address it. Otherwise, we are simply asking to be lied to once more.

At the PPC Camps, several attendees have asked me where they can obtain concise, reliable, and comprehensive explanations for our economic situations and what each of us can do to prepare ourselves and our families. In answer, I strongly recommend viewing the free "Crash Course" by Mr. Chris Martenson. Even if you have no background in economics, finance, or natural resources, you will find Mr. Martenson’s webinar easy to understand. His advice will leave you in a better position than many who graduate college with Economics majors. After that you may want to move on to "Smoke and Mirrors: The Story of Fiat Currency Abuse," a webinar presented by Richard Karn of Emerging Trends Report and hosted by the Bullion Management Group, Inc. While parts of this may be a bit dense, especially at the beginning, I advise you to stick with it. You will have a good grasp of our financial situation by the end.

These two webinars will give you the basic knowledge you need if you want to have any hope of holding our Republican candidates to anything resembling real principles. We cannot afford to get it wrong anymore. We cannot continue to watch our government pervert capitalism in favor of unequal patronage whereby favored insiders profit while all others struggle. We cannot allow our government to burn the savings of our people and spend away the wealth of this nation to leave our children, for the first time in U.S. history, a standard of living which is less than our own. We cannot let our government continue to weaken what should be the greatest nation on earth.

Child Safety Standards And The Idiocy of ABC

By Julian Dunraven, J.D., M.P.A.

Honorable Friends:

I know better. I really do. In truth, I was simply trying to be polite. Nonetheless, I opened the email from my honorable friend, clicked on the link, and suffered through a clip of ABC’s World News with Charles Gibson, a man who somehow manages to look grave while pronouncing utter rubbish.

The clip in question, "Lagging Safety Standards for Baby Products," was not news, but rather an inexcusably fear mongering advocacy piece calling for greater government regulation in response to the recent crib recall. My honorable friend sent it along to me in the hope that I could explain why the federal government does not already set strict safety standards for baby products.

Contrary to ABC’s histrionics over what it sees as a complete lack of regulation, the federal government does indeed impose rather exacting safety standards upon manufacturers and retailers of child products. The Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act of 2008 (CPSIA) stands as just one example of such regulation. This is nothing to celebrate, however. The CPSIA serves only to impose crippling costs on business, and actually undermines the safety of the children it purports to protect. All it successfully does is increase the size, scope, and power of government. Only Mr. Gibson could breathe a solemn sigh of relief over that. Sensible people should be alarmed.

The Economic Costs of Regulation

The economic costs of the CPSIA are fairly obvious. The CPSIA requires that any product intended for the use of children under age 12 must be tested by a third party and certified for safety under standards promulgated by the Consumer Product Safety Commission (the Commission). Other than prohibiting excessive levels of dangerous substances such as lead or phthalates, the CPSIA leaves it to the Commission to define and set safety standards. Once certified, a manufacturer must affix a proper label to each of its products. Even without knowing what additional testing standards the Commission will impose, this third party testing, certification, and labeling requirement imposes enormous expense.

For a large toy manufacturer such as Hasbro, these additional expenses, though irksome, are manageable. The company will simply pass the costs along to consumers, and young parents, struggling to pay bills, will marvel at the outrageous prices of baby products while no doubt cursing the "greedy" corporate executives they mistakenly blame for the cost. The consumer suffers, but the large company may survive with less profit. A small business, however, will suffer even more.

A stay at home mother who designs and creates baby bibs for her own children, then has them manufactured for public sale, will suddenly find her business faced with expensive new testing requirements for every fabric she uses, for every fastening device and material she attaches, and for any pacifier or toy she may include with the sale of such a creation. It makes no difference that she thoroughly researched the safest types of products and materials for use in her designs. She must meet the requirements of the regulations, though the cost of doing so is greater than all the revenue of her small start-up company. The time commitment alone is more than she has as a new mother. So she closes her business. Others like her are prevented from entering the market at all. Government has just set a high wealth barrier to market entry.

Regulation’s Cost to Safety

Perhaps even more worrying than the financial costs of the CPSIA, though, is the damage it does to the cause of child safety. This may seem counterintuitive given that CPSIA is intended to do the exact opposite. Make no mistake, though, the existence of the CPSIA ensures that baby products will be less safe than they would be without the CPSIA.

