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Bernanke Adopts Decoupling, Discusses Gold, Does Not Think $1,200 Gold Is A Direct Affront To All Things Keynesian
From Bunning's questionnaire:
Q. Time and energy in macroeconomic analysis is spent attempting to measure business and consumer confidence. Confidence measures are part of macroeconomic forecasting and directly impact monetary policy decisions. Likewise, certain market movements reflect investor confidence or lack of confidence. Gold is at an all-time high because investors have lost confidence in policymakers' handling of fiat currencies. How is the Fed incorporating this market information into its analytical framework? Does the lack of confidence in fiat currencies have the potential to impact monetary policy?
A. Gold is used for many purposes, including as a reserve asset, as an investment, and for use in electronics, automobiles, and jewelry. Thus, fluctuations in the price of gold can reflect changes in demand associated with any of these uses, as well as changes in supply. In monitoring the price of gold, the Federal Reserve must attempt to interpret which of these factors is responsible for its fluctuations at any point in time. One of the ways we do this is by consulting other indicators of market sentiment. A number of measures of expected future inflation in the United States, including measures taken from inflation-protected bonds and surveys of consumers and professional forecasters, have been well contained. Accordingly, increases in the price of gold do not appear to reflect increases in the expected future of U.S. inflation.
Based on this questionnaire the former Princeton professor seems unaware that the price of gold has become nothing more than a risk proxy of the Obama administration's money printing insanity. Dear Honorable Chairman, maybe if you were to visualize the price of gold since President Obama took office your opinion would change? Because, even though it seems completely understandable, the usage of gold in "electronics, automobiles and jewelry" is unsatisfacorily short in explaining the 50% increase in the price of gold since February 2009.
Other gold-related observations indicate that Bernanke has now fully embraced that the world has entered a decoupling phase. In question 26 he points out that gold is rising simply as a correlation with other global commodities:
The most recent increases in the price of gold likely reflect diverse influences, including investor concerns about the many uncertainties facing the global economy; however, it is also the case that the rise in gold prices has not been much out of line with the increases in other commodities. According to the Commodity Research Bureau, after fluctuating in a broad range for the previous 1-1/2 years, the price of gold has risen 22 percent since early July, while the CRB’s index of overall commodity prices has risen 17 percent. These increases appear to reflect the recovery of the global economy, and it is not clear they have been out of line with fundamentals.
Paradoxically this contradicts Bernanke's response to a question discussing the Output Gap. The question is lifted straight from Zero Hedge's previous observations that the St. Louis Fed itself is telling Bernanke his entire monetary policy approach may be completely flawed due to the inability to adjust for bubble impacts over long periods of time (thank you Greenspan).
The bulk of the evidence indicates that resource slack is now substantial, as evidenced by an unemployment rate of 10 percent and a rate of manufacturing capacity utilization of only 68 percent--lower than seen at the trough of every postwar recession prior to the current one. Thus, I continue to expect slack resources, together with the stability of inflation expectations, to contribute to the maintenance of low inflation in the period ahead.
So: recovery in the global economy yet slack resources... 17% commodity price inflation (22% in gold) yet 68% capacity utilization in the US... Fair enough - that can only mean that the Fed Chairman's new official policy is the global economy has entered into a decoupling phase. And in that case, which is a departure from the Fed's previous position vis-a-vis global economic development, how does the Fed propose to account for liquidity and monetary policy imbalances that are a critical part of every "decoupled" world. This is a critical answer that Bernanke should answer before he is reappointed for another 4 years of perpetuating the broken Keynesian thought experiment.
h/t Geoffrey Batt
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Asking Ben Bernanke to give his astute opinion on the price of gold, is like asking for Mugabe's astute opinion on forex.
Remember, Benny is the harbinger of contrarian consideration (thank the Lord above for Youtube - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQ79Pt2GNJo). While he said the “price of gold do not appear to reflect increases in the expected future of U.S. inflation” and what he actually said was “gold very strongly reflects increased certainty of future U.S. inflation because of my quantitave easing policies and Bond market support. Damn skippy it does, from India to China baby! Toilet paper will be out and nuggets will be in. YEEEE HAWWWW MOTHER FUCk’A!”
Then again I don’t know what I am talking about.
