Here's the first story of the day...and it's also your first absolute must read as well. This is Karl Denninger over market-ticker.org...and he's on a rant...and has every right to be.

Don't even try to "invest" in this market folks, and if you decide to trade, realize that you're playing in a rigged casino and the entire force of the government is not only behind rigging the casino but explicitly endorses and permits the rigging to go on and continue, despite being fully-aware of it.

Liquidity? None. This is the bid/offer stack in the S&P futures a few minutes into the trading day.

Nobody is talking about this. That's 27 - twenty-seven contracts - on the bid at 1146.75. During the trading day. There's less than a thousand up and down the stack through the entire visible portion.

This is a tiny fraction of normal liquidity and those sub-100 numbers are more-akin to what you expect in the middle of the night when everyone's sleeping!

All that's left is the computers. The humans have gone home. True liquidity and participation has ended. The people have given up. This is not an isolated incident - as I write this I'm seeing it literally minute-by-minute, and it's been very common all month. A few minutes ago I saw seven contracts on the bid at the money. Seven - at 9:57 (ET) in the morning.

This story was posted on his website on Friday morning shortly after the markets had opened for the day. As I said, this is an absolute must read...and the link is here.

I never steal more than a quote from Bill Buckler's be-weekly newsletter, The Privateer. But someone else stole more than that in this piece posted over at zerohedge.com...so I'm more than happy to post it here.

The financial press has been inundated with articles comparing what is happening in global markets now to events in the latter part of 2008. Sure enough, the surge in Treasuries from 100 to 143 in the last two months of 2008 following the Lehman bankruptcy is most comparable to the move in the same security from 122 to 140 in the two months since the beginning of July 2011. But there is one key difference between 2008 and 2011. Bill Buckler, in the latest edition of The Privateer, demonstrates what it is...

Fortunately, this must read piece is very short...and I thank Alberta reader B.E.O. for sending it along. The link is here.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel no longer has enough coalition votes in the Bundestag to secure backing for Europe's revamped rescue machinery, threatening a constitutional crisis in Germany and a fresh eruption of the euro debt saga.

Mrs. Merkel has cancelled a high-profile trip to Russia on September 7, the crucial day when the package goes to the Bundestag and the country's constitutional court rules on the legality of the EU's bail-out machinery.

If the court rules that the €440bn rescue fund (EFSF) breaches Treaty law or undermines German fiscal sovereignty, it risks setting off an instant brushfire across monetary union.

The seething discontent in Germany over Europe's debt crisis has spread to all the key institutions of the state. "Hysteria is sweeping Germany " said Klaus Regling, the EFSF's director.

This Ambrose Evans-Pritchard offering showed up Sunday night over at The Telegraph...and it's well worth the read. I stole this from a GATA release...and the link is here.

In July, Athens secured a second bailout package worth €109bn (£96bn), which involved "haircuts" for holders of Greek debt, and contributions from its eurozone neighbours.

Both parts of that deal now look distinctly shaky. Finland, where the anti-European True Finns party scored well in recent elections, has demanded that Athens put up collateral against the Finnish share of the latest loan.

Other small but angry nations, including Austria, Slovenia and Slovakia, responded by saying that if Finland was getting collateral, they wanted some too. Eurozone finance ministers were discussing the issue this weekend; but the Finns appear reluctant to back down.

Just another brick in the Eurozone wall. This story was posted in the Sunday edition of The Guardian...and is Roy Stephens first offering of the day. The link is here.

The heads of the U.S. Federal Reserve, IMF and OECD stepped up pressure on political leaders on both sides of the Atlantic to shake off their inertia and tackle urgent economic problems.

If politicians ignore their pleas -- including a blunt call from International Monetary Fund chief Christine Lagarde to "act now" -- the slowdown in world growth and debt turmoil in Europe could morph into a deeper crisis, top monetary officials and economists warned at an annual retreat here. [It's already a 'deeper crisis' - Ed]

This Reuters story was filed on Sunday from Jackson Hole, Wyoming...and is worth the read as well. I thank Roy Stephens once again...and the link is here.

A Gallup poll showed that thirty-four percent of Americans say gold is the best long-term investment, more than say so about four other types of investments. Real estate (19%) and stocks (17%) are distant second choices.

Gold is Americans' top pick as the best long-term investment regardless of gender, age, income, or party ID, but men, seniors, middle-income Americans, and Republicans are more enamored with it than are other Americans.

This gallup.com story was posted last Thursday...and I thank reader John Steinke for sharing it with us. The link is here.

Here's a Thomson/Reuters interview, probably from London, that was posted at their website on August 25th. It runs for 8:39...and is well worth watching. Once again I thank Roy Stephens for digging this up over the weekend...and the link is here.

Consider this: In the last one year, gold prices in Mumbai have jumped from about Rs 19,000 per 10 grams to nearly Rs 27,000, a rise of 42%. Quite naturally those who were buying one or two grams of gold occasionally - which used to cost about Rs 2,000 or Rs 4,000 then-now have to shell out nearly Rs 3,000 to Rs 6,000. Since the salaries have not jumped by as much, these investors now find it tough to stick to their plan of buying gold even in the smallest of denominations available in the market.

Innovations in the bullion market are coming to address this loss of affordability. Wholesale bullion traders in Mumbai have come out with half-a-gram gold coins and some even with pieces of gold leaf that weigh as light as 100 milligram, that is 1/10th of a gram.

This very interesting story was posted in The Times of India early yesterday morning...and is another offering from Roy Stephens. The link is here.

Record gold prices, rather than denting China's enthusiasm for bullion, have emboldened investors to plough more money into gold bars and riskier bullion-based derivatives.

