“It’s not even a theory; it is a theology.” So Nouriel Roubini, with his best Strangelovian inflection, describes the gold standard to Yahoo Finance’s The Daily Ticker, and in doing so displays shocking ignorance of the gold standard and either the work of Ben Bernanke or a presumption that the rest of the world is ignorant.
In slurring supporters of gold as “lunatics and hacks,” Roubini falls into lockstep with other leading defenders of the status quo: Prof. Barry Eichengreen in “A Critique Of Pure Gold” in The National Interest‘s September-October issue, Thomas Frank, in the July issue of Harper’s Magazine, calling gold “yet another eccentricity of the right-wing fringe … into the mainstream of American life,” Paul Krugman’s July 6 New York Times blog post, “The Armageddon Caucus“: “Gold bugs have taken over the GOP,” Think Progress‘ June 9 report by Marie Diamond stating that “Tea Party groups are determined to make returning to the gold standard a litmus test for GOP presidential candidates. And it looks like they’re succeeding,” and the Roosevelt Institute’s Mike Konczal blogging on April 27, “Conservatives are organizing against a full employment mandate and rallying around the gold standard wing of their party.”
Professor Roubini launched an amusing 16 hour War via Twitter, tweeting against Tangent Capital Management’s James Rickards and his Currency Wars: The Making of the Next Global Crisis. But in prosecuting that war Prof. Roubini steps on a landmine. He attempts to refute Rickards by reference, in part, to the writings of one Ben Bernanke.
Whatever one thinks of Bernanke, this is the intellectual equivalent of an unforced error. As this writer previously has noted here then-Professor Ben Bernanke observed, in an NBER Working Paper written with Harold James, that the sustained deflation that was the precipitating factor of the Great Depression was not the fault of the gold standard, but was “the result of a mismanaged international gold standard.”
George Gilder, whose new book publishes today, is one of the original pillars of Supply Side economics. As stated by Discovery Institute, which he co-founded, “Mr. Gilder pioneered the formulation of supply-side economics when he served as Chairman of the Lehrman Institute’s Economic Roundtable, as Program Director for the Manhattan Institute….”
He was the living writer most quoted by President Reagan. And he is back with his most brilliant work yet — one of potentially explosive importance if taken to heart by our political and policy thought leaders. It is a radical guide, with surprising insights on almost every page, to the creation of a new era of vibrant prosperity.
As reviewer Paul Brodsky, a professional investor in New York City, perceptively notes,
"Lewis Lehrman is one of a very small group of contemporary gold advocates able to successfully bridge the gap separating practical conservative intellectualism from fleeting, half-baked idealism. His CV lists great success across many fields including education (degrees and teaching fellowships from Yale and Harvard); industry (past president of Rite Aid); politics (narrow loser to Mario Cuomo in the 1982 New York governor’s race); finance, (past Morgan Stanley managing director); private sector entrepreneur (founder, L. E. Lehrman & Company); public sector advocate (founder, Lehrman Institute); historian (author, Lincoln at Peoria: The Turning Point); and recognized philanthropist (awarded the National Humanities Medal by George W. Bush in an Oval Office ceremony). ... Only someone erudite and elegant in demeanor could hope to pull it off . In an irreconcilably over-leveraged world where irritated bond vigilantes question economic sustainability and angry Tea Partiers protest the immorality of it all, Lehrman’s views are considered and his convictions carry weight. He brings gravitas to his cause, and he does so from within as a member of the club."
Before the Fed: JP Morgan Summons the Bank Presidents
"Finally, on the night of Sunday, November 2, Morgan summoned the presidents of the major New York banks to his new library, at the corner of Madison Avenue and Thirty-sixth Street, an Italian Renaissance-style palace he had built next door to his house to showcase his collection of rare books, manuscripts, and other artwork. Its marble floors, frescoed ceilings, walls lined with tapestries and triple-tiered bookcases of Circasian walnut, crammed full of rare Bibles and illuminated medieval manuscripts, made it an incongruous setting for a meeting of the banking establishment. Once the moneymen had gathered, Morgan had the great ornamental bronze doors to the library locked and refused to let anyone leave until all had collectively agreed to commit a further $25 million to the rescue fund."
— Liaquat Ahamed, Lords of Finance (Penguin Books, 2009, p. 54)
Lately we have been engulfed by headlines reporting financial turmoil on every continent, in almost every nation, large and small. The commissars of central planning who so marred the history of the 20th century have been replaced by central banks in the 21st. In Cyprus, the new leadership now dares to confiscate citizens’ wealth with a one-time tax of up to 60 percent on bank deposits above 100,000 euros. Self-interested prime ministers blame continental monetary policies for instigating the currency wars that they themselves surreptitiously carry on.
Constitution.org provides an extensive and thoughtful Memorandum of Law by Larry Becraft, Esq., of Huntsville, Alabama, on Article I, Section 10, clause 1 of the US Constitution.
Sir William Blackstone courtesy of Wikipedia
One of many interesting matters the Memorandum treats is Blackstone's Commentaries, a book that was a fixture in the...
The value of the yuan has been slowly rising. The value of the Japanese yen has been sharply falling. Abenomics is attempting to reflate the Japanese economic – slowly, slowly. “Japan is back!” Prime Minister Shinzo Abe tells the Japanese.
Coming back isn’t easy. The Financial Times’ Jonathan Soble has noted...
Sean Fieler, James Grant, Steve Hanke, John D. Mueller, Lawrence Parks, Judy Shelton, Lawrence H. White
Senior European Advisor Paul Fabra
Advisors Jeffrey Bell, Ralph J. Benko, Andresen Blom, Frank Cannon, Rich Danker, Brian Domitrovic, Charles Kadlec, Christopher K. Potter, John Tamny and Frank Trotta
In Memoriam Professor Jacques Rueff (1896-1978)
Now Available on Amazon and from The Lehrman Institute