Chemtrail Facts not conspiracy theory’s but conspiracy facts!

Chemtrail-II

Daniel Joseph Leach Jr.founder of http://AntiIlluminatiParty.com
According to some people who want to be willfully ignorant about the so called chemtrail conspiracy theory, those long-lasting trails left in the sky by high-flying aircraft are chemical or biological agents deliberately sprayed for Geo engineering and weather modification. Just in case you want to have a better understanding of this subject.here are just some of the historical Facts not conspiracy theory’s but conspiracy facts!
RESOURCE LIST AND REFERENCES
1976 UN Weather Weapons Treaty
Canada: Weather Modification Information Act (1985): http://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/PDF/W-5.pdfsued:
European Parliament (Motion B4-0551/95)
http://www.envirosecurity.org/ges/TheorinReport14Jan1999.pdf or
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do…
1999-0005+0+DOC+PDF+V0%2F%2FENpr 2009 Report 10/09 RS1636
The Royal Society (London), Geoengineering the Climate: Science, Governance and
Uncertainty (2009) [Founded in 1660, the Royal Society is an independent scientific academy]
http://royalsociety.org/…/publ…/2009/geoengineering-climate/
UK House of Commons Science and Technology Committee report, Regulation of Geoengineering, 2010
http://www.parliament.uk/…/comm…/science-technology/s-t-pn26
100318/
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/…/cmsctech/221/221.pdf
Summary of conventions on weather modification, Scientific American, Oct. 2012:
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm…
U.S. military’s secret experiment sprayed toxic chemicals on low-income housing
http://www.informationliberation.com/?id=41600,
University of Missouri Dissertation, DAI/A 73-10, Jul 2012,http://gradworks.umi.com/35/15/3515886.html
UK: Guardian newspaper report April 2002 (http://politics.guardian.co.uk/…/story/0,9174,688098,00.html
List of Geoengineering Patents:http://geoengineeringwatch.nature4less.com/?page_id=26
Water, Air & soil testing list of results (8 countries where tests have been taken):
http://geoengineeringwatch.nature4less.com/…
UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) 2010 & Oct. 2012, a de facto moratorium on geoengineering
experiments (Action Group on Erosion, Technology and Concentration),
http://www.etcgroup.org/…/pdf_…/ETCNRCBDmoratorium101029.pdf
http://www.etcgroup.org/issues/climate-geoengineering
Belfort Group (Belgium), report Case Orange: Contrail Science, Impact on Climate and Weather
Manipulation (written by aviation engineers and pilots), analysis of highlights of the report:
http://www.globalresearch.ca/atmospheric-geoengineeri…/20369
Carnicom Institute (USA):http://www.carnicominstitute.org/html/geoengineering.html
“What in the World are they Spraying” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=te_FOsKL_5Q
http://www.coalitionagainstgeoengineering.org/j…/take-action
May 2007 Informal Report on Chemtrails (UK)
http://www.checktheevidence.com/…/Dept%20of%20Environment%2…
http://www.tdlr.state.tx.us/weather/weathermod.htm (the website Texas Department of Licensing and
Regulation, “Currently, cloud-seeding projects designed to increase rainfall from convective cloud towers
are conducted in nearly 31 million acres of Texas (or almost one-fifth of the state’s land area).

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Inc., located in Washington, DC, or Denver, CO?

Recently John McGuire and I went to the monthly liberty-oriented Movie Nite that the Hope For Rochester Ministry organizes, and as is tradition I streamed the presentation Which You Are You? (a.k.a. Who Are You?, a.k.a. What the Frequently Unanswered Questions?) onto our YouTube Channel, which you can find together with Bernie Wheater‘s presentation that followed in which he showed a short PowerPointed lesson on how the “UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Inc.” corporate fake shadow-government hides inside our original and legitimate Government and has been used incrementally to strip you of all your rights (I exaggerate not) by making you legally someone other than who you think you are (if common law were in force), namely making you a corporate slave. So John, healthy skeptic that he is, started doing his own research (as Bernie had encouraged us all to do) and found out some really interesting data that we thought you should all probably know about. I have know for years about the Sovereign Citizen Movement (that John is just starting to find out about) and the Shadow Corporate De Facto Government. De facto is Latin for in fact, and in political terms it indicates a government that may have seized power unlawfully. They may not be constitutionally appointed, but are in fact. De jure is the opposite. A de facto government is supported by the people of the state and not by a constitution. A de jure governing body, on the other hand, is supported by a constitution currently in force. Or a de jure government is officially recognized by the constitution and other (neighboring) states, and sometimes even supranational and inter-governmental institutions. De facto governments are not recognized. De facto governments are caused, for example, by a revolution within (i.e. incited by the people of the state). This is what John wrote:

“I can’t believe no one is talking about this. UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Inc., is in Evergreen, CO, a mere half-hour drive from the Denver Mint, the single largest producer of coins in the world! Does it get any shadier than this?”