Remember, Benny is the harbinger of contrarian consideration (thank the Lord above for Youtube - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQ79Pt2GNJo). While he said the “price of gold do not appear to reflect increases in the expected future of U.S. inflation” and what he actually said was “gold very strongly reflects increased certainty of future U.S. inflation because of my quantitave easing policies and Bond market support. Damn skippy it does, from India to China baby! Toilet paper will be out and nuggets will be in. YEEEE HAWWWW MOTHER FUCk’A!”
Then again I don’t know what I am talking about.
Actually, you quoted Mugabe, not Ben.
Well, it is indeed difficult interpreting Shona in the Manyika dialect, so it is hard to discern. Either way they were obviously cut from the same Keynesian lies and paper deception.
Logically speaking when one lies they are speaking the opposite of the truth. When Ben, Mugabe, Bush (I or II or III (Obama)), Nixon, or Friedrich Ebert, President of Germany (1919-1925) speaks what they believe is the truth, they are speaking their truth of lies. It just happens their truth is a lie which is the opposite of truth. We should know by now when Benny gets in front of the boob tube, it means we have two months or so before his opposite truth comes to be. At least that is what history teaches us.
Well, depending on your time zone,
Mangwanani
If I really wanted your zvizvuvhutswa
I would have asked for Ben to assess their value.
But, then again, you might want to consider Ben a biased resourse.
Or, not.
Nice!!! zvizvuvhutswa or "gold nuggets".
Disclaimer: Google allows for tapping into the infinite consciousness which allows for one consciousness of reality which in turn creates a global political awakening that is scaring the Bernanke’s (Jibberish for “piece of shit”) out of the Fed and its minions.
If, just suppose if, one were to switch the two kewpie dolls:
Say, switching Bernanke and Mugabe (silmultaneous body/brain, of course),
Well then, would you possibly fantasize the result . . .
For instance, would the Bernanke/Mugabe kewpie doll choose to print notes with gold-plated holograms with .001 gram of .9999 gold, and each was worth exactly the amount that was printed on it (mulitplied by 10, or 100, or 1000, of course)?
OK, just suppose . . . .
Damn skippy that was funny.
Made me shoot a bit of Great Lake Brewing Company Christmas Ale out me nostrils.
Huh...banged me a girl named Shackleford back in the days. Me fingers smelled so bad, cats would follow me around. Not that I am saying anyhting bad about your family, defeinitely no relation. I am just sayin'.
"...an unemployment rate of 10 percent and a rate of manufacturing capacity utilization of only 68 percent--lower than seen at the trough of every postwar recession prior to the current one..."
So essentially they've managed to export jobs overseas thereby undermining the industrial base - no jobs or infrastructure to create new ones - now that's one way to subdue inflation. How many Sloan Fellows and Wall Street bottom feeders do we have to thank, or was it the congress and FED that gave them the financial incentives marking the pathway of good intentions - semantics at this point.
Mister B's brilliant Zimbabwe epiphany is in the decoupling process; we will be truly decoupled from the global economic when the world no longer accepts Federal Reserve Notes for all debts public and private.
And maybe it is not too late to realize we should not accept the Federal Reserve before we're offered a one world currency as a last resort.
But the biggest laugh was: ".... Accordingly, increases in the price of gold do not appear to reflect increases in the expected future of U.S. inflation."
No if that were true, the price of gold would already be $5000.00 per oz (or more) were it not for the fine art of manipulating the prices through naked futures contracts, GS and JPM have been able to suppress prices for decades, thereby maintaining the illusion of low inflation along with a bogus rendition of the CPI.
...is the only requirement for being a FED chairman based on the ability to appear droll and placid while spewing Keynseian drivel?
"electronic, automobiles and jewelry"
Not one of which is moving at present. He hands out $100K cash per family, maybe I'll buy enough gold as a material commodity to put on that kind of price pressure.
Who does he think he's kidding?
Us. He thinks he is doing it very well, too.
Bernanke is like a teacher; in many was inept. However, like a teacher, he is in a position of power and those that are under his tutelage are too gullible to see past the BS, and are thus inclined to believe it. The punchline is that Bernanke wears the shackles of his Keyensian master. Point being, he may very well believe his own bran of BS.
That's a B+
A Minsky world, being viewed through the eyes of a Friedmanite chairman.
As an aside, when we do go back to the Great Depression next year, do you think that Big Bands will make a comeback?
