Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) said he plans to introduce legislation next year to force an audit of U.S. holdings of gold. Paul, a longtime critic of the Federal Reserve and U.S. monetary policy, said he believes it’s “a possibility” that there might not actually be any gold in the vaults of Fort Knox or the New York Federal Reserve bank.
The libertarian lawmaker told Kitco News, a website tracking news about precious metals, that an audit was necessary to determine how much the U.S. maintains in gold reserves in case the government were to use gold to back the dollar.
“If there was no question about the gold being there, you think they would be anxious to prove gold is there,” he said.
“Our Federal Reserve admits to nothing, and they should prove all the gold is there. There is a reason to be suspicious and even if you are not suspicious why wouldn’t you have an audit?
“I think it is a possibility,” Paul said when asked if there was truth to rumors that there was actually no gold at Ft. Knox or the New York Fed.
You know I may not agree with everything Ron Paul says, but I have to give the man credit, he sticks by his beliefs, unlike almost every other politician in Washington.
Thinking about this some more. I’ve personally seen the gold, but have not personally seen Ron Paul. Perhaps Ron Paul is bogus.
Seriously though, I can respect Ron Paul (but not his son). I disagree with him on some significant issues, but can respect him.
So, what’s with this lunacy? Is he trying to become irrelevant? Why can’t we find a politician who isn’t bought, has some honest and decent ideas about the country, and doesn’t make statements about there being no gold in the U.S. or about UFOs?
Aside from the slight insanity issues, a race between Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich would be between two people not bought by corporate america with real ideas on fixing our problems.
Imagine a race between two respectable candidates, a true conservative and a true liberal. What a concept!!
And then I woke up.
Why is it “lunacy” to ask for some transparency and do an audit to find out what our obligations are to various governments and banks around the world? You’re saying you prefer government secrecy to an open and honest accounting of our public assets? The only lunacy is in your thinking.
How far has our politics sunk when a politician earns “respect” merely for being honestly idiotic?
Scott: can you think of a different word?
“understand”
“respect his honesty, but not his politics?” ((not one word, it is a challenge to encapsulate your meaning???))
“totally reject”
And so forth. Hitler was pretty honest too! (Ha, Ha!!)
@carl
All money in Canada is gold, you can just dig it out of the ground here.
But we make the notes out of color full plastic – after all oil is a scarce and limited resource.
“Hitler was pretty honest too! (Ha, Ha!!)”
Godwin ftw.
bobbo in the mirror: Godwin normally invokes “a lose” not a win, so at face value: thank you for seeing the point being made:
Respecting politicians is a foolish notion. On the distorting Mirror end of things, take Bill Clinton: I have almost no respect for him lying in office, selling pardons, totally corrupt but one of the better politicians to have served in office.
Respect???? Its a term to bamboozle the voting public.
I recently heard a some great advice for gold bulls:
*Sell all your assets and take out massive loans.
*Use all that money to buy gold that you can physically hold.
If you’re right, and the fiat currencies collapse, you can pay back the loans at a song. Put your fictional paper currency where your mouth is.
I own some gold. Bought a bunch about four years ago. A bunch. Figure I will just hang onto it, and my kid will get it.
These days I am buying 1000 round lots of ammunition. I started doing this, plus picked up an AR before Sock Monkey got elected.
Bobbo, go right ahead, cheesedick.
Some congressman did the same thing back in the 70′s. I saw a 60 Minutes piece about it, I think. He eventually got a guided tour of Fort Knox, and saw massive amounts of gold. Maybe Paul is just repeating that stunt.
#24 – bobbo,
Perhaps I haven’t followed Ron Paul closely enough since my politics does not lean toward the libertarian.
My view of him is as a classic libertarian, as in “freedom to starve.” Is this not the case?
I can respect the Heinleinesque libertarian viewpoint (but, of course, not the teabagger brand of anarchist that wrongfully calls themselves libertarian).
If Ron Paul is not what my impression is, then I just haven’t paid enough attention to him, which is extremely possible. If he is a classic libertarian and not bought by corporate interests, I can respectfully disagree with his politics.
