When a ‘too big to fail’ America meets a government too broke to bail it out



I’ve been titanically bearish on America for years. Sorry. I can do math.

The United States owes more than $38 trillion. That alone makes the balance sheet hopeless. The debt is insurmountable.

America’s GDP in 2024 was $29.2 trillion, meaning the debt exceeds 130% of what we produce in a year. If this were a business, every financial adviser would tell you to file Chapter 11 and salvage what you can.

Washington keeps adding another trillion to the tab roughly every 100 days. As the debt climbs, interest payments climb faster. The country now spins in a debt spiral that ends only one way. Game over.

The more the world moves away from the dollar, the more tens of trillions of unwanted dollars come flooding home. You haven’t seen anything like real devaluation yet.

Then comes the $210 trillion in future unfunded liabilities — mostly Social Security and Medicare. Those numbers don’t pencil out in any universe.

Underneath all of it sits a sinking currency. The dollar lost 87% of its value since we abandoned the gold standard in 1971. For decades, the petrodollar arrangement held the world in our system by forcing oil purchases through the U.S. currency. Saudi Arabia let that mandate expire last year. Global energy deals immediately began shifting to other currencies.

The more the world moves away from the dollar, the more tens of trillions of unwanted dollars come flooding home. You haven’t seen anything like real devaluation yet.

To fund our binge, Washington must keep selling treasuries. But foreign buyers are losing interest. Rates rise. The government buys its own debt just to keep markets from buckling. The Cayman Islands now holds $1.85 trillion — the largest single foreign share and rising fast. Treasury officials tried to obscure the numbers. None of it signals stability.

Meanwhile, our economy rests on an absurdly fragile foundation: 70% consumption. Seven out of 10 dollars depend on Americans buying things they can no longer afford. Household debt hit a record $18.6 trillion — nearly two-thirds of GDP. Families now pay down debt instead of fueling growth.

Shrinking consumption means a shrinking economy. Shrinking economy means shrinking tax revenue. Combine that with a weakening dollar and the picture becomes darker still.

Enter artificial intelligence, the accelerant. AI threatens tens of millions of jobs within years, wiping out income and collapsing the consumption model even faster. A government facing falling revenue and exploding obligations cannot pretend to stay solvent.

Some cling to fantasies like universal basic income. With what money? The same government already $210 trillion short on existing promises? Please.

This all points toward an economic crash far larger than 2008. Washington froze that crisis with $29 trillion in bailouts — money it didn’t have then either. We conjured it and shoved it onto the national debt.

That option is gone.

Today the government sits too deep in debt, with a weaker dollar and fewer global buyers. And the next crisis won’t hit one sector. It hits everything:

• Record mortgage debt: $13.1 trillion
• Record credit-card debt: $1.2 trillion
• Collapsing commercial real estate: $4.9 trillion
• Big Tech borrowing hundreds of billions to inflate an AI bubble

OpenAI’s Sam Altman already expects an eventual government bailout for AI’s collapse.

RELATED: When the AI bubble bursts, guess who pays

Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images

Total U.S. debt — public and private — hit $102.2 trillion in 2024. Washington cannot rescue a single major sector, let alone all of them. The national debt was $10 trillion during bailout 2008. It’s four times that now. The dollar buys less. Foreign creditors show less patience.

So who steps in next time? Who buys the treasuries? Who absorbs the losses?

No one. Not abroad. Not at home. Nowhere on this planet.

That leaves Washington with only one move: Print tens of trillions in new dollars and hand them to itself — more IOIs (as opposed to IOUs) stacked on a pile already ready to topple.

And that printing wave will obliterate whatever value the dollar still holds.

Think the dollar’s fallen far? You haven’t seen anything yet.

Bitcoin and the return of honest money



Bitcoin. Cryptocurrency. Blockchain. A decade ago, most Americans hadn’t heard those words. Even now, many don’t fully grasp what they mean. Some still dismiss Bitcoin as an internet fad — yet with one coin worth roughly $119,000, the joke is wearing thin.

The real story isn’t the price. It’s what Bitcoin represents: freedom, trust, and control over your own money. Those are conservative principles — and conservatives should embrace them.

