Andy, I seriously doubt that the US has the Gold capacity to make any sizable appreciation of the USD.  Forex markets exchange a trillion USD daily, that's a lot of gold...

If the US "really" wants a strong dollar, they need to attract investment into their currency.  What would an investor need as incentive to do that?  A return of course.  How to get the USD or treasury bonds to give you a return?  a) Improve the economy (debt-GDP) and hence the face value of the currency (hahaha!) or b) increase rates (hahahaha!).  Good luck with that!