Rep. Paul uses four-letter-word in exchange with Greenspan, who ducks

8:47p ET Tuesday, February 26, 2002

Dear Friend of GATA and Gold:

Canada's Financial Post, the business section
of the National Post, devoted most of a page
today to a long article about GATA. It appeared
with a big photograph of GATA Chairman Bill
Murphy and Alain Despert's painting symbolizing
our cause. The article was a result of GATA's
February 12 press conference in Washington,
which the Post's reporter attended.

While the article's tone ranges from the bemused
to the dismissive, its most important sentence
may be: quot;The Financial Post's calls to such
major players as the U.S. Treasury and J.P.
Morgan Chase went unanswered.quot;

The perpetrators of the suppression of the
gold price will face still more questions as a
result of GATA's work. Meanwhile, our friends
all over the world will know us no matter how
we are disparaged, if only we ARE made known,
as we were made known today in Canada, a
major mining country.

With your support we are making huge progress,
and today was a great day to be thankful for.

The text of the Financial Post article appears
below.

CHRIS POWELL, Secretary/Treasurer
Gold Anti-Trust Action Committee Inc.

* * *

Gold prices tarnished, group claims

quot;There's a conspiracy to keep world prices
low,quot; says GATA founder Bill Murphy

By Peter Morton
Financial Post, Canada
Tuesday, February 26, 2002

WASHINGTON -- Bill Murphy looks for all the
world like a conspiracy theorist. He speaks
breathlessly, like a man with much to say and
little time to say it. His eyes bulge as he
drives home his points.

quot;We were always the conspiracy nuts,quot; says
this man with a mission standing before a
core of true believers and a few puzzled
journalists.

On this day, Mr. Murphy has come to the
National Press Club to explain that gold
conspiracies have been eclipsed by terrorists
and Enron Corp. -- quot;those were conspiracies
alsoquot; -- but that the plot to suppress the
price of gold goes much further than either
of those.

He believes billions of dollars are being
secretly siphoned off to a dozen
international banks with the quot;surreptitiousquot;
help of the U.S. Treasury and the Bank for
International Settlements.

quot;A group of banks and the Treasury has
conspired to keep gold prices down,quot; he says,
waving a document in proof. quot; Gold prices
should be well north of US$600 and are going
there soonquot; -- just as soon, in fact, as the
conspiracy is unveiled.

Gold is trading at about US$293 an ounce.

Like most modern conspiracies -- the Kennedy
assassination, UFOs in Nevada -- there is
enough evidence to make Mr. Murphy's gold
conspiracy seem plausible.

He points to the proposed 1999 sell-off by
the International Monetary Fund of its 3,000
tonnes of gold reserves to help developing
countries wipe out their debts to
industrialized countries. A noble idea, but
the proposal was quashed by G-8 members, who
argued that dumping that much gold on the
market would wreak havoc on developing
nations where gold is produced and in
developed nations where gold is consumed.

The United States was so concerned about such
a move that it convinced European countries
to sign the Washington Agreement, which
effectively prohibits them from selling their
largely unneeded gold reserves.

That agreement, which expires in 2004, is
expected to be extended and expanded to Latin
American countries.

It was as a result of this that Mr. Murphy
founded the Gold Anti-Trust Association to
get the word out. He speaks to groups like
this one, brandishing document after document
purporting to prove that the price of gold is
deliberately being kept down.

His belief in a plot extends to the murky
world of derivatives, pointing to banks such
as J.P. Morgan Chase which he says has a
US$65-billion exposure to gold .

Other powerful institutions are also in what
he calls quot;the gold cartel,quot; among them
Citigroup, the Bank of International
Settlements, the U.S. Treasury and the
Federal Reserve. They are all taking short
positions in gold, says Mr. Murphy, which is
why it is in their interest to see gold prices
stay low.

quot;These big banks are trapped,quot; he insists.
quot;Every time the price of gold spikes, there
are people who knock it back down like a
neutron bomb.quot;

Few people in Washington pay heed to Mr.
Murphy and Chris Powell, a New England
newspaper editor and treasurer-secretary of
GATA.

quot;The U.S. press just ignores us,quot; Mr. Murphy
complains as yet another journalist slips out
of the room. quot;We are now into the cover-up
stage.quot;

GATA is not completely ignored. The
Washington Times Insight magazine did a story
this month on it. And in the increasingly
competitive post-9-11 world of international
chicanery, conspiracyplanet.com, calls GATA's
gold plot an quot;X-files type of conspiracy.quot;

Although shunned by Congress and the
administration, GATA has caught the attention
of one lone congressman, a Republican from
Texas named Rep. Ron Paul. He recently
introduced the Monetary Freedom and
Accountability Act, which would restore
congressional authority over U.S. gold
policy.

quot;The Treasury has been able to engage in the
buying and selling of gold to manipulate the
worldwide market price,quot; Paul said when he
tabled his proposal legislation. quot;Gold is
very important to markets and investors in
America and around the globe, and Congress
should not allow the administration to
interfere in the gold market behind closed
doors.quot;

The members of Mr. Murphy's gold cartel tend
not to respond to his charges. The Financial
Post 's calls to such major players as the
U.S. Treasury and J.P. Morgan Chase went
unanswered.

Some regard GATA -- which has raised
US$170,000 for a lawsuit it launched in
Massachusetts in December against several
banks and the U.S. Federal Reserve Board --
as gold enthusiasts who are looking to pump
up the price.

Others see GATA as a bunch of post-millennium
Luddites who want a return to the days when
the U.S. dollar and other major currencies
were based on gold reserves.

quot;I think it has more to do with panic in the
markets,quot; says Oscar Gonzalez, a senior
economist at John Hancock Financial Services
in Boston. He says the more sophisticated the
stock market becomes -- with derivatives and
other arcane financial instruments -- the
more people are drawn to straightforward
investments like gold.

Mr. Powell could not agree more. It is his
turn to take over the podium at the National
Press Club, and he worries aloud that the the
financial world is no longer rooted in
reality.

quot;Gold is one of the few real things in this
world of paper and digitized money,quot; he says,
which brings approving nods from those
remaining at the luncheon. quot;We have to cling
to what is real in this deceitful age we are
living in.quot;

Loath though they are to talk about GATA and
its theories, the long-struggling gold
industry shares at least one of Mr. Murphy's
goals: higher gold prices.

quot;They may be kooks, but they're our kooks,quot;
says one gold industry official. quot;And God
bless them if they're right.quot;

______________________

If you benefit from GATA's dispatches, please
consider making a financial contribution to
GATA. We welcome contributions as follows.

By check:

Gold Anti-Trust Action Committee Inc.
c/o Chris Powell, Secretary/Treasurer
7 Villa Louisa Road
Manchester, CT 06043-7541
USA

By credit card (MasterCard, Visa, and
Discover) over the Internet:

a href=http://www.gata.org/creditcard.htmlhttp://www.gata.org/creditcard.html/a

Donors of $200 or more will, upon request, be
sent a videotape of GATA's February 12, 2002,
press conference at the National Press Club in
Washington.

Donors of $750 or more will, upon request, be
sent a print of Alain Despert's colorful painting
symbolizing our cause, titled quot;GATA.quot;

GATA is a civil rights and educational organization
under the U.S. Internal Revenue Code and
contributions to it are tax-deductible in the United
States.