Entries in the 'Crisis' Category

Stanley Fischer: Israel Was Barely Scratched By The Global Banking And Credit Crisis


In the News (from Matzav): “Fischer: Israel One of World’s Safest Places for Investors” “Israel was barely scratched by the global banking and credit crisis” … In an exclusive interview at the Bank of Israel headquarters in Jerusalem, the Governor of the Bank of Israel said foresight and “some luck” not only helped the tiny nation in the Middle East avoid the credit crisis, but stabilized and subsequently strengthened its own currency in the process.

My Comment: He may be right, but as the saying goes: the night is still young.

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It Doesn’t Make Sense To Blame The United States For The Financial Crisis

You Can't Teach Anyone Through ForceA question I received: Are you critical of the United States, like most people? Do you think the United States is responsible for the financial crisis? And do you think that only the United States can find the solution?

My Answer: The whole world blames the United States. But if any other country would have had an opportunity to do the same thing, would it not have? Americans built a system that enabled them to “use” the whole world. But who wouldn’t want to do the same thing? The United States was successful, and everyone else is offended that it was able to profit using everyone, and not them. So blame yourselves for your failure, rather than them for their success!

The capitalistic principle, “mine is mine and yours is yours,” worked well for some time, and at one point people were proud of it. But now it is beginning to feel completely unfair. This is because the world is revealing a spiritual layer, and it is becoming clear to everyone that people are inherently unequal.

For this reason, not all people can be given the same opportunities: this destroys society rather than building it. Opportunities should not be simply equal; they should be equal with regard to one’s personal capabilities, education, and abilities.

The less a person is able to do, the more society should help make up for his deficiencies. If you are stronger than me, you should receive less help. This will be fair. After all, we receive our capabilities from Nature (or the Creator), and the compensation for them should come from society.

So are equal opportunities good? No, they are destructive. We have to know how much each person received from birth and what kind of upbringing this person was given, and then we should supplement him so he will live at the same level as others. That is justice, and it will lead to peace. Then, no one will have a reason to complain of being deprived of something or of being treated unequally. And as long as that’s not happening, there will be no peace in the world.

Yet, is it possible to implement this? Yes, but to do it, we would have to know the inner data of every person, and this is only possible by revealing people’s souls, the inner forces and traits of each person. This revelation occurs when we all strive for unity.

In Kabbalistic terms, I, for example, will add you as an AHP to my Galgalta Eynaim, and this will result in a full Kli made of ten Sefirot, which I will fulfill. This is how each person fufills the desires of everyone. And this is the only way to reach equality and perfection.

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Let’s Build A Bridge Through The Economic Abyss


In the News (from The Financial Times): “US non-farm payrolls fall 467,000 in June” …the economy shed an average of 691,000 jobs a month during the first three months of the year. Monthly job losses, as measured by the Labor Department, peaked at 741,000 in January. Employers have cut 6.5m jobs since the recession officially began in December 2007. The average workweek fell to 33 hours, the lowest level since records began in 1964, from 33.1 hours in May.

My Comment: Will there be a bottom to this, or is it a bottomless abyss? Clearly, using the old means to recover is not working. Thus, what we have to do is to improve the social relationships, rather than the economic or industrial ones. We have to make them global. Then, all the other relationships will change as well.

There are three issues we have to agree upon:
1) That a commonwealth of all people within a global civilization is a must;
2) That Nature has a force that can correct people from hatred to love for one another;
3) That Kabbalah tells us how to do this.

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Why Don’t The Rich Nations Offer The World Solutions To The Financial Crisis?


In the News (from Global Issues): Many people are now calling for fundamental reforms of the financial systems, internationally. This includes international banking and finance, to reform of international financial institutions such as the World Bank and IMF … it was hoped leading developing countries might have voice to make the rich nations agree to meaningful measures … Instead, rich nations resisted substantive reforms demanded by developing countries.

My Comment: Today, no one is making any offers to anyone because the future is uncertain. People can plan for long-term reforms as long as the markets are predictable, but now, no one understands what is going on. And this trend will continue until people discover that the problem is the faulty relationships within the society.

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Will People Get Used To The Crisis, As Government Leaders Hope?

laitman_2009-06_3382_w1A question I received: As a child, I asked my grandmother about the war she lived through, and she said, “You know, people get used to everything, even war.” So, in the current situation of economic uncertainty, this would mean that what’s happening isn’t so bad, because people will simply get used to having smaller salaries, and eventually everyone will simply forget about the crisis completely.

My Answer: This is exactly what the government leaders are hoping for: that our living standard will gradually decrease and reach a humble type of existence, a much lower living standard than today. This will also improve the ecology and the public relations. When everyone suffers together, people are comforted and everyone is in agreement.

However, what people don’t realize is that the crisis was not caused by overproduction or market speculation, but by the fact that human egoism has grown so much that we have lost all control over it. We are now at the final stage of egoism’s development, and Nature is now leading us to the next stage of our development – altruism. The fact that we are revealing a total interconnection between us and Nature means that this stage is already here. It is being revealed, and we have to adapt to it.

The only thing that can help us go through this period more smoothly is the dissemination of Kabbalah’s wisdom, which will explain the situation and the means to correct it. The government leaders will not be able to correct anything; in fact, they cannot even reach an agreement regarding anything. It would be good if they were able to reach a consensus at their G8 or G20 meetings and decide how much each country should lower its living standard for the sake of the common good.  However, instead they are involved in protectionism, where each is trying to separate from the rest. And this kind of behavior often leads to war.

Nevertheless, I am hopeful that the situation will reach a good outcome, and I do hope that they will discover the true reasons for the crisis and the solution, which is explained in Kabbalah. The program for everything already exists in Nature. However, this program does not include anything that’s artificial, such as the measures they are trying to take.

