The New Nation - Internet Edition

For clean and efficient candidates

TRANSPARENCY International Bangladsesh (TIB) last week released the findings of a study at a seminar about what people all over the country are keenly expecting from the upcoming election to form the next parliament. A large number of people were questioned for the purpose and from the response it emerged that the respondents overwhelmingly are in favour of clean and efficient candidates. While competence is expected, people are stressing very much their clean background in all respects, their education to be able to understand nationally important issues as lawmakers and the minimum of ability to deal with them.

Nobody can blame the people for their thinking. Again and again they gave proof of their political maturity and wisdom but to no effect most of the time. The incumbents in power took over with the resolve that they would work very dedicatedly to implement only what vital things are in people's minds. But nearly two years down the road, they seem to be far from realising their objectives. A number of people with corruption backgrounds may not be allowed to participate in election. But it seems that others with such backgrounds might be able to do so for various reasons.

Thus, the government needs to concentrate its energies on bringing everybody around-specially the political parties-to nominate better candidates for the national elections at their own initiatives. The tendency on the part of the political parties will remain to go on in their old ways. But the government needs to maintain the pressure and persuasion till the last minute like it did in the matter of registration of political parties, to get their cooperation in nominating candidates in line with the expectations of the people. Needless to say, the elections will be meaningless if good and able persons are not elected.

Poverty on rise in USA

AS reported by the media, more than 37 million Americans live in poverty and nearly 46 million have no health insurance. According to the US Census Bureau's annual report on income, poverty and health insurance coverage as quoted by the AFP news agency, some 37.3 million people lived in poverty in the United States in 2007, an increase from the 36.5 million people in 2006. The poverty threshold for 2007 was set at 21,000 dollars for a family of four, regardless of whether they lived in a small town or large city like Los Angeles where the cost of living was significantly higher. The number of people without health insurance coverage decreased to 45.7 million in 2007 from 47 million in 2006.

Generally, what the report shows is that there has been some change but it's pretty minor and this is not progress. The changes are insignificant. According to a report published earlier this year by the Annie E Casey Foundation, which advocates for public policies and reforms to alleviate poverty, both the Democratic and Republican parties have made the 'fight against poverty a priority in their campaigns.' A survey released, in this regard, two months ago showed that an overwhelming majority of Americans-82 per cent- think the US healthcare system is in need of a complete overhaul.

Nine out of 10 Americans want the 2008 presidential candidates to address healthcare reform. In fact, both the candidates-Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain-in their debates gave much more stress on the issue to be addressed with priority. People who were already 'living on the margin' when the 2007 report was compiled could well have fallen over into poverty this year.

Global food crisis: Result of double standards

Ramzy Baroud

The 25th annual World Food Day, marked on 16 October, was an occasion whose arrival and passing received little media attention or governmental fanfare. Evidently, much of the world media and governments are consumed with an economic crisis of epic proportions, which is perceived in the US as the worst such upheaval since the Great Depression. In the rest of the world, it's depicted as the worst economic crisis in recent memory or, as the BBC termed it, "the most tumultuous times on record in the global financial markets."

There is hardly any disagreement that Wall Street's woes are manmade. Regardless of what terminology one wishes to apply (miscalculations, greed, or wholesale failure in the US capitalist system, rooted in the economic philosophies of Milton Friedman and his ultra laissez- faire approach), the fact is the US economic crisis is not a fleeting phenomenon and no quick fixes can provide a magic remedy.

In an interview with Fox Business Network, US Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson expressed regret, unusual to any top US official, for the economic "mistakes" made and which are promising a global recession for years to come. "We're not proud of all the mistakes that were made by many different people, different parties, failures of our regulatory system, failures of market discipline that got us here." However, he promised that the US "will mitigate the impact on the real economy and we'll get this financial system working again."

