Posted: Sep. 18, 2011 | 2:01 a.m.
It's tempting to say that in vending machines today, a Coke now costs $1. But the four quarters you're shoving into the slot consist mostly of copper and contain not a smidgen of silver, so your mistake lies in believing those four copper sandwich slugs are worth a dollar.
Go to a pawnshop or coin store today and try to buy four battered, old "common-date" pre-1965 silver quarters. You'll pay at least $29 in greenbacks, and that's only because those four quarters collectively contain not a full ounce of silver, but only .72 ounces.
That means, compared to 1964, the buying power of a paper dollar is now three cents.
As the dollar approaches the value of the currency of Zimbabwe, Americans are going to need some alternative form of currency. Or did you think it was going to be easy to trade your services as a cocktail waitress to your dentist in exchange for getting a cavity filled?
Bernard Von NotHaus checked with the federal government to make sure there was nothing illegal about his plan to mint and sell one-ounce silver rounds. "No problem," they told him. Then they arrested him, seized his silver and gold to a value of millions of "dollars," and put him in prison, supposedly for counterfeiting.
Now, Coin World magazine reports anyone out there holding such a silver round may find it subject to confiscation. (http://tinyurl.com/42gsnk6)
Jill Rose, chief of the criminal division for the U.S. attorney's office in Charlotte, N.C., told Coin World Aug. 24 that the Liberty Dollar medallions are contraband, even if they're being exhibited for educational purposes.
Rose, who served as lead prosecutor in the Von NotHaus case, said "because Von NotHaus' conviction included violations of Sections 485 and 486 of Title 18 of the United States Code, the Liberty dollar medallions were determined to be counterfeits, contraband and subject to seizure," Coin World reported.
After all, because these rounds bear the legend "Liberty Dollar," some poor sap might get duped into accepting one of these full ounces of silver in place of an old, pre-1935 U.S. silver dollar, each of which contains 0.7734 ounces of silver, and which don't circulate anymore, anyway.
That's right, leaving aside the numismatic value, which might lead a collector to pay you more for an uncirculated old silver dollar with an "S" or "O" or "CC" mint mark, the one-ounce Von NotHaus "dollars" contain more silver, and are thus worth more -- not less -- than the "real thing."
Now, Von NotHaus was selling and redeeming his coins in some kind of multi-level operation that sought to establish a value for the things considerably above "melt." Every multi-level sales operation I know about informs participants that the buyer is paying some premium, which flows "up-line" as commissions. This is perfectly legal, because no one is obliged to buy.
Von NotHaus had no power to require people to value his coins any higher than melt -- unlike, say, the federal government, which has banned contracts calling for payment in gold or pretty much anything except their own increasingly worthless fiat greenbacks, the value of which melts away like sugar cubes in the rain, even as you wait for your creditor to pay you back.
A "counterfeiter" whose coins are purer than any ever minted for circulation by the U.S. government? You'll pardon me if I thus presume this is a first step toward making it illegal for U.S. citizens to hold and use any currency other than the increasingly worthless green paper-and-linen trading stamps of the fraudsters at the Federal Reserve.
Give them time. Soon you'll hear that our economic problems are being caused by speculators and hoarders attempting to salt away anything that could be of value during the forthcoming currency collapse. Like, oh, I don't know ... gold, guns and silver... continued
