Another Hit For ESG: Florida Removes Billions From Blackrock
Authoritarians struggle to get in control of as much as possible (schools, media, political parties, entertainment, etc.). They must believe that if they control it all, that their ideology will "win." But it's just not true. Freedom is the opposite. Freedom just needs a few small (often imperceptible) openings, and it prevails. ESG is an attempt to control the economy with an authoritarian political ideology. Freedom is already starting to burst right through it.
Hello everybody and thank you for tuning in to the Liberty Report.
With us today is Chris Rossini, our co-host.
Chris, welcome to the program.
Dr. Paul, it's great to be with you.
Very good.
You know, this morning when I got up and started looking at some financial news, there was a bit of excitement today.
I just want to mention that.
And that has to do with the reports.
The reports, you know, in a way aren't that astounding, but because they were slightly different than everybody was anticipating, it was a big deal.
And the market was down like 400, 500 points, which since then has gone back up.
I keep thinking about when those chairmen of the Federal Reserve Board would tell me, yeah, you may be right about that.
But as long as these changes are orderly, I got to thinking this morning they weren't so orderly.
They were disorderly.
And of course, the disorder is what we've been warning people about over the years.
This is going to get much worse because now the bills have come due.
That's what we're talking about in finances.
And then they have this silly notion that, yes, there's inflation.
The treatment for inflation is mess up the economy.
Maybe the economy don't work.
So then it'll drive prices down.
So they look at prices and manipulation of prices as the whole thing.
And of course, when things are in the boom part, it's the prices of the stocks, you know, push the stocks up.
Eventually that gets exhausted and the prices of stocks don't go up quite the way they want them to, like this morning.
But there's a lot of manipulation and misunderstanding.
You know, this is one of the reasons we do partner with Birch Gold, because there's a lot of information.
Of course, I've been watching gold probably almost every day since Bretton Woods broke down because I saw that as a big event.
And I think more people are watching gold than ever before.
You know, it's up around 1,800.
But it too is vulnerable to news, both in the fact that what they're doing is important, but also trying to interpret what the average investor is going to do.
Because I don't think they all believe in exactly what they're doing.
They're saying, oh, most of the people now are going to sell, so I better do that and get in on it.
And it's not an economic calculation.
But I think the more information all of us have, the better.
And that's why, if you look at the bottom of the screen there, there is a number that you can text, and that will tie you into the Birch Gold.
And they can mail you some information.
And there's no cost to this.
It's just to introduce you to a little bit more about the activities of gold and other investment.
So if you text that number, you can ask for that package.
In the meantime, we're going to keep plugging away here and trying to understand exactly what's going on.
And there's a lot of people trying hard because nobody has a monopoly over wisdom, especially when predicting the future.
You have to put up with a bunch of economic interventionists and authoritarians and people who hate gold, people who hate liberty, people who will do almost anything to manipulate political power.
So there's a lot of difficulties there.
And we want to talk, Chris, a little bit about that because there is a lot of manipulation going on.
And we keep thinking, oh, what are they going to do?
But here, you know, we've praised DeSantis.
We're not excited about his foreign policy, but we praised him on his economic policy and how he handled COVID and all.
So he's taken a stand, and we like that.
And it isn't a solution, but it's a step in the right direction.
And we want to talk about that a little bit.
Yes, Dr. Paul, he pulled out $2 billion from BlackRock, which is one of the big culprits in this ESG scam, which is environmental, social, and governance.
And all that is, is it politicizes corporations.
It's the exact opposite of the market process, where your corporations are there to satisfy consumer wants, try to do it as profitably and as efficiently as possible.
And that's how the market works.
And the more successful you are at that, you're rewarded with profits.
And if you're not, if you're inefficient or making things that people are not willing to pay for, then you're punished with losses.
Well, this ESG has, you know, the consumer is basically out of the picture.
Things will be produced based on what these big financial institutions and so-called experts want.
They will provide you with what you want.
So let's say consumers, obviously, myself included, love steak.
Well, you'll hear from corporations, I'm sorry, the experts say this is bad for the environment, and we've got to watch our ESG score.
So here's some bugs for you to eat.
And we see, we're already starting to see this kind of talk.
They're trying to push bugs on us.
It's insanity.
That's not the market.
This is politics, which is taking over the market, which is the exact opposite of what we need.
We need to get politics out of the marketplace so that corporations, businesses can actually provide us with the things that we want without being woke and all the other garbage that they've been pushing on us these last few years.
But that's what this ESG is.
And DeSantis, among other states, are starting to stand up against it.
Yes, and this is very political.
It introducing the whole notion of radical environmentalism that is used to control people, just like radical vaccinations want to get control of the people and deny that science exists and only Fauci can tell us what to do.
So this is, it's not really an investment in the true sense of the word.
And this company is not that old.
It was started in 1988.
And one of the reasons what they wanted to do was protect the assets of the average person.
And I don't think that's exactly what they have.
Well, maybe they did have it in mind.
I don't know, but it didn't work out that way.