Published on Jun 27, 2012

EXECUTIVE ORDER, NATIONAL DEFENSE RESOURCES PREPAREDNESS in Words http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-o… Obama Executive Order Seizes U.S. Infrastructure & Citizens for Military Preparedness & Slavery Details Explained Video! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=myPEND… The Defense Production Act of 1950. The Federal Restricted Buildings and Grounds Improvement Act that effortlessly passed the House and the Senate is a law that most Americans don’t know about but could put them behind bars for up to 10 years. The law states it is a prosecutable offense to without lawful authority enter a building or grounds of a special event of national significance or enter a building or grounds where the President or other person protected by the Secret Service is or will be temporarily visiting. Your Employers “Gov’t Servants “can kill you legally for no reason “or if you know the TRUTH”. If you don’t fire them your DEAD ! Legalizing Holocaust. Under National Defense Authorization Act S 1867 U.S. military can (1) arrest U.S. Citizens without any charges (or evidence) (2) Can do it secretly (Just disappear you) (3) Can hold you indefinitely (4) With No Right to a Trial. (5) Can torture. (6) Can assassinate U.S. Citizens. Stop them NOW or DIE ! Your All Terrorists(TRUTHERS), going to take Gov’t Word No DUE Process ! National Defense Authorization Act S 1867 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National… S 1867 NDAA End of Human Rights Petition http://www.change.org/petitions/stop-…… FAIR USE NOTICE: This video may contain copyrighted material. Such material is made available for educational purposes only. Martial Law Bill Passes Congress Allows Military to Arrest, Permanently Detain, Torture, Kill American Citizens without Trial. The National Defense Authorization Act. America is a War Zone. Romney Ron Paul http://www.campaignforliberty.org/ .Know who runs the World the Federal Reserve system was fraudulently created & it’s Counterfeiting Notes “the Dollar” is illegal & Unconstitutional. Become a Freeman on the Land & know the Deceptions of the Law. Statues & Acts are not law & need your consent (like stating your name or showing ID) Don’t enter the Law Society. lawyer society unalienable rights commerce maritime admiralty common ucc uniform commercial code contract consent civil corruption central bank karma reincarnation enlightenment united states passport legal fiction register court judge property imf wto foreclosure social security Medicaid Medicare debt consent blacks law society sovereignty Osama bin laden death Al Qaeda terrorist haarp chemtrails fema coast to coast am gas oil price middle east 2012 conspiracy terror food crisis gold silver revolution inflation Ron Paul Obama zeitgeist disaster riots protests jobs alex jones prison planet info wars nature corporation wikileaks climate change police state meditation constitutional Jesus Christ ufo’s aliens tea party rand paul Jesse Ventura David Icke max Kaiser Mayan spirituality free Tibet china tyranny terrorism consciousness world war 3 Buddhism Tao Zen god truth justice knowledge wise slavery history freedom fluoride peace love history terrorism occupation information deception paradigm matrix law America recession inflation economy stock market bush depression nwo space mac mind control Hinduism meditation Egypt Libya Jews Israel Mayan new York 911 lies conspiracy theory sovereign state imf wto world bank apply federal reserve slavery Islamic Yemen Pakistan Afghanistan Syria Saudi Arabia Persians Sunni Shiite Islam Iran Iraq Israel 9/11 maritime admiralty law Monsanto seeds farms fda fbi cia homeland security sovereignty graham Hancock Peter Shiff sovereignty earthquake tsunami nuclear japan radiation precession of the equinox prophecy revelation apocalypse rapture bible Christian Pakistan Fukushima default debt stock market crash Peter Schiff max Kaiser rt Oath Keepers tsar ion Occupy Wall Street End the Fed Alan Watts truth movement we are the 99% we are change anonymous marine soldier occupy marines a new alliance Tear Gas OWS Zuccotti park TSA

Ever Wonder why having that Birth Certificate was so important? Why a Certified Certificate of Live Birth from the Hospital wasn’t sufficient enough? I didn’t have a Birth Certificate until I was 12 years old, when suddenly it was required to play Bobbysocks, even after already joining the previous year. Some time in the 1980’s, it was required that you have a Social Security Number for your children in order to claim them on your taxes. Of course, a Birth Certificate is required to obtain an SSN. This video is posted for educational purposes only. No copyright infringement intended.

