We always enjoy having Doug Tjaden on the show, and this week’s session of Off the Grid Radio with Brian and Doug is as interesting as any we’ve had. As those of you who have been with Off the Grid Radio for a while, Doug Tjaden is the executive director of the Sound Money Center and the author of Fool’s Gold.
Off The Grid Radio
Ep 073
Released: October 28, 2011
Brian: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Off the Grid News – the radio version of offthegridnews.com. Today I am Brian Brawdy, Bill Heid is on assignment and will not be joining us. It is my pleasure to be spending some time with the guy that I’ve interviewed before. I dig his books, I dig his work, I dig his passion. We’re going to be talking today with the Executive Director of the Sound Money Center and you can find more information at soundmoneycenter.org which is a really cool site dedicated to helping educate Americans on the merits of sound money and helping states pass and implement sound money legislation. Our guest is also an author and – I love Doug’s book – “Fool’s Gold,” one of my favorite books. We’ve got all kinds of questions. Doug, welcome back to the show.
Doug: Brian, it’s good to be here.
Brian: Alright, my friend, we’ve got to hop right into this because I’ve read your book twice now and I need five minutes on the couch, if that’s cool with you. I’m going to have you play financial expert but also a little bit of a therapist for me, if that’s cool.
Doug: That’s good.
Brian: Alright, so I’m reading off the back of your book – “when the wisdom contained in God’s word is replaced by the wisdom of man, a very dangerous path has been chosen. We are – as I think most of us would agree with you – in a period of history when evil is rapidly spreading throughout the world.” The question is, as you ask on the back cover of the book, why? You say “we need look no further than God’s word for the answer. Now, before I ask you this question, because I’m going to get all kinds of hate mail, I’m going to disagree with 1 Timothy 6:10 when it says “the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil.” For me, Doug, isn’t money just a means to an end? And isn’t the root of all evil the individual being separated from the Divine so that they need money to buy all this other stuff to fill in the vacuum? Or am I just splitting hairs when it comes to that old saying that money is the root of all evil?
Doug: I think that’s a … that’s something that’s somewhat of a misconception in that money itself is the root of all evil because money, as you said, it’s just a means to an end. It’s something that we use to transact with one another, to do business, to make an easy medium of exchange for goods and services rather than having to have a full barter economy. So money itself is not the root of all evil and as Scripture says “it’s the love of money that’s the root of all evil.” What’s interesting about that is we peel back and as I’ve noodled through that, that Scripture obviously is something that means a lot to me as I looked at that and really examined the evil that’s around the world. I’m going “is that something that was meant in a context that wasn’t as literal as it may seem? The love of money is the root …” – and it says, depending on the translation, either “all evil” or “all kinds of evil.” I come to this conclusion – the love of it is the root of a whole lot of evil. That’s something that I think we can all hang our hats on as we look at what’s going on in the world. Certainly, you’re right, Brian, one of the things that we see is people try and fill that void – they try and fill the void that’s in their heart with stuff and with pleasures and with control and with power and with lust that can be bought, or they perceive, with money. So as they try and fill that insatiable – that black hole, so to speak, that can only be filled by our Savior, Jesus Christ – as they try and fill that, they try and accumulate more and more stuff. They need more and more money. So they begin to love it more and more and that contributes to the evil that the enemy wants to take us and run us down a path to where he’s got us consumed by the love of money and it separates us from God. In a lot of respects, what you’re saying is right on, but I think it’s that love of it that has caused so many problems in our nation today. We see it infecting everything from our fast food, immediate gratification culture to the power and corruption that is going rampant right now in Washington, DC. The root of that is, if you really get it to its lowest common denominator, you go back to it – it’s the love of money.