Unfortunately, for now they are still talking like regular leaders: “I have power, an army, police, and money.” Thus, they rule the world and every individual country using two things: the authority of money and the authority of force.

But what people need today is to be enlightened, educated about the global world we are now living in, and about the fact that all of our suffering is caused by a faulty global connection among us.

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The Needed Change In Our Global World


A question I received: If you worked on Wall Street, would you not have done the same? They had an opportunity to embellish stock prices, fool the world, and receive a return of hundreds more times what the stock was originally worth. The problem is that the lies came to the surface and the stocks collapsed. So now the government is lining the pockets of the bankrupted financiers just to keep the entire system from crumbling. What’s next?

My Answer: By causing us to develop, Nature is pressuring us to find a solution. Kabbalah offers people a way to learn about the global world we have found ourselves in – a world of total, universal interconnection. Then, using this knowledge, we will be able to build a new society as well as a new kind of personal and public relations.

This wisdom enables people to see that we will reach a terrible outcome – such as wars and natural disasters – if we continue to develop arbitrarily. This outcome is opposite to the social change that Nature requires of us in a global world. The needed change is to create more global connections, mutual understanding and common participation.

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The Main Lesson To Learn From The Crisis Is That We Are All Part Of Nature

laitman_2009-05-xx_ny_5054A question I received: Today’s economy, and life in general, seem very chaotic. Things are difficult to regulate, control, and predict. What should people do in this situation?

My Answer: Firstly, we should learn from this situation. The crisis and the uncertain state of the world should help us see that we are developing according to certain laws, irrespective of our will. Moreover, we do not know what these laws are.

It would be nice if we could predict things in some way, but all our attempts to predict and change anything do not produce good results. However, if we learned the laws of nature, we would gain strength and wisdom.

Question cont’d: So what are we to do about the situation?

My Answer: All of people’s attempts to fix things have not yielded any positive results. This fact should help people see that all of their mistakes have been programmed by Nature in order to teach them something. This is Nature’s way of helping people to advance.

Question cont’d: Isn’t this fatalism?

My Answer: Nature encompasses everything, even all of people’s instincts, behaviors motives, and actions. The basis of all human problems is that we single ourselves out from nature.

Nature’s goal is to teach man that he should not stand out or try to separate from Nature. People have to realize that we are all part of Nature, that we are “built into it,” so to say.

Man’s task in Nature is to integrate all of Nature using his power, control, and desire. In other words, we need to bring the entire system into harmony and balance. Nature pushes man forward and teaches him lessons in the process. A person may feel bad at times, or he may be scared; and all of this is intended for him to understand that right now, all of Nature is disjointed, contradictory, and prone to crisis for just one reason: because human beings are breaching the natural balance.

Man must do everything he can in order to collect all of Nature’s parts into one, and thus to bring them to harmony. This is something that depends on every person.

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The Stable Financial Situation In The US Is Deceptive


A question I received: I don’t understand you when you say there’s a crisis. In Detroit, for example, even though the factories closed down and stopped manufacturing cars, people started growing their own cabbages and vegetables on city lots. They got used to the new conditions and adapted to them. So, why do you say there’s a crisis?

My Answer: People are feeling a false sense of calmness, which has been “manufactured” in agreement with the banks and other systems. It’s all being done to save President Obama’s image, since he just came to power. The current crisis is being masked by artificial means, but it won’t take long for the next crisis to unfold.

What does it really mean that people have gotten used to the situation and are growing vegetables now? The news will even tell you that the President’s wife is growing vegetables at the White House. All of this is clever and deceitful advertising, leading us to believe that everything is getting back to normal. However, the reality is that nothing can be done about the crisis and no one knows how to stop it. The only thing people can do about it is to hush it up for the time being.

And this is what is being done: more money is being printed and the national debt is increasing. But the people in power cannot go on like this for very long. People will soon see the truth and will realize that we haven’t even entered the real crisis yet. All that has happened thus far is not the real crisis yet; it is still ahead of us. So far, our problems have been mere bubbles created by the financial industry, which continue to grow bigger and bigger.

The only thing to do is to let the events unfold gradually, and to lower our standard of living little by little in an effort to prevent the crisis from hitting us abruptly, as a sudden, terrible blow that will bring about war and destruction. People can get used to anything: for example, they can get used to working just once a week and earning a quarter of their past salaries.  What should not happen is being thwarted with one powerful blow, and instead to ease down slowly. There is no one who knows how to how to avoid the coming fall entirely. It is clear to everyone that the measures being taken at present are like a feast during a plague, and that eventually, we will have to pay for everything.

The fact is that corporations are not producing anything and the layoffs are continuing. Everything’s going downhill. Yet, we are still seeing a picture of prosperity, like a display window at a shop that looks as attractive as usual, or even more so. Yet, inside the shop, all the products have expired long ago. People can’t put enough food on the table with what they make, and everything is dependent on the growing debt.

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Everything Unnecessary Will Vanish!


In the News (from Bloomberg): “Five Banks Seized, Raising U.S. Tally This Year to 45” Five U.S. banks with total assets of about $1.04 billion were seized by regulators, pushing this year’s tally of failures to 45 as a recession drives up unemployment and home foreclosures.

My Comment: Financial institutes are changing their configurations and  some of them will vanish. The extra, unnecessary enterprises will need to close. Salvation is in educating the population!

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A Fiscal Crisis In California


In the News (fromThe Huffington Post): “Schwarzenegger Declares Fiscal Emergency In California” Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has declared a fiscal emergency to address California’s deficit and has ordered state offices closed three days a month to save cash. The government shutdown will lead to a third furlough day each month for 235,000 state employees, bringing their total pay cut to about 14 percent.

My Comment: This in relatively well-to-do California!  So what about Mexico just across the border?

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