Money Problems

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Don Luskin is right about how a “strong” – i.e., appreciating – dollar is not in itself a good thing. But neither is current dollar weakness, because with fiat currency everything that pols and central bankers say takes on excessive, even superstitious significance that can be economically destructive.

There’s no way around it. Any verbal fart by a major official could be the first indication of a policy change. Vague talk by treasury secretaries that weakens the dollar is therefore just as bad in its own way as are deflationary policies that keep the dollar appreciating. Nobody would care what Snow or Greenspan – or James Baker – said, if the U.S. Govt’s established (ideally, legislated) policy had been to maintain the money supply such that the price of gold stayed in a range of, say, $345-355/oz.

Even when a discretionary currency regime seems to work well, there’s a strong risk that eventually the people in charge, being people, will overdo it and screw things up. That’s why investors are not unreasonable to fear that the Bush administration may, in a shortsighted political attempt to aid big-business exporters or otherwise boost the economy before an election, or even to punish Europe, be going overboard in weakening the dollar. Sure, Bush said that he doesn’t want a weaker dollar, but he wouldn’t have said that if there weren’t a problem.

And even in a discretionary-policy environment it’s possible for officials to have enough sense to keep their mouths shut. Clinton and Rubin seemed to understand this, while Bush and Snow apparently do not. That’s reason enough for dollar-holding investors to be nervous.

Currently the dollar seems to be stalled in a range of 1.17-1.19 Euros. We’ll know soon enough whether we’ve seen the bottom.

Make your own nation

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Jennifer Government: NationStates lets you create and lead your own country.

We are all going to die of thirst!

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These people are going to ensure it: UN nuclear agency tries to avert water crisis

Prominent pro-Arab lobbyist Möllemann dies, very likely by suicide

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Möllemann published an anti-Israeli flyer during the federal election campaign last year causing a scandal that cost the FDP (Freie Demokratische Partei) a lot of votes, unfortunately just enough to let Schröder squeak by with a tiny majority of about 6.000. It turned out later that Möllemann may have financed the flyer by illegal campaign contributions and is also possibly guilty of fraud and other offenses. After months of investigations the Bundestag revoked his parliamentary immunity on Thursday, shortly afterwards police raided 25 buildings in four European countries. Less than 30 minutes later Möllemann plummeted to his death while parachuting; since there are no signs that his equipment was sabotaged suicide seems very likely.

Stefan Sharkansky has more; he has kept an eye on Möllemann for over a year and has even devoted a website to him: moellemann.com.

Suicide bombing kills five in Kabul

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Four of the dead are German soldiers, 30 more soldiers and bystanders were injured.

As terrible this is it still is telling that attacks like this are rare enough to be newsworthy in a country that has been liberated less than 18 months ago. It really seems as if the remaining Taleban and Islamists in general are no longer capable of conducting real operations and are reduced to blowing themselves up like Palestinian terrorists.

Going after European targets is a seriously boneheaded moveon the side of the Islamists; for all their hypocrisy about the American approach to the war on terror European governments are much less concerned with respecting the human rights of terrorists once they feel forced into all-out war. The European camps are going to be much less pleasant than that at Guantamano Bay, not to mention much larger.