Any power not delegated to the Federal government by the Constitution belongs to the states. “…To coin Money, regulate the Value thereof, and of foreign Coin, and fix the Standard of Weights and Measures…” Article I, Section 8. A simple look at history and the constitutional convention debates will show that the choice of the word “coin” (as opposed to print) was no oversight. The massive inflation caused by printing Continentals during the Revolution, as well as every other fiat currency throughout the history of the colonies, showed our founding fathers the need to abstain from paper money. And alas, they were right. A mere 16 years after the Federal Reserve Act was passed, we had the worth depression in history, FDR stole everyone’s gold, and we’ve since been saddled with a dollar that’s worth about 4 cents what it was then.

Most Constitutionalists usually know a little about history, too.

At Bretton Woods in 1944 the US was #1 in Gold Reserves, #1 in Manufacturing, Large Oil and Natural Gas Prospects, the strongest military, A stronger rule of law and financial institutions and traditions that merited confidence. The leader of the “global economy” was placed in our hands. Great for our financial institutions and political leaders. But…power corrupts. Today we our no longer a leader in manufacturing, Research and development is follwing the same path. Our military is tied up in two gureilla wars, our natural resources are depleted, our political and financial leadership is corrupt and no longer respected. Our grip on the “global economy” is slipping as more countries no longer want to use our dollar as the reserve country. With good leadership this wouldn’t have happened. But power corrupts as it always has. Our leaders have concentrated on military and financial power at the expense of everything else. If we maintained our manufacturing and development leadership other countries would still be willing to follow us. As we have nothing but our military power and our historical role as global finance leader…most countries are seeing us for the hollow shell that we are. Our days are numbered. But this is what history tells us. Empires rise and fall and are replaced by the next empire. China? India? Who knows…You will know the passing of the baton is near when the latest products and scientific breakthroughs are coming from Asia instead of the US. There is a false belief that Americans are naturally intuitive as part of our culture and the Asians are not capable of being inventive!!! This is nonsense. Most of our talented scientist are imigrated Asians. They are already doing the heavy lifting, they have just been doing it here. They came here because this is where the most money and work was being done. Many of Asias most talented engineers and scientists are staying put now. It is only a matter of time. You can only run the world on a printing press and by the barrel of a gun for so long. The rest of the world is turning away from us. The smartest thing any American can do right now is buy gold and silver.

“In the absence of the gold standard, there is no way to protect savings from confiscation through inflation. There is no safe store of value. If there were, the government would have to make its holding illegal, as was done in the case of gold. If everyone decided, for example, to convert all his bank deposits to silver or copper or any other good, and thereafter declined to accept checks as payment for goods, bank deposits would lose their purchasing power and government-created bank credit would be worthless as a claim on goods. The financial policy of the welfare state requires that there be no way for the owners of wealth to protect themselves.

This is the shabby secret of the welfare statists’ tirades against gold. Deficit spending is simply a scheme for the confiscation of wealth. Gold stands in the way of this insidious process. It stands as a protector of property rights. If one grasps this, one has no difficulty in understanding the statists’ antagonism toward the gold standard.”
Alan Greenspan
1967

“By a Continuing Process Of Inflation, Governments Can Confiscate, Secretly And Unobserved, An Important Part Of The Wealth Of Their Citizens”
John Maynard Keynes

But by the way, I find nothing hilarious or outlandish about having the federal government grant letters of marque & reprisal. I think taking such an action could have been a useful tool in taking care of Bin Laden.

1) It refers to the STATES, not the Federal government – it’s in a section entitled “Restrictions on State Powers.”

2) The same clause authorizes letters of marque & reprisal…so I’m heading to the courthouse to get my privateering paperwork done so I can sail the high seas plundering our enemies’ vessels.

How many people who claim to be Constitutionalists are really just following whatever they’re being told, and how many just have issues with reading comprehension?

Just my .02

Gold and silver are completely manipulated on the world market, thanks to the plunge protection team (PPT) and can’t be trusted — see http://www.gata.org for verification on this.

Southeast Asia securities and foreign property investment (anywhere Americans will have to move to, to be able to afford retirement and healthcare outside the US) are the only real reliable sources of future income, going forward.

Cash out your home equity while you still can. Liquidate your assets. Get out of US dollars entirely. The plan seems to be to make the US dollar worthless, to ensure a smooth transition over to the North American Union “Amero” currency. The Amero will likely be backed by digital gold, which will be yet another form of fiat money (vulnerable to Fed-induced inflation).

1. If you want cheaper silver, buy silver. Liberty Dollar costs more because of the expense of it’s design to be a currency (rather than a bulk commodity)

2. If you want a currency that doesn’t encourage BIG Govt, non-backed fiat and the semi private Federal Reserve, you’ve not much choise than to use LD. Have you ever tried to negotiated a trade wiht a PLAIN silver round? Even in a post catastrophe or hyper inflation I think a more fairly denominated silver round will do better than the plain ones or the silly denomination of “ONE Dollar” Federal ones.

3. TIPS??? Sure, IF you trust the Govt’s inflation measure more than thousands of years of Silver as money.

4. and sheeeesh dude!!!you need READ the Constitution!! it clearly states “NO STATE shall make anything but GOLD AND SILVER a TENDER”

5. Who benefits from The Liberty Dollar??
Holders benefitted greatly since 1998 since it started, LOOK at a silver price chart.
Business who accept them get new customers and make a commission using LD.
Customers get a bit of BEAUTIFUL silver occasionally as they choose. it’s gone up in value and is a nice value holder for future. Many many people have LEARNED and had fun by TALING about using REAL money. (even today, Law dictionary’s define real money as “precious metal or gold and silver” and Federal Reserve notes as “evidence of debt”. Many customers even get a discount for using LD and/or buy it from www LibertyDollar ORG direct at a discount, saving money shopping at LD merchants.

To say money should not be a commodity is fine,IF it were by FREE Choice. Money wouldn’t NEED the force of LAW if as you claim, fiat were superior! Silver as money ensures’ it’s continued supply, it does not make it “dissapear” as you seem to think. For you to assume current per ounce prices off to the future is not proper, even ONE OUNCE of silver could be a worlds’ supply of money if denominated in millionths of an ounce. so THAT argument is irrelevant too

So, Finally, CHOICE is important in a FREE Society, we don’t stop YOU from using Federal Reserve notes (just because we occasionally use silver), please don’t encourage our Govt to continue to stop us from using Silver!! via such strong attacks.

but THANK YOU very much for listening and letting me react to your article!!