Wish there was a Lord Keynes here, today?

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Wish there was a Lord Keynes here, today?

While watching the WTC/Afghanistan bombing, I felt the need for a John Maynard Keynes. Keynes was one of the most important economists of the twentieth century. He was also one of the important intellectual forces of the early twentieth century who contributed to laying the foundations of “modernism.”

But Keynes was more than an intellectual. He was a statesman—perhaps even a conscience of society. He spoke freely and from intellectual conviction. He was able to think beyond narrow patriotic concerns. But then we must remember he had no consulting contracts official positions, or any other kind of funding to hold him back from his intellectual convictions.  

At the end of World War 1, the allies, UK, France, England and Italy had got together and imposed a fairly harsh treaty on Germany. As history has shown the treaty imposed a very harsh economic burden on Germany. The economic mess—unemployment slow growth and hyperinflation-- that ensued in Germany led to the rise of Hitler and the Nazis.  Eventually the roots of the second World War are known to lie in that poorly conceived peace treaty at the end of World War 1.  

Keynes, as a UK Treasury representative had participated in the summits leading up to the Treaty.  He was disgusted at the proceedings and the shallowness of the leaders of the victorious countries.  He foresaw the weaknesses of the Treaty of Versailles and in a very famous book, The Economic Consequences of Peace had made a scathing attack on all aspects of the treaty, including the personalities of the leaders who brokered it.

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The thrust of his argument is presented in a verse from Tolstoy in the introduction

“Nought remains

But vindictiveness here amid the strong,

And there amid the weak an impotent rage.”

Could we sum up the Afghan, Palestine and Muslim situation better?

Keynes was very clear that a policy based on vindictiveness and vengeance that did not allow Germany room to grow would be disastrous and eventually lead to another war. He does not mince his words.

“The policy of reducing Germany to servitude for a generation, of degrading the lives of millions of human beings, and ...

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