A Debt That Will Never Be Repaid - The USA Defaulting on Its Debts?

Whiskey & Gunpowder By Gary Gibson January 7, 2011
Baltimore, Maryland, U.S.A.

As you read this, the U.S. government owes just a sliver under $14 trillion dollars to various suckers who’ve lent it money. And it wants to borrow more.

Timothy Geithner warned that a failure to raise the debt limit would mean the government would not be able to make the payments on the current debt in the very near future.

Consult the official record and you’ll read that the U.S. has never defaulted on its obligations. That’s technically true…but then what about when France’s prime minister Charles de Gaulle politely asked the U.S. to hand over the gold it promised was backing the U.S. dollars held by France and other nations?

“No gold for you!” Nixon was heard to say. That’s because the U.S. had printed a lot of dollars in order to pay for Lyndon Johnson’s social programs and war (among other things). There was no way that the ratio of dollars to gold held by the U.S. was still anywhere near an amount that would support the official $35/oz.

What was the real price of gold with all those extra dollars floating around? Who knows? But when they were allowed to own gold again beginning in 1974 Americans bid gold up to over $887/oz in just six years.

Nixon knew back in 1971 that there was no way the U.S. could make good on the dollar at the official rate. The official rate was a lie. If every yahoo with $35 U.S. were to show up at the gold window then, only a small percentage of them would get their gold. So Nixon “closed the gold window.”

But a default by any other name apparently isn’t really a default.

And now Mr. Geithner tells us that in order not to default, the U.S. government has to take on more debt.

Remember, there are certain ways government gets purchasing power…

Steal it directly by openly taxing its subjects (on income, payrolls, transactions, imports, exports, etc)…

Steal it sneakily through currency debasement (inflate paper money supply or clip the coins).

Borrow it.

Number three really isn’t really income, however. And it often leads to number two.

Geithner just admitted that if the U.S. doesn’t borrow more than the current debt ceiling allows, the government wouldn’t be able to meet its obligations. When you can’t pay for your expenses — including the interest on the debt you already owe — is it really a good idea to borrow more?

Maybe you should cut up the credit card, move to a smaller apartment, sell the car and take public transportation, stop eating out so much…any of these things in any combination would help. Borrowing more to fund your lifestyle doesn’t make the list. It just guarantees there will be even more pain to reckon with later.

Borrowing is what got them in this jam. Raising the debt ceiling at this point is about as healthy as having the credit card company extend an individual more credit when he already owe more than he can make in a year.

Some would say not to worry so much. Sure, the national debt is unthinkably high in absolute terms, but as a percentage of GDP the debt isn't as bad as it was right after WWII. And, say, didn’t the national debt go to zero briefly under President Jackson?

Today the choices for dealing with the debt are pretty simple…

…They raise income by stealing more in taxes, less money is available for business investment and tax revenues ultimately fall.

…They lower expenditures and the net tax recipients could get violent.

…They default honestly and the dollar falls hard and fast.

…They default sneakily by creating new money to monetize the debt and the dollar falls slowly at first...and then hard and fast.

Or they could just raise the debt ceiling and let the next couple of generations worry about it.

They’ll probably just raise the ceiling. They'll put off the day of reckoning. Who wants to contend with currency collapse and hyperinflationary chaos today? Let it be on our children's heads...and that of our children's children.

Regards,
Gary Gibson
Managing Editor, Whiskey & Gunpowder

P.S.: Agora Financial executive publisher Addison Wiggin composed a letter to Harry Reid about raising the debt ceiling. We’ll be passing that along later today so you can take a look at it.

I’m sure you’ll find it very useful reading. Especially since Addison is going to be making a special offer…

A Debt That Will Never Be Repaid is featured at Whiskey & Gunpowder.

Nothing in this e-mail should be considered personalized investment advice. Although our employees may answer your general customer service questions, they are not licensed under securities laws to address your particular investment situation. No communication by our employees to you should be deemed as personalized investment advice. We expressly forbid our writers from having a financial interest in any security recommended to our readers. All of our employees and agents must wait 24 hours after on-line publication or 72 hours after the mailing of a printed-only publication prior to following an initial recommendation. Any investments recommended in this letter should be made only after consulting with your investment advisor and only after reviewing the prospectus or financial statements of the company.

Tiny Rare Earth Mining Company Scoops:“The $58 Billion Mining Coup of the Century”

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When the news hits mainstream, this penny stock should go ballistic and early investors could pocket 1,443% gains by January 31.

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The Infestation of Corporate Lobbyists

The response is extraordinary.

Public Citizen supporters across the country are answering my urgent call for financial support with incredible generosity.

We’re pulling out all the stops to challenge corporate power from the moment the new Congress convenes in early January.