If the CPSIA and its like did not exist, children would not be in any imminent danger. Rather, the safety of products would be determined by the courts. If a child were injured by any given product, and the parents brought suit against the manufacturer, a judge would look to see whether the manufacturer knew, or should have known, that the product could be expected to cause injury. A judge would hold a manufacture responsible for knowing the best practices of his or her industry. Thus, even if a particular manufacturer was ignorant of a product defect or risk which others in the industry had discovered and corrected, he or she would still be held responsible in tort (and sometimes under criminal law) for failing to maintain best practices. The beauty of this system is that the safety standard is always rising as the industry gains new information. Manufacturers have great incentive to keep up with or exceed best practices as punitive damages can put them out of business and the safest products have great marketing appeal.

The CPSIA changes all that. Under the CPSIA, the Commission sets industry standards by law. That then becomes the minimum safety level, and as long as a manufacturer meets the legal standards for its products, it cannot be held liable for the injuries its products may cause. The industry may, in fact, develop best practices far in excess of the safety standard set by law. However, as these standards are more costly and the law does not require them, many manufacturers will not use them in the production of their goods. While the Commission will attempt to issue regulations modified for industry development, it cannot possibly keep pace. It is but one underfunded government agency charged with setting standards for millions of baby products in the industry. Inevitably, its regulations will lag by many years. That is the sole point ABC correctly reported. The government, acting through the Commission, cannot possibly set safety standards as exacting or as efficiently as the industry itself through the proper operation of our court system and the market.

ABC and Mr. Gibson seem to think government must involve itself in everything we do for our own good—especially to protect the children. As I hope you see here, though, further government regulation of child safety standards actually leaves our children more vulnerable while imposing crippling costs on our small businesses. Just ask yourself: do you want the products your child uses to be subject to the highest standards the market and toy industry can offer? Or do you really want to leave your child’s safety at the bottom of a federal bureaucrat’s inbox?

　

　

　

Obama's Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009: What You Don't Know May Kill You

By Julian Dunraven, J.D., M.P.A.

Honorable Friends:

Yesterday, the people of Denver demonstrated that they have far more sense than their Congresswoman does when 700 of them rallied on the State Capitol steps to voice their opposition to President Obama’s health care bill.

The President has been working hard in recent weeks to persuade us that such opposition is unfounded. In his recent prime time press conference, he soothingly told us that this legislation would help reduce the costs of health care. He went on to assure us that we would all be able to keep our current health care plans and would not be forced onto government programs. In conclusion, he promised that health policy would be free from congressional meddling, as it would be overseen by a nonpartisan committee of medical experts whose recommendations would have to be accepted or rejected in their entirety by Congress. He said all of this with a straight face. None of it is true.

As a former Constitutional Law instructor, Mr. Obama knows that Congress’s legislative authority cannot be limited in such a way. Had Mr. Obama actually read the text of the bill, he also would have known that it allows people to keep their own health care plans only so long as they stay with their current plans. If they try to change their plans, they are indeed forced onto the government’s program. He certainly knew, though, that the Director of the Congressional Budget Office, Douglas Elmendorf, estimated that the bill actually increases costs of health care and enlarges the federal deficit by billions of dollars.

Denver Representative Diana DeGette, apparently a very credulous person and far too busy to read the 1000+ pages of the bill for herself, has taken the President at his word and maintains that there is a need to pass the bill immediately. Unfortunately, the arguments she uses to support the urgent need for legislation are rooted almost entirely in myths about our health care system; myths Dr. Clifford S. Asness easily and entertainingly debunks in his essay, “Health Care Mythology.” Fortunately, the American people are not so easily duped.

Money Morning and Stephen Hyde both point out some of the most egregious financial problems with this bill. As Hyde asserts, “The bill requires virtually all employers to offer minimum health benefit plans that far exceed anything most of them offer today.” This will necessarily increase insurance costs. As Money Morning shows, it also has a more devastating aspect. Under the legislation, any business that cannot afford to provide the extensive coverage the bill requires will be taxed up to 8% of its payroll. This will almost immediately result in severe wage reductions and layoffs as businesses attempt to defray that cost. This hardly seems like the best idea as the nation struggles for economic recovery. Yet, this is not the worst the bill has to offer.

Peter Fleckstein (aka Fleckman), has diligently combed through the legislation and assembled a brief, line-by-line cheat sheet. His full analysis, “The HC Monstrosity-All 1,018 Pages,” can be found at his blog. While somewhat cursory, Mr. Fleckstein successfully highlights some alarming details in the legislation. To list just a few, the bill provides for:

• Nationwide government access to our private healthcare and financial records, as well as our bank accounts.
• Exemption from judicial review of the prices government sets on health care.
• Government wage controls over physicians, as well as limitations on physician ownership of hospitals and other health care providers.
• Mandates for end of life care and consultations without benefit of legal counsel.
• Government interference in marriage counseling and childcare.
• Government appointed standards and rationing for what treatments we may receive.
• No private option if you leave your current insurance carrier.

