The Evansville, IN, headquarters of Liberty Dollar was raided by federal agents earlier this month. The Liberty Dollar is an alternative currency backed by precious metals that is designed, and encouraged, to compete with current US currency as an “inflation-proof currency.” Documents, precious metals, and other equipment were seized.
The Liberty Dollar website is a good source of current articles on the raid. The US Mint issued a warning over a year ago that Liberty Dollars are not legal tender. Elsewhere there are commentaries on the constitutionality of the laws of which Liberty Dollar is running afoul. (I'm declining to embroil myself in political discussions. Not going there. ;))
Independent of any legal, political, and constitutional issues, though, Liberty Dollars at their most innocuous were a very expensive way to buy silver if you did it through the company. To get started through the site required paying $50 per ounce of silver. The initial $250 to become a Liberty Associate was split three ways: $100 worth of Liberty Dollar coins went back to you (five one-ounce $20 silver coins), $100 went to your referrer, and $50 went to the company. So you receive five one-ounce coins for $250, or $50 per ounce of silver. If that's all you ever did, that's a really bad way to buy silver. But you could buy more at reasonable markups to spot (but “at a discount” compared to the “face value” of the coins). Or, to really cash in, you could refer someone else so that they could get started with silver at $50/ounce. ** rolling eyes **
So despite the noble guise of putting real money back into circulation and putting control of the currency back in the hands of the people, the primary market for obtaining and exchanging Liberty Dollars was costly to enter and the only way to recoup your initial fee was to refer more people.
Here's my first post on the Liberty Dollars.
Oh well. At least the lucky few that got Ron Paul Liberty Dollars can sell them for quite a nice little profit now that many of them were seized. (According to CNN, Ron Paul's campaign knew they existed but did not authorize them.)
Lol. I don't see why they can't make fake money if they don't expect everyone to accept it. Kind of like Linden dollars. On the other hand, I'd never buy it myself. I don't subscribe to the idea that in a catastrophe we'll need gold and silver–I think food will be more valuable.