JJ8, I read a lot of porter. I don't care for him. a close look at his stuff reveals a lot of claims that didn't happen the way he cites.
Jim Rickard, to me, is the most accurate person in that group, but again, he is trying to make money selling his books. I like his theories.
What I do agree with, is the idea of precious metals as an 'insurance' policy to help save wealth, that mining companies tend to be a bit more volatile than gold, and that a lot of people think of silver as 'gold on steroids.' there are some other things also. Reading about this stuff is a reason for me being in banro in a pretty big way.
jmo
PS. I also find mike Maloney's 'History of money' on youtube interesting.