The
American Mint is a television rip-off scheme; this company goes on TV hawking allegedly
rare collectors'
coins featuring important U.S. historical figures. They claim that they will only be making a few thousand coins, and then the molds will be destroyed, thereby insuring their rarity.
The coins run anywhere from US $5-$15. What they mention almost as an afterthought is that the coins aren't American tender as their visages imply, but come in fact from The Republic of Liberia, an extremely poor African nation. This company gets them to mint poorly made coins with the faces of American heroes, which are worth $5-$15 Liberian Dollars, and then sell them for that value in American Dollars. Currently, 1 American Dollar is worth 45 Liberian dollars.
This is a vile scheme that exploits Americans' sense of patriotism. I've noticed that the ads have been airing more frequently since the tragic events of September 11, 2001. Imagine all the grandparents who are buying these coins, thinking they're leaving their grandchildren some kind of valuable legacy, when all they're really doing is helping some heartless corporation exploit the extremely poor denizens of the war-ravaged state of Liberia. What some people do to make money really makes me sick.