Hi Mr. Butel. I thought I would send you a little rant.......a bit over the top, but I really don't like what is going on right now. I recall sending you an e-mail about two or three years ago warning that the stock markets were headed for big trouble. I don't know for sure where we go from here. It is conceivable that, as with Zimabwe, they can drive the markets to infinity, but that would be worse. They need to devalue the U.S. dollar over time, but I can't see them destroying its value, as I don't think the banking oligarchs would benefit from that, but it is confusing. The result depends on the decisions of a very few....decisions that may have not been made yet. My best guess at this point is that this bear market is not over, and we are heading into a depression. The upcoming depression may not have the same "feel" as the 1930's, which were deflationary, but I expect it to be worse, and any "genuine" spark of true recovery to be a long long way off and from much lower levels in REAL terms (I am guessing deflationary at first, then highly inflationary). I believe that history has shown through many examples that any democratic nation that attempts to inflate its way out of debt (which is exactly what this and may other nations are now doing), will lose democracy to a more sinister form of government, be it a dictatorship, military government or what have you. Think Hitler's Germany, or Argentina, or Venezuela, or many others. I believe that what our governments are doing by transferring this country's wealth to private financial interests from the future taxation of its citizens is very wrong, and will leave the nation in tatters. Increasing spending and borrowing when headed into an economic downturn is, in my opinion, criminal. I have tried to wake people up. I have written letters to the gov't, news agencies, other organizations, and have knocked on hundreds of doors........but nobody cares. I have even had it out face to face with my MP. I have resigned my efforts, and, sadly, now expect that I may be moving out of this country within the next year or so. I just thought I'd respond to your inference from the Max Keiser video (interesting guy, I watch him from time to time), that Goldman Sachs created the crash of last year. Well, not exactly. The Federal Reserve secretly pulled liquidity out of the banking system in the 4 days leading up to Paulson's forcing of the bailout bill (coup of the United States by the Federal Reserve), to create stress and panic in the banking system to scare Congress into passing the bill. At the time, the Fed's daily liquidity adds/drains were published on a website, although obscurely.....but this information is no longer available. The creation of a panic is a similar strategy to what Hitler used to force the German government to hand full control over to him to avoid an apparent immediate and impending communist move. As it turned out, as soon as the bailout bill was passed, the markets went into a downward spiral anyway. Because they had to.....that's all. Don't get me wrong. Goldman Sachs is not innocent. They are indeed the ring leader (to over simplify). But it was Bernanke and the Federal Reserve. The Federal Reserve, is no more "Federal" than Federal Express.......it is a private - for profit bank, which controls the currency. As it has been said by one of the founding fathers - "He who controls the currency, controls the nation". Back to the book "The creature from Jekyl Island", the Federal Reserve is private, and owned by not just U.S. banks, but also several overseas. It is on their website. As an aside.....in June of 1963, John F Kennedy signed executive order 11110, which took away the power of the Federal Reserve to print currency and reinstated it back with the Treasury (government) where it belongs. It also stripped away the ability for the Federal Reserve to lend money to the government at interest. John F Kennedy was forcefully retired a few months later, and the executive order 11110 was rescinded. It is time for the New World Order. An international financial oligarchy who is making a move to enslave the middle class, and basically own and more completely control most everything. Goldman Sachs is just a shell, but is one of many involved, and may be considered the ring leader to oversimplify. To sound really scary about it, there are too many people on the planet for the resources available, so one objective of the NWO when a more dominant control is gained.........will be population reduction. Wars, famines, pandemics, who knows? The bank of Canada may now be controlled by Goldman Sachs as well (via Mark Carney, who is another GS alumni - and the "ownership" of many current political figures). Canada is being sold out, but the heist is only in its early stages here in Canada as opposed to how advanced it is in America. But theft of our nation's future is accelerating. I believe that our nation is being led to failure. In a democracy, it is every citizen's duty to do what they can to educate themselves and if appropriate, find a way to stop it. Considering those before me that went overseas to stop bullets for this country and what it has stood for, I am ashamed of the vast majority of our citizens. They will get what is coming to them, and so will their children and grandchildren. Keep in mind that this is only my opinion at this time, and is subject to change with new information, but I have been feeling this way for quite a while. I have done well shorting the markets off and on for almost 3 years now, so I have been putting my money where my mouth is. I really hope I'm wrong about much of what I see. Rolling Stone magazine had a great article just recently about the history of Goldman Sachs' true role in the financial markets. The font is a little difficult to read here, but it is a great article. Keep in mind that cap and trade legislation was passed in Congress on Friday - now on to the Senate. http://zerohedge.blogspot.com/2009/06/goldman-sachs-engineering-every-major.html Oh, and if you want a good laugh from time to time, this guy posts videos quite regularly. He is funny, but don't laugh too hard. He really knows his stuff. He knows the numbers, who is doing what to whom, and he has a good idea how. Most people could learn a lot from him. You can search for past videos of his on Youtube as the poster "walstreetpro2" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MoAyBb8D5GU Another guy who makes interesting videos you might like (and he knows the score too - but more from a common sense point of view). He covers some interesting topics in many of his past videos. I see he has a new format, so I'm not sure how you get a list of all of his past videos. If you like that kind of stuff, I guess you could do some poking around there. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xDAo73GDcno