From: Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs on November 15, 2005:

Q.7. It is my understanding the Federal Reserve has decided to halt disclosure to the
public of its M3 findings and report. The findings of the M3 report provide pertinent
information to the public--from economists to investors and to industries which all use M3
report findings for economic forecasting, investing, and business decisions. You have
advocated a “more open” Federal Reserve under your command. Will you work to reverse
this policy and commit to keeping the M3 report and its findings available and open to the
public? What is the rationale and reasoning by the Federal Reserve to keep the M3’s
information from the public?
A.7. My understanding is that the Federal Reserve decided to discontinue publication of
the monetary aggregate M3 because the costs of collecting and processing the underlying data
were judged to exceed the benefits. The Federal Reserve will not withhold the M3 data from the
public; rather, it will no longer collect and assemble that information. The Federal Reserve will
continue to collect data for and publish the monetary aggregates M1 and M2 and their
components.
The benefits of continuing to publish M3 appear to be minimal, because M3 has not been
actively used in the formulation of U.S. monetary policy and, at least within the Federal Reserve,
has not been found to have much value for economic forecasting. Discontinuing publication of
M3 will allow the Federal Reserve to terminate certain reporting forms that currently must be
filled out by depository institutions, lowering the costs of such institutions. Costs at the Federal
Reserve Banks and the Board will similarly be reduced as these particular reports will no longer
need to be processed and analyzed.
I view the periodic reappraisal of the costs and benefits of reports as a useful discipline to
ensure that the reporting burden on financial institutions is kept to a minimum.

When I see stories like this, I start writing notes, in outline form, to discuss with my friends. It's sort of an exercise in amplification, and sometimes we come to interesting and useful conclusions. I'm sharing my initial notes with the group because I'd like to drill down to the fact of the matter. Facts are reportable -- and action-able.
Yes, there are some points that are just screaming "CONSPIRACY". However, there are also some points that also just sort of yell back "INCOMPETENCE" (my apologies in advance to the Treasury Department -- it isn't you giving the orders). Let's try to overlook the obviously sensational nature of some of these points and see if we can't figure this supposed action out.

1. If the US ecomomy is already shaky/unstable, why release the money now?
a. As an excuse or opening move for justifying/starting another war?
b. As an excuse for initiating some other domestic program or action?
1. Cause a disturbance and conveniently solve it
2. Cause an actionable disturbance that will allow policy enforcement
c. Make it so foreign reserves of US currency will have less purchasing power?
1. Who has such reserves and why would they have them?
2. Other countries are bailing on the dollar, notably Iran, which is switching to Euro for oil bourse. If that's the case, why print more?
d. (self-troll warning here) To cripple the purchasing power of anbody without hard currency (gold/silver) or valuable trade goods and the ability to negotiate.
1. This refers to 1.b.2; people in a country with no purchasing power (worthless currency) might become violent in pursuit of resources they could no longer buy but that were defended by federal authority and which were necessary for basic survival.

2. Who are the credible sources for the information in this report?
a. Have they tried to interest other media outlets in this information?
b. Why is there no corroborative reporting on this issue except in this channel?

3. Banks and financial institutions have their own private systems for detecting this kind of inflation (they count the quantity of bills of all denominations in their inventories, not just their net worth).
a. None have yet reported this, even though there is a 15-30 day lead time for private systems like theirs to detect a problem).
b. Is this a reprint being done to
1. release new printing (to phase out old bills that were more easily counterfeited) and
2. create a stock of printed money to be released slowly so that the plates can be changed or the tooling for printing can be changed?
c. What are Federal targets for releases of new US currency?
1. Have some target dates for releases of new bills been missed, and now they're trying to catch up?

Because the Bush administration is not so good at cover-ups, I'm inclined to believe that this is good old-fashioned village idiocy at work. Ladies and Gentlemen, roll the presses...

more on money issue and oil
http://www.indybay.org/news/2006/03/1811962.php

"the whole Immigration Amnesty Debate...was deliberately scheduled to take place now, to divert attention from this massive printing/devaluation of the U.S. Dollar."

Although I am skeptical about the immigration issue too, the above statement doesn't make sense.

Why would you need to distract anybody? We never know how much money is being printed anyway, so how would anybody find out? And how many people really stood up and took notice over the last several years of massive dollar printing anyway? Very few people watch this stuff.

Your observation that the M# report was of little value, and it was decided to terminate it to reduce costs is possible, however i have read many reasoned comments that the M3 is indeed important, and without it a total overview of the money supply, and hence the value of the Dollar, cannot be accurately judged.

Additionally, I have trouble remembering the last time the government ended a process in order to reduce costs.

This 'immigration-issue' timing is STANDARD banana republic-drug warlord(ie. al-CIAda) divide and conquer tactics. In america, we already have DEEP race issues, all being propped up through the years by civils-rights opponents, outsourcing issues and institutionalized illiteracy (over 50% in amurka); not to mention a perfectly timed influx of immigrants (last 6 months, a 75% increase--coinkidink?), and the ever so transparent mythological Aztlan story-the 'emotional homeland-instigational apparatus'- so, now we have the perfect breeding ground for hopeless, diversionary race warversus an deducated focus on the REAL class war. It's simple really, think Hegelian dialectic. If you think this is bad, think about those poor immigrants who are following their "dangling carrot" to be used as scapegoats for angry, confused americans...so then we can all be rounded up together, as equal cannon-fodder, and sent to fight in eternal wars that we have all forgotten about while we were too busy quibbling instead of stopping those who are the real problem.

Not likely. 500 sheets of my copy paper is 6cm thick. If they
printed the two trillion in $100 bills on paper that thick,
the stack would be 2400km high. On thinner paper, less,
but with smaller bills, then more. Anyway, probably too much
to be lifted by helicopters.