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In the article "Our Quasi-Soviet Fiscal Policy," the author writes - "When the hammer and sickle flag was lowered for the last time in Moscow on December 25, 1991, the international finance agencies created in Bretton Woods in 1944, led by British economist John Maynard Keynes and the Undersecretary of the U.S. Treasury Harry Dexter White, found a new mission." I remember that date well, because I was there in Moscow, watching on TV as Mikail Gorbachiov signed the document that dissolved the USSR.The next day I boarded a Delta flight back to the U.S. to celebrate a late Christmas with my family. A well-dressed couple was seated in the row behind me and the plane was only about 1/4 full (most people had taken earlier flights so they could be home on Christmas), so I introduced myself. They were the CNN reporters who were interviewing Gorby as he prepared to sign the document... but he didn't have a pen! So the male CNN reporter lent him his pen, and on Dec. 26 he showed me "the pen that was mightier than the sword" - it dissolved the USSR! The factories in post-Soviet Russia were in shambles: workers had looted them for anything they could carry out past the bribed guards. Stores were empty, roads were full of potholes, theft was everywhere, inflation was roaring. The problem with Socialism is that "if everyone owns everything, nobody really owns anything, so nobody is responsible" - a common saying that I heard often in post-Soviet Russia. That new mission of international aid would just be pouring more and more sand down a rat hole. Read the full article to get the whole story! And subscribe below to get our free weekly newsletter: |