When America moved off of the gold standard this last time it was to strengthen the American dollar and give America more buying power... however less than 5 years after the fall of the gold standard our money depreciated so much that we couldn't even keep up with the silver standard. A few years later we fell off of even the COPPER standard and could no longer afford to stamp pennies in copper. So we started making them out of the nearly worthless zinc. In 2009 our monetary system fell so far that we fell off of even the zinc standard, and the cost of stamping a penny in zinc and copper plating it was more than the entire circulation life of a penny (which could span decades of use).

We need something solid to base our money off of before our economy completely collapses. Yet many senators are still buying into the lies that our current system is expanding the power of our dollar faster than would be so with a gold or silver standard.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iYZM58dulPE&feature=player_embedded