Greg, I see your point, but I wonder where you got the notion that Daniel’s example would "piss people off". If you’ve effectively engaged your prospect to stand up and battle the nefarious forces that have held them back, then dammit, stand beside them through the whole battle!

You can’t get them all heated up about their enemy and then say: "If I were you, I’d stop complaining and think about trying to provide a better life…"

You have to say:

"You owe yourself this chance to get back what has been taken from you… You owe yourself the sweet taste of revenge…  You are in control…. Your moment is now!"

The mechanics of U.S. Government debtWhen the expenses of the U.S. Government exceed the revenue collected, it issues new debt to cover the deficit. This debt typically takes the form of new issues of government bonds which are sold on the open market. However, the debt can also be monetized by which the Federal Reserve creates an entry on its books to credit the US Government for an amount equal to the dollar amount of the bonds the Federal Reserve is acquiring. The money created in this process not only includes the new dollars that came into existence just to purchase the bonds, but much more because this new money is now sitting in the form of checkbook money at the Federal Reserve. Under the scheme of Fractional Reserve Banking this new checkbook money is treated as an asset to lend against. Economists estimate the expansion of the money supply as being many times the amount of the initial money created with the exact amount being a function of what percentage of deposits banks must set aside as "reserves". The ultimate consequence of monetizing U.S. debt is that it expands the money supply which will tend to dilute the value of dollars already in circulation. Thus, expanding the pool of money puts downward pressure on the dollar, downward pressure on short-term interest rates (the banks have more to lend) and upward pressure on inflation. Typically this causes an inflationary boom that ends in a deflationary bust to complete the business cycle. Note that money supply expansion is not the only force at work in inflation or interest rates. United States Dollars are essentially a commodity on the world market and the value of the dollar at any given time is subject to the law of supply and demand. In recent years, the debt has soared and inflation has stayed low in part because China has been willing to accumulate reserves denominated in U.S. Dollars. Currently, China holds over $1 trillion in dollar denominated assets (of which $330 billion are U.S. Treasury notes). In comparison, $1.4 trillion represents M1 or the "tight money supply" of U.S. Dollars which suggests that the value of the U.S. Dollar could change dramatically should China ever choose to divest itself of a large portion of those reserves.

Nothing against Clayton mind you, but I just don’t want a mental image of anyone whose thong is too tight:-) 

Personally, I’ve found that copy worded like this tends to piss people off. They think "ARGH! Stop trying to sell me!"

Instead, I like to use a slightly less blatant approach by using myself as an example (instead of saying stuff like "wouldn’t you…?" it’d be more like "I don’t know about you, but personally I’d rather be getting rich off all this stuff instead of sitting around bitching and moaning about my gas bill going up all the time - and be able to provide a better life for my kids before they enter college…"), to which the reader can then transpose himself into the same shoes.

Then it comes off less like I am trying to force words into his mouth.