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Davos: ‘the best of the best’ FAIL to offer solutions for terminal economy
by finn Sunday, Feb 1 2009, 11:48pm
international / social/political / commentary

Still no solution to world crisis

Except for Roubini, Schiff and very few others, the world cannot seem to grasp the FACT the beast (capitalism) is DEAD -- long live inverted values and financial models based on theft, fraud and exploitation! The witch is dead, the witch is dead, the MAD ol’ bad ol’ witch is DEAD! And good fuckin’ riddance!

Grab what you imagine is of value (not a lot actually) and RUN like the devil if you number in the corporate, executive, political, financial classes. Fair warning is here given.

Who would be able to manage or control angry mobs when the ENTIRE SORDID TRUTH of insider corruption is REVEALED? The current collapse was predicted (many times) on this site, not that recognition or ‘credit’ is sought. It ‘pays’ to be ahead of the game and the view from here reduces the spectacle to something akin to a circus of fleas or an ant farm. What a tiny, tragic group of no-accounts our leaders and ‘knights of the realm,’ TRULY are; see how they run!

Leaders at the World Economic Forum are stumped for remedies

DAVOS — Mired in indecision and uncertainty, the world’s foremost gathering of the best and brightest in government and business failed to come up with any new plan to stem, much less reverse, the global financial meltdown.

The five-day World Economic Forum in this Swiss alpine resort wrapped up yesterday in the same atmosphere of doom and gloom that it began, with a realization that the depth of the crisis is still unknown and the solution remains elusive.

“Everybody’s lost in Davos,” said Mr Kishore Mahbubani, dean of the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy in Singapore.

“No one seems to have a clear understanding of how big this crisis is and what we need to do to get out of it,” he said.

“My own view is that you really need to do a fundamental reexamination of the whole global system to see what went wrong, and nobody here is yet ready to ask these kinds of fundamental questions in Davos.”

Government leaders, however, were united in their calls for vigilance against protectionism, stressing the danger of policies that crimp trade.

Anger at job cuts resulting from the financial crisis and the use of public money in bailouts could lead governments into policies that favour national companies and close markets to foreign products.

Alarm was raised by a United States Congress proposal that includes a “Buy American” provision barring the purchase of foreign steel for any publicly-funded infrastructure project.

“Trade protectionism serves no purpose as it will only worsen and prolong the crisis,” said Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao, whose country is set to overtake Germany as the world’s biggest exporter.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel criticised government aid for the US auto industry. “I am very wary of subsidies in the US being injected right now into the auto industry. Such periods must not last too long because they inevitably lead to a certain degree of distortion and, quite frankly, constitute protectionism,” she said.

Some 20 trade ministers from countries such as China, India, Brazil, Japan as well as a representative of the US government, shared the view that the stalled Doha round of trade talks, which was launched in 2001, could and should be resolved this year.

They also agreed to fight the introduction of trade barriers such as tariffs or export restrictions, which risk undermining a new free trade agreement and further stifling international trade that has been deeply hurt because of the global financial crisis.

“Trade is part of the solution of the global crisis,” said Switzerland’s Economy Minister Doris Leuthard.

“In fact, free trade could serve as the largest economic stimulus package to revive the global economy and fight poverty,” she said. Agencies

http://www.todayonline.com/articles/299864.asp