Every monetary crisis in US history has given rise to a movement of money crankism, which is this strange combination of good and often accurate descriptions of the problem with the money and banking system, with only small but very critical inaccuracies, combined with a populist resentment against bankers complete with phony quotes from the usual suspects, a below-the-surface anti-semitism, followed by a head-long plunge into the full-scale wackiness of advocating government-printed “debt-free” money – a system guaranteed to remove every check on credit expansion and one far worse than the system the cranks claim to deplore.
In the 19th century, we saw these tendencies in the free silver movement. We saw it during the Great Depression. And we will see it again today. Just this morning someone sent me this video, which is good in places and even vaguely Rothbardian until it plunges wholesale into full-scale money crankism. Again, on the good side, the people are opposed to the Fed; on the bad side, they favor something even worse.
If someone sends you the above video, send that person this one back as a better alternative.
