In case people didn't get it, the cartoon was a jab at Ron Paul and his push for a modern gold standard. I'm not sure what the cartoonist was angling at other than making fun of the idea of a gold standard without realizing that it wouldn't be RP's administration that would start calling in people's gold like FDR did in 1933 via executive order 6102:
Executive Order 6102 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
"Executive Order 6102 required all persons to deliver on or before May 1, 1933, all but a small amount of gold coin, gold bullion, and gold certificates owned by them to the Federal Reserve, in exchange for $20.67 (equivalent to $371.10 today[3]) per troy ounce. Under the Trading With the Enemy Act of 1917, as amended by the recently passed Emergency Banking Act of March 9, 1933, violation of the order was punishable by fine up to $10,000 (equivalent to $180 thousand today[3]) or up to ten years in prison, or both. Most citizens who owned large amounts of gold had it transferred to countries such as Switzerland.[citation needed]
"Order 6102 specifically exempted "customary use in industry, profession or art"—a provision that covered artists, jewellers, dentists, and sign makers among others. The order further permitted any person to own up to $100 in gold coins (a face value equivalent to 5 troy ounces (160 g) of Gold valued at about $7800 as of 2011). The same paragraph also exempted "gold coins having recognized special value to collectors of rare and unusual coins." This protected recognized gold coin collections from legal seizure and likely melting."
This, in 1933, is when the US Gov't defaulted on the gold standard domestically. Fortunately, this executive order was replaced with another act at the end of 1974, legalizing ownership of gold bullion. Please keep in mind, though, that Nixon took us off the gold standard in 1971, causing the default on the gold standard internationally. Right now, there has never been a time in the past when ALL countries were not on a gold standard of some sort. This means that when one country went off the gold standard, its citizens could run off to trade their domestic paper currency for a foreign currency that was still gold-backed and have some protection against central-bank-induced inflation. Today, you cannot escape into anything except gold/silver/tangible things.
There is no Sound Money in place today in any country, though a few are starting to talk about it.