Remember this morning when I suggested the latest debt-ceiling crisis is affected by Republicans who are confused about the basics? The National Republican Campaign Committee is helping reinforce the thesis.
This morning, the NRCC argued, apparently in all seriousness, "The amount of platinum needed to mint a coin worth $1 trillion would sink the Titanic." To help drive home the point, the campaign committee even created an image of a President Obama platinum coin weighing down the Titanic.
Making matters slightly worse, the NRCC says the coin would "pay for [Obama's] spending," which suggests Republicans still don't understand that the White House cannot legally spend money that hasn't already been approved by Congress.
But even putting that aside, the problem with the image and initial argument is that the NRCC appears to have forgotten how money works. A $20 bill does not have $20 worth of paper. Indeed, the paper and fibers that go into a $50 bill do not have five times the value of a $10 bill. And as such, a $1 trillion coin would not need $1 trillion worth of platinum.
Maybe you think the coin idea is sensible; maybe you think it's ridiculous. Either way, the conversation would be more productive if Republicans who support holding the nation hostage brushed up on the introductory facts. As Jamison Foser joked, "The NRCC reminds me of old Letterman joke about offering Dan Quayle two fives for one twenty."
The value of the materials that go into American currency is unrelated to the monetary value the government assigns to the currency itself. Does the NRCC think a nickel is worth more than dime because the latter is physically smaller and lighter? When we print $10,000 bills, do they assume we use really expensive paper?
It's not at all reassuring that the NRCC finds this confusing.
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HA HA HA That is funny...if the GOP is confused the Demo are delusional...witness the states they run and the out of control spending. I saw that Obama was fine with huge taxbreaks for corporation, has done little to tax Capital for his buddies, Corzine, Buffet, Kerry, Gore and other mega wealthy Democrats that happily talk the tax line...but then avoid paying any! Happy Trillion 2013 deficit and don't forget the FED's Trillion dollar printing. Wasn't Obama going to rein in the banks...instead of handing them multi-trillion dollar to juice the stock market? What happen with that? Sadly my kids with be paying off Obama and the democrats misadventure! Please explain how unlimited deficit spending and unfunding all pensions and perks for government works? How did Bill Clinton make $100 Million dollars anyway? Is he now a bad person?
And another white American male moron comes along to show that white American males are lower on the evolutionary scale than amoebas. Go eat another double cheeseburger, fatboy.
Easy, TCinLA. There's actually some white American males here.
How about remaking the same add saying that the liberals want to pay for the 2 Bush wars and the tax breaks to the rich.
So put Chris Christie's picture on the coin. That ought to bulk it up.
It is amazing how ignorant many of the people leaving msgs here about something they dont have a clue.
Keep voting for the dems and run up the debt for all these programs we can ill afford. Their point was the value of the money is worthless, hence the precious metals inference. Do you think once the rates start going up that our worthless dollar will be worth more than the peso? Do you think that the feds printing money in the basement is helping our economy? It is a house of cards and payment will come due. When it does we will see how "stupid" it was to hold the debt cap hostage to force future cuts. Wake up- they are not doing this for current expenditures, but to keep this ridiculous wanton habit of spend, spend, spend, spend in check for futures of your kids to come. Like the blonde joke-"how could I be out of money...I still have checks left....
Hey, dipwit, the guy who founded Berkshire Hathaway is on board with this idea. You really need to keep up with things, I know it's hard when you don't have frontal lobes and all, but please try.
TC you seem to have a fairly small vocabulary used for cutting down. Perhaps your lack of self esteem is the problem,
The white comment about cheeseburgers is self evident. I would say go stuff your face with some chitlins, but then again why level the playing field- Shut the crack up.
Berkshire- for your limited knowledge suggested raising captial gains not income taxes which is what ended up happening. There are two forms of earnings- capital gains and income. The upper 1-2% for your information is pulling in their millions/billions not by income....wait.. OK you figured it out- capital gains.
None of Bamas partners/friends/fundraisers like liberal Holly types were hit at all. We the middle class got stuck with a 2% raise in SS tax. Think that will be there when it is time to collect-nah. Just some IOU's.
So put the crack pipe down and go start peddling your papers. you will need it to subsidize your welfare checks.
Oh, it's always so edifying when the useful idiots of the malefactors of great wealth start pontificating. Doesn't this tool have some job cremator's boots to lick somewhere?
The GOP and those who have accumulated great wealth that they represent have lost sight of where their money originated. Now that a lot of their income comes from the money itself going to work for them, via interest/investments, they think that these are how money originate, and if you are too stupid or too poor to get this kind of income, then you are just a drain on them. They extend this logic not only to the poor but to anyone who earns or has had to earn their living by working.
They have a big impediment in their vision, a huge blind spot. And that is because, psychologically, they cannot admit that the origin of their money was those very people whose labor allowed them or their forebears to profit.
