Down to Hot Air

The (financial) world has come to this--a few empty word from the premier of China and the world stock market jumped. Wen Jiabao said he was confident that China will have 8 percent growth this year, a level general considered to be the mark of China financial progress and social stability. If you live in the export oriented industrial area, or once worked in those areas, you may be excused to think that confidence as a lot hot air. And if you are a foreigner doing business in China, you may be similarly excused. The truth is nobody in their clear mind would accept Wen's declaration at face value. Like injecting vast amount of money into the economy, Wen's hot air is an injection of vast amount of hopefulness into the psyche of the economy. One of the unexpected thing about this recession/depression is the realization that money really means nothing, a trillion here, a trillion there, still nothing. Half a year ago, free market theory failed; now it is also becoming increasing clear that New Deal is at best ineffective. The world is now looking towards a pseudo-communist country to rescue them from of their capitalist failure. And the leaders of this pseudo-communist country are down to hot air. This is what the world has come to.