http://cambridgehouse.com/conference-details/vancouver-resource-investme…

GATA

At the conclusion of the conference, starting at about 5:30 p.m. Monday, the GATA delegation plans to be haunting the Lions Pub, 888 West Cordova St., just a couple of blocks away from the convention center, and hopes to meet friends there. Just remember that, while “in vino veritas,” coherence is something else.

Your secretary/treasurer and GATA favorites James Turk of GoldMoney, Hugo Salinas-Price of the Mexican Civic Association for Silver, London silver trader Andrew Maguire, and financial market analyst and journalistic provocateur Max Keiser, among others, will be speaking at the Cheviot Sound Money Conference in London on Thursday, January 27. Again admission is free but reservations are required. You can learn about the Cheviot conference here:

http://www.gata.org/files/CheviotSoundMoneyConferenceInvite.pdf

CHRIS POWELL, Secretary/Treasurer
Gold Anti-Trust Action Committee Inc.

Did U.S. Export Over 175 Million Ounces of Gold?

So, for 2007 and 2008 combined, the U.S. exported 22 million ounces of refined gold and over 154 million ounces of “compound gold.” This is more than 11 times U.S. gold mine production during those two years. In fact, this is higher than global gold mine output. Where did all this gold come from?

This amount of gold exceeds what is held by all private parties in the U.S. combined. When the U.S. government called in gold in 1933, it then melted down the coins without refining. As a result, such bars from the coin melt would have a purity of around 90 percent gold. These would not qualify for description as refined gold, but could fit the definition of compound gold.

In the past few years, several gold traders have commented that a surprising number of coin melt gold bars were being delivered in London and Zurich markets, bars which almost certainly came from the U.S. Treasury vaults.

It is possible that some of these gold exports could be the repatriation of foreign central bank gold that had been stored with the New York Federal Reserve. Such transfers would be classified as “exports” for purposes of this report. The other possibility is that it could be gold formerly held by the only central bank in the world that had that much gold – the United States.

Wherever this gold came from, it is bad news for the U.S. government. If foreign central banks are pulling their gold reserves out of storage in the U.S., that signals lost faith in U.S. financial strength, which the U.S. government would not want the general public to learn about. If the U.S. government has actually been exporting its own gold, while still trying to pretend that the quantity in its vaults is unchanged, confirmation of such exports would clobber faith in both the U.S. government and the dollar.

The U.S. government has not had a genuine audit of its gold holdings in decades. In recent years, it has changed the description of gold holdings in reports so that now it is only described as “custodial gold” rather than gold reserves.

READ THE FULL ARTICLE HERE: http://www.numismaster.com/ta/numis/Article.jsp?ad=article&ArticleId=6745

That seems to answer a lot of questions, here is GATA’s web site http://www.gata.org

============MORE FROM RAPIDTRENDS============

http://www.rapidtrends.com/2009/05/31/us-gold-going-or-completely-gone/

The Implications

Ladies and gentlemen, the foregoing data and discussion with the USGS individual is proof that the United States of America [or criminal elements within its Treasury and/or The Federal Reserve] “HAS” surreptitiously exported physical gold – and continues to do so. It is confirmed. The exports are likely coin melt [or gold compound, if you prefer] from the great gold confiscation back in 1933; or alternatively, this terminology is being used to disguise physical repatriation of foreign gold bullion formerly on deposit with the N.Y. Federal Reserve. Such repatriations are recorded as “exports” in U.S. Trade data. Public acknowledgement of same would scream like a siren call that the global financial community has totally lost faith in American financial stewardship – hence the need to do so on the sly.

This is being done in a vain/desperate/losing battle to satiate “off the charts” global demand for physical gold bullion arising from the profligacy of the American Empire’s two previous Administrations and to prop up the failing U.S. Dollar.

Over the course of 2007 / 2008 – more than 5,000 metric tonnes of “Gold Compounds” have been exported from the United States of America representing more than 62 % of reported sovereign U.S. gold reserves or about 24 times annual U.S. mine production.

Each month, the US Treasury publishes its International Capital account, (TIC) which foreign currency traders and bond dealers use to gauge the flows of money from around the world, into and out-of the US-capital markets. The demand for a nation’s bonds and stocks, combined with international trade flows for goods and services, plus behind the scenes intervention by central banks, all act in concert to influence the foreign exchange market which handles $4-trillion per day.

A surplus in TIC inflows is generally seen as a positive for the US-dollar, because it signals that foreigners are willing to increase their holdings of US-securities, displaying greater confidence in the currency. On the other hand, a TIC deficit is generally interpreted as bearish for the US-dollar, because it means that foreign inflows into the US aren’t sufficient enough to fund government borrowing. http://www.safehaven.com/article-13381.htm

Buckle down for the ride, it’s going to be rough. Those without a basement full of gold and silver, move to where the food is….time of crisis often breed opportunity for the sharp people. I’m reminded of that Sam Kinson bit, about the starving people of Africa. He’d say something like, they are living in the desert and starving because there is no food…then he yell, ‘MOVE TO WHERE THE FOOD IS”. Will that be the 2010 U.S. battle cry for its citizens?

http://turnerradionetwork.blogspot.com/2009/05/us-to-repudiate-debt.html

President Barack Obama today used certain words that ought to make the entire planet shudder. He said “The long-term deficit and debt that we have accumulated is unsustainable.”(Here)

Do you have any clue at all what that means? It means “prepare yourselves, the USA is going to repudiate its national debt.” It is the first hint to the world that the USA has reached a point where we can no longer service our debt. It means our country will announce it cannot repay its debts and therefore, it will not.

