Best Coffee: 2010

Thursday 30 December 2010

Making Money Program

If any of you are writing to Governor Beshear of Kentucky about the life-sized Noah's Ark the state will be underwriting, don't wait for a reply — he's sending out a standardized form letter, which many people have been forwarding to me. Here it is, in case you haven't got one.

Thank you for contacting me with your concerns about proposed "Ark Encounter" tourist attraction. I appreciate knowing your views.

Bringing new jobs to Kentucky is my top priority, and I believe this project will be beneficial to our future, providing an estimated 900 jobs and $250 million in annual revenue for the regional economy. The theme park is expected to draw 1.6 million visitors in the first year alone. I am excited to have another unique, family-friendly tourist attraction for the state.

The theme park will be funded by private developers at a cost of $150 million. The for-profit developers are seeking state tax incentives under the Kentucky Tourism Development Act - the same program used to help bring the state's first NASCAR race to the Kentucky Speedway. Any tax incentives the project may receive will come in the form of sales tax exemptions once the project is completed, and as long as it meets the guidelines under the Development Act.

The state has reviewed the project from a legal standpoint and, if the Noah's Ark application meets our laws, finds nothing unconstitutional about a for-profit company investing $150 million in Kentucky to create jobs and bring tourism to our state. The tax incentive law does not discriminate among religions and was not created specifically to benefit the theme park. The Tourism Cabinet also is in the process of reviewing the park's application for tax incentives to make sure the project can deliver on certain performance measures. This project is an investment in the future of the Commonwealth and is sure to bring people from across the country to Kentucky.

Again, thank you for sharing your views. As always, please feel free to contact me in the future whenever an issue is important to you.

Sincerely,

Steven L. Beshear

I feel like I've been slimed reading that.

First of all, it's not about jobs, and he knows it. That "900 job" estimate is, as near as anyone can tell, a fiction from a feasibility study cobbled together by one of Ken Ham's cronies, and which no one else has actually seen. The state will be coughing up more money than they're telling us, too: AiG is already asking for road expansion. What else can we expect them to ask for?

It's never just about jobs. If it were, the state would be expanding investment in education and would be taxing the churches. There are always other motives behind exactly what the state government will and will not support.

Come on. This project the governor is supporting only reinforces the stereotype of Kentucky as a state full of ignorant hillbillies and gullible rednecks, making the place a laughing stock. Seriously. Fred Flintstone-style dioramas and exhibits of people working with dinosaurs? Dragons, unicorns, and the Loch Ness monster touted as evidence for the Bible? The whole notion of the Ark itself is ludicrous and untenable…and Beshear is simply dismissing reason and evidence to promote superstition and folly in his state. Because it will part the rubes from their cash. That's cynical and contemptible.

If the governor were sincere in his desire to invest in the future of the state, he wouldn't be supporting miseducation and lies and a low-class, rinky-tink gang of pseudoscientific poseurs and bible-thumping con artists.

Jesus’s birthday is coming up. And you know what he wants for his birthday? Nothing more than for you lose weight and become more attractive. As C.S. Lovett helpfully explains in his 1979 book, Help Lord … The Devil Wants Me Fat!, there’s a simple way to not be so fat: stop eating. Just completely stop. See, it’s not hunger that causes you to eat delicious holiday treats, it’s Satan.

Maybe that seems extreme to you. What about clean, natural, whole foods in their purest forms? you might ask. I eat a raw, macrobiotic, vegan diet, and I feel fantastic, you say. Yap, yap, yap. All I hear is Satan telling filthy lies.

Not convinced? People who own the book and have followed the instructed fast simply rave about it!

This book has to be one of the greatest books written concerning weight loss and how to tear down strongholds that the enemy has built in one's mind by causing one to overeat. By putting thoughts in one's mind to eat when one is not really hungry, the devil deceives unsuspecting Christians by the bondage caused by overeating and not being able to serve the Lord, as one would if he was in better shape. (I didn't word that right but you will understand what I mean if you will buy the book.) … [A]fter reading the book I fasted for 11 complete days and there was nothing to it.

—Ndubusi, on Amazon

Some readers feel so passionately about how this book has changed their lives that they even blog about it on SparkPeople.

Most do not think of overeating as a sin but it's the devil's way of getting control of otherwise good Christians who would never think of sinning in other ways, to destroy themselves, bite by bite. It really doesn't matter whether we are bound by drugs, sex or money, the chains still chain us. In reality it wouldn't matter if we were bound by rope, iron or real chains, if we're bound, we're bound…When you look at it as a battle with Satan, it perks up your soul and helps you to determine not to let him win anymore.

Lovett and his wife, Linda, who did the book’s illustrations, encourage you to win your battle with the devil by thinking of your brain (soul?) as a computer that you can program with visualization. Like this:

Like any war with dark forces, this one will require constant vigilance. Much like Santa Claus, Lucifer sees you and what you eat not just when you are awake, but even when you are sleeping.

So now our plan is in place. Let’s make Jesus happy and stick to our inevitable New Year’s resolutions. Just remember, if you break this diet, there's more at stake than skinny jeans and self esteem. There is your immortal soul.

Merry Christmas!

Previously: Looking Pretty for the Holidays.

Salvatore A. Giunta to Drop the Times Square Ball and 5 Other New ...

