Your Money and Your Life
Financial freedom for Whites -- an interview with John Ubele of the National Vanguard Tampa Unit.
American Dissident Voices
broadcast for
December 18, 2005
by Kevin Alfred Strom
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TODAY WE ARE happy to welcome to the American Dissident Voices microphones the Assistant Coordinator of the National Vanguard Tampa Unit, Mr. John Ubele. Welcome, John.
UBELE: Thank you for having me, Kevin.
KAS: John, I see in your biography on the National Vanguard
Tampa Web site that you work as a private contractor. So you're an
independent businessman, is that correct?
UBELE: That's correct.
KAS: It also says that you were the person who initiated and
organized the National Vanguard mailing to attorneys around the state
of Florida. Can you tell us a little bit about that?
UBELE: I was inspired to do that by the rounding up, so to speak, of political
dissidents at the time, namely David Duke, Chester Doles, and another
gentleman named Artie Wheeler. I felt that something had to be done to
respond to what the system was doing, so I, along with several other
members of our Tampa Unit, formulated an idea for a mass mailing to
criminal defense attorneys throughout our state. It had the effect of
essentially slapping Florida's ruling class in the face.
[ http://www.nationalvanguard.org/story.php?id=2641 ]
[ http://www.nationalvanguard.org/story.php?id=2879 ]
[ http://www.nationalvanguard.org/story.php?id=939 ]
[ http://www.nationalvanguard.org/story.php?id=2504 ]
KAS: What happened?
UBELE: A single small newspaper down in Miami picked up the story, and then a day later the Associated Press picked it up.
KAS: And the story was that these terrible, evil White
people were actually mailing their views to attorneys around the state
and asking attorneys to join us, right?
UBELE: That's correct; that's exactly what was said. It was
a well-done letter, very professional, one page in length. It
introduced our organization and the things that we believe. We also
included a brochure with information about what we stand for and the
goals toward which we're working. Also in that brochure was an
application for membership. That really angered the establishment.
I remember that in several articles they referred to a picture that
was in the brochure as a "racist cartoon," when all that the
illustration showed was a White man standing on a podium, speaking. I
guess that constitutes a "racist cartoon."
KAS: Weren't they also rather upset that you used a public-domain list of attorneys for the state of Florida?
UBELE: Yes, that got on their nerves. I had bought the list
from the Florida Bar Association. The Bar had a two-page questionnaire
that asked what I was going to be doing with the list. I had to put
down like all my personal information on it as well.
KAS: What was the upshot of it all? Did they restrict access to the list from that point forward?
UBELE: Well, about four months later they retained an
attorney who had actually been a lawyer for George Bush during the 2000
presidential ballot debacle in south Florida. I forget the man's name
now, but the Florida Bar retained him to investigate how they could
restrict selling attorney's names to people -- not to people generally,
just people who are working for the interests of Whites. I'm not sure
how that panned out, because there were no follow-up stories in the
news.
KAS: I guess the only way to find out would be to try again to get the list and do another mailing.
UBELE: I was thinking about contacting them about that, but we're waiting at this point.
KAS: You and the Tampa Unit of National Vanguard have a lot
of projects going on. In fact, this coming weekend you're having yet
another event, is that correct?
UBELE: Yes, that's going to be our annual Yule Fest, which our Unit has been celebrating for at least the last ten years.
KAS: I know you have other events, too. You had the Summer
Solstice festival where I was very happy to be in attendance and gave a
speech, as did a number of other people from all over the continent.
You flew the "Love Your Race" banner above the Daytona 500 in the early
part of this year, too. Very impressive!
[ http://www.nationalvanguard.org/story.php?id=5465 ]
[ http://www.nationalvanguard.org/story.php?id=5622 ]
UBELE: We try to keep as active as we can. I think one good
thing about our Unit is that we have a good core of people who have a
lot of different abilities. Each of us kind of specializes, and that's
one thing that makes our Unit highly effective.
KAS: You have just written a book. What is the title?
UBELE: It's called Personal Finance for a Higher Purpose.
KAS: When I hear that title it reminds me of some of the
books that one might find on a Christian bookstore shelf; books about
how to make money and give more money to the church -- but this is not
really a religious book in the conventional sense, is it?
UBELE: No.
KAS: All right, then, what do you mean by "personal finance for a higher purpose"? What's the "higher purpose"?
UBELE: The book is written to show people how to save money,
how to be become more resourceful, and how to put their savings towards
pro-White political activism. That's the higher purpose: the salvation
of our race.
KAS: What led you to do this and what are your qualifications for delving into that field?
