.............................................................. >From the New Paradigms Project [Not Necessarily Endorsed]: Conspiracy Shopping Cart: http://a-albionic.com/shopping.html From: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Cc: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: [turmel] Report on April 1 IMF-World Bank Florham Protest Part A Date: Tuesday, April 04, 2000 12:38 PM STAR-LEDGER ARTICLE ABOUT IMF-WORLD BANK CONFERENCE JCT: I first became aware of the IMF-World Bank meeting from the article in the New Jersey Star Ledger of March 29 2000 titled: "World Bank meeting to draw protesters" by Margaret McHugh. Law enforcement officials through Morris County are bracing for a 48- hour protest of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund conference that begins tomorrow in Florham Park. Though neither police nor protesters predict anything close to the large crowds and melee that disrupted the World Trade Organization meeting in Seattle in December, police intend to be prepared for the worst. "We're trying to balance both sides here, the right of the people to protest and the right of the World Bank to conduct their meeting" said Deputy Chief Edward Facas of the Morris County Prosecutor's Office. "It's a juggling act, and we're in the middle." The New Jersey/New York Mobilization for Global Justice, a coalition of 30 environmental, civil rights and religious organizations, planned the florham Park protest a month ago as a prelude to a massive demonstration to be held in Washington, D.C., in mid-April. "Somebody saw something about the conference on the World Bank web site," organizer Jim Burchell said. JCT: It's funny that there was no mention of it on the a16 newsgroups that I'm subscribed to. Even though everyone at the meeting was involved in getting ready for the Washington protest. More than 170 experts from throughout the world are scheduled to attend the conference at the Hamilton Park conference hotel off Park Avenue in Florham Park. The conference, titled "Emerging Markets in the New Financial System: Managing Financial and Corporate Distress," will focus on the corporate and financial restructuring process under way in Southeast Asia. JCT: They're giving lessons on managing the distress they cause. It is sponsored by the World Bank which provides loans to developing countries; the IMF which lends money to struggling countries if they agree to debt restructuring; and the Brookings Institution, a Washington-based think tank. Protesters say the IMF and World Bank share responsibility for an "unjust world economic system." The conference was scheduled in August, months before the World Trade Organization gathering in Downtown Seattle where more than 500 protesters were arrested and merchants reported $2 million in property damage. The National Guard was also called in. JCT: Other reports say that the damages and the "loss of business" were $2 million. From my report on the Seattle protest, there is no way that there was $2 million in damages but this is how they exaggerate the threat. One reporter says $2 million in losses, another translates that into $2 million in property damages. But unlike the Seattle protest, or the planned demonstration in Washington, D.C., the vigil and rally to be held in Florham Park are not intended to shut down the meeting. Rather they are designed to call attention to the protesters' concerns, Burchell said. "At no time have we threatened any disruption," said Burchell,president of Peaceworks, a group concerned with Latin America. In fact, Burchell said he thinks "the local authorities are completely overreacting. There may be more police than protesters," he said. The coalition expects to maintain a presence of about 20 or 30 people starting at 5p.m. tomorrow, as conference attendees arrive to register. The biggest crowd, estimated at between 300 and 500, is expected a rally to be held from noon to 5p.m Saturday, as the conference wraps up. "We view the IMF/World Bank conference as an opportunity to explain the implications of these undemocratic institutions' unprecedented power to control the world economy and harm the global environment," said Nicole Roskos of the Drew University Environmental Action League. A "teach-in" to air the protesters' concerns is scheduled for Friday at Drew University in Madison. The protesters won't be allowed on the grounds of Hamilton Park but police made arrangements with Fairleigh Dickinson University to let them set up in a parking lot next to the conference center. Police also made arrangements for them to park at a corporate complex down the road and provide a shuttle bus to the FDU parking lot, Burchell said. "They are bending over backward to accommodate us," he said. JCT: How nice of the authorities to help keep it organized! Representatives from law enforcement agencies throughout Morris County will meet today to go over the strategy for the 48-hour protest, Facas said. "We're not anticipating any problems," but want to have a plan for added police if it is necessary, Facas said. "We've adopted a wait-and-see position." Michael Arnold, trial court administrator for Morris and Sussex counties, said four