Ezra Taft Benson, thirteenth prophet of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, was one of the greatest statesmen that has ever lived. Not only was he prophetic when it came to spiritual things, he was equally prescient when it comes to economic issues. I have read several times the economic warnings of President Benson, but his warnings have never rung more true than now--when we are in the midst of suffering for failing to heed his warnings.Recently I wrote about the prophetic mantle of Gordon B. Hinckley as regards the world economy. With similar prophetic insight, Ezra Taft Benson authored The Red Carpet in 1962, and in 1969, he penned An Enemy Hath Done This. What follows are selections from those two books. Warning: If you feel a sense of dizzying deja vu, don't be surprised.
Care for a stimulus package, anyone?
A nation cannot spend itself into prosperity.
How about a bailout? When you read the following axiom from Benson, the futility of such economic silliness will make perfect sense to you.A nation cannot spend itself into prosperity. Nor can we preserve our prosperity and our free-enterprise system by following a reckless policy of spending beyond our income...Do you ever wonder why Americans have become so conditioned to
The Red Carpet, p. 167
Corporate entities lack social consciousness.
spend themselves into drunken oblivion? It's because we've been encouraged to do so by the profligate monetary policies of our government Treasury and quasi-government organizations, such as the Federal Reserve.Few policies are more capable of destroying the moral, political, and social basis of a free society than the debauching of its currency.Free enterprise = corporations, right? No--not very often anymore. If it was bad enough in the 1960's for Benson to write the following, imagine how bad it must be today.
An Enemy Hath Done This, p. 211
...corporate entities seem to lack that social consciousness proportionate to their power and the privileges granted them by the state. Some...still fail to recognize that there are social and spiritual values...that should be considered in their operations.In his recent book, Bad Money, Kevin Phillips observed the insanity
The Red Carpet, p. 119
A nation enjoys in the form of goods and services only what it produces.
of the United States having nearly completely replaced its manufacturing capability with a non-productive financial sector. Forty-six years ago, Ezra Taft Benson warned against such foolishness.In the long run, a nation enjoys in the form of goods and services only what it produces.It has been common for economic analysts to
The Red Carpet, pp. 116-117
We abolished slavery once in America. Now, unfortunately without most of us even noticing it, slavery is coming back in vogue.
predict that the current economic collapse will ultimately be "great"er than The Great Depression. For statesmen like Benson, this was not hard to predict almost fifty years ago.We must reverse our present dangerous fiscal policies. If we fail to do so, we will set off an international monetary debacle that could easily make the experience of the 1930's sink into insignificance.
The Red Carpet, p. 308
Much of our program of letting the government pay for it "can be described as an attempt to better yourself by increasing your pay and then sending yourself the bill."Ron Paul, among others, from a closer vantage point in time, had been warning about the obviousness of the pending economic collapse, although
The Red Carpet, p. 221
The pending economic crisis that now faces America is painfully obvious.
hardly anyone would listen. But it takes a prophet to notice, from five decades hence, the obviousness of something the likes of which nearly everyone else observed only when it began affecting them personally. Part of Benson's prophecy is still yet future, however. Are we stupid enough to simply count him lucky in what he has correctly "predicted" so far?The pending economic crisis that now faces America is painfully obvious. If even a fraction of potential foreign claims...were presented to the Treasury...the rush to get rid of dollars would rapidly accelerate the visible effects of inflation... Uncertainty over the future would cause the consumer to halt...spending. ...problems of unemployment and low production will be compounded by a monetary system that will be utterly worthless.Benson taught that free choice should
An Enemy Hath Done This, p. 216
The welfare state not only fails to provide the economic security sought for, but it always ends in slavery.
always prevail, and that along these lines, government should never insinuate unfairness between business and labor unions. Yet with recent financial and automotive bailouts, this is precisely what's happening. Big business and labor bosses are getting the cream of the crop, and the rest of us get to pay for their indulgences.My conscience forbids me to consent to granting exclusive privileges to either business or labor unions. ...the power of government should never...force it one way or the other.What's the antidote? Free enterprise, says Benson, which we haven't experienced too much of lately.
An Enemy Hath Done This, pp. 237-239
The welfare state...not only fails to provide the economic security sought for, but [it] always ended in slavery---and it always will.We abolished slavery once in America. Now, unfortunately without most of us even noticing it, slavery is coming back in vogue.
The Red Carpet, p. 308
My brother also predicted it, as he likes to remind people. When the de-regulation drumbeat started years ago, he said, "Those #$*%ers are going to de-regulate everything, and it's going to be the biggest financial disaster of our lifetime." Silly me, like Greenspan, I actually thought most people would put the interests of their shareholders above greed and expedience, but he was right (which I'm sure I will hear again next time he comes over).
ReplyDeleteAnybody who had been inside the government building, moreover in the top echelon would see all what Benson saw. It also does not require a high intelligence to deduct what ripples to expect down the road on the bottom later on. Benson was only an honest man and could not keep himself back from disclosing what he saw, also its logical consequences.
ReplyDeleteSo, if just being in government gives one the intelect to see the future problems then we have some rather ignorant people in govenrment. Either these people are causing the problems or are plain silly. Wars are started for profit. We become the pawns they use.Benson warned Castro was not to be trusted. he was right at a time we were supplying him with guns.
ReplyDeletePeople always choose their masters. God or tyrants. Today the people spoke and we are seeing tyrany and oppression
Gene