We were warned about this way back in the year 1992, when then presidential candidate H. Ross Perot bought national TV time to talk about the issue. We were warned again in 2001 when an employee of the US Treasury exposed the “protocols” the Treasury had adopted for this scenario. That lengthy warning appears below. We were warned about it again in 2005 by David Walker, then US Comptroller General and chief of the General Accounting Office (GAO) who said that the United States would no longer be able to service its debt beyond 2009. We were warned yet again via CBS News “60 Minutes” broadcast on March 4, 2007. (Video here)

Warned in 1992, 2001, 2005 and 2007, our Congress did NOTHING except continue rampant spending. This year, it all ends. This year, the United States goes bust. Nothing can stop it.

When this actually takes place — probably this summer — the economic shockwave it will cause around the world will result in wars, economic chaos and provide the perfect opportunity to usher in a new one world currency and perhaps even one world government !!!!!

The official plan

The USA already has in-place a series of official “protocols” to deal with this situation. They are referred to as “the 6900 series” of protocols. They appear below.

Editor’s Note: The info appearing below was first written in 2001. Its author was an employee of the US Treasury. The facts outlined are ALL verifiable. Every web site that has published this piece has been strong-armed into removing it. Given what Barack Obama said on May 14, 2009, this information is more important than ever. Please note that this article mentions the “Bush-Cheney Regime” and includes info from David Walker, US Comptroller General and chief of the GAO at the time, who said that the United States could no longer service its debt beyond 2009. Well, here we are!

” Protocols for Economic Collapse in America”

This is how the U.S. Treasury would handle an economic collapse. It’s called the 6900 series of protocols. It would start with declaring a force majeure. Force Majeure literally means “greater force”. These clauses in contracts excuse a party from liability if some unforeseen event beyond the control of that party prevents it from performing its obligations under the contract. When the US Treasury declares a force majeure it will immediately be interpreted by the marketplaces as a de facto repudiation of debt.

The SEC and the various regulatory exchanges would anticipate
a) the U.S. market’s decline, hour by hour
b) What will happen when Japan’s markets opened the next day,
c) what would happen when the European markets open, and
d) all the inter-linkages of the global markets.

On the second day, US Special Forces would be dropped in by parachute to the cities where the twelve Federal Reserve district banks are located.

They’d wait to make this declaration until the European markets closed, which equates to about 12:30 PM eastern US time. That’s when they’d determine how to begin the process of unwinding or controlling the collapse to the best extent possible, mainly because they know that the greatest hedge pressure would be people seeking to use other markets to hedge their long exposure in the United States and that the US would be the biggest seller in all the rest of the world’s markets. Therefore they would want to declare the force majeure when the rest of the world’s markets closed.

The declaration of force majeure would be precipitated by the declaration that the United States is no longer able to service its debt. That’s pretty simple.

Who makes that decision? The Treasury Department. The President does not make that decision. The Secretary of the Treasury does. He has that authority.

You might ask — wouldn’t he have his arm twisted not to do that?

The answer is that if there isn’t any money left to service the debt, it doesn’t make any difference what the current regime might want to do.

The day of reckoning is now coming. What has happened in the interim, from 2001 to present, is dynamic, global economic deterioration. The economic deterioration visited upon the United States is not a localized event. It is, in fact, global. We have a planet now that is sinking into a sea of red ink.

The United States is consuming 80% of the planet’s savings rate to finance its debt. The central banks of Germany, Japan and Saudi Arabia are no longer the powerhouses they used to be. Their reserves have now been substantially depleted. They can, therefore, no longer hide the fact that they own a certain number, likely in the trillions of dollars, of U.S. Treasury debt that isn’t being serviced, because they can’t hide it through bookkeeping tricks anymore because their reserves are so depleted.

Therefore somebody has covertly been putting demands on the Bush-Cheney regime for payment. Why do you think 2900 metric tons of gold is depleted from U.S. inventory since March of `01?

Why do you think that $2 billion in currency seized from Iraq last May is now unaccounted for?

Someone is putting demands on the Bush-Cheney regime. Someone is saying to the Bushonian Cabal that — “You’ve got to start servicing this debt because we, foreign central banks, are in nations – European and Asian – whose reserves are now nearly exhausted.”

Who could be putting that kind of pressure on them?

It has to be coming from whoever is organizing this thing at the very top, which I would tend to think has got to be most likely a cabal of people that would involve Henry Kissinger, James Baker, George Schultz, possibly William Simon. It would be somebody at the very top that is familiar with how to do this. It would have to be someone familiar with finances.

So would this be one faction of a cabal blackmailing or forcing another faction? No, it’s not really blackmailing. It’s being done out of desperation. The German, Japanese and Saudi central banks are saying to the Bushonian cabal, “You’ve got to start servicing this debt because we don’t have the reserves to cover you anymore. We can no longer make it appear that the debt is being serviced because our own reserves are so substantively depleted. Therefore you must begin to cover this debt. If you don’t, then, at some point, we will have to publicly admit–in order to save our own necks — that we were the end buyers of a lot of stealth debt, a lot of debt that your Treasury issued illegally and has never serviced. That would then expose the whole cabal.

