The French and Brazilian presidents have called for new action to fight poverty in the developing world. At a New York meeting ahead of the UN General Assembly, they urged radical steps to raise the $50bn UN officials say is needed to tackle the problem. Money could come from new charges or taxes on such things as greenhouse gas emissions, arms sales, airline tickets and credit card purchases. More than a billion people live in absolute poverty (less than $1 a day). The meeting focused on a report by a UN commission which said that the global imbalances were morally unacceptable and politically unsustainable. Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and French President Jacques Chirac said world leaders should ensure that the world's unprecedented wealth became a vehicle for the integration - rather than the exclusion - of the most underprivileged. "We must harness globalisation, we must turn it into a positive force for all peoples of the world," Mr Lula told the meeting. Mr Chirac said they needed new approaches to the problem of poverty. "It is up to us to give globalisation a conscience," he said. "There is no future in globalisation that tolerates predatory behaviour and the hoarding of its profits by a minority. There is no future in globalisation that destroys the social and economic balances, crushes the weak and denies human rights."
Oh, yeah. Like that's gonna happen. This is the proverbial lead balloon. It's just not going to fly. If only Chirac would stop paying his cows $730 a year just to exist , or would realize he's paying a friggin' fortune on his grocery bills, (honestly, his wife is the worst keeper of a household budget...ever)perhaps
farmers in the developing world could not only survive, but thrive.
Hence there would be no need for a tax on all those nasty, rich
westerners to equalize the woes of globalization. Alas, however, Chirac
thinks differently.
Go figure.
I have a little diddy running through my head right now. It's the theme
to Speed Racer. I think you all know how it goes. Only, my version is slightly different.
Go. Go. Go, Go, Sarkozy!.
{Hat tip: Fausta. Who also has that wonderful, laugh-inducing picture of Blaque Jacques up on her blog.)
Posted by Kathy at September 1, 2004 09:06 AM | TrackBack