As far as I know based on the little attention I’ve given him, the only point on which I truly don’t respect his view (though there are many points on which I disagree with his view) is on abortion, which is indeed a big one.
Paul tried to get an audit of the Federal Reserve, too. Didn’t happen and neither will the gold audit. I find it extremely unlikely we have anywhere near enough to service our debts and it would be disastrous to the economy if that got out.
“…said he plans to introduce legislation next year…”
Can we set the bar ant lower?
He doesn’t say he will, but that he “plans to”.
and, of course, he doesn’t say he will find the support to get it passed & signed by Obama… No. Just that he will “introduce” a bill [of some kind] next year.
Yeah, and I plan on introducing toilet paper to my butt the next time I take a dump.
#27 – bobbo,
Respecting politicians is a foolish notion.
Ack. Perhaps we need a different word for respect that means respect relative to other major-league scumbuckets willing to run for public office despite having to compromise every principle they’ve ever held. I guess that word wouldn’t really be respect, would it? What word would you suggest for the less bad politicians who have only compromised 99.44% of their principles?
I think this is Ron Paul’s plan to enable him to retire from politics.
.
For those who claim that releasing the figure of how much gold is there, it was never a particular secret. Wikipedia reports 147.4 million troy ounces at Fort Knox.
Sure, an audit is probably in order, if for no other reason than to out Paul’s outrageous conjecture and let him retire in peace. If there is any kind significant discrepancy, I’ll eat my hat. (my LA Dodger’s hat to be specific)
I want so much to like Ron Paul, but his religious and conspiracy beliefs make me shudder. I DO believe that he is straight forward and honest in what he says; that he actually believes it all. Same goes for George W. Bush though.
Oh, and Scott, I agree that a Paul/Kucinich race would be a great thing to have! I would have to take a long, hard look to decide between the two. As for loonyness, I’ll take the UFOs over God as by far the more likely to actually exist. But note that despite one being an “honest conservative” and the other being an “honest liberal” they are both very decidedly anti-war.
#23 – David,
Why is it “lunacy” to ask for some transparency and do an audit to find out what our obligations are to various governments and banks around the world? You’re saying you prefer government secrecy to an open and honest accounting of our public assets?
No David. It is not lunacy to ask for an audit and transparency. It is, however, lunacy to suggest that there is no gold in Ft. Knox or the Fed. You can take a free tour of the Fed. I’ve done it. Have you? There’s gold in them thar vaults!! I know this to be true, personally. Why has Ron Paul not simply taken the tour?
This statement is indeed lunacy:
35. spsfan- “Wikipedia reports 147.4 million troy ounces at Fort Knox.”
Debates over, Call Ron Paul and tell him to Google it. So, you sticking with that?
#35 – spsffan,
I agree that W probably believed what he was saying too, probably not a neuron of a doubt since he has so precious few neurons.
The difference is that his delusions were far worse and had not even an air of potential respectability.
Regarding peace, his view appeared to be ‘Armageddon: Bring it on! Here comes The Rupture.’
Regarding economics and taxes: “Let the next poor schmuck pay back the debt I run up. I’m not going to be the guy who raised taxes. I’m just going to be the guy who mortgaged the country to China.”
And, it only got worse from there.
BTW, no matter who gets into office, this past decade will require that taxes will go up. Trillions in Iraq; trillions to the banks*. A trillion here a trillion there, sooner or later it adds up to real money.
Yes, borrowing trillions from China at treasury rates (2.x – 3% or so) to lend to the banks at 0.5% interest so that they can lend it to us at 5% is a gift to the banks. There is no other way to view that. And, let’s hope no one is silly enough to get partisan on this. All of this, and the paltry little $700B bailout, had full bipartisan support.
#37 – McCullough,
The beautiful thing about most wikipedia pages is that they cite their sources.
http://tinyurl.com/j7cka
Paul is a moron. Plain and simple.
And to all those in this thread do we have it, do we really know.
http://gold.org/assets/file/value/stats/statistics/archive/pdf/World_Official_Gold_Holdings_June_2010.pdf
Yes we do and look at who is number one.
Obviously Paul can’t Google.
I am so glad that his wife has the food business or he would starve.
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