There is no reason to doubt Paulson's commitment to the financial system. In fact, when it's the rich and powerful whose wealth and influence are at stake, the US government, if not most world governments, hold true to their word. While the IMF had repudiated governments in Asia, Africa and South America for many years for any slight intervention in their country's economies (for a "free market economy" has to be entirely unregulated in order for natural checks and balances to resolve whatever crisis is at hand, they were told), the Bush administration and leading Western powers moved with no hesitation to nationalise some of the largest institutions in their own markets. Like China's brand of capitalism that operates under communist symbols, the US, the UK and others are becoming increasingly socialist under the banner of capitalism. Of course, it's not socialism for the downtrodden, but corporate welfare in its most stark manifestations.

Consider the size of the entire US GDP for 2007 -- $13,800 billion -- to appreciate the awesomeness of the US rescue package of $700 billion. Still, in the UK the percentage is much higher as the country's GDP for 2007 was estimated at $2,457 billion while the government's rescue package is $680 billion. A more astonishing number: the rescue package for the entire Eurozone estimated at $1,370 billion. Conventional wisdom, as parroted by almost every financial expert on most media outlets, states that such lofty numbers are simply a reflection of the scale of the crisis at hand. In fact, some argue that the Bush administration's greatest fault is intervening too little too late, by failing to nationalise Lehman Bros as it did Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

It's rather ironic that those who cried foul every time a Third World government dared intervene in their national economy -- even if to guarantee the welfare of the poorest segments of society -- said nothing as the US, the UK and others defied every rule of the free market economy long championed by neoliberal economists. Even leading US Republicans who chastised "Big Government" at every turn (especially to block welfare programmes that mostly benefit the poor) cheered the government on as it moved to bail out the rich who, as usual, are likely to remain unaccountable for risking the retirement funds and life savings of millions of Americans.

A dominant argument to justify government behaviour is, yet again, the trickle down effect: a term coined by a Ronald Reagan speechwriter that simply means that what is good for the rich is, eventually, good for the poor. While elites in every society eagerly infuse such "Reaganomics" at every turn, the world's poor is yet to feel the trickles, which poses an interesting question: Why the unprecedented and historic urgency to bailout the rich (for the sake of the poor, at an imaginary point in the future), while the poor can easily be saved without such roundabouts plans?

The fact is that neither America's poor nor Africa's poor are on the minds of European leaders, nor the Bush administration, as their high officials continue to hold anxious meetings and offer the most generous rescue packages. If indeed it's the plight of humanity that is worrying these governments, then maybe they should consider the following, according to Oxfam, UK: "The number of hungry people now stands at 967 million. And around 24,000 people die daily of hunger-related causes. Around 2.7 billion people live on less than £1 a day; up to 80 per cent of this income goes on food." Care International's calculations are equally bleak, with 220 million people of the number above on the brink of starvation.

According to Oxfam, the main reasons for world poverty are also manmade: "biofuel policies, high fuel prices, growing global demand, unfair world trade rules, and climate change." Long before the Wall Street financial crisis, there existed a much more dangerous crisis, the world food crisis, dubbed a "perfect storm". The latter is much more consequential for it affected the very lives, not simply the standard of living, of many millions around the world.

Barbara Stocking wrote in the New Statesman, "According to the latest figures, the food crisis has resulted in an extra 119 million malnourished people, bringing the total to almost one billion -- nearly one in seven people now goes hungry. This is hunger on so vast a scale that it is difficult to understand how the world arrived at this point."

It's very telling that trillions have already been spent to patch up leading world financial institutions, while out of the comparatively small sum of $12.3 billion pledged in Rome earlier this year, to offset the food crisis, only $1 billion has been delivered. The hope that at least extreme poverty can be eradicated by the end of 2015, as stipulated in the UN's Millennium Development Goals, seems as unrealistic as ever, not due to lack of resources but a lack of true concern for the world's poor.

Whether the American, European or any other government infused bailout packages rectify the financial crisis or not, chances are that 16 October 2009 will bring similarly devastating news about the plight of the world's poor and which is likely to remain that: mere "news" that requires little action, if any at all.