Brian: And I think, Doug – back in the time when it was written, I’ve always found interesting that in the early Greek the definition for diabolos or diabolic was another name for evil was to block the path. It was a block between the individual and the Divine, between the individual and God. I guess for me I take it one step back, which is why I was so excited to talk to you today, because you’re great when it comes to this topic as well – it’s that vacuum. It’s that void. We try to fill that void with all kinds of stuff, to quote George Carlin, when we fill the void with all kinds of stuff, you just can’t do it. It’s a never-ending pit. You can have all the money in the world and still not have a chance of cutting off that vacuum.
Doug: it’s a treadmill, like you say. The enemy wants to put us on this treadmill that is never ending. One of the most striking things, I think, one of the best examples that there’s such truth to what Scripture is talking about here is – and it’s almost one of those things “be careful what you wish for” – this love of money. “I want money. I want to win the lottery.” You hear about so many people who win the lottery and it could be Powerball with tens of millions of dollars or just a local lottery where somebody may win $50,000 or $100,000 or $200,000 and they end up squandering it all. They end up in a worse position than they were before because they think that that’s the savior to their problems. “Now I’ve attained everything I need. I have money so life is going to be good and happy.” All of a sudden it’s gone and they end up in a worse position than they were before. There are problems with that and as I wrote in the book, those problems have been foisted upon the country in many ways because of the monetary system that we have. The way that it’s crept in and been changed over the last 100 years in particular to be something that takes us away – and God tried to protect us from this – He gave us everything we needed in creation, including our money. He tried to protect us. He loves us enough to give us protection from us falling into this trap. Unfortunately, man has – so often as he does throughout history, he’s shown it over and over again, this pattern of turning our back on God and his ways. We’ve walked away from the protections that he gave us in Scripture to use an honest weight and measure, to transact with one another in an honest manner that would give us those protections. They’re gone now. We’ve decoupled our monetary system from that and things are now spinning out of control because of it.
Brian: Doug, why do you think that is? Are we lazy? Are we stupid? Given those protections that you referenced, are we couch potatoes … I’m at a loss because I so agree with you. I can’t figure out how we started down this path.
Doug: Unfortunately, it’s – Brian, it’s one of those things we look at history is so clear that we do not learn from history. Why that is? It has to be some fundamental portion of the nature of man who thinks in his pride, and I have to assign it back to pride, that it’s always going to be “different this time,” that “we’re going to be able to handle this, this time. We’re not going to fall into the same traps that men did 50 years ago, 100 years ago, 1000 years ago.” Somehow “we’ve got it handled because we have more information, we have technology …” whatever it is. But the fact of the matter is, we can’t handle certain things. When we decouple ourselves from Scripture we implement the traditions of men. That’s the subtitle of my book. My book’s called “Fool’s Gold” and I call it “Fool’s Gold” because the money we use today is like fool’s gold, it’s like pyrite. It looks like it – it looks like money, it spends like money, but it’s fake. It’s a façade and it is an illusion. It isn’t real money. What we’ve replaced it with is a tradition of man and that is man comes along and says “I’ve got a better way to do this. I’ve got a better way to handle our monetary system. Don’t worry, we can handle it this time.” It’s proven to not be the case. We can’t handle control of something so powerful as the creation of wealth, if you want to call it that, it’s pseudo-creation – it isn’t really wealth, but the illusion of wealth is there and it tempts man to pull the strings and levers and to push buttons and to do things with it that he normally wouldn’t until it spins out of control and harms everybody. We’re on the precipice of that right now.
Brian: You know what I’ll do, Doug? We’ve got to run to a quick commercial break – when we come back, Doug, I want to talk about that illusion that you referenced here just a moment ago. Ladies and gentlemen, we’re with today for the full hour, Mr. Doug Tjaden. He is the Executive Director of The Sound Money Center. He’s going to be with us, as I say, for the full hour. Back after this commercial break.
