Re: [Fwd: Wallerstein: Camdessus is worried (fwd)]] (fwd)

[Paul Davidson <pdavidson@xxxxxxx>]

At 12:29 PM 02/18/2000 -0500, you wrote:


> >Comment No. 34, Feb. 15, 2000
> >"The Head of the IMF: A Secret Radical?"
>
> >Sometimes, when important persons take leave of their public life,
> >they feel the need to make a bow to historical truth and seek to be
> >remembered for more virtuous analysis than they normally had made
> >earlier. This was the case when the last military man to be a
> >president of the United States, Dwight Eisenhower, gave his farewell
> >address in 1961. In that speech, he warned against the dangers that a
> >"military-industrial complex" was coming to control the decisions of
> >the U.S. government. This has been a theme ever since of the U.S.
> >left but it has not been a theme frequently repeated by subsequent
> >Republican politicians.
> >
> >The story may turn out to be similar with the "farewell speech" of
> >Michel Camdessus, Managing Director of the International Monetary
> >Fund (IMF). On Feb. 13, 2000, the day before he was to leave office
> >after 13 years (the longest term of any Managing Director), Camdessus
> >addressed the Tenth United Nations Conference on Trade and
> >Development in Bangkok. He said some very radical things.


Isn't it strange that when people leave power they suddenly become such
statesmen and worry about the poor and unemployed?  See Paul Volker's
statements since he left office -- after he engineered the world's worst
recession since the Great Depression.

It is always easy to be a radical when you can do nothing.  It keeps you in
the spotlight.

But when you are in the corridor's of power "worldly wisdom suggests that
it is better to fail conventionally than to succeed unconventionally."

Paul

> >

Paul Davidson
Holly Chair of Excellence in Political Economy
University of Tennessee
SMC523
Knoxville, Tennessee 37996-0550
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email: pdavidson@xxxxxxx
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