14 Comments

The letter is prescient. Unfortunately, our nation is way past any possibility of paying back the debt of $33 trillion. For example, paying back "only" $1 trillion using $1 per second would take 31,688 years. So the U.S. is already insolvent.

There are only three possibilities on how to handle the debt: 1) Austerity (cutting spending), 2) Defaulting, and 3) debasing the currency. Politicians have zero incentives to do #1, as no one will elect them. #2 is not practical, because politicians will never agree to not pay back their own citizens who are holding bonds, etc. That leave #3, which is what has been going on since 1913, so that our dollar has lost 99% of its value. The history of fiat currencies is that they always end up hyperinflating and failing because governments cannot resist overspending to get elected and to get power. The U.S. dollar and our government is no different.

The only solution is bitcoin, so plenty of us are gradually moving out of the U.S. dollar and into bitcoin. Thank God we have an alternative, because the German people didn't have any solution in 1922-24, and the mark went from 4 marks per dollar to 4 trillion marks per dollar!

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It, the debt, could be somewhat alleviated with a proper valuation for gold relative to dollars in circulation.

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A gold backed currency is the only solution. Bitcoin is even more fiat than fiat - nothing supports it at all.

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founding

Perfect to go to our history to look for solutions. Thank you once more, Emerald, for sharing this piece of history. We must never forget the sacrifices made for future generations. Will we learn from our mistakes?

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Between my husband and our 3 daughters, our family has 5 degrees from Mr. Jefferson's University You've made their day with the sharing of his timeless letter to James Madison with your audience. We are so saddened by the treatment President Jefferson receives today by the woke idiots in charge of his once great institution, University of Virginia.

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Good to see fellow Wahoos on this thread!

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WAHOOWHA!!

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founding

Excellent. Thank you.

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Thank you! This is so TRUE and wonderful you sharing with us at a time that we MUST remember those who gave us Our Constitution and Freedom! Now we must UNITE and take our Country back Peacefully !

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The irony and probably the reason Jefferson was so sensitive to debt was because he was perpetually in debt. Building Monticello and his investment in books (yes, books were expensive then) and a continued habit of living above his means caused lifelong servitude to personal debt.

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You must be a Va Tech (VPI) graduate!

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Does this mean the constitution itself should only have applied to the generation that ratified it? And all other subsequent laws, for that matter?

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A vision from a great historian.

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Of course, a gold standard for our currency would make Jefferson's proposal much more attainable than it is under a fiat currency system. But even with a solid backing for money, debt can happen. As Jefferson cautioned in his letter. His proposal is both immanently fair and brilliant.

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