Ron Paul's HR 1207 bill to audit the Federal Reserve has quickly been gaining momentum and support in the House of Representatives and around the country over the past several months. While it is true that the bill aims to force the Federal Reserve to fess up to all of its dirty dealings, the bill's ramifications could be much more far reaching. Back in early June, CNBC reported that according to some experts, if the Fed were to be audited, it would be unable to stay alive.
The Federal Reserve's balance sheet is so out of whack that the central bank would be shut down if subjected to a conventional audit, Jim Grant, editor of Grant's Interest Rate Observer, told CNBC.
With $45 billion in capital and $2.1 trillion in assets, the central bank would not withstand the scrutiny normally afforded other institutions, Grant said in a live interview.
While this is great news for any lover of liberty, the ramifications of this bill could be even more powerful than closing the Fed. According to George Smith of the Mises Institute, forcing the Fed to show the world its dark side would necessarily force the American government to do the same.
...the really appetizing part of auditing the Fed is knowing what stands behind it. The Fed is a racket at heart, a con game writ large — what else can you call an organization with the exclusive privilege of printing money in the trillions and handing it over to friends? But if this is true, what does that say about the state, the organization that created and sanctions it? Is the Fed an honest mistake in the state's otherwise undying efforts to preserve our liberty, or might it be a key component of a bigger racket?
Now, let's not get our hopes too hight. As always, we need to keep our focus on the battle at hand -- merely getting the House of Representatives to debate the measure and to comparable support for the bill's Senate compantion, S. 604. But hey, just because it's only the 4th of July doesn't mean we can't already be dreaming of Christmas.
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