These are just a few of the many devilish details hidden within Mr. Obama’s Affordable Health Choices Act. It seems unlikely that any sane person, after reading this bill, could support its passage. That may be exactly why Mr. Obama and the Democratic leadership in the House and Senate wanted to push it through so quickly.

The American people need to know the horrors contained within this bill. Health care represents 20% of our economy. That economy is now suffering a soft depression. If we truly desire health care reform, we deserve much better than what Mr. Obama is offering. This bill’s financial aspects alone have the potential to drive us into an unbearably hard depression, to say nothing of the damage it does to personal liberties. We cannot afford to make such massive changes to such a large portion of our economy with so little knowledge or time to review. All concerned Americans should contact their congress people and demand an end to this abominable and irresponsible legislation.

How to Craft a Stimulus if You Absolutely Must & Why Obama’s Will Fail

By Julian Dunraven, J.D., M.P.A.

Honorable friends:

Last night, sounding quite defensive, President Obama gave a press conference to resentfully explain his stimulus package to the nation and insist that it be passed without further delays or questions—or we risk catastrophe. So much for the change we were promised. I have heard this tune before, from Mr. Bush. Pass the Patriot Act immediately for the safety of all Americans; yet we ended up mutilating the Constitution and the Supreme Court is still performing reconstructive surgery. We must invade Iraq or be destroyed by WMDs; but there were no WMDs. We must pass the TARP bailout now or the economy will collapse; and it is still collapsing with no sign of recovery on the horizon. Now our Dear Leader, singing the same song with a new voice, wants us to pass an even bigger ‘stimulus’ package lest the economy collapse . . . further. Whenever a politician asks to be trusted on faith alone and for action to be taken without delay or question, that is the time to settle comfortably into your chair, pull out your spectacles, and peruse the supposedly vital proposal most closely. So far, I have not found much to be pleased with—starting with the pork.

Mr. Obama’s claim that the stimulus bill does not contain pork is laughable. While it does not contain any earmarks inserted by individual lawmakers, it does fund a host of local projects that look identical to traditional earmarks. This might not be so objectionable if the projects stood a chance of building an economic infrastructure that generated more wealth than we are spending. It does not. According to the Congressional Budget Office, the cost of this bill alone will increase our annual budget deficits by $884 billion over the next ten years. It represents approximately one tenth of our GDP. Add to that the $9 trillion we have spent on prior bailouts and federal backstopping and we have devoted almost our entire GDP to deficit spending on bailouts. Thus, the stimulus will hurt us, not help us.

The money for this cannot even be financed with debt any longer. U.S. Treasury bonds are becoming increasingly difficult to sell as the world loses confidence in our ability to handle our massive debt. As such, the U.S. must either raise taxes or print the money. Even the Democrats seem to be leery of raising taxes during such hard times, which means the money must be printed. As Dick Army has stated in The Wall Street Journal, “If the government prints the money, it will increase inflation, which will decrease the value of the dollar. That would, in effect, rob Paul to pay Paul back with devalued currency.

“Taking money out of the private economy -- either through taxes or inflation -- and spending it in a way that doesn't offset the loss of money with real economic gains is worse than doing nothing.”

Doing nothing is exactly what some economists argue would be best right now, given the damage the current stimulus could do. Even those economists who want to see some sort of stimulus are not confident in Mr. Obama’s plan and certainly against taking any overly hasty action to pass it. On the right, Martin Feldstein argues that “The problem with the current stimulus plan is not that it is too big but that it delivers too little extra employment and income for such a large fiscal deficit. It is worth taking the time to get it right.” On the left, former CBO Director Alice Rivlin echoes the need to carefully consider the stimulus and its long and short term goals, warning that acting too quickly on one giant bill could ensure that “money will be wasted because the investment elements were not carefully crafted,” and, “that it will be harder to return to fiscal discipline as the economy recovers if the longer run spending is not offset by reductions or new revenues.”

These economists are correct. Too much is at stake to rush into this massive stimulus package just because Mr. Obama wants his first hundred days to be wildly productive. A good stimulus plan should include a large reduction in taxation so as to free up money for investment. Currently, the tax cuts in Mr. Obama’s package are too small and too brief to have any real effect. Second, a good stimulus should focus heavily on infrastructure and production. Currently, the stimulus bill devotes only about 5% of its spending to true infrastructure. The great bulk goes to social service spending such as unemployment, food stamps, et cetera. While such social service spending may be noble, as Jim Puplava has stated on the “Financial Sense Newshour,” it is like giving people fish instead of teaching them how to fish. Once they have eaten the fish, they will be hungry again.

When Japan experienced its terrible recession of the 90’s, its government quadrupled its debt in an attempt to spend its way to recovery through public works. The effort failed. Only when Japan reinvested in infrastructure, boosted productive capacity, and started selling their products to China did they begin to recover. In short, they had to create a “fishing industry,” rather than just distribute fish. America, too, must create a “fishing industry” if it wants to recover. The current stimulus contains nowhere near enough infrastructure spending and virtually nothing that could boost our productive capacity.

Even if these deficiencies were corrected though, the problem of financing any stimulus with our massive debt remains. The people supervising the process are still the same people who failed to see the problem coming, who failed to manage the first bailouts effectively, and who now fail to properly pay their own taxes. No one in Washington is even attempting to reform the banking and securities laws or the Federal Reserve’s meddling which brought us here. Trust has been lost. Moreover, the U.S. cannot possibly afford the trillions of dollars it would take to counter the contraction in consumer spending. We are entering a depression, characterized by massive deleveraging. The stimulus, as written, is doomed to failure and, at this point, can only add to our woes. Truly, it would be better to do nothing and allow the market to purge itself.

None of this, of course, will stop our government from passing the stimulus package. That will require a great deal of anger on the part of the people. Ben DeGrow of Mount Virtus has issued an appeal to speak out against it and I echo that call. We will not be able to stop it entirely, but we might convince Congress to take the advice of Ms. Rivlin and Mr. Feldstein to continue working on it for a while so that it is not a complete shambles.

Global Warming: Policy Change, Not Climate Change, Is the Real Danger

By Julian Dunraven, J. D., M.P.A.

Honorable friends:

Global warming does indeed seem to be a pervasive problem. Yesterday it plagued me in my morning paper, harangued me from radio and television broadcasts, and even managed to insinuate itself into the conversation of irksome social acquaintances. Although I have become accustomed to bad policy masquerading as good science, and even look forward to reading my Global-Warming-Article-of-the-Day in the paper, yesterday’s news was particularly insufferable.

Todd Hartman of The Rocky Mountain News started it off, trumpeting Dr. Susan Solomon’s new pronouncement that CO2 emissions “will irreversibly change the planet,” for centuries to come no matter what we do. I suppose someone should suggest to Dr. Solomon that, if she has noticed human behavior has little to no impact on climate change, it might be because the whole things is part of the earth’s natural and periodic cycles. However, I was rather hoping her pronouncement might end the climate change squawking; after all, she does not seem to have much hope that there is anything more to be done. Alas, fortune is not so kind.

True believers never lose hope, and so NPR did its best to keep the faith alive by broadcasting proposed solutions. It seems a few members of the scientific community were watching “The Simpsons” and drew a bit too much inspiration from Mr. Burn’s attempt to block the sun by raising a giant metal disk over Springfield. Of course, the earth is a lot bigger than the town of Springfield, and thus there would have to be quite a few of these disks launched into orbit before we could block enough sunlight to begin cooling the earth. The disks would also have to be replaced occasionally as they fell out of orbit. The real sticking point is the cost, which is currently several trillion dollars. It is always unfortunate when mere economics gets in the way of good Simpsons . . . or science rather.

Another absurd proposal NPR and others have deigned to promulgate, involves launching sulfur particles into the atmosphere. This, would be far cheaper than the Mr. Burns plan, and would sufficiently darken the sky to promote global cooling. Unfortunately, it may also severely change weather patterns, increase acid rain, and—oh yes—darken the sky. No one quite knows how many species of animal and plant life would be devastated from a decrease in light sufficient to cool the earth. It might eventually leave the world a barren wasteland, but everyone agrees it would be a cooling barren wasteland.

Fortunately, it is only bureaucrats like those running the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) who seem to use middle school science fair projects as the standard for publishable research. The IPCC’s report, which was authored by a mere 52 scientists, was widely touted as representing the final and absolute conviction among the scientific community that Global Warming is the result of human produced CO2 emissions. Instead, the Republican minority of the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, led by Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK), has soundly refuted this in its Minority Report, which cites over 650 scientists, all contesting the IPCC’s claims.

