Chriss Street points out a little-discussed dimension of the crisis in Ukraine: taxes imposed by non-democratic foreign entities.
The International Monetary Fund or IMF is not a product of the free market, taking deposits from voluntary customers and lending to private entities on the basis of creditworthiness. Rather, it is a creature of western governments, funded by taxes that fall on individuals involuntarily and lending to governments, i.e. local and regional monopolists of the use of force. Client's eligibility for loans is generally enhanced the worse economic shape the country is in. Loans are made less on the basis of prospects of repayment than in exchange for political influence. Thus while the IMF is not a government agency, much less a democratically accountable one, much less accountable to the citizens of its client states, yet it frequently comes to dictate the fiscal and monetary policies of entire nations.
Does it surprise anyone that such schemes frequently result in outcomes that range from disappointing failure to catastrophic conflict?
Street also documents statistics of Ukraine's regional economic divisions, its endemic corruption and its strategic importance to Russia as a buffer zone against historical adversaries.
Read the complete article at AmericanThinker.com.