Inflation is the most pernicious of taxes levied by our government. Officials systematically devalue the dollar, then levy capital gains taxes on assets when their dollar price rises.

The “gains” are largely illusory. Rising asset prices over time reflect the fact that the dollar buys less of everything. But the tax obligations triggered by this inflation are very real.

Once a phrase generally eschewed in the legacy media, the term “Deep State” has now gone quite mainstream. In February, for example, Salon defined ”Deep State” as: 

[This article was presented at the Austrian Scholars Conference, March 13, 2010.]

History shows that, if individuals have the freedom to choose what to use as money, they will likely opt for gold or silver.

Of course, modern politicians and their Keynesian enablers despise the gold or silver standard. This is because linking a currency to a precious metal limits the ability of central banks to finance the growth of the welfare-warfare state via the inflation tax. This forces politicians to finance big government much more with direct means of taxation.

The Creation of Jobs

If the media tell us that “the opening of XYZ mill has created 1,000 new jobs,” we give a cheer. When the ABC company closes and 500 jobs are lost, we’re sad. The politician who can provide a subsidy to save ABC is almost assured of wide spread public support for his work in preserving jobs.

We would seem to be experiencing a pretty close duplicate of the almost fifty year old scandal that rocked the world and brought down President Nixon. But this time the Washington Post is trying to cover up the scandal, not bring it to light.

Donald Trump addressed his first joint session of Congress this week. During the speech, one subject was almost entirely ignored: the national debt. Though Trump did take a moment to bash the spending of Obama’s administration — ignoring his own political party’s legacy on the subject — he did little to address the very real threat posed by the nation’s current debt levels. Further, there seems to be no end in sight.

Donald Trump’s speech to a joint session of Congress this week has been hailed as good politics from both supporters and opponents alike. The Washington Times declared that Democrats were left “befuddled, in ruins” after the speech.