USC “law” is fictional law. It is 100% color of law no matter how the “government” put it. ALL, and I mean ALL of our judges and representative are not qualified by the constitution to even be in office remember that these people CHOOSE to take an OATH to those “laws” by their own recognition (see 18 USC 1918, 18 USC 241, 18 USC 242, 5 USC 7311, 18 USC 1621 and 5 USC 3333.)
<a>Gnarly Carly</a>
On March 28th, 1861 Congress adjourned sine die and never has reconvened de jure…

What you think is the Government of the United States of America is, in fact, THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA INC., and the Congress and Senate are STOCKHOLDERS or CORPORATE OFFICERS. The real United States of America Government died (sine die) and never returned.

The original 13th Amendment prohibits “Esquires” (Attorneys) from holding positions of public office. Read the only one I could find,inside Texas, and look at the date!!!!! ..1819 not recognized by the CORPORATE (defacto) UNITED STATES.

U.S. Citizens were declared enemies of the U.S. CORPORATION by F.D.R. by Executive Order No. 2040 and ratified by Congress on March 9th, 1933, 48 Stat. 1, resulting in use of the Rules of Land Warfare being part and party to their Constitution. ‘FOR THEIR PROTECTION’

F.D.R. changed the meaning of The Trading with the Enemy Act of December 6th, 1917 by changing the word “without” to CITIZENS “within” the United States. The multi-nation Bankruptcy and Great Depression changed our world. The Bankers and Attornies of England took over completely. Thank you F.D.R. …you are hereby assigned 2nd in line to the burn pile…ain’t enough duck tape for that guy!!

Today, almost all mothers unknowingly inform on their own babies. Take a look at the so-called “Birth Certificate” CERTIFICATE OF LIVE BIRTH where the mother signs and you’ll see the title of the box stating in small print: “MOTHER OR OTHER INFORMANT.”

The word “OTHER” makes the mother an “informant.” By signing the “Birth Certificate” as an informer, she contracts with the government putting her child and her child’s future labor AND SERVICE IN THE ARMED FORCES as collateral for the national debt (servitude-slavery.)

Alternative Currency System Secret Of Who Created Bitcoin Is Of Great Concern Truthers Want To Know Is Bitcoin A NWO Operation?

The bitcoin logo
The bitcoin logo (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 

Alternative Currencies is something I have been interested in for awhile now that I have been enlightened about the Federal Reserve system and the IMF or International Monetary Fund run by private corporations who want to run the world and control the New World Order.  I’m working on putting together a page or categories for the best source for Alternative currency‘s or systems of Trade and Barter.  AntiNWOParty is also trying to through our hat in the ring at some point.  We are trying to create our own currency and Trade system for our community.  The Question I and I’m sure many other Truthers want to know is Bitcoin a NWO operation?   Bitcoin is an experimental new digital currency that enables instant payments to anyone, anywhere in the world. Bitcoin uses peer-to-peer technology to operate with no central authority: managing transactions and issuing money are carried out collectively by the network. Bitcoin is also the name of the open source software which enables the use of this currency. The software is a community-driven open source project, released under the MIT license.  Satoshi Nakamoto is the pseudonymous person or group of people who designed and created the original Bitcoin software, currently known as Bitcoin-Qt.  His involvement in the original Bitcoin software does not appear to extend past mid-2010.
A global currency the exact thing the New World Orders  “end game”.  Despite what we see here about Mr. Nakamoto’s views on central banking (https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Satoshi_Nakamoto), what if he (it?) is really using bitcoin as a test bed for a global currency? With global concerns of hyper-inflation and currency wars, it makes sense to me for something like bitcoin to become successful. What if talk of the “Sheeple” getting “chipped” just means their Bitcoin private addresses will be implanted so they can’t be stolen?

 

Max keiser says in an interview that there will only be 21 million bitcoins ever made and says nothing at all about them being divisible, it comes off as him trying to mislead people who know nothing about bitcoins to think these will be a rare item adding to the peoples desire to join in ? How can you have a Hard limit of about 21 million Bitcoins and have a global currency with     world population total number of living humans on Earth. As of today, it is estimated to number 7.073 billion by the United States Census Bureau (USCB).[1] The USCB estimates that the world population exceeded 7 billion on March 12, 2012.[2] According to a separate estimate by the United Nations Population Fund, it reached this milestone on October 31, 2011.[3][4][5] 

 

Peter Van Laer

 

One Bitcoin is divisible down to eight decimal places. There are really 2,099,999,997,690,000 (just over 2 quadrillion) maximum possible atomic units in the bitcoin design.