Honest money for a dishonest age

In Denton County, Texans understand independence. We work hard, save what we can, and expect our money to keep its value. But Washington keeps printing dollars to solve political problems, and every new round of “stimulus” steals a little more of what Americans earn. That’s a big reason groceries, gas, and housing cost so much more today.

At its heart, Bitcoin isn’t about tech or speculation. It’s about trust — and keeping financial power in the hands of citizens instead of bureaucrats and corporations.

Bitcoin doesn’t play that game. Its supply is capped at 21 million coins forever. No bureaucrat or central banker can “stimulate” the economy by diluting your savings. It’s steady, transparent, and immune to the inflationary habits of modern government.

That’s not radical — it’s a return to honest value. Early Texans traded cattle, crops, and tools, and a handshake sealed the deal. Bitcoin is a digital version of that same trust: value backed by proof of work, not political decree.

Freedom in your own hands

Bitcoin is, at its core, a conservative idea. It rewards effort, limits government control, and protects personal liberty. You can own every rifle and round of ammunition in the world, but if the government freezes your bank account, you’re stuck. With Bitcoin, you control your money. Nobody can seize it.

The network itself is decentralized — millions of computers around the globe share the ledger. No single government, company, or regulator can shut it down. If one node fails, the others keep the system alive. It’s built to endure.

Lessons for a digital age

That model should guide how we build other technologies. Take artificial intelligence. Meta just poured $14 billion into one massive data center — a single point of failure. One cyberattack or natural disaster could wipe it out. America should follow Bitcoin’s example: distribute computing power, build smaller centers across the country, and bring skilled jobs to local communities like ours.

RELATED: ‘Lipstick on a pig’: How printing cash is destroying America — and crypto could be next

dem10 via iStock/Getty Images

Bitcoin also saves money. Send $1,000 through a credit card processor and you’ll lose $40 in fees. Send it through Bitcoin and it costs about four cents. That difference matters to small businesses, churches, and local campaigns. Political donations in Bitcoin should be legal nationwide — transparent, secure, and independent of the big banks that profit from the current system.

A return to honest value

At its heart, Bitcoin isn’t about tech or speculation. It’s about trust — and keeping financial power in the hands of citizens instead of bureaucrats and corporations.

Here in Denton County, we understand that kind of freedom. It’s the same spirit that settled Texas: work hard, hold what’s yours, and keep government out of your pockets.

Bitcoin isn’t the future of money. It’s the return of honest money — and conservatives should lead the charge to make it America’s next great success story.

America’s debt denial has gone global



My high school history teacher, back in 1989, asked our class to name the single biggest problem facing the United States. We wrote our answers anonymously, and he tallied the results. When he read mine aloud — “the federal government’s debt” — he rolled his eyes, as if I’d said something idiotic.

I didn’t name debt nearly 40 years ago just because I think borrowing is bad. I named it because elected officials were already pretending deficit spending wasn’t a problem — and because no one seemed willing to hold the government accountable for it.

The more the Fed prints, the weaker the dollar becomes. The weaker the dollar becomes, the more the world doubts it.

Almost four decades on, nothing has changed. The problem has only grown — as every neglected problem does.

In 1989, the budget deficit was $153 billion. The total national debt stood at $2.86 trillion.

By 2024, the annual deficit had exploded to $1.8 trillion, and the total debt hit $35 trillion. Interest payments now consume 3% of GDP, and they’re still climbing. Meanwhile, the country faces $210 trillion in unfunded liabilities, mostly Social Security and Medicare.

The United States is broke. And Americans act as if it doesn’t matter.

Washington pretends everything’s fine

The federal government has been shut down for three weeks. Republicans want to keep spending at ruinous levels. Democrats want to spend even more ruinously. Both sides ignore the obvious: We’re bankrupt. And nobody in America seems to care.

Congress hasn’t passed a real budget since 1996. For nearly 30 years, lawmakers have funded everything through “continuing resolutions,” which automatically renew old spending and add new layers on top. Every “temporary” increase becomes permanent.

The 2009 “one-time” $831 billion stimulus? Still baked in. The $4.6 trillion COVID “relief” binge? Never rolled back. Dozens of other “emergency” expenditures have quietly become fixtures of federal spending.

Year after year, Washington keeps the faucet open — and the debt grows.

By 2024, U.S. GDP was $29.2 trillion. Federal debt was $35 trillion. That’s a debt-to-GDP ratio of 123%. And Washington keeps spending as if it can print reality.

