Travis Seitler: Web Designer

• Bear Stearns Loss Presages More Turmoil – New York Times [NY Times]
  “Morgan Stanley on Wednesday announced the sale of a $5 billion stake to China’s sovereign wealth fund, and both Citigroup and UBS made similar deals with Middle Eastern and Asian governments…”
• The alliance between China’s communist government and Wall Street deepens [Roubini Global Economics Monitor]
  “The CIC’s big stake [in Wall Street] still worries me—in large part because the CIC also owns three of the four large Chinese stake banks, and is expected to own two others after the recapitalization. And there is no doubt that the state banks have been managed in part to achieve non-commercial goals. China’s banks have historically been used to implement China’s version of industrial policy—directing credit to favored sectors of the economy.”
• Crazy For China [Forbes]
  “This is China’s century. The rest of the world is just living in it.”

America isn’t just bleeding money—Asia is busy holding buckets underneath to catch it all. You never know… this might be a good time to brush up on your Mandarin. :/

The Wall Street Journal has just published a decent article on the fight against the tithing heresy, and it’s scary how similar my own story is to that of one of the believers in the article:

When he objected to his church’s instructions to tithe, Kirk Cesaretti took it up with the church leaders. In response, he received a letter from the pastor and elders of Hydesville Community Church in Hydesville, Calif. “At this time, we believe your concerns do not warrant any change in our church policy or positions,” the letter read.

The letter closed with a verse from Hebrews 13:17: “Obey your leaders, and submit to them; for they keep watch over your souls; as those who will give an account. Let them do this with joy and not with grief, for this would be unprofitable for you.”

Mr. Cesaretti, an engineer in Fortuna, Calif., says he took the letter to mean he was no longer welcome at the church. Hydesville’s senior pastor, Michael Delamarian III, says he believes “the more you give the more you’re going to be blessed.” He says he did not bar Mr. Cesaretti from the church.

There’s a lot of passive-aggressive manipulation happening on the part of these pastors toward the flocks under their care. The article also mentions the practice of pastors making applicants sign a document essentially vowing to tithe. Are there so few people who understand that inclusion in the visible expression of the Body of Christ is not something to be held for ransom? My heart breaks for the people who have turned (or rather, been turned) away from Christ on account of grinning, greedy wolves like this at the pulpit.

So yeah, if you were wondering… the wound’s still a bit fresh.

If I had a gold-based salary (rather than U.S. Dollar-based), I’d be doing quite well now.

I just ran the numbers, and sheesh! When I started working full-time as a web designer, my beginning salary was $25k/yr. At the time, gold was trading at $280US/oz., so if I’d been paid in gold, I would have been working for 89.29oz/yr.

Fast-forward to November 2007: the U.S. Dollar has become so devalued (primarily due to the never-ending Federal Reserve printing presses—we’ve got to fund the troops somehow, and that somehow is by printing more FR notes) that if we take that hypothetical “gold-standard salary” and convert it into today’s U.S. Dollar, you end up with $71,500/yr.

Let me say that again: $25,000 in May 2000 equals $71,500 in November 2007.

Somehow those raises don’t seem so much like raises anymore.