Ron Paul devotee Rep. Dan Kaiser (R-3/Aberdeen) ran his first big nutty Libertarian/end-times bill up the committee pole yesterday. He told House Commerce and Energy to pass his House Bill 1100, a proposal to require the state to let Kaiser and Glenn Beck listeners trundle down to the courthouse with their wheelbarrows of gold and silver coins to pay their taxes. David Wiest of the Department of Revenue testified to say please, no. The committee listened and shot down this unrealistic, impractical idea that serves more to flog the religion of Ron Paul.

Libertarians like Rep. Kaiser use this gold and silver foolishness as a front for making their  hopes for the collapse of the American government a self-fulfilling prophecy. How better to undermine confidence in the U.S. dollar (and drive up the value of that gold Glenn Beck told you to buy) than to force the government to create a new market for all that metal you have sitting in your bunker?

Freshman legislator Kaiser tells reporter David Montgomery that he's "going to focus on researching the issue to better address criticism next year." Don't waste your time, Dan: real research will only make it harder for you to defend your Ron Paul agenda. You might as well call my cousin Aaron and come back next year with a bill to require full-reserve banking.

Hmm... I wonder if U2 are Libertarians....