[0:10:20 – 0:14:33 break]Brian: Ladies and gentlemen, I’m Brian Brawdy, sitting in today for Mr. Bill Heid. Back with one of our favorite guests, Mr. Doug Tjaden. Doug, here’s something that you said on your book that was of interest to me. When we talk about replacing the Divine will with human will, we talk about how we abandoned – and I asked “are we lazy? Are we soft?” You talked about the illusion. I got into a debate the other day, quickly, with a gentleman who says he’s an atheist. He goes on and on and on about being an atheist and then he ends by saying “that’s why I’m such a fan of big government, because there is not God – in this gentleman’s estimation – that’s why there’s a need for government.” I simply fired back saying “you profess to be an atheist when truly you’re not. What you’ve done is replace God with government. You still believe in an all powerful, you still believe in top-down, you still believe in external control. You just opt to call it government.” Do you think that’s what a lot of people have done? They’ve turned from the Divine going “instead of turning to God it’s easier to turn to Big Brother”?
Doug: Unfortunately in our nation today, we have replaced the traditional Judao-Christian value system with a secular humanist value system. Secular humanism is – in Romans it talks about a self-imposed religion. As we go down this path of debauchery we end up with this self-imposed religion and that’s what we’re faced with. We have a self-imposed religion in this country right now and it’s called secular humanism. And, yes, every “religion,” if you want to use that word, must have its own “deity.” You’re absolutely right. At some point in time – even the Evolutionists – the evolutionary thinking of secular humanism has to say “somebody” or “some group of people” has evolved to lead this world. They put the elites out there and say “they’re smarter than we are. They have everything under control. They’re benevolent and they really care about us,” which you and I both know is a bunch of baloney. They do have to conjure up some kind of humanistic deity in their mind to justify their acquiescence of their own freedom. They’re giving away of their own freedoms and placing themselves under some authority, even though that authority – because of, as you know, man’s fallen nature – does not necessarily have their best interest at heart. That’s part of what we’re dealing with here.
Brian: I thought of you yesterday when I was watching some of the protests. Now they say they’re happening in New York, I believe Los Angeles was another place. But this “walk in on Wall Street,” this whole campaign where you have people now protesting the economy, protesting big business, all the rest – what’s the real impetus behind that?
Doug: Their god has failed. [laughs]
Brian: Great answer.
Doug: They’ve made government their god and their god has failed them. Now they’re searching for answers as to why and they’re looking at “who do we blame?” In many ways, because of my understanding of Scripture and our monetary system and how it’s contributed to all this, I’m sympathetic somewhat to their cause. They have a right to be angry with Wall Street. They have a right to be angry with the Federal Reserve. The problem is, they’re searching for laying the blame at the feet of the people who are only creating the symptoms of the problem. They’re addressing the symptoms. They say “we’ve got a bad economy. We have people out of work.” But what they haven’t connected yet is this whole issue of this flat-out, dishonest monetary system that we have that’s built on a faulty foundation of a dishonest weight and measure that’s an abomination to our God, that has allowed these false gods who have come in, in place of God’s ways and His precepts and principles – this has allowed these false gods to come in and steal them, to put them and their grandchildren and future generations into bondage through this debt-backed monetary system that they have. They haven’t equated that yet. My prayer is that we can educate them and help them connect those dots and then find – guess what? Not only do we have this problem with our monetary system but there’s a reason for it and it ties back to Scriptural principles. Through it all, Lord-willing, it may lead some people to the Gospel of Jesus Christ where they find out there are these biblical principles mean something. They’re there for a reason. It can lead them to the truth. That’s my hope and prayer. I’m sympathetic, as I said, to the problems and the pain they’re experiencing. They’re just looking in the wrong place for the solutions.
Brian: Doug, let me ask you, last week we interviewed briefly, Ron Paul. Bill and Jeremy and I were out in Clinton, Iowa where he came to speak. He talks about ending the Fed and he talks about sound money policies. Whenever I hear that I always think of you. From the first times that I’ve listened to you speak and I’ve read your books. When that phrase and that line of thought pops in mind I always think of you. So what’s up? Why does everyone think Ron Paul’s a kook? When you talk about ending the Fed, when you talk about Fiat currencies, when you talk about unfair weights and measures. Why are you and Ron Paul considered to be kooks?
