24 Sept 2026
John Briggs, Banking Fraud and a Seven-Year Sentence
Broadcasts live every Thursday at 8:00p.m. uk time on Radio Soapbox: http://radiosoapbox.com (http://radiosoapbox.com)
I opened this week’s show in a thoroughly autumnal mood, reflecting on the first real glow of the season, the strange sweetness of late September, and a memorial gathering that brought old friends, old bands and old memories back into sharp focus. From there we wandered, as we do, through Henley, black-and-white dogtooth jackets, Frank Bellamy’s magnificent comic artwork, Heath Robinson, harmonicas, Motown, and the sort of English melancholy that seems to arrive with falling conkers and warm evenings at the tail end of summer.
The heart of the episode was a long and lively conversation with John Briggs, author of Alice and the Money Tree, Revisited, about debt-based money, usury, political power and the problem of how to explain financial fraud in plain English. We talked about history, propaganda, children’s stories, comics, Belloc, The Wizard of Oz, and the need to get foundational ideas across simply enough that ordinary people can grasp what sits underneath the whole system. In the final hour, Monica Schaefer joined us with grave news about her brother Alfred Schaefer, who has been sentenced in Germany to seven years in prison for speech. Monica spoke movingly about prisoners of war in the present age, the use of force when argument fails, and why the answer cannot be fear or silence but greater clarity, courage and resolve.
Paul English Live: https://paulenglishlive.com/ (https://paulenglishlive.com/)
Paul English Live on Rumble: https://rumble.com/PaulEnglishLive (https://rumble.com/PaulEnglishLive)
Food For Thought Radio (FFT Radio): https://www.fftradio.com/ (https://www.fftradio.com/)
WBN324 Talk Radio: https://linktr.ee/wbn324 (https://linktr.ee/wbn324)
FTJ Media: https://ftjmedia.com/?lang=english (https://ftjmedia.com/?lang=english)
Free Speech Monika: https://freespeechmonika.com/ (https://freespeechmonika.com/)
UK Column: https://www.ukcolumn.org/ (https://www.ukcolumn.org/)
Alice and the Money Tree by J. M. Weston Briggs: https://uk.bookshop.org/p/books/alice-and-the-money-tree-j-m-weston-briggs/1995428 (https://uk.bookshop.org/p/books/alice-and-the-money-tree-j-m-weston-briggs/1995428)
Economics for Helen by Hilaire Belloc: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/75629 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/75629)
Breaking the Spell by Nicholas Kollerstrom: https://holocausthandbooks.com/book/breaking-the-spell/ (https://holocausthandbooks.com/book/breaking-the-spell/)
Tell the Truth and Shame the Devil by Gerard Menuhin: https://openlibrary.org/books/OL40733528M/Tell_the_Truth_and_Shame_the_Devil (https://openlibrary.org/books/OL40733528M/Tell_the_Truth_and_Shame_the_Devil)
Frank Bellamy Checklist Website and Blog: https://www.frankbellamy.co.uk/ (https://www.frankbellamy.co.uk/)
TV Century 21: https://www.tvcentury21.com/ (https://www.tvcentury21.com/)
Heros the Spartan (Grand Comics Database): https://www.comics.org/feature/31151/ (https://www.comics.org/feature/31151/)
Heath Robinson Museum: https://www.heathrobinsonmuseum.org/ (https://www.heathrobinsonmuseum.org/)
Martha Reeves official website: https://marthareeves.net/ (https://marthareeves.net/)
The Duran: https://theduran.substack.com/ (https://theduran.substack.com/)
Tommy by Rudyard Kipling: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/audio/77043/tommy (https://www.poetryfoundation.org/audio/77043/tommy)
Chuck Berry official website: https://www.chuckberry.com/ (https://www.chuckberry.com/)
