he commissioned a report to analyzernwhy the IMF had failed to forecast Mexico’srndeteriorating financial situation andrnthen decided to keep the report secret.rnPerhaps the truth was unbearable. Dr.rnRachel Ehrenfeld, the author of twornbooks on the problem of illegal drugs, arguesrnconvincingly that the devaluation ofrnthe Mexican peso was, in part, a reactionrnto massive transfers of drug money out ofrnMexico. Mexico, one of our partners inrnNAFTA, has been thoroughly corruptedrnby the drug trade.rnIn an April II, 1996, address to thernMid-America Committee in Chicago,rnCamdessus declared, “Countries as diversernas Chile, the Czech Republic, Indