The Federal Reserve and Purposeful Malaria

Figure 1 Hydrotherapy for an arthritis patient, who is being fed water through a hose in the belief that the water would push the poisons from his system, 1846. Figure 2 Ben Bernanke implementing “quantitative easing” by the Federal Reserve.

An article about bygone medical methods said “the annals of medical history are filled with some bizarre treatments. They range from the infamous, like leeches and bloodletting, to the obscure.” If we use history to assess our world, our current system, processes, and events, we can get an idea of not only the evolution of mankind but also the devolution and paralysis of it, usually imposed by a cadre of people in power. The article went on to say that one of those bizarre treatments, purposeful malaria, made sense: heat could kill syphilis, and a fever generates heat. So, in order to induce a heat-generating, syphilis-killing fever, all you needed was…malaria. Austrian doctor Julius Wagner-Jauregg came up with this one, hoping to end the psychosis and cognitive dysfunction brought on by untreated syphilis. In 1917 he began injecting syphilis-infected patients with malaria. And it worked, too, killing only 15 percent of Wagner-Jauregg’s patients and winning him a Nobel Prize in 1927. Nowadays, however, we’re better at diagnosing syphilis sooner, and we can treat it with a shot of penicillin, thereby eliminating the need to cure one disease with another one.i

The Federal Reserve and our nation’s method of banking is a kin to “purposeful malaria.” We are yet coerced to use a system of banking and currency devised over 100 years ago by a few men that represented a majority of ownership in industry and banking. The Federal Reserve Act slipped into existence in the 11th hour on December 23, 1913. It certainly wasn’t representative of the population who had been fighting central banking and debt-based currency for 50 years and its doubtful it could have withstood the test of direct democracy or a referendum. But who needs those tools when we have a representative government?

So why is the United States still stuck in the malaise of a central banking system endemic to the people? Is it endemic to the people? Is the $38 trillion debt a bane or a boon to Americans? The interest alone is increasing our federal budget, which incurs more monetary inflation, which incurs more debt. So why don’t we care? Well, some of us do care and here are a few reasons why we have been retarded in the area of banking and currency. First and foremost, it is our education system. With most elementary and secondary curricula, there is no mention of banking and finance. Most of the secondary education programs are now geared to get graduates into colleges and universities. Sounds reasonable right? Here’s the main bottleneck. The majority of those colleges and universities teach Keynesian economics which not only condones monetary inflation but central control over the economy. In other words, “there’s nothing to see here.” Not to get too far into the categories, but command economies are typically socialism, communism, and fascism. So how did our constitutional republic with a relatively free market slip into, as Rothbard called it, centralized statism? I would tell you it’s a long story, but it really isn’t. We are celebrating our 250th year anniversary as a nation. In the scheme of human history, this is a short story, but one that requires an education off the beaten track.

Another reason Americans don’t care about the intricacies of banking and economics is due to credit. So much credit has been extended to all classes of Americans that they have the time and ease of indulging in consumption and entertainment. In many cases, however, that credit is just a short term fix that, in the long term, acts as the wheel for rats that either have to report to the office on a daily basis or actually produce something for the other 98 percent of consumers.

As some of the basics of life become much more expensive for working Americans, like housing, food, and healthcare, people are starting to look for the penicillin that cures the malady. This is where it becomes a street fight. They are up against their own representatives on Pennsylvania Avenue who have long been bought off by Wall Street and lobbyists for special interests. Those institutions are flanked by massive public relations campaigns from Madsion Avenue. Billions of dollars in bailouts, subsidies, and advertising are spent to maintain this status quo of our system. Can we overcome it? It doesn’t appear that the younger generations have the consciousness or the minerals to fight this battle. If they do show some spirit, they usually pick fights on Main Street against their own neighbors. This is typically manifested in identity politics. However, the rest of the world may not wait. BRICS and other currencies may replace the dollar as the world reserve currency, that is, the one that is used most commonly in global transactions. Does that mean Main Street is going to get the shot in the arm from afar? Will competing currencies restrict or impede the Fed’s monetary inflation policy by it’s reduced demand? Is America ready to engage more heavily in production than in academics and bureaucracy in order to offset the imbalance of trade we’ve enjoyed through monetary inflation? I don’t think so. Interesting times. Hang onto your mortarboards.

i https://www.statnews.com/2015/11/06/alarming-medical-procedures-history-forgot