No one in America seems to care.

The world is awakening

The rest of the world is starting to notice.

To fund its deficits, the U.S. Treasury sells bonds — IOUs that investors buy with the promise of repayment plus interest. Lately, those auctions have gone poorly. The world’s appetite for American debt is fading.

As one financial analysis put it: “Given the poor state of the American fiscal situation, auctions will likely remain large for the foreseeable future. The risk that markets will push back is rising.”

Another report warned that persistent $2 trillion deficits during peacetime raise “important questions about what might happen during a recession or war.”

When investors balk, the Federal Reserve steps in, printing money to buy the debt. That fuels inflation — the same inflation that has already stripped 87% of the dollar’s value since we abandoned the gold standard in 1971.

The more the Fed prints, the weaker the dollar becomes. The weaker the dollar becomes, the more the world doubts it.

The emperor’s new clothes

The only thing still propping up the dollar is its role as the world’s reserve currency — the global default for trade and central bank holdings since 1944. That status lets America keep spending money it doesn’t have. But the illusion can’t last forever.

RELATED: The American dream now comes with 23% interest

wenjin chen via iStock/Getty Images

The BRICS nations — Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa — are challenging the dollar’s dominance. They’ve added members such as Iran, Egypt, Ethiopia, and the United Arab Emirates. Saudi Arabia, the world’s second-largest oil producer, has been invited to join. At least 40 other nations are lining up.

As Business Insider put it, “BRICS is consolidating its global power and influence. This should be a key cause of concern for the U.S., as new members could amplify de-dollarization.”

So what has Washington done? Cut spending? Tighten the money supply? Restore fiscal sanity? Of course not.

Instead, the government rattles sabers. President Donald Trump recently threatened a 100% tariff on the BRICS bloc countries if they move to undermine the dollar — as if bluster could paper over decades of reckless spending.

The United States is broke but still pretending otherwise. Washington spends like a drunk who keeps ordering drinks on a canceled credit card. The world is beginning to call the bluff.

And the American people? They’re still sleepwalking — as they have been for decades.

Trump’s tariffs are working — now comes the ‘marshmallow test’



The Congressional Budget Office released a report Wednesday detailing the budgetary and economic impact of President Trump’s tariffs. The top-line result: Even the Democrat-controlled CBO concedes that tariffs will reduce the deficit over the next decade.

Trump has every reason to celebrate. Tariffs shrink the deficit in one of two ways. They either raise revenue directly — as tariffs are a form of tax — or they do so indirectly, by reshoring industry and expanding GDP.

History suggests both outcomes are likely. But if Trump stays the course and keeps tariffs high and stable, the United States could seize the opportunity of a generation: reindustrialize the economy, grow GDP, and restore prosperity for our grandkids.

The marshmallow test goes national

In the 1960s, Stanford psychologist Walter Mischel ran an experiment on self-control. Children were given a choice: Eat one marshmallow now or wait and receive two later. Those who delayed gratification generally fared better in life. Intelligence and future success correlated with restraint.

The implications extended beyond childhood. Researchers found similar behavior in animals, with more intelligent species — like crows — choosing delayed rewards.

Delayed gratification builds successful investors, entrepreneurs, and nations.

No one pretends tariffs deliver instant gratification. They don’t. They aren’t supposed to.

Tariffs function much the same way. They impose short-term pain in exchange for long-term gain. Like the marshmallow test, this moment asks whether Americans will accept some present discomfort to secure a far more prosperous future.

Fortunately, patience pays. Economic logic and historical evidence both show that tariffs expand the gross domestic product and create jobs over time.

What the trade deficit reveals

In 2024, America posted a net trade deficit of $918 billion. That figure represents more than a statistic. It reflects real, physical production now taking place elsewhere — mostly in China.

The math is simple: If Americans didn’t buy those goods from abroad, they would need to produce them at home.

Reshoring that production would raise GDP accordingly. When demand remains steady and supply shifts from overseas to domestic producers, GDP rises.

Demand drives supply. That’s basic economics.

This principle played out throughout American history. For over a century, high tariffs protected domestic industry. America’s economy grew faster than the global average. Consumption increased. Industrial output soared. Not until the 1970s, when the country embraced so-called “free trade” and abandoned the gold standard, did growth begin to stagnate.

