32 being in a high cost area. I did an exercise two years ago looking at all of this. If when I started Hamilton Securities, instead of doing Hamilton, I only invested my money in the stocks I thought would go up during this period, how much would I be worth?” I figured that I would probably be worth – at a minimum – $40 million. I showed my analysis to a very good friend. She looked at me and said, “Yes, but you would be dead.” She was right. If you look at what I would have had to live with and emotionally tolerate, I’m not someone who can watch people being genocid- ed around me and do nothing. To sit around and do nothing would have literally killed me. And If I had stayed in the traditional healthcare system instead of getting to know a wonderful world of natural health and nutrition practi- tioners, that would certainly have killed me. One thing I will say – if my net worth is not at the $5-10 million level that many advisors would insist is necessary for a secure retirement – I would say the primary reason is because the cost and time required to live successfully in the face of significant criminal elements has been and continues to be enormous. It was certainly not the result of a failure to save. When you donate approximately 30,000+ hours of make-work to litigating with the federal governments efforts to falsely frame you during your prime working years it qualifies as a “deep state drain.” This is why I am consistently shocked when Americans suggest I should donate more time to helping the US government. So it’s an unorthodox pathway that I’ve taken. I have constantly moved away from untrustworthy systems towards trustworthy systems. Sometimes that has meant going without or going it alone. If you look at my experiences with the 401(k) system, with federal law enforcement, with the pension fund system, with one of the largest global banks in the world, or the community bank in Washington that I believe defrauded Hamilton Securities, what I have found is that many of these different systems are untrust- worthy. The moral of the story is to do your best to stick with trustworthy people, institutions and governments. Seek integrity – there is still plenty available but you need to find and cultivate it. If I were reviewing your situation, I would have to look at the specifics to understand how this applied to you. If you take someone who is in a corrupt 401(k) situation and in a corrupt pen- sion fund system and in a state and local govern- ment that has sizeable unfunded liabilities, you’re talking about someone who can be harmed badly – even destroyed – by what is coming. VIII. TOTAL ECONOMIC RETURNS – WHY ARE WE FINANCING GOVERNMENTS, COMPANIES, AND PRODUCTS AND SERVICES WITH NEGATIVE RETURNS? When a private investor buys stock in a company that is making money by doing something harm- ful to the environment, people, or economy, the investor may say, “I am only one person. I have to go along with what makes money in the mar- ket. There is nothing else I can do.” Although I do not agree with this point of view, it is true that the typical impact of one person is small. However, for a large US pension fund, investing a portion of $25 trillion in US retirement sav- ings, it is hard to make the same case. If a large pension fund is making money on corporate or government activities that shrink the overall economy or harm the health and well being of the general population, ultimately the harm done to the whole will shrink the total economic pie. Our pension funds are large enough, in fact, that they can understand and take responsibility for the health of the whole. If one looks at countries where sovereign wealth funds and pension funds have taken an interest in long-term strategic thinking about what can make the economic pie healthy and as large as possible, those governors appear to have more support and trust from the general population. Indeed, a number of large US public pension have also provided leadership on public policy II. THE STATE OF OUR PENSION FUNDS “If a large pension fund is making money on corporate or government activities that shrink the overall economy or harm the health and well being of the general population, ultimately the harm done to the whole will shrink the total economic pie.”