Aaron Russo Uncovers America From 'Freedom to Fascism'

Aaron Russo Uncovers America From 'Freedom to Fascism'

Phil Brennan, NewsMax.com
Wednesday, Aug. 9, 2006

Film Review:
"America: Freedom to Fascism"
A Film by Aaron Russo

Do you know which law requires you to file an income tax form? Is the Federal Reserve System a part of the federal government or a privately owned bank?

Ask most Americans to name the law that mandates the filing of income tax forms and they'll tell you they can't – but they're sure it's in there someplace.

As award-winning film producer Aaron Russo ("The Rose," "Trading Places") claims in this blockbuster of a film, it's not. "There is no law," Russo insisted to NewsMax.com.

If they think about it at all, most Americans think the Federal Reserve System – the all-powerful central bank that produces our currency and controls credit – is an agency of the federal government.

Not according to Aaron Russo. He'll tell all who will listen that the Federal Reserve System is a privately owned bank, accountable solely to the unidentified banks – many of them foreign banks – that own it lock, stock and barrel. Moreover, the identities of the banks that own the Fed are a deep, dark secret.

And most of your money, collected from the taxes you pay, goes to pay the interest on the national debt to the banks that hold the government's IOUs, Russo said.

What galls Russo is the fact that "the government can make their own money without paying any interest. Why are we paying interest to these banks when we can make the money for nothing?"

The real scandal here, Russo says, "is not the fact that the banks are making us pay them for something we can do for free. That's not the worst part of the scam. The fact is that they control the government because of all this."

Reginald McKenna (1863-1943), one-time British Chancellor of the Exchequer, took note of this when he once explained, "The banks can and do create money – and they who control the credit of the nation direct the policy of government and hold in the hollow of their hands the destiny of the people."

During the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln spurned borrowing money from foreign banks to finance the war and borrowed $450 million directly from the American people by selling them bonds redeemable after the war.

This infuriated the international bankers, leading the Times of London to write: "If that mischievous financial policy, which had its origin in the North American Republic during the late war in that country, should become indurated down to a fixture, then that government will furnish its own money without cost.

"It will pay off its debts and be without debt. It will become prosperous without precedent in the history of the civilized governments of the world. The brains and wealth of all countries will go to North America. That government must be destroyed or it will destroy every monarchy on the globe."

If all this shocks you, wait until you see Aaron Russo's new film, appropriately titled "America: Freedom to Fascism." It's a shocker.

NewsMax asked Russo how audiences are reacting to the film. "People are crying when they leave the theater," he said. The film "is really bringing people together."

Russo cited an incident he had learned from an e-mail, but could not verify, that allegedly took place in Austin, Texas, as a man handed out flyers advertising the film.

"When two cops appeared and tried to arrest him, the whole theater filed out and surrounded the cops. The person who wrote the e-mail said you could feel the sense of togetherness – that they know that they have to work together now to stop what's happening."

What's happening, Russo documents, is frightening.

CBS critic Todd David Schwartz called the film "The scariest damn film you'll see this year. It will leave you staggering out of the theater, slack-jawed and trembling. Makes 'Fahrenheit 9/11' look like 'Bambi.' After watching this movie, your comfy, secure notions about America – and about what it means to be an American – will be forever shattered."

Russo and his colleagues at Cinema Libre Studio, Schwartz said, "deserve to be heralded as heroes of a post-modern New American Revolution. This is shocking stuff. You'll be angry, you'll be disgusted, but you may actually break out in a cold sweat and feel a sickness deep in your gut; I would advise movie theatre managers to hand out vomit bags. You may end up needing one."

Added popular Internet journalist Devvy Kidd, the film "could once and for all blow a hole so big in the web of deception, the course of history could be changed."

"America: Freedom to Fascism" connects the dots between money creation, voter fraud, the proposed national identity card, the implementation of radio frequency identification (RFID) technology to track citizens and the police state quietly evolving in America.

As the film shows, none of this is the imagination of some right-wing conspiracy nut. What's happening is thoroughly backed up and documented with interviews with top experts such as Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, former IRS criminal investigator Joe Banister, Katherine Albrecht, author of "Spychips," and the authors of the Federal Reserve exposé, "The Creature from Jekyll Island."

Telling the truth can be risky to a producer attempting to attract audiences to his film, as Russo explains.

"I was canceled off two radio stations in Chicago," he revealed. "One of the producers said that the owner of the station got a call from somebody and then canceled me. And instead of an hour, they gave me 10 minutes because they had to – they had mentioned I was going to be on.

"The biggest radio station in Chicago canceled me altogether, and I was supposed to be on that station for a couple of hours," Russo continued. "Nobody will put me on television to discuss the movie – nobody.

"There are forces out there that don't want this movie seen or heard, and they're putting a media clampdown on me. They are seeing that I can't buy that much advertising to get media publicity to promote this movie around the country. Those are the tactics used to make sure I don't get on the air."

Booking the film into theaters, he added, has not been a problem. According to his office, the film is being shown to large audiences in five cities now, and in September it will be in theaters all across America.

The Internet is also spreading the word. There have been more than 500,000 viewers of a trailer at www.freedomtofascism.com, and people have donated tens of thousands of dollars to assist in the theatrical launching of the film.

In the film, Russo insists focuses on what he says is the illegality and deception surrounding the federal income tax and the founding of the Federal Reserve System.

He also says the Constitution's ruling that only the government is authorized to create money has been defied. Congress simply handed the power over to the Fed in 1916.

It's not just Russo and other critics of the Fed who have railed against the creation of a central bank. Abraham Lincoln, Andrew Jackson, and even Franklin Roosevelt warned against a U.S. central bank.

Said Thomas Jefferson in just one statement of many against a central bank: "If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issuance of the currency, first by inflation, and then by deflation, the banks and the corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the people of all property until their children wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered . . . I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies . . . the issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the government, to whom it properly belongs."

"I am trying to wake America up," Russo said. "That's why I used that title. Fascism is a reality in America. Fascism is the synergistic effort of big government and big corporations working together to stifle the people. That's what we have in America today. The corporations have taken over America, and the largest corporation of all is the Federal Reserve System. "