Industrial production also benefits from increasing returns to scale. The more you produce, the cheaper each unit becomes. Part of the reason Chinese goods seem inexpensive lies in our own underproduction. As American firms ramp up supply, the cost gap narrows.

Financing habits support this trend. Americans fund trade deficits by selling assets or issuing debt. Those mechanisms would remain available in a closed trade system. True, consumers might get less “bang for their buck” in the short term, but the willingness to spend wouldn’t change.

Most Americans will continue to consume, no matter where production occurs. That behavior ensures demand will remain steady — providing the economic incentive for supply to shift back home.

Unused capacity, untapped opportunity

America’s industrial potential remains far from exhausted. Millions of citizens remain unemployed or underemployed. Hundreds of billions of dollars in productive capital sit idle.

The infrastructure exists. The labor pool exists. The only thing missing has been the incentive to build again. Or more accurately, the disincentive to rely on foreign labor.

The United States thrived for generations as a self-sufficient manufacturing power. It can do so again.

RELATED: Without tariffs, the US is defenseless in an economic war

Photo by SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images

Production follows consumption. That truism holds in both individual and national economies. No one works because they love harvesting wheat or running a forge. People work because they want to eat, live, and flourish.

In a globalized economy, countries can consume without producing. But once that system breaks — or gets reshaped by political will — production must rise to meet domestic demand. It cannot work the other way around.

This logic exposes a hard truth: America’s trade deficit reflects lost potential. We haven’t stopped consuming. We’ve just stopped building.

Trump’s tariffs aim to reverse that trend. By shrinking the trade deficit, the policy raises GDP. With production comes employment. With employment comes prosperity.

The patience to win

No one pretends tariffs deliver instant gratification. They don’t. They aren’t supposed to.

Tariffs offer a national test of will. Do Americans want long-term sovereignty, security, and wealth badly enough to endure a temporary adjustment? Or will they flinch the moment cheap consumer goods rise in price?

This question lies at the heart of the national debate. And the outcome will shape whether America reclaims its manufacturing base — or continues hemorrhaging power to rival nations.

The evidence favors success. But only if we stay the course.

Conservatives and nationalists should recognize what’s at stake. Tariffs don’t just serve economic goals. They advance a moral imperative — to rebuild the country we inherited and preserve it for those who follow.

The marshmallow test may sound childish. But its lessons hold: The future belongs to those who can delay gratification today to build something greater tomorrow.

America stands at that threshold now. As I show in “Reshore: How Tariffs Will Bring Our Jobs Home and Revive the American Dream,” reindustrialization isn’t a fantasy. It’s within reach. But it requires courage, consistency, and sacrifice.

Trump’s tariffs have set the stage. The numbers now support the policy. The question remains: Will the American people pass the test?

Let’s hope so. Because this country doesn’t belong only to us. It belongs to our children, our grandchildren, and every generation still to come.

Trump’s Bitcoin masterstroke puts America ahead in digital assets



With a single stroke of his Sharpie, President Donald Trump instantly made the United States into the world leader in digital assets, ensuring its dominance in the sector for the foreseeable future.The new Strategic Bitcoin Reserve and a U.S. Digital Asset Stockpile are a triple win for the American people.

Win No. 1: No cost to taxpayers

The reserve comes at no expense to taxpayers. Every asset within it was already owned by the federal government, including 200,000 Bitcoin — an amount that crypto czar David Sacks recently estimated to be worth about $17.5 billion. Moreover, the executive order establishing the reserve explicitly binds the government to “budget-neutral” strategies for acquiring additional Bitcoin and forbids the acquisition of other digital assets except through forfeiture proceedings.

The United States is poised to be the world leader in digital assets for many years to come.

In other words, the crypto reserve will be funded entirely by criminals and scammers like the ones who allegedly bilked several Massachusetts residents out of their savings through a fraudulent trading platform.

Win No. 2: Boosting domestic innovation

The crypto reserve will foster domestic innovation in an industry poised to be a major driver of economic growth well into the future. American digital assets companies, like Avalanche, already play a crucial role in this ecosystem, delivering high-paying jobs and contributing to the president’s broader economic agenda.

