From the June 2003 Idaho Observer:

The purpose of money: The international bankers' perspective

Respected researcher/author G. Edward Griffin proposed “the Rothchild formula” in his monumental work “The Creature from Jekyll Island.” Griffin described the international banker as being incapable of “such a primitive feeling as patriotism, so he is free to participate in the funding of any side in any conflict, limited only by factors of self interest.”

To look around at the world and assess the totality of international relations and the level of indebtedness suffered by the nations of the world, Griffin prefaced his theoretical formula by stating that, if an aspiring international banker “were to survey the world around him, it is not difficult to imagine that he would come to the following conclusions which would become the prime directives of his career”

1. War is the ultimate discipline to any government. If it can successfully meet the challenge of war, it will survive. If it cannot, it will perish. All else is secondary. The sanctity of its laws, the prosperity of its citizens, and the solvency of its treasury will be quickly sacrificed by any government in its primal act of self-survival.

2. All that is necessary, therefore, to insure that a government will maintain or expand its debt is to involve it in war or the threat of war. The greater the threat and the more destructive the war, the greater the need for debt.

3. To involve a country in war or the threat of war, it will be necessary for it to have enemies with credible military might. If such enemies already exist, all the better. If they exist but lack military strength, it will be necessary to provide them the money to build their war machine; if an enemy does not exist at all, then it will be necessary to create one by financing the rise of a hostile regime.

4. The ultimate obstacle is a govenunent which declines to finance its wars through debt. Although this seldom happens, when it does, it will be necessary to encourage internal political opposition, insurrection, or revolution to replace that government with one that is more compliant to our will. The assassination of heads of state could play an important role in this process.

5. No nation can be allowed to remain militarily stronger than its adversaries, for that could lead to peace and a reduction of debt.

To accomplish this balance of power, it may be necessary to finance both sides of the conflict. Unless one of the combatants is hostile to our interests and, therefore, must be destroyed, neither side should be allowed a decisive victory or defeat. While we must always proclaim the virtues of peace, the unspoken objective is perpetual war.

The purpose of money: The producer and consumer perspective

The world is overwhelmingly comprised of ordinary people who produce goods, perform services and purchase the goods and services of others. These activities comprise an economy. Since a millennium before the birth of Christ raw goods such as livestock and grain have been “monetized” with metal formed into round or rectangular coins with conspicuous markings. For money to be of ultimate benefit to the producers and consumers who comprise the totality of an economy, its use should be confined to being merely a tool used to facilitate the transfer of goods and services to the consumer. If the use of money were confined to the narrow scope of representing the value of and payment for goods and services, opportunists would have difficulty transforming the tool of money into a for-profit commodity.

Unfortunately, those in power seldom have the best interests of those they govern in mind when monetary systems are designed and implemented. If that were the case, money would be minted into existence and there would be no such thing as public debt; there would be no such thing as loans at interest and transactions would be current.

It is when government chooses to borrow money into circulation that the cycle of economic oppression begins. In simple mathematics, the paper money debt “owed” will always be greater than the supply of paper funds and, therefore, cannot be paid in full.

The cycle of economic oppression that begins with governments borrowing paper money into circulation from private banks inevitably ends in bankruptcy.

Conversely, money minted into circulation and used solely for the purpose of getting goods and services into the hands of consumers with no interest promotes prosperity for as long as goods and services are produced and people are willing to buy them.

The greatest challenge we face as a people is to replace the current debt-based monetary system -- a system that benefits the few to the detriment of the many -- with a system that benefits those who choose to participate in our economy by producing, supplying and consuming.