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Here's a head scratcher: as everyone knows from elementary chemistry courses, gold is the most inert metal in the world - it does not rust, nor corrode. Yet this is precisely what Russian commercial precious metal trading company, International Reserve Payment System, discovered on thousands of (allegedly) 999 gold coins "St George" (pictured insert) issued by the Central Russian Bank.

Among the silliest things that people say about gold standard systems is that under them, the “money supply” grows about 2% per year, due to mining. This is demonstrably false – not only that, but so utterly wrong as to induce falling-off-the-chair guffaws from those who understand such things. For an example in the United States in 1775, the total amount of currency in circulation (primarily gold and silver coins) was an estimated $12 million. In 1900, it was $1,954 million – an increase of 163x!

Craig Franco hopes to cash in on Gold currency legalization with his Utah Gold and Silver Depository. His business idea: Store your gold and silver coins in a vault, and Franco issues a debit-like card to make purchases backed by your holdings.

At current metal prices it costs 2.4 cents to make a penny and 11.2 cents to make a nickel. This week President Obama asked Congress for permission to change the mix of metal that goes into these coins, because apparently the zinc and tinfoil they’re made of now is just too expensive.

An under-reported development of this campaign season is the Republican Party's decision this week to send Gov. Mitt Romney into the presidential race on a platform effectively calling for a new gold commission. The realization that America's system of fiat money is part of its economic problem is moving from the fringes of political discussion to the center.

The city of Atlanta will pay $4.9 million to the family of Kathryn Johnston, a 92-year-old woman killed in a botched November 2006 drug raid, Mayor Kasim Reed's office announced Monday.

"It seems to me we're going to be trying the most dangerous terrorists in the wrong place," former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani said on "Good Morning America" today. Giuliani argued that if Abdulmutallab, 23, is tried in a military court the government would have more time to interrogate him.

“Originally designed as a marketing device for an online gold trading business,” according to the Guardian, “the machines have become such a success that their inventor plans to build a global network, installing them everywhere from fitness centres to cruise ships.”

Gold-to-Go machines have since began operating in luxury hotels in Abu Dhabi, Bergamo and Madrid as well as around Germany in Sept. Next month the first machines will open in the United States, in Las Vegas and Boca Raton, Florida.

Two brothers from Cuba have been arrested in the $80-million heist of pharmaceutical drugs from a Connecticut warehouse, solving what was one of the largest -- and most daring -- such robberies in U.S. history, officials said Thursday. An errant water bottle played a role in identifying the suspects, officials said.