PRESS RELEASE
Helga Zepp-LaRouche: Urgent Appeal
To American Patriots on Glass-Steagall
May 17, 2010—This is a transcript of a video appeal by Mrs. Helga Zepp-LaRouche to Americans to support the Cantwell-McCain amendment which calls for the reintroduction of the Glass-Steagall legislation. The video was posted yesterday on www.larouchepac.com. Zepp-LaRouche is Chairwoman of the Civil Rights Movement Solidarity party in Germany, and the wife of statesman and economist Lyndon LaRouche.
Helga Zepp-LaRouche: Hello. I want to use this moment, where in the American Senate, the amendment to the Dodd Bill, introduced by the Senators and McCain and Cantwell, I hope, that you understand that this is not just a matter for the United States. But the re-introduction of a Glass-Steagall standard in the united States is probably the only hope for the rest of the world, and especially for Europe. Because Europe right now is plunging into a complete catastrophe, and those people who know history really understand the signs of the times. Because the euro experiment has completely failed, as it was clear it would, because the euro was not voted up by the peoples of Europe—there was no referendum in any county.
The euro was imposed for geostrategic reasons after the German unification. Because Margaret Thatcher, at that point, wanted to weakened Germany, she launched an unbelievable campaign against Germany at the time; also, Mitterrand, of France, basically made it a precondition that France would agree to unification, if Germany would give up its d-mark, and the former President Bush Sr., very consciously wanted to impose the euro, so that Germany would be contained, in the European Union structure of the Maastricht Treaty.
Now, that this could not function was clear from the beginning, because you can not put very little developed countries like Greece and Portugal, which almost have no industries, together with highly-industrialized countries like Germany, France, a good part of Italy, without causing exactly the kinds of problem which you see now.
Now, this experiment has failed. The euro is not as hard as as the D-mark, as a matter of fact it's about to drop with gigantic speed, and what has happened over the [May 15-16] weekend is that after the danger existed that the Greek state bankruptcy would spread to Spain, Portugal, Ireland and Italy, the European Union, the IMF, and the European Central Bank, quickly imposed a kind of a "super-TARP," a bailout package of $1 trillion. Now, this already is hyperinflationary, because, in four days the euro dropped to the dollar from 1.30 to 1.24, and it's still plunging, but this is bringing back memories of what happened after the First World War in Versailles.
Remember that Germany was forced to pay all the debt and war reparations for World War I, even if by now it is very clear that the role of the British Empire in manipulating the chessboard of the different countries in Europe before World War I, was the actual, contributing major factor to World War I, nevertheless, Germany was forced to pay an enormous sum, which was much more than the German industry could produce. So what the Reichsbank did at that point, they just printed money. And for a couple of years, this was not visible. But then, in 1923, in the Spring, when the French occupied the Rhineland, and production came to a standstill after a strike, you had an explosion of hyperinflation in half a year! And from Spring to November 1923, everything was completely ridiculous, and you had to pay 1 trillion Reichsmarks for one pound of bread!
Now, this was the most brutal exploitation, and stealing, robbing of the life's savings of the population, and I can assure you, right now, the people in Germany in particular, are really scared of inflation coming back. It's sort of deep in the bones of the German population that hyperinflation is destroying your entire life. And then, unfortunately, this hyperinflationary bailout is not the only thing, but the European Union is planning, on the 20th May, which is in a couple of days from now, to impose something called "fiscal unity"—even if there is no political function, so it will not function—and they want to have brutal austerity and a surveillance of the national budget by the European Commission before the national parliaments even get to see these budgets.
Now, this will not work: Right now, you already have an explosion of a mass-strike ferment in Greece, in Romania, in Bulgaria, the Spanish, the Portuguese trade unions all have announced they will not accept that; people in Belgium will march this coming weekend; and the Greek trade unions have already said what is happening now is the worst attack on human rights and the living standards since the days of the military junta.
Now, the danger is exactly that: The danger is, that after an austerity in the tradition of Brüning—Brüning was the Chancellor in the beginning of the '30s, who implemented brutal austerity, which created the conditions which made the taking of power by Hitler possible. Now the danger is that this is again happening, maybe not in the form of Hitler—history in that sense does not repeat itself, exactly—but there is the danger of mass chaos, of a plunge into a dark age, and a catastrophe.
So, you know, since the European Union right now is completely modeled on the British Empire, they have not learned anything from the crisis; they're still sticking to their neo-liberal policies, and they're actually destroying much of the national economies of the member-states. And as long as the straitjacket of Maastricht and Lisbon exists, you can not expect any European government to do anything to defend their own population, or their living standards, because they have no control over their own currency, or their own economy.
So therefore, if a terrible catastrophe for all of Europe is supposed to be prevented, the only hope is that the American Senate implements a Glass-Steagall standard, which then can be taken as an example to introduce a similar division between high-risk banking of investment banking, and those commercial banks which have to give credit for the common good, can be implemented in the European nations as well.
So, please understand, that you have a responsibility not only for what happens in the United States, but what you do, and the kind of mobilization you get going to support the McCain-Cantwell Amendment will decide the history of mankind for a very long time to come.
