Voltaire V2: The Warning About Paper Money America Ignored
How many people today can honestly argue with Voltaire's quote on Chris’ new strike, Voltaire Version 2? The round is engraved with the words,
“Paper money eventually returns to its intrinsic value…zero”.
2026 “Voltaire V2” Silver Proof Coin, by Chris Duane
And to make matters worse, today, unlike during Voltaire’s lifetime, our paper currency is no longer backed by anything of true value, not silver or gold or even sea shells. In reality, the faith, hope, trust and prayers of the citizenry are the only things supporting the pieces of paper we call dollars because they aren’t even worth the paper they are printed on.
In the recent past, people gladly placed their trust in our country's fiat currency, despite its being supported by nothing of value, because they believed that the dollar was backed by the “full faith and credit” of the United States government.
Well, that was fine and dandy until the government became the worst credit risk on earth when it became so mired in debt that it is now on the verge of collapsing in upon itself.
Unfortunately, in the 1970s, when the country began to slide into financial oblivion, while accumulating more and more and more debt, it slowly became obvious to most people that the “full faith and credit” of, and in, the government was seriously misplaced.
The United States government’s debt has recently topped $40 trillion!! In 1970, when the decline began, and despite the fact that we were fighting the lengthy Vietnam war and initiating Democrat President Lyndon B. Johnson’s Great Society’s welfare programs, it was only $371 billion. And even when you adjust that figure for inflation, it would only be $3.2 trillion today, not $40 trillion.
Where has all of the money gone and how the hell did we get into this suicidal predicament? No one in their right mind would run their household finances as irresponsibly as the U. S. Government has run itself over the last 60 years. In fact, the banking industry would not have permitted an individual to become so severely mired in debt. There are checks and balances, and punishments, for individuals who become rabid spendthrifts.
2026 “Voltaire V2" Silver Proof Coin, by Chris Duane
The government was run like a household budget until the 1970s. Up until that point, the stellar financial reputation of the U.S. Government was controlled and sustained by The Greatest Generation of men, as it had been by their male ancestors. When these men retired, their children, especially thousands of female Baby Boomers, were unprecedentedly placed into influential positions within the government. And what do women like to do most? Correct. Spend money and preferably other people’s money. And that’s exactly what they did.
Once Pres. Nixon took the United States off the gold standard in 1974, all hell broke loose. All of the restraints, controls and restrictions inflicted on government spending, that was tied to the limited supply of physical gold, were removed. This was when the run-away-spending began. The bureaucrats allowed spending to spiral out-of-control, while going on wasteful spending binges that should have set off alarms. But, it didn’t because no one with any financial expertise, personal responsibility or self-control was left to watch the store. And worse yet, if anyone objected to, or questioned, the outlandish expenditures, they were called sexist or a racist. This process resulted in sidelining the very men who were financially savvy and were needed to control the huge budgets. And worse yet, no one who remained cared.
So, today, just as Voltaire (1694-1778) had predicted, our currency is nearly worthless when compared to just 60 years ago. And again, who’s to blame? The same incompetent, unqualified and obnoxious bureaucrats who insulted, demeaned and ultimately castrated the men who were truly qualified to create, organize, supervise, implement and control a huge government budget.
The people left behind were the first people to treat our dollar as though it were nothing more than an endless roll of toilet paper. They may as well have tossed it out the window while they chased feel-good, senseless, pointless and expensive pet projects here and abroad.
The most recent, and the worst case of fiscal malfeasance, was discovered by DOGE (Department of Government Efficiency) in 2025. This government program was hemorrhaging tax dollars overseas and it was named USAID (U.S. Agency for International Development). Most people had never heard of it before it was exposed to be a huge purveyor of influence peddling while doling out millions of dollars in bribes here and bankrolling leftist ideology overseas. And its annual budget? Between $35 and $50 billion!
USAID was administered by a political hack named Samantha Powers. She is married to Cass Sunstein. The same radical thinker Sunstein, who served under Obama. Rodrick Watson, who is black, was the decades-long contracting agent for USAID. He was arrested for his involvement in a $550 million bribery scheme along with two black contractors. USAID was so corrupt that it was disbanded and 90% of the existing contracts were canceled.
So, here we are after 60 years of mismanagement by the drunken sailors who were running the government agencies, departments and programs on the behalf of the taxpayers and the value of the dollar is nearly gone. They have wasted more money than anyone could calculate with any accuracy, thereby diluting the dollar's buying power to the point of irrelevance and obscurity.
And these people were not the only ones to blame because the scheme had been going on for decades and rather than reign in the abusers, the Fed continued to print more and more toilet paper to sustain the illusion that everything was fine, when it wasn’t.
Chris’ new strike, Voltaire Version 2, reminds us of the words written by Spanish philosopher George Santayana (1863-1952),
“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”
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