The crypto industry’s domestic investments will reinforce the principles of putting America first, creating American jobs, and driving economic growth that are at the heart of Trump’s plan to Make America Great Again.

Win No. 3: A global statement

By publicly staking America’s claim in digital assets, Trump and his crypto team led by crypto czar David Sacks and Bo Hines, executive director of the Presidential Council of Advisers for Digital Assets, are sending a strong signal to the global crypto community: America is open for business. For an industry that has faced widespread skepticism and even open hostility from establishment forces all over the world, this invitation will be enthusiastically embraced.

Instead of building data centers and other crypto infrastructure overseas, tech companies will invest hundreds of billions of dollars in the U.S. economy, creating new jobs and broadening our tax base.

The crypto industry has come a long way since a young programmer completed the first commercial Bitcoin transaction — exchanging 10,000 BTC for two Papa John’s pizzas. Today, those Bitcoins are worth just under $1 billion — an increase of roughly two billion percent in just 15 years.

Bitcoin’s value will soar

With Bitcoin’s circulation now capped, its value is projected to continue appreciating. Unlike the U.S. dollar, which inflationary policies can devalue, no entity can create additional BTC. Other digital assets have similar built-in safeguards, ensuring that they cannot be manipulated like fiat currencies.

In many ways, cryptocurrencies and other digital assets resemble gold, real estate, and other assets that serve as a stable, long-term store of value.

Sadly, this fact has not been appreciated by those in power until now.

“At one point in time, we had about 400,000 bitcoin on the federal balance sheet. We sold roughly half of that for something like $360 million total,” Sacks disclosed recently on an episode of the "All-In Podcast."

Although the premature sales cost American taxpayers around $17 billion at today’s prices, they serve to reinforce the benefits of creating a strategic reserve of these unique assets.

Throughout recorded history, governments worldwide have recognized the necessity of maintaining strategic gold reserves. These reserves can strengthen the domestic economy or provide strategic flexibility in international relations. The new crypto reserve will likely serve a similar function in the future.

As usual, Trump is several steps ahead of the political establishment. Thanks to his visionary leadership, the United States is poised to be the world leader in digital assets for many years to come.

Time to dismantle the Fed’s debt-based dollar scam



A banking cartel is haunting our society with its ability to create, destroy, and control money — the Federal Reserve. It must be abolished and replaced with a more rational and fair system.

Money is the lifeblood of modern civilization. It enables us to establish contracts, assess the worth of goods and services, and trade efficiently. But what exactly is money, and who creates the U.S. dollar?

Our monetary system is a mechanism for transferring wealth to urban elites who produce nothing.

The first step in understanding money is dispelling the notion that a valuable asset like gold backs it — because it doesn’t.

The dollar is valuable for two reasons. First, it is backed by the “full faith and credit of the U.S. government,” meaning its worth derives from its ability to tax people to pay its debts. Second, the federal government only accepts tax payments in U.S. dollars, creating an inherent demand for the currency.

Despite these factors, the federal government creates very little of our money. The U.S. Treasury prints paper bills and mints coins, but physical cash accounts for only about 10% of our total money supply.

The hidden mechanism of money creation

Most of our money comes from debt — and that’s a problem.

Modern money is almost entirely created through lending. Every non-cash dollar must eventually be repaid to a private bank with interest. In other words, most U.S. money is simply a collection of IOUs owed to private financial institutions.

Commercial banks operate under a system called “fractional reserve banking.” They are private businesses that only hold a small amount of cash reserves and issue loans often exceeding 900% of their small cash reserves. When a bank issues a loan and deposits it into a borrower’s account, new “money” is created out of thin air.

An unelected financial cabal

Over 100 years ago, a group of powerful financiers met on Jekyll Island, off the coast of Georgia, to draft a plan that would give them — rather than Congress — control over America’s monetary system. The result was the Federal Reserve Act of 1913, which created the Federal Reserve — a private banking cartel disguised as a government agency.

The Federal Reserve is not part of the U.S. government. It is a privately held bank consortium, accountable only to its shareholders. The Federal Reserve’s transactions have never been fully audited, and its decisions require no approval from any government official. Congress has outsourced its constitutional control of the American money supply to some of the wealthiest people in the world, arguably the greatest financial crime in the history of this country.