UBELE: For as long as I've been involved in the struggle
I've seen a real void in the area of personal finance. So many people
in our society generally -- and White nationalists especially -- just
don't grasp how to be successful in this area. I felt it was important
to write a book to help these people learn how to budget their money,
become more resourceful and disciplined, and thereby become more
politically active. One of the book's main goals is to show people how
to become more fiscally disciplined, so that they're not as dependent
on the system -- because I think that's one thing that holds many great
people back from becoming politically active. They know that if they
become active -- if their name appears in the newspaper or they appear
on television or speak on the radio -- that they'll lose their job. So
many people who could give so much to our cause let that hold them
back; that's what needs to stop.
As to my credentials, I worked for my father's construction company
for about nine years. It was a mid-sized company; we had about forty
employees for the entire period that I was there. I basically ran the
business, performing tasks ranging from accounting and bookkeeping to
marketing and advertising. I also handled inventory and purchasing and
did a lot of managing personnel. I would run the business in my
father's absence and I ran it a lot of the time when he was there, too,
so it really gave me a good grasp of just how a business operates and
how it should be operated.
KAS: So you've been an employee, you've run the family business, and now you are an independent businessman.
UBELE: Exactly.
KAS: By the way -- this is really off the subject -- but,
speaking about you and your background, when I put the search term
"Ubele" -- your last name -- into Google, the first thing that came up
was the article about you on the National Vanguard Tampa Web site.
Anybody looking up that name is going to find you first.
I know a lot of White people these days are living paycheck to
paycheck. Expenses are high, and the value of money keeps decreasing. I
think people have gotten into a materialistic cycle of working harder
and harder to get more and more material goods, and many of them depend
on debt financing to keep going from one month to the next. Instead of
building up independent wealth that could be used in the future to
break free of the system and free themselves from having to sell their
labor on a daily basis, they're building up the opposite. They're
building up debts that will keep them in financial chains and,
instead of becoming independently wealthy, they will be forced to
remain employees essentially forever. Debt forces them into this kind
of situation for the rest of their lives and they have very little to
pass on to their children. Do you see your ideas as a way out of that
trap?
UBELE: Totally. Whites in general don't really understand
what they're capable of. We are a race of greatness. I don't say that
to sound pompous or arrogant, but our ancestors did amazing things
throughout history and we are their descendants. We are of the same
blood as they, and we, too, can do great things. We underestimate what
we're capable of. So many people get used to working at a dead-end wage
job for their entire lives when they can really do greater things.
They're capable of giving to society and of making things better, but
they seem to just hit a dead end in their lives and keep on working at
what they know. It's like they just exist; I don't think there's any
other way to put it.
KAS: When someone reads this book what will they find in it? What will it do for them?
UBELE: At the very least it should give them a good
foundation of knowledge about how to write a budget and start budgeting
their money. That's the most important aspect of personal finance, but
fiscally disciplining oneself to follow a budget is the hard part.
People these days are caught up in "buy now, pay later" mentality and
they don't realize how detrimental it is to their financial well-being.
Besides the information on writing a budget and sticking to it, the
book has a lot of other ideas and tips, not only about how to save
money and about generating extra income, but also there's an entire
section on becoming politically active.
KAS: Do you mean advice on forming an organization and running that organization?
UBELE: Yes. I've come across so many books that were just
full of needless stuff. This is a short book based on an unconventional
way of thinking. Most books on personal finance run somewhere between
two and three hundred pages in length. I've read a lot of them and
there's only just so much that you're going to get from just one book,
so what they authors tend to do is fill it up the pages with a bunch of
stuff that really doesn't benefit the reader. This book is very
condensed. Everything that's in it is something that the reader will
find helpful. Whether it's about saving money, starting a garden,
writing a budget, becoming politically active or running for office,
everything's in there in a condensed form and it's powerful.
KAS: Writing a budget doesn't sound like a very exciting or romantic idea, but can it really do great things for your life?
UBELE: Yes, it can. As much as I don�t like to say it, our
world pretty much revolves around money. That sounds like a
superficial, materialistic thing to say, but it's the way our society's
become. However, this book is not about saving money to buy a new car
or new clothes, it's about saving money to enrich your own life -- to
start a business, to become independent of the system, and to put those
savings toward political activism or the funding of an organization. It
can enrich a person's life if they follow the exercises and they do the
worksheets and they stick to it.
KAS: So you can really save several hundred dollars a month by following the tips in your book?
UBELE: That claim sounds unfounded, but it's not and I can
explain it. Let's imagine that over a year's time an individual writes
a budget and sticks to it. That person may be able to start a business
-- plumbing, an electrical business, a handyman business, or anything
else you can imagine. As long as they stick to their budget and apply
it also to the business, there will be ways that they can take profits
from the business and save them. It's very easily to reach that level
of independence if you work at it. It goes back to two things --
self-discipline and ambition. Hopefully this book will awaken those two
qualities in its readers.
