All Ashore Who's Going Ashore

I thought that this tread at Smirking Chimp was interesting and informative. It outlines a few possiblities swirling around the tanking dollar. Post 44, which discusses the end of dollar hegemony is especially compelling:

Rejection of the dollar is increasingly being used as an act of political aggression, and nowhere more acutely than in oil-producing countries. The trailblazer was none other than Saddam Hussein who, in 2000, announced that Iraq would henceforth make all its oil trades in euros, a decision that conspiracy theorists - and not a few eminent Middle Eastern experts - say triggered the US invasion. The United States derives substantial benefits from the dollar being the established currency of the oil industry. Because most countries import oil, they must maintain reserves in dollars to pay for it - two-thirds of the world's currency reserves are kept in dollars. This is a major factor upholding the dollar's position as the world's reserve currency; a switch out of dollars in the oil industry would be a major assault on the currency's pre-eminence.

Another poster (52) responded:

Some players might get out of dollars on principle or as a way to hurt the US, but only massive dollar dumping would cause a rapid collapse and world banks would buy dollars to stop that if at all possible.

This is sort of like being in a ship with a deranged captain. He must be slowed down and stopped very carefully so that the ship isn't crashed onto the shoals. The other powers want a different captain not a sunken hulk.

That's our boy. He's turned the US into the Exxon Valdez.

Comments

[Mark]

You’re going to have to use a different analogy. I don’t think our “leader” would see anything wrong with the Exxon Valdez.

[eRobin]

LOL