Liberals are idiots. Currency represents value. Simply printing a number on a coin creates value only for a greedy liberal. In the real world, liberal "money" is fraud and soon becomes valueless. Guess how much oil you can buy with valueless currency. Guess how much interest you pay with valueless currency. Would you idiot liberals sell me your car for a 1 trillion coin?
Go back to WackoWorld and crawl back under your rock, fatboy. Your sheep miss your "tender ministrations."
Poor Kurt. You'd think a grownup would understand what money is. You'd be wrong.
Try this, Kurty: money is only something used to exchange wealth. That's it. It has no intrinsic value.
Now go clean up the mess your head exploding caused.
Maddow, O'Donnell, Mathews, Limbaugh, Levin and Hannity as well as the political "leadership" on both sides have made it impossible to have a reasonable discussion in this country anymore. How about we turn them ALL off and start over. STOP relying on the talking heads for info and do your own research which is readily available on the internet. Stop trivializing issues like this platinum coin silliness and start focusing on the real problems. We have a dysfunctional government and a dysfunctional press that has us fighting WITH each other rather than FOR our common interests. They are forcing us to pay attention to them rather than listening to us. Let's all agree on the social ssues like abortion, LGBT rights, racial equality, sexual equity in the workplace. Let's then examine our political climate and get rid of the extremists on both sides who are pulling the middle of this country apart. Be part of the solution not the problem.
And while you're wishing, may I have a pony?
I'm not wishing. I'm suggesting reason. Look at some of the comments in other posts "Fornicate with sheep", "Christies picture will bulk it up", "liberals are idiots" "another white moron". How do ths comments move the conversation forward. A pony might not be a bad idea to start with. A more productive way to start would be offering up constructive ideas. Anyone can be a bully or hurl invectives. Is the art of Socratic dialogue dead? Is there no way to work cooperatively and to question intelligently and civilly?
"Is the art of Socratic dialogue dead? Is there no way to work cooperatively and to question intelligently and civilly?"
The answer to both of these disingenuous or dangerously naive questions is a resounding "Yes!", and it is those on the right who have made it that way. Not everybody is willing a lot of time and effort correcting the malicious misinformation of those on the right.
I'm sorry, VoiceO'Reason. What you advocate would be wonderful, if it were plausible. To get to somewhere better, we as humans need to start with what we have today.
I'm beginning to come to grips with the idea that they really ARE that stupid.
I wish Rachel would discuss the perks of being a member of Congress and the Senate. eg. pention, health care, student loans that don't have to be repaid, and all the things they vote for themselves that they think the American people shouldn't have. Maybe this would wake Americans up and try to do something to stop it...
Sorry guys- missed the news!? What's up with the $ trillion coin
Representative Nadler (D-NY) made an unfortunate statement about trillion dollar coins, which the NRCC's director Andrea Bozak seized on, and the right launched as a "symbol" of the general Democratic thought process on government spending: just mint more money. It's an old meme transmogrified into The New Meme.
Because the right has nothing better to work on, nor any ideas of their own, let alone releasing their death grip on increasing taxes, they've taken this statement and run with it to fill empty air time and empty heads with fresh empty talking points.
That is my take, however see the posts of Scott, BobBuford, really?, John, Berkshirefollower, and Kurt Froehlich since they seem to have a far deeper inside bead on the farce and have come here not so much to educate, but to ridicule the rest of those who've posted. Perhaps they will choose to enlighten us all with their knowledge.
Respectfully.
Oh. My. Gawd! Is the NRCC *really* that dumb? I guess if you believe that all of our money is still backed by gold, it's plausible.
So far removed from reality is the NRCC they can't even get their image of the Titanic right: it had four funnels not two.
MONEY, n. A blessing that is of no advantage to us excepting when we part with it. An evidence of culture and a passport to polite society. Supportable property.
~ Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary.
We've been printing funny money for a long time now, basically turning straw into gold (or platinum!). If the trillions of dollars stuffed in the mattresses of the uber-rich were liberated to join the rest of the economy and were put into remaking our infrastructure, we could have an economic renaissance, and all this fake hullabaloo would fade into forgotten history.
Even so, it does beg the question of what money really is.
Money grows by lending. Inflation makes the value of a unit of currency decrease over time. Hence the numerical quantities of money we have to refer to increases over time. Now we talk glibly in billions and trillions. Not so long ago a million dollars was considered a sizeable fortune. Not any more. A million in today's parlance is small change.
There is no finite given amount of money on the planet. Money is unlimited according to how we create it and what we do with it. We can't run out of money any more than we can run out of inches. The GOP argument about cutting spending is therefore vacuous.
So what really is money, other than knowing the price of everything and the value of nothing?
