The late George Orwell (left) is long gone, yet his historic creation, "Big Brother" as a metaphor for deceitful and stultifying government, lives on in spirit and in fact at the April 2nd G-20 conference in London. It will convene just hours after the traditional April Fool's Day.
How can we tell that Big Brother lives?
Just listen to, and read, what these worthy national "leaders" say during their one-day, anti-freedom extravaganza. Analyze the words in their sanctimonious staff-drafted statements -- prefabricated in back rooms days in advance, awaiting the inevitable official stamp of approval.
For example, an official draft G-20 communiqué leaked to the German press makes the preposterous claim that the global financial system in the future needs to be protected from "offshore and loosely regulated jurisdictions"
As Orwell Predicted: OECD Blather
You can bet that blatant lie was drafted by the tax exempt bureaucrats at the OECD's palatial headquarters in Paris -- and the leak itself has caused plenty of friction and accusations among G-20 participants. Some saw the leak as a calculate act of sabotage by other EU leaders against summit host Gordon Brown.
The truth is what James Kirkup, a Daily Telegraph columnist wrote a few days ago: "This crisis didn't begin in Guernsey or the Caymans, it began in New York and London."
This draft communiqué embodies exactly what Orwell warned against when he wisely observed: "Political language...is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind. One cannot change this all in a moment, but one can at least change one's own habits, and from time to time one can even, if one jeers loudly enough, send some worn out and useless phrase into the dustbin, where it belongs."
The Real Truth
Most people outside global financial circles (and the tax havens themselves) know little about how these jurisdictions operate, aside from the OECD manufactured caricature of money laundering and terrorist blacklists. But the attendees at the G-20 do know the truth, and if they don't, they should not be there.
Orwell gave us "Big Brother" and many other pungent phrases, (unperson, thought crime, doublethink, newspeak, Ministry of Truth) in his description of a totalitarian society where the masses are kept in line with the ominous warning: "Big Brother is watching you." "War is Peace, Freedom is Slavery, Ignorance is Strength."
Now add to that stellar list of official lies, the new G-20 slogan, "Tax Havens Caused the World Recession."
Another Obama Harvard Buddy
To elaborate on this inane slogan, today's Bloomberg News attributes to one Mike Froman (left) identified as "Obama's deputy national security adviser for economic affairs,"a statement to the press that President Obama will seek backing from other G-20 leaders to force offshore tax havens to adopt global accounting and transparency rules -- as though he doesn't know they have done so years ago!
Froman and Obama are buddied from their time as editors of the Harvard Law Review. Froman also is a veteran of Citigroup, a bank that has received $45 billion in taxpayers bailout funding.
Froman had a leadership role in Citibank's Alternative Investments group that had to write down more than $200 million in April 2008. Throughout 2008, as the credit crisis hit, Froman's group had to rescue or close nine hedge funds in which it had invested. He also was a campaign contribution bundler for Obama in the 2008 presidential race, raising over $200,000 for the Democrat.
Now Froman is in charge of Obama's G-20 operations -- and saving the world from tax havens.
Threat to Offshore Centers
With this interesting background, Froman and advisers to other nations' leaders have been hammering out a draft agreement for Thursday's summit. It includes strategies for stimulating economies, rescuing the banking system and reforming financial regulation -- and an unwarranted attack on offshore financial centers.
That leaked draft pledges the G-20: "to take action to identify non-cooperative jurisdictions, including tax havens, and to stand ready to deploy sanctions to protect our public finances and financial systems."
Froman underscored this threat: "The G-20 countries want to 'encourage' offshore financial or tax havens to sign on to global accounting and transparency rules. There are a number of things in the toolbox that might be available and that's what's being discussed this week," he said -- declining to elaborate.
Sounds rather like those old World War II B-movies where the Nazi officer inevitable sneers: "Ve haf vays of making you talk!"
Brown Goes Berserk
Meanwhile the host of the meeting, the politically nervous British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, is trying to turn the G-20 meeting into a re-elect Brown and Labour rally. Brown says he will use the meeting of world leaders to approve a deal which he now claims to have spent a decade, including his time as Chancellor of the Exchequer, trying to secure.
What sheer audacity for Brown to try to take credit for the independent self-survival decisions by leading offshore financial centers to increase their cooperation in future response to international requests for information based on alleged tax evasion.
Indeed, during Brown's Treasury tenure, he did advocate more openness and stricter regulation on the U.K. tax havens, but the reform work was done by the individual jurisdictions -- and it was so successful that they now have far better regulatory financial regimes than do London or the United States -- the true centers where this colossal global financial mess was allowed to fester and erupt.
The Orwell Wisdom
George Orwell was right after all.
In his dark, futuristic satire, the totalitarian government used indoctrination, propaganda and fear to enforce order and conformity. His "Big Brother" - the face of this all-knowing police state regime - was never wrong, and to make sure of it, history was constantly being rewritten -- just as it will be tomorrow in London on the issue of tax havens.
As I said two days ago, when this London circus ends, if tax havens and offshore finance are anything more than a minor part of any "global new deal" struck, then the G-20 global economic meeting will have failed.
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