The value of “1 BTC” represents 100,000,000 of these. In other words, each is divisible by up to 10^8.

As the value of the unit of 1 BTC grows too large to be useful for day to day transactions, people can start dealing in smaller units, such as milli-bitcoins (mBTC) or micro-bitcoins (μBTC).

 

 

This section copied from socialcompare.com

 

Alternative currency is a term that refers to any currency used as an alternative to the dominant national or multinational currency systems (usually referred to as national or fiat money). Alternative currencies can be created by an individual, corporation, or organization, they can be created by national, state, or local governments, or they can arise naturally as people begin to use a certain commodity as a currency.

 

Mutual credit is a form of alternative currency, and thus any form of lending that does not go through the banking system can be considered a form of alternative currency. When used in combination with or when designed to work in combination with national or multinational fiat currencies they can be referred to as complementary currency. Most complementary currencies are also local currencies and are limited to a certain region.

 

Barters are another type of alternative currency. These are actually exchange systems, which only trade items; thus without the use of any currency whatsoever. Finally, LETS is a special form of barter which trades points for items. One point stands for one man-hour of work.

 

Often there are issues related to paying tax. Some alternative currencies are considered tax-exempt, but most of them are fully taxed as if they were national currency, with the caveat that the tax must be paid in the national currency. The legality and tax-status of alternative currencies varies widely from country to country; some systems in use in some countries would be illegal in others.

 

List of alternative currencies

 

 

The Rise and Fall of Bitcoin

 

 

 

At least three Ancient Antarctica Pyramids Underground City’s Found

Please visit our sister site: http://antinewworldorderparty.blogspot.com/2012/09/antarctica-triangle-ancient-pyramids.html

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A team of researchers are claiming that they have discovered three ancient pyramids on the ice covered continent of Antarctica. Exact details are sketchy, but the team have released three intriguing pictures of their discovery.

The international team comprises researchers from the United States, and several other, are from various European countries. Two of the huge pyramid structures were found approximately 10 miles inland, the third one not far from the coastline, clearly visible from ocean.

Can it be possible that Antarctica was once warm enough in the recent past to actually have had an ancient civilization living there?  And even more perplexing is the question of if an advanced culture did develop there, are there any structures still remaining that are buried underneath the ice?  Amazingly a team of researchers is making the claim that they have found evidence of several ancient pyramids on the ice covered continent of Antarctica.

The team are currently planning an expedition to reach one of the pyramids to find out if it is a natural or an artificial structure. No further Details have been reported from the team as of 29 August 2012. More news is pending. Im undecided on this one guys until further confirmation, so as always you decide.

Underground Pyramid base entrance, maybe.  One thing I can tell you is that what you are seeing is the Antarctic Triangle.  Put in to hide whats really there.  Underground City‘s they dont want you to know about or to find.  I have done some research and what I have found is other groups have tried to go to the Antarctic to find its secrets and have not returned or if they have will not talk about what they have found!

Have the Russian team inadvertently stumbled across something not meant to be seen, somethingburied many years ago by Aliens or earthly forces? Hopefully they will reveal all when they eventuallymanage to make contact… but in the world of conspiracy and secrets people have a habit of turningup dead.

A Russian team trying to reach the alien structure discovered by a roving satellite miles below the Antarctica  ice only have a limited period each year when work in the region is possible.
They last contacted their base on January 30th this year and they are now down to less than 48 hoursbefore temperatures fall to the lethal level and escape would be impossible!
The scientists carry Iridium satellite phones for communication, but there are black spots.
At the moment, nobody knows what has happened to them!
Read on for the full story.

In 1947 the US Navy under Admiral Byrd conducted Operation High Jump. The expedition to Antarctica involved 4000 naval personnel and 13 huge ships, including several large airplanes and helicopters. The goal was to map and catalog all of the coastline of the continent, including minerals and wildlife. The entire expedition was to last 6 months.

During the expedition a base was established at Little America, a coastal bay, and a tent city was constructed where aircraft could be maintained for the survey. Several teams of explorers were sent out to various corners of Antarctica with large format cameras for the photographic survey. When the crew photographing the region directly Southwest of the Australian continent arrived for their mission they were shocked. They radioed back that the coastal region was free of ice and that the water was 38F. They continued to take photographs and later returned to process the images.

