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Speaking of monopolies
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By Samuel L. Blumenfeld
© 1999 WorldNetDaily.com
Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson's ruling that Microsoft is a monopoly raises
the question of how that monopoly is to be remedied or abolished. The judge
wrote, "Microsoft has demonstrated that it will use its prodigious market
power and immense profits to harm any firm that insists on pursuing
initiatives that could intensify competition."
But the hallmark of a true monopoly is that it has the force of government
behind it, like the public schools, and can charge the highest price for the
shoddiest goods, which is what the government schools do. Microsoft is
certainly not a monopoly in that sense. It has given consumers an excellent
product at a very good price. In fact, it is the knowledge of potential
competitors waiting in the wings that forces Microsoft to offer its products
at a very reasonable price. If consumers thought that there was a better
product at a better price that would give them what they now get from
Microsoft, they'd abandon Microsoft in a minute.
Apparently, the Justice Department is very selective in how it views
monopolies. For example, there is one government-sanctioned monopoly in this
country that has more power than all past monopolies put together. It's
called the Federal Reserve System. Here's what a reporter in Worth magazine
of November 1998 wrote about it:
The U.S. Federal Reserve is the most powerful central bank in the world. It
can send stock markets around the world soaring or crashing with merely a
word, and wipe out or create billions of dollars with a hint.
Now that's a monopoly! That's the kind of colossal power the opponents of the
Federal Reserve Act feared in 1913 when they voted against the creation of a
central bank. Andrew Jackson knew that such a monopoly was bad when in 1832
he vetoed the extension of the charter of the Bank of the United States and
withdrew federal funds from it. The bank was hated in its day and considered
a "hydra-headed monster, a grinding monopoly, robbing the people, making
money dear, ruining State banks, and causing hard times." Jackson wrote in
his veto message:
Many of our rich men have not been content with equal protection and equal
benefits, but have besought us to make them richer by act of Congress. By
attempting to gratify their desires we have in the results of our legislation
arrayed section against section, interest against interest, and man against
man, in a fearful commotion which threatens to shake the foundations of our
Union. It is time to pause in our career to review our principles, and if
possible revive that devoted patriotism and spirit of compromise which
distinguished the sages of the Revolution and the fathers of our Union.
>From that time on, the American people thought that a central bank was a bad
idea and stayed away from it. England, France and Germany had central banks,
but that was Europe where monopolies and cartels were part of the system. But
in the U.S. monopolies and cartels were finally made illegal with the passage
of the Sherman Anti-Trust Act of 1890, which was used to break up John D.
Rockefeller's Standard Oil Trust.
So, how were the bankers able to get Congress to create the biggest monopoly
of them all? The plan was conceived by a cabal of New York moneyed interests
that met in secret on Jekyll Island, Ga., at the private resort of J.P.
Morgan in November of 1910. The participants were Nelson W. Aldrich,
Republican senator, chairman of the National Monetary Commission, business
associate of J.P. Morgan, and father-in-law to John D. Rockefeller Jr.;
Abraham Piatt Andrew, assistant secretary of the U.S. Treasury; Frank A.
Vanderlip, president of National City Bank of New York, representing William
Rockefeller and Kuhn, Loeb & Company; Henry P. Davison, senior partner of
J.P. Morgan; Charles D. Norton, president of J.P. Morgan's First National
Bank; Benjamin Strong, head of J.P. Morgan's Banker's Trust Company; and Paul
Warburg, partner in Kuhn, Loeb & Company.
All of these gentlemen rode in secret to Jekyll Island aboard Aldrich's
private railway car. It is obvious from the roster that this was an inside
deal made between corrupt politicians and big money. Thus, when Aldrich
presented his plan for a central bank to the Congress in 1910, it was
rejected. A second version was introduced in 1913, and this time, there was a
president, Woodrow Wilson, who would not veto the plan as Andrew Jackson had
done. Indeed, Wilson had been put in the White House by the very men
masterminding the Fed.
The basic argument for the Federal Reserve System was that it would provide
stability for the economy and end the boom and bust cycles that plagued the
stock market. It is true that the stock market had its ups and downs, but
they were never prolonged, and recovery took place in a relatively short
time. So how come the worst stock market crash and prolonged depression took
place after the Federal Reserve was in power for more than 15 years?
The answer is quite simple. The Federal Reserve is a monopoly, or more
correctly, a cartel of New York banks. Their aim was to shake out the
economy, get rid of the hundreds of small, local banks that held the deposits
of millions of people, reduce the price of stocks so that they could be
bought up on the cheap by those with cash waiting for the fall. In fact, many
of the top moneymen got out of the stock market knowing that the Fed would
destabilize it and bring about a crash. They sold their stock when prices
were at their height, and bought them back when they were at their lowest.
And because our economy is now run by bankers, we have become a debt economy
in which all of us are up to our ears in debt. We can't save money because
taxes are so high, so we must borrow money for homes, cars, vacations,
college tuition and just about everything else. And that's how the banks get
rich, charging interest on borrowed money. The banks prefer debtors to
savers, because savers collect interest from the bank, while debtors pay
interest to the bank. And since the Federal Reserve can create money out of
nothing, banks don't even need savers for money to lend out. They can borrow
it from the Federal Reserve.
What a racket! Americans are now so used to buying everything on credit, that
the whole concept of thrift and saving is now considered old fashioned. Why
delay gratification when plastic can get you what you want now? Yes, you
become a debtor, but that's OK because everyone is now a debtor, and banks
have liens on virtually all of our assets. And when banks make mistakes, like
lending money to Third World nations, there is always the taxpayer to bail
them out.
So when the Justice Department and Janet Reno talk about the evils of
monopolies, one must stop and think and wonder when will the nation wake up
to the biggest monopoly of them all.
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Samuel L. Blumenfeld is the author of eight books on education, including
"NEA: Trojan Horse in American Education," "Is Public Education Necessary?"
and "Homeschooling: A Parents Guide to Teaching Children." All of these books
are available through Amazon.com.
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any copyrighted work in this message is distributed under fair use
without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest
in receiving the included information for nonprofit research and educational
purposes only.[Ref. http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml ]
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