As the aardvark is invisible, it does not reflect light in the correct wavelength in order to appear pink. Thus there is not an invisible pink aardvark. QED.
I'm sorry. You just don't "get" the invisible pink aardvark. Typical non-believer.
"The company I work for is a great place to work; we only hire really great people, we work on hard, interesting problems, and we treat our employees well."
So, um, who do you work for? And how much do you pay?
I feel that teaching our children that theories (even well evidenced ones) are facts causes some long term problems.
They're not teaching that theories are facts, they are teaching what the facts are (species change, ie "the fact of evolution"), and what the possible explanations are (ie, "the theory of evolution").
So, instead of just admitting that maybe we were wrong and look for a different theory altogether, science has created another theory to "fix" the old broken one.
So instead of admitting they were wrong and coming up with a new theory, they.... admitted they were wrong came up with a new theory?
Surely, if gold has no intrinsic value as you claim, people wouldn't irrationally flock to it as an alternative to paper money whenever possible, right?
Sorry, but it is intrinsically worthless. If you doubt me, grind a bar of gold down to it's component subatomic particles and show me one quantum of "worth". The reason people flock to it is because they have assigned it a value. People also flock to silver, oil, and hog futures, but that doesn't mean we should be on the hog standard.
The exchange medium of choice should be left up to the market.
Why?
Tying the dollar to gold is not only a good idea...it's a terrible idea.
It's man made and it's skimming wealth of the top each year and if you don't happen to own a bank, investment firm or a firm being invested in chances are you are among those getting screwed?
Yeah, who wants to be able to go to the bank and borrow money to buy a house or a car?
And even if they did, who wants their debt to decrease in value over time instead of just staying the same old burden year after year?
My, if he hasn't changed his mind recently, surely he's been wrong all along
No, but it does suggest he isn't open to considering new ideas. "Back in my day, we all walked 10 miles to school barefoot in the snow, and WE LIKED IT."
an idea that was sound 25 years ago sure couldn't be right now!
Sure it could, but the world has moved on since the 80s.
Look up the Great Depression. The Fed caused it, and the fed made it continue far longer than any previous recession.
Yeah, and Bernanke already said they know now that they did then was wrong and that they've learned from their mistakes. And if you haven't noticed, the Great Depression started over 70 years ago now.
Because the constitution prohibits the issuance of bills of credit or making anything but gold or silver legal tender.
Bzzt. The Constitution prohibits States from doing that. The Federal government can make chickens legal tender if it wants to.
Article I, section 10:
No state shall enter into any treaty, alliance, or confederation; grant letters of marque and reprisal; coin money; emit bills of credit; make anything but gold and silver coin a tender in payment of debts; pass any bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or law impairing the obligation of contracts, or grant any title of nobility.
Ron doesn't even know what the Constitution says. From his "Texas Straight Talk" column: "Certainly the drafters of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, both replete with references to God, would be aghast at the federal government's hostility to religion."
You seem to be missing that with the fair tax you take home your WHOLE PAYCHECK. ...and you end up giving 30% of it back in taxes anyway. So what's the difference?
(Except that rich people would get more of a break than everyone else, of course.)
But the FED seems quite adept and printing more dollars.
The Fed only prints as many dollars as people want.
You cannot arbitrarily inflate or deflate gold.
Yes. That's the problem.
Pegging the currency to gold wold keep prices fairly stable
Only if the United States lived in a vacuum. I didn't write this, but it sums up the problem:
The big problem is that once you move in to the scale of global markets on a gold standard you can no longer directly control the flow of money in and out of the country. This is well and dandy if you are running a trade surplus; money/gold flows in while goods flow out and you see a healthy level of inflation (gasp! Poor person tax ) and economic growth. Reverse that situation for a country running a trade deficit and a large amount of currency flows out of the country overseas. Lacking all this commodity based currency causes the value of money/gold to surge to the heavens and you see massive deflation. There isn't enough money in circulation so economic growth and investment stagnates and causes people to hoard what little they have left and it spurs a depression cycle.