When the federal government spends more than it collects in taxes, it borrows the difference. It issues Treasury bills to borrow money from investors or the Social Security trust fund. In some cases, it issues Treasury bills directly to the Federal Reserve. The Fed then creates money by adding numbers to an account without tangible backing. This process leaves the government — and ultimately taxpayers — responsible for repaying the Federal Reserve with interest.

Leveraging their monopoly on money creation, private banks earn vast sums from interest on loans that far exceed what they hold in reserves. U.S. banks currently have $3.3 trillion in reserves yet carry $12.5 trillion in outstanding loans. Borrowers pay real interest on imaginary money, funneling nearly half a trillion dollars annually into bankers’ pockets.

This is why skyscrapers bear the names of banks. Bankers get rich on money that doesn’t belong to them. Our monetary system transfers wealth to urban elites who produce nothing. The interest they collect is a one-way street paved with gold.

The Fed and inflation

Since the Federal Reserve’s creation, the federal government has continuously eroded the U.S. dollar through reckless borrowing. We have now accumulated $38 trillion in debt, and inflation has soared to over 3,000% since 1913, eroding the purchasing power of ordinary Americans.

The tidal wave of newly created “magic money” inflates the total money supply, devaluing existing dollars and making everyday goods more expensive. The Federal Reserve’s shareholders profit because they collect interest on government-issued debt, while bureaucrats, lobbyists, and corporations tied to federal spending rake in the cash. The rest of us, however, pay for their legerdemain through higher taxes and the devaluation of our wealth.

In the last two years alone, the wealth of the bottom 50% of Americans grew by just $1.5 trillion, while the wealth of the top 1% gained $11.8 trillion. Empowered by its control over money, the wealthiest elite has consolidated ownership of media conglomerates, major industries, and political influence. Elites have rigged the system, ensuring that the magical goose laying their golden eggs is never threatened by ordinary people.

Boom-bust — a banker’s best friend

Massive government borrowing coincides with colossal money creation, triggering economic booms. Speculative bubbles form in stocks and real estate, but these booms always lead to busts.

When debt-laden consumers default on loans, the money supply shrinks, and the economy grinds to a halt. Bankers and politicians, armed with insider knowledge, navigate these cycles with ease — profiting from the economy’s expansion and collapse. Meanwhile, the average American suffers job losses, foreclosures, and financial ruin.

We do not elect the elites who control this system. We are simply the drones who ultimately pay for it through higher taxes, inflation, and economic instability. The top 0.1% in America now controls as much wealth as the bottom 90%.

As Thomas Jefferson wrote in 1816, “The banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies.” He foresaw the threat posed by private banks controlling the nation’s currency, predicting they would “deprive the people of all property until their children wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered.”

It is time to end this system of financial serfdom. The power to issue money should be returned to the people where it rightfully belongs.

Is Fort Knox still secure?



For over 50 years, Americans have grown accustomed to the sound of cash-printing machines, generating dollars as if our economy were a Monopoly board. Yet, amid the flood of money, a critical question remains unanswered: What about gold? It’s one of the most important and historically trusted assets in the world, and yet it’s often overlooked in the conversation about our financial future.

Last week, I sent a letter to President Trump urging him to conduct a full audit of our nation’s gold reserves, which have been stored at Fort Knox for nearly 90 years. Given the widespread distrust Americans now have for their government, confirming what’s inside Fort Knox could begin restoring much-needed faith in our monetary system.

Revaluing America’s gold reserves to match the current market price could change everything.

History underscores the importance of auditing our gold reserves. From the late 1800s until the start of World War II, the U.S. dollar operated under the gold standard, meaning its value was directly tied to a fixed quantity of gold held by the government.

In 1944, as the Allies moved toward victory in World War II, the United Nations convened the Bretton Woods Conference in New Hampshire to establish a new global financial system. The conference transformed U.S. monetary policy by making the dollar the world’s reserve currency, allowing countries to exchange dollars for gold at a fixed rate of $35 an ounce. Soon after, under the Marshall Plan, the U.S. shipped vast amounts of gold to Europe to aid its recovery, cementing the dollar’s role as the dominant global currency.

By the 1960s, cracks in the system began to show. The Vietnam War and Lyndon Johnson’s “Great Society” programs drained government coffers, leading to massive spending and excessive dollar printing. The U.S. could no longer maintain the Bretton Woods dollar-to-gold ratio and faced the risk of depleting its gold reserves.

