Nearing the Eve of Destruction, will this be Obama's Winning Hand?

Inspired by a thread in GD:

International Monetary Fund strongly suggests countries tax the rich to fix deficit

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/10/11/international-monetary-fund-strongly-suggests-countries-tax-the-rich-to-fix-deficit/

From octoberlib's thread:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=3833410

To which I replied:

OMG! What did Obama do to them? Give them the look he gave Putin here?



Seriously. though. Obama appointed Jim Yong Kim to head the World Bank and he has great influence on the IMF:

World Bank president: Debt debate could be dire

By Susan Page - October 8, 2013



WASHINGTON — The president of the World Bank warned Tuesday that congressional maneuvering over raising the debt limit could have dire consequences for the global economy and the world's poorest people.

The effects of a default would be "really severe," Jim Yong Kim told USA TODAY's Capital Download, but even a period of uncertainty as the Treasury Department's Oct. 17 deadline approaches could unnerve stock markets and increase borrowing costs for developing countries.

"The notion that getting close to the 17th and then in the final minute doing something heroically, that will have an impact," he said in an interview with the weekly video newsmaker series at World Bank headquarters, where its annual meetings are being held this week. He issued a plea for members of Congress who are now debating what to do. Some Republican lawmakers have expressed skepticism that failing to raise the debt limit would have catastrophic economic repercussions...

A report from the International Monetary Fund on Tuesday on the world economic outlook warned that risks to the global economy were building, including potential damage from the U.S. partial government shutdown if it continues for an extended period of time...

There is a lot more about the great harm done by the GOP actions in 2011 and what they are doing right now at the link:

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2013/10/08/world-bank-president-jim-yong-kim-warns-about-impact-of-debt-ceiling-debate/2944169/

One of Jim Yong Kim's goals is to eliminate poverty across the world. Here is some more about him and his ideas:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Yong_Kim

We need more of these great Obama appointees, like Kim, Warren, Cordray, Sotomayer, Kagan, Kerry, et al. They are leading this country and world to what we need it to be.

BTW, a little more about the IMF and World Bank:

The IMF and the World Bank. How Do They Differ?

By David D. Driscoll

If you have difficulty distinguishing the World Bank from the International Monetary Fund, you are not alone. Most people have only the vaguest idea of what these institutions do, and very few people indeed could, if pressed on the point, say why and how they differ. Even John Maynard Keynes, a founding father of the two institutions and considered by many the most brilliant economist of the twentieth century, admitted at the inaugural meeting of the International Monetary Fund that he was confused by the names: he thought the Fund should be called a bank, and the Bank should be called a fund. Confusion has reigned ever since.

Known collectively as the Bretton Woods Institutions after the remote village in New Hampshire, U.S.A., where they were founded by the delegates of 44 nations in July 1944, the Bank and the IMF are twin intergovernmental pillars supporting the structure of the world's economic and financial order. That there are two pillars rather than one is no accident. The international community was consciously trying to establish a division of labor in setting up the two agencies. Those who deal professionally with the IMF and Bank find them categorically distinct. To the rest of the world, the niceties of the division of labor are even more mysterious than are the activities of the two institutions.

Similarities between them do little to resolve the confusion. Superficially the Bank and IMF exhibit many common characteristics. Both are in a sense owned and directed by the governments of member nations. The People's Republic of China, by far the most populous state on earth, is a member, as is the world's largest industrial power (the United States). In fact, virtually every country on earth is a member of both institutions. Both institutions concern themselves with economic issues and concentrate their efforts on broadening and strengthening the economies of their member nations. Staff members of both the Bank and IMF often appear at international conferences, speaking the same recondite language of the economics and development professions, or are reported in the media to be negotiating involved and somewhat mystifying programs of economic adjustment with ministers of finance or other government officials. The two institutions hold joint annual meetings, which the news media cover extensively. Both have headquarters in Washington, D.C., where popular confusion over what they do and how they differ is about as pronounced as everywhere else. For many years both occupied the same building and even now, though located on opposite sides of a street very near the White House, they share a common library and other facilities, regularly exchange economic data, sometimes present joint seminars, daily hold informal meetings, and occasionally send out joint missions to member countries.

Despite these and other similarities, however, the Bank and the IMF remain distinct. The fundamental difference is this: the Bank is primarily a development institution; the IMF is a cooperative institution that seeks to maintain an orderly system of payments and receipts between nations. Each has a different purpose, a distinct structure, receives its funding from different sources, assists different categories of members, and strives to achieve distinct goals through methods peculiar to itself...

More at the link:

https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/exrp/differ/differ.htm#a8

Even though with the rise of think tanks, speculators and personages who have disparaged Keynesian economics, it was well regarded as I was growing up and I would hope there will be, if not exactly the same methods used, a system that embodies the spirit of it.

The IMF and World Bank gained a foul reputation over the years, their actions seeming to do much more harm than good. For them to do a turn to something more humane would be good. It is possible that this will help the poorest and help discredit the inhumane and callous ideology from which we are presently suffering.

An aside to anyone who may not have made the connection between the mission of helping the poor here or abroad, or saving the environment another of Kim's goals.

It is a reactionary thought pattern to believe that when the poorest or most oppressed benefit, the working or middle class does not do as well. This is something TPTB, soon to be TPTW, have promoted.

What the predators of the TPTB - because they are not as monolithic a group as they may seem - use to scare us into compliance with schemes to benefit their own pockets and power is this:

Poverty and great wealth is created by our allowing inequality, through fear of losing what we have to those higher or lower than us in society or the world. So many go along with inequality and intolerance, even wars and oppression, because they believe it is their only way to survive.

It's time to change, in order to realize our full human potential as a species before things get worse than ever.

Keynesian economics served as the standard economic model in the developed nations during the later part of the Great Depression, World War II, and the post-war economic expansion (1945–1973), though it lost some influence following the oil shock and resulting stagflation of the 1970s.[3] The advent of the global financial crisis in 2008 has caused a resurgence in Keynesian thought.[4]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keynesian_economics

Keynes argued for a mixed economic system, a social democracy with some government inverntion. While it was in vogue, there was an increase in prosperity and the standard of living in the USA and other countries. The predatory capitalist model that replaced is miserable one, destroying the environment, human rights and civil society world wide, leading to violence, ignorance and intolerance. It's time to change the course.

This is a BOG post. You know the drill. TIA.

For Sheshe, who gave me some encouraging words last night.

Thanks.