Tag: James Orlin Grabbe

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A Letter to Mother. PT-1

James Orlin Grabbe more commonly referred to as J. Orlin Grabbe, or just JOG, was an American economist and prolific writer with contributions in the theory and practice of finance. Wikipedia Born: October 8, 1947, Hale County, Texas, TX Died: March 15, 2008, San José, Costa Rica Books: International Financial Markets, 3rd Edition Education: University of California, Berkeley, Harvard University Fields: Financial economics, Quantum mechanics

The Painful Truth has recently acquired a letter that James Orlin Grabbe had wrote to his mother concerning the Worldwide Church of God and the various characters within. This seventy page letter was written in either 1973 or 1974. There is some confusion as to the exact date.

Orlin Grabbe was born October 8, 1947, in Hale County, Texas, and grew up on a farm in Briscoe County in the Texas panhandle. He showed great academic prowess in his youth and in response, he was invited to participate in nationwide, specialized education in mathematics. Two of his brothers also achieved doctorates and became professors. His brother Lester was a professor of theology at the University of Hull in England, while his brother Crockett was a professor of physics at the University of Iowa.

In the fall of 1966, Grabbe joined an older brother at the Worldwide Church of God‘s Ambassador College, based in Pasadena, California. He graduated in 1970 and served on the teaching staff until 1973. During this time, he was the editor of the student newspaper. In his memoir, written later in his life, he described not only his own experiences and thought processes, but also the atmosphere that permeated the college, its students, and the organization as a whole.

After leaving Ambassador, Grabbe enrolled at the University of California, Berkeley, to pursue his interests in research and science, with an emphasis in mathematics. In 1976, he received a Bachelor of Arts degree in economics. He continued his education at Harvard University where he was awarded a Ph.D. in economics in 1981.

Grabbe specialized in the study of financial derivative instruments and published important pricing models for futures, forward contracts and options, especially in the foreign exchange (FX) markets.

If your not familiar with Mr. Grabbe, and his contributions, go HERE.

And yes, he even had a part in the movie, “Ruby Ridge” staring Randy Quaid, Laura Dern, Kirsten Dunst.

His website from ten years ago can be found HERE.

A pioneering work for Grabbe is his “The End of Ordinary Money, Part I” and Part II.

And finally, a most telling article here on the Painful Truth, “Memories of Pasadena” originally provided by Bill Ferguson of “Ekklesia“.

Due to file size, the Painful Truth will present this letter as png picture files, instead of pdf files for the time being. We will post one big pdf file when this series is complete.

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Why the Founding Fathers Made Their Own Money

· Mar 13th, 2014

rebellion moneyIt is an interesting historical fact that people who take part in rebellions tend to coin their own money – not when the rebellion concludes, but as it starts.

There is good evidence that silver half shekels, like the one pictured above, were actually minted on the Temple Mount during the Jewish Rebellion against Rome in 66-70 AD. (The wonderful Biblical Archaeology Review ran an article on the subject.)

And this case is hardly unique; there have been many rebellions that promptly issued their own currency. Here is Massachusetts currency from 1776, issued early in the American Revolutionary War:

rebellion money

The primary reason that rebels create their own currency is that monetary control is far more of a force than people realize. Baron Rothschild was not being overly flamboyant when he said, “Give me control over a nation’s money supply, and I care not who makes its laws.” Being able to manipulate a money supply is a fantastic power, affecting every part of an economy. If you know in advance that the money supply will go up (diluting its value) or contract (concentrating its value), you immediately gain a massive advantage over everyone else – and you can target this advantage to help or hurt almost any group you choose.

Because of this, a rebel group that is tied to their opponent’s money has nearly lost before the battles begin. Serious rebels learn this quickly.

The Modern Rebellion

The rebellion that we’re all part of is not an armed rebellion, but a moral rebellion. And, interestingly enough, our rebellion understood very early on that money was a primary factor in our enslavement.

The roots of our rebellion go back as far as the first oppressed man or woman who thought clearly about morality, whenever that was. In modern times, however, we can trace our rebellion back to the 1940s – a time in which Mises had already been examining the foundations of money, Hayek was interested in competing currencies, and Rand was examining the morality of money.

(I’m passing over very many good people in the above paragraph. May they forgive my brevity.)

In our lifetimes, we’ve had David Chaum’s work on digital cash, Orlin Grabbe’s work (both theoretical and practical), e-gold, Pecunix, networks of exchangers, subsidiary services, and, most recently, crypto-currencies, beginning with Bitcoin. Our moral rebellion is not slowing down.

What matters about all of these currencies (and many more I haven’t mentioned) is that they are all rebel currencies. Sure, a few criminals and Ponzi operators have made use of our technologies, but that’s simply unavoidable. How many crooks use government money? (Answer: all of them.)

Rebel Morality

I think it’s important to make a few points about this moral rebellion of ours:

  1. This is not about attacking anyone or even attacking the current systems of oppression. Yes, every individual has the right to self-defense, but what we’re after here is not to lord it over anyone else, but being left alone to live as we wish.
  2. We must treat our fellow men and women with respect, even if they are wrong. If they want to be ruled by a state, that’s their choice, and we have no right to rip it away from them. (If it crashes without our coerced “support,” that’s not our problem.) If we think that people are being stupid to choose state serfdom, we should convince them that other ways are better, but we cannot force them to live our way and still call ourselves moral.

Our rebellion money has actually done a fine job of supporting these two moral points. The supposed failures of these currencies were primarily that they couldn’t withstand coercive and violent attacks. In other words, they worked very well; their “problems” were attacks from the status quo: a system of coercion and violence, masquerading as justice.

What we are now seeing is a moral awakening. Young people are questioning the systems that supposedly sustain them but actually use them as slaves.

When people begin to see the world in moral terms, they quickly perceive the deep immorality of the status quo – a system that is utterly dependent upon coercion and deception. If there is a root to the continuance and success of honest, rebel money, this is it.

In the end, our battle is this: morality versus coercion and deception.

Paul Rosenberg
FreemansPerspective.com