Immediately after this event the entire expedition was halted and all ships and Naval personnel were made to return to the States. The results of the mission are still classified, after 60 years. Only Admiral Byrd, who was interviewed by a Chilean journalist on his trip home from the expedition, commented on the sudden return home. He stated that there was a danger which this expedition had encountered that posed a threat to every nation in the free world. He declined to elaborate on this.

http://rense.com/general32/aryan.htm   

For five years, the Germans carried out work for the creation of a secret project code-named “Base-211,” This has been determined by several independent experts. By the end of WWII, the Germans already had nine scientific enterprises where “flying disk” projects were tested. Many scientists are positive that at least one of these Third Reich enterprises was transferred to the Antarctic. Famous researchers of the Third Reich’s Antarctic mysteries, R. Vesko, V. Terziysky, and D. Childress, claim that from 1942, thousands of concentration camp prisoners, prominent scientists, pilots, politicians with their families, and members of the Hitlerjugend were taken to the South Pole via submarine. Some scientists believe that a German base still remains in the Antarctic. Moreover, it is even said that there is an underground Aryan city called New Berlin, which has a population of two million people.

http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/antarctica/antartica12.htm

Representatives of three occult societies, “Thule”, “Vril” and “Ahnenerbe”, ran those projects.
Famous researchers of the Third Reich’s Antarctic mysteriesR.VeskoV.Terzisky, and D.Childress, claim that from 1942, thousands of concentration camp prisoners, prominent scientists, pilots, politicians with their families, and members of the Hitlerjugend were taken to the South Pole via submarine. Some scientists believe that a German base still remains in the Antarctic. Moreover, it is even said that there is an underground Aryan city called New Berlin, which has a population of two million people.

This has been determined by several independent experts. By the end of WWII, the Germans already had nine scientific enterprises where “flying disk” projects were tested. Many scientists are positive that at least one of these Third Reich enterprises was transferred to the Antarctic.

An ancient hi-tech “city” nicknamed “Rainbow City” was reportedly discovered in Antarctica by a small group of American researchers in the late 1940’s.

Reportedly an on-site staff of 2000 was later stationed there to study the ancient mechanical devices, the operation of time-space portals, holographic records, and an ancient underground ‘rail’ system with Rainbow City being the central hub. Antigravity craft are also reportedly being used by the researchers.

~The Hefferlin Manuscript; Rainbow City and the Inner Earth People, by Timothy Green Beckley

Conspiracy theorists recall the rumor, following WWII, of Nazi bases that were established in Antarctica. Other stories say that the Nazis contacted and were working with a group of extra-terrestrials and that there is an huge underground base there.

We’re not sure whether or not this is a base, but it does look un-natural and somehow maintained free of ice. We welcome any suggestions or comments.

Besides these images, the team is remaining pretty silent with their discovery until more research can be conducted on these pyramids.  I was able to obtain some small bits of information from a friend of one of the team members though.  The team is made up of 8 explorers from America and several European countries.  Two of the pyramid structures were found approximately 10 miles inland while the third one was very close to the coastline.  The team is currently planning an expedition to physically reach at least one of the pyramids to determine if it is natural or artificial.  No time frame was given as to when this expedition will be taking place though.

So, what is your opinion on these pyramids?  Are we on the verge of perhaps one of biggest archaeological discoveries ever or are these structures nothing but natural formations?  Be sure to stay tuned to this one ……

Read more: http://scienceray.com/biology/man-made-ancient-pyramids-found-on-antarctica/#ixzz26bi9AdbA

http://www.viewzone.com/antarcticbase.html

With google-earth we now have the ability to see the coast line of Antarctica in great detail from satellite images. We see the coast that was photographed, as well as some mountains that are free of ice or snow. We can see the ice breaking up in this region as if melting from some source of heat. But what’s more remarkable is that we can see some kind of an entrance.

The image above is readily available to anyone using google-earth and the coordinates provided. I suggest you try to examine this location at an angle instead of just straight down, and maintain the true North. The entrance appears to be about 180 feet wide by 230 feet high. Outside there are some straight surfaces which appear man made.

Why Do We Need Local Money?

Why Do We Need Local Money?.

From ROB HOPKINS
Transition Network UK

[Foreword to the book ‘Local Money‘]

The power of holding your community’s own money.

