Tesla, the Wizard of Colorado Springs.

Actually, the novels (and the comic book prequel "Welcome to the Jungle", which was also written by Butcher) make it out that the Ascension ritual to become a god (ala the Dark Hallow) is a pretty huge deal, requiring a massive amount of sacrifice and absorption of mystical energy to knock yourself up into that tier of power. People worshiping you isn't enough.
  There are lots of Cults to demons and Wizards, but they wont make that creature a god.

Personally, I'd go with a Scion of Hephaestus, since he's basically the god of technology (You could even say that Tesla was just a guise of Hephaestus, since Changes pretty heavily implies that a lot of the old god are just slumming around Earth), by its very nature, Hephaestian Sponsored Magic would amount to, "If it was made by man, its my bitch." 

   I'd have a bit of a problem with people taking "goal Aspects" related to the specific story. As something like "Determined to find the Biomancer", could, justifiably, be invoked for nearly every roll pertaining to that story. Then, since you can change an aspect at every Milestone, you can just switch to a similarly universal aspect at the beginning of the next story.
   Thats a bit too open ended for my taste. I'd say, for a goal to really be deep enough for an aspect, it would have to be the type of goal that is going to span multiple cases.
   Example: Harry touches a Blackened Denarius and is shackled with the Shadow of a fallen. He could, take an aspect related to his goal of getting rid of the Fallens influence. A goal that transcends any individual Case he may have. Then, 5-6 cases later, when that goal has run its course, and the group decides its about time to tie up the Fallen angel story arc, they play out the dramatic climax of that story, and Harry changes that aspect to something else.

Loup-garou aren't really that tough.

If Dresden were better optimized, he'd have had little trouble with it.

   How is that, considering Loup-Garou are all but immune to magic? Dresden was already optimized in the best way any character could be to deal with a Loup-Garou. He had a preesstablished Aspect of inherited silver. The only thing that CAN stop it.

    This is sort of off topic, to the actual thread, but I just wanted to throw it out there.
    

It seems like for the cost, hard cover rpg books just aren't made like they used to be.

   Actually, I think, in general, RPG books are made better now than they used to be. Certainly there are exceptions, and the odd individual flawed book (which seems to be the case here). But I remember 2nd edition D&D, where every single member of our group, had had to patch the binding on every single hardcover book, with duct tape, because they fell apart after a couple months of use.
    I haven't (nor has anyone I've gamed with) had to do anything like that on any of their books since then. So I'd say, as a rule, the quality of the actual RPG books has gone up across the board since the mid 90's (roughly the time RPG's really started to take off as an industry).
    Yes, the prices of the books have gone up drastically over that time (I'm paying two to three times as much now for a core game book than I did then), but I think thats actually part of the reason why the quality has gone up too. None of us would pay $40-$60 for a book like the 2nd edition D&D corebooks. We'd look at the book, and go, "horrible quality, mediocre artwork and shoddy rules system, not worth the price."
    

Why would valkyries be at Senior Council level?

   Valkyries, as the legends portray them should be about that powerful. but Dresden Valkyries don't really work that way. The stories, most heavily "Aftermath"     So, its all a matter of how you portray them. If you're saying they are Demigods of war, then they'd all be at least senior council level... But I wouldn't portray them that way.

Since we have absolutely NO evidence to believe that a shadow can exist separate from its host, we must assume that a banished shadow IS a dead shadow.

   Which is why the most you can do is banish it back to the subconscious and temporarily cage it (like Harry did). This is also supported by the rules, where it says you can't just whip up a spell to solve every problem or end run around the story. Magic doesn't work like that. For major problems, the best you can do is temporarily alleviate the problem, or have the spell point you in the right direction (which in this case is convincing the tainted to willingly reject the coin).   

And we're not talking about a dimestore mortal spell, here.  We're talking a spell significantly more powerful than something that Harry Dresden, Wizard of the White Council of Magic, self-proclaimed as farm more adept with thaumaturgy than evocation, initially deemed impossible.
Steps one through twenty of this ritual are going to be figuring out how it's accomplished.

    And if such a spell were possible (and the rules of the game and theme of the novels heavily imply its not), then someone would have thought of it already. And Dresden would have just went to McCoy for a de-taintifying. And the church wouldn't have a problem with people people being corrupted and stealing back the coins.


    In addition, exorcism wouldn't work on a shadow, or the Fallen anyway, because they aren't possessing the target, they're there willingly. Unless the target rejects the coin and the source of temptation, he is allowing the shadow to be there (even if he doesn't want it there, he's saying its better than the alternative, which counts as consent).
    So, even if you could make a spell to get rid of the fallen/shadow without the target rejecting it, that would be a forcible altering of the subjects mind(the shadow is built of the subjects mind, and if the subject isn't rejecting it, then its there of his own free will) and a breach of the fourth law.

No, because Lash was dead. Actually burned out of Harrys mind through her own choice. If a spell forces the shadow out, it can't break the link the fallen has to the target. That can only be done through free will. Either the holder gives up the coin and the source of temptation, or the Shadow destroys the link. No third party can do it for you.