Reading between the lines, and thinking outside the box . . .
...Here's what started WW2 (video)
Why millions want Obama to prove he's constitutionally qualified to be president.
Chicago mercenary firm gets millions for private "security" in Israel and Iraq.
(And: Obama is "keeping score")
The G20 was not created in order to provide genuine solution, but to salvage the powers that be and try to plug the breaches in capitalism.
It is therefore impossible for this body to opt for measures that are sufficiently radical to save the day.
The G20 will see to it that the core of neoliberal logic is left untouched. Its support to the god of the free market is non-negotiable.
Even as the leaders of the 20 largest economies gather in London to address the global economic crisis and battle growing evidence of protectionism, there are signs that the world's biggest experiment in free trade — the single European market — is cracking.
The dream of a single market is being undermined by a more blinkered local reality.
(And: ECB cuts key rate to 1.25%)
The eve of formal G20 discussions due to be held in London's Excel Centre in the east docklands area was marked by competing press conferences between old alliances.
(And: World leaders comments)
The differences between the US and Europe are far from being the product of ignorance, however.
They reflect fundamental divergences within the structure of world capitalism that have been brought to breaking point by the onset of global recession.
G20 leaders and ministers sat down to hammer out new rules for world financial markets today after a warning from France and Germany that a London summit should declare an end to the unfettered capitalism that has plunged the global economy into recession.
France's president argues that the current global economic crisis was created by a system that has drifted away from the basic values of capitalism.
At the G-20 summit, he wants a reform of international financial systems, additional economic aid and speedier crisis management.
France and Germany delivered a late threat to derail Gordon Brown's efforts to secure a global recovery deal last night by demanding new concessions from the US on financial regulation.
In a classic show of eve-of-summit brinkmanship, Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy joined forces to give warning that they would refuse to sign any agreement that did not meet their "red lines" on tax havens, hedge fund regulation, tracing "securitised" assets sold around the world and capping bankers' remuneration.
They also wanted the "naming and shaming" of tax havens that refused to go along with tougher regulatory rules, which is being opposed by the US.
In a reminder of former confrontations between America and the countries of Old Europe, Sarkozy suggested that Europe would not take economic direction from the US.
He appeared to suggest that America would have to compromise, adding pointedly: "The crisis didn't spontaneously erupt in Europe, did it?"
Sarkozy said that the summit provided a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to give capitalism a conscience.
Obama conceded that the US had "some accounting to do" for the crisis, but sought to brush past French and German demands for global financial regulations that could reach well inside American borders.
Obama is holding a solo press conference Thursday afternoon in London to shape the message coming out of the G20 summit, as he appears to be losing ground on economic policy among traditional allies.
China is usually content to keep in the background at diplomatic events.
But, ahead of this week's G-20 summit in London, Beijing has been offering ideas for a radical shake up of the international financial system.
Their primary concern: that inflation could wipe out the value of their foreign currency reserves.
The summit diplomacy gets interesting. The head of the IMF said in an Financial Times interview that the funds experience from 122 banking crises is that "that you never recover before the cleaning up of the banking sector has been done".
UN chief Ban Ki-moon warned today that failing to act to halt the global economic crisis could lead to widespread social unrest and failed states.
"What began as a financial crisis has become a global economic crisis. I fear worse to come -- a full-blown political crisis defined by growing social unrest, weakened governments and angry publics who have lost all faith in their leaders and their own future. There is a thin line between failing banks and failing countries, and we cross it at our peril."
Today's G20 meeting should be a defining moment in the fight against the global economic slump but it will more likely provide nothing more than a limp communiqué that barely papers over the cracks between delegates.
Every national leader in London today knows that their top priority is not shoring up the global economy but watching their political back at home.
From Europe to Turkey, world leaders are coming together this week for a slew of global summits.
These summits are not just about photo-ops and handshakes.
Taken together, this array of diplomatic meetings constitute the greatest density of decision points in the modern world since the summits that brought about the end of the Cold War.
This is a time when the true colors of nation-states come out, as each fights for their political, economic and security interests behind a thin veneer of global cooperation.
(And: State of the nations)
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