Woo hoo! Keene Wal-Mart officially accepts Liberty Dollars

[FTL_Ian]

Nice.  Well done so far.  Be careful though.  We're not supposed to call them "coins".  Try "10 Dollar Piece".

[Dave Ridley]

Mike Fam's information was accurate. ?In what way are you saying he sabotaged me? ?I'm not saying he didn't, I just don't have any information indicating he did.

[Dave Ridley]

sent this to norfed at Jim's suggestion

Truth@LibertyDollar.org

Dear folks at NORFED:

Thought you might like to know about a controversy going on over the Keene, NH wal mart and its flip flopping on liberty dollars....which includes one of their managers trying to have a guy's LD's confiscated (this actually happened in the Amherst NH wal mart but the manager was from the keene store). Details are at

http://forum.soulawakenings.com/index.php?topic=1326.0

and are being updated as situation unfolds.  I'm wondering if you might be in a position to have someone high up at norfed contact the district manager of wal mart. I've left my number with him asking him to call but don't know if he will and don't know if I am the right person to talk with him.   

[KBCraig]

That dollar sign is going to continue to be a problem, as is calling them "ten dollar pieces".

I know that Norfed's "suggestions" include being less than fully forthright. That's going to cause more situations like this one, especially with bigger stores.

The place to spread LDs is at small operations, where the proprietors understand, and the clientele are mixed, but can take time to be educated.

Kevin

[Erethizon]

Nice.  Well done so far.  Be careful though.  We're not supposed to call them "coins".  Try "10 Dollar Piece".

I believe the forbidden phrase is "legal tender". Anything else goes.

[tracysaboe]

Or if they wanted to, they can exchange then directly with NorFed for U.S. Dollars couldn't they?

Tracy

[Fluff and Stuff]

Everyone knows about this, right?

http://www.austinsilver.com/

Lots of places all over Austin take these.
It would be cool if someone in the NH community created a similar list,and it had Wal-Mart on it!

[Kat Kanning]

Cool website!  Welcome, TN-FSP!

[Ron Helwig]

Nice.  Well done so far.  Be careful though.  We're not supposed to call them "coins".  Try "10 Dollar Piece".

I believe the forbidden phrase is "legal tender". Anything else goes.

"coin" is possibly also forbidden. According to NORFED, 'coin' can be interpreted as a legal definition that applies only to legal tender, AKA government tokens.

Of course the common usage of the term, the one that we are all familiar with, does seem to apply to the silver and gold produced by NORFED. Bernard wants everyone to not use the term because there is some potential that the govt could say it is the "legal tender" definition, causing trouble for the speaker/writer.

I prefer the term "Silver Liberties" or "Silver Liberty" for a single ounce piece. I also have a couple "Gold Liberties" - they're cool!

And yes, it would be nice if they didn't need to be labelled for comparison to "dollars", but the reality is that they need to in order to work as a currency. (At least until the majority of consumers understand a lot more about money)

[Michael Fisher]

Guys, please stop attacking me over this.? You know you're making a profit on LDs and the LD associates are not required to pay $10 for them back.? I get pre-circulated 1-ounce silver coins for 10-15% over spot.? LDs are 43% over spot price.? That is clearly unacceptable for a currency.? Do not call me anti-free market only because I'm against us making money at the expense of third parties who should know better than to accept LDs at 43% over spot price.

Anyways, I have a solution to this problem.

-Use precirculated bullion for thinner margins.

-Get a coin shop to create small bullion-holding bags with certifications of value on them.

-For example, you hand the people at WalMart a one-ounce silver coin, minted by any government or company, and it's in a small protective bag with an attached certificate of value that expires in two weeks.

-It could say "Certified Value:? $7.50".? "Certification expires on July 26, 2005".? "Redeemable at FULL value at Bob's Coin and Jewelry, 603-555-1234, 6 Main St, Wherever, NH 01234."? "Call if desired for verification of value."

-It will have an exception written on it for the possibility of the price falling by more than 5% or 10%, in which case the redemption value will be modified.

Coin shops may be willing to do this.

[Kat Kanning]

No one is attacking you, Mike.

[FTL_Ian]

Mike,

    The purpose of the ALD is not as an investment.  You aren't supposed to be exchanging the paper for the silver.  If you want silver, go and buy it in bullion form.  The point is to circulate them.
    If you want currency, the ALD is great!
    If you think it stinks then get competitive instead of complaining.  See if you can make your plan work.  It sounds like it needs some refining to me.  Perhaps with a little work, the LeReuineur Dollar will become more popular in the marketplace!

Until something else comes along (I've heard about the Phoenix Dollar), NORFED is the best option out there.

May the best currency win.

[tracysaboe]

I made a simular post on the FSP board

I don't really buy Hayek's theory of competing currencies.

Money evolves because the previously it worked. I kind-of think that trying to intoroduce a currency where no currency previously existed is a little counter-intuitive to how most people think about money, or how money evolved to begin with. Yes, if we were in a society where their were many different goods, all competing to become the most saleable commodity, and the FRN and NORFED were just two of those -- then yes, it makes sence. But we already have a most saleable commodity. The government just hijacked it. Trying to introduce a currency where it has never worked in the past, is completely contradictory to the origins of money. In short, Hayek forget's about Mengar's theories on the origins of money.

But then -- Rothbard's theory on how to get back to sound money has flaws too. He thinks the government should pin the dollar to a set ammount of gold -- so that the dollar can be demacratized through the economy again. (currently that would probably be around a dollar equalling aprox 1 thousanth of an ounce or something.) but for an anarchist, I don't understand how he can trust government to do something like that. Sure, all he would be doing is fixing previous mistakes. And I guess their is precedent -- Grover Cleveland, brought us back to sound money through simular measures. But really -- is such a thing possible? The powers that be, are allways going to want control over the money supply.

So, Hayek's theory -- as flawed as it is, is all we have to currently work with for the time being.

Perhaps their's a third way to work towards bring us towards sound money that doesn't involve depending on the government to fix it, and but also takes Mengar's theory of how money evolved into account.

But my current possition is to neither oppose or endorse the use of NORFED. The more ideas we have on how to get money back into a free market arena the better off we'll be.

Tracy

[Russell Kanning]

I talked with the Wal-mart manager today and offered to buy his LDs ....he said he is waiting to get them all back and then will call Dave. We had a nice relaxed chat.
He just didn't know what to do with them .... they always start their drawers with new money.

...maybe we need checkout #15 to be only LDs....that is where you go to stock up on food and ammo

[Michael Fisher]

It's a fact that precirculated silver bullion, not even purchased in bulk, is available for less than 15% over spot price.

LDs go for 43% over spot.

The $7 in silver makes liberty-oriented people think it's okay, when in my view, it's clearly not okay.

The $3 in profit from the unsuspecting victim goes to NORFED, some of it to a regional distributor, and a few percent to the reseller.

It is highly undesirable to purchase bullion in uncirculated mint condition and circulate it at great cost to the recipient.  If you really care about liberty and promoting bullion usage, then it is far more desirable to purchase pre-circulated thin-margin bullion as cheap as possible and sell it for a tiny profit to cover the margin.

Most people seem to agree with me when I say that, but they reject the idea because people "won't take our word for it" when we say a silver coin is worth $7 and it doesn't have "$7" anywhere on the coin.  My previous idea was to simply have a local coin shop temporarily certify the value.  There may be better ways to do this, but any such idea is far better and more honest than using LDs.