McElchap, the solution to your problem is very simple. If you can't beat 'em, join 'em. The other is -- If you can't bite them, leave them alone.

McElchap …. If you said you were responding to JV, then try to write clearly. In your last comment, your English is so bad it is hard to understand what you mean.

Read your own comment again and try to correct your crooked English.　 Only people like PureTrust endorsed your comment because they thought they understand your English when they truth is they don't. Had you written understandable English, they would not have endorsed your comment.

To be sure, I quoted what you wrote down: "I guess us slaves should just shut up and get back to work …"

Now don’t escape your own trap. You are trying to escape by telling me:  You totally missed the mark in assuming I called myself a slave. Who said then, that you are a slave? Not me. I didn’t even assume that you are a slave. You said it boy …"I guess us slaves should …" Read your statement again. Use your contact lens. If you can’t understand what you wrote down, don’t bug me. Call an ambulance.Who said then, that you are a slave? Not me. I didn’t even assume that you are a slave. You said it boy …" …" Read your statement again. Use your contact lens. If you can’t understand what you wrote down, don’t bug me. Call an ambulance.

 Bayag!  You totally missed the mark in assuming I called myself a slave, and in calling me a "jerk". Your literary comprehension is very low. I was responding to Vanderville's proclaiming to represent humanity's "master" in a broad address to all working classes. My response was in a similar vein, a broad representation on behalf of all Vanderville deemed to be slaves of the "people" he represented. I was responding directly to issues he raised, and I have dealt with logic without silly name-calling as you have. I see this long discussion becoming pointless in dealing with the ignorant, spiteful, and facetious slings and arrows sent my way.

Oh, by the way, McElchap, I appreciate all the work you have done in the past to move freedom ahead. Don't let these jokers get you down. When freedom takes off again, they will all slink back to their holes and put on their "ra, ra, freedom" garb, and nobody would ever recognize them for what they are here.

Any of you jokers do the legal research on "legal tender" that I suggested you do? NO? Well, maybe I'll be back after you have done some. After all, then you might, at least, be able to talk about it intelligently. Judging by all your posts, I'm beginning to suspect that you can't talk about anything intelligently. But I have seen JV and brag come pretty darn close, so it might be possible.

A couple of top-notch legal researchers are Gene at www.theamericanrepublic.com, and Marc at www.marcstevens.net. These guy probably won't play your games with you, but if they did, the only denial you could truthfully do, would be to deny yourselves. Of course, you are almost doing that already.

Hey, guys ... name-calling is off limit for you and me. Ad Hominem specialists need help. Let's just provide a detour to where they are going, okay?

McElchap, JV did not call you slave.  In your own comment, it is you who called yourself slave -- you jerk! If you must know, my muscles are bigger than yours, Elf.

 I second the motion.

JV, please bear with us. As the presumed leader of this positive-thinking group on the side of the public, we can sense your frustrations. Don’t give up. Stay here with us. You have to share your knowledge and wisdom with those cretins who need them badly like McElchap because of mental shortcoming and regressive misdemeanor.

Vanderville! It has been a hoot, but I do see through your facade and recognize you for the strawman poser you are. I guess you just like to make sport here by pretending to be the opposition.  Unless you actually are a Reptoid with a Klingon philosophy of violent domination. In that case, I have a 12 gauge I'd like to acquaint you with.  I may be impoverished, but I don't think like a slave, you phony phantom of the Phoenix! 

McElchap, you are bringing up my "arrogant reply" to you? How about your arrogant reply to me … is that okay, and mine is not?

How dare you compare me to yourself as "slaves" that "should shut up and get back to work …" You don’t dare say that to your Master.

You believe you are a slave, and that’s fine with me. But I am not. However, if you drag me there, then you should know that I and my kind are your Masters from whom your life depends on, to command and show you the way, to run this world for the benefit of all of your kind … Masters you can’t live without.

Arrogance of knowledge and wisdom is never the object of scorn. Only arrogance of ignorance is always the subject of contempt. That’s the difference of arrogance you display, against mine. Mine, I can back up to the hilt. With no back up of knowledge and wisdom, yours rises from the trench, and falls back into the gutter. I am telling you this to make you aware of your ignorance, mental shortcoming offensive misdemeanor.

As I expected, you could never figure out why in this Millennium, this wealthiest and mightiest nation on the planet can no longer go back to the gold and silver standard. You can't be helped. You are what you are. You and your kind, and the likes of Ron Paul are fossilized remnants of the past.

