On Mon, 2004-12-06 at 16:10 -0800, Jay P Hailey wrote: > http://www.strike-the-root.com/4/herman/herman35.html > > Money--Funny, Scary, Paper Money
No, we are not headed that way. Douglas only thinks we might be because he doesn't have a good command of the situation, and the historical changes in global currencies. I have yet to see someone who has a good grasp on what is going on, and why, combined with historical knowledge (not just tidbits, but the details and why-fors!) believe we are headed that way. Now to deal with some specifics. Douglas wrote: Paper money must have either a foundation of precious metal to back it up--or government integrity for fiscal responsibility in the eyes of financial leaders. When both are lacking, that currency is doomed. Actually, we've lived through several period where neither of these existed, but the currency in question did not fail. Truth is, there wasn't a gold standard when we went off of it. There were, and are, however "market" controls through international agreements. These non- market effects eventually caused the failure of the system(s). Just as we are seeing today. No more. "For the last thirty years, since Nixon closed the gold window, the world has been on a paper money system. Never before has the world tried such a risky venture, and now dark clouds are gathering on the horizon," wrote Bill Haynes. Bill Haynes, again, doesn't know what he's talking about. Lemme clue you in on what was really going on. During the days of the so-called "gold standard", countries routinely left the gold standard in times such as war or internal conflict or "great need". Indeed, it was standard practice to do so. Further, the "gold standard" was regulated in gold- prices. Seems too many forget, or never learned, this. If you care to research this, google for "Brent Woods system". The phrase "what you didn't know" will likely come to mind as you learn what the vast public didn't know. No conspiracy, as they did it in the open it is just that nobody paid any attention to it. http://www.iie.com/publications/papers/bergsten0702.htm Is from 2002. Pay particular attention to the historical comparisons and the true consideration of the dollar value. One of the underlying points is that the problem is in resisting the correction of the dollar. as that resistance is finally allowed to die, things will actually improve, not deteriorate as the fear-mongers proclaim. Sure, some people will not do as well as others (hmm the word "duh!" comes to mind for some reason), but overall we'll see improvement. Sadly, I've been arguing this point pretty much solidly the last few weeks (when one of my CPUs wasn't on the fritz) and don't have much energy to put into it again anew. In summary, economists are wrong when they say there will be a sudden fall of the dollar and resulting chaos, yadda, yadda, yadda. Part of that is the "academic" and FRB/IMF economists' preoccupation with overarching numbers that by definition do not take a multitude of things into account. Part is also due to the public not paying any attention to economists unless they are predicting doom. Perhaps I'll have energy after the first of the year to summarize better and drop it on the web somewhere. Cheers, Bill _______________________________________________ Libnw mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] List info and subscriber options: http://immosys.com/mailman/listinfo/libnw Archives: http://immosys.com/mailman//pipermail/libnw
