Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not entirely. Greece and Italy cannot issue the currency in which their debt is denominated. The Germans (and French to a lesser extent) control the ECB. The U.S. can issue the currency its debt is denominated in. That puts us in a different situation than Greece. Not necessarily better, but not as imminently bad either.
Would this mean that the U.S. dollar, being fiat currency, would not be a good place to keep your wealth?
http://www.minyanville.com/businessmarkets/articles/gold-cru...
Treasuries, denominated in U.S. dollars, are held as liquid assets. People usually hold these when they expect markets to decline. They are perceived as very low risk, safe investments. They don't carry a lot of return, but they are seen as reliable.
If you think that the U.S. is going to issue a huge amount of dollars in order to pay off its debts ('monetizing the debt'), that would ordinarily lead to a great deal of inflation. The situation we are currently facing may prevent inflation from occurring. Because we are entering a credit crunch, the overall money supply has actually started to contract (using the broadest measure of money, 'M3'). A contraction in the money supply would lead to deflation. Thus a massive printing of U.S. dollars (at least in the short term) may serve to counteract deflation rather than causing inflation.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/7769126/US-mone...
Because of the turmoil in Europe, odd things have been happening. Usually the dollar and gold move in opposite directions (strong dollar weak gold, weak dollar strong gold). But people have been fleeing the Euro, causing both the dollar and gold to strengthen at the same time.
http://seekingalpha.com/article/204718-reading-into-the-simu...
The euro is facing a crisis, Japan's banks are also quietly scrambling for funds to prop up their banks, and there's a great deal of debt in the Chinese system that hasn't really been put to the test yet (but may be soon). There isn't really any currency that is unencumbered by large amounts of debt, including the dollar. Nevertheless, of the major world currencies (dollar, euro, pound, yen, yuan), the dollar probably still enjoys the greatest confidence.
If you are going to invest in anything denominated in a major currency, the dollar is still probably the best at the moment. If you have no medium- to long-term faith in fiat currencies, then buying gold and silver are the traditional alternatives.