Has Brussels Reached a Vespasian Moment?
Upon the death of Nero (54-68AD), the Roman Empire was at a crossroads. The last member of the Julio-Claudian bloodline was dead. Many hoped for the return of the Republic. But the old Oligarchs had been mostly killed more than 72 years before.
Otho and Vitellius sought to grab the throne. A third general Vespasian made his move and seized power. Then the move of separatists unfolded. This was the opportunity to break away from Rome.
The Jews made their play to get out of the Roman Empire. They issued their own coinage and believed with Nero dead, now was their moment in history.
Vespasian was forced to invade Judea. He had no choice. If Israel separated, then others would follow. Vespasian invaded and destroyed their temple. The Arch of his son Titus stands at the edge of the Roman Forum and it shows the Romans carrying the spoils from Judea back to Rome. This was displayed on the Arch because this act held Rome together. Had Judea separated, everyone else would break away.
Brussels has reached that same Vespasian Moment with the Greek elections. They will now try to bribe Greece to stay for do not believe for an instant that they claim the Euro does not need Greece – Greece needs the Euro. Brussels needs Greece for what they should fear is its departure and you will see its economy start to revive. When Britain abandoned the gold standard, it was the FIRST to recover in the Great Depression and that was noticed by Roosevelt who ended the austerity policies of the USA.
What does austerity do? It supports the debt holders at the expense of the economy. This is why Europe is doomed and now pouring in new money cannot possibly overcome the destruction to the capacity to produce. They have to eliminate taxation and reduce regulation. You cannot create new money but raise taxes and regulation simultaneously.
If The Greek choose freedom and reject the behind-the-scene offers to stay with debt reductions and 100 year interest free loans to keep jobs in Brussels, then others will follow. Scotland will eventually break away from England and Spain will also break apart. Italy will leave the Euro at the end of this affair.
Brussels has reached its Vespasian Moment and they know it. The question is how hard do they fight to keep it together?
Comments From Greece
COMMENT: Hi Martin,
I know you like the political views of Nigel Farage and I just wanted to say that Independent Greeks and Panos Kammenos -the participant in the new government in Greece- share the same thinking
I know you like the political views of Nigel Farage and I just wanted to say that Independent Greeks and Panos Kammenos -the participant in the new government in Greece- share the same thinking
Keep talking the same way that you do.
Best regards
EK
EK
Hey Marty,
I remember you once said that the extreme left and extreme right are like siblings that meet up at opposite ends of a circle.
Well, this seems to be the exact situation that has occurred in Greece!
The extreme left-wing coalition has teamed up with the Independent Greeks – an extreme right-wing party – to form government!
Given the extremes involved here, is it near-impossible to see Greece staying in the Euro?
Swiss Franc Mortgages Blowing Up Everywhere
It is just amazing how we never learn. During the 1980s, I was dealing with Australians who were sold Swiss mortgages to interest. Boy – the losses I had to bailout. Well, history constantly repeats. Now Hundreds of people have protested in Romania against high repayments for Swiss franc loans, blaming the banks for offering deceptively cheap loans and calling on the government to regulate hard currency loans.
The cry is always the same - ”The bank tricked us!” This is the chant being yelled up to 1,000 demonstrators gathered in a downtown square. The banks always do this. To sell loans, they tell people they will save interest using another currency.
I was blamed for the takeover boom because I advised many of the takeover tycoons in the 1980s. But I showed them HOW to take debt and convert it to a performing assets. I showed Alan Bond of Australian and if we borrowed in a depreciating currency against a asset in a rising currency, the debt would be reduced by 20-40%.
Borrowing in one currency for an asset in another can be very beneficial. But you need a sophisticated computer to track it. The banks just dump average folks in this stuff and walk away. They do this every single time.
The amount of mortgages in Swiss are staggering. They are in Britain down to Greece. It was a great sales pitch and the unfamiliar average person has been wiped out in the middle of an economic decline. This is how an economy implodes into deflation.
Democrat’s Dream – Always More Taxes
There’s is little doubt that the Democrats can’t sleep at night worrying about someone made some money they did not get a piece of. The worst tax of all that is directly causing a worldwide depression is none other than FATCA. The FATCAworldwide hunting down pf Americans overseas was a portion of the 2010 Hiring Incentives to Restore Employment (HIRE) Act (Pub.L. 111–147, 124 Stat. 71, enacted March 18, 2010, H.R. 2847). The final version passed the House with only a 217 to 201 vote. The Democratic argument has been that It has been estimated that the U.S. Treasury loses as much as $100 billion annually to offshore tax non-compliance. The law is so Draconian, that Americans have been thrown out of everywhere. As this has happened, Americans have been forced to repatriate their money to the USA, even those who have lived outside the country for more than 20 years to life. Of course this was a guess for they could not determine what was outside the USA. This is the primary goal of the NSA to record every phone call worldwide. All they need to do is type in your name and it all pops up on the screen. As Snowden revealed, even Skype calls and provided to the NSA by Microsoft.