To prevent this, President Richard Nixon took the drastic step in 1971 of severing the dollar’s tie to gold. This officially ended the gold standard, leaving U.S. currency backed by nothing tangible.

This shift created an increasingly unstable financial landscape. Despite that, gold remains a crucial asset in the global financial system — serving as a “fail safe” hedge against inflation and a reliable store of value. Yet for decades, while countries, particularly in Asia, have been amassing gold, the United States has provided little transparency about the status of its own gold reserves.

Why gold matters in 2025

Major shifts are making waves in the global gold market, and the U.S. needs to be part of that conversation.

Countries around the world are buying gold in record amounts — could it be that the United States is doing the same, perhaps in preparation for a major revaluation of gold to stabilize our currency? Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent recently spoke about “monetizing” the U.S. balance sheet for the American people. Could this include revaluing our gold reserves to better reflect market prices?

The U.S. Treasury’s gold stockpile is currently priced at just $42 an ounce, a value set by law back in 1973. In the real world, gold is worth nearly $3,000 an ounce. What if we revalued America’s gold reserves to match the current market price? That could change everything — maybe even provide a stabilizing force for the dollar, fight inflation, and stop the endless money printing.

Do we really own our gold supply?

But one major roadblock poses a severe risk to gold’s promise: rehypothecation.

Rehypothecation is like borrowing $10,000 from a friend and giving him your motorcycle as collateral and then he uses that same motorcycle to secure his own loan — the practice of using the same asset multiple times as collateral for different debts.

If America’s gold has been used to back multiple loans or obligations, our actual access to gold as a liquid asset might not be as great as we think. That’s why we need a full audit of Fort Knox. The complex hasn’t been fully audited since 1953, and we have no way of knowing how much gold we actually own and how much has been rehypothecated in the global market.

Restoring confidence in our financial system begins with opening the vault and showing the American people what we really have. Moreover, taking stock of our usable gold supply paints an actual picture of the country’s total assets, which is critical if the United States will maintain her role as the leader on the global financial stage — a position that is not guaranteed and can, if it hasn’t already, slip into other hands under our negligence.

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Who doomed the petrodollar: America or Saudi Arabia?



There has been a lot of confusion lately about Saudi Arabia allegedly ending a 50-year-deal with the United States that tied oil sales to the U.S. dollar.

While many have claimed that the deal never actually existed, financial expert Carol Roth is here to clear that up.

“There was a deal put in place, but never once did I come across anything that said we have a specific expiration,” Roth tells Glenn Beck, who notes himself that if the world goes off the petrodollar, “that is the beginning of the end.”

Roth explains that when the United States went off the gold standard, they created a secret delegation that went to Saudi Arabia as part of a diplomatic tour.

“There was an oil embargo put in place by the Arab oil exporters. It sent the price of oil sky-high. So, the big objective was basically the U.S. didn’t want crude oil, you know, energy, which is obviously really what fuels growth around the world to become an economic weapon,” Roth explains.

“They knew, 'Okay, well, now we’re off the gold standard, we’ve got this currency, wouldn’t it be great to have somebody finance our deficits?'” She continues.

In exchange for economic and military support, the Saudis struck a deal with the U.S. to price oil in dollars around the world.

“There was a secret piece of it, and that was that the Saudis did not want everyone to know that they had this huge treasury stockpile,” Roth says, noting that it was because they didn’t want anyone to know how “closely they were in bed with the U.S.”

Now, this deal has ended.

“The FED has managed to hold the dollar not stable either for the world or domestically,” Roth says. “So, it’s not like they even made the tradeoff. They just abandoned it all together.”

“The big issue, if you are these countries around the world that now have everything priced in dollar, all of your major commodities, because it’s not just oil at this point,” she continues, “When you have these huge swings in the dollar, that means that threatens you as a nation, because you now may not be able to afford energy, or you may not be able to afford the food for your country.”

“That’s a national security issue,” she says. “And so, countries were getting sick of that we weaponized the U.S. dollar, and at the end of the day, they’re starting to move away from it.”

This is why it isn’t the Saudis who are to blame for the end of the deal.

“The Saudis did not break a deal. We’ve broken the deal long ago,” Roth says.


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