there were no computer problems. This is a h_ll of a state of affairs when a person with resources can not figure out a safe place to put it. Gold (may go lower), stock market (will obviously go higher to 15,000 Dow if you believe the idiots), real estate (what happens when payments system collapses), farmland (prices will fall as farmers go bankrupt), commercial property (John Q has no savings and everything is bought on credit). Why is the Dow at an all time high? This is mania times 3. Clinton can not even fight a decent war. Kosovo was a fantastic operation. Lets see now 30,000 sorties, zero planes shot down and 13 enemy tanks destroyed based on an actual count. What happened to all the smart bombs? Why no TV coverage of all of the destroyed military equipment? Perhaps there was nothing to report. After the Gulf war, there was footage of miles of destroyed equipment that included perhaps thousands of vehicles and that was accomplished in 4 days. Perhaps the public is a little skeptical of the current administration. Last but not least the national debt should be all gone by 2015. They could even do it quicker than that. Just invest all of the trust funds to pay off the debt and it would be all gone. Right? Of course there would then be an additional $6 Trillion of debt obligations to the trust funds but the national debt would be paid off. Do you believe this? I don't. With all of this spin, does anyone believe that the Government has fixed the Y2k problems? I don't. Tune in tomorrow for more B_ from the government.

-- Curly (Curly@notstupid.gom), July 06, 1999

Answers

Hey;

Bubba Bill Klinton has it all under control. There are no problems in the world.

What a legacy! Visualize it "Whirled Peas" in our time!!!

I still have lots of Baseball cards! What their not worth anything anymore, but but....

Gold $800 an ounce, I remember fondly that day.

Interest at 18%+, 1982 if I remember signing the papers for the loan.

Iowa Land Prices 2.5K/acre == 1972

Gas 23c/gal at "Price Wars" in 1964

I guess prices do change with time.

-- No (Problems@all.com), July 06, 1999.

If you know someone in that kind of trouble, have them go to:

http://buffalo-creek-press.com/parity/default.htm

The government owes a lot of farmers a lot of money.

-- Villain (villain@thedoghousemail.com), July 06, 1999.

Pay off the Federal debt? Will never happen, not in a million years!!! You cannot pay of a debt with borrowed money. Thats robbing Peter to pay off Paul! Cannot be done, EVER!

Most Americans have no clue how our American economic system works. The US Treasury prints up our money and then sells it to the Federal Reserve Bank for only the printing costs. That is two and a half cents for a hundred dollar bill!

Then when our government needs some spending money, the idiots borrow it back from the Federal Reserve bank and pay interest on our own money! Yes, every dollar in your wallet has been borrowed and is part of the Fedewral debt. This is the biggest FRAUD in Amerixca's history!

If our elected officials had any guts, they would end this Ponzi sceme and Federalize the Federal Reserve Bank! The Fed Bank is not Federal! Check it out, they are listed in the yellow pages with all the other private banks. They call themselves Federal to deceive all Americans!

-- freddie (freddie@thefreeloader.com), July 06, 1999.

To the new folks participating/lurking on this forum:

You do not have enought time to read threads like this one. You must have the will power to ignore any thread where the discussion revolves around the president, gun confiscation, black helicopters, the Federal Reserve Bank, the IRS, the constitution, or executive orders.

You have fewer than 6 months to decide in your own mind how dangerous this Y2K problem will become. Then you will need to prepare. We started over two years ago and have only thought through and prepared for half of what we know must be done. Get going!

Sigh,,, here is the definitive post from an earlier time waster: >>>>>>> Begin Clip

Some people in this argument seem to be confusing the US Treasury and the Federal Reserve. Maybe I can help clarify matters.

It is absolutely correct to say that the Federal Reserve doesn't borrow money. It is the US Treasury that borrows money to cover the difference between what it gathers in taxes and what the government spends. This is the national debt.

And, yes, the Fed does invent money and lend it to the government, in a sense. It does this indirectly, by buying US Treasury bonds on the open market and holding them. The money used to buy the bond is simply created by the Fed. The seller of the bond is given money that simply didn't exist until the Fed wrote the check. This is called monetizing the debt.

This gives the Fed vast power over the economy, and over the US overnment. The Treasury can't invent new money to retire its debt, and it can't force the Fed to create it, either. That is why the Fed was created - to deprive the US Treasury of the power to create money.

But what has not been explained by anyone in this thread is that the Fed only creates money to buy a very *small* percentage of the US bonds that are circulating. The rest of the US bonds are in private hands, or in central banks of other nations. These bonds are subject to the "discipline of the market."

If the holders of US bonds believed they would be repaid in grossly devalued dollars, they would dump their bonds in the open market as quickly as possible. The effect of this would be to drive interest rates sky high and choke off any borrowing by the US Treasury. This would be a financial calamity of the highest order. The Fed knows this.

But - unlike the suggestion ... at the beginning of this thread - PAYING OFF the debt would NOT drive us into hyperinflation. It would be deflationary. (Yes. Deflation is probably coming to a town near you!) Only MONETIZING the debt would cause hyperinflation to occur.

Ideally, the Fed creates money at a pace that closely tracks the growth of "real" wealth in the US economy, as measured in the goods and services the economy creates. This is only possible when the economy is stable and growing.

It was demonstrated during the Depression that, if the economy contracts and the Fed then contracts the money supply to match the new, smaller size of the economy, it causes the economy to contract further and initiates a vicious cycle. Since the Depression, the Fed has nominally adopted a policy of "leaning against the prevailing wind" - or, pumping up the money supply to counteract a recession, on the theory that the new growth this stimulates will offset the inflationary effects, later on. In reality, the Fed rarely gets it right, but it sometimes gets close.

A good book on this subject is "Secrets of the Temple" by Wm. Greider.

-- Brian McLaughlin (brianm@ims.com), June 29, 1999.

>>>>end clip

Start thinking, start preparing, quit reading these time wasters, get going!

Sincerely,

-- Uhm... (jfcp81a@prodigy.com), July 06, 1999.

President Reagan created a commission to investigate the income tax and they discovered that not one cent that Americans pay on income tax goes to run our government. It all goes to the Federal reserve as a bank entry and then it disappears! Even social security payments!

Ask any self employed person to check how his IRS social security payments are endorsed. Social security payments are supposed to go into the social security trust fund!! Try to pay your income tax with cash. The IRS will not accept cash! It is because they cannot delete cash as a bank entry! The incomne tax is a scam and it remains so because of people like Uhm!!! Very few Americans are patriotic enough or have the guts to do something about this scam!

-- smitty (smitty@sandiego.com), July 06, 1999.

Any other Economist-types care to weigh in here? You've got me interested, dang it!

Admittedy Macro-Econ Impaired (I never took that one in college),

-- Spindoc' (spindoc_99_2000@yahoo.com), July 06, 1999.