In the next four days—before the clock strikes midnight this Friday, December 31—we must reach our $150,000 goal to have a fighting chance against the infestation of corporate lobbyists in Washington, D.C.!

Please contribute $10, $20, $35 or whatever you can right now.

From winning the fight that created the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, to mobilizing more than half a million people in support of a constitutional amendment to overturn the Supreme Court’s Citizens United v. FEC ruling, we’ve done good and great things this year.

Your online activism has been instrumental to the success we’ve achieved together. Now, as we prepare to take on a Congress more beholden to corporate greed than any in recent memory, I’m asking you to supplement your grassroots advocacy with financial support.

We can’t afford to face the new Congress wishing we had done more to strengthen our defenses. Contribute today!

We can’t do what we do without your grassroots advocacy. But we can’t organize and coordinate that grassroots effort without your generous support.

We need to raise $150,000 by midnight this Friday so that corporate lobbyists don’t get even one day’s head start in the new Congress.

Corporate lobbyists have risen to a new level of influence in Washington. They’re not just raising money for members of Congress, they’re joining congressional staffs and writing the very laws that directly benefit their former, and future, employers.

For example, Speaker of the House-elect John Boehner—who once handed out checks from tobacco company PACs on the House floor—hired the chief lobbyist for the medical device industry as his policy director. This example of the “revolving door” is representative of the pro-corporate mindset that dominates the Republican Party and even many Democrats.

Stand with Public Citizen against this corporate faction by contributing $10, $20, $35 or whatever you can.

There’s no question, we’re going to have to work in a more hostile political environment. But Public Citizen has met challenges like this in the past. We took on Nixon. We took on Reagan. We took on Bush. Both of them. And we consistently won substantive reforms and protections that make life better for ordinary Americans like you and me.

Public Citizen’s strength comes from the grassroots activism and financial generosity of our members. I want to thank you for all you’ve contributed by staying informed and taking action as part of our online community. And I want you to know that I’m counting on your financial support, too.

We will do this.

Together.

Robert Weissman, President

P.S. Contribute $100 or more right now and we’ll send you a DVD from a selection of progressive films like Battle in Seattle, An Unreasonable Man and The Story of Stuff as our thanks for your support.

To get regular e-alerts about opportunities for activism and other ways to help with Public Citizen's work, sign up for the Public Citizen Action Network.

Celebrating 2 Christmas Family Traditions: Eating and Texas Hold 'Em!!

Happy Holidays,Facebook Social Network Blog Readers!

If your Christian, Merry Christmas!
If your Jewish, Happy Hanukah!
If you are Muslim, Happy Islamic New Year!

If you are African-American, Happy Kwanza! (Some of you get double the fun!)

And if your Atheist.... this is some pretty crappy weather we are having huh?
Regardless of how you spent the holidays, we hope you enjoyed it surrounded by those you love.
Jose Feliciano - Feliz Navidad



Christmas Songs - We Wish You a Merry Christmas Lyrics

The Descent of Money

Bill Bonner [Reckoning on January 29, 2010 from Paris, France]

Science and technology have produced many wondrous breakthroughs. But there are some things it cannot improve. A kiss from natural lips is still the lover's choice. Baby formula proved no match for the real thing. Ersatz money is a flop too. That last item is not so much a fact as a prediction.

The first modern competition between gold and paper money ended like the pre-modern ones. Gold won. Herewith, a short summary:

A rogue, John Law, was the protagonist of the story. He killed Beau Wilson in a duel. Then, he went on the lam...first to Scotland...then to Amsterdam...and finally to Paris. Like Alan Greenspan or Ben Bernanke, he made himself useful to people in high places - in this case the Duke d'Orleans, who needed money. Law had a way to get it:

"I have discovered the secret of the philosophers' stone," he is said to have remarked, "it is to make gold out of paper."

We need to look no further. Law may have been good with figures; it was at philosophy that he failed. A thing cannot be both one thing and a different thing at the same time. It is either gold. Or it is paper. Rarity and durability give gold value - as money. Paper's most conspicuous properties are just the opposite - it is common...and has a tendency to curl up and blow away.

Law's new, easy money helped France to an economic recovery - or so it seemed. But in the end, the philosophical error caught up with him. Gold has real value. If you can create it at will, why not create more of it? It was just a matter of time before he had created too much. Soon, there was an angry mob outside Law's office on the Rue Quincampoix. People who held his paper gold had come to see it in a different light. Where once they cherished it as paper gold...now they despised it as nothing but paper.

Law's scheme increased France's money supply - including banknotes and shares in his Mississippi company - by 300%. Prices in Paris doubled between 1718 and 1720. Then, when the new money system began to give way, the Duke d'Orleans "cranked up the printing press." By 1721, Law's money was worthless. "Banque" was a dirty word in France for the next 200 years.