Good question. I've been wondering if we'll see a big resurgence in punk. I would love to see another wave of punk rock, at least that would give me something positive out of this mess. But I think it's more likely we are damned to endless American Idol.
Punk, cool: God save the Goldman jerk. You owe him for his work
i hope you're right. i also hope we see rap enter a darker and less blingy period, maybe wu-tang will carry the banner. can't stand him, but dmx will probably be back with some music about robbing people, which will also perfectly match the zeitgeist
james taylor muthafuckas!
Leonard Cohen.
Sebastian Bach as lead singer for Aerosmith?
I am Chumbawamba.
Maybe. I certainly think we should start filming everything in black and white again.
http://www.925foxnews.com/
Levin on fire tonight. you got to listen
Ben will never admit to the behind-the-scenes monetization of the debt and the blatant fraud of the Fed's operations. Bhagdad Ben says, "According to our official data there's nothing wrong, we see global recovery"....but he never mentions the massive increase in US Debt and the withering demand for such debt.
The dude's a quack. Yeah, that's right, his conclusions are whack. Here's a grain of salt: Amongst his many follies, this is the same dolt who pontificated that real estate was not in a bubble and that it only goes up in value.
Yep. Electronics, automobiles and jewelry have just been flying off the shelves! Comme des petits pains chauds...
But, But, But...
Where is Samuelson when you need him?
"we don't know what exactly causes inflation."
you don't even need to use the Austrian definition of inflation at this point. Just "too much money chasing after too few goods" will suffice. Given bb's claim that gold is not changing relative to other commodities, it has to be because there is more money in the market.
What's not being said here is that if there is such a slack in resources and the price is not falling, but raising, then the effects of the inflation are countering even the increase in supply. There is a massive inflation going on right now .
"Where is Samuelson when you need him?"
"we don't know what exactly causes inflation."
Not sure but maybe just maybe charging huge compounding interest to loan money that you create out of thin air MIGHT have something to do with it. Or it could be caused by pressure to repay such rediculous things. I hear pressure inflates things.
Sorry but Samualson is an idiot, if not an ideological puppet whose sole purpose was to justify the superiority of markets over anything and everything..Wouldnt take a single word he said seriously..
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Gold's dead.
If bankers are so smart why does Calculated Risk have a need for a Troubled Bank List?
Oh. The FDIC has one, too?
Aren't they broke?
k
coming up next, Philip Morris will testify that cigarette smoking is not bad for you.
This guy is either:
a) Absolutely f*cking stupid, or
b) Arrogant beyond belief
He has got to go, badly.
He is not stupid.He is evil.Look at what his actions have produced.The funniest part was the 10 percent unemployment.22 percent is more like it.It is surreal watching the entire world get stolen, isn't it?
I find it strange that you keep on calling Bernanke's policy as a broken Keynesian experiment. As a devoted Posy-Keynesian in the tradition of Minsky, I find absolutely nothing Keynesian in the policy implemented by the U.S apart from the fiscal stimulus program by Obama. Rather, Bernanke is a well-known monetarist and this is the biggest MONETARIST experiment in the world, trying to fight a debt-deflation with the printing press. It is very harsh on a great economist like Keynes and people who truly understand what he was all about (The post-keynesians or the Minsky followers in the academic circle) to claim that the policies implemented are truly Keynesian. The Post-Keynesians were the only academics writing about the coming crisis from 2005 onwards, drawing attention to the bubble (or the super-fast Minsky cycle beginning from 2001) and it was the monetarists rejecting that on every ground.
Here is a great article on this written by Dirk Bezemer of Groningen University, it is available online:'No One Saw This Coming": Understanding Financial Crisis Through
Accounting Models. This paper has quotes to many post-keynesians including Godley, who has been developing models of U.S and the world economy in a truly keynesian framework.
Here are a few examples from this paper:
Wynne Godley, US Distinguished Scholar, Levy Economics Institute of Bard College
“The small slowdown in the rate at which US household debt levels are
rising resulting form the house price decline, will immediately lead to
a …sustained growth recession … before 2010”. (2006). “Unemployment
[will] start to rise significantly and does not come down again.” (2007)
Michael Hudson, US professor, University of Missouri
“Debt deflation will shrink the “real” economy, drive down real wages, and
push our debt-ridden economy into Japan-style stagnation or worse.”