The Kissinger-Baker faction are at the top of how this was done on the economic side of the equation. They were not the original insiders so much, but the managers of the conspiracy from the U.S. Treasury, to wit, the U.S. Treasury and Federal Reserve role-play the part.

Take Henry Kissinger. It may not have occurred to anyone why in the last 3 years Henry Kissinger has been back in Washington more than he has in the last 30 years. And why are all these quiet meetings in Washington with alleged senior Bush-Cheney regime officials, as foreign news services endlessly put it. It’s because Kissinger is the point man. He’s the one that is telling them the disposition of other foreign central banks.

Kissinger would probably also be involved in transfer or hypothecation of any assets from the cabal. In other words, they’re being stolen from the American people by the Bush-Cheney regime and the Bushonian Cabal, and they are being used to hypothecate, transfer, service, or otherwise carry this debt held by certain foreign central banks.

The process of unraveling has already begun because of ever-spiraling Bushonian budget deficits. The Bush-Cheney regime, even in its overt policies (now they’re overt political, economic, social and military policies) is generating $600-billion-plus deficit per year, which is consuming 80% of the planet’s net savings rate.

It doesn’t have the slack. In other words, it can’t refinance stealth debt by issuing more stealth debt anymore. Nor can they bleed money out of the system like they could in the 1980s by hiding it when the overt policies of the Bush-Cheney regime are already producing a budget deficit of 6% of Gross Domestic Product. There is no other mechanism that they could use anymore to hide expansion of debt that could be used to service said stealth debt, and they are, frankly, running out of assets that they can steal from the American people.

So the proverbial day of reckoning is coming. The Bush-Cheney regime (and I give them credit for this) are telling the American people what’s coming, knowing the American people are too stupid to understand. They are telling the American people about the re-institution of the Gold Confiscation Act and the sudden scrapping of the Treasury’s emergency post-collapse gold note scheme to maintain domestic liquidity.

David Walker, US Comptroller General and chief of the GAO has said that the United States could no longer service its debt beyond 2009. They’re not hiding it from anybody anymore. They are telling you what’s happening.

Now, what does that mean? The key is in what Walker is saying when he says the debt can no longer be serviced. I’ve been asked this on the radio shows. People have noticed what Walker said because he’s out in the news more often than he used to be. It’s unusual for the Comptroller General of the United States, which is a rather arcane position, to be out in the news so much.

It simply means that when he says the United States “will no longer be able to sustain budget deficits,” he means that by 2009,, the United States will be consuming 100% of the planet’s savings rate to finance budget deficits.

Therefore, if the planet can no longer generate any more liquidity to lend to the United States, one of three things have to happen:

A) There has to be a sudden and dramatic reduction in federal spending. There are only two places that can come from. There would have to be an immediate $100-billion cut in defense spending, which would end any hopes the Republicans had of getting into office for years to come because it would destroy any confidence the NFWCs (Naïve Flag Waving Crowd) had in them. Or you would have to scrap the multi-trillion-dollar tax cuts for the rich, something that’s equally unpalatable.

The other option, B, as Paul O’Neill mentioned, is a dramatic increase in the rate of federal income taxation from the current nominal rate of 28% to 65%, which is what the Treasury Department estimated would be required post-2009 to provide the U.S. Treasury with sufficient revenues to continue to service debt.

The third option, or C, becomes the declaration of a force majeure on credit service of U.S. Treasury debt by the United States Treasury, which is tantamount and would be accurately construed as de facto debt repudiation by the United States of America.

There are other signs to look for. some currency expatriation control. See if that doesn’t come in the way Nixon tried it in May-June of 1971.

In the second Bush-Cheney term, there will be some sort of currency expatriation control in the United States, but there will also be loopholes that will allow the large money to escape. The restrictions will apply to the 10- and 20-thousand-dollar people. It ain’t going to apply to the 10- and 20-million-dollar people. It would be self-defeating to do that.

When that day comes, in other words, when the U.S. Treasury declares a force majeure on debt, it wouldn’t be broad-cast on mainstream media. There’s no sense because the American people don’t even understand what it means. But the announcement would actually be put on the Federal Reserve wire system, which would, of course, immediately be picked up by all media outlets anyway.

The U.S. Treasury would declare a force majeure on debt after the Asian and European markets closed, probably at 12:30 p.m. EDT. The reason why that hour was always selected is because Asian and European markets close. It’s also the lunch hour for the markets. It’s when you’re going to have the fewest people on the floor of the exchanges. That would be the ideal time to make such an announcement.

A few seconds after that announcement was made, all United States markets, both equities debt and commodities–i.e., stock, bonds, commodities, that have trading collars or permissible daily limits –would all be limit-offered with pools. “Limit-offered” means that there are more sellers at the limit – i.e., limit down– than there are buyers.

So-called ‘pools’ would immediately begin to form, probably a thousand contracts every few minutes. ‘Limit-offered with pools’–this is trader language. Pools to sell–2,000 lots, 3,000 lots. That means, the number of sellers over and above the available buyers at the limit-offered price. That would begin to build.

By 1:00, the news would begin to sink in – because it would take awhile before panic selling would arise from the public. This news is being released at lunch hour.

