Who Knew? (Part 4)

Peter Schiff, That's who. (wikip.)
I am half-assedly posting about articles I've seen that point out those anointed few who not only saw, to some extent, financial collapse coming, but had the balls to try and fight it publicly, up front. See also, part 1 (Iris Mack), part 2 (Byron Dorgan), part 3 (Elizabeth Warren))Please comment to this or any Who Knew? post when you see one of those who were willing to stake their reputation by pointing out our crash course with economic crisis in times where everyone else let the good times roll.

So, why haven't you heard of this genius yet?
Because, silly, he hasn't made me any money yet!
(aka: Because, silly, he still thinks its going to get worse!)

He saw it coming and took every chance he had to publicly debate the collapse of our credit and housing markets. This includes a book with his prediction in the title: Crash Proof: How to Profit From the Coming Economic Collapse which was released in 2007.
In many of the public forums he used to try to get his message across, he was literally laughed at, or at least smirked at in epic proportions of condescension. (Epic, because he was right and he was right on a big thing (right, Ben Stein?)

It would be best if you watched a 'victory lap' video made by a fan: (there are plenty of other videos to watch too!)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2I0QN-FYkpw

Despite his predictions throughout 2006 and 2007 of the upcoming economic collapse and the fact that he stood his ground because he knew he was right, he is generally not lauded as the economic seer he is. You would expect people to cling to his every word, to make notes of every gesture, to analyze his every thought after being right about the coming crash.

But, as it turns out, all of his short term investment picks since the economic collapse have been wrong. Now, he only gets speaking engagements outside of the U.S. The only press he gets include headlines of his losses since the collapse.What good is seeing the future if you can't make any money off of the predictions?
Additionally, he is still generally lauded with smirks and rolled eyes as he continues to predict a worsening economy, pointing out that we are only bailing out a part of the deck in a house of cards.

After writing that paragraph, I see that he isn't necessarily a genius... He's just unwilling to ignore the evidence and refuses to assume that endless growth is possible. Not exactly groundbreaking news...

Mad props to his father, Irwin Schiff, who decided in the 1970s that federal income tax was unconstitutional and stopped paying them. (He still pays his state taxes...) His belief in this is so strong that he has been in and out of court and jail fighting for his rights ever since. Today, at 90, he sits in jail again.

Ignoring a sage for being a sage...

THIS is whyipaytaxes.

Read more: I found Mr. Schiff in an article painting him out to be an Extremist in the June 1 Time. Go find it yourself if you must, I'm not going to link to it from here...