"The surge in prices has sparked another gold-buying craze. The 50 gram and 100 gram gold bars were selling like hot cakes," said Ms. Liu, a store manager at Shanghai's major jeweler Lao Feng Xiang Co Ltd, who said gold sales this month were up at least 30 percent from a year ago.

The attitude of Chinese consumers -- expected to soon overtake Indians as the world's top buyers of gold -- will be an important influence on longer-term trends.

This Reuters story from early yesterday, which I ripped out of a GATA release, has a wonderful photo imbedded as well...and the link is here.

Economist and former banker Alasdair Macleod wrote yesterday that Venezuelan strongman Hugo Chavez, seeking to repatriate his country's gold reserves, is attacking capitalism's weakest point. Macleod writes of Chavez:

"He has been told by his central bank that the Fed, the Bank of England, and the Bank for International Settlements hold gold for the whole central banking community in the main trading centers and that much of this gold exists only as a ledger entry and is not backed by physical metal. Whether or not Venezuela's gold is held in these fractionally backed sight accounts or in earmarked accounts where the gold is held separately, we do not actually know. But there is little doubt that this move is designed to encourage other central banks to demand that their gold is also repatriated."

In my opinion, this is another must read. I stole the story and the preamble from another GATA release. The story is posted over at goldmoney.com...and the link is here.

Yesterday, King World News interviewed Sprott Asset Management's chief investment strategist, John Embry, and found him noting huge demand for real metal amid the paper price takedowns. Embry also paid tribute to mining entrepreneur and gold trader Jim Sinclair. Both men spoke at GATA's Gold Rush 2011 conference in London this month.

I stole the introduction from Chris Powell, for which I thank him...and an excerpt from the interview is posted over at the KWN website. The link is here.

Here's a story out of the Saturday edition of The Telegraph that was sent to me by Washington state reader S.A.

Gold's thunderous bull run came to an abrupt halt on Wednesday, raising questions about whether the precious metal is really the safe haven that investors believe it to be.

So what's next for the price of the metal? Is the sharp correction a sign that its allure is fading? Or is the price fall an opportunity for investors who have stayed on the sidelines to join in the fun?

Despite the correction in the second half of the week, many observers say the price is likely to continue to rise over the coming months if the markets remain uncertain. Catherine Raw of BlackRock, the fund manager, said: "In the US and Europe the leadership has come under question in dealing with the spiralling debt crisis, meaning the market is unable to predict the direction of policy, particularly with respect to the financial system."

For The Telegraph, this is a pretty positive story but, like every other story you see from the main stream media these days, they always have to get their negative shots in at the end. The link is here.

Here's your long read of the day. It's a piece posted over at goldseek.com...and is by GATA's friend, Frank Holmes, CEO and Chief Investment Officer at U.S. Global Investors.

One market trend that seems to be attracting more and more attention is the large performance gap between gold bullion and gold stocks. The price of gold bullion has increased roughly 28 percent in 2011, while the S&P/TSX Gold Index was down 1 percent as of last Monday.

A report this week from BMO Capital Markets offered one reason behind the performance gap, “The rate of change in the gold price has been high over the past decade, perhaps too high for investors to gain confidence in that price as sustainable for an equity investment decision.” BMO says it was hard to imagine gold prices could sustain a $1,000 an ounce levels five years ago, but “now it’s hard to see the gold price falling to that level.”

There are lots of terrific charts and graphs...and I thank reader U.D. for sending me this story. It's posted over at goldseek.com...and the link is here.

On Saturday I posted Part One of this interview in my column...and the balance of the interview is now posted over at resourceclips.com...and the link is here.

I got these three blogs in quick succession from Eric yesterday, so I decided to post all the links under this one heading. The first is headlined "Ben Davies: Monetary Blunders & How it Will Impact Gold". The second is titled "Peter Schiff: Dollar Crisis to Intensify Gold and Silver Demand"...and the last one is from Richard Russell...and the headline reads "Gold Will Break to New All-Time Highs". They are all very much worth your time, so fill yer boots!

If judged by the criteria of six years ago, Julian Phillips argues, then one could argue that it should be time to sell but, change has come to the gold market and things are not what they were.

The conditions that have lifted gold from $275 to $1,900 continue to persist. The gold price is not about gold; it is about the bear market in currencies, the deteriorating confidence in the value of currencies, as well as developed world's government's ability to restore that confidence.

As these factors point to more of the same, expect a continuation in the fall of currencies against gold and silver to levels deemed incredible by the developed markets of the world.

This very worthwhile piece was posted over at mineweb.com last Friday...and I thank Reno, Nevada reader Glen McMillion for sharing it with us...and the link is here.

Both gold and silver have made big moves higher so far this year, but silver’s gains of more than 30% year to date are more impressive than gold’s 25% climb and, likely, will continue to be.

“Own gold and silver as soon as you can,” Alex Cowie, editor of Diggers and Drillers, said in a recent report for Daily Reckoning Australia. But “I would choose silver over gold.”

This very short marketwatch.com piece was sent to me by reader Matthew Nel...and the link is here.

I could hardly believe what I was reading. Today's last story definitely comes out of the top drawer of the 'You-can't-make-this-stuff-up' filing cabinet.

Coin World's Paul Gilkes reported that federal officials have changed their position and are now threatening to confiscate as "contraband" any Liberty Dollars displayed publicly.

Gilkes writes: "Jill Rose, chief of the criminal division for the U.S. attorney's office in Charlotte, North Carolina, told Coin World August 24th that the Liberty Dollar medallions are confiscatable as contraband regardless if they are being exhibited for educational purposes only."

I stole this story...and most of Chris Powell's preamble...from a GATA release yesterday. The Coin World report is headlined "Liberty Dollars May Be Subject to Seizure". I'd say that this is a must read...and the link is here.