A proposal for senator McCain and governor palin

Dr. M. S. Haq

The factors such as and as appropriate: one, the anticipated demand-supply gap pertaining to management of an imminent global recession and uncertainties associated with it - through a foreseeable future; two, the central role of the US in dealing with say, that recession; three, the possible role of fallouts from interplays of terrorism and recession and vice versa, in, among other things, facilitating or not facilitating a possible upsurge in terrorism and extremism during say, the period of recession and in the post recession period - relative to time, space and other variables, though; four, the capacity of US and other countries when it comes to withstanding and dealing with - under the anticipated situation - new levels of challenge, as well as opportunity (in addition to the existing ones) to be associated with for example, the war on terror and extremism and ramifications thereof; five, possibilities of recession triggered nuclear and other types of war in a world where the gap between dissatisfied people and satisfied people (in certain ways) has been growing continually at a somewhat geometric rate; and six, an unexpected increase in the loss of human and other lives on account of for example, poverty, hunger, malnutrition, disease and war throughout the world - whether person-made or not, in varying degrees, though - during the recession and after the recession - - could set inter alia additional requirements for the US to strengthen its national security as means and measures for say, facilitating minimization of the effect of recession on the people of US and the people of world at large and to protect, preserve and promote (as appropriate) its (I mean, the US) territory and assets in an event of possible terrorist attacks in the period of recession.

The bottom line is: the national security will continue to play inter alia the top most role in protecting, preserving and promoting the US economy at least through a period of recession - coinciding perhaps with a sizeable amount of period through the upcoming presidential term in the country.

In light of above and other considerations, the US voters can not and should not afford to allow the country to, among other things, prioritize its economic agenda over national security agenda via their voting decisions in the November election. Which comes first - the country or the agenda of higher spending or otherwise - when the country is on the verge of recession, per se? Which come first the physical existence or the economy?

In other words, it does not sound logical in many respects for the US and its people to promote an agenda of higher spending when the country is in for example, war - unless Senator Obama and his democratic party has got some hidden objectives (I mean, hidden as at today - 25th day of October 2008) aiming at negotiating with terrorists and others in pursuits of stopping the war after Senator Obama becomes the next president of the US - if that happens, though. But in such an event, there exist possibilities like: the country might face, at least initially in the post defeat period, confidence crises of different nature and magnitudes in the domain of trade, business and investment - I used deliberately the term post defeat period because a negotiated settlement of above nature would be amounting to a defeat on the part of US in the war on terror, among other things.

Further, a defeat of the US in the war on terror could be instrumental in sending a message to world people that terrorism could achieve its objectives in an increasingly re-integrating world and in brightening the prospect of terrorism in future, to mention a few. In short, I believe this year decision of US voters will not be tainted with a short lived theatrical magic of Senator Obama. I also believe they will be more realistic in their decisions in a favor of a more apparent realist - Senator McCain.

As regards strengthening further Senator McCain's and Governor Palin's ongoing fights for vote on the economy front, one of my proposals will be: craft a sound and implementation friendly 100-day immediate financial relief package for all concerned including inter alia undecided and new voters; market the package in the election market in a convincing, confidence-building, and user-friendly fashion; and ensure eventually the availability of financial relief to all concerned within the stipulated period after the election. It is expected CNN and other media (print, electronic, others) will assist Senator McCain, Governor Palin, and the republican party in the effort towards say, marketing the package in the election market in a timely, meaningful and result-oriented fashion.

The last word: there always exists for example, 'truth' behind the 'truth' - in a deeper sense, for example. But the discovery and establishment of 'truth' is relative, among other things, to time, space and other variables. The opinion poll related 'truth' of today may not necessarily represent the election day 'truth' in pertinent areas and vice versa. It is hoped the republicans will step up efforts towards - one republican bring one new republican to vote for Senator McCain - on the election day.

