Last week Donald Rumsfeld went on the Opie and Anthony radio show to promote his new book, “”. It was an odd interview to begin with. Opie and Anthony are not known for their hard-hitting political interviews, but rather, numerous fart and sex jokes. Comedian Louis C.K. was in studio during the interview, and decided to ask Donald Rumsfeld a humorous question. You can listen to the interview here:
Compare that interview with the rather hard-hitting tough journalistic interview Judge Andrew Napolitano did last night with The other Donald:
And here is the Judge after the interview, saying that Rumsfeld described the interview as the “toughest” he’s had. I’m thinking he wishes he’d rather be asked if he’s a lizard by Louis CK than be interviewed by the Judge again.
by Michael Pento, Senior Economist at Euro Pacific Capital (www.europac.net)
It now appears that the United States has finally succeeded in its efforts to destroy confidence in the U.S. dollar. Given the currency’s reserve status, its ubiquity in financial markets, and the economic power and political position of the United States, this was no easy task. However, to get the job done Washington chose the right man: Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke. Thanks to Bernanke’s herculean efforts, investors across the globe have now been fully weaned from their infantile belief that the U.S. dollar will remain the ultimate safe haven currency.
The proof of Ben’s success can be seen in comparing how the foreign exchange markets reacted to the recent crisis in the Middle East with how they reacted to the financial crisis of 2008. Back then, investors looking for safety abandoned their foreign currency positions and piled into the U.S. dollar (the market for U.S. Treasury Bonds in particular). As a result of these fund flows, the U.S. dollar surged 20% from August to November 2008.
However, during this latest round of global destabilization the dollar experienced no such rally. In fact, the greenback shed about 5% of its value since the Tunisia revolution began in December of 2010. The reason should be clear; the Fed has placed international investors on notice that it will unleash even greater doses of dollar debasement at the first whiff of additional economic weakness, deflation threat, or dollar appreciation. Just this week, Bernanke once again made clear that despite what he considers to be a better growth outlook at home and abroad, and spreading global inflation, the United States will not pull back from monetary accommodation, even as other nations conspicuously do so. The architect of U.S. monetary policy has stated explicitly that dollar debasement will continue for the indefinite future.
In the world of precious metals, silver spends a lot of time in the shadow of its big brother gold.
Gold, with its high price-to-weight and distinctive yellow tint, has always occupied a special place in the human psyche. To many people across many ages, gold is simply the ultimate form of money – and, as a long-term, stable store of value for one’s personal wealth, I agree it’s hard to beat.
However, rare circumstances are aligning today that I believe will make silver the true champion of this bull run.
WHAT’S DRIVING PRECIOUS METALS?
Gold and silver are both benefitting from a perfect storm in the sector.
Dollar devaluation means that much of the ‘gains’ we see are really just losses by people holding dollars. In other words, if your dollars lose 50% of their value, it’s going to take twice as many of them to buy the same ounce of gold.
But the rally is based on more than simple inflation. Precious metals are regaining their role as the ultimate reserve asset. That means many, many more people are buying and holding these metals than at any time in the last thirty years.
Earlier today, Ron Paul used his five minutes of questioning to ask Hillary Clinton why we prop up dictators. Clinton’s answer seemed a bit similar to David Letterman’s response to Ron Paul’s son when Rand Paul appeared on Letterman’s show.
Letterman, basically said what Rand was saying didn’t sound right, but he didn’t know why. Hillary’s response to the elder Paul was more or less “sometimes we get it right and sometimes we don’t”. That is another non-answer, but that’s why they are called politicians I suppose. Check out the exchange below.
Liberty Maven
by Peter Schiff, CEO of Euro Pacific Precious Metals and author of the hit economic parable 
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