A lot of the American people initially would not even understand the severity of the news. You would see professional selling first, and as that professional selling intensified over the afternoon, the SEC, the CFTC, NASDAQ, and various market regulatory authorities would begin to institute certain emergency market protocols. This would be the installation of the so-called ‘declaration of fast market conditions,’ for instance; the declaration of ‘no more stop orders,’ the declaration of ‘fill at any price,’ etc.–in a desperate bid to maintain liquidity.

That first day, the Dow Jones Industrial Average and related indices on a percentage basis would lose about 20% of their value by the close of business that day. The real impact would come overnight when the American people found out what this was all about and when it was explained to them.

At 7:30 a.m. EDT, the Tokyo markets would open, and no price would be affixed for probably three or four hours into the session due to the avalanche of selling. Once prices were established, the government of Japan would close all of its financial markets. Europe would not even open. All European governments would close all capital exchanges the next day.

The United States would, in order to accommodate global electronic trading, attempt to open the market on the second day, which they would do, regardless of price, just to maintain some liquidity. At the end of Day Two, the Dow Jones and related indices, would have lost two thirds of their value, and prices would be set accordingly.

On Day Three, the New York Stock Exchange, the SEC and other related agencies would recommend to the United States Treasury and the Federal Reserve that all markets be closed. That would be on the morning of Day Three. Eleven a.m., the Federal Reserve would then order all domestic banks closed. All of the twelve Federal Reserve district banks would (30 minutes later) have special U.S. forces parachuted in and around them to secure whatever gold bullion reserves they had left.

Day Three, 9:00 p.m., the President of the United States would declare a state of martial law. All financial transactions would come to an end. The Treasury would act to formally de-monetize the U.S. dollar and declare it worthless.

At this point, it is productive to explain why “money” is actually “legal tender.” Legal tender is whatever a government decides is legal tender. Since only government can decide what IS legal tender, the same government can also decide that something IS NOT legal tender anymore.

Once the Treasury “demonetizes” the US Dollar, it isn’t legal tender anymore. It isn’t “money” anymore. At that moment, everything you have in banks, CD’s, IRA’s, 401-K’s, stocks, bonds, mutual funds, hedge funds. . . . . . is instantly “not money” anymore. It is all wiped out. Gone. Worthless.

This would be totally unprecedented. In the past, collapses have been temporary and have been brought back up. But what we’re talking about now is the end.

These protocols that I’m referring to aren’t even all that secret. They were publicly available all through the Clinton era. These are Treasury protocols that were instituted mostly in the late 1970s when the Treasury and Federal Reserve began to feel that it was important to have an emergency-collapse protocol in place.

What precipitated the timing of this was the inflationary spiral of the late 1970s. The U.S. Treasury and the Federal Reserve were both concerned that this inflationary spiral, which was occurring not only domestically but globally, might lead to a global, uncontrollable hyper-inflation that the Federal Reserve or major central banks could not stop by traditional means, i.e., by raising interest rates and contracting money supply.

There was also the recognition, of course, that global central reserve bank bullion inventories had been so depleted over the previous 30 years that any re-institution of a species currency, even on a temporary basis, and even within a regional or individual nation-state basis, was no longer possible.

This is an analogy. In a military scenario, it’s like the President of the United States pushing the final red button — the commit button. The Treasury Secretary of the United States has a similar mechanism. It’s called the yellow button, the commit button. The Secretary of Defense has the same system. This is what happens. Computer program starts to institute these protocols. Imagine the complexity of trying the manage all this. I think it’s going to happen all simultaneously. There are hundreds of different agencies involved, both domestically and internationally. In order to maintain liquidity for as long as possible, it has to be extremely well-coordinated, and there must be existing collapse protocols that can be used.

The reason I was familiar with them was because I used to see the U.S. Treasury 6900 Series Collapse Protocol, 6903, 6904–there’ll be A, B, and so on–which keyed in to the Department of Defense to be incorporated within the Department of Defense’s own World War III scenario and various types of military/ political/ social instability/ war/ pestilence, chaos, etc. scenarios.

All federal agencies had individual collapse protocols that ultimately got coordinated through the Department of Defense. Obviously, the Department of Defense would be the ultimate coordinator because it would need to have special forces available, on a stand-by basis, ready, that could quickly parachute into areas all over the country, into the cities particularly, to secure federal properties and assets.

And that’s literally how it would begin. By the end of the third day, it would be all over — a state of martial law. We’re not talking about war, now; this is just economic collapse.

There’s no military implication here, no political, no social implication or policy directive thereunto. This is strictly economic collapse. By the end of Day Three, effectively, all banks in the world will be shut down, all paper currencies will become valueless. Martial law would be declared. There would be no continuing transactions, at least for a period of time, of commodities. All providers of fuels and foods would be shut down automatically.

They have planned this in great detail. U.S. Department of Defense Special 117th Assault Unit would parachute in to seize control of the cattle yards in Oklahoma City. This is how well it’s planned. In other words, economic collapse would automatically involve expansive military action and control.

By the end of the third day, when you no longer have a domestic medium of exchange, you have to have secured food and fuel stocks. You’ve got to have troops that have secured distribution points where there is food and fuel stocks, warehouses, tanks, etc. Otherwise people are just going to go get them, and the people have to know that if they try to go break into that store and steal that loaf of bread, they’re going to be shot.

