By: T F Stern
T F Stern’s Rantings

There’s an old truism, “It doesn’t matter who poisons you, you’ll still be just as dead.” The first time I heard that it had to do with permitting a friend to steal your dream of success by letting them pour cold water on it. So many of us punch the time clock when we arrive at our jobs, punch out at lunchtime, punch in for the second half and then punch out on the way home. Doing anything different scares many folks away, so living a different “dream” is frightening. Marginal poverty is “safer” than risking failure of the unknown, going into business for yourself; but I’m rambling now.

This morning there was an article by David Wolman at Times.com explaining how the North Korean government was printing counterfeit $100 and $50 dollar currency in order to prop up the won.

“These ultra-counterfeits are light years beyond the weak facsimiles produced by most forgers, who use desktop printers. As an anti-counterfeiting investigator with Europol once put it: “Superdollars are just U.S. dollars not made by the U.S. government.” With few exceptions, only Federal Reserve banks equipped with the fanciest detection gear can identify these fakes.”

You might say, jokingly, Korean printed paper money is about as worthless as the money printed by our own government. (I don’t hear anyone laughing, that was a joke, hummm…) The U.S. Treasury continues to add billions of dollars to the supply which in turn devalues currency which is already in the hands of the citizenry; some might call this theft on a grand scale, others might even consider it treasonous to intentionally destroy the foundations of society.

“According to the House Task Force on Terrorism and Unconventional Warfare, superdollars may be part of the regime’s effort to acquire materials for nuclear weapons.”

Just so you know, that line was supposed to be aimed at the North Korean attempt to destroy the U.S. Dollar; however, it could easily have been directed at the Obama administration which has done more to destroy the value of the dollar than all previous administrations put together. Remember, it doesn’t matter who poisons you, you’ll still be just as dead.

Wolman’s article takes off on a tangent a bit further down; equating folks who exchange cash for goods with criminals or whacko survivalists. Apparently, anyone who doesn’t go through the formality of banks, either with checking accounts or “plastic,” folks like that are a fringe element of society tending toward being unscrupulous.

“At the risk of infuriating cash-hoarding militia members, anonymity-obsessed ACLU’ers, the U.S. Treasury, Russian mob, Laundromat owners, and just about every person who has ever hid a purchase from a spouse or income from the government…”

There was another reference in the article, an important warning which might be overlooked by folks. The people in North Korea woke up one morning only to find their ability to purchase everyday items was devastated.

“The won was devalued by 100 percent, which meant 1,000 won suddenly had the purchasing power of 10 won. (Imagine waking up to (a) learn that a slice of pizza costs $250.)”

This same thing happened in Zimbabwe in 2007. It can happen anywhere governments print money that has nothing of real value to back it up.

“One US dollar now buys 30,000 Zimbabwe dollars on the official market, having previously earned 250 Zimbabwe dollars.”

Can you imagine going to the grocery store and having to take a suitcase to carry cash instead of a wallet? It wouldn’t matter much, Zimbabwe grocery stores didn’t have anything to sell because the entire infrastructure had been destroyed; nothing was making it to the market place.

Moving right along; the spot market on gold is an interesting way to determine the cost of inflation. Several years ago, the price for an ounce of gold hovered around $400; that same ounce of gold this morning will cost you $1848. What has been the cost to U.S. citizens who’ve had to sit and watch their life savings destroyed because their own government has been attacking the marketplace and devaluing the dollar in leaps and bounds?

In case you missed the lesson today, it doesn’t matter who poisons you, you’ll still be just as dead. We have a chance to slow down our rate of destruction, perhaps even reverse course come November. Elections have consequences, throw these rascals out!

This article has been cross-posted to The Moral Liberal, a publication whose banner reads, “Defending The Judeo-Christian Ethic, Limited Government & The American Constitution.”