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The marketplace here is booming. Hundreds of people have shown up to spend the week. Many are drawn here by the Free State Project, which is trying to get libertarian-leaning folks to move to New Hampshire. You can buy just about anything you want at PorcFest — food, drugs, bootleg cigarettes or alcohol.
And you don't even need U.S. government currency to do it. Someone shows me a cash register stocked with tiny pieces of silver and gold.
Trying to give up the U.S. dollar means a lot of extra math. You hear it all day long. How much is silver? How many grams in an ounce? It's 8:30 in the morning, in the woods, and people are checking the precious metal prices on their cell phones. I go directly to the source. Down the hill, Ron Hellwig has set up a bank and a mint on a folding table.
Ron has invented these neat little laminated cards that contain strips of silver. He has basically created a silver-based currency with different denominations — 1 gram, 5 grams, etc.
He tells me proudly that, although he makes his living cooking, he has no permit to sell food. He's never been inspected. And he does not pay taxes. "I don't want them in my business at all," he says of the government. "If somebody wants to buy my food, it's between me and them."
Originally posted by 4Starlight2Decay0
Pretty cool, just like a music festival or rainbow gathering with the exception of mushroom chocolates being the most sought after currency
Originally posted by Lightrule
You are also missing the point that these people have every right in the world to organize and start their own society with their own rules and currency. It is no different than your current government, just not as old.
You are missing the point... His laminated cards are actually worth the value of the silver contained within them. Which makes them infinitely more valuable than any fiat currency.
Originally posted by Lightrule
reply to post by kro32
Been there done that! They are fun arn't they!?
Now that you mention it I should get one going for this summer, got a neighbor I could buy the pig off and everything!
-Lightrule
Don't forget nosing around in adult diapers.
Originally posted by randomname
police have better things to do, like tasering children or faceplanting crippled people on the sidewalk.