(2006)
Similarly, Post-Keynesians have also proposed solutions to the crisis and necessary regulations for future, which go well beyond the stereotype Keynesian recipe of fiscal expansion.
This is from Davidson (January 2008): How to Solve the U.S housing problem and Avoid a Recession', again available online:
'The proposed stimulus package will bring forth some additional household and business spending. Nevertheless, perhaps as much as 20 percent of each dollar of household tax rebate will go to buy cheap foreign imported goods, and therefore will not stimulate demand for American produced goods. Another 20 to 30 percent of household rebates may go into reducing household credit card or other debts, or directly into savings accounts. Accordingly, perhaps as little as fifty cents on the dollar will stimulate the economy. Not much stimulus bang for the buck!'
'...the real cost of a serious recession in 2008 is very large if we do nothing but hope that the Federal Reserve continues to lower the interest rate that they charge banks.
...The temporary tax cuts for businesses may not stimulate much additional investment as long as domestic market demand remains slack.
As you see, the true keynesians that reject the standard IS-LM model of Hicks (Keynes himself never talked about IS-LM) are aware of what is happening and what needs to be dome for a long time..Therefore, I find it unfair to blame Keynesians on this mess, your true targets should be the monetarists that created and made things worse since the onset of the crisis, I would like to repeat that arguing that U.S is adopting a Keynesian policy is a STEREOTYPE, one that every second year economics student has in his/her mind as soon as he/she hears the word fiscal stimulus. The stimulus would be very helpful if combined with other more important insights of real Keynesians ( I mean Post-Keynesians). Let me finish with my favourite quote from one of the best economists ever to exist, Keynes himself :)
“Speculators may do no harm as bubbles on a steady
stream of enterprise. But the position is serious when
enterprise becomes the bubble on a whirlpool of
speculation. When the capital development of a country
becomes a by-product of the activities of a casino, the job
is likely to be ill-done.”
Keynes (1964)
Well said - Milton and the other Chicago gangsters are responsible for this mess
I don't see any solutions there. And I don't see any insight into the nature of this crisis. And associating stimulus with Keynesianism is totally appropriate given this obsession with aggregate demand and aggregate supply modeling.
The monetarists are Keynesians on monetary policy. Still trying with all their might to prove the phillips curve. Let it go. It's neither emperically nor aprioristically true.
Yes Cattullus good old fashioned protestant capitalism was about investment and then future profit - the concept of stimulus would have been alien to them.
Sad to see so many economically ignorant people writing here, Keynes never even implicitly said anything about phillips curve or natural rate of unemployment..and there is nothing called monetary keynesianism. Mainstream keynesianism is wrong, as I said myself, it is simpy a wrong interpretation of what Keynes wrote. The current policy in U.S is as monetarist and mainstream neo-classical as it can get, apart from the stimulus package (which might be the only true policy among all others)..If you deny the vitality of demand in the economy, you may be one of those that expect hyperinflation rather than debt-deflation..Start reading Minsky, Godley, Lavioe and Keynes himself (you can start with 'treatise on money')
Yes I am a simple soul who regards money as merely a token of energy yet to be used and its value as the number of units issued divided by the energy in the system - both Milton and John seemed to think that demand was a natural economic law but they just accelerated demand by destroying capital through monetary and fiscal means.
The phrase "no bucks no Buck Rogers " comes to mind but I think it should be reversed for Buck could not even get out of his back yard without technology but he may have enough energy to wank off on his Phillips curve.
Ben said: "Accordingly, increases in the price of gold do not appear to reflect increases in the expected future of U.S. inflation."
In a way he's right, though.
It's trading on a different dynamic.
The gold price exploded when it became clear that the U.S., after all its fiscal imprudence and gaping budget deficit, would then pile on top the largest social entitlement in history with "healthcare reform" (which it will be, just watch).
Cutting through all spin of 'getting it passed for the American people', this piece of legislation, and the thousands of add ons that will surely follow, has a legitimate chance of breaking the back of the U.S economy.
Also, there won't be a single person in this country who pays less for anything health related than they do right now. The absolute audacity of this man to let people believe that they will getting 'free government healthcare'....And, yes, many of his flock are so confused they actually believe that! They're too dumb, or too drunk on the Obama Kool Aid to see that they will have to buy a policy with their own cash.
You have to be making less than 15k or so a year to be part of the crowd gets anything for free in this monstrosity.