 Vanderville, I noticed your arrogant reply to me totally avoided the issues I raised and you aligned yourself with Bernanke. There is a well known quote from Greenspan about how fiat currency is an instrument of theft, which you apparently condone in financing those space colonization missions you spoke of. I guess us slaves should just shut up and get back to work so the House of Rothschild, the House of Windsor, and the House of Rockefeller can command great starships to plunder other planets with powerful weapons. I am well aware of the fact real wealth is in real estate and real goods, which are being stripped from the people by use of the "legal tender" greenbacks you prefer!

 Little knowledge is dangerous!

Brutos caught this "loony" flatfooted forcing him to drop out the Legal Tender issue he couldn't handle, but if you read candy-lady Panocha's lastest comment below, I think she clearly demonstrated how crazy is PureTrust's twisted understanding of what Legal Tender means.

PureTrust dropped off the Legal Tender issue in his last comment. I think JV is convinced this guy is HOPELESS. But Brutos caught PureTrust's quoted argument crazy he was forced to hide himself in his usual hiding place -- around the bush ... heh, heh, he, he.

Once in awhile JV just about gets to the point where he says something logical, where one could almost envision that he sincerely wants to SEE. Then the rest of you jokers jump in and mess him all up in his thinking, and he forgets what he was looking for in the first place.

Come on, JV. You can do it. You're almost there sometimes. Don't let these others drag you down. You almost made it to freedom. Keep trying. don't give up. You just might make it, yet.

No Panot, don’t do it! You may be as hot and wild as I was when I was in my teens, but don’t do it! You, the tax collector, PureTrust and Larken a convicted tax felon will be arrested and lumped in the same cell for agreeing to violate the law on Legal Tender. Get arrested on something else … just don’t violate the law on Legal Tender by circumventing it with a mutual agreement [a conspiracy to violate] for this embarrassing purpose of evading payment of taxes.

.

The Tax Collector representing the Government and I agreed that just a passionate kiss in a dark secluded corner is more than sufficient as payment for my income tax this year. Can I and this kind-hearted IRS worker that transacts business with me for and in behalf of the Government, be sued for evading payment of tax? I know that a kiss is NOT a legal tender -- but we mutually AGREED that it is a legal tender!

Never mind Brutus... I am tired of drilling it into a really thick and hard cranium. Right now I am so frustrated I could kick Gago out of frustration. Gago is our male five years old Chihuahua.

PureTrust, I know exactly what your problem is: "If the customer and the store owner agree that it is legal tender regarding their transactions, then for them it IS legal tender. If they do NOT agree that it is legal tender, then it IS NOT."

WRONG! The storeowner and the customer CANNOT disagree that your gold teeth or silver teeth that JV has cited as an example, is NOT a legal tender because the law says that it is NOT. Neither can they both disagree that the $20 bill is NOT a legal tender because the law says that it is.

There is a LOT of difference between WHAT is a legal tender, and ACCEPTING or REJECTING a legal tender.

I know what is in your mind. Just because it is ACCEPTED, to you it is a legal tender. Just because it is NOT ACCEPTED, to you it is not a legal tender.

What is a legal tender does not depend on whether the medium of exchange is accepted or not. When a piece of wood is offered and ACCEPTED in lieu of the $20 bill, still the wood is NOT a legal tender because the law says it is NOT! The fact that the piece of wood was ACCEPTED as payment, does not make that piece of wood a LEGAL TENDER because the law does not consider a piece of wood a legal tender.

I am afraid that a dull mind cannot penetrate and understand this difference.

WRONG!The storeowner and the customer CANNOT disagree that your gold teeth or silver teeth that JV has cited as an example, is NOT a legal tender because the law says that it is NOT. Neither can they both disagree that the $20 bill is NOT a legal tender because the law says that it is.

There is a LOT of difference between WHAT is a legal tender, and ACCEPTING or REJECTING a legal tender.

I know what is in your mind. Just because it is ACCEPTED, to you it is a legal tender. Just because it is NOT ACCEPTED, to you it is not a legal tender.

What is a legal tender does not depend on whether the medium of exchange is accepted or not. When a piece of wood is offered and ACCEPTED in lieu of the $20 bill, still the wood is NOT a legal tender because the law says it is NOT! The fact that the piece of wood was ACCEPTED as payment, does not make that piece of wood a LEGAL TENDER because the law does not consider a piece of wood a legal tender.

I am afraid that a dull mind cannot penetrate and understand this difference.

JV, it seems like you are totally missing the point. In your simplistic question, "Is gold or silver a LEGAL TENDER?" there is no simplistic answer.