I really love your posts, and I think you are very intelligently presenting factual accounts. What I do NOT like, or think is productive, is stooping to the level of the media mouths who use name calling as an attention getting tool. The right wing has received a trouncing recently, and they are confused, scared and in political disarray. Abortion, gay marriage, insolvency of the United States, guns are all near and dear issues to them. Most of the right wing people I personally know, are very educated and intelligent. To dismiss them as idiots is simply not productive. We have the moral high ground, a president with the gumption to make some seriously needed changes, let's not waste energy on foolishness. It's beneath you. Thanks
A classic exercise in holier-than-thou Personal Virtue. By the way, "educated" (for some value of "educated") and "intelligent" do not necessarily work out to "good person". Edward Teller was "educated" and "intelligent".
I concur, though I would ask, while you defend them, can you answer for why these same kind of people voted to put/keep this particular clutch of Republicans in Congress?
In fairness, there's a disconnect between what not just conservative but all voters want and what they are getting...education and intelligence can still be blind and biased too, in any of us.
I think the President should order Treausury to issue three 1 trillion dollars platinium coins and deposit them with the Central bank in order to pay for future spending. At the same time the President should order 535 commeratives silver coins, with a fifty dollar face value and fifty dollars worth of silver, and have his election campaign buy all of them and send them to each of our Congressmen and Senators, with a note to thank them for finally finding a non political solution to the current and future debt crisis. From now on this PResident and all future Presidents, whenever he or she is in need to increase the debt, and Congres does not want to cooperate you simply issue more coins.
Regards
"The amount of platinum needed to mint a coin worth $1 trillion would sink the Titanic."
I would like to point out that the Titanic is on the bottom of the ocean. You don't even have to add a nickel to do that...
His point is well taken however the largest US bill currently printed is $100. The US hasn't printed $10,000 bills since 1946. If you are going to point fingers at the GOP, don't then shoot yourself in the foot with a wrong example.
The gold standard for us currency was abandoned by Nixon in 1973. We had deficit prior to and since. Our largest deficit was from WWII and we paid that off with a good economy.
While this back and forth on the monetary policy decisions and their effects is interesting and educational to some, the issue is still the need to grow the economy with jobs. There is no viable Republican plan for this to happen, other than cutting the legs from out of those who would be the very ones to spend and create the demand for products and services to create jobs. Jobs, with better pay (I might add) would begin to fill the revenue coffers, like what happended during the clinton adminstration. Yes, we need to cut "entitlements", first those that do not help the economy overall, such as deductions for corporate ariplanes, unnecessary oil and farm subsidies, etc. before going after the folks that need the dollars and will spend so the money cycle can do its circulation. The position and notion that entitlement cuts to benefits to those who paid into those funds, such as SS and Medicare, are simply vindictive, cruel, and deceitful, in putting the burrden on those who would benefit from them in a meaningful way. Why? Look art thge 20 -30 year trend lines for the pay of the workers vs those at the top. The leveled off line at the lower end of the pay chart are the workers, while the pay chart at the top that goes up at a 45+ dgree angle is that of the top earners, and we know prices increase, as evidenced by the CIP, so why is the 98% being targeted? How about greed, how about getting campaign dollars from the corporations and top 2% earners, keeping the electorate dumbed down with eduction funding decreases and cutting teachers' salaries, how albout eliminating union influence, to name a few. See, if they win elections across the ciuntry, guess what wil lhappen; our debt wil go down significantly, the pay gap will get even more pronounced, the 98% would totally bear the costs of government, and the 98% would be the bottom class of a two class society. What you're seeing today is the progress of a long term Republican plan that's coming to fruition. The 2010 Republican win and the gerrymandering of districts, the states taken over by Republican governors, senates and houses, voter supression in these states, etc., etc., etc. and that is the reality. And don't forget gun control and those who benefit from no or minimal control. The beneficiaries are not the gun owners, but NRA and the Republicans who want the elctortate to think that way, so the manufacturers and lobbiests and NRA can continue making huge sums of monies at the expense of the the 98%. Yes, even the gun nuts are part of the 98% that are being taken advantage of; they're spending their dollars on the prolducts and donations and dues. By their actions to add more guns in schools, NRA seems to be the non-profit arm of the gun manufacturers and lobbiests, which makes me wonder what their Vision and MIssion Statements and Values are as stated in their Strategic Plan and how closely they're being followed. A bit cynical, but might the NRA and Company be thinking that if more of the population are wiped out in the increasing number of gun violence acts that they have a better chance of increasing gun sales and Republicans winning more elections and the Presidency, ya think?
And the amount of toilet paper necessary to print a 1000.00 bill is enough to paper Boehner's and Grover's houses too.....by that logic anyway.
After reading the comments from those supporting the Tbagg...I mean, Repubicans in Congress, I now understand how the politicians of that party have managed re-election all these years.
It's not because of the stupidity of the politicians...
Why not? We pay 3 cents for every penny; and a rag-paper dollar is not worth that much in exchange for anything except the full faith and credit of the United States.
A $1 Trillion coin is very foolish idea, but then again we have an extremely foolish, and non-functional Congress so any little idea is better than doing nothing.
If we could put the whole NRCC on the Titanic, it would be worth it to sink it all over again.
What great and creative ideas. I can’t wait to try some. Thanks for sharing