judges will be assigned to duty in the new jail where they will set up makeshift courtrooms with recording equipment. DREW UNIVERSITY TEACH-IN JCT: I called New Jersey Transit and found out that it was a 2- hour bus ride to Newark and a half-hour train ride to Madison where the teach-in at Drew University is located. I left at 4:30a.m. and was at Drew before 9a.m. When I got there, the news was about two protesters who had been arrested the day before. They had sneaked into the conference Hotel with a huge protest sign and draped it from the roof. I'm not sure what they were charged with. Probably trespassing though I'm not sure how that could apply to a what may be construed as a public place. Then again, a conference hotel may not be construed a public place. I hope someone keeps us up to date. I spoke to Steve Cooper, the teach-in organizer from the New Jersey Independents, Box 86, Hackensack, NJ, 07602, about a chance to speak about interest-free community currencies but they already had a full slate of speakers. As I expected, it was be the usual litany of complaints about how bad things are and how something must be done but nobody had any suggestions about what to do about it, other than me, who wouldn't get a chance to explain the realistic solution to the debt problem. It was the same story from every speaker. "World Bank bad, we want good." With statistics of how bad. It's basically the same show we see every year at the anti-poverty TOES conferences, at the 50 Years is Enough demo last September, at Seattle last December. Everyone telling the same sorry tale and no one having any suggestions about what to do about it. And yet, eliciting cheers from the audience who may not realize that they're hearing basically the same thing over and over but never hearing what could be done about it. Sad. Still, I certainly did explain it over and over to everybody I could find on a one-to-one basis. For the record, my main message to the protesters was basically: To cancel the debt, someone has to take the loss and getting people to agree to that loss cannot be easy. To cancel the future growth of debt, the interest, no one has to take a loss and it's easier to get the rich to listen. Add the fact that their money starts to buy more and more over time as technology gets better and it's almost like they're getting interest but without taking it away from poor people like interest. Actually, most people caught on and saw the wisdom of not taking their money from the rich but only preventing the growth of future debt as an easier sell. Eric Lerner was a speaker from http://www.workersdemocracy.org He told us that the problem arose when the high oil prices had the rich Arabs depositing their money into banks who then lent it out to the poor nations. Unfortunately, that's not how banks work. Banks do not lend out their depositors' funds like piggy banks. Banks lend out new money like casino banks. As long as you think banks operate like piggy banks lending their depositors funds, then you don't know where the source of money is and you therefore cannot grasp how it could be fixed. I know many people have fallen for the piggy banks story which is why I explain the real engineering design at my web site's crucial info section in http://www.cyberclass.net/turmel/bankmath.htm Only when you understand that banks are the source of newly- created money can you then understand where enough money can come from. Of course, the shortage is created by the fact that for every ten tokens borrowed into circulation, there ends up a growth of the debt to 11 tokens due to usury, interest on money. Yet he pointed out that the benefit of debt repudiation was that the money now paid in debt service could be diverted to people service. Later, I pointed out to him that we could just cancel the interest debt service and get the same benefits but he insisted that the whole debt had to tackled and ran away from further discussion. It's sad to think that these he's so involved in fighting with the rich that he can't see the advantages of getting the rich to see they also can benefit from a better way. I've managed to convince some rich that it would be worthwhile to cancel their interest as long as they get to keep their bankroll and it starts buying them more and more. And we don't need to fight against anyone. Consider his article in his newsletter: WHY WE ARE FIGHTING FOR A PUBLIC WORKS PROGRAM by Eric Lerner NY Workers Committee Why are we linking the fight against workfare and a public works program? And why is the demand for a public works program central to workers battles around the country? There can't be much doubt about the need for a huge public works program in New York and every large city in the U.S. There is a shortage of 30 million units resulting in homeless.. Private sector is not building enough.. Schools are falling down.. Mass transit bad.. Only a huge public works program can start filing these unmet needs. Only through a Public Works Program can employment be expanded.. Not enough classrooms.. Hospitals and transit need new construction.. JCT: Okay, so you get an idea of what he's saying. I agree that things are bad and a Public