After committee deliberation, Sen. Max Baucus and Rep. Charles Rangel introduced the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act of 2009 to Congress on October 27, 2009. It was later added to an appropriations bill as an amendment, sponsored by Sen. Harry Reid, which also renamed the bill the HIRE Act. The bill was signed into law on March 18, 2010. This is significant. Who was publicly exposed for not paying taxes? Charles Rangel didn’t pay taxes and claim he forgot he had some accounts where $500,000 went. In all, Rangel was accused of 13 ethical violations. The allegations included failure to report rental income from vacation property in the Dominican Republic and hundreds of thousands of dollars in additional income and assets on his financial disclosure statements. And this is the guy who has set in motion the destruction of the world economy! Rangel was kicked out of being House Ways & Means Chairman, and then sued Congress for this sanction. When he concoctedFATCA, he assumed he would personally escape one must expect.
There maybe no reason to worry about the latest tax hikes proposed by President Obama, since there’s little chance Congress will pass them. Nevertheless, the world economy is imploding into deflation and budgets rise and taxes are in hot pursuit. Yet, Obama’s plan is a blueprint for what is on the horizon. What’s going to happen when federal coffers finally run dry? Tax hikes even from Republicans. There’s no choice but to raise taxes without major structural reforms. The middle class will discover that the definition of the “rich” is anyone with a spare dime.
For now, the Treasury can still borrow at remarkably low rates and until 2015.75, the economy is not moving down in a free-fall yet. Europe is trying to collapse the Euro and US officials AGREE assuming that only 13% of GDP is US exports. With the USA becoming energy self-sufficient, the wrong believe that the dollar can now rise with no harm to the US economy. The fools do not comprehend the business cycle no less capital flows.
The generous US position to allow a higher dollar is directly tied to the collapse in the world economy accelerated by FATCA. Japan, who once had a trade surplus, has a a trade deficit that at least shrank to its lowest level in 18 months in December. This has been attributed to the lower yen and stronger dollar for which people are crediting Prime Minister Shinzo Abe ’s policy of pushing down the yen as finally appearing to be helping the economy. This policy is now adopted by Europe and the USA is in AGREEMENT.
Japanese exports grew 13% in December from a year earlier in yen terms thanks to Christmas, while imports rose only 1.9% as oil collapses. The trade deficit fell to ¥660.7 billion ($5.6 billion), which was the 30th straight month of shortfalls. This is down by half the figure from the previous year.
See – there is a cycle to everything. You can be on top of the world in once decade, and at the bottom within two successions.
Youth Take Back Their Country – Greece
The celebrations are going on in Greece. My emails have been lighting up. This is precisely what was suppressed in Scotland and in Spain. The younger generation is revolting against what they see as the corrupt elites. One cannot deny that the older establishment of thinking is so out of touch with reality it is unbelievable.
The older generation is dominated by people who are still fighting World War II. They have passed their expiration date and by 2016, we will see a sweeping new trend of a younger generation taking back their countries around the world.
This is exciting for there is hope perhaps on the horizon. Not that this will prevent the Crash & Burn, but that this will be the passing of the crown from one generation to the next. Taxes are OBSOLETE. There is no longer any need for taxes and these draconian austerity measures create unemployment and cause the economy to implode. These insane political elites in power borrow year after year with no intention of paying anything back and they have simply refused to even look at what they are doing. It is only about them.
About 70% of the national debts are accumulative interest expenditures. This socialistic agenda has done nothing but lined the pockets of politicians for this money did not go to the poor or schools or anything else they pretend. Yes they “feel” our pain – and rachet the screws tighter to see how much more society can endure.
This is not unique to the United States. This is a systemic crisis that is engulfing the entire world. Government should be prohibited from borrowing money and only print what they need for their budget. That is it – nothing more. The budget should be capped at 5% of GDP under penalty of life-imprisonment or death – their choice. Here is the view of Germany – the so-called best of the EU. There is nothing different.
Now these brilliant elites are moving interest rates into negative territory. This funds more and more of their debt while robbing the elderly of everything they worked for over their lifetime. It is a real shame. The savings of the elderly are worthless and taxes keep rising. States are hunting pension to tax and they consume every penny they possibly can. There is no promise these politicians will not violate to keep the game going with them in power as Obama just displayed at the State of the Union address. He relies upon the press to be stupid and controlled to grid their fellow citizens down into the ground.
The wheel of fortune is completing its revolution. There is nothing we can do to stop it. We simply have to crash and burn and then hopefully the younger generation will reject these brain-dead ideas of how to run a country into the ground.