KAS: I see one tip in your book that I have followed
religiously. I buy almost all of my family's clothing at thrift stores.
In fact, since I discovered thrift stores, I've decided that people who
buy their clothes at the retail establishments are actually insane, and
I was insane to buy them there too. You can get essentially new
clothing -- clothing in perfect or almost perfect condition -- for
one-tenth or one-twentieth of what it would cost you in the other
stores.
UBELE: That's totally true, and some people will lean toward
following certain tips or certain parts of the book much more
religiously than others. I have a habit of shopping at thrift stores
for clothing, too. Sometimes I'll go to Ross or T. J. Maxx or even
K-Mart to buy a new shirt because I might not be able to find exactly
what I need at the thrift store, but the last time I visited a mall and
purchased a shirt from any of the name-brand stores was probably two or
three years ago.
KAS: What you need to shop at thrift stores is patience,
because, as you say, what you want might not be there today, but it
might be there tomorrow or next week. If you're just patient, you will
eventually be able to get it at a thrift store.
UBELE: Exactly. And there are certain thrift stores which
specialize in certain things. If you go to hospice thrift stores, you
can usually get good dress pants, dress jackets, polo shirts, and other
things of that kind. I've found that they don't have much of a kids'
line, but if you go to a Salvation Army store or and some of the other
ones you find a different selection. So, like you said, it's all about
shopping around.
KAS: Yes, and that patience seems to be the opposite of what
most people have today. They want to get exactly what they want right
now, but they pay a big premium for it; it's impulse buying, I think.
UBELE: That's exactly what it is and that's the way the
system has conditioned us. If you don't have the money to pay fifty
dollars for a pair of jeans, you put it on your Visa.
KAS: Right. There are many kinds of advice in your book, by
the way -- it's not just about thrift stores, but there's also
information about government surplus auctions, private auctions,
parlaying the little bits of money you get into big savings, about
preventing identity theft, making productive use of your spare time,
and even how to save money by going on cheap dates. You also have
information on how to start your own part-time or full-time business
with lots of tips on how to do it right and stay on the right side of
the law. And then you get into something that almost no personal
finance book gets into -- the subject of political activism. Can you
tell us how that links up with personal finance?
UBELE: It's not directly related, but I consider it
indirectly related. White nationalists are all working for the
salvation and progress of our people, so for those who save up a bunch
of money and want to make sure that our interests are represented,
there's Section Five, which is about political activism and forming and
maintaining a Unit and/or an organization. A lot of the things that
I've learned from my experiences over the last few years with the
organization as a whole and also with the local Units are described in
the book. Many other Units across the country haven't had the benefit
of the experiences I've had and they have to just grind through, making
mistakes. If you can learn from somebody else's mistakes then you're
far better off, and the ones I've made are among the lessons that I put
in that section.
KAS: You named the book Personal Finance for a Higher Purpose and obviously that higher purpose is furthered through political
activism, but clearly it's not just any political activism. Can you
tell us a little about what's really motivating you in your heart and
soul to get this book out to people and to get them to activate that
higher purpose in their life?
UBELE: It's really about one thing. We all see what's
happening to our race. We see what's happening to our country. And the
higher purpose is to set things right. It's much easier said than done,
of course -- but that's what we need to do. We need to work to build a
White community and build stronger links, not just socially, but
financially and politically, and we need to make sure that our
interests are represented.
Almost everybody thinks that the government is going to take care
of them. So many White people are conditioned into thinking that way.
But the government isn't taking care of us at all and neither are other
power structures. They're doing everything in their power to basically
wipe us off the face of the earth. That might seem a bit extreme, but
that's the way I see it and I think a lot of other people do as well.
Hopefully the book will inspire and motivate people to do the things
that need to be done, which is stand up for our interests.
KAS: Some people who are on our side, who say that they're
pro-White, are always saying that if anybody makes any money or makes a
profit -- for example, by selling pro-White books or through a
pro-White business that's doing well -- that somehow they're
"profiteers." Their attitude seems to be that we should all be monks up
in the hills somewhere, living on nothing and working for free. Our
enemies obviously don't look at themselves that way. I mean, I don't
see anybody on the Jewish side saying that Steven Spielberg should be a
pauper. They applaud him and his success, and the way he leverages his
profits into new projects that benefit Jews. I think we ought to have
the same attitude. I want every pro-White activist and every pro-White
leader to be a millionaire. I want them all to be tremendously
successful.