If the customer and the store owner agree that it is legal tender regarding their transactions, then for them it IS legal tender. If they do NOT agree that it is legal tender, then it IS NOT.

There are circumstances where it is legal for the customer and store owner to so agree. And there are circumstances where it is illegal for them to so agree.

The United States Government and the State Governments do not have this option. Constitutionally, in the spirit of the Constitution, gold and silver IS the only legal tender that the Government can use.

But in legalistic form they have found a way around the legal writings of the Constitution. They have totally bypassed the Constitution regarding the legal tender issue altogether. Government doesn't have anything to do with issuing legal tender or not issuing it. Instead, they have passed the money thing over to the Federal Reserve Bank, a private entity, that is not really part of Government. If you are really interested in seeing how it was accomplished by Government, and how it is legalistically legal for them, the best writing that I know of to date on this subject can be found at http://www.teamlaw.net/history.htm.

On top of this, Government, itself, only borrows and repays legal tender from and to the Fed. And if that isn't enough, the term "legal tender" has been re-defined, so that it can fit whatever they want it to.

If you want to find out what the term "legal tender" means, you need to look up the meaning in the various law dictionaries and encyclopedias. Try Black's, Bovier's and Ballentine's for dictionaries. Try Corpus Juris Secundum and American Jurisprudence 2d for encyclopedias.

Then, once you look up the meanings, you need to look up the meanings for all of the words that define the term, and the words that define those words, etc., all the way back until you come to "circular references." In addition, you need to read any court cases listed, to find out to whom any particular meanings apply. And you need to shepardize the court cases to be sure that they are up to date.

So you see, your simplistic question, "Is gold or silver a LEGAL TENDER?" simply has no simplistic answer.

By the way, have you pulled my dental records again to find out that I have gold and silver teeth?

 Bird that flew out of the cuckoo nest!

PureTrust … you are bouncing like a ball around the issue. Pay attention to this simple issue or question I raised: Is gold or silver a LEGAL TENDER?

I held that it is NOT. I supported this position by giving an example that your gold teeth or silver teeth is NOT A LEGAL TENDER. Focus and dispute this if you can.

Now listen carefully: Although your gold teeth or silver teeth is gold or silver, the store owner will reject it as payment for the groceries you purchased because it is NOT a legal tender he expected to receive from you.

I ask you one more time: Your tooth is gold, your other tooth is silver – IS ANYONE OF THESE TWO TEETH OF YOURS A LEGAL TENDER? That’s the issue. Just answer me that the gold or silver in your teeth is a LEGAL TENDER that the storekeeper MUST accept or REJECT. Now I ask you again -- Is it a legal tender?

Here is your pain in the …* You said The term "legal tender" is a legal term. It only applies to Government, and to those people outside of Government who wish to freely accept it that way.
You are not one of those people in the Government – therefore “legal tender” decreed by law does NOT apply to you because you are outside of the Government? Good grief [!] that’s pretty screwed up!

Can anyone OUTSIDE the Government then, refuse or not accept a legal tender? In short, can that storeowner in the example reject a $20 bill [Green Buck] as payment for the grocery items a customer bought? Of course he CAN. He is free to do so – there is no federal law that prevents him from doing so for any reason that comes to his mind … a “donation” is one of those reasons not to accept the $20 bill … he just want to give away the items for free!. BUT IS THAT RELEVANT TO THE ISSUE RAISED WHETHER OR NOT GOLD OR SILVER IS A LEGAL TENDER? Can you see how disconnected you are?

Recap: Is the “Silver Circle” of Tom Woods & Megan Duffield -- a token silver coin that Ron Paul was holding in front of the Video Camera -- a LEGAL TENDER or not … If you could focus on this issue, instead of jumping all around like a bouncing ball, you might still turn out to be not as bad as those wayward tornadoes that destroyed many towns in the Midwest!

You kids are totally missing the point. You are talking about legal tender in the United States. But at the same time the talk involves money outside of the United States.

The United States is an incorporated entity of sorts. That is what the Government is. When you use the words "in" or "within" you are speaking about someone inside of the Government, doing his official Government office duties.

Most of the people on the United States of America land are not in the Government. They are private, even if they are running corporations authorized by a State, or sometimes, even by the Federal Government.

Yet you choose to mix the two groups. You choose to assume that what applies as legal tender to one applies to the other in the same way. You also mix up the ideas of legal tender and value for value trading. They are completely different for people in Government doing Government work, and for the rest of the people who live on the land.

