The blind leading the blind at G-20 summit

AT the start of the Great Depression in the late 1920s US business barons - who in those days ruled the world (or thought they did) - would hold what later became known as "no business" meetings behind locked doors, where they would smoke, drink, play cards and discuss anything but business.

They would then emerge to assure a panicked public that, after intense debate, they had determined the crashing stock market to be a passing attack of investor nerves. "Keep calm and carry on" was the message - and we heard something rather similar last weekend at the G-20 meeting in Shanghai.

US Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew told pressmen at the outset that there was no need for "crisis measures" at a time when no crisis exists - a rather disingenuous comment given all the warnings from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operatio…