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Leave us your voicemail at (219) 2DAVIDP. Here's one voicemail that I got asking about
the gold standard.
Caller: Hey, David and Louis. This is Xavier Onassis. Listen, I'm calling to see if you
can clarify something for me that Ron Paul talks about. I know most of what he says is
very silly, but I don't understand the concept of going to the gold standard and what is
that all about. If you could sort of do a primer for that on those of us with no economic
background, that'd be great. Thank you, keep up the good work. Bye.
David: All right, so the quick story on the gold standard, the gold standard is a monetary
system where the amount of currency in circulation is based on a gold backing. In other words,
if you have $10 million in bills floating around, it is actually backed by $10 million
in gold. Now, it can also be not on a one-to-one basis, it can be a fractional gold standard.
There's a number of other variations. We have been off the gold standard for a long time.
The idea is that it actually makes money worth something versus just the promise to pay in
a way that if there is no confidence, actually has no value, because it's backed by gold.
That's the long and short of it. I mean, we could do hours and hours of pros and cons
and history of the gold standard; that's the long and short of it.
Louis: Yeah, I think the corporate infrastructure in this country would not exist if we were
on the gold standard.
David: Well, there's a lot of...
Louis: And banks, I mean, banks, the financials, they'd just... it would be completely different.
David: Well, debt... this is also very tied into the fractional reserve system in banks
and the idea... the ability to create money from money. If you... we're getting... we
don't have time to get in very deep, but there's a lot to be said about it. That's the idea,
money in circulation backed by actual gold or precious metals.
On Nazi John Demjanjuk, Terry says, "This guy is old, and I feel bad that he's ill,
but then again, so many people that he helped to kill were as well. He needs to live out
the rest of his days in prison. If he has amnesia, lock him up in an old persons' home.
Yes, what he did was heinous, but if he genuinely has no memory, then what use is it locking
him up in prison?" Maybe it's not for him, maybe it's for the families of the victims.
"Why would I pay money to support a dying man? If you're going to do anything, cleave
his head off. He's just taking my money." Capital punishment, I guess.
Louis: Taxpayer money.
David: Cruel and unusual. And on the Koch brothers buying professors at Florida State:
"This is pretty scary. How many more rich ideologues are going to invade schools?" This
could be opening up the door to many rich ideologues trying to influence higher education
by simply trying to buy professors, that's the scary thing.
Louis: So clearly there needs to be some type of legislation to avoid this.
David: Maybe there does. And on the topic of Ron Paul: "I disagreed with Ron Paul's
statement that if you legalize ***, nobody else would use it. David Pakman, he never
said that nobody would use *** if it were legal, he said people who don't want to use
it today won't start simply because it's legal."
Louis: And we're saying yes they will.
David: And I'm saying, yes, that some people will.
Louis: Many people will.
David: Not everybody, you're right, but many people will. And, "It's funny, he complains
about growing federal power, but uses it to his benefit, but wants to grow state and local
power." OK, well, getting into a more... more wonky argument about Ron Paul. I think the
bottom line with Ron Paul is he has no chance, and he can say whatever he wants, which is
great. New show in a couple days.
Announcer: The David Pakman Show at www.DavidPakman.com.
Transcript provided by Alex Wickersham and www.Subscriptorium.com. For transcripts, translations,
captions, and subtitles, or for more information, visit www.Subscriptorium.com, or contact Alex
at subscriptorium@gmail.com.