Mayer Rothschild is famously quoted as saying “Permit me to issue and control the money of a nation, and I care not who makes its laws!” – and so it is. When we look at the distribution of capital, we see that those who control the franchise of creating money through loans and debt rule our world. Ellen speaks with one of the planet’s oldest serving statesmen, Canada’s Paul Hellyer, about the nature of this controlling franchise and about the alternatives still available. Walt McRee speaks with Lisa Cody, a researcher for the Service Employees International Union, who did a landmark study of the outrageous costs Los Angeles has paid private financiers as part of our ongoing series What Wall Street Costs America, and Matt Stannard comments on the increasingly popular idea of providing a basic income to people as one way of balancing the scales against the controlling interests.
It’s Our Money with Ellen Brown – The Little Bank that Does – Part 2 – 06.08.16
We continue our conversation with the preeminent historian of the Bank of North Dakota, Dr. Rozanne Enerson Junker, about the founding factors and functional dimensions of America’s only state-owned public bank. Ellen discusses block-chain technology with co-host Walt McRee while this week’s What Wall Street Costs America examines the impact of predatory banking costs on the city of Detroit — Matt Stannard talks with Tom Stevens of “Detroiters Resisting Emergency Management.”
It’s Our Money with Ellen Brown – You’ve Been Strip Mined! – 04.13.16
You’ve Been Strip Mined! That’s how Ellen’s guest Les Leopold describes what has happened to the constructive role of capital, such as investment in research and development, expansion and improvement of services and industries. He calls it “economic strip-mining” in which capital speculators like hedge funds strip the equity of companies, countries and consumers to feed their insatiable desire for short term profits – outcomes be damned. We also introduce the new national project and campaign called “What Wall Street Costs America” – the start of a national conversation revealing the massive extraction of public dollars by Wall Street interests. And Matt Stannard reviews presidential politics and bank reform on the Public Banking Report.