Doug: I think it’s a case of people, again. John Adams said – and I’m probably going to slaughter this quote a little bit – but he said “all the perplexities and distress in America rise not from wont of honor or virtue, but from downright ignorance of coin credit and circulation.” The people in this country are ignorant about what coin is – that means money itself, the very nature of what it should be; credit, its evils – when it should be used, when it shouldn’t be used and the problems that can arise from the misuse of it; and then circulation – that is how our monetary system is used to facilitate business. We’re ignorant of what that really means. Ron Paul knows it. He gets it. He’s tied these principles together. He’s gotten it for a long time. But the interesting thing is, people are beginning to wake up. This whole “occupy Wall Street” thing is an indication that people are waking up. They just haven’t quite gotten the whole picture yet. That’s why at the Sound Money Center, I’m the Executive Director of that, we’re trying to educate people on the merits of sound money, the constitutional support for sound money, the historical support for sound money, the economic reasons that sound money’s important and the moral reasons of why sound money is important. it’s been interesting, over the last two or months in particular, the center and the message is really being received in a way that it wasn’t even six months ago. People are really beginning to understand that there is something broken here and it needs fix. I think we’re on the cusp of a real enlightening of what Ron Paul has said in his message – and by the way, I am a huge fan of Ron Paul – I wish he’d run Independent. I think if he announced Independent you would see him running neck-and-neck or leading in a three-way race between any Republican and President Obama. Maybe that’s a wish list thing of mine that I’d like to see, but the man understands our monetary system, he understands freedom, he understands the Constitution more than anybody does. We’ll see. We’ll see what happens over the next six to nine months. But the message is being more well received and people are starting to wake up a little bit, I think.
Brian: Doug, I’m with you in that regard, that if he ran as an Independent – if Dr. Paul ran as an Independent – it would be a good bit different of an election outcome. But you can’t say that, in a lot of ways, to his supporters. Go ahead and float the idea that there is no way that Dr. Paul will win the GOP nomination. Just given media, given its financial control and big business – there’s no way Dr. Paul’s going to get the GOP nomination. Absolutely no way. Anyone willing to bring the title to their car, their boat, their plane, their house and bet me on that – everyone knows where to get a hold of me. But when you say that, as I have, and called for him to run as an Independent, it seems to fall on deaf ears. But I want to go back to something that you said in your book. You say “the consequences of such foolishness is the unleashing of all kinds of evil on our world.” What’s the greatest evil that you see and what can you do at the Sound Money Center? I love your Storm Watch by the way. If I haven’t mentioned that to you before, I think that’s one of the coolest links – when you talk about the different things that are coming. “We Have the Technology” article I thought was a really good one. But talk to me for a second about the greatest evil we face and what you’re doing at Sound Money Center – the soundmoneycenter.org for those people that want to check it out. What are you doing to beat back that evil?
Doug: To put an overall on it, I think the greatest evil that we have is tyranny. I say that because it encapsulates so much. What we’re seeing here with our federal government is that because of the monetary system that we have today, they are able to print money – well, they don’t print it – again, the misconception is that our government creates money, they don’t. The Federal Reserve creates it and loans it to the government, enslaving you and me and future generations in debt. That is in and of itself is an evil. But what they use that money for then is they turn around – right now they’re funding 43 cents of every dollar they spend on borrowed money. The problem with that is – guess what? 43 cents of every dollar goes to fund agencies like the TSA and the NSA and the NEA and the EPA and all of these agencies that impose federal tyranny. If you take a sound money system and put it back into place, then you limit the government’s ability to print money – obviously they can’t print it because you can’t print gold and silver. You also limit their ability to borrow. So a lot of these agencies that they use to expand their control and their power immediately go away. If they don’t go away they are severely curtailed in their ability to extend their overreach. One of the things that I’m doing right now is I’m going around speaking on the issue of sound money. I’ve hooked up with the Tenth Amendment Center. I’m speaking at their “Nullify Now” tour and I’m trying to get people to understand that sound money has to be. It’s a necessary component of all battles that we are engaged in right now, to push back the overreach of the federal government. Without it, they’ll just print up more money and they’ll buy back victory from us. They’ll turn around and change our victories into defeats over time because they’ll continue to fund these issues that relentlessly come after us. I look at sound money as being the ultimate nullifier, not of just the Federal Reserve, which it will – if you implement sound money it will nullify the Federal Reserve eventually because people will become wise to what’s going on and they will choose to use a form of money that is sound and has more longevity and savings of the purchasing power. But it also will de-fund a lot of these agencies as well. The message is sound money is the ultimate nullification. You’re hearing a lot more of that particular doctrine coming out as well in the political arena – this idea of state’s right and nullification and standing against the federal government.
