 |  | | Debt Crisis & West |
 YOU may recall the Latin
American debt crisis of 1982,
the Asian debt crisis of 1997,
the Russian debt crisis of 1998
- and you´ll certainly remember
the US sub-prime debt crisis of 2008.
Now we have a European debt crisis
and, horror of horrors, a US government
debt crisis.
That´s the word to keep hold of: debt.
Ignore the financiers´ jargon - bond
yields, credit default swaps, hedge
funds - which make finance sound like
quantum physics, a fearfully abstruse
subject beyond the grasp of ordinary
mortals. Financial crises occur when
people (or governments or companies)
can´t repay their debts. Or more precisely
when their creditors (or shareholders)
decide they aren´t likely to get
their money... |
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| |  | | US GRIPPED BY GREAT
CONTRACTION |
| IN the wake of the hugely disappointing
budget deal and
the S&P´s debt downgrade,
maybe we need to hang a new
sign in the immigration arrival
halls at all US ports and airports. It
could simply read: "Welcome. You
are entering the United States of
America. Past performance is not
necessarily indicative of future
returns."
Because our country is now finding
itself in the worst kind of
decline - a slow decline, just slow
enough for us to keep deluding ourselves
that nothing really fundamental
needs to change if our
future is to match our past.
Our slow decline is a product of
two inter-related problems. First,
we´ve let our five basic pillars of
growth erode since the end of the
Cold War - education, infrastructure,
immigration... |
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PMO not indicted by CAG: Sibal
IANS NEW DELHI THE government asserted on Monday that nobody in “high office” has been indicted in the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) report on the Commonwealth Games (CWG) as the opposition stepped up its demand for the ouster of Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit over alleged irregularities in the sporting event.
The government also clarified that the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) was not “indicted” by the CAG report released on Friday.
Human Resource Minister Kapil Sibal told reporters that there was no indictment of the PMO in the CAG report on the CWG.
Information and Broadcasting Minister Ambika Soni, who was flanked by Sibal and Law Minister Salman Khurshid at a joint press meet, also reiterated the statement.
“There is no indictment of anyone in the high office, leave aside that of Sheila Dikshit,” Soni said about the CAG report.
There are references (about Dikshit’s role in contracts relating to the Commonwealth Games), but references do not constitute an indictment, she stressed.
Sibal too, stressed that there was no “indictment” of Dikshit in the CAG report.
He said parliament’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC) would examine the CAG report and the government would take a stand only after that.
Action will be taken against anybody, including Dikshit, if any wrong has been done. But there is a process, Sibal added.
The minister also appealed to the opposition to break the deadlock in parliament over the CWG issue and stressed that they had a responsibility towards the functioning of parliament.
Both houses of parliament were adjourned for the day on Monday as the opposition pressed hard for Dikshit’s ouster.
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