Protocols for environmental disasters are called ‘scaling-circle scenarios.’ ‘Scaling circles’ is a Department of Defense euphemism. It’s also used in FEMA, OEM and other emergency management services. In environmental catastrophes, which are going to become national or global, it’s got to start someplace. It’s going to start in one very small, specific area. Therefore what happens is that the immediate force containment is the greatest in the first circle, to try to contain the spread of the disaster and keep it within that circle.

The environmental problem, to whatever extent it’s possible, before it spreads, will be neutralized or mitigated, in order to keep that catastrophe within that circle, or, if it is likely that it is to escape that circle, to attack whatever it is in such a fashion as to mitigate its strength and its ability to contaminate or otherwise affect other areas.

In the case of earthquakes, for instance, affecting the west coast, beginning at Mt. Rainier and moving southward — that’s a different type of scenario. That does not include as much Department of Defense involvement. It includes separate protocols, wherein mostly FEMA and OEM act as the senior coordinating agencies between municipal, county and state disaster and containment, which is called Disaster and Containment Units. Federal troops would only be brought in for the purposes of maintaining control.

In a military or economic collapse situation, National Guard units would provide any spare help they could in combating whatever the problem is. Federal troops would be used in order to have the specific authority simply to shoot anyone. There are plans for all sorts of scenarios. The economic-disaster scenario is the one I always found the most intriguing because it is the one that is least understood by the American people.

Military control would be necessary when lines begin to form at the banks, people trying to access their money. But that wasn’t even anticipated as a big problem. Lines would form at the banks, but it was not even envisioned until sometime on Day Three because the American people wouldn’t get it. It would be announced that the stock markets are down 2000 or 3000 points, and since we’ve always been taught they’ll come back, the people would still be buying stocks.

You could count on everybody remaining in ignorance all the way down because the American people have never been taught Economics 101. The American people wouldn’t realize the full extent of it until the markets were closed on the third day, or until the time when they went down to cash a check and the bank was closed with soldiers out in front. Then they would go down and see the gas station’s closed. They see the local supermarket has been shuttered, and there’s federal troops in front of it. Then they might begin to catch on

And remember — it’s not just federal troops. In emergency-collapse protocols, even before the declaration of a formal state of emergency or a state of martial law, the local military authorities within any given county or jurisdiction have the ability to essentially militarize anyone, that is, any civilian. This would be more than just deputizing civilians. It’s federal. In other words, they would have the ability to militarize and give military authority to a civilian force.

This would include not only police and the sheriffs and state police, but all local law enforcement that exists below the state level would be immediately militarized. They wouldn’t take just anybody – like they did in Iraq. It would be like the military when they “call for volunteers.” Then they’d have everybody and their brother-in-law volunteering, waving around the American flag and so on.

“And besides, if you do this, then you’re going to get to eat.”

In other words, this is how it would unfold over three days, but, in fact, very few Americans would know what to do about it or how to take any precautions. They wouldn’t have a clue because they don’t understand enough about economics to know what is happening.

So that’s what it is — Economic Armageddon.

In conclusion, since there is very little the people of the United States can do to protect themselves. We’re not going to make any suggestions of how to protect yourselves because there’s very little you can do.

We could tell you to go out and buy gold coins and bury them in the coffee can in the back yard and go to your nearest survivalist store, but, frankly, that’s useless. In the last analysis, it’s a lot of hype. There is very little the average US citizen could do.

The only thing that can prevent this, as the Comptroller alluded to when he was asked by Barbara Walters, “How do we prevent reaching the problem by 2009?” He said simply, “A change of regimes.”

So how do you prevent it? Don’t vote for Bush and Cheney — and hope that Bush does not use his emergency powers to cancel or postpone the election by edict, powers which you, the flag-waving citizens, have given him.

All flag-waving citizens, be warned. If you want to vote for Bush-Cheney again, make sure you got plenty of Spam on hand.

Here’s an interesting and humorous aside. A couple of days ago, Hormel Foods, which makes Spam, announced that in the last six months there have been record sales of Spam in the United States – the survivalists’ food of choice. After all, they pride themselves on the fact, as the spokesman for Hormel said, “It is the only food product you can buy with an expiration that’s 50 years.”

When everything goes to hell, when all that man has created has turned to dust again, the final legacy is going to be Spam. It will be the last surviving item — when the anthropologists of 20 thousand years from now are digging sites and they see these enormous mountains of unopened cans of Spam They’ll have monuments to the past out of Spam.

On April 13, 2004, Deputy Assistant Treasury Secretary John Boine talked about potential currency restrictions. He used the word that’s going to fuel the flames of the survivalist and gloom-and-doom collapse people.

It’s very, very telling that the U.S. Treasury may institute a restriction on the amount of U.S. dollars that can be converted into gold.

Furthermore, he intimated (and I suspected that this was coming, although this wouldn’t actually become law until Bush-Cheney was in office for second term one way or another) that the Bush-Cheney regime determines that the Gold Confiscation Act gives to Treasury the power for so-called forced disclosure of gold holdings.

