*** March 2013 Low Content Thread ***

[Malachi]

http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2009/09/office-39-200909

They are crafted with extraordinary care. Klaus Bender, an authority on banknote printing, writes in his book Moneymakers that unlike other forgeries, and unlike any other currency except real U.S. banknotes, these supernotes use paper with long, parallel fibers, manufactured by a machine called a Fourdrinier and composed of 75 percent American cotton and 25 percent linen. Like genuine bills, modern supernotes are printed using “optically variable ink,” which appears to change color from bronze green to black depending on the angle of the light. (Indeed, their quality is so superb that Bender suggests they aren’t made by North Korea at all, but somewhere in America by the C.I.A.—a claim for which there is no evidence.)

The print quality is exceptional. Again like genuine dollars, the supernotes are produced on a special intaglio press so that their intricate design is raised above their surface. The “microprinted” features, 1/42,000th of an inch high, found on real dollars are reproduced exactly on counterfeit ones. At Liu’s trial in Las Vegas, the prosecution blew up images of the supernotes to hundreds of times their normal size, and even then, says an F.B.I. agent who worked on the case, the differences between the supernotes and genuine bills were invisible to the naked eye: “Frankly, if I’d been the defense attorney, I would have asked the prosecution, ‘How can you prove these are counterfeit?’ He could have persuaded the jury they were real.” Lorelei Pagano, a Secret Service counterfeit specialist, told a private banknote-industry conference in 2003 that the makers of the supernotes had likely included their few tiny flaws on purpose, so that they and their customers could tell the difference between the counterfeits and the real thing. Otherwise, there would be nothing to stop criminals from ripping off their suppliers by purchasing supernotes—which typically cost around a third of their nominal value—with other supernotes.

technology is making fiats obselete.

[Student]

I don’t know where else to put this.

But, in case you were wondering, Doctor Who is back this week!

[Anenome]

No one’s better at counterfeiting dollar bills than the Fed Reserve

[Blargg]

Yeah but those printed on the Fed’s presses don’t have the same destructive effects on the economy as these supernotes.

[ClaytonB]

john bolton is an anarchist.

LOL, this put a smile on my face! Thanks!

Clayton -