Awesome. The race to debase is like watching NASCAR, with no country wanting a currency to appreciate as all want to export their way to prosperity. Every so often a debt bomb goes off and the US Dollar spikes, and commodities get hit hard.
Seems like the first bombs to go off will be in some of the weakest Euro-zone countries, maybe central Europe. Should be an interesting 2010 in the credit and currency markets.
Am I missing something or is there still a lot of bad debt going badder on the books of US banks in the form of credit card defaults, auto loans, mortgages, commercial real estate, etc? Lord knows how many nasty loans are despoiling on the books of the European banks.
Given the job-destroying tax-raising revenue-decreasing propensity of the Obama Administration, are we likely to be looking at some of the TARP-less banks blowing up again in a year or two? Does the Obama administration want the banks to blow up again and then take them over? I say yes.
All the while our national debt spirals out of control? Hmmm....how does one protect wealth in such a mess?
Most commodities can only go so high so fast before demand destruction occurs, and the price falls back down--oil, food, and what not. The price of gold or silver, however, for example, are not subject to demand destruction as the potential amount of investment dollars (trillions?), far exceeds the reduced affordability of jewelry.
How about replacing Bernanke with Judd Gregg?
I watched Gregg give Bernanke a kiss right on the mouth last week at a hearing in congress committee. The day before he defended him to the hilt on CNBC Squawk Box. I don't this this is a good idea, unless he changed his tune since. Not that any of those lying pricks would do anything like that.
Bernanke should not be reappointed, Geithner should be fired, Summers gone, Rubin gone...oh shit, not enough space to list them all.
In other words "Gold rally has not even begun"... LOL
Gold is the third rail for Ben, the Fed, the U.S. Treasury, and the US $.
You will no more get straight talk from Ben on gold, then you will get straight talk from U.S. politicians on Social Security, the other third rail.
Bernanke...
Zero point Zero!!!!!
Ben Blutarsky!
http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article12695.html
interesting take, but it is why uncle ben gets the privilege of pretending that he is in charge ... he was groomed for this much like easy al's "lost" doctoral thesis underscores how he was similarly groomed.
his answers are about as perfect as anyone in his position can / will ever utter. he answered factually with a bit of colour and while providing but a smidgen of lay in his replies it is really what / how he doesn't say more than what he does in terms of fleshing out the actual statement to infer any meaningful takeway (which no one ought be from these nothing questions / answers) ... but then again, such is entirely in the eye of the beholder and inflationist v. deflationist is the literal line of electro-shock demarcation for each of our mentally / emotionally / spiritually - charged belief structures (see: mark douglas).
The only response to any statement from Bernanke is laughter, loud, rude and boorish. How about a good old Mcenroe "you caught be serious".
Really people... Should we let this fuggin agile just lie to us under oath or otherwise and not respond??. Why is any one listening to this buuffoon.
Hey Ben! Tell those prisoners to work faster!
The website nowpublic reports that a former corrections officer in Florida is suing the Federal prison system, alleging that employees and inmates are being poisoned to death. Freda Cobb, 48, says she was one of hundreds exposed to toxic chemicals at the Federal Corrections Institute in Marianna. Cobb and 25 other plaintiffs are suing the prison for exposing them to dangerous lead levels as prison laborers were instructed to burst open computers with hammers to extract gold from within.
http://www.nowpublic.com/health/prisons-earn-878-million-annually-poison...
https://www.prisonlegalnews.org/20750_displayArticle.aspx
I'll take these words from Ben as a strong signal to buy.
I could have sworn I read a few articles in the MSM that all of those "bling" guys weren't buying anymore. I guess I'm wrong.
Does Bernanke have an inside track knowing a lot of those rapper dudes who wear "bling"?
interest rate have been at zero for a long time and gold is only at 1100ish per ounce? I think the gold bugs haven't a clue. The second Ben hints at raising rates gold falls to $800.
I think it will fall to $795.86. No lower. Well maybe $795.85. Because if Ben stops "hinting" about, "wink wink", raising rates, and actually does it, the stock market will, "nudge nudge", blow up.
"Honk honk".
Yes. Pay attention to this guy.
He was right when gold was $250.
He was right when gold was $350.
He was right when gold was $450.
He was right when gold was $550.
He was right when gold was $650.