They are now in the business of protecting their not only financial assets, and it's huge, but also the political operations.
I mean, the way this thing works, because the BlackRocks and the other investment companies, they get along with the Fed quite well.
But I think Blackstock is the closely related.
And she has people on her staff that are very good buddies with Kamala Harris.
So maybe Kamala Harris knows more about what's going on than she appears to know.
But she's in a place, but at least they get credibility of that.
But BlackRock manages $10 trillion.
That's a bit of change.
And it's reported, and I imagine the statistics are pretty accurate, that they're third in line for the size of anybody holding assets and investment.
And the two in front are the United States and China.
And then it's BlackRock.
I mean, this is huge.
And there's so much coercion that goes in, it's sort of a blackmail type of thing, that if you don't obey and do the rules and total line on the radical environmentalism, you're going to be denied certain benefits.
And like, for instance, BlackRock was in charge of distributing the funds after COVID.
I mean, they're very much tied into that.
Now, Larry Fink, who runs BlackRock, I believe he really believed in this radical environmentalism, but he'll bend when he has to and save some bucks.
But he is one that's probably radical and believes in it.
But everybody that puts money in there and saves the money and supports BlackRock and the other companies like Fidelity and Vanguard, they do it because they're hoping somebody's going to help them preserve their cash and their savings.
But they cannot, Larry Fink is one that I think he really believes in this whole thing of radical environmentalism.
So it's the E for the environment, and then there's the social welfare stuff that he does, and then also governance.
He's involved in everything.
And, you know, I keep thinking, I have a sort of a theory in my head about, you know, when did the coup occur in this country?
There has been a coup because it's not our Constitution that deals with all these events.
Challenging Government's Role00:11:48
Now, others do.
So I would say somebody like a Larry Fink and these investment companies really have taken over the principles that were laid down by our founders.
I find that really tragic.
But we cheer the individuals on, like a DeSantis, who is willing to, you know, challenge these people and point out when they stray away from the principles they're supposed to be upholding.
Chris?
Right, Dr. Paul.
And we have praised Ron DeSantis over the last few years because he has been a star.
And he was the star of the election.
His people voted for him in tremendous numbers and he was re-elected.
And it's because he stood for freedom against unprecedented tyranny that has never occurred before in the world.
And he was one of the few that did the right thing.
But as we mentioned even last week and this week, and he's governor, so he has no foreign policy.
But if he ever becomes president, his foreign policy views, we think, need a lot of work because they're interventionist.
And it clearly goes against what he has done, what has made him a star.
This man understands Florida first.
He took care of the people in his state.
He did not go around trying to remake New York, remake California because they weren't free and they weren't.
He let them go and live in their misery.
And he took care of the people in Florida.
That is how American foreign policy should be.
Ron DeSantis needs to make that connection.
We need to be a shining example, just like you made Florida a shining example.
We're not supposed to go around and try to remake the world that are not like us and constantly fail and go bankrupt doing it.
So if he would take the philosophy that he has done as a governor and applied it to American foreign policy, I mean, you're talking about a major, major force that the American people would finally be able to unite around.
Now, the establishment would not like it.
They want the empire.
And it's yet to be seen.
If he goes for the presidency, foreign policy might be the key area that he really needs to change.
Very good.
You know, the effort that he made this week by taking the money out of BlackRock, I think, is important.
But it brings up the subject of states' rights.
And the founders were, you know, pretty astute in looking at that.
And what they had advised, obviously, we've lost so much of it because the states were sort of close to being an independent country.
But that was dismissed rather early.
And the debate went on with Hamilton and Jefferson about, you know, just what it should be like, and Jefferson defending states' rights.
In a way, this is making use of the Constitution because so far it's still okay if you're in New York and say, I've had it.
I'm getting out of here.
I'm going to Florida.
I'm going to Texas.
You know, that's good.
That still happens.
And, you know, DeSantis isn't the first one to withdraw these funds.
I think Texas did it and maybe some others.
But this could be contagious.
States should be independent-minded.
They shouldn't be roped into doing all these things.
But the problem is, is it's the demagogues that flock to the system because if you say that you don't believe in pure democracy, that you believe in a republic, you can get into big trouble.
But what if you say that you like the principle of states' rights?
You'll be called a racist.
They'll just demagogue it to death rather than say, you know, I believe in liberty and a small government.
And the smaller the better.
Some people believe in independent down to the individual.
We should be worrying about ourselves and taking care of ourselves.
But then local government is best.
But this, what we're witnessing today, though, and the thing that DeSantis was attacking was this whole thing where it gets much more confusing.
Everybody concentrates on the elections, which I don't consider exactly above board.
But there's another system that is sort of very seductive and buried, and that has to do with the control of the finances.
It's always been that way, and the Federal Reserve has been involved, and we complain about them.
But this whole thing about these, the combination, once again, this is corporatism at its worst.
And that is why, you know, these corporations, why they followed through and did what the government told them to do to enforce to restrict the First Amendment.
And they've done that.
But now, in finances, they're getting people to invest in these companies.
