LETTERS : Can’t Print Away Debt

Regarding “U.S. Could Sell, Lease Assets to Reduce Its Debt” (Letters, Feb. 3), Samuel V. Abraham fails to see that every dollar printed must be guaranteed by the U.S. Federal Reserve. If the United States printed the “necessary money” without that guarantee, those dollars would be as useless as any counterfeiter’s bills. If the solution were as simple as Abraham suggests, wouldn’t the U.S. government have beefed up the printing process long ago?

Abraham’s logic is so preposterous (“nationalization of banks with a possible lease-back arrangement?”), that I have to believe the only reason you printed his letter was to get some retort from a usually passive reader. If that indeed is the case, it certainly worked with this normally passive reader!

DIANA K. JACKSON

Studio City