Complete mintage for modern commemorative coinage according to its option.

OK Vic, you were being serious and I was joking around. So, on a serious note, if you actually understood, I don't think you'd disagree with at least 2 of those things either.

Let's take #1. I grade coins based in the ANA standards, and you say that is not the current market standard. Many others claim that too. But is that really true ?

Well, I guess that depends on how you define what the current market standard actually is. Some claim that it is defined by how the TPGs grade coins. But if you have read my posts then you have also read where I have quoted many, many noted and highly respected numismatists who agree with me that the TPGs routinely overgrade coins. So if all those people agree with me, then what standards do you think they use to grade coins ? They use the ANA standards too. And if they are using them, then how can it be said that the ANA standards are not the current market standard ? Those people are the market. They buy and sell more coins every single day than any of us could ever dream of.

Let me quote you something directly from the ANA standards book.

" Lest a reader get the wrong idea, this book reports the grading being used in the marketplace. It does not create it."

Now you might want to read that again. The use of italics is theirs, not mine. And they are telling you that the ANA did not make up these grading standards, that instead they are only telling us what grading standards are actually used in real life. And who uses them ? Well all those people I mentioned above are good examples. More examples would be the contributors and authors of the ANA standards book. People like Ken Bressett, Q. David Bowers, Tom Delorey, Michael Fahey, Bill Fivaz, John J. Ford, James Halperin, Dennis Gillio, Ron Gillio, Ira and Larry Goldberg, Julian Leidman, J.P. Martin, Scott Travers, - the list goes on and on. They are the biggest and best known names there are in numismatics. And all of those people use and endorse the use of the ANA standards.

So I think it would be pretty dang tough to say that the ANA standards are not the current market standard. And my use of the ANA standards to grade coins, I think that puts me in pretty dang good company. I think I'll stay there.

But there is something that the ANA standards are not, they are not the standards used by the TPGs.

Now you have to think about that a little bit. If all of those people, the giants of the hobby, if they do not grade coins the same way the TPGs do, then why on earth do the TPGs do what they do ? Simple answer, they do it to make their customers happy. And who are their customers ? John Q. Public is their customer.

Do you realize what all of those people I mentioned above do when they see a coin in a TPG slab ? The ignore it, plain and simple they just pretend that the grade listed on that slab isn't even there. Instead, they grade the coin themselves, based on ANA standards. And they can do this because they know how to grade. They are not like John Q. Public who is willing to take the word of the TPGs. They know better. They know that the public wants coins with high grades on them, grades higher than the coins deserve. That's all the public cares about. And the vast majority of the public really can't do much else because they can't grade themselves.

So I submit to you that the ANA standards are indeed the current market standard. It is the TPGs and the general public who do not follow and grade by the current market standard. Not me, and not those people I mentioned above.

#2 - You think the customer is always right, I do not. On that we will never agree.

#3 - Victims blamed for fraud. Another thing you just don't understand. My claim is that nobody can ever take advantage of you unless you let them. And that if you do let them, then it is your own fault.

Now that is something that is entirely different than the victim being blamed for the fraud. The bad guy is the one who is at blame for the fraud, not the victim. But it is still the victim's own fault for allowing himself to become a victim.

Why ? It's pretty simple, people are responsible for their own actions, each and every one of us. Nobody makes us do anything. The bad guy didn't hold a gun to that victims head and force him to buy that coin, the bad guy merely presented the coin and allowed him to buy it. In other words he let the victim walk right into his trap and buy that coin 100% willingly.

And that is the victim's fault because he should have known better. He should have either done his homework so he could recognize a bad coin when he saw one, or else he should have just walked away and not bought it all. That is what makes it his fault. No, the victim isn't guilty of a crime, and yes the bad guy is guilty of a crime. But if the victim wasn't so gullible as to do something that he should know better than to do - then the bad guy would never be able to take advantage of him in the first place.

And that's why nobody can ever take advantage of you unless you yourself let them take advantage of you. And if you do, then you've got yourself to blame for it.

 

#1 - No, they don't use "their" standards, but the sheep do.

#2 - You have a completely different way of thinking than I do.

#3 - Exceptions do not disprove the rule.