"The U.S. is, in dollar terms, bankrupt. How did this happen? Well, there are $800 TRILLION dollars in over-the-counter derivatives floating around in the market. That’s 10 times the GDP of the WORLD. These dollar-denominated paper assets are likely worthless or close to it. Which means that the dollar is already...effectively worthless." --Richard Young

This may be the re-start button I've been pondering. The US dollar is worthless. So we HAVE been reset back to zero. It's the restart PROCESS that's being hindered. The reality is too horrific to be publicly acknowledged. So don't expect a ribbon-cutting ceremony or a Wall Street Journal headline. No one standing on a podium is going to come clean. Political instituions --governments and central banks-- will never openly acknowledge the obvious: "Dear America, due to an epic dereliction of duty we ground your currency down to nothing." Nah, they're going to sidestep the pomp and circumstance.

Even the markets, normally politically unbeholden, are still grappling with the almost-unimaginable implications. The financial engineers created so many dollar instruments that they soared beyond the intrinsic measure of global wealth (GDP) by an order of ten. That is, it would take ten years of the world's productivity to 'pay them down'. The whole world will not submit to a decade of debt peonage to bail out the banking elite. At least, not willingly.

Gold seems to be a no-brainer.