One of the more interesting dissenters is Dr. Don Easterbrook, whose study of the climate indicates normal and alternating periods of warming and cooling stretching back for millennia. Not only does Dr. Easterbrook contest the idea that Global Warming is caused by humans, after looking at the sun’s recent activity and the Pacific Ocean’s decadal oscillation, he has staked his reputation on his theory that we are now entering a period of Global Cooling, and the Warming advocates will soon see their arguments collapse.

Whether or not he turns out to be correct will be largely irrelevant for the next four years. President Barack Obama’s cabinet selections clearly indicate the he accepts the idea of human caused Global Warming absolutely, and intends to write policy with that in mind. In his January 2009 Monthly Review, Richard Loomis of World Energy gives a thorough analysis of “President. Obama’s Energy Picks.”

As. Mr. Loomis explains, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton sees Global Warming as a national security threat and, during her campaign, advocated for strong carbon cutting measures. Steven Chu, as Secretary of Energy, has expressed great distaste for oil, dislikes nuclear power for the waste it generates, and refers to coal as, “my worst nightmare.” Solar, wind, and natural gas power and natural gas fuel seem to be his preferences. Carol Browner, the “Energy Czar,” comes to us from the EPA, where she argued that California should be granted a waiver from the Clean Air Act to allow it to more strictly regulate carbon emissions. Lisa Jackson, the EPA Administrator, pushed a moratorium on new coal plants as the EPA head for New Jersey. Then there is Ken Salazar as Secretary of the Interior who, while not joining the rest in his hatred of coal, is strongly opposed to expanding oil drilling whether on land or off shore.

From this list, Mr. Loomis is correct to fear some sort of cap and trade mechanism being forced on the U.S. by executive order. And herein lies the real danger of Global Warming. In his January 24th broadcast of “the Big Picture,” Jim Puplava warns that the U.S. will have a difficult time convincing the rest of the world to join in such an initiative during this economic crisis. Europe especially will be disinclined to rely more on natural gas when Putin has consistently demonstrated his willingness to use the gas supply as political leverage. Thus, the U.S. will be forced to pursue carbon reduction policy alone. The high energy costs of such a policy would put the U.S. at a competitive disadvantage to Europe, China, and our other major trading partners. This is especially worrisome at a time when tax revenues are declining and government spending is increasing, and Mr. Puplava is right to wonder how much more of our debt the world will continue to finance when other nations are beset with their own economic problems.

Then there is peak oil. The recent IEA World Energy Outlook reports a 9.1% annual depletion rate in the world’s oil reserves. All major oil fields are in decline, virtually no new discoveries are being made, and oil demand continues to rise across the world—despite the economic crisis—especially in China, India, and oil producing nations developing their own economies. We are set for an oil supply crisis to hit between 2012-2015. Our own oil reserves are not sufficient to avert this problem, but they can help buy more time for us. However, as developing an oil field takes anywhere from 4-6 years, we would need to start investing today. Instead, low oil prices, and the refusal of the Obama administration to expand drilling while it considers actually raising taxes on oil produces has all but killed capital investment in this vital field.
Natural gas fuel is also a viable stop gap measure while we search for something to more permanently replace oil. However, it is not unlimited, and if we insist on squandering it to supply our electricity, it will not be of much help to us when we face the coming oil supply crisis.

As I have said before, Global Warming is something science is still vigorously debating as it attempts to fully understand the causes of climate change. However, to the Obama administration, the debate is over. In the midst of an economic crisis, it is willing to tax coal and nuclear power into extinction—despite an already overburdened grid. It is willing to put our nation’s entire economy in peril of the worst oil supply crisis ever seen and squander the natural gas resources that could help protect us. And it is willing to do all of this solely on the basis of its faith in human caused Global Warming. Whether climate change is a real problem caused by humans is still up for debate. However, the dangers of policy change based on that premise are very real and imminent.

The Rise of Gold and Fall of The Dollar

By Julian Dunraven, J.D., M.P.A.

Honorable friends:

Last month I wrote that the bailout total, which has now reached more than $8.5 trillion, with another $850 billion stimulus to come this year, will eventually force us into dangerous levels of inflation. I thank the Bangor Daily News and Bridget Johnson at The Rocky Mountain News for picking up on that post. Since then, although the Fed printing presses have been running at a frantic pace, nearly doubling the money base, much of it has not yet reached the money supply. That is about to change.

