bearfund

Mission Impossible? Obama Must Rebuild Confidence in Federal Government

The problem of confidence in government is not unlike the problem of confidence in banks. Install stodgy, conservative, traditionalist businessmen in senior managerial positions, borrow as little as possible for terms that match your investments, and spend money on only the best investments, and I'll have confidence. That is not in any way what the government looked like under Bush, and it is not what the Obama administration is shaping up to look like, either. Spending is too high. Borrowing is too high. The thresholds to be met for new spending are far too low if indeed they exist at all. Government is reaching ever farther into people's lives, imposing new intolerable burdens and constraints every day, without any checks and balances or possibility of appeal. It does too much, spends too much, and tries to be too much to too many.

If Mr. Obama wants my confidence, he will:

1. Ask Congress to approve, and the states to ratify, a Constitutional amendment making gold and silver the only legal tender for government business and permanently fixing the value of the dollar at 1/1000 oz gold plus 1/100 oz silver,

2. Immediately close most executive departments and fire all their staff,

3. Ask Congress to terminate all bailout programs of any type and description,

4. Begin an investigation of the FDIC's longstanding practice of undercharging banks and failing to adequately account for risky bank activities in setting premiums,

5. Ask Congress for legislation abolishing the Federal Reserve Bank,

6. Instruct the Treasury Department to establish banking regulations requiring that all banks retain in their physical possession an amount of gold and/or silver equal in value to at least 50% of all outstanding demand deposits and at least 33% of all outstanding time deposits,

7. Abandon any attempt to appoint Eric "Censorship for All" Holder to the Attourney General's post,

8. Fire Tim Geithner and appoint in his place Rep. Ron Paul of Texas as his new Treasury Secretary.

If even half of these steps were taken, both my personal opinion of Mr. Obama as a leader and my financial confidence in the United States would immediately and dramatically increase.

So far, however, he's done pretty much the opposite of all of these, so I'll stick with gold, thanks. In *that* I do have confidence. In 5000 years it's never let anyone down.