Long term trend watch: In today’s WSJ, Judy Shelton writes an interesting opinion piece [subscription requred] about the perils of a fluctuating value of the dollar.  She basically endorses Robert Mundell’s call for the world to get together and create a global currency system, likely based on gold.  As I suspect that near the end of this decade the currency-manipulation, inflation and trade chickens will come home to roost, I can see the US taking the lead on creating a new Bretton Woods-type currency system. 

Of course, I believe there is no true panacea out there, and that we will end up trading one set of issues for another.  But that is just the way the cycle turns…