September 2009, Lambeth Town Hall, Brixton. On a beautiful evening with just the first hint of autumn in the air, hundreds of people are packed into the large room for the launch of the Brixton Pound. In the days running up to the launch, the media was full of stories about the currency; it even made the front page of the BBC website on the day. Alongside explanations of how it is intended to work and interviews with advocates were mainstream economists who, somewhat patronisingly, assured readers that this could never really work and that it was all tremendously naive and foolish. Clearly that was a sentiment that those gathered in the hall, and the 70 traders already keen to accept the notes, had chosen to overlook – or, more likely, would fervently disagree with. This event was both a celebration of the new currency and, perhaps most importantly, of Brixton itself.

Derrick Anderson, the Chief Executive of the local council, which had partly funded the initiative, told the audience that he would be using Brixton Pounds, that he hoped they would become ‘the currency of choice for Brixton’, and that he was delighted that this was a good news story about the area. When I spoke to him later, I explored with him how deep the commitment of the council to this new currency would actually run. Would it accept the currency in payment of Council Tax? Would it accept rent from stallholders in Brixton Pounds? The answer to both questions was yes: a national first.

At the end of the evening, the notes themselves were unveiled to rapturous applause. Each note featured a prominent Brixtonian, chosen via a community-wide ‘Vote the Note’ poll. They showed Vincent Van Gogh on the £20 note; C. L. R. James, a local historian, political theorist and cricket writer on the £10 note; Gaia theorist James Lovelock on the £5 noteand Olive Morris, Brixton Black Women’s Group founder, on the £1. Morris had died at the age of 27, and some members of her family were present to see this extraordinary memorial to her life and work.

At the end of the evening, people brought the first notes into circulation, and the Brixton Pound was now a reality, ready to take its place in the tills of Brixton. But is this legal? Will it work? And, perhaps most importantly, why would anyone bother?

The emergence of Transition currencies

In 2006, I attended a talk by economist Bernard Lietaer at Schumacher College. He said two things that stuck with me: firstly, that localisation was impossible without having a local currency; secondly, that that local currency had to be designed in such a way that businesses would use it. I was familiar with models such as time banks and Local Exchange Trading Schemes (I had been a member of a few different LETS schemes), but I left Lietaer’s talk thinking that something else was needed. A few days later, I visited a local film company whose offices used to be the Totnes Bank. Lovingly framed and hanging on the wall was an 1810 Totnes banknote – a beautiful handwritten document, which had been legal tender in the town. What would happen, I wondered, if we printed some new ones? If we got a few shops to agree to take them and just ran it for three months and saw where they went? Would we be allowed, or would we suffer dawn raids from the Bank of England and be stuffed into a small and rather unpleasant room in the Tower of Londonreserved exclusively for those who print their own money? The answer to all those questions was a big ‘no idea’, but in the Transition movement that is rarely a reason for inaction. From the moment when 150 people first sat in St John’s Church waving their freshly minted Totnes Pounds, the first for almost 200 years, the idea of communities printing their own money has, as Peter North so lucidly narrates in this book, grown rapidly.

First came Lewes in Sussex, then Stroud, then Brixton, and now several other places have their own schemes on the drawing board. Each currency learns from the previous ones in a wonderful iterative way, and each currency is fiercely of its place. They are all bold, thought-provoking and charming, and they all embody an important principle of not waiting for permission to initiate the process of relocalisation. They couldn’t have come at a more timely moment.

Why do we need local money?

In spite of the Queen’s musing aloud in early 2009 as to why no one had seen the economic meltdown coming, many people had been only too aware that economics, as currently practised, is designed to draw money upwards, does nothing to stop the poor getting poorer and everything to help the rich get richer, and has no loyalty to communities or individuals. A common national unit of exchange – sterling – is, of course, extremely useful, as it enables national trade. Yet its weaknesses are such that it needs a complementary currency running alongside it. Some transactions can be in one; some in another.

The very thing that sterling is designed to do, i.e. enable and stimulate trading between people and businesses, it often fails to do – especially in times of economic contraction. Money often feels like something ‘done to’ communities. The large corporate chains that now dominate the nation’s high streets are like mining operations, extracting the potential wealth of communities and siphoning it away to shareholders and executive bonuses. It is a vicious cycle: people buy from chain stores, less money goes to local businesses, less money circulates locally, local businesses struggle, and we end up with identical high streets up and down the land – what the new economics foundation calls ‘Clone Town Britain’. A local currency is an intervention that can, it is hoped, start to reverse that trend, building trade for local businesses, creating a mindfulness that means people start to choose local shops over chains, and encouraging them to get out and discover the independent traders in their community.