The term "legal tender" is a legal term. It only applies to Government, and to those people outside of Government who wish to freely accept it that way.

If someone outside of Government, operating in his private capacity, decides to define "legal tender" in a different fashion than Government has, he has that total right.

The whole talk on this subject, in this article, and in these comments, us moot. Why? Because the meanings of the words and terms are being used interchangeably in this talk, on a regualar basis. And if that were not bad enough, the commenters, and probably the article itself, don't even realize that they are doing it!

If you want to make sense, you need to define what you are talking about, and the ways in which you are talking about it. And this is a BIG necessity when talking about things that have a legal definition.

Some of you kids have a lot to learn, yet.

To McElchap … Just to pull your feet to the ground, I want you to know that the subject of Monetary and Fiscal Policies is one of the Chapters in my book on Globalization. So what you are trying to argue here with me in an attempt to impress me is just kindergarten to me.

I don’t think I should waste my time pulling you up to the level of what I know so that you would understand why in this Millennium this wealthiest and mightiest nation on the planet could no longer go back to the gold and silver standard, especially when it is out of ignorance. By the way, it is not gold or silver that made this country the wealthiest and the mightiest on the planet. What was used as legal tender to achieve that – I will give you a chance to use your brain and figure it out.

With your academic background and Ron Paul’s educational background, you and Ron Paul’s kind are not in the position to argue and embarrass Dr. Bernanke and me and people like us whose bread and butter is Economics, by lecturing us that we should go back to the gold standard because you think you know better than we do. The Austrian theory on this regard has long been discarded and buried in the past. Moreover, you, Ron Paul, and the likes of you who have not gone to schools of higher learning to specialize like we did, are still there on that Austrian foothold of inferior knowledge and ignorance.

I will just give you the bottom line of what you do not understand: Gold and Silver cannot and will never bring you to the Moon. We are now exploring the outer space. Gold and Silver will and can NEVER make that possible. Our super-infrastructures on land, sea and space can NEVER be funded by gold and silver, today or tomorrow. The future score of Metals as legal tender is ZERO. No amount of gold and silver found on this planet could be mined to finance our travel to outer space and for our inter-Galactic defense as we leave Earth and inhabit places beyond, now in the drawing board. Did we have a lot of baggage along the way? Sure we have, but not what we couldn’t carry, as we moved to where we are now, and to the future.

I am giving you an idea. You figure it out.

These guys are very knowledgeable when they are unanimous in their findings and arguments that gold or silver is not a legal tender in U.S.A. Although they are right, I don’t want anymore to argue any further. As a closure, I just want to make it clear to everyone that under the United States Coinage Act of 1965, "foreign gold or silver coins are not legal tender" in the United States.

Congress declared by law, that gold or silver is no longer legal tender in the United States. Now to pat yourself on the back that you are smarter than the U.S. Congress, you can argue until you turn blue that gold or silver is legal tender in the United States – BUT STILL IT WILL NOT CHANGE THE TRUTH THAT IT IS NOT. You cannot politicize a lie out of the law like Ron Paul does, and dictate the Fed how to run our monetary system when he is not even aware that the "Silver Circle" token coin he was holding was NOT a legal tender he can use to pay for his grocery. Tom Woods & Megan Duffield can’t fool the public either by pandering to Ron Paul’s image for publicity purposes. What are those guys trying to do – kill their business?

 Vanderville, Anonymous75, et al:  I concede that the federal government has not permitted gold or silver to be used as legal tender as it once had been under the US Constitution and common sense. Even when the coins come from the US Mint! But I support Ron Paul in returning to constitutional money, and allowing alternative currencies and barters to become lawful and commonplace in a free market economy. Even today, although you wouldn't be able to use silver dollars or gold coins casually at the cash register, if you have such coins, there is always someone willing to make a transaction or put your favored fiat currency in your hand. The market value of metals may float, but Federal Reserve Notes only sink in value, having lost almost 98% of the Dollar's value since the central bank's charter began. You are entitled to kiss bankster butt if you are so inclined, but I will Live Free or Die Trying!

I know the solution to your problem. I feed sunflower seeds to make bird brain grow. It is especially good for birds that flew out of the cuckoo nest!

With regards to PureTrust's comment, I know what your big problem is, JV. And that is how you could make a weird bird understand … this one that flew out of the cuckoo nest.

You are as usual, again way, way off the loop. The issue raised – which you are supposed to address – is whether or not gold or silver [representing your gold teeth or silver teeth you use to pay your purchases in the grocery store] is a LEGAL TENDER in the United States. I took the position that it is NOT [unless you are in Utah, and transact business using gold or silver, in Utah, and in Utah only].