UBELE: I agree completely. Of course, you're always going to
have dissenters in any kind of movement, but those people who say those
things really don�t have a full understanding of what's going on or an
understanding of economics and our economic system.
KAS: We need to have powerful, prosperous individuals -- and
powerful, prosperous organizations working for our interests, with
profitable businesses as adjuncts, creating a powerhouse of a community
that can get what we want in this society. That's what you need to have power.
UBELE: You're totally right. It goes back to what I said about how money keeps this country running.
KAS: Well, as I said in one of my speeches recently, money
is like crystallized time, and our people are spending their time --
and through extension, their money -- on worthless things, harmful
things, garbage entertainment. They really ought to be spending -- or
at least tithing -- their money and their lives for their race, but
they're not doing that.
[ http://www.nationalvanguard.org/story.php?id=6540 ]
UBELE: No, there's been an absolute corruption of the value
system that Whites used to have, and we need to fix that.
Unfortunately, this task has been left to our generation and, of
course, the next one; we're the ones who have to deal with all this.
We need to realize that things aren't going to get better by
themselves. The economy's not going to get better, the country's not
going to get better, and really the way to get started on the path to
victory is to become stronger as a White community and as an economic
community. That's our task and that's what we need to set out to do.
KAS: I think that Personal Finance for a Higher Purpose can help people do that. I talk about "tithing" -- giving a tithe of
your time and a tithe of your money. I think it would be easy,
following the instructions and the worksheets in your book, to save ten
percent of one's income. I think that's a very modest estimate, and
that ten percent could be invested in helping our cause grow.
UBELE: I totally agree. There are some people who may be able to save as much as forty, fifty, maybe even sixty percent of their take-home pay and they just don't realize it. I'll
give you an example. I have a friend who lives with his mother. He
makes like thirty-eight thousand dollars a year and I know he takes
home at least twenty-nine thousand of it. He goes drinking every
weekend and he just wastes a ton of money. For him it would be
extremely easy to save fifteen thousand, maybe even twenty thousand a
year. Hopefully he'll read my book -- because he has a copy of it --
and he'll put it to good use.
KAS: One of the things that prevents people from
accumulating wealth is debt. Can you give me your thoughts on consumer
debt, and debt in general, in our society?
UBELE: I think debt is an evil thing. It doesn't help people
at all; it just binds them and ties them down, and it's only getting
worse.
I'll give you an example. I�m 27 and my grandparents were born in
the 1920s. Young Americans of their generation would live in an
apartment for a few years and save up some money. Then they'd have a
house built -- and it would be completely paid for; they'd own it free
and clear.
For my parents' generation, it was normal to live in an apartment
for a few years and save up some money, then make a big down payment on
a house -- maybe twenty-five, thirty percent of the cost.
Now my generation has trouble coming up with even three or four
percent of the purchase price of a property, and in a lot of cases
properties are so unaffordable that we can't even come up with one
percent.
I think that something that all Whites should strive for is to become as debt-free as they possibly can, and that should be the goal, because if you can eliminate debt, or at least a majority of it,
then you're far better off than the general population, and as you said
and as I've said, it's not that hard to do. It takes a little bit of
sacrifice and a little bit of discipline, but it really goes a long
way.
KAS: How can one get hold of Personal Finance for a Higher Purpose?
UBELE: All you have to do is go to our Unit's Web site, natvantampa.com and click on "Unit Store" in the sidebar, scroll all the way down to
the bottom of the page, then click the book link and place your order.
KAS: How much does the book cost?
UBELE: The book is six dollars, plus two dollars for shipping, so it's eight dollars total.
KAS: For those of our listeners who might not be on the Internet at this moment, is there a postal address for ordering the book?
UBELE: They can make their check payable to National
Vanguard Tampa Unit, and write to P. O. Box 7732, St. Petersburg FL
33734, U.S.A.
[ http://natvantampa.com/the_unit_store.htm ]
KAS: Well, I want to thank you for all the things that
you're doing in the National Vanguard Tampa Unit. I want to thank you
for writing Personal Finance for a Higher Purpose. I was
privileged to read one of the advance copies, and I can say it is a
very fine book. I highly recommend it, and I believe that if one has
the discipline to follow the suggestions in it, it will really improve
the reader's life -- whether or not he chooses to use some of the money
he gains for political purposes. We hope he does, but in any case it
can certainly help him to stop wasting the hours of his precious life.
I really think that that is your gift, John, to the reader, and I
deeply appreciate your doing that.
UBELE: Thank you. I appreciate your having me on the show,
Kevin. It's been a great experience and I hope that people realize that
time is short and we need to get active.
KAS: Well, let's get active and let's get successful! I thank you for being a guest on American Dissident Voices, John -- thanks a lot.
* * * * * *
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