The dollar remains the best of a questionable bunch. Our problem is primarily one of regulatory capture, e.g., those players with the deepest pockets and the least interest in a productive economy (real goods and hedges on real commodities) pretty much ride herd on the regulators, not the other way around (the most current example to follow).
Now, considerable `sap sucking' of face value is governmentally derived, no denying that. PAY-GO (Congress having to cover not only any spending increase, but cover any tax cuts as well before implementing them) went out of fashion. In 2006, then Sen. Obama, pretty much summed it up prior to his vote against raising the debt ceiling.
http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CREC-2006-03-16/pdf/CREC-2006-03-16-pt1-PgS2236.pdf (page S2237) Sad to say, his stimulus also skirted the PAY-GO.
Regulation? How about transparency and effective oversight? That is the primary hobgobblin. There is a reason thieves prefer the dark, they are complaining vociferously about the possibility of light and the Current House is acquiescing quite nicely:
The Senate Banking Committee's review of the one year anniversary of Dodd/Frank (the entire hearing is enlightening/frustrating) go to 1:20 to listen to what ticks me off the most:
http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/300630-1
This brings me to the current bit of slight of hand (Bank Of America trying to slip ~50 Trillion in derivatives from their holding company into their depository operation so if they go busto the counterparties will be paid off before the depositors (a result in a change made in the 2005 bankruptcy law) - FDIC -taxpayers- will have to cover the depositor's loss. Looks like a too big to fail extortion scheme to me.
A good precis:
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/10/20/idUS347712244020111020
Link to another reporter's blog (covering original report):
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2011/10/bank-of-america-deathwatch-moves-risky-derivatives-from-holding-company-to-taxpayer-backstopped-depositors.html
Have a fun weekend (when you hear the financial services folks complaining, through their media mouthpieces, about `regulation' just replace it with `oversight').