The current experiment with paper money began on the 15th of August 1971. Henceforth, said Richard Nixon, foreign countries that wished to exercise their right to trade US dollars for gold could drop dead. From that point forward, the dollar was worth only what someone would give you for it. Philosophers held their breath. But nothing happened. Many have died since, waiting for the dollar to succumb first. Still, the millstones of monetary history may grind slowly, but the more slowly they grind, the more fingers they pinch.

The new paper money standard allowed for a worldwide credit boom - just as in Paris following the establishment of Law's scheme. The US created dollars. Its citizens spent them. The dollars accumulated as reserves all over the world...and every central bank raced to keep up. Soon, the exporters were producing too much. The importers were consuming too much. And there was too much money and credit everywhere.

The Japanese economy was the first to blow up - in 1989. The tech sector on Wall Street was next to go - in 1999. Finally, in 2007, the planet-wide bubble popped. Suddenly, the whole world was Japan. And now, every nation in Christendom, to say nothing of the others, is following Law's example. All issue paper gold - in the form of bills, notes, and bonds - as if they were the Banque Royale. Europe is estimated to need $2.2 trillion in deficit funding this year. America will need at least a trillion more. If the depression deepens, maybe $2 trillion. How long can this go on? Where will it lead?

"There are no means of avoiding the final collapse of a boom brought about by credit expansion," wrote Ludwig von Mises. "The alternative is only whether the crisis should come sooner as a result of voluntary abandonment of further credit expansion, or later as a final and total catastrophe of the currency system involved."

On Tuesday, the S&P rating agency issued a warning. If Japan continues in the direction it is going, it will have Hell to pay. Japan leads the way into the future. And into a monetary minefield. Her current deficit - a record - is more than her tax revenue. And her public debt is nearly 7 times as great. Her feet grow larger.

No natural life survives the lifecycle. And no paper currency standard has ever survived a complete credit cycle. It is just a matter of time until we hear the explosion and see body parts flying.

Regards,

Bill Bonner,
for The Daily Reckoning

Joel's Note: Addison tells us they're putting the final touches on a collection of Bill's various reckonings from over the past decade, titled "Dice Have No Memory: Big Bets and Bad Faith from Paris to the Pampas." At this stage, we're looking at a March release. Keep a look out for it.

The Religion of Consumerism: Continuing a holiday tradition, even if it’s fiscally imprudent

Joel Bowman
From Buenos Aires, Argentina...

Cricket in the park...beers in the sun...outdoor cafes and pretty girls in summer dresses. We're getting an early jump on the holiday season here at The Daily Reckoning...at least so far as it's conducted south of the equator.

Last year your editor celebrated the occasion with Buddhist friends in the Far East. The year before, with Hindus in Mumbai. And before that, with Muslims in the Middle East. This weekend, we'll have Catholic buddies around for an Argentine asado. We'll drink Malbec and yerba maté and listen to Carlos Gardel belt out some old classics from the rooftop terrace.

That's the wonderful thing about the holiday season. It's a time of year when people of all faiths set aside their differences to worship a common higher purpose: the religion of consumerism. Flocks of all colors and creeds make their annual pilgrimages to consumerism's many temples - sometimes known as "malls" - to prostrate themselves at the discount aisle and to sacrifice the balance of their credit cards. Indeed, people who don't even believe in Jesus Christ or the virgin birth can still be found queuing up for two-for-one tie sales and half- off kitchen appliance clearances. We remember reading somewhere, a highly regarded scientific journal perhaps, that the sound of the collective global credit card swipe around this time of year is audible even in the outer reaches of space.

"But wait a minute," we hear some Fellow Reckoners complain. "Isn't this precisely how we arrived in this mess in the first place? By overspending on junk we didn't need and couldn't afford? Shouldn't we be paying down our debts and practicing some fiscal responsibility?"

Oh bah humbug! Don't be such a Grinch! Nobody likes a stickler for inconvenient facts while the eggnog is still flowing.

Besides, Christmas isn't about spending money we don't have on things we don't need...it's about spending money we don't have on things other people don't need. The net effect might be the same, but at least the soundtrack to financial ruin is a feel-good one.

Christmas is also a time to gather with friends and family and to reflect on the year gone by. Who got married? Who graduated? Which currency narrowly escaped collapse? That sort of thing.

With that in mind, we present the first installment of our 2010 Daily Reckoning "Best Of" Series. Your editors sifted through both the column archives and the reader mail to come up with a selection of essays that, we hope, provide you with some interesting discussion topics for your holiday season family gatherings.

First, let's go back to the beginning...

Way back in January, Bill Bonner penned the following essay, a kind of "ghost of currencies past," if you will. Please enjoy and send your comments to the address below...
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