I THINK MINING

Annually the Fraser Institute comes out with a survey of mining countries and ranks them according to how good a place it is to try to find an ore body, to open a mine, to operate a mine.  The Institute gives you a good guide about where to invest.  I pay considerable attention to what they say.  For this is not some fusty old institute opining; it is the honest opinion of real mining men and women who are asked their opinions of mining countries.  This is no academic ranking.  This is what people who are trying to find ore bodies, open mines, and run mines think.  And their thinking is based on hard experience. 

As it is a Sunday that I compose and post this comment, I thought that I would enliven the dull issues  of incompetence and commercial interest with pictures that most epitomize the story.  Thus you will find a lot of reproductions of paintings of The Judgement of Paris.  Recall that Paris was asked by the three godesses, Hera, Athena and Aphrodite, to decide who was the most beautiful.  Paris got Helen, wife of Agamenon’s brother, as the prize for the correct answer.  And then ensued the fall of Troy and the founding of Rome.   Helen, incedentally went back to her husband after the fall of Troy.

The judgement of the Fraser Institue is about as subjective and consequential as the judgement of Paris.   At the end of this posting, I give more on this fateful judgement.  Now enjoy the judgement of the Fraser Institute.  But be wary:  the following is not for the faint of heart when it comes to corrupt politicians, venial NGOs, and the voluptuousness of Medievial, Classical, and Modern art. 

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