Weigel

StopTheCoin.com

First they laugh at you, then they get mad at you, then they fight you. We’re at the fighting stage of the Great Platinum Coin Crusade of 2013, with a leading Republican proposing legislation that would ban the coin trick, and with the arrival of StopTheCoin.com. American Committment’s Phil Kerpen (formerly of Americans for Prosperity) bought the domain today to advertise a petition that bonds together skeptics of the coin plan.

Joe Firestone, the blogger who first proposed the idea, is now calling for a $60 TRILLION platinum coin to be minted.  That would mean completely unlimited federal spending, without the approval of Congress - and the value of the dollar would be gutted.

“Any risk of this scheme being used is enough to warrant Congress stepping in and stopping it,” says Kerpen. “Walden stepped up with legislation to do that and it’s worthy of broad public support. We’d like to see at least House vote on it to see where every member of Congress stands.”

In related coin news, TPM has begun asking which great American should appear on the theoretical coin. Seems obvious to me: Slap Ronald Reagan on the thing, and translate “Deficits don’t matter” into Latin.