Brian: Doug, we’re going to run to a quick commercial break. When we come back I want to talk about the Tenth Amendment Center and nullification and some of the state’s rights issues that you’ve raised. Ladies and gentlemen, a quick commercial break. Come on back – Doug Tjaden will be with us for the full hour, right after these words.
[0:27:04 – 0:31:20 break]Brian: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to Off the Grid Radio. As the announcer says, getting you ready to prepare for the worst. Today I’m Brian Brawdy, sitting in for Mr. Bill Heid. We’re here with Doug Tjaden from the Sound Money Center. You can find him at soundmoneycenter.org. Doug, let’s talk about the Tenth Amendment Center. I dig those folks. I know that you’re tight with some of those over there. I like the message. I like the nullification message. Give me an idea of how you guys have hooked up and then I have a question for you.
Doug: I met Michael Boldin at a couple of different speaking engagements that I was on. I got to talking to him about the Tenth Amendment Center and states’ rights and introduced him to this issue of sound money and sound money legislation that has introduced in many of the states. It actually was passed in Utah in March, and we can talk a little bit about that later. I posed the question to him, or posed the thought to him, saying “Michael, you guys can fight these battles to roll back the federal government. You can go to court and win and put in nullification legislation in all the states and those kinds of things. But unless you also do that with sound money and have sound money as a companion to your nullification bills, they will turn around and use this printed money with their Fiat monetary system and they will buy back any victory that you gain.” If they print money then they can buy all the evil they want, that’s part of the tragedy of the system that we have right now. He’s getting that and understands it and so now we’ve decided to go on the tour with him and bring that sound money message as part of the “Nullify Now” tour that is around in the various cities around the nation that he’s doing.
Brian: Then here’s my question … we talked about Dr. Paul running as an Independent. And although I dig Dr. Paul and his message – and I’ll be honest, this is a debate I got into a couple weeks back with my friend Tom Woods. For Dr. Paul to run as President is one course of action. The other course of action that I questioned is that why shouldn’t we be taking that energy, instead of working so hard to get the message out in a GOP primary field that’s not going to let him get the nomination – why aren’t we working harder at the state level to implement your opinions and his opinions about the sound money – not just the Sound Money Center but the whole concept. If a part of the evil is treating politicians like rock stars, and we have a President and he or she can do this or that, it would seem to me going back to a more grassroots level, going back to the people, having you speak to groups like the Tenth Amendment Center, like “Nullify Now,” and start to do it from the bottom-up, as opposed to the top-down – that seems to me to be a more judicious use of our time and our energy. Even if – let’s say we could get you elected President tomorrow – until we put the senators and the members of the House in a position to help you, you’re a lame duck 35 seconds after your hand leaves the Bible on Inauguration Day.
