1 Billion $1 Coins Collect Dust; Congress Does Nothing

In 2005 Congress got the bright idea that Americans should go the way of Europe and have $1 coins. Coins are more popular in Europe, where $1 bills do not exist. When the new $1 coins came out there was much fanfare. Each President would be featured on the coin, over the course of 10 years the mint would get to every President.

Unfortunately the bright ideas Congress comes up with are rarely popular with Americans. NPR of all news organizations reports that there are $1 billion worth of $1 coins sitting in the Federal Reserve. The mint continues to press new coins to the tune of $200 million a year. The cost to taxpayers is $300 million so far and that just includes the cost to press the coins. It doesn’t include storage or shipping costs and it doesn’t include the multi-million ad campaign when the coins first came out. With those costs and the cost to press the rest of these coins over the next 5-6 years and taxpayers are on the hook for well over $1 billion. The worst part of all is that we’re only up to President Grant. It’s a long way to Reagan.

Congress needs to repeal this law and stop pressing coins that no one wants. Yes, this is a small potatoes sort of an expenditure but it’s a good example of government waste. We have 1 billion coins sitting around Federal Reserve banks collecting dust with another 1 billion coins on the way. It’s clear that no one wants these coins. Surely there aren’t collectors waiting to snap up $1 billion worth of coins. This would be a good project for my freshman Congressman Justin Amash. Take on this nonsense and save taxpayers a lot of money.

Having said that, this coin situation is a good example of how the government sits apart from the free market when they make grand decisions. Americans don’t want $1 coins. It’s been tried over and over again by the Federal government and Americans have consistently pushed back and showed their disinterest by not using the coins. Congress and government do not know better than the people. Their bright ideas may sound great on the floor of Congress but if Americans aren’t interested the only way government can get its way is through brute force.

We can extend this situation to any number of other areas. Government is mandating what kind of light bulbs we can purchase, which is leading to little more than hoarding and increased prices. When Clinton banned 3 gallon toilets in the 90′s people near the Canadian border raided the plumbers there and took home as many toilets as they could. The free market should be left to dictate these matters. The government has no business trying to direct us from on high.

NPR Executives Caught Making Anti-Jewish and Christian Statements

Leaders of NPR have been caught on tape saying disparaging things about conservatives, Republicans, the Tea Party, Christians and Jews. A conservative leaning group caught NPR executives saying these things by posing as a phony Muslim group offering to donate $5 million to NPR. The phony group presented itself as wanting to fund NPR because of Republican threats to cut NPR funding and because they wanted to lessen ‘Jew inflience’ and ‘Jew money’ in media. Apparently these anti-Jewish goals didn’t stop Ron Schiller, President of the NPR Foundation and VP of development at NPR from attending the meeting.

Schiller accuses the Tea Party of being ‘racist, racist people.’ He accuses evangelical Christians of being weird while agreeing that Jews control the media. He also apparently wants more Muslim voices in media, which is perhaps why he agreed to meet with this phony Muslim group. I suppose the prospect of $5 million didn’t dissuade him either.

Schiller accuses the Tea Party of being xenophobic, gun toting and ‘scary.’ He accuses conservatives of not being as educated as liberals, suggesting the educated elite is to small in the US. Conservatives are apparently engaged in ‘anti-intellectualism.’ Because of course one could never be educated and disagree with liberals.  On the bright side, Schiller admitted NPR would probably be better off without government funding. I suppose he deserves credit for that.

Ron Schiller exposes how he and other NPR executives believe and if you think that doesn’t come across in the reporting or on the shows NPR has you’re crazy. Just last year NPR fired Juan Williams for daring to suggest that he, like a lot of Americas, is nervous seeing someone in Muslim garb in an airport. Williams frank, matter of fact statement earned him a pink slip at NPR because the statements were anti-Islamic, even though they really were not. I wonder what NPR will say about Schiller’s anti-Christian and anti-Jewish remarks. I suspect not much because it’s acceptable these days to attack and disparage Christians and Jews. Especially so among the educated elite, you know the liberals who think they have superior intellect.

The left loves to point fingers at their opposition and accuse them of doing the very things they engage in. They claim the Tea Parties are racist and violent even though to this day there hasn’t been any overtly racist statements made at a Tea Party nor has there been any violence. At union rallies and Code Pink rallies over the last month there have been multiple examples of overt and blatant racism as well as violence. At NPR, Juan Williams can get fired for saying something that is a fact but the NPR foundation President and NPR VP can yammer on about the Jew media and call Christians weird, among other things.

Every negative thing the left does they loudly blame their opposition of doing all while pretending they don’t engage in such behavior. The NPR tapes prove one aspect of this. Lila Rose proves another aspect of it when she exposes Planned Parenthood over and over again of abusing young women and shielding child molesters. The left forever accuses the right of not caring about girls because we oppose abortion, yet Planned Parenthood actively harms underage women by protecting their adult pimps or by aborting the babies of underage mothers without their parents consent. Over and over again the left proves itself liars.

I suspect NPR won’t do much about Ron Shiller’s anti-Jewish, anti-Christian and anti-conservative statements. They’ll whine about being set up and point the finger of blame at conservatives. Even if we agree that they were set up, there is one question that still remains. Why exactly would government funded NPR agree to meet with an organization that wants to promote sharia law in America and is overtly anti-Jewish? Before they ever sat down for the lunch now making the rounds online NPR decided that this was an organization worth meeting with and worth taking money from. If they weren’t worth meeting, if the organization raised red flags with NPR they would have said you guys are racists, thanks but no thanks. Instead, they met with members of this organization. NPR has no one to blame but themselves.

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