“Dialogue in Hell:
limitation to the increase of taxes. So they conceived a scheme truly admirable for its simplicity…. A special fund was created, the capitalized resources of which are meant to be a permanent redemption of the public debt by successive fractions; so that every time the state borrows, it must endow the sinking fund with a certain capital for the purpose of liquidating the new debt at a given time….
Our system of accounting, fruit of long experience, is distinguished by the clarity and the certitude of its procedures. It obstructs abuses and gives to no one, from the smallest official to the chief of state himself, the means of diverting the least sum from its original purpose, or of making irregular use of it.”

— Will Eisner

The Plot: The Secret Story of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion (10/2/2005)

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Will Eisner 87

American cartoonist 1917–2005

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“Funding I consider as limited, rightfully, to a redemption of the debt within the lives of a majority of the generation contracting it”

Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) 3rd President of the United States of America

Letter to John Taylor (28 May 1816) ME 15:18: The Writings of Thomas Jefferson "Memorial Edition" (20 Vols., 1903-04) edited by Andrew A. Lipscomb and Albert Ellery Bergh, Vol. 15, p. 18
1810s
Context: The system of banking we have both equally and ever reprobated. I contemplate it as a blot left in all our Constitutions, which, if not covered, will end in their destruction, which is already hit by the gamblers in corruption, and is sweeping away in its progress the fortunes and morals of our citizens. Funding I consider as limited, rightfully, to a redemption of the debt within the lives of a majority of the generation contracting it; every generation coming equally, by the laws of the Creator of the world, to the free possession of the earth he made for their subsistence, unincumbered by their predecessors, who, like them, were but tenants for life.

“These contributions [federal taxes on consumption of foreign goods] enable us to support the current expenses of the Government, to fulfill contracts with foreign nations, to extinguish the native right of soil within our limits, to extend those limits, and to apply such a surplus to our public debts as places at a short day their final redemption, and that redemption [of debt] once effected," he said, "the revenue thereby liberated may, by a just repartition among the States and a corresponding amendment of the Constitution, be applied, in time of peace, to rivers, canals, roads, arts, manufactures, education, and other great objects within each State. In time of war,—if injustice, by ourselves or others, must sometimes produce war,— increased as the same revenue will be increased by population and consumption, and aided by other resources reserved for that crisis, it may meet within the year all the expenses of the year without encroaching on the rights of future generations by burdening them with the debts of the past. War will then be but a suspension of useful works, and a return to a state of peace a return to the progress of improvement.”

Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) 3rd President of the United States of America

Advising the origination of an annual fund from surplus revenue.
1800s, Second Inaugural Address (1805)

“Instead of funding issues of paper on the hypothecation of specific redeeming taxes (the only method of anticipating, in a time of war, the resources of times of peace, tested by the experience of nations), we are trusting to tricks of jugglers on the cards, to the illusions of banking schemes for the resources of the war, and for the cure of colic to inflations of more wind.”

Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) 3rd President of the United States of America

Letter to José Correia da Serra (1814) ME 14:224
Posthumous publications, On financial matters

“Population regulates itself by the funds which are to employ it, and therefore always increases or diminishes with the increase or the diminution of capital. Every reduction of capital is therefore necessarily followed by a less effective demand for corn, by a fall in price, and by diminished cultivation.”

David Ricardo (1772–1823) British political economist, broker and politician

Source: The Principles of Political Economy and Taxation (1821) (Third Edition), Chapter II, On Rent, p. 41

“At some time, here or hereafter, every account must be settled, and every debt paid in full.”

John Heyl Vincent (1832–1920) American theologian

Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), p. 361.

“Throughout the years in which the US was punishing countries that departed from fiscal prudence, it was borrowing on a colossal scale to finance tax cuts and fund its over-stretched military commitments. Now, with federal finances critically dependent on continuing large inflows of foreign capital, it will be the countries that spurned the American model of capitalism that will shape America's economic future.”

John Gray (1948) British philosopher

A shattering moment in America's fall from power (2008)

“Dialogue in Hell:
Twenty-First Dialogue

Machiavelli: I am afraid that you are somewhat prejudiced against loans;… modern economists today expressly recognize that, far from impoverishing the state, public debts enrich it. Will you allow me to explain how?
Montesquieu:…. I should first of all like to know from whom you will ask so much capital, and for what reason you will ask it.
Machiavelli: For that, foreign wars are a great help. In the great states, they permit the borrowing of five or six hundred millions; one manages so as to spend only half or two-thirds, and the rest finds its place in the treasury for domestic expenditures.”

Will Eisner (1917–2005) American cartoonist

The Plot: The Secret Story of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion (10/2/2005)

“So the game plan is not merely to free the income of the wealthiest class to “offshore” itself into assets denominated in harder currencies abroad. It is to scrap the progressive tax system altogether. … How stable can a global situation be where the richest nation does not tax its population, but creates new public debt to hand out to its bankers? … The “solution” to the coming financial crisis in the United States may await the dollar’s plunge as an opportunity for a financial Tonkin Gulf resolution. Such a crisis would help catalyze the tax system’s radical change to a European-style “Steve Forbes” flat tax and VAT sales-excise tax…. More government giveaways will be made to the financial sector in a vain effort to keep bad debts afloat and banks “solvent.” As in Ireland and Latvia, public debt will replace private debt, leaving little remaining for Social Security or indeed for much social spending. … The bottom line is that after the prolonged tax giveaway exacerbates the federal budget deficit – along with the balance-of-payments deficit – we can expect the next Republican or Democratic administration to step in and “save” the country from economic emergency by scaling back Social Security while turning its funding over, Pinochet-style, to Wall Street money managers to loot as they did in Chile. And one can forget rebuilding America’s infrastructure. It is being sold off by debt-strapped cities and states to cover their budget shortfalls resulting from un-taxing real estate and from foreclosures. Welcome to debt peonage. This is worse than what was meant by a double-dip recession. It will be with us much longer.”

Michael Hudson (economist) (1939) American economist

Obama's Bushism http://michael-hudson.com/2010/12/obamas-bushism/ (December 8, 2010)
Michael-Hudson.com, 1998-

“Management's objective is to achieve a return on capital over the long term which averages somewhat higher than that of American industry generally — while utilizing sound accounting and debt policies.”

Warren Buffett (1930) American business magnate, investor, and philanthropist

29 March 1974
Letters to Shareholders (1957 - 2012)

“Foreign debts. About $12,000,000,000 is due to our Government from abroad, mostly from European governments. Great Britain, Finland, Hungary, Lithuania and Poland have negotiated settlements amounting close to $5,000,000,000. This represents the funding of over 42 per cent of the debt since the creation of the special Foreign Debt Commission. As the life of this commission is about to expire, its term should be extended. I am opposed to the cancellation of these debts and believe it for the best welfare of the world that they should be liquidated and paid as fast as possible. I do not favor oppressive measures, but unless money that is borrowed is repaid credit can not be secured in time of necessity, and there exists besides a moral obligation which our country can not ignore and no other country can evade. Terms and conditions may have to conform to differences in the financial abilities of the countries concerned, but the principle that each country should meet its obligation admits of no differences and is of universal application.”

Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American politician, 30th president of the United States (in office from 1923 to 1929)

1920s, Second State of the Union Address (1924)

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