You probably already know of the "orange spot," but ING has a very good interest rate, it's FDIC insured, you have the convenience of banking here, but it's actually Dutch owned. You can have a savings account or buy CDs.
I'm going to try to link you:
http://www.ingdirect.com/osa_work/I have quite a substantial investment there considering my very low income, so I do believe in them. I don't think you can get more "unsophisticated" an investment than a savings account or CDs, but I think it's relatively safe.
Buying gold or, heaven forfend, buying into some African gold mine (and perpetrating God knows what misery there) is not my idea of a secure investment. Gold and platinum are already quite high; indeed, platinum is ridiculous, if you ask me. But I've never been happy about the returns (lack of) on my heavy metals investments.
With the dollar so weak, the interest rate so low, and the lack of returns so poor in the stock market, I also believe that your best investment can be to pay off your home or any other debt. It depends on your analysis of how likely your home is to be at risk in civil disruption (war, more acts of terror, etc.) that are not covered by homeowner's insurance because you will have a total loss if, for example, a nuclear bomb is dropped in your neighborhood.
It's horrible that we even have to be thinking like this...but we had to have similar considerations in the 80s when no one knew if Reagan was going to entirely lose it and start lobbing nukes...and we muddled through. We've had madmen as leaders before and will again. We have to hold onto our courage.
Maybe you can tell that I'm relatively unsophisticated in my investments too. You take a huge hit buying euros with dollars these days, so I think we missed the boat on that one.