Doug: I couldn’t agree with you more. That’s really the beauty of this whole movement. What’s happening now around the nation is really happening at the grassroots level. You are seeing these issues come at state and state politicians and state representatives, state senators and even more so, governors. I wish governors would realize the constitutional power and authority that they have instead of trying to use their office as a dress rehearsal for something on the national scene like a senator or President. If they understood what they could do for their people, it would be an incredible, incredible thing. But you’re right, and I think what we’re seeing is the states are putting up firewalls. That’s what they’re doing – they’re erecting firewalls between themselves and the federal government. Even down in the local level, people are getting more involved in understanding who they need to put in to be their representatives at the state and local level. Ron Paul being President would simply give some political cover to a lot of the things that the states need and want to accomplish because he’s all for it. But I agree, you’ve got the Congress in Washington that is a much, much bigger problem. That is a multi-election cycle problem to turn around. If you could get somebody – a President to stop the overreach, give political cover and messaging to what the states are trying to accomplish, then I think the state could be able to accomplish a great deal on their own. Somebody like a Ron Paul could run a lot of interference for them, even though Congress would try and maintain their control over it. It’s a big problem …
Brian: Yeah, I’m looking for the next 50 Ron Pauls. I’m looking for the governors that are going to take that message. As you say, even down to the local level. It’s probably no secret that I’m a libertarian and we spend a good bit of time as libertarians – a friend of mine called it the mutual respect debate society. Here’s the thing, we’re so busy sitting around trying to debate and have this big philosophical discussion, and as you said earlier, we’re enslaving our grandchildren. This isn’t a philosophical debate anymore. It’s not like you and I get in a bubble to play some chess match about what the world should be like. This is really enslaving our children, and I know you have some children – and for those listeners that have children, as I do – we really are truly enslaving them. It’s not insightful rhetoric, it really is true, isn’t it?
Doug: Absolutely it is. I don’t care if any individual is personally debt free. I think that’s great if they are, but the fact of the matter is your children and you are still enslaved to the national debt that we’ve racked up and all the debt that these banks have racked up. They are going to tax us to try and pay that off. It’s impossible – the system is on its last legs. It is going to go through a reset process. There is no stopping it. We cannot pay back the debt that we have right now. What happens in that case is the enslavement is either through the debt that we have to pay off through taxes or is our property is stolen through us through some inflationary or hyperinflationary event that destroys the purchasing power of our savings, which is why it’s so important that people protect themselves from that. We can switch gears a little bit and exhort folks to “protect yourselves from what is coming” – that is an ultimate – I’ll say at the least the beginning of the collapse of the US dollar as this problem over in Europe gains more traction and it does spread around the world and eventually gets here. It’s going to happen. Precious metals have been a part of the way to protect people’s provision for 5,000 years of history. It’s been proven to be an asset class that will hold your purchasing power, protect the provision God’s given you, as we move through this time of change. My recommendation is that folks go out and seriously look at getting some sound money before it becomes sound money. Get in front of the curve on this thing. You have to have sound money saved before you can spend it. A savings accumulation program is important as well. We’ve talked on previous programs about SilverSaver – you guys are involved with that. It’s a way that we help people. I say “we” – it’s a way that they help people to accumulate precious metal savings and at the same time help out organizations like yourselves who are doing a great job in helping people prepare and get the word out.
Brian: Doug, I want to talk to you – we’re going to run to a quick commercial break here in just a minute – then I want to talk to you about an article that you wrote in April of this year. I’d like to talk about SilverSaver, I’d like to talk about a little more of some of the other things you’re doing and how you do it in response to this question. The title of your piece was “Does Honest Money Have a Chance?” We’re going to run to a break because I ran a little over in the last segment, but when we come back I’m going to ask you that question straight up. I’d like you to answer it and then give me an idea as to what I and our listeners, as individuals, can do to start bolstering honest money’s chances of beating back all the obvious evils that we’ve been discussing throughout the show. Ladies and gentlemen, we’re going to run to a quick commercial break. When we come back, the final segment with Mr. Doug Tjaden. I’m going to ask him “does honest money – do our grandchildren have a chance? Is there a way out of this?” Quick commercial break and then we’ll be back.
[0:40:28 – 0:44:47 break]Brian: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back. Brian Brawdy today, in for Mr. Bill Heid. I’m here with Doug Tjaden from the Sound Money Center. Doug, here’s the question – no BS, right to the top – does honest money have a chance?