As the credit crisis hit and companies began to deleverage in earnest, selling anything they could to obtain dollars and pay down debt, U.S. treasury bonds sold very well. Our people, seeing the credit crunch and falling prices, began to fear a deflationary trend and flocked to treasury bonds as well. Truly markets are psychologically driven—and often insane. More rational heads have reminded us that real deflation requires a contraction in the money supply—which the Fed’s printing has made all but impossible. It seems, however, that reason is beginning to reassert itself.

U.S. treasuries are now selling at almost zero percent interest rates. As a result, $1 million invested into a one month treasury bill, rolled over each month, will earn you only a meager $100 annual interest. A one year treasury bill for $1 million will earn you only $4,300. No one can live off such pathetic returns, certainly not our retirees. As for other governments, such returns offer little incentive to continue financing our debt, which increasingly looks to be utterly unmanageable. As a result U.S. Treasury sales are beginning to decline.

As the Ludwig von Mises Institute points out, our biggest creditor nations are unlikely to increase their investment. Japan has been a net seller of U.S. Treasuries and it has its own problems to deal with from demand destruction affecting its exports. OPEC nations are suffering from falling oil prices and their own resulting economic woes render them unable to finance more of our debt. The Caribbean banks are suffering from the credit crunch forcing liquidity and in no position to offer help. That leaves China, which is passing its own $585 billion stimulus, of which the government is providing only $170 billion, leaving the rest to be financed out of its foreign exchange reserves—such as U.S. treasuries.

To further complicate the matter, Chuck Butler’s Daily Pfenning yesterday picked up on news that Chinese officials are now contemplating selling U.S. Treasuries in part out of retaliation that the U.S. government has cast blame on China for the global financial crisis. Yu Yongding, a former member of the People's Bank of China's policy board, also warned that “supply of Treasuries may far exceed demand in the future.”

Thus, as the Fed finds itself unable to sell sufficient treasury bonds to finance all the government spending, it will have no choice but to begin quantitative easing, a polite term for printing money and injecting it directly into the money supply. In other words: massive inflation.

As part of their efforts to accomplish this enormous monetary expansion and devaluation in a vain effort to stimulate the economy, the Ludwig von Mises Institute points out that the central banks have finally abandoned their attempts to artificially suppress the price of gold through naked short selling and dumping. Slapstick Politics discussed this inevitability back in October.

As I predicted last month, the result of all of this has been a drop in the value of the dollar and a precipitous rise in the price of gold as people try to find a way to preserve their wealth. The other major fiat currencies of the world are no better, as James Turk of Gold Money illustrates. The central banks of the world have all embarked on this strategy of bailouts and spending together, and they are all devaluing their currencies together. That trend is likely to continue for some time, and gold remains the best protection against it.

For those of you who still have yet to purchase gold and are cringing at its current price surge to around $900 per ounce, there are some hopeful signs to watch for. Although I do not think the bailouts and stimulus packages will be at all effective at solving the financial crisis in the long run (a topic Slapstick Politics will continue to address), I do expect them to produce a short term boost in confidence in the near future. The strange aura of hope that the Obama administration has coming into office will assist this as well. There may also be another period of deleveraging in the near future. In either scenario, several investment specialists speculate that the price of gold could plummet back down to $650-700 per ounce. If that happens, it would be a wonderful time to purchase. Before the central banks have completed their efforts at quantitative easing, most gold investment experts are estimating the price of gold could rise to anywhere from $1,500-5,000 per ounce. The Ludwig von Mises Institute goes quite a bit further, speculating that gold could climb to almost $10,000 per ounce. While I tend to lean toward the more conservative estimates, gold continues to provide the best possible protection against the inflation and devaluation the central banks of the world are now foisting upon us in what is perhaps the greatest theft of wealth in history.

Sen. Inhofe Asks the People to Help Fight Second TARP Bailout

By Julian Dunraven, J.D., M.P.A.

Honorable friends:

From what I have been reading, I doubt there are many people left in this nation, outside the District of Columbia, who still believe that the TARP bailout was a good idea. Despite this, only a few members of the Senate have shown courage in representing the people against this horrendous and immoral plundering of our country’s wealth. Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK), along with Senators Barasso (R-Wyo.), Wicker (R-Miss.), DeMint (R-S.C.), Lincoln (D-Ark.) and Enzi (R-Wyo.), have cosponsored legislation that would halt the second installment of the $350 billion bailout.

