Ron Paul has written a book, End the Fed, well known in these circles. We have a better idea: Stiff the Fed. In case you missed it, the financial cable network CNBC actually produced something informative a little while ago. It listed our 15 biggest creditors, the entities to which the captive citizens of the United Snakes of America owes money. Canada, which we always held as infinitely more sensible, turned up in the Top 15 for the first time. We owe Canada $3.6 billion. Coming in at 14th is Hong Kong, at $138.9 billion. We owe the Cayman Islands' banking centers $146.3 billion. Twelfth is Brazil; we're into them for $184.4 billion. We owe OPEC $210.4 billion. We owe the insurance industry $261.8 billion. ... Are we beginning to see a pattern here?/David Bond, Wallace Street Journal. More here.

Question: Bond goes on to say that the Number One I.O.U. "is our very own United Snakes Federal Reserve Bank, which has us on the hook for a staggering $5.351 trillion!" (which is five times as much as we owe the Chinese). Bond suggests that the U.S. walk away from its debt to the federal reserve, like so many former home owners, and concentrate on paying off everyone else. What do you think of that approach?