Dear Dirty America

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The Economic State – Should We Go Back to Gold?

February 29
15:30 2012
LAUREN WINDSOR 

 
As Athens burned after Germany forced Greece to accept severe austerity measures in exchange for billions in emergency aid, stubbornly high unemployment rates and budget cuts in America threaten to choke off the demand necessary to launch a true economic recovery in the U.S.
Big business is sitting on record profits, but is unwilling to invest­ in hiring American workers precisely because of that forecasted decline in demand. It’s a vicious cycle that is primed for more catastrophe as the Eurozone teeters on the edge of collapse. 

A hard reality: many of the unemployed have turned to selling their blood, gold, cars and other assets in return for cash. In this cash for gold economy, people are becoming desperate. The Occupy movement has emerged as a result of that desperation and from a growing frustration with an ineffectual Congress that has been corrupted by corporate money. 

The issue of corporate money in politics is central to the ethos not only of the Occupy movement, but of the Tea Party as well. The Citizens United Supreme Court case lifted the limits on political spending of corporations engaged in political speech, thereby recognizing the First Amendment rights of “corporate persons.” 

In order to reverse the Supreme Court precedents, legislative action is taking place at the local and state level. Titled “Move to Amend,” the proposed legislation would amend the Constitution to preclude the rights granted to human beings from being applied to corporate entities. The issue of ending corporate personhood has been championed by Republicans, Democrats and Libertarians alike, and is a platform plank for Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul, the Texas congressman and author of End the Fed

Congressman Paul is an outspoken critic of the administration’s monetary policy and a proponent of returning to the gold standard. He argues that out-of-control deficit spending by the government will eventually cause a debasement of the dollar and hyperinflation: think breadlines in Russia or civil war in Zimbabwe. According to Paul, gold offers greater stability as a store of value and will force America to rein in its profligate spending from the instatement of a fixed rate. Returning to the gold standard is a topic of contention amongst economists, most of whom argue against it. Gold standard or not, there is one thing that is not contentious: if America does not get its fiscal house in order soon, we may be following the path of the Greeks. 

Lauren Windsor is a freelance writer for web-marketing companies and a producer of written, graphic and video content for her own political website, www.LadyLibertine.net. Follow her on Twitter @ladylibertine27

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