Topic: CNSNews.com
Who knew there was a fundamentalist Christian activist who was a coin dealer?
Randy Hall did, and he quotes the guy in a March 9 CNSNews.com article. Hall found the dealer, Troy Thoreson, spouting the usual right-wing stuff about the U.S. Mint's moving "In God We Trust" to the edge of the new presidential dollar coin:
"When this story first started to develop from the U.S. Mint, I could see the writing on the wall," said Thoreson, whose primary expertise is in dealing with modern coins.
Not only would this be the first time since 1866 that the national motto would not appear on the front or back of American dollar coins, but there would also be some "godless coins" since a number of them would accidentally go through the stamping process without having "In God We Trust" imprinted on them, he noted.[...]
Thoreson offered a suggestion to those who decide to boycott the new coins - boycott the earlier dollar coins too.
"If the U.S. populace really wants to make a statement here - because these coins have little or no numismatic value - what they should do is find any 1979 Susan B. Anthony dollars or any 2000 Sacagawea dollars they have laying around," Thoreson said.
"Take them to your bank and turn those in as a protest about not having 'In God We Trust' on the front or the back of the new coins," he said. "That will drive the government crazy, because the banks are going to send them right back to the Federal Reserve, which is trying to get rid of them.
"And if you're a collector, you just need three of these coins: one with the inscription printed properly, one with the inscription accidentally printed upside-down and one of those that have no inscription at all," Thoreson added. "Get your one example of each and take the rest back down to the bank."
One question that Hall appears not to have asked: Does Thoreson so object to these new dollar coins that he would not deal in them, even if the government caves to his demands and withdraws it, thus increasing the numismatic value of those coins?
This, by the way, was the second article in two days on the issue, following a March 8 article by Susan Jones.