Not to mention that there simply isn't enough gold out there to buy up to recognize and back the value of our economy so you would need to mandate a massive devaluation of currency right off the bat just to make the initial adjustment. Fiat systems work because the value of your currency is an aggregate of the total worth of your economy and is being constantly re-evaluated and re-appraised by other economies, countries, and foreign businesses. Only so much "Jew manipulation" can happen because if you push it too hard everyone else realizes you are trying to "print money" that doesn't have real economic backing and they devalue your currency for you because of that. Trying to tie your currency to a rock or oil or some other singular (or small set) of commodities is retarded because it will never be a truly accurate measure of your economy's worth, it might only keep in line for some periods of time if you are lucky.
TL;DR Gold Standard only works if you put the entire continental united states in a gigantic bubble and blast it off in to space so you never have to deal with any foreign bodies again
...and
The US converting to a gold standard would require them to re-issue all currency in circulation as a fixed amount of gold. Since the US government doesn't have a lot of gold, it would mean a lot less currency. Thus, they would need to purchase gold -- as a result, the price of gold would skyrocket. The US government would have to sell assets in order to purchase the now absurdly expensive gold, or run a deficit. Taxes would be forced to rise to finance this.
However, this would be pointless, since approximately 1 trillion dollars of goods flows out of the US economy every year. Thus, the economy would literally bled gold bullion. The only way to balance out is a recession, so deep and crippling, that it would eliminate the US trade deficit.
I don't think he's ever read the Constitution. For evidence, see his "replete with references to God" quote.
Plus he wants to amend it to remove birthright citizenship from the 14th Amendment, and he sponsored the "We The People Act", which would gut the First Amendment. So Ron Paul is 100% behind the Constitution, except for the parts he doesn't like.
Name one candidate who understands the monetary policy behind a fiat currency
If you read it, the entire section is one long run-on sentence. All those semicolon-separated clauses are different powers. The power to collect taxes for the general welfare is [i]in addition[/i] to all those others, otherwise it doesn't make sense. The next clause after the bit about taxes and general welfare is "To borrow money on the credit of the United States". By your logic, Congress has the power to collect taxes... so it can borrow money?
which he (correctly) points out is not something the federal government is permitted to do under the Constitution
Say what now? Congress has the power to collect taxes to "promote the general welfare of the United States". I'd say that funding medical research surely qualifies as general welfare.
Slashdot Mirror
As the aardvark is invisible, it does not reflect light in the correct wavelength in order to appear pink. Thus there is not an invisible pink aardvark. QED.
I'm sorry. You just don't "get" the invisible pink aardvark. Typical non-believer.
Sure. And the fact that many people's grandparents are still alive proves they didn't have parents.
Let's not forget that Evolution, especially with respect to the origin of species, also fails this test.
Nope. We've seen speciation occur.
"The company I work for is a great place to work; we only hire really great people, we work on hard, interesting problems, and we treat our employees well."
So, um, who do you work for? And how much do you pay?
I feel that teaching our children that theories (even well evidenced ones) are facts causes some long term problems.
They're not teaching that theories are facts, they are teaching what the facts are (species change, ie "the fact of evolution"), and what the possible explanations are (ie, "the theory of evolution").
So, instead of just admitting that maybe we were wrong and look for a different theory altogether, science has created another theory to "fix" the old broken one.
So instead of admitting they were wrong and coming up with a new theory, they.... admitted they were wrong came up with a new theory?
Evolution is a "fact" now?
It always has been. Species change over time. This is the very definition of evolution and has been observed; therefore, evolution is a fact.
Surely, if gold has no intrinsic value as you claim, people wouldn't irrationally flock to it as an alternative to paper money whenever possible, right?
...it's a terrible idea.
Sorry, but it is intrinsically worthless. If you doubt me, grind a bar of gold down to it's component subatomic particles and show me one quantum of "worth". The reason people flock to it is because they have assigned it a value. People also flock to silver, oil, and hog futures, but that doesn't mean we should be on the hog standard.
The exchange medium of choice should be left up to the market.
Why?
Tying the dollar to gold is not only a good idea
Anyone that didn't vote for Paul ought to be committed, as they cannot form simple value judgments without the support of the idiot-box.
Or maybe they don't want Dr. Ron's anachronistic policies to destroy the country. Just hypothesizing.
It's man made and it's skimming wealth of the top each year and if you don't happen to own a bank, investment firm or a firm being invested in chances are you are among those getting screwed?
