[Conservative til I die]

Oh, well, there goes the mint screwing up a perfectly good coin yet again.

The Jefferson nickel, like every other US circulating coin right now, is an ugly piece of crap. And an embarassment to numismatic design. BTW, I don't know how the Mint altering the design temporarily, while still keeping Jefferson on the obverse prevents you or anyone else from continuing a collection.

[zeugma]

It doesn't prevent you from continuing a collection. What it does is cause the older coins to leave circulation earlier than would otherwise be the case. How many 'wheat' pennies do you see in circulation these days? They aren't any older than many of the nickels you regularly see in your change. The difference is the design change. You will also seldom see a quarter, dime, half or dollar in circulation that is older than 1965 due to the metal debasement that occurred then.

Granted, this won't happen overnight, but if they stick with the design, the older ones will go away much faster than otherwise would be the case.

I would agree with you that our coins aren't the most beautiful in the world, but I really wouldn't put money on the mint coming up with a really wonderful design like the walking liberty. It would seem to me that all the great engravers must be dead or something. They couldn't even come up with a good origional design for the 'silver eagles' and these are non-circulating.