Where is the Sound Money Candidate?

With 17 candidates presently vying to be the Republican Party's presidential nominee in 2016, I find it amazing that no one has taken up the issue of sound money and the urgent need to reform the Federal Reserve System.

It's out there just waiting to be seized upon and the candidate that does so effectively will clearly set himself apart from the pack.

Sure, discussing monetary policy may not exactly fire up a crowd looking for the usual red meat such as building a wall on the southern border or getting tough with the government of Iran. But I believe the public instinctively knows something is terribly wrong with our present monetary system.

The Federal Reserve has pursued all manner of "unconventional" policy in the form of acronyms such as ZIRP and QE. ZIRP, or "zero interest rate policy" has essentially suppressed short-term interest rates at abnormally low levels, crushing the very savers whose capital is needed to fund promising entrepreneurial ideas that advance our economic well-being. QE, or "quantitative easing" represents the purchase of Treasury and mortgage-backed securities in the Fed's lame attempt to "stimulate" the economy via currency depreciation.

Politicians that even mention the need to reignite economic growth from its present moribund level, such as Jeb Bush or Mike Huckabee, never connect the issue of weak growth with our unstable dollar.

Monetary policy seems to be an issue that candidates consider to difficult to grasp or address in a way that resonates with voters. However, Ron Paul really didn't have that problem during his political career. He made monetary policy a key component of his legislative agenda. Paul was a student of the topic and a passionate advocate for reestablishing a gold standard. He effectively questioned the existence of the Federal Reserve itself. He showed the way. It can be done.

Tax cuts, relief from onerous regulations, and dismantling restrictions on international trade are certainly key supply-side components of improving economic prosperity but pale in effectiveness compared to monetary reform that results in a stable dollar (preferably linked to gold).

There are a number of legislative efforts underway to both audit the Federal Reserve System, aka Federal Reserve Transparency Act of 2015 (S. 264) and to establish a commission to investigate the effectiveness of the Federal Reserve's monetary policy over its first 100 years of existence, aka Centennial Monetary Commission Act of 2015 (H.R. 2912).

The fact that Fed Chair Janet Yellen and numerous other Fed officials vehemently oppose both pieces of legislation speaks volumes about how nervous the Fed bureaucracy is over congressional scrutiny of its conduct of monetary policy and banking regulation.

Both efforts should be enthusiastically embraced by all GOP presidential wannabes. Rand Paul re-introduced the Audit the Fed bill in early 2015 as S. 264 but has curiously gone silent on the issue during his presidential campaign. Senators Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio are co-sponsors but unfortunately have said little about it.

The unstable dollar creates economic chaos in numerous ways, such as stultifying long-term capital investment and impeding the efficiency of global trade flows to name just a few.

It is crucial that the next President make monetary policy a key priority if the U.S. (and global) economy is to break free of the pathetically meager levels of growth experienced in recent years.

Who will pick up the ball and run?