Doug: Yes, it does. The reason being, we’ve had several historic events happen in the last six months in terms of turning this monetary system that we have around. Back in March of this year, Utah passed the first Sound Money Act in a state in 80 years. Simply what they did is they came up and they declared that “we’re going to go back to Article 1, Section 10 of the Constitution which says that no state shall make anything but gold and silver coin tender in payment of debts. We’re going to hang our hat on that and say we’re going to implement that here in our state.” Over the last six months, the free market has put in place – and is putting in place – implementation plans to allow people to accumulate and spend gold and silver coin as constitutional money. There’s some very exciting things happening in Utah. Because of that, many other states – probably a dozen other states – are putting their hands up saying “we like what they’re doing out there. Let’s try and get that through in our state legislation as well in 2012.” There’s a growing momentum to implement honest money. Now, as you know, the Federal Reserve and the big government folks and the big bankers are not going to sit by idly and just let it happen. They’re throwing up roadblocks right now to try and slow the progress there. But it caught them a little bit by surprise that this even happened. There’s some momentum here and there really is a chance to get some protections put in place before this US dollar, Fiat debt-backed thing that we have right now goes ‘boom.’
Brian: You know, Doug, I said the other day – actually, I posed it in the form of a question – I’d love your answer – do you really think the Fed is going to sit back when everyone starts with the posters and the signs and the calls to end the Fed, to use the title of one of Dr. Paul’s books? Do you really think Big Ben and the boys at the Fed are going to sit back and go “alright … Utah’s law’s going to catch fire. Governor Herbert will just be one of many governors that will do this …” Do you think they’re just going to sit there and take it on the chin?
Doug: Well, no, they won’t. Again, as I said, they’re trying to throw up some roadblocks out there right now through regulation and so forth. But the thing that’s interesting, is because of this overall move around the nation to reenact states’ rights and to have the states stand up and really protect their citizens, they’re catching a little bit more of a problem getting out in front of this thing and controlling it than I think they anticipated. What we’re seeing because of that is they’re back on their heels a little bit. You’ve got these protests we talked about earlier that are going on. People are just becoming aware and once the American people become aware en masse, they may want to stop it but they’re going to have a very, very difficult time having the political capital to do it. I’m excited. I really think we have an opportunity here to do some fantastic things. What worries me is that we’ve got an economic situation that could go over into tilt at any time and if that happens, either by design or by chance, that would be a whole nother debate, what they’re going to do is they’re going to have a solution waiting in the wings to that problem. Patriot Act was sitting on the shelves when 9/11 happened. They didn’t dream that up in three days. So if we have another major economic/currency crisis, they’ve got a plan to replace this current system with something else – exactly what it is, I don’t know, but it’s waiting in the wings. They’ll present that to us in the hopes the American people will say “please do it! Take my pain away.” I think it’s important for us to get out in front of this thing and work as hard as we can to get sound money implemented in as many states as we can, again, as a firewall against that next system which would be some kind of a regional or global type monetary system and consolidating power at a greater and higher level. We don’t want that so it’s incumbent upon us to fight it tooth and nail right now.
Brian: Alright, Doug, the people in the media are going to say “come on, Doug. It’s too extreme. Too controversial. Too difficult to implement. It’s too archaic.” Should those be trigger words? And by trigger words I mean words that cause us to sit up and go “wait a minute – how can sound money be too archaic? How can it be too controversial?” Should the rest of us, when we hear these terms, these attacks on honest money, should that be a flag for us that we sit up and go “let’s look into this a little more because we’re being bamboozled when we’re told that ‘sound money is too extreme.’”
