Re: us fiscal cliff: what is it?

The article IS A GOOD READ!

It helped me understand just why china even bought our debt in the first place.

And that like stated above that japan is next in line behind china and I didnt know that.

However whats this deal about "obamacoin"??

Here is a rather liberal/democratic view of:
Obamacoin

I'm sure you can find plenty of stories with whatever political view you prefer (conservative, libertarian, statist, etc)

"In case you're not familiar with this idea: In general, the Treasury Department is not allowed to just print money if it feels like it. It must defer to the Federal Reserve's control of the money supply. But there is an exception: Platinum coins may be struck with whatever specifications the Treasury secretary sees fit, including denomination."

so the coin can be worth whatever they say and is backed by what? More debt? gold?

Backed by the fact that the US Treasury denominates it as $1 Trillion, and someone is dumb enough to buy a titanium coin at that price. In this case, that would be the Federal Reserve. The US normally trades US Bonds (debt) for the Fed's cash, but this is a way for the US gov to go around having to pay the Federal Reserve back, while raising money to pay for budget items.

As a side note, the instance that happens (if it were ever to, which is looking unlikely according to gov officials), inflation would skyrocket. Theoretically, they could just mint 17 of these things and pay off all the debt. Consequently, the dollar would be worthless. Even though they most likely won't go ahead with this scheme, the gov will continue to sell bonds to the FED and continue the inflation process as usual, which is still the fastest they've ever increased the money supply in our history. The USD will be worthless in 10-20 years, especially with sound competition from other currencies like Bitcoin and whatever the future brings