A Story

Once upon a time a man from the country of Connecticut went to the Country of Englandland and borrowed from a wealthy investor $1,000 units of purchasing power with a check holding $1,000 of gold who in turn gave him a $1,000 money order considered as good as the recognized currency of $1,000 dollars exchange at the time. He then came back to Connecticut and gave the $1,000 money order to the Inn Keeper for his room and board for a room and meals and transportation costs which he used for 30 days before returning to Englandland. The Inn Keeper during this period then gave the local merchant the $1,000 money order in exchange for the food and for the cost of heating and cooling the room (oil and electricity) the guy rented and for transportation costs. By now the money order had been divided up into paper at about 10:1 equal to the original amount, and was charging interest for its use to the food supplier, but the food supplier used his portion of his payment to buy stuff for his family, and the transportation guy and the inn keeper who had used the share of the money order to buy clothes and food for himself and to heat his own home – so the money no longer was invested in something that would make more money but was consumed. By now, only paper had changed hands but no money or gold had changed hands. Now the guy who gave the check in exchange for the money order found out that his bank had never honored his check because it went out of business and his real money savings in gold had been confiscated because it wasn’t guaranteed and had been leveraged 1000 to 1 so was only worth $1, and the guy had given him the money order had died and his estate would not honor his debt for the unpaid check because no money was received when the check was deposited. Question – who didn’t get paid. In reality EVERYONE because there was no money to begin with. We are about the stupidest species on the face of the earth and truly deserve to become extinct. The cockroaches have gotten it right. Mary Anne

Then we're totally wasting our time here on this board talking about making money in the markets. We would be better served buying guns, ammo, water, food and retiring to a hovel in the mountains to await armageddon. Us and the cockroaches. U.F.O.

This is the most hilarious string I ever read on this forum! My 6yr old didn't really get the whole thing, but even he laughed a lot.

And then they found out that the gold was actually made of gold plated-steel and the crook who made the fake gold spent all of his ill-gotten gain on a lady of the evening. That's why, in the end, the women wind up with everything.

The moral of the story is not that we're all cockroaches.

It's that the illusion of value is what makes the world go round -- and keeps everyone employed.

(Think of fractional reserve lending in terms of the Parable of the Loaves).

And what's wrong with that ?

Edited by beta, 20 September 2008 - 02:34 AM.

... of course, one should "Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees." (Matthews 16).