I will give you a simple pointer on how to make a comment that connects: When you make a comment, you either agree because …[support your position]. Or disagree because …[support your disagreement]. In his comment, an idiot couldn’t fly way out to the Moon and think he is smart, because you are not that smart at all by any stretch of the imagination.

But instead, you call the store owner "idiot" for not accepting your token silver coin [represented by your silver teeth in the analogy] as legal tender. You clearly bare your ignorance as to why the store owner does not accept your gold teeth or silver teeth [Silver Circle token coin of Woods & Duffield] as legal tender. The value-ratio of 1 silver dollar to the $20 or $30 value of the same silver dollar in the market, which you found in the Web but do not even understand, is totally irrelevant – way off the issue. Again, the issue is, whether or not gold or silver is today’s legal tender in the United States. And I have to ram it hard down your throat to make you understand that it is NOT. Capis?

Next time if you make a comment and still does not connect, I don’t just ignore you – I don’t even know you from Adams!

Some of you kids are so ridiculously un-thinking. Here's what I mean.

If the Silver Eagle says "One Dollar" on it, and if the store won't accept it as payment for a 99 cent item, because they think it is NOT legal tender, we have 2 idiots here. The first is a joker who wants to throw away $20 or $30 - the value of the coin in silver. The second idiot is the store, that won't accept the $20 or $30 that the first idiot is trying to throw away.

The value of the coin at a coin shop might be $20 or $30 or whatever, depending on the price of silver. But the value of it at the store is $1, because it says so on the face of it.

You folks are so much fun. No wonder we aren't following the Constitution. Big Gov can pull just about anything over on us just about any time they want, and we don't even get it.

Hey, you bunch of "once upon a time" ... but now no more! Don't you get it? Just fool yourself with your own ignorance, but not the people! Legal tender ... bah!!!

Hey! Vanderville, Panchoa, and other "useful idiots" insisting on sticking with greenbacks, take note.  In America, once upon a time, there were many mercantile establishments and individuals, banks included, that accepted gold and silver by weight, even gold dust, foreign coins, nuggets or artifacts of gold and silver were commonly in commerce. However, it is true that in the past century the feds have killed off any use of gold and silver as legal tender... in a blatant disregard for constitutional money. I'm sorry you fools believe in fiat currency that amounts to nothing more than an IOU destroying the American economy. Yes, we're forced to use it, but we don't have to like it!

Is your heart not bleeding to see that pathetic picture of Ron Paul holding a token silver coin and pleading to the Chairman of the Federal Reserves to accept it as “money” or legal tender to pay his groceries?

Mine does.

Calm down ... they are just expressing their "admiration" of Ron Paul's vast knowledge in Economics -- in particular, their American Idol's expertise in monetary economics -- the one and only, direct from the "lunatic fringe".

JV, again, another one from the "lunatic fringe" ...heh, heh he e e eeek! Give me a glass of water, please ... I'm choking!

You said "Silver Round" (or gold round) of honest weight　is legal tender …　Don’t sound like an idiot. Your "Silver Circle" is NOT a legal tender. You want to prove that it is NOT a legal tender?

Go to the grocery store today. Take off your gold or silver teeth, then pay the grocery with your gold or silver teeth. If the cashier won't accept your gold and silver teeth as payment for your grocery and they throw you out of the door, sue the grocery store.

Oh, by the way include the U.S. Government in your lawsuit for the "unconstitutionality" of the Green Buck. Tell the Sheriff exactly what you said in your comment that only gold or silver is a "CONSTITUTIONAL" money or LEGAL TENDER, and that he violates his oath for allowing the cashier to accept only dollar bills as money to pay for your grocery. If the ambulance brings you to the asylum, give me a call from there. I want to record your comment and play it for you later on after your release

Some criticize Ron Paul's "Silver Circle" promotion, saying it is not real money. I note the US Constitution declares a prescribed weight of silver, or gold, to be a US Dollar.  The US Constitution prescribes a certain weight of silver or gold to be lawful money. The US Constitution DOES NOT prescribe any particular inscription, motto, image, or design for coins denominated in dollars. Therefore, a "Silver Round" (or gold round) of honest weight is legal tender ... unless you talk to the US Treasury, the Federal reserve, Secret Service, FBI or IRS. The treasonous federal government prefers to limit us to enslaving debt instruments known as Federal reserve Notes, or IOU's.  Live Free or Die Trying!