He was right when gold was $750.
He was right when gold was $850.
He was right when gold was $950.
He was right when gold was $1050.
etc.
etc.
etc.
And of course, he is excellently right at this point in time.
if you raise rates on a almost infinite amount of debt you will not have enough revenue to sevice that debt so your only option is to print more money.
In that case I haven't had a clue for the past 10 years.
That would be gold at $300 or so.
I feel like a real fool.
Wanna take another look at who might not have a clue?
How's that quant trading working for ya?
what a disingenuous piece of excrement. do you recall that when benny was asked about fed monetization he replied that "there are fewer treasuries on the fed's balance sheet than this time last year. oh, really. well what about the dollar trillion plus of mbs that now reside there. just another low-life politician spinning non-truths. our country is so f-cked with clowns like this at the helm.
"Gold price affects only Americans living abroad."
Allow me to imbibe your consciousness with my understanding of the situation. Gold will become ultra valuable world wide for one simple reason. The end of the world. Yes, you heard right. See, the end of the world must come to pass because the seed of endedness was planted in the consciousness of mankind about 2000 years ago. The price of admission to Armageddon was paid in full at Calvary, from then until now is the waiting in line to get into the theater.
Now, in Australia there is a big red rock in the desert the aboriginals know of, and they know that under it is about 50 million tons of pure sparkling 24 carat GOLD with a capital everything. And they connected this with the END as per the prophecy : when teh white man digs up the accursed mount of our ancestors to get the gold, then the end comes quickly.
So world events must conspire to force whitey to dig up the mountain in Australia.
Btw, right now this mountain is agreed by whitey to be forbidden to dig because whitey knows too that the prophecy is true about it. The forces of poverty shall conspire to make it look less forbidding in due time.
-MobBarley
Well now,
Are you selling any of that fine weed you are smoking?
Or are you keeping it all just for yourself?
Could you translate that from Australian to English?
Thanks.
jim willie actually alludes to something similar in his latest:
"The Greenspan-Guidotti criterion for debt default has long ago been triggered, even assuming the USGovt OWNS ANY GOLD. It does not. Rather it owns clear ledger items called 'Deep Storage Gold' that is not deep in underground vaults, but deep in mountain ore deposits, not yet mined, kept very secretive."
http://www.financialsense.com/fsu/editorials/willie/2009/1215.html
The entire Q&A presented here and in the other post outline what Bernanke intends to do unless he is stopped. Just as his deflation speech from 2003 presaged what he has actually done when the threat of deflation loomed, he is now telegraphing his dollar policy by evidencing his complete lack of concern for its value ("that appreciation [at the crisis peak] has gradually unwound and the foreign exchange value of the dollar has essentially returned to its level prior to the events of the fall of 2008"). In other words, the "prior" level of the dollar, which was an all time low, is of no matter to the man who has as his prime responsibility custodianship of the nation's currency.
That alone is reason to deny him a second failed term.
Where they going to get the $? They don't want to tax the guys with the $ so how are they going to turn the QE off?
Maybe they'll start taxing soup line recipients to make up the difference?
$38 Billion Tax Break Granted to Citigroup to Help Improve the TARP Results
"The government is consciously forfeiting future tax revenues. It's another form of assistance, maybe not as obvious as direct assistance but certainly another form," said Robert Willens, an expert on tax accounting who runs a firm of the same name. "I've been doing taxes for almost 40 years and I've never seen anything like this where the IRS and Treasury acted unilaterally on so many fronts."
http://jessescrossroadscafe.blogspot.com/2009/12/38-billion-tax-cut-gran...
The scary thing is that Bernanke's Jedi mind tricks are working. The market absolutely believes him, otherwise why would people still be buying US treasuries?
What makes you think "people" are buying UST's?
ZH,
drum roll, please! let's roll the videotape mash-up of Ole Ben: (still good for a few chuckles... polls of liquidity)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FrpuVDMW6lw
Heli Ben knows the value of gold like I know nuclear physics. The professor is out of his league. But he is Time's man of the year. That ranks right up there with B.H.O. winning the Nobel peace prize. Move along sheeple, you are in good hands with this crew. Bring back the Committee to Save the World-oh yeah, they are already in place
Didn't you hear? Time Magazine just named him 2009's Person of the Year (seriously!). Unfortunately, I think this means his continued reign is cemented.