I’m not quite sure of the language of the Gold Confiscation Act from 1933. It just says, “compelled,” as in citizens are lawfully compelled to redeem gold for script. I don’t think there was any such provision, which he was inferring that there is. That was FDR’s “Raw Deal” of 1934, when people were coerced into giving up their gold. But nowhere in this act does it specifically authorize the Treasury to mandate citizens to report their gold holdings. So if this gets any press at all, particularly within the circles of gold bugs and so on, watch out.

Furthermore, on Washington Journal they were talking about how FEMA has recommended to the Office of Homeland Security to have increased restrictions regarding citizen hoarding of long-term food and fuel supplies. That’s pretty sinister too.

What they’re talking about is the purchase of long-term so-called stores of survival food. FEMA was talking about some sort of restriction preventing people from accumulating food stores; putting it simply, that’s what it means. The second point was to increase restrictions that already exist.

FEMA was recommending even tighter restrictions on citizens building their own private property underground storage tanks for the purposes of long-term storage of fuel. The real intent of this is is threefold: a) to restrict citizens’ ability to hoard food; b) restrict citizens’ ability to hoard long-term storage of fuel; c) the forced identification of citizens to reveal food and fuel stocks they may be hoarding.

And that, in my opinion, is the real essence. The Bush-Cheney regime was scared of having the FEMA angle put into the equation because they knew what it means and how people would interpret it.

They have tried to use environmental legislation to restrict people’s ability to build fuel storage facilities on their own property — to get around what the true intent of that was.

But the bigger picture is that if you start to limit citizens’ ability to hoard fuel and food and shake them up by potential forced identification of gold holdings or forced redemption…

In other words, what you don’t want is citizens who have the ability to store a lot of food and fuel and to own gold because they would be able to resist state control in the future.

You’ve got to have every citizen on a rationing card to control the civilian population. You can’t have citizens out there hoarding food and fuel because then people can say to government, “I ain’t taking a rationing card, baby, with my national ID card. I don’t have to. You can’t control me through food and fuel and ever-worthless paper currency.”

I used to make fun of these people. But now, things have come full circle on this debate. The Bush-Cheney regime is making it increasingly clear through their small changes in policy. Not a lot of people monitor these decisions, but I do. And the pattern is becoming increasingly clear.

In fact, I would believe that those of the survivalist mentality (the food, fuel, the gold coins in the coffee can in the back yard) people who think that way will be ultimately vindicated.

People should quit making fun of them because they would be vindicated – even though they were all burned out, twenty-dollared to death, buying books and tapes, and discredited by mainstream media. It may sound like a hollow victory, but it won’t be a hollow victory for them – them that’s got the Spam… ”
———————————— End of US Treasury Employee report

In August, 2008, I warned my audience about the dire consequences we would face when this collapse happens. That report highlights the unimaginable horrors we are likely to face and offers suggestions to prepare. You can read it HERE

The U.S. Treasury’s Golden Shell Game

Ed Zimmer

There is some question as to whether or not the gold vaults of the U.S. Government still have any of the yellow metal in them. The question is inaccurate in that it focuses on whether there is any gold left, instead of how much gold is left.

The U.S. Department of the Treasury is no help in this regard, at least as far as the public information disseminated by the Financial Management Service goes. In a deliberate case of who cares what we say, the FMS has gone to great lengths to hide how much gold is being sold by the government and how much is still in the vault. Although the US left the gold standard decades ago under the Nixon Administration, the FMS currently still values the gold that it claims to possess at the ridiculous price of $42.22 cents per ounce.

In March of 2006, FMS issued the last of what could be considered accurate statements regarding the amount of gold held by the US Mint in working stock. At that time, some 2.8 million ounces of gold was declared as being the Mint’s possession. The following month, this figure was reduced to 2.78 million ounces, where it has remained unchanged, each month for the past two and a half years. In fact, the figures from April of 2006 appear verbatim in the latest report from November of 2008. By this public report, the mint has not gained or lost any gold for two and a half years!

Even so, the Mint has sold gold every month. Gold Sales in 2006 from April through December totaled 135,500 ounces. 2007 sales were 198,500 ounces and 2008 sales were 860,500 ounces. Even though the 30 month period shows total gold sales of some 1.19 million ounces, the working stock of the US mint as reported by the FMS is still 2.78 million ounces. (Actual figure is 2,783,218.656 ounces – yes they have it counted to the 1/1000th of a ounce.)

By this single line item, the FMS would appear to be off by nearly 1.2 million ounces of gold. Yet attempts to contact the FMS by email for an explanation have been met with silence, not to mention a continuation of the same figures, month to month for 30 straight months.

One cannot judge the entire monthly report by this single line item, but it does call into question the entire report. If this single line item is off by some 40%, then what about the rest of the gold supposedly held by the US Treasury? The Federal Reserve Bank-New York Vault is supposed to hold nearly 74,000 ounces of gold coins. According to the FMS, this amount is unchanged in the past 30 months, as is the supply of Gold bullion in Denver, Fort Knox and West Point. Without a reliable, accurate report, the public is left to guess as to which shell the gold is really under.

Are the vaults empty? Is the gold all loaned out or borrowed against? Is it overflowing with the yellow metal? Who knows?  This is the stuff which sparks revolutions.

“That is to say, under the old way any time we wish to add to the national wealth we are compelled to add to the national debt.

