Sunday Posts

The world economy is still struggling, with Japan trying to put more stimulus out and thereby, becoming even more dangerously indebted. President Obama finally realized that Wall Street does not care about jobs and decided to do something direct, which means more debts. This is a strange world in a way, America can keep on borrowing at a very low rate because those who have the money believes in the 'resilience' of the American economy/ government. The borrowed money then goes into the banks because they are mostly 'too big to fail'. But, that's the big hole - money goes there, it stays there - the banks use the money to repair their balance sheets, as no one still knows how badly affected they really were with all the gambling they did. But, in the process, the banks, the same institutions which were meant to supply capital, siphon capital out of the economy, leaving careers and families destroyed. Besides, the Americans [and of course there are others too] are tod...

One week from Climate Change conference in Copenhagen, when World Leaders must meet and decide how they are going to 'save the planet', many countries are still wringing their hands and unsure whether they need to do anything at all. Unfortunately, India is one of them. India is a big polluter in absolute terms, but a minnow when compared on a per capita basis - because of its large population. India's professed stance, for more than two decades since we started talking about Ozone layers and climate in general, is that it will only do its bit when the developed world, primarily America, starts acting on cutting its own carbon emissions. The logic of this stance was development. India and America are competing in many spheres, and the Indian government did not want to burden Indian producers with 'unnecessary' obligations to the environment when Americans are not doing enough to cut their emissions. The move would have been politically suicidal, it was argued, a pe...