They face tough opposition, however. Obama, backed by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Leader Harry Reid, has demanded that Congress release the money to the incoming administration. Obama has threatened to veto any attempt Congress makes to withhold the money.

The U.S. Senate is due to vote on the issue this afternoon. Many people have told me that they feel helpless to prevent what seems to them to be inevitable. It is not. Sen. Inhofe and his allies are committed to fight it, but Inhofe has asked for the help of the people. All it takes is a few moments to find your senator’s web page, type a quick objection to the bailout, and e-mail the message. The Senate needs our help to stand up against this pressure, but it can be done.

Already, CNN reports that Republican senators, anticipating that Obama will get the money, are asking his administration to promise that he will only use it on the financial industry, and not alter the purpose—for the auto industry for instance—as the Bush administration did. There was a time when such a request would have been silly. The Constitution, after all, prevents a president from altering legislation to his whim—he is charged merely with enforcing it. Yet, today, Congress must beg the president to even follow the laws they pass. As Sen. Inhofe has stated before, and I have echoed, our Republic is in dire straits.

If we are unhappy with this state of affairs, then it is up to us, the people, to correct the government which should be answerable to us. It is our responsibility to defend the Constitution and to make our will known to the spineless and feckless fools currently sitting in Congress that we do not want more money to go to these bailouts. It is not hard, and requires only a few moments, and a few clicks of the mouse. I hope you will all join me in answering Sen. Inhofe’s call to contact our senators, and to send them all but one powerful word: “NO!”

How Bernanke Stole Christmas

By Julian Dunraven, J.D., M.P.A. (With Apologies to Dr. Seuss)
December 2008


Every Who Down in Who-ville Liked Christmas a lot
But Bernanke, who lived just north of Who-ville, thought it might be for naught.

Bernanke feared for Christmas, and the whole shopping season.
Now, please don’t ask why. No one quite knows the reason.
It could be that interest rates weren’t adjusted just right.
It could be, perhaps, that banks were leveraged too tight.
But I think that the most likely reason of all,
May have been that his brain was under Keynesian thrall.

But whichever of these reasons you may choose,
He stood there on Christmas Eve, fretting for Whos,
Staring down from the Fed with a sour, Bernanke frown,
At the warm lighted windows below in their town.
For he knew every Who down in Who-ville beneath,
Was busy now, hanging a mistletoe wreath.

“And they’re hanging their stockings! He snarled with a sneer,
“Tomorrow is Christmas! It’s practically here!”
Then he growled, with his Fed fingers nervously drumming,
“I MUST find some way to keep Christmas cash coming!”

For tomorrow, he knew, all the Who girls and boys,
Would wake bright and early and rush for their toys!
And finding none there—Oh the Noise! Noise! Noise! Noise!
That’s one thing he hated! The Noise! Noise! Noise! Noise!

Then the Whos, young and old, would expect a great feast.
And they’d feast! And they’d feast!
And they’d feast! Feast! Feast! Feast!
But this year there would be no Who-pudding, and no rare Who-roast beast.
Which was a thought poor Bernanke couldn’t stand in the least!

And then they’d do something he liked least of all!
Every Who down in Who-ville, the tall and the small,
Would stand close together, with Christmas bells tinkling
They’d stand hand-in-hand. And the Whos would start thinking.

They’d march and they’d protest!
And they’d chant! Chant! Chant! Chant!
And the more Bernanke thought of this Who Christmas Chanting
The more Bernanke thought, “I must stop this Who ranting!
“Why for 45 years we’ve made fiat work now!
I Must keep Christmas cash flowing!
. . . But how?

Then he got an idea!
An awful idea!
Bernanke
Got a wonderful, awful idea!

“I know just what to do!” Bernanke laughed in his throat.
And he made a quick Santy Claus hat and a coat.
And he chuckled, and clucked, “What a great Fed-ish trick!
“With this coat and this hat, I’ll look just like Saint Nick!”

“All I need is a reindeer . . .”
Bernanke looked around.
But since reindeer are scarce, there was none to be found.
Did that stop old Ben?
No! Bernanke simply said,
“If I can’t find a reindeer, I’ll make one instead!”
So he called his friend Hank. Then he took some red thread
And he tied a big horn on top of his head.

Then he fired up the printing presses.
He had lots of money to make,
Loaded the sleigh with excesses
And he hitched up old Hank.

Then Bernanke said, “Giddyap!”
And the sleigh started down
Toward the homes where the Whos
Lay a-snooze in their town.

