Michelle Obama emerged from a presidential plane in hot pants last week, letting Americans ogle at her long and shapely legs. France, Germany, Hong Kong and Japan said they were through with recession, central bankers from important countries congratulated themselves for having successfully shooed away the worst, the dollar lost a little against the euro and the yen and oil leaped to almost $75. Well, if a British wife can sell a Porsche for peanuts (about $3,000) on the Internet simply to punish her cheating hubby, what kind of slowdown are we talking about?

America has finally managed to hoodwink UBS into giving out details of about 5,000 Americans who have stashed away money in its vaults, and has indicted a former banker and a lawyer for having offered (and provided) tax evasion assistance to US citizens. Liechtenstein too has agreed to help Britain catch tax thieves. Billionaires and millionaires around the world should be frantically looking for places to park their hidden hoards of cash, estimated (worldwide) at $7 tn.

New business opportunities will soon be emerging since big money has to be parked in several small slots, rather than in a few big garages, providing more employment than before. By the way, Indians (who pride on being the best in software) should hang their heads in shame as it was two Russians, along with one American, who managed to steal 130 mn credit card IDs from payment processor Heartland and retailer 7-Eleven’s systems.

In the last nine months average credit card balance of Americans has declined by $500 or about six percent, bank closures number has hit 81 in the US alone, retail sales were again down in July, airlines continue to loose premium travelers, and Sony has cut PS3 price 25%.

Warren Buffett says the massive dosage of ‘monetary medicine’ being injected into the world economy is bound to have side effects. Krugman says Obama speeches sound like “written by a committee.” What are the boards of directors of the faceless corporations, Mr Krugman, Sir, if not committees? On the other extreme, Joseph Stiglitz says capitalism is beginning to fail. Nope. It is excess that has failed. Excessive state control fragmented Russia and excessive economic freedom has bruised, and may eventually batter, America.

Ambivalence has become omni-present. While fighting malicious propaganda against his well intentioned healthcare reform, Obama is swinging like a pendulum between the concepts of economic freedom and state control of essentials. Recently he said, “UPS and FedEx are doing just fine. It’s the Post Office that’s always having problems.” He doesn’t realise that certain things have to be sustained, irrespective of their economic viability. That’s the reason Americans rejected Hillary.

Until the US comes back to its senses, the world has to suffer. It keeps talking of economic freedom and capitalism, blissfully ignoring the IOUs its kids are signing for buying food, clothing, shelter and even schooling. The extent to which reading and writing have become anathema to America should be clear from the financial travails of something as legendary as the Reader’s Digest.

What the US needs is not healthcare reform but more abundant supply of doctors and nurses and hospitals. Obama’s plan to create ‘federally subsidised rental units’ in cities sounds imaginative. May be he has learned from Hong Kong; the concept not only keeps rents in check (though rents in Hong Kong can hardly be described as moderate) but also provides lasting sources of revenue for the government.

Municipalities around the US are showing the way that Obama refuses to see. The latest among them is Chicago, which has planned, for balancing its budget, three forced holidays when garbage will not be collected, libraries will remain closed and health centres will down shutters.

While the world continues to increase spending on new mobile phones even at the cost of food and clothing, Apple is trying to put a lid on news of iPhones exploding around Europe. In 2007, 15,000 wealthiest Americans accounted for 6.04% of the $8.7 tn earned by all US citizens. In Japan, youngsters don’t want to vote because leaders are all too old while politicos are avoiding handshakes for fear of contracting swine flu. While in Russia, the govt has actually invited tenders for luxury furniture, including a bed with decorative elements at the head and footboards covered with a thin layer of gold, in London, some former pick pockets have started surreptitiously putting money in poor people’s pockets as atonement for their past sins.

One bright spot is that the world’s stress on conserving energy is growing. In Japan, battery-boosted bicycles have become a craze for courier companies and pizza deliveries, solar air-conditioners are being sold aggressively in America, somebody is producing ice in the nights to cool a building during the day, and one entrepreneur is offering MicroFueler, a $10,000 system that helps individuals produce pure ethanol from organic wastes. Under the US cash-for-clunkers program, 83% of vehicles turned in were trucks while only 53% of new purchases were trucks, implying that the “fill her up” attitude is really, really on its way out. The world’s oceans have reached their warmest ever (average 17 deg Celsius) but of course there are people who say trees burnt in pre-industrialisation era are responsible for the high carbon dioxide situation today.

Brace yourself for the worst, which is yet to come. Stop bothering about the future of your children beyond limits because the system wouldn’t let you save; Japan is trying to tempt its citizens into buying bonds that guarantee a return of 0.05% per annum. You can’t even stop them from watching porn on the net because Uncle Sam would deliver it by emails, even if you somehow manage to filter it out. Give your children some ‘education,’ if you can, which is somewhat different from a Harvard or Yale MBA.

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