Money and resilience

Central to Transition is the concept of resilience. This is the concept, originally from ecology, that systems – whether businesses, settlements or entire nations – tend to be more or less able to withstand shocks from the outside. Although just-in-time distribution systems allow us to have access to a dazzling array of foodstuffs and other goods (much of which our great-grandparents wouldn’t have even been able to name), we are left with an economy with little inbuilt resilience. The whole system is highly oil-vulnerable. Price volatility, or worse still, actual shortages, are things we are hugely unprepared for and could be devastating.

In the middle of the nineteenth century, when there was no welfare state and some business owners still paid their employees in a far less ethical form of local currency, one that could be spent only in their own stores, the question of ‘plugging the leaks’ in local economies was not hypothetical: it was, for many communities, a matter of survival. The Cooperative movement emerged, inviting people to invest inwards into their communities; to invest in local jobs and local businesses. It was hugely successful, and its legacy is still with us today. As the scale of the UK’s debt, incurred through years of living beyond our means and the 2008 bailing out of the banks, becomes clear, and the scale of the cuts in public spending that they will necessitate also emerges into reality, we find ourselves needing models and approaches to do the same thing again. Communities will find themselves needing each other again, after years of being able to get by without knowing your neighbours and the very idea of community being pilloried.

Where all this might lead

So where might all this end up, if local currency becomes a key element of our daily lives? One could imagine a situation where several of the approaches Peter outlines here sit alongside our ongoing relationship with sterling. A significant proportion of our weekly shop would be done with local businesses, which, in turn, would encourage them to seek out local suppliers, leading to an explosion of local market gardening and other local manufacturing.

Alongside the printed currencies, we may also make use of time banks, and we may be members of a local credit union. For loans, we may talk to the credit union, or we might visit a website such as zopa.com and borrow direct from other people, with no bank in the middle. Any surplus money that we want to invest, we are now able to invest in local shares or bond issues, which raise the capital for our locally owned energy company to begin installing renewables, or for local food-growing initiatives to secure access to land. There may well be all kinds of evolutions that we can only speculate on at this stage, such as local electronic cards or even the idea of currencies that are stored on our mobile phones. Perhaps there will be regional currencies, as can already be found in Austria, Germany and Switzerland. What is key is that as humanity begins its inevitable shift away from energy-intensive, globalised, corporate economics to a more human-scale, localised version, the way we ‘do’ money will need to catch up. This book identifies a number of possible tools, and doubtless there are many more yet to be thought of.

The Cheerful Disclaimer

What Peter has done here is write a book that is a clear and deeply researched practical guide for you to get started, laying out of some of the tools that increased economic localisation will need. He brings to this project many years of insight and observation of local currencies around the world, and I hope that you will find the result both fascinating and thrilling. It is important at this stage to bring in what we call ‘The Cheerful Disclaimer’. If you are reading this book thinking that local currencies, the Transition idea, projects like the Brixton Pound, are all tried-and-tested things that we can guarantee will definitely work, think again. Transition is an iterative process, a collaborative process of learning as we go along, of sharing successes and failures, of people being bold and trying things out, and learning from what has gone before.

At this time in history when things are changing so fast, this kind of innovative thinking and creativity is something that can really come only from communities, who are able to innovate and experiment in highly imaginative ways. Although this book does not come with a guarantee of success, it does come with the firm belief that what we need to do, what has the most chance of enabling a successful Transition, is to harness engaged optimism. What does engaged optimism look like? The currencies discussed in this book are all just one approach; perhaps just initial experiments from which other, better-refined, approaches will emerge. What they do, though, is give a physical form to that sense of engaged optimism: a tangible statement of a community’s intent.

Moving forward

The Transition movement has developed a power and a speed to its vital momentum around the world. As I write, there are well over 200 formal initiatives and thousands more at earlier stages. Will they all produce their own currencies, and indeed do they need to? Probably not. What they will no doubt do, though, is continue to innovate, and it is that spirit of innovation that we hope this book captures. Having attended the launches of the Totnes, Lewes and Brixton Pounds (I was unable to make the Stroud one), I was struck by the fact that they were all characterised by being incredibly energetic and dynamic occasions. You get a sense at these events of a latent power that governments can’t tap, but which rather can be ‘unleashed’ only by those communities themselves.

This book was preceded by Local Food, which set out an array of things that Transition Initiatives can do to start building resilience around food, seeing this as an opportunity to rethink many basic assumptions in a very creative way. It sought to give Transition food groups the best possible start and save them reinventing too many wheels. This book does much the same, capturing from across the Transition network, as well as from the many projects that preceded and which run in parallel to it, best practice as it is currently understood in relation to alternative currencies.

