Tuesday, June 05, 2007

You are only seven men

One of my favorite musicians is Nick Harper, son of Roy. I once broadcasted a live gig over my cell-phone to Da Missus in Illinois because she adores him. Afterwards he chatted with my step-daughter on the phone and then wrote the sweetest note to her on an autographed CD cover -- it went along the lines of "don't ever change".

The song that features the line "you are only seven men" is now inaccurate because at some point, while I was probably watching CSI, it became eight. As in the G8. The lines go "you are only seven men, we are nations."

I don't advocate any kind of violence but I can understand the poor uprising. Actually, not just the poor, but those with a conscience of any kind. From what I have seen of the meeting of the G8 in Germany, it's a shed-load of political show-boating.

Greenhouse this and nuclear that. Tony Blair with the "End world poverty" banner quite frankly made me puke.

I say "get over yourselves" and start thinking about what you can actually do rather than sit eating banquets discussing it for the benefit of your own political (and financial) gain.

The last summit, there was an almighty momentum to relieve poverty. Commitments were made by various countries to contribute millions of greenbacks to the cause. How much has been fulfilled? I'll let you guess.

It is disgraceful that 8 PMs, Presidents, Finance Ministers or whatever you want call them can be so disingenuous. If you're set an objective at work and commit to it, you do your damndest to hit that, and people expect you to. Why does this not apply to the G8?

You are only seven men. We are nations.

1 comment:

Stan said...

The G8 is unlikely to achieve anything, ever. Its membership is biased to industrial Northern hemisphere and defies logic (Spain's economy is bigger than Canada's). Also does anyone think any world decision can be made without China ?

To be fair, the original remit of the G8 was purely Economic http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1st_G6_Summit - I'm not entirely sure whos fault it is that the forum is now measured on its inability to cure Aids, make poverty history and reverse Climate Change.