Yeah, who wants to be able to go to the bank and borrow money to buy a house or a car?
And even if they did, who wants their debt to decrease in value over time instead of just staying the same old burden year after year?
Basing your currency on the good will of a government is a folly.
Then why does no modern nation have a commodity-based currency? Or is everyone equally stupid?
What's to stop the government from printing the value right out of your money?
The fact that the United States doesn't exist in a bubble.
Do you know what "replete" means?
My, if he hasn't changed his mind recently, surely he's been wrong all along
No, but it does suggest he isn't open to considering new ideas. "Back in my day, we all walked 10 miles to school barefoot in the snow, and WE LIKED IT."
an idea that was sound 25 years ago sure couldn't be right now!
Sure it could, but the world has moved on since the 80s.
Yeah, and Bernanke already said they know now that they did then was wrong and that they've learned from their mistakes. And if you haven't noticed, the Great Depression started over 70 years ago now.
Because the constitution prohibits the issuance of bills of credit or making anything but gold or silver legal tender.
Bzzt. The Constitution prohibits States from doing that. The Federal government can make chickens legal tender if it wants to.
Article I, section 10:
When Ron Paul finally saw what was going on, he fired the people responsible.
The subscription manager for the newsletter (Jean McIver) is now the Texas field director for Ron's presidential campaign.
Is a constitutionalist.
Ron doesn't even know what the Constitution says. From his "Texas Straight Talk" column: "Certainly the drafters of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, both replete with references to God, would be aghast at the federal government's hostility to religion."
There is no reference to God in the Constitution.
Votes to protect religious freedom.
Really? Then why does he keep sponsoring this?
You seem to be missing that with the fair tax you take home your WHOLE PAYCHECK. ...and you end up giving 30% of it back in taxes anyway. So what's the difference?
(Except that rich people would get more of a break than everyone else, of course.)
You can check out Ron Paul interviews from the 80's where his position is exactly the same on every single issue except one
I'm not sure that voting for someone who hasn't changed his mind on anything in 20-25 years is such a good idea.
The Fed only prints as many dollars as people want.
You cannot arbitrarily inflate or deflate gold.
Yes. That's the problem.
Pegging the currency to gold wold keep prices fairly stable
Only if the United States lived in a vacuum. I didn't write this, but it sums up the problem:
Ron Paul has studied economics quite extensively.
In Bizarro World?
Now, you may hold the opinion that it's a good thing to let the government and the banks increase and decrease the currency supply at will
It is a good idea because it allows quick action to stabilize the economy.
What we're doing now is illegal.
Explain why.
He supports the Constitution.
I don't think he's ever read the Constitution. For evidence, see his "replete with references to God" quote.
Plus he wants to amend it to remove birthright citizenship from the 14th Amendment, and he sponsored the "We The People Act", which would gut the First Amendment. So Ron Paul is 100% behind the Constitution, except for the parts he doesn't like.
Name one candidate who understands the monetary policy behind a fiat currency
I can't name any, and that includes Ron Paul.
and it is natural that engineers should support paul
:(
I'm an engineer, and I wouldn't vote for Dr. Ron if he were the only one running.
I guess I'm unnatural.
If you don't think that any of the other candidates are hearing the buzz around him and adjusting to steal some of that thunder, you're nuts.
The "buzz" around him is more of a barely detectable whisper that you need special equipment to hear.
(A bunch of people on the Internet flooding online polls and waffling on about a 'R/evol/ution' does not constitute a buzz.)
No, you're wrong.
If you read it, the entire section is one long run-on sentence. All those semicolon-separated clauses are different powers. The power to collect taxes for the general welfare is [i]in addition[/i] to all those others, otherwise it doesn't make sense. The next clause after the bit about taxes and general welfare is "To borrow money on the credit of the United States". By your logic, Congress has the power to collect taxes... so it can borrow money?
which he (correctly) points out is not something the federal government is permitted to do under the Constitution
Say what now? Congress has the power to collect taxes to "promote the general welfare of the United States". I'd say that funding medical research surely qualifies as general welfare.
Gallileo was told not to teach his theories as fact until they could be proven
In which case he could never teach them, since theories are NEVER proved, only disproved.