There are several places on earth which are ’powerless,’ and of course I mean without electricity. There’s Nepal, Iraq most of the time, and South Africa, which is so powerless that the mines can’t operate, causing the price of Platinum to go up. Power is important. Without parental power, parents can’t control and raise their kids correctly. Hillary thinks that kids should have the right to sue their parents, but that’s another column. We have to have economic power to succeed in life, as well as power which is obtained by education, high IQ, correct raising, and even good genes. Who then is powerless?
All of us, and there isn’t a damned thing we can do about it…or almost nothing anyway. We are powerless, when some bureaucratic buffoon interferes with out workplace, business or job. I’ll never forget the OSHA creep, who found a carpenter, working for himself in his own shop, not bothering anyone, and he was fined for not having a correct blade guard on his table saw. We have a so-called “Homeland Security” bureaucracy, which insists on grandma taking off her shoes to be certain that she hasn’t a bomb concealed in her inner-soles, while the luggage is inspected to be sure there isn’t any toothpaste concealed inside. All the while, ’Homeland Security,’ hasn’t seen fit to seal our borders with Mexico, nor to inspect thousands of containers which arrive in the US daily. Our lives must be made miserable because of government’s ever increasing self aggrandizement and power seizing, making us ever more powerless to run our own lives. We must buckle seat belts or face traffic fines, and beware of ever present government snooping on everything. We have become powerless to run our own lives, buy what we choose to buy, and live as we see fit. But that’s not the worst part of our powerlessness. We are powerless to stop the ever increasing degradation of our money. Everyone is taxed in this manner. You can defy the IRS, but I wouldn’t advise it, and you can take a chance on a cop not seeing your lack of having a seat belt choking you and making you uncomfortable, and you might even dare to use a power tool without the required appurtenances, but there is no possible way to stop the dollar from going down the tubes.
We measure distances in miles, feet, inches, yards, and meters. We measure capacity in gallons, and ounces. We measure electricity in volts, amps, and watts. We measure size in acres, and square feet. We measure weight in pounds and ounces. We measure light in lumens. We measure resistance in ohms. We measure power in horsepower. We measure frequencies in Hertz. We measure time in hours and minutes. We measure temperatures in degrees. We measure speed in miles per hour or RPMs maybe. We measure pressure in pounds, GPM, or other. We measure volume in decibels. We have accurate addresses so our mail can be delivered. We have accurate phone numbers and e-mail addresses so that we can communicate. We have various measuring devices to make sure that all is accurate, such as thermometers, volt meters, rulers, yardsticks, and the like. Without accurate measurements, society would collapse. Nothing could be manufactured. If measuring devices were not accurate, no one could build a house, car, computer, or any manufactured item. Without accurate measuring devices, society, literally would grind to a halt, or never have gotten started in the first place. Without accurate writing, language, and measuring, we might be where civilization was a couple of thousand years ago, and that might be grunting, eating grubs and grass for food, living in a cave, and acting like an animal.
Thanks to writing, languages, and measuring, we are a civilized society, and can travel thousands of miles in total comfort, watch distant happenings on a TV screen, sleep in comfortable beds, have wonderful homes, cars, and appliances, and live far above an animal, which we often keep for a pet. The measurement we use for our wealth is the dollar, yen, peso, euro, franc, or what have you, depending on where you live. In America, we are concerned with dollars, although my columns are read all over the world. The dollar, or ’buck’ as it is called, is a bad measuring device, and at the same time is one of our most important measuring devices. Suppose the degree, pound, gallon, inch, or volt decreased in value every day? Can you imagine the chaos that would result? No one could manufacture or fix anything. Replacement parts would be impossible, as would construction, and invention. Utter chaos would result if measuring devices shrank or changed value, even once a year. But our dollar, which is one of our main measuring devices, changes in value just about every day, generally going lower, in comparison to other currencies or measuring devices.
The dollar going down in value, being compared to other measuring devices in the form of currencies, is really not accurate, because all currencies are losing value or purchasing power, and therefore no currency anywhere is an accurate measuring device. The dollar isn’t going down as fast as the Zimbabwe currency, which has reached zero, but it’s not doing too good compared to the euro. No currency is an accurate measuring device, because all currencies can be increased in numbers, at the whim of any government which issues them, since none of them are backed by anything. In the case of the United States government, it has gotten out of control, and no one can stop it, because once inflation starts, it only gets more severe, because the politicians can’t stop spending and making wars, paid for with the currency or paper money they themselves create.
Please let me re-state “Stott’s Law,” which merely says that “The more of anything there is, the less they will be worth.” This applies to everything, be it radishes, lumber, airplanes, antiques, gold, or even smog. Therefore, the more dollars printed, to pay for government spending, the less they will be worth, and there’s nothing we can do to stop it. We are therefore, powerless. We cannot stop the decline of the dollar, which is what we measure our wealth with, and we must therefore, protect ourselves by getting out of the declining dollar, and into non-dollar denominated things. Things which are measured in other denominations such as gallons, ounces, or board feet, and which can be bought with dollars. When the things we buy go ’up’ in dollars, (they are the same things, only their prices in dollars change), and we eventually need dollars, we can sell the things we bought, to get dollars, to buy things which are still priced in dollars. Saving in dollars in CD’s bonds, or savings accounts means that we lose our assets as the dollars go down. If we hedge our assets by getting out of dollars, we save our assets. It’s so damned simple than a kindergartner can understand, but 99% of Americans will just put more dollars away in bonds and savings accounts, and eventually rue the day.
The gas we buy for $3.50 is the same gas we bought for a quarter when I was a kid. The milk we buy for $3 now is the same milk I bought for a dime when I was a kid. Of course wages have gone up to meet inflation, although not as fast, but I am not talking about prices-wages, I am TALKING SAVING SURPLUS ASSETS. I give up. Why do I write this stuff, when America is so damned stupid. I do suggest that you print this and pass it around. I almost feel like a pastor who is attempting to save people’s souls and who is underpaid for his efforts. No one pays me to write this stuff. I do it to try to save people’s assets, and 99% of the public are aptly called ’sheeple.’