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Posted on 11/16/2007 7:30:20 PM PST by traviskicks
As if Ron Paul's supporters needed any more motivation to storm the battlements and wreak havoc on the Republican presidential primary, now comes this: the feds are trying to take away their money.
Federal agents on Wednesday raided the Evansville, Indiana headquarters of the National Organization for the Repeal of the Federal Reserve and Internal Revenue Codes (NORFED), an organization of "sound money" advocates that for the past decade has been selling what it calls Liberty Dollars, a private currency it says is backed by silver and gold stored in Idaho, with a total of more than $20 million in circulation, according to the group.
NORFED officials said yesterday that the raid occurred just as they were preparing to mail out the first batch of about 60,000 "Ron Paul Dollars," copper coins sold for $1 and decorated with the craggy visage of Paul, the libertarian Texas congressman, Iraq war opponent and sound-money advocate who has sparked a surprisingly vigorous insurgent campaign for the GOP nomination. The group says that it in recent months it already shipped out about 10,000 in silver Ron Paul dollars that sold for $20.
(Excerpt) Read more at blog.washingtonpost.com ...
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Bump
The way that I understand it, the FBI et al is investigating NORFED for money laundering, wire fraud and mail fraud.
Strange really, first Egold now Norfed.
Were they pegging it to the national Dollar?
No, they were offering them for private barter, they had denominations on them, but they are basically worth whatever one is willing to take in trade for them.
Sort of like those gift certificates only backed by silver instead of WalMart.
If what you are saying is true, I’m not calling you a liar BTW, then their actions should be perfectly legal. It seems that hippies often overlook other currency related issues and they probably got busted for one of them.
Biased much, WaPo?
Perhaps, wire fraud generally requires some element of well..fraud...these weren’t fraudulent, their value was strictly barter, and they were worth whatever one decided that they were worth.
Liberty Dollar one-ounce silver and gold rounds have been minted and sold since 1998.
Funny that the raid took place less than a month after the government’s motion to dismiss a lawsuit filed by the Liberty Dollar corporation against them was denied, eh?
Why bother to fight someone in court when you can intimidate and bankrupt them with a stroke of the pen?
“Funny that the raid took place less than a month after the government’s motion to dismiss a lawsuit filed by the Liberty Dollar corporation against them was denied, eh?”
That’s very interesting—and disgusting.
That's the nice thing about being a Fed - never having to say you're sorry. You can destroy a man financially with trumped-up charges - or murder his son and his wife - and get a promotion when all is said and done.
They drew fire for the simple reason of putting USA, $20, and TWENTY DOLLARS on their coins. This was a stupid and pointless thing to do. I have plenty of one ounce "silver rounds" made by at least a dozen mints, and they just say "one ounce fine silver" and contain some decorative artwork. What they don't say is "DOLLARS" or "$".
For those of you who don't know about private silver coins, they are like gold Krugerrands or gold Liberty Eagles, except they are silver, obviously, and not gold. You buy them at coin dealers for a set % above that day's quoted spot price. Currently that would be $14.53/ounce, plus the dealers commission, which might be 3 or 4%, depending on the amount of them you purchase etc. (I bought a bunch at between $8 and $10.) There's absolutely no problem with buying and selling these various silver coins, because they are just what they say they are, and no more: one ounce of fine silver.
(Actually, they weigh 1.1 troy ounces, the extra is hardening alloy, but exactly one ounce of pure silver is in them.)
Heaven forfend! Private citizens protest what they see as government tyranny with non-violent, by-most-accounts-perfectly legal creative action? Sounds downright American, to me.
There is no problem with buying and selling these silver bullion coins, for that's all they are: bullion.
Interestingly, at the founding of our country, a "dollar" was meant specifically to denote an exact weight of silver, based on the most common silver coin circulating in the colonies, the Spanish "Piece of Eight." That is, a dollar just meant "a coin created by the U.S. mint containing as much silver as a Spanish piece of eight." IOW, a dollar was an amount of silver.
Over the past 200+ years, this understanding of the word "dollar" has been debased and bastardized until it has lost its original meaning, and a dollar is just a paper fiat bill, backed by nothing but the faith and credit (sic) of the U.S. govt.
Quite so. But I don't think the Ron Paul dollars minters would be in trouble if they had left off the "TWENTY DOLLARS" along with "$20" and "USA" all on one face of their coins. That was begging for trouble to no purpuse.
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