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The Fleecing of the Sheeple–America Discovers “What That Thing Will Bring”

There is a very old legal maxim: “The value of a thing, is what that thing will bring.” It was developed by the courts to establish the value of a loss, in civil claims. The maxim has been perhaps over-used in central Europe, where if you recklessly drive your car and run down a farmer’s laying hen, you can be held liable for for not only the replacement cost of the chicken, but also the value of its future offspring for the next year–or perhaps even two years if the judge is in a bad mood. That ancient maxim is …




Letter Re: Calculating The Bullion Value of US Silver Coins

Mr. Rawles: My parents and grandparents gave about $60 face value in junk silver coins, including a few Morgan and “Peace:” dollars. The quarters and dimes are all 1964 and earlier, but some are the 50 cent pieces were made in the late 1960s. (Those are 40% [silver content], right?) With silver now rocketing up past $20 an ounce, how do I determine the current market value of these coins? Thanks, – G.E.T. JWR Replies: To calculate the silver metal value of 90% silver pre-1965 mint date US dimes, quarters, and half dollars: A $1,000 face value bag contains approximately …




Letter Re: Self-Sufficiency–How Do We Do It All?

Dear Memsahib and Jim, I am a daily SurvivalBlog reader and contributor, along with my husband. I am very interested in learning more how Memsahib and other retreat women manage to do all that they do. How does a day or week in your life go? How do you can, bake, cook, shear, spin, weave, knit, sew, teach, et cetera and get it all done? We are moving to our retreat soon. I have baked, cooked, knit, learned to spin and weave, and have canned in the past, but not all at once. I forgot to mention clean, wash, take …




Odds ‘n Sods:

My old friend Jeff moved to England to get his final sheep skin–a doctorate degree. He tells me that the price of gasoline (“petrol”) now averages £1.09 GBP per liter in the Thames Valley, and that he has seen it advertised for as much as £1.50 GBP/liter out on the highways. At current exchange rates, £1.50 GBP equals $2.97 USD. Now, multiplying liters to US gallons (x 3.785) that equates to a heart-stopping $11.24 USD per gallon. Ouch! (For comparison, I most recently paid $2.98 per gallon, locally, but I’ve seen it as high as $3.05) OBTW, Jeff mentioned that …




Jim’s Quote of the Day:

“There is not any one news item that I can point to. We know that there is paper out there that we can’t trust. We don’t know exactly who owns it and how much. And we don’t know how they are valuing it.” – Douglas Peta, Chief Investment Strategist at J. W. Seligman & Company in New York, as quoted in the New York Times, March 1, 2008