Thursday 23 June 2005

The United States of America

Born: July 4th, 1776

Died: June 23rd, 2005

R.I.P.

2 comments:

David Farrer said...

Comments made on previous template:

Rethabile Masilo
Please note that it is "Mugabe" and not "Mugabwe," that is if you're referring to Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe.

30 June 2005, 20:06:33 GMT+01:00
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triticale
I worked for a goldbug for many years, which was lucky for me. If he'd taken my advice in 1980 and put that money into Intel stock instead of mining stock, he wouldn't have needed to keep the company going.

29 June 2005, 05:26:45 GMT+01:00
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Steve
New London is in my small, very blue state and, as you can imagine, there's been a lot of teeth gnashing and garment rending over this decision. 
 
There have been calls to boycott New London to punish the City Council but that would only impact small business and entrepeneurs.  
 
Holding each and every councilman, General Assemblyman, and Congressman to an anti-Eminent Domain position will be item one in the next election - at least along the New England coast. 
 
Be interesting to see when their pandering begins.

26 June 2005, 14:12:11 GMT+01:00
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Bill (Scotland)
As Andrew Duffin has pointed out, we in Scotland now have a pretty amazing system which allows some citizens to buy-out forcibly another person's property, and the state handily provides the money for these thefts to proceed. 
 
It surprises me about the US though (or not, in the light of some of the things that have been going on there in the past few years). The US seems now to be modelling itself after the way some property-developers in Spain acquire land for redevelopment by demolishing the property of others - with the local authority's blessing.

24 June 2005, 19:55:42 GMT+01:00
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David Farrer
Merrill Lynch have a Gold & General Fund. Up 2.8 today

24 June 2005, 16:52:45 GMT+01:00
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David Farrer said...

Comments made on previous template:

John East
dearieme, 
Most small investors buy gold coins such as krugerands. 
Try weightoncoin.com, taxfreegold.com, or eBay. I cannot recommend the first two because I've not used them. 
Alternatively, buy gold shares.

24 June 2005, 15:16:49 GMT+01:00
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dearieme
Gold: how do you buy it, how store it (in the UK)? How do you avoid a govt confiscating it a la FDR?

24 June 2005, 14:53:26 GMT+01:00
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Andrew Duffin
Coming as we do from a country where the neighbours can use government (ie other peoples') money to buy your property regardless of whether you want to sell it to them or indeed want to sell it at all, I suggest the most appropriate reaction would be a yawn. 
 
What do you expect The State to do? It's not your friend, you know.

24 June 2005, 12:22:12 GMT+01:00
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Andrew Ian Dodge
Yes, this is an outrageous event and rather distressing. I plan to read the actual ruling but from what I have heard its is pretty bad. Emiment Domain is pretty bad already and this just makes it far worse.

24 June 2005, 11:56:26 GMT+01:00
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steve shackleton
Apologies missed a bit, so much for "anglo saxon" economies small goverement etc. 
 
We have our own tub of lard doing the same in Bootle on the rather more dubious grounds that the police cannot police the area so the residents have to lose their homes to allow for poorer quality new housing. At least Mr Prescott will be able to say he has built some new affordable homes somewhere (even if he did knock down some affordable homes to do it.)

24 June 2005, 10:31:39 GMT+01:00
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John East
Thanks for the info. I'm also a gold bug, the sort of person who's had "loser" tatooed in invisible ink across his forehead for most of the last 20 years. 
When gold breaks $550 I'll drop by for a whiskey.

24 June 2005, 10:13:17 GMT+01:00
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steve shackleton
Doesn't seem to be much difference between Mugabwe and New London to me, I can imagine how it will turn out if not stopped. This will be just the first step (or is it a continuing step) in local/national govt disposing of private property as they see fit. 
 
As for gold, I find myself split, came into the free thinking market via Milton Friedman and so started out as a monetarist, and the only experience I had of a "gold standard" was the gold standard of the early 20th century which performed the same way as fixed exchange rates (poorly). It is only later on that I discovered that this is not what 100% fully backed gold means.

24 June 2005, 09:58:51 GMT+01:00
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David Farrer
A bit dramatic perhaps, but the American blogosphere was on fire last night. I think this decision - to take private property for private, not public, use - will cause outrage in the US. 
 
As for gold, well it's real money. Like many libertarians I'm a 100 % gold-backed money man. It seems a useful service to provide the price of money in terms of bits of paper.

24 June 2005, 09:51:19 GMT+01:00
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John East
PS 
While I'm here, what gives with the Kitco 24hr gold chart? It seems to be an unusal thing to find on a blog.

24 June 2005, 09:34:17 GMT+01:00
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John East
That's a bit dramatic. Best wait and see how it turns out. If we see Mugabwe style clearances then R.I.P. it is, but compulsory purchase at full market value plus compensation for one person holding up a large development? Maybe I could live with that.

24 June 2005, 09:25:24 GMT+01:00