Works Program too. But how to pay for it? If you understand how the money system really works, you then pay workers to produce new buildings with new money so that every new dollar is backed up by new housing, just like poker chips are backed up by new collateral deposited in the cage. Inflation is impossible. Keep producing new housing and the bank keeps issuing new money in paychecks. But if you don't know where money comes from, you make suggestions like Eric does: There is plenty of money in this country to pay for a public works program, the wealthy and the corrupt have it and they've stolen it from us. A wealth tax on family wealth over two million dollars would raise more than $150 billion a year and more would be raised with a progressive income tax. JCT: So if you don't know how to run your own money system, your only alternative is to fight with the rich over their money and it's not the rich who are hurt by a progressive income tax, it's the lower and middle classes. In addition, the bloated defence budget providing arms this country has no use for could be slashed without in any way harming our real security releasing $200 billion a year. JCT: Okay, I must admit that I like this one. If you consider how much the U.S. spent during the Cold War for no good reason, every American could have been rich. I think George Orwell explained the futility best in his book 1984 under the WAR IS PEACE section: >Page 153 >The primary aim of modern warfare in accordance with the principles >of doublethink is to use up the products of the machine without >raising the general standard of living. Ever since the end of the >nineteenth century, the problem of what to do with the surplus of >consumption goods has been latent in industrial society. At present, >when few human beings even have enough to eat, this problem is >not urgent and it might not have to become so even if no artificial >processes of destruction had been at work. >From the moment when the machine first made its appearance it was >clear to all thinking people that the need for human drudgery and >therefore to a great extent, for human inequality, had disappeared. >If the machine were used deliberately for that end, hunger, overwork, >dirt, illiteracy, and disease could be eliminated within a few >generations. And in fact, by producing wealth which it was sometimes >impossible not to distribute, the machine did raise the living >standards of the average human being. But taking the money from war for peace is still only a diversion of money from one place to another without considering the overview that for every dollar in existence, there is a debt which has grown with interest. No amount of taking from one to give to another can remedy that shortage. You have to fix the banks' computer program, not take money from the rich. And we'll need the help of the rich to cancel their future money growth of interest, help which Eric will never while fighting with them to take take away their wealth. Anyway, every single speaker repeated the same basic message: "Things are bad and it's the IMF-World Bank's fault." Through it all, I kept saying to myself "I've heard this before. Nothing new." HOW DOES IT HELP PEDRO IN ECUADOR? As I mentioned in an earlier post, the way to judge the worth of any speaker's ideas is to ask "How will what you suggest benefit Pedro in Ecuador?" How did shutting the WTO help Pedro? It didn't. The 50 Years is Enough brochure states "Shut down the IMF/World Bank." In the a16-message group egroups.com, I asked how shutting down the IMF- World Bank was going to help Pedro? No one could answer because it will not help. But there it is on the flyer. The great demand for something that will not help anyone. Do any of the speakers or groups have anything which, if successful, would help Pedro? Other than the odd local currency advocate, not one can answer that what they are suggesting will help Pedro at all. Of course, I and do-it-yourself currency advocates have a suggestion that would help Pedro. Reprogramming the banks' computers to operate interest-free like LETS, on a pure service charge without any debt service, would have the same benefits of no debt service as cancelling the debt would have. So given I have a solution that would help Pedro, I feel I have a perfect right to point out the uselessness of the other speakers who don't have any engineering solution to offer. I know this sounds like griping and it is. At all these meetings, it's always the same "tell-us-about-the-problem" troupe of speakers and rarely are there any "tell-us-about-the-solution" speakers. And I find repeatedly hearing about how bad things are and how badly they're doing it frustrating when they never tackle how it should be done right. <A HREF="http://www.cyberclass.net/turmel">John C. "The Engineer" Turmel Home Page</A> Abolitionist Party of Canada Founder L.E.T.S. Abolish Interest Rates For Turmel topics: <A HREF="www.egroups.com/group/turmel">www.egroups.com/grou p/turmel</A> ------------------------------------------------------------------------ @Backup- Protect and Access your data any time, any where on the net. 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