Furthermore...

Ryan also made the point that I said previously that I had admitted the value of the dollar to have a greater impact than I had previously thought. This is very true, so let me explain...

You cannot buy a barrel of crude oil (regardless of where that oil originates from) with anything BUT a US dollar. More accurately, according to yesterday's market close, 112 US Dollars. No matter the amount, you can't buy a barrel of crude with a British Pound, or a Russian Ruble, or an EU Euro, or a Mexican Peso. Only US currency buys crude oil, so if someone in Japan wants to buy a significant amount of crude oil, they must do it by first buying dollars, then buying the oil. This is true on every trading floor of every commodities exchange in the world, from New York, to Chicago, to Moscow, to Tokyo, to Hong Kong, to Kansas City.

Since 2001, it has been estimated that the global value of a US Dollar has fallen more than 40%, which means it is 40% MORE expensive for someone dealing with US dollars in the first place to buy oil. That is bad for the US, but it is good for places like China, Japan and India... they get cheaper dollars to buy oil with.

No greater factor in the fall of the value of the dollar can be found than the Federal policy of increasing the national debt over time with no corresponding increase in Federal revenues. I can't blame this solely on Obama (Bush had his spending sprees, too, as Ryan said), but there is no question that Obama is the President that said this was the way it was going to be "officially" for the forseeable future, and that has gone a long way to making rival economies like China and India look more and more to surpass US national debt rankings.

My point... or question... is this: Is the requirement that crude oil contracts be conducted in US dollars also applicable to these OTC futures contracts that Ryan pointed out in his last post? Do those traders in future prospects barter their contracts on tomorrow's price of oil in dollars alone? Can they promise to sell oil futures with yen instead of dollars, even if the contracts for oil themselves are sold in dollars?

To use Ryan's example of the gun show...

If I wanted to buy a firearm from a licensed, regulated vendor... I'd have to use dollars. But if I bought a rifle from a private individual walking the show room floor, does the same requirement to use dollars apply? Or can I use Euros, Rubles, Drachmas, Dinari, Pesos, or Pounds Sterling?

I ask, because if the same requirement does NOT apply, then that is a further drain on the global value of a dollar, and a further weakening of the US economy due to a lack of regulation.