“Now, that is what Henry Ford wants to prevent. He thinks it is stupid, and so do I, that for the loan of $30,000,000 of their own money the people of the United States should be compelled to pay $66,000,000 — that is what it amounts to, with interest. People who will not turn a shovelful of dirt nor contribute a pound of material will collect more money from the United States than will the people who supply the material and do the work. That is the terrible thing about interest. In all our great bond issues the interest is always greater than the principal. All of the great public works cost more than twice the actual cost, on that account. Under the present system of doing business we simply add 120 to 150 per cent, to the stated cost.

“But here is the point: If our nation can issue a dollar bond, it can issue a dollar bill. The element that makes the bond good makes the bill good. The difference between the bond and the bill is that the bond lets the money brokers collect twice the amount of the bond and an additional 20 per cent, whereas the currency pays nobody but those who directly contribute to Muscle Shoals in some useful way.

” … if the Government issues currency, it provides itself with enough money to increase the national wealth at Muscles Shoals without disturbing the business of the rest of the country. And in doing this it increases its income without adding a penny to its debt.

“It is absurd to say that our country can issue $30,000,000 in bonds and not $30,000,000 in currency. Both are promises to pay; but one promise fattens the usurer, and the other helps the people. If the currency issued by the Government were no good, then the bonds issued would be no good either. It is a terrible situation when the Government, to increase the national wealth, must go into debt and submit to ruinous interest charges at the hands of men who control the fictitious values of gold.

“Look at it another way. If the Government issues bonds, the brokers will sell them. The bonds will be negotiable; they will be considered as gilt edged paper. Why? Because the government is behind them, but who is behind the Government? The people. Therefore it is the people who constitute the basis of Government credit. Why then cannot the people have the benefit of their own gilt-edged credit by receiving non-interest bearing currency on Muscle Shoals, instead of the bankers receiving the benefit of the people’s credit in interest-bearing bonds?”

Essential Further Reading:
PROSPERITY: Freedom from Debt Slavery is a 4-page quarterly Journal which campaigns for publicly-created debt-free money.  http://www.ProsperityUK.com All back-issues are still available. The 40-page Report, Clarifying our Money Reform Proposals, launched at the 2006 Bromsgrove Conference, is available for £10 payable to PROSPERITY and is essential reading for beginners.

The Grip of Death: A study of modern money, debt slavery and destructive economics by Michael Rowbotham, [Jon Carpenter Publishing, 1998] and Goodbye America! Globalisation, debt and the dollar empire by Michael Rowbotham, [Jon Carpenter Publishing, 2000] and Creating New Money: A monetary reform for the information age by Joseph Huber and James Robertson [New Economics Foundation, 2000] are all available from PROSPERITY.

(AP) The government is expected to take over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac as soon as this weekend in a monumental move designed to protect the mortgage market from the failure of the two companies, which together hold or guarantee half of the nation’s mortgage debt, a person briefed on the matter said Friday night.

Some of the details of the intervention, which could cost taxpayers billions, were not yet available, but are expected to include the departure of Fannie Mae CEO Daniel Mudd and Freddie Mac CEO Richard Syron, according to the source, who asked not to be named because the plan was yet to be announced.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and James Lockhart, the companies’ chief regulator, met Friday afternoon with the top executives from the mortgage companies and informed them of the government’s plan to put the troubled companies into a conservatorship.

The news, first reported on The Wall Street Journal’s Web site, came after stock markets closed. In after-hours trading Fannie Mae’s shares plunged $1.54, or 22 percent, to $5.50. Freddie Mac’s shares fell $1.06, or almost 21 percent, to $4.04. Common stock in the companies will be worth little to nothing after the government’s actions.

The news also followed a report Friday by the Mortgage Bankers Association that more than 4 million American homeowners with a mortgage, a record 9 percent, were either behind on their payments or in foreclosure at the end of June.

That confirmed what investors saw in Fannie and Freddie’s recent financial results: trouble in the mortgage market has shifted to homeowners who had solid credit but took out exotic loans with little or no proof of their income and assets.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac lost a combined $3.1 billion between April and June. Half of their credit losses came from these types of risky loans with ballooning monthly payments.

While both companies said they had enough resources to withstand the losses, many investors believe their financial cushions could wither away as defaults and foreclosures mount.

Many in Washington and on Wall Street hadn’t expected Paulson to intervene unless the companies had trouble issuing debt to fund their operations.

This summer, Congress passed a plan to provide unlimited government loans to Fannie and Freddie and to purchase stock in the two companies if needed.

Critics say the open-ended nature of the rescue package could expose taxpayers to billions of dollars of potential losses.

Supporters, however, argue the Bush administration had little choice but to support Fannie and Freddie, which together hold or guarantee $5 trillion in mortgages – almost half the nation’s total.

Representatives of Fannie and Freddie declined to comment on the government assistance plan.

Treasury spokeswoman Brookly McLaughlin said officials “have been in regular communications” with Fannie and Freddie, but refused to comment saying, “We are not going to comment on rumors.”

Concern has been growing that a government rescue of Fannie and Freddie could not only wipe out common stockholders, but also be costly for scores of investment, banking and insurance companies that hold billions of dollars in their preferred shares.

Paulson has been in contact in recent weeks with foreign governments that hold billions of dollars of Fannie and Freddie debt to reassure them that the United States recognizes the importance of the two companies.