You don’t need to wait for anyone’s permission to initiate local money. Its potential as a tool for relocalisation is something we are only just starting to grasp. One of the key things for a successful local currency scheme is trust. People use sterling because they know it and they trust it. Without trust, money is meaningless. However, the process of building trust in the currency is also one of building trust in local traders, and of local people learning to trust one another again.

Ultimately, the best thing about these schemes is simply that they are more fun; they feel better. Shopping with 40 Brixton, Totnes, Lewes or Stroud Pounds, you still return home with £40 worth of shopping, but what you leave behind you is a far more virtuous cycle of money cycling around locally, supporting local businesses, local traders and so on. Local currencies are, in effect, ‘mindful money’. Our daily actions can make a huge difference, and local currencies can become a very powerful, and far-reaching, fact of everyday life. This book celebrates those who have taken the first steps to create them.

Don’t Trash the American Flag! How to Retire a U.S. Flag

On Location in Rochester NY, today I found a American Flag in the trash on my way home tonight and I saved it from disgrace and took it home for a proper retirement ceremony. As I was getting out of the car with Cathy and the baby to go inside for the night, a old lady said “that she had followed me home to ask what I was doing with the flag that she saw me take out of the trash?” Eve I said to Eve the above statement! Eve asked if I wanted two more Flags that she had rescued from the trash a few weeks earlier. She said that I was sent from God and that she was meant to meetup with me this day! She gave me the flags thanked me and said her name was Eve and that her father died in World War 2 her brother fought in Vietnam and that her sister was a nurse in the US Army.  She said she was proud to see me do this.  I felt her pain and saw it in her face I could see she felt like crying for her loss of her father and brother
This is what I could do to honer our Country and those who fought and died for us today! For the Grandfather I never met who came home so messed up with PTSD and never was the same man he did that for you and I. Now I’m thinking about doing a Proper Flag retirement ceremony on the 4th of July this summer! How strange is life! God is good!
 Retire a U.S. Flag
National Flag Foundation recommends the following as the proper ceremonies for retiring and destroying a worn Flag.
    • This ceremony should be conducted at a private, non-public location.
    • Only one Flag, representing all those to be destroyed, should be used in the ceremony.
    • Two color guards should be used at evening retreat, one for the Flag currently in use and a special color guard for the Flag to be permanently retired.
    • Just before sunset, the Flag that has been flying all day is retired in the normal, ceremonial procedure for the group or site.
    • The color guard responsible for the Flag receiving the final tribute moves front and center. The leader should present this color guard with the Flag that has been selected for its final tribute and subsequent destruction. The leader then should instruct the color guard to “hoist the colors”.
    • When the Flag has been secured at the top of the pole, the leader comments: “This Flag has served its nation long and well. It has worn to a condition to which it should no longer be used to represent the nation. This Flag represents all of the Flags collected and being retired from service today. We honor them all as we salute one Flag.”
    • The leader then calls the group to attention, orders a salute, leads the entire group in the “Pledge of Allegiance” and orders the Flag retired by the color guard.
    • Slowly and ceremoniously, the flag is lowered, then respectfully folded in the customary triangle. The Flag is delivered to the leader and then the group is dismissed.
    • This concludes the Ceremony of Final Tribute.
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    Ceremonial Burning of the Flag

    • This ceremony should be conducted at a private, non-public location.
    • The burning of a Flag should take place at a campfire in a ceremony separate from the Ceremony of Final Tribute. The fire must be sizable (preferably having burnt down to a bed of red hot coals to avoid having bits of the Flag being carried off by a roaring fire), yet be of sufficient intensity to ensure complete burning.
    • Before the ceremony begins, the color guard assigned to the Flag opens up its tri-corner fold and then refolds it in a coffin-shaped rectangle.
    • All assemble around the fire. The leader calls the group to attention.
    • The color guard comes forward and places the Flag on the fire.
    • All briskly salute.
    • After the salute, but while still at attention, the leader should conduct a respectful educational program as the Flag burns: e.g. singing of “God Bless America”; offering an inspiring message of the Flag’s meaning followed by the “Pledge of Allegiance”; performing a reading about the Flag; reciting the “American’s Creed”; etc.
    • When the Flag is consumed, those assembled, with the exception of a leader and the color guard, should be dismissed. They should be led out in single file and in silence.
    • The leader and color guard should remain to ensure that the Flag is completely consumed, and to burn additional Flags, if any.
    • The fire should then be safely extinguished.

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