by Kevin L'dux

Created on: July 17, 2009   Last Updated: July 19, 2009

I am an American, therefore I will write from my first thought about the question.

A million pounds of what? Gold, coal, sand, topsoil or what? Such is the possibilities of tossing out a question like this.

If it were the papery money, I would invest it in gold bullion. I want the actual coinage in my hands, not a piece of paper that "assures" me I have it hidden away in a vault somewhere. I would go for Canadian Maple Leafs or Vienna Philharmonics due to their purity.

Why gold? Gold has spiked over the $1000 an oz mark several times this year and is hanging at roughly $975 as of this date. Watch television and take note of the commercials that urge you to place your old and broken gold jewelry in to an envelope and send it away to receive cash for your gold. Why are so many banks buying up gold in this manner? The USA dollar is stretching rather thin and will be worthless soon. Someone is hedging on this and gold will be one of the only sure means of doing commerce. This country used to base it's money standards on the value of gold and used minted gold as legal coinage more than a century ago.

Again, why gold? I can't figure that out. Clean potable water is worth more than gold and a thirsty man will part with plenty of his wealth to sustain his life. At that point gold has the value of wooden nickles in his pocket. Gold doesn't do much for me personally. I don't wear jewelry and prefer a stainless steel watch. However, a million pounds worth of gold would be one of the best investments I can conceive at this point of time in my country as we are hurting financially as a nation.

A million pounds of beef would feed a small country in Africa for a week at the least. Those people are on the verge of starving to death if I am to believe each and every human interest story I see concerning the subject. The various charities that ask for your money to ship them food make it appear as if they eat a bowl of rice a day and are happy with that. I think a million pounds of beef would beat that out. Let's ask the hungry villagers - "Do you want meat or rice?". Meat or ice?

A million pounds of ice is priceless at a Mexican resort beach town, especially if from potable water. There's that potable word again, it must mean something important.

Which leads me back to why I delved into this query. A million pounds of what? Quid or squid?

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