The Men who built america, Amazon $19.99 blu-ray with prime

It's also $19.99 at bestbuy. Amazon is still a bit cheaper if you don't have to pay taxes with them.

Quote from grueber : Maybe Obama should watch this.

So you're saying these guys actually built the infrastructure like roads and bridges? You learn something new every day.

Quote from magsk : It was George Westinghouse who withdrew funding I think, though he was also the one who initially supported tesla promoting ac instead of dc, winning the worlds fair.

That's what I thought too, but Morgan was also an investor:
http://www.eng.utah.edu/~kier/tesla/about.html

Gripping series. I caught it in the middle at 11pm....at 130am I was exhausted and forced myself to go to bed and DVRd the rest. This should be shown to all 10th graders as it is similar to what to learn but with much more production value and extraordinarily interesting.

I found the series terrific. Certainly not an exhaustive review of each of them but the series does a great job of showing the highlights and how their fates were intertwined.

Like others - the stupid recaps after every commercial break killed me. Between those and commercials you could easily cut the run time by 50% over what was scheduled on TV.

Pretty sure I watched this when it was called "Roots."

Is it about Nazis or about Chinese immigrants? Or does each group get a disc? If so, who's the third disc about?

Quote from JC86 : I'm intrigued, could you explain more or point me in the direction where I can read more? I know there's a lot of history behind these people but never knew that about Morgan.

Sure, the best way to learn about these histories is to first learn the true nature of the early banking system. The gold smiths of the middle ages would secure their holdings in a vault. Most people had no access to a vault (which was high tech at the time) so they either had a choice of burying their gold or allowing the gold smith to keep it in his vault. The gold smith would issue a ticket for the amount of gold deposited there.

Soon, the tickets began to be traded instead of real gold. With this trade of paper, the gold deposits were only rarely withdrawn from the goldsmiths vaults. The goldsmith, now a banker, realized that only a small percentage (about 10%) of the deposits were ever withdrawn at any one time. He was able to issue more bank notes corresponding to gold which didn't exist in his vaults. So began the practice of fractional reserve banking which still exists today. As long as there was no run on the bank, the banker could "create" wealth out of thin air.

Currently, when you deposit $1000 dollars into your bank you may think that your bank now has $1000 to lend out. Not so. Each bank has an account with the Federal Reserve. Your $1000 is then deposited at the Federal Reserve and $9000 is then "created" by them and given back to your local bank.

That is just a bit of backstory to help understand how the Rothschild family was able to accumulate such massive holdings starting in the 1700's. During the Battle of Waterloo, Nathan Rothschild received word of the French defeat a full day before anyone else (carrier pigeons and riders). This was the first time he (likely) made use of "agents"- people who were really working for him but with the relationship kept hidden. Instead of buying British holdings in anticipation of news of the British victory, he began quietly selling all stocks and treasuries, but only to his own agents (himself effectively). All the other traders noticed and a panic selling began. By the end of the day, Nathan Rothschild owned every share of every stock.

Since then they have only continued their dominance. They have often funded both sides of a single war and their influence in starting the war itself is in question. The reason Bonaparte sold the US the Louisiana purchase land was because he refused to be owned by the central bankers. Their means of manipulation has not changed. They play chess when others can only play checkers. The reasons behind the moves are not obvious on first inspection.

Even today they continue to use agents. Their wealth is far beyond any others but they keep the true wealth hidden through obfuscation and agents. The Russian oligarchs who rose following the dissolution of the Soviet Union were mostly Rothschild.

One book that revealed far more than was intended about the inner circle power hierarchy was "Tragedy & Hope: A History of the World in Our Time " by Carroll Quigley. Quigley was repeatedly mentioned by Bill Clinton as his mentor. A very bad guy but also very informative.
Quigley wasn't some "conspiracy theorist". He was actually an insider who didn't agree with the methods of secrecy. Unfortunately, the book was quickly withdrawn soon after printing and the version available today is heavily edited.
An important book (that does veer into conspiracy, but quite accurate I believe) is about the creation of the Federal Reserve called "The Creature From Jekyll Island". Dumb title maybe, but an excellent look into the creation of the FED.

Aside from that, I would research the methods of manipulation (hegelian dialectic in particular) that these entities use and realize that the personality types who seek total control of power can be classified as Psychopathic- totally without empathy for others. They don't think like we do, so to apply our rationale to their actions would be a mistake.

Watching American movies about America is like watching North Korean movies about North Korea. An exact analogy, that works on all levels.

What is the point, unless you are some sort of brainwashed lemming craving for another dose of propaganda?

Quote from flancrest : Pretty sure I watched this when it was called "Roots."

My thoughts almost exactly. The could have come up with a more appropriate title for this.

Quote from AndreyT : Watching American movies about America is like watching North Korean movies about North Korea. An exact analogy, that works on all levels. What is the point, unless you are some sort of brainwashed lemming craving for another dose of propaganda?

Except for the part where American movies aren't made by the government...

Quote from grueber : Maybe Obama should watch this.

So he could do a better job tearing down America?

So the History channel credits rich, white men with building America. What a farking joke.

Quote from OmegaPirate : While the story was entertaining, it certainly wasn't accurate. Even today they are still afraid to even mention the real power. Carnegie, Vanderbilt, Rockefeller and Morgan were only front men. Lieutenants. The most that Morgan ever owned of his own companies was 19%.

Who's afraid and of whom?