Gold skyrockets, cats to replace U.S. dollar.

I've been meaning to post about this for awhile, just haven't had the time or opportunity. While flipping back and forth on the cable networks, as I'm oft one to do to the dismay of anyone watching with me, I've noticed a perplexing phenomenon; back to back commercials offering to buy and sell you gold. I don't think I've ever seen a product before that is treated as disposable junk in one ad, and then a precious investment in the next, all in the span of two minutes.

Here's a typical ad for Cash4Gold, a much maligned online pawn shop that pays you pennies on the dollar for your family heirlooms and symbols of eternal commitment:



Often times that commercial will be followed by this one, starring Watergate felon and unrepentant birther G. Gordon Liddy:



Gotta love Liddy's inexplicable punching of the cardboard foreclosed sign.

Anyways, because these ads usually run in interchangeable slots, they must be aimed at the same audience. You'd think then, that said audience would eventually figure out that at least one of these offers is a scam. Yet these ads have been running like this for years, and companies like Cash4Gold and Rosland Capital are raking in dough.

Could it be because they're both scams?

Gold has a long history of rising demand during economic downturn, and it is looked upon as a safe investment that actually increases in value as things get worse.

In fact gold prices recently reached a historic peak in September before dipping slightly. Gold brokers like Rosland Capital, however, continue to invoke economic gloom and doom to persuade buyers to pay nearly the highest price in history for gold. In essence, they're betting on the economy to fail, and they want you to pay top dollar to throw in on this bet. It's not surprising then that these type of ads are prevalent on Fox News, where the content of the programming itself is already making the case for them.

So is this yet another bubble waiting to burst? Or is gold destined to climb higher and higher until the world economy collapses and America turns into society of well armed misers sitting on piles of gold in their fortified compounds?

Will the dollar drop so low that cats become the new currency?



Or will the gold bubble burst, only to be replaced by a more, ahem, liquid asset: