With respect to the Continental, the United States established the Continental on the basis of the successful experience of the Pennsylvania Land Bank’s issuance of paper money backed by land and the collection of such interest on loans that taxes were not necessary. The Continental reflected the nature of money as political-legal construct. Two factors damaged the Continental, however. The first was outright counterfeiting by the British. The second was massive manipulation by short-selling the Continental — by the British. Please see Ellen H. Brown “The Web of Debt” and Stephen Zarlenga “The Lost Science of Money”.

Misapprehension and distortion of accurate history serves the ends of the distorters, by and large. Those who benefit from the distortion of history are fans of the commodity and credit theories of money. Consider the source of the stories on hyperinflation and the Continental in particular. Do as Deep Throat advised Woodward and Bernstein — follow the money!

Smith helped erect a Mythology of Money obscuring the science of money. History and thought shows moneys essence to be an abstract legal power, but economists still argue whether it should be a commodity like gold; or a private credit issued by banks. Economics has never properly defined money! The “father of economics” himself – Adam Smith – promoted this confusion by attacking the legal concept of money in his definition:

“By the money price of goods it is to be observed, I understand always, the quantity of pure gold or silver for which they are sold, without any regard to denomination of the coin.”

Smith’s primitive misdefinition of money as a commodity insinuated a mythology of money into economics in 1776, from which it has not recovered.”

This is totally asinine. “Economics has never properly defined money!”…yeah, economists never have…..but mankind has, and it’s gold + silver. Smith PROPERLY identified money as gold + silver, in spite of what economists and bankers want. Here’s another beaut:

“After the Punic wars weakened Rome’s money system, she regressed to silver then gold, and then civil war contenders privately issued coinage. Wealth concentrated and the general population
regressed into slavery. The breakdown of Law and money worked the one upon the other for centuries in a downward spiral of societal decay. Even commodity money came close to vanishing in the dark ages in the West.”

“After the Punic wars weakened Rome’s money system…”?? This guy has no knowledge of world history if he makes a statement like this. There were 3 Punic Wars, all within 120 yrs [264bc - 146bc]. The first was a ‘draw’ [but Rome actually won], the last 2 were victories for Rome. Before these wars, Carthage was the predominant western Mediterranean power; Rome was a backwater town [the Romans hadn't even conquered the whole Italian peninsula at this point]. By the end of the 3rd war, in 146bc, the Romans had not only razed Carthage, but subjugated Greece [made it a province] the same year! So in this 120 yr span, Rome had attained Mediterranean superpower status, and totally destroyed Carthage, and expanded into Greece and the Balkans. Now, we know wars are expensive endeavors; how did Rome fund these operations if the Punic Wars ‘weakened her monetary system’? Answer: it didn’t. Far from it. With every victory, the legions brought back huge amounts of booty from the conquered areas, all for Rome’s coffers. In fact, she conquered Spain’s silver mines in the 2nd Punic War, and all this silver now flowed to Rome. Far from weakening, these new sources of funds strengthened Rome to the point where she could undertake serious expansion….all funded by the legions. As long as the legions continued to win [and they did], new sources of wealth flowed to Rome; she got bigger and richer with each conquest. So the above statement is not only inaccurate, it’s downright WRONG. Rome’s coinage didn’t collapse until the mid-3rd century…about 400 yrs after the Punic Wars. And by that point, the legions weren’t bringing in any more wealth; on the contrary they were now a drag on the treasury. No more victories, but the legionaries still had to eat and get paid. And Rome never ‘regressed’ to silver + gold; she ALWAYS used them [everybody did] as money….and copper too.
So this article was written by a bunch of STUPID economists who’ve never understood this fact: gold + silver were [and are] money because MANKIND PICKED THEM TO BE. They were never fiated into existence; mankind chose them to be money because they are the most marketable commodity: easily exchangable in trade for a required item….and everybody accepted them. THAT’S what makes money, not whether some idiot economist can define it or not. And since the comments about the Roman system were totally wrong….it makes me wonder about the comments about ‘British counterfeiting’ in NY, too.
I stand with JP Morgan’s statement: “gold is money, nothing more.”
And just because some economists don’t like it doesn’t make it so. It’s STILL money…..

http://beforeitsnews.com/story/499/Tungsten_Filled_Gold_Bars_-_GLD_ETF_WARNING.html

Any other questions?

An excerpt:
“And lets take a look – First THE CONTINENTAL CURRENCY of the American Revolution. $200 million were authorized and $200 million issued. They functioned well until General Howe made New York City the center for British counterfeiting. You Brits counterfeited billions of our Continentals. If you ever find out how many, please let us know for the
record! Newspaper ads openly offered the forgeries; yet General Clinton complained:

“The experiments suggested by your Lordships have been tried, no assistance that could be drawn from the power of gold or the arts of counterfeiting have been left untried; but still the currency…has not failed.”

The Continentals carried us over 5½ years of Revolution to within 6 months of final victory. Tom Paine wrote:

“Every stone in the Bridge, that has carried us over, seems to have a claim upon our esteem. But this was a corner stone …But to suppose as some did, that, at the end of the war, it was to grow into gold or silver… was to suppose that we were to get 200 millions of dollars by going to war, instead of paying the cost of carrying it on.”

The Continental Currency gave us a nation. ”

Mises, the money power and the guys running gold mines and manipulating gold prices are basically the same folks, and you probably know it.