All their windows were dark. Quiet snow filled the air.
The Whos were all dreaming sweet dreams without care
When he came to the first failing bank in the square.
“This is stop number one,” The old Bernanke Claus hissed
And he climbed to the roof, bloated bags in his fist.

Then he slid down the chimney. It looked rather grimy.
But if Santa could do it, then so could Bernanke.
He got stuck only once, for a moment or two.
Then he stuck his head out of the fireplace flue
Where bad mortgage backed debt all sat in a row.
“These derivatives,” he grinned, “are the first things to go!”

Then he slithered and slunk, with a smile most like a snake,
Around the whole town, and financed each big bank’s mistakes.
Fannie and Freddie, Bear Sterns, and Citi
TARP, AIG, GE and more Citi.
To bad business he gave billions, oh very nimbly,
But as for good business, they didn’t get any.

To get the money flowing he was bound to inflate,
So he even brought treasuries down to negative interest rates.
Printing money by trillions he nearly doubled the cash.
Just think of Zimbabwe; it wouldn’t be rash.

Then he stuffed all the money down the chimneys with gusto
“And NOW!” grinned Bernanke, “I’ll fix up the Autos.”

And then Bernanke flew to Detroit, with more money to drop
When he heard a small sound say “The Senate said ‘Stop.’”
He turned around fast, and he saw to his gall
Congressman Ron Paul, who was ready to brawl.

Bernanke had been caught by this noble Who master
Who’d got out of bed to see what was the clatter.
He stared at Bernanke and said, “Santy Claus, why,
“Why are you devaluing our dollar and savings? Why?”

But, you know that Bernanke was so smart and so slick
He thought up a lie, and he thought it up quick!
“Inflation’s not bad,” the fake Santy Claus lied,
“It’s just that this level has never been tried.
“So I’ll inflate until we can create a new bubble.
“Then our economy will be back to boom on the double.”

But his fib fooled no one. Then he grabbed Paul by the head
And he trussed him and gagged him and tossed him back in bed.
And when Paul was disposed of, with his Constitution too,
He turned back to Detroit and forced the money through.

But inflation burned through the Whos’ savings like fire.
They were poorer, not richer, as he left, the old liar.
Working longer and harder before they could retire.

And the only speck of money
Left to the average Who house
Were accounts that were even too small to buy food for a mouse.

Then the same thing befell all the Whos’ houses
Leaving accounts much too small to feed the other Whos’ mouses.

It was a quarter past dawn . . .
All the Whos, still a-bed
All the Whos, still a-snooze
When he packed up his sled,
Packed it up with their final stimulus package! The checks! All indebting!
For the poor! And the Middle Class! For Change! What trappings!

80 trillion feet up! Up the side of Mount Debt-it,
He rode to overlook Who-ville, on their heads to dump it.
“Hal-loo to the Whos!” he was Fed-ishly humming.
“They’re finding out now that Christmas cash is coming!
“They’re just waking up! I know just what they’ll do!
“Their mouth will hang open a minute or two
“Then all the Whos down in Who-vill will all cry YOO-HOO!”

“That’s a noise,” grinned Bernanke,
“That I simply must hear!”
So he paused. And Bernanke put a hand to his ear.
And he did hear a sound rising over the snow.
It started in low. Then it started to grow . . .

But the sound wasn’t happy!
Why, this sound sounded angry!
It couldn’t be so!
But it WAS angry, VERY!

He stared down at Who-ville!
Bernanke popped his eyes!
Then he shook!
What he saw was a shocking surprise!

Every Who down in Who-ville, through distortions great and small,
Was chanting! Not one had any presents at all!
He HADN’T kept Christmas cash flowing!
IT FROZE
Somehow or other, it froze, though how, he did not know.

And Bernanke, with his Fed-feet ice-cold in the snow,
Stood puzzling and puzzling: “How could it be so?
“It froze despite nationalizing! It froze despite rate cutting!
“It froze despite bailouts, quantitative easing, and printing!”
And he puzzled for hours, ‘till his puzzler was sore.
Then Bernanke thought of something he hadn’t before!
“Maybe our economy,” he thought, “doesn’t come from just a store.
“Maybe the economy . . . perhaps . . . means a little bit more!”

And what happened then?
Well, in Who-ville they say
That Bernanke read von Misses and Hayek that day!
And the minute he saw true capitalism’s light,
He whizzed back to town to set all to right.
He stopped all the bailouts and ended fiat money!
And he, he himself, Bernanke, restored a land of milk and honey.