Shocking: Iran is funneling billions through Fed system

When I was growing up in the 80’s, my dad would go to military training for two weeks every summer as part of his commitment to the US Army Reserve. And when he flew home, we would always meet him at the airport.

But then my mother, sister and I could all go straight through security and wait for him at the gate, which was actually quite normal until the late 90s.

Then of course everything changed after 9/11. The federal government took over airport security overnight and for the past 23 years we have been taking off our shoes, being groped by federal agents and throwing away our fluids.

More than twenty years after 9/11, most of these TSA security rules (which have been implemented around the world) seem pretty dumb.

Does anyone really believe that a 100ml tube of toothpaste is okay, but that 100ml poses a safety risk?

This is the kind of idiotic logic behind rules that add unnecessary inconvenience to people’s lives without providing any noticeable benefit.

The same goes for those ridiculous consent forms on countless websites across the internet. When we visit a site, we are now forced to “accept cookies”, thanks to a law passed by the most idiotic politicians in the European Union.

They somehow think we are all safer and better off… and that our privacy is protected.

Except that our privacy is not protected. Mark Zuckerberg and the Google guys are still following us around the internet, monitoring everything we do and click. And then we haven’t even talked about the governments themselves who are collecting our biometric and personal data, putting it all in a database and then making it vulnerable to hackers.

But hey, at least we have those cookie notifications to keep our data safe, right?

It’s just another stupid rule that inconveniences people without providing any noticeable benefit.

Another good example is the banking sector.

Some people aren’t old enough to remember, but it used to be a fairly simple process to open a bank account. You showed up, signed some paperwork, and you were good to go. Now we’re all threatened with jail time, forced to fill out a million forms, and every transaction is checked for anti-money laundering and anti-terrorism regulations.

The whole apparatus treats you like a criminal suspect instead of a valued customer. And why?

It all turns out to be for nothing.

Laws such as FATCA, CRS, and the USA PATRIOT Act were reportedly passed, at least in part, to keep terrorist groups out of the global financial system.

But all the watchers missed was that Iran, a country blacklisted in the global financial system, sent hundreds of millions of dollars to Hamas, a blacklisted terrorist organization. And then Hamas used that money to murder innocent Israeli civilians on October 7, 2023.

The US President himself agreed to release $6 billion in frozen funds to Iran for the release of a handful of Americans. So again, what exactly is the point of all this oversight of the financial system?

My mother has to jump through hoops to prove she is not a criminal just to get some money out of her bank account, but Hamas and the Taliban are getting hundreds of millions of dollars funneled through the American banking system.

The most recent example is the Iraqi banking system, which was partly set up by the US government after the 2003 invasion.

Top officials from the U.S. Treasury Department and the Federal Reserve oversaw the establishment of Iraq’s new financial system, including controls on terrorism and money laundering.

Well, it’s a big shock: it turns out that the Iraqi banking system, that is, the system set up by the US government, has been used by terrorist groups to send money to Iran and Hamas.

So again, what exactly is the point of all these rules and regulations that hinder ordinary law abiding citizens… if groups like Hamas can still receive ample funding through the system. It is clear that the rules are pointless and provide no real benefit.

The irony is that so many governments around the world, including the US, are among the most vocal opponents of cryptocurrencies.

The US Treasury hates crypto. They say it’s dangerous to have an unregulated monetary system where terrorists and drug cartels can operate in complete privacy.

Yet it is precisely the banking system that THEY have set up that finances terrorists.

Everyone else has to struggle with the problems on a daily basis and are treated like criminals just to be able to send money from A to B. Withdrawing $5,000 in cash comes with a bureaucratic shock and awe.

And this is one of the main reasons why I think it makes sense to own crypto.

I am not a crypto enthusiast by any means. I do not own it to speculate on its price. And most days I do not know the price of Bitcoin or Ether. I do not care.

To me, there’s no point in trading dollars for crypto just hoping to trade crypto back for more dollars. The bigger idea is that crypto is a way to send and receive money outside of a system run by incompetent bureaucrats who are constantly making our lives worse.

It’s similar to my belief that gold makes sense as a long-term store of value; I don’t trust the Federal Reserve or the White House to preserve the value of my savings. Gold is a great way to do that… without relying on the financial system.

With both crypto and gold, there is no middleman or incompetent bureaucrat to intervene.

That’s also why I’ve never seen a reason to debate which is better, gold vs cryptoThere is no reason to discuss it.

Both serve a useful purpose and are worth considering as part of a sensible Plan B.