World stakes in new American leader

Tom Plate

Americans are angry," said John McCain, while debating with opponent Barack Obama, in their last scheduled face-to-face televised debate confrontation, "and they have every reason to be angry."

The Republican candidate for the American Presidency certainly got that right. The American people are angry that their retirement nest-eggs are cracking, that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan keep on raging with no end in sight, and that too many American politicians remain pettily partisan when what's needed is national unity.

But Americans aren't the only people angry with America. A lot of people around the world feel the same way - and in some sense rightly so. Our elite political and business establishments have not only screwed up the US economy, they have hurt the world economy as well.

For years we have been preaching to other countries about the near-religious virtues of management accountability and financial transparency, not to mention the need for rigorous quality control of export products.

And then we permitted our elites to leech investment money out of honest pockets, construct and then package mortgages like proverbial houses of cards, and then peddle toxic investment products worldwide under the glossy fog of complexity and ambiguity.

It was anything but an entirely scurrilous assertion when, recently, a top official in China's central bank blamed rich nations of the West for triggering the current global economic turmoil.

The US government and elite, which have been lambasting Beijing for years for keeping its currency inflated and un-convertible, really had nothing to say in response. What could they?

Both McCain and Obama offer the prospect of better governance, to be sure. It is a widely held view here that the nation and the world would be much better off with either one in the White House than the one who is there now. The American news media in general greatly favour Obama, obviously.

The reasons are not necessarily ideological (that is, he's a liberal, while the former Vietnam War prisoner is not). After all, Obama speaks better, holds himself with more presidential heft and, of course, bodes to become our first President of colour. And these are important things.

But worldwide viewers should also note the tendency of our news media to fall in love with the "good guy" and defend their new boy with evident cynicism and criticism towards everything his opponent would say or do.

A case in point was the issue of protectionism. Commendably, McCain portrayed himself as a free-trader and apparently felt no need to qualify or footnote. By contrast, Obama, coming from America's hard-hit Midwest, raised the issue of our economic relations overseas in a way that our friends across the globe could find troubling, even angry-making.

In an Obama administration, the Democratic candidate announced, tax breaks for American companies "shipping jobs overseas" would be curtailed. I don't know about you, but this comment made me edgy.

There are better, less punitive ways to deal with the phenomenon of American companies seeking to gain control over their labour costs - but the other night Obama did not put any out there.

Obama also expressed sharp dismay that Japanese and Korean manufacturers have been so proficient in developing and marketing energy-efficient cars in the US; that China was still "manipulating" its currency, and that some Free-Trade-Agreements (as with Columbia) were a bad deal for America.

Alas, McCain was not, for some inexplicable reason, able to rejoin with some obvious points. One is that Congressional approval of the pending free-trade agreement with South Korea would open up the market for American cars (Obama Democrats are against it).

Another is that in the current worldwide financial crisis, China should consider itself perhaps justified in having protected its national coin from Western sharks and market turbulence. Finally, America's trade negotiators - in both the Bush and Clinton administrations - have been anything but pushovers in all of these tough bilateral negotiations.

Sure - let's give Obama his due. For the third consecutive time, the Illinois Senator "won" the debate, especially on style (shades, perhaps, of "Slick Willy," as Bill Clinton used to be called). Every poll in this country shows now Obama winning this election as it moves to the end. Indeed, if we opened the contest to the voters of the world, the Illinois Democrat would win by an even larger margin, presumably.

But he is not right on every issue, and McCain is not wrong on every issue.

Why has Obama not gotten the trade issue as right as McCain? It's simple: the Democratic Party includes unions and human rights groups that often work against lower trading barriers, for various reasons (some much better than others). Obama is a Democrat.

A Democratic White House will definitely complicate the international-trade picture. And this would come at a time in world history when the worst medicine for the global economy would be a push - not to mention a rush - in the direction of a new American protectionism.