Yep, 5000.
You said:
"Its because the banks are not public and are owned by powerful banking families that we have all this hassle."
Which, aside from being basically false, I assumed, perhaps wrongly, to be based on the same intellectual foundations that saw groups like the Rothschilds as some type of international bankers' conspiracy. And "banking families," in most populist circles at least in the US, is often a reference to Jews. Especially when combined with theories of global geopolitical gerrymandering leading to aggressive wars to enforce a specific financial objective (in your case you identified alternative monetary regimes). Perhaps I misconstrued you. If so, it will be the first time I have personally had a discussion with a person who was politically vocal about international conspiracies of banking families controlling nations who was not also some variation of racist or anti-Semite.
Then again, I am probably oversensitive right now, as the class for which I wrote that paper is a class in European history from 1914-1945.... so the question of racism is kind of on the forefront of my mind. If I have misconstrued your position, and you would like to provide evidence of an international conspiracy of international banking families (who are not Jews) manipulating governments into wars or corrupt policies, I would be glad to hear it. I had no desire to impute beliefs on you which you did not have, and if I have done so, I do apologize.
I do find it funny that you say you aren't prejudiced, then identify at least 2 prejudices.
And I guess you don't object to the "paranoid" ad hominem?
(sorry-- a side tangent in my research, which my advisor told me to drop in my paper, was about interlocking directorates and structures in WWI European finance, and a tangent from that led me to all sorts of exciting anti-Semitic conspiracy theories)
Could be a UK thing. We don't have any banking "families" down here in Australia that I know about, but if someone WAS to talk about Banking Families I would assume they were having a go at the supposed international Jewish Conspiracy.
