An Empire Built of Paper (Paleo Barf Alert)

The American Conservative ^ | March 27, 2006 | Llewellyn H. Rockwell Jr.

[peyton randolph]

-snip-

The president moves about like Caesar Augustus, with a vast, graded court of civil and military aides, doctors, secretaries, valets, hairdressers, makeup artists, bodyguards, drivers, baggage handlers, cooks, food tasters, Praetorian guards, snipers, centurions, bulletproof limos, a portable hospital, and an armored rostrum. And that’s when he travels in the U.S.

-snip-

After all, the long-term mean value of paper currency is zero. Is the dollar magic, so that it is permanently immune from the norm? For the last 100 years, it has lost value more quickly than the Roman denarius after Nero.

-snip-

[peyton randolph]

Any chance of getting "The American Conservative" mag to change its name to "The American Moonbat?"

[tlj18]

This is hardly being a Moonbat. This is very serious stuff. Think about it - dollar bills have virtually no intristic value. If no one will accept it, it has virtually no value. And why should anyone accept it anyway? Once the US is no longer a world power, the dollar will crumble.

[Spirochete]

Portions of the article are lucid, then it degenerates into moonbat mode before acending back into reason, then dips back into battiness again.

[proxy_user]

The value of the dollar is based on the total output of the US economy. That is not nothing, nor is it as much as it might be. Other countries have problems too. Relatively, we're holding our own.

[Publius]

The barf alert is neither necessary, nor wise. The author has overstated his case in places, but I agree with 90% of it.

I've been familiar with William Bonner's writing since the days of "Strategic Investment" in the Eighties, when he and James Dale Davidson were working together. (Read Davidson's The Great Reckoning and The Sovereign Individual if you're looking for penetrating insights into our economic future.) Bonner correctly foresaw the collapse of the Soviet Union when people like Kissinger were saying that it was stable enough to last another two centuries. I'm going to have to read his book.

[tlj18]

Well, I agree with the crux of the article, but the geopolitics in the article is a little too extreme for me. But, after all, this is Buchanan's magazine.

The same Buchanan who said last year that World War II wasn't worth fighting.

American isolationism went the way of the dinosaur with World War II. Isolation is no longer possible. Unless you want to model ourselves after North Korea...

[mkjessup]

Once the US is no longer a world power, the dollar will crumble.

As long as the dollar is backed by those other rare metals like uranium and plutonium, specifically backed by the metals used in the construction of Trident D-5 missiles, Minuteman and MX, the U.S. will ALWAYS be a world power.

When the U.S. economy sneezes, the rest of the damn world catches a cold.

Remember that.

[voteconstitutionparty]

Thanks for posting this. I enjoyed reading it, and I don't feel the least bit nauseous.

[Arthur McGowan]

Sorry, but what you've just said is meaningless. There is no connection between the Dollar and the U.S. economy. The U.S. Government can create as many Dollars as it pleases. No limit on this Dollar-creation is imposed by "the U.S. economy." It is when there is the proper POLITICAL motive that the U.S. Government WILL make the Dollar worthless. There is no economic force that can or will prevent that hyperinflation, when the POLITICAL motive to hyperinflate exists.

[starbase]

Well I don't share his financial credentials, but the very broadly stated emotional hyperbole used is a distraction from the message. From the book:

The average American reacted just as the average Roman had reacted. When the purple was hoisted, he stood up and saluted. It made him feel like a big shot. If Americans were bossing people around in Asia or the Middle East, it made him feel more important. His homeland team was winning all over the world.

Generalizing, and heavily condescending. There's also mockery:

There is no inherent reason that a plumber with a U.S. flag pin should earn more than one with a crescent moon.

They may have good monetary insights, but these writers are emotionally bitter, and that must color their analysis. They seem to view Americans as idiot boors. The writers seem to be in love with a simple immediately post-colonial concept of Republican America which is, naturally, never coming back. The word "resentful" springs to mind.

I think the writers spend a lot of time in ivory towers of various sorts.

Having said that, however, I think I will also buy their book, and mine it for insights while filtering out the condescension.