Doug: Yeah, sure. The fact of the matter is, any time that – and I’m struggling for the quote right now – but in general, any time that lies predominate in the nation, truth becomes the enemy. People are going to – they’re going to blanch against it. They’re going to stand up against sound money for a while until they really begin to understand the principles and the history behind it and how it has protected people throughout, literally, 5,000 years of history. I think we’ve got an opportunity here to educate people and to help them move in a direction where they begin to understand this is necessary. One of the things that they will do is they’ll say “you’re going to say we’re going to carry gold and silver coins around? That’s 1800s stuff. You’re nuts.” Well, the fact of the matter is, we can marry 21st Century technology with sound money and we can issue debit cards that are backed by sound money. You can have title and ownership of that money change hands just based on swatting of a debit card. The technology’s there. It’s being implemented right now in Utah and Mass Metal and SilverSaver is part of that. We are … we’re there. The solutions are there. The convenience is there. It’s all there. People just need to understand it.
Brian: We could probably speak for a whole nother show about your position, whether it’s – your quote was “whether it’s by chance or design.” you talk about the evils – and you’ve said before, a couple of different times in our interview – “they – they want this, they want that.” Who’s the “they,” Doug? Do you know what I mean? Who are the people – if you believe it’s by design, who are the “they”?
Doug: That’s a good question. I get that question a lot because I do use that term “they.” “They” would be the politicians who want to hold onto their power. They would be the global banking system who wants to hold onto their control of the purse strings. If it goes beyond that, if there’s a ruling elite that’s out there that really wants to consolidate and control power, especially in the Western World – Europe and the United States – I think you can go out and with very little time, go out and find on the internet – you’ll find some kooky things but you’ll also find some very, very plain documentation about an agenda that they have to undermine and undercut the sovereignty of the United States and bring them into a broader power structure. I see that as conspiracy because it’s there, it’s open. They’ve said it, they’re implementing it – to me that’s an agenda. You’re familiar with the “Agenda” movie that was made? It’s just there. People need to understand and open their eyes that it’s out there.
Brian: You know, I thought about it this morning when they were reporting that once Putin is elected President – like there’s any question as to whether that’s going to go down, right Doug? He’s talking about wanting to build a Eurasian Union where he wants to set up a currency and he wants to set up customs and trade and both a fiscal and a monetary policy for all the former satellites of the Soviet Union.
Doug: You bring up a very interesting point, Brian. That is, one of the real dangers that we have right now, that we’re walking into, is the United States is becoming more and more isolated. I really believe that’s by design. When Europe goes through their major crisis, which they are on the cusp of today – Greece defaults, the cascading effect that happens there, the European Union is going to be fractured and decimated – we don’t know exactly what’s going to come out on the other side of it, whether they’ll be able to maintain the Euro as a currency or not. But you’ve got China and Russia over there that are very, very interested in drawing very close to the European nations and increasing their influence there so they can further isolate the United States and weaken us. There is a grand political, strategic game being played right now that has very, very – I won’t say extreme – very serious consequences going forward in terms of what this world is going to look like in future generations. There’s a lot going on besides just money. It’s centered around the crisis that is coming out of the monetary system and its collapse.
Brian: Doug, we’re going to have you back some time because what I’d like to do for that full hour next time is talk about a chess match, because as I listen to you speak it’s like there’s a big chess board and there are people moving the pieces to bring about the very things that you and I have discussed today. Ladies and gentlemen, it’s been a pleasure, as always, to get a chance to hang with Mr. Doug Tjaden. He is the Executive Director at soundmoneycenter.org. Also, go over to Facebook. Good golly, check him out on Facebook, go ahead and “like” his page. A lot of great information. Very passionate about everything that he does. Thank you, Doug, so much for your time. We’ll look forward to having you back.
Doug: Well thank you, Brian. I appreciate the opportunity to speak with you again.
Brian: ladies and gentlemen, as always, thank you for listening to Off the Grid Radio. Please email us your questions, your comments, your critiques to [email protected]. You can find us on Facebook – facebook.com/offthegridnews and of course, as always, you can follow us on Twitter @offgridnews. On behalf of Mr. Bill Heid who’s on assignment today, and the entire team at Off the Grid News, thank you so very much for joining Doug and I today. I’m Brian Brawdy.
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