Salvatore A. Giunta, the first living person to receive the Congressional Medal of Honor since the Vietnam War, is this year's Times Square ball drop guest of honor. Surge Desk offers 5 facts about the famous New York tradition.

Warren Buffett boosts Iowa wind | Green Tech - CNET News

Berkshire Hathaway-owned subsidiary goes big for wind in Iowa, inks deal with Siemens as turbine provider. Read this blog post by Candace Lombardi on Green Tech.

Fox News Channel's Kimberly Guilfoyle: Ignore CPAC boycotters ...

Former first lady of San Francisco tells groups boycotting February convention to participate if they want to be heard.

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Tuesday 28 December 2010

Make Making Money

Counterfeiting is an arm’s race to nowhere. An endless struggle, with both sides trying to out-wit the other. While treasuries all around the world try to find new ways to make counterfeiters sweat, and ultimately unable to make fake money, the counterfeiters in the world just need to figure out how those individuals are making new money, and copy it. There have been plenty of options in the past, like watermarks, ink that never dries, holograms, and colors that can’t be copied. But, they’ve all been figured out in one way or another. But now, thanks to thin-film transistors, it may be almost impossible for counterfeiters to get the job done.

The new technology, which is still being fleshed out, is designed to literally wrap around paper money. The thin-film transistors are made out of gold, organic molecules, and aluminum oxide. The transistors are then set into a patterned mask, and laid on top of the money. How would merchants be able to tell if it’s the real deal? Once the film is in place, there would be about 100 different organic and invisible transistors on each side of the paper note. Thanks to a small 3 volt current, the note would seem to turn “on and off.”

So instead of having to use a special marker, a person would just pass the bill over a sensor, and if it manages to generate the required voltage, the bill is real, and they can buy whatever it is they intended on purchasing. There’s no doubt that this seems like a huge step to fight counterfeiting, but let’s face it: it’s necessary. Will it solve the problem? We can probably hope it does for a long time, but it’s probably not a permanent fix.

[via TG Daily]

No summary of 2010, visual or otherwise, would be complete without an extensive overview of what pundits call Monetary Stimulus, quantitative easing or Large Scale Asset Purchases, and the peasantry calls, just as correctly (with a few footnotes), the printing of money. If there are two words that define what we had an absence and an abundance of in the past year, those would be jobs, and money. As some of the key jobs-related charts were presented yesterday, below, once again courtesy of BusinessWeek, are the main charts that among other things demonstrate the various currency manipulation playbooks, the price of gas in bacon and other products, the annotated strength of the dollar through time, and what is actually printed when the Fed does print money.

The first chart shows the progression of dollar strength (and weakness) with an annotation for contemporaneous global events. What is ironic is that while everyone realizes the world is still in a very week position, the core debate over who is weaker - Europe or the US, is sure to provide many hours of entertainment in 2011. And as a bonus, the man whose policies, together with those of Bernanke, are instrumental in just how weak the dollar gets, is presented in his key natural states: from lying just every so slightly, to lying a lot, to lying profusely to save his life, to lying at such a rate, it would make those whose pants are burning, blush with envy. And now you will know how to distinguish the four...

The next chart deals with the actual money printing, but not in an deeply philosophical manner, one in which hours of debate are wasted over whether trillions in excess reserves are actually printed money (even though the last time someone acquired USTs, MBS, and soon Munis and ETFs, with pixie dust, the legal consequences were not all that palatable). Of the just over $300 billion in actual currency printed in 2010, the vast majority was in $100 bills, next up was $20s, followed by $5s, $10s, and lastly, singles. Not a single $50 bill was printed. Also noted: the amount of cash in corporate America. Of particular interest: GM has more than half of its market value, or $27.5 billion sitting in cash. Lastly, and this not come as a surprise to many, the money multiplier: the money supply divided by the monetary base, is at near record lows, courtesy of the $1 trillion in excess reserves.

Another popular meme in 2010 was pricing X in Y, most often the stock market in gold, in which basis it is still down for the year, as gold (not to mention silver), despite the short memory of many, is by and far the best performing asset class of 2010. Those who followed our advice in early 2010 to avoid stocks and to invest in gold, are ahead of most. The chart below takes a comic approach to this relative performance, showing how much the price of gas changed when priced in other "currencies."

Last, and probably most interesting, is the graphic presentation of the currency manipulator playbook: in a world in which Ben Bernanke knows very well he has little competition when it comes to doing as he chooses with the world's reserve currency (for now), other sovereigns are forced to come up with their unique responses. The playbook below shows all the various defensive tactics adopted so far. Luckily, few offensive plays have been established to date. We doubt that will be the status quo for a long time.

And as John Taylor and many others have pointed out, now that the fiscal "stimulus" of the payroll tax has been exhausted in a few short weeks courtesy of the jump in crude oil, and any further fiscal intervention not likely to occur unless Congress wants another incumbent bloodbath next time around, as Americans are tired of subsidizing banker lifestyles, expect to see many additions to the FX manipulation playbook, as the year progresses and monetary intervention continues to be the only direct way of making sure every new banker bonus year is a record one is via the Fed and its ongoing dollar printing-cum-debasement. That said, should the bankrupt European house of cards continue to wave a white flag of surrender every 3 months, the race to the bottom may not have a clear winner well after 2011 is also history.

All charts courtesy of BusinessWeek

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