And this is compounding the natural thing to one that we should expect is when you have a Federal Reserve manipulating interest rates, you build bubbles and distortions and malinvestment that need corrected.
And my argument has been all along that these malinvestments because of these rigged controls where all this money is channeled in for social order, the bubble gets even bigger.
But the market will deal with it.
And right now we're witnessing today and other days in moving in the direction.
We've had enough of this.
We don't have to listen to them and put our money all in BlackRock.
We'll go on and on.
So I see that as positive.
Excellent, Dr. Paul.
I'll make my closing statement, and that is it doesn't take much for freedom to prevail.
Usually just a few people with enough courage to do it.
It's the opposite of the authoritarian way.
The authoritarian way is to try to control everything, to steamroll everything, take control of the schools, take control of the media, entertainment, political parties, get in control of it all, and then the world will bend their knee to us.
And that is not how it works, eh?
You can do that for a little while.
But freedom is the opposite.
Freedom just needs a tiny, imperceptible hole, and then it prevails, you know, out of nowhere.
Where did that come from?
You know, our country was founded like that.
We're a bunch of nobodies, and we broke away from the biggest empire in the history of the world.
But the people wanted freedom, and nothing would stop them.
So, but it takes going against the green, and we see that today.
We see that with the Musks and the Trumps.
Even if you're a billionaire, if you go against the green, They're coming for you to try to cancel you out.
And most people do not want to go against the green.
They just want to go along.
But a DeSantis didn't go against the Green.
Like Dr. Paul said, he turned his state.
I remember during COVID, people were saying, you know, I flew to Florida, and it's like, you know, you're going across the Berlin Wall.
You're going from tyranny to freedom.
You know, he did it.
And many of us, we know a lot of progressives.
A lot of my friends are progressives.
And you're in the minority.
And it's easy to get discouraged, like, oh, my gosh, I'm surrounded.
But you're the DeSantis if you're in the minority.
And if you do the right things, say the right things, stick to principles, stick to the truth, what you say, the ideas that you say will ultimately prevail.
So it doesn't take much for our ideas to succeed.
It just needs enough people with the courage to make it happen.
Very good, Chris.
And I want to talk a little bit more about the business cycle and what we're facing and why it seems to be a problem getting much worse at the present time.
And I think there's one basic rule in economics that I believe is a proper one.
And that is, if you look at the big economy like you look at an individual economy, a personal economy or a personal business, if you're running your business or your household by running up debt, you keep borrowing and borrowing and money's generous around.
And you can get these loans and you keep building and building and using a lot of credit cards.
Eventually, this excessive living beyond your mean has to be met up with a period of time when you will live beneath your mean.
People can understand that if they're an individual and they just took six credit cards out and they got in over their heads and they weren't paying their bills and they didn't know what to do.
They get into a dilemma.
But we're in the process now and all of society and our country and the rural world for that matter will be forced to live beneath its means no matter how hard they work to perpetuate what we have.
Well, we have a problem.
So the problem is that we have too much inflation because we print up too much money and now we're having problems with prices going up.
Well, the solution is print more money then.
They just need more money and everything will be okay.
Now that's not going to work.
It works for short periods of time.
But this time around, I just don't think it's going to work.
And even these big companies that's controlling the money of the world, market forces are more powerful than the bureaucrats and the money manager.
Eventually, the market will overwhelm.
And that's why artificial interest rates work for a while and they'll boost the market.
But eventually, the whole thing comes down because it's not viable and it's not viable and the thing comes down and then you keep fighting.
But if you keep doing the same thing over and over again.
So I think we're in the midst of this and we have to do something about changing people's attitude and that's what we hope we can participate in with our program is get people to look at what a free market is all about, what sound money is all about, what personal liberty is all about, what it means to be independent-minded when you want small units of government.
Because when that happens, it will move what the government's done.
Just like when the people got fed up with wearing masks when all there was a leak, people started hearing, you know, the masks aren't doing any good in social dissidents.
It doesn't work.
And give it to the shots of kids doesn't work.
All of a sudden, people woke up.
And I would say, in a positive way, of course, I would say that that is the sign that we see.
And even with this, it might seem minor about what the governor of Florida has just done, but it's still very beneficial.
It's moving in the right direction and say he doesn't have to have information from the bureaucrats and the Federal Reserve threatening him and intimidating him.
So you've got to put the money in, or we'll call you an anti-environmentalist.
You hate the environment.
And they get to the point where, you know, they throw around a lot of harsh terms.
So that's why we do need people to stand up and be courageous about defending these positions.
It should be easy because there's so much better chance of getting peace and prosperity by doing this right thing of protecting liberty than what we're doing now.
And the deeper hole we have, we keep digging and digging and thinking that spend more monies, you know, print more money, regulate more, tell the people what to do.
It doesn't work.
So what we're asking people to do is just look at this and participate as so many of you have done for so many years and spread the message of liberty because I am absolutely convinced if we want to have a promotion of peace and prosperity, that's the way to go.
Thanking Listeners Today00:00:03
I want to thank everybody for tuning in today to the Liberty Report.