The two companies had nearly $36 billion in preferred shares outstanding as of June 30, according to filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Mudd, the son of TV anchor Roger Mudd, was elevated to Fannie Mae’s top post in December 2004 when chief executive Franklin Raines and chief financial officer Timothy Howard were swept out of office in an accounting scandal. Syron was named Freddie Mac’s CEO in 2003, replacing former chief Gregory Parseghian, who was ousted in after being implicated in accounting irregularities.

He formerly was executive chairman of Thermo Electron Corp., a Waltham, Mass.-based maker of scientific equipment, served head of the American Stock Exchange and was president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston in the early 1990s.

Fannie Mae was created by the government in 1938, and was turned into a shareholder-owned company 30 years later. Freddie Mac was established in 1970 to provide competition for Fannie.

A government takeover could cost taxpayers up to $25 billion, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

But the epic decision highlights the size of the threats facing the housing market and the economy. On Friday, Nevada regulators shut down Silver State Bank, the 11th failure this year of a federally insured bank. And earlier this year, the government orchestrated the takeover of investment bank Bear Stearns by JP Morgan Chase.

By AP Business Writer Alan Zibel

US Mint Issues False Statement on Silver Bullion Sourcing By: Bix Weir

June 6, 2008
Another open letter to:

Henry Paulson
US Secretary of The Treasury
1500 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20220

Edmond C. Moy
Director of The US Mint
801 9th Street, NW
Room 8S23-3
Washington, D.C. 20220

RE: US Mint Issues False Statement on Silver Bullion Sourcing

Dear Sirs:

The US Mint just released a statement concerning the rationing of US Silver Eagles that stated one of the reasons for the rationing program was that the silver bullion had to be newly mined and could only be sourced from US sources.

“By law, the United States Mint’s American Eagle silver bullion coins must meet exacting specifications and must be composed of newly mined silver acquired from domestic sources. The United States Mint will continue to make every effort to increase its acquisition of silver bullion blanks that meet these specifications and requirements to address continuing high demand in the silver bullion coin market.”
http://www.numismaster.com/ta/numis/Article.jsp?ad=article&ArticleId=4613

I believe this to be a false statement. US Law: 31USC5112 clearly states: http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgibin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=browse_usc&docid=Cite:+31USC5112

(C) Sources of bullion.–The Secretary shall obtain silver for minting coins under subparagraph (B) from available resources, including stockpiles established under the Strategic and Critical Materials Stock Piling Act.
The US Mint is erroneously referring to the section about sourcing gold which specifies that gold bullion, and only gold bullion, is newly mined and sourced from mines in the United States:

7) Source of gold bullion.—

(A) In general.–The Secretary shall acquire gold for the coins issued under this subsection by purchase of gold mined from natural deposits in the United States, or in a territory or possession of the United States, within 1 year after the month in which the ore from which it is derived was mined.

Congress passed two laws in 2002 to ensure that the physical silver needed to make US Silver Eagles would be available to the US Mint in any quantities and from any source. These are the laws I am referring to:

Support of American Eagle Bullion Program Act
S. 2594
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=s107-2594“An Act – To authorize the Secretary of the Treasury to purchase silver on the open market when the silver stockpile is depleted, to be used to mint coins.”

Silver Eagle Coin Continuation Act of 2002
H.R. 4846
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=h107-4846

SEC. 2. DELETION OF LIMITATION ON ACQUISITION OF SILVER FOR $1 COIN FROM ABOLISHED STOCK PILE.

(4) with the depletion of silver reserves in the Defense Logistic Agency’s Strategic and Critical Materials Stockpile, it is necessary for the Department of the Treasury to acquire silver from other sources in order to preserve the American Eagle Silver Bullion Program;

(5) with the ability to obtain silver from other sources, the United States Mint can continue the highly successful American Eagle Silver Bullion Program, exercising sound business judgment and market acquisition practices in its approach to the silver market, resulting in continuing profitability of the program;

(b) IN GENERAL- Section 5116(b)(2) of title 31, United States Code, is amended–

(1) in the 1st sentence, by striking `, except silver transferred’ and all that follows through the period at the end of such sentence and inserting `or may obtain silver from other sources as appropriate.’; and

(2) by striking the 2nd sentence.

Please note the title of Section 2 of this important law “DELETION OF LIMITATION ON ACQUISITION OF SILVER FOR $1 COIN FROM ABOLISHED STOCK PILE”. I believe that the US Congress clearly does not want ANY LIMITATION on the acquisition of silver to make the US Silver Eagles.

There is no reference to silver bullion having to be “newly mined” or being sourced domestically in the US coinage law 31USC5112, but there are specific laws passed to ensure that there is NO LIMITATION on the silver bullion available for the US Silver Eagle Program. If there is another US law changing the above references please state them in a press release because it is clear that the US Congress intended US Silver Eagles to be made available to the public in sufficient quantities to satisfy all demand.

Respectfully,

Bix Weir US Citizen

Cc: Michael Mukasey, US Attorney General
A. Roy Lavic, Inspector General CFTC
Senator Dianne Feinstein
Congressman Ron Paul

Source: www.rapidtrends.com/blog…

]]> http://www.dgcmagazine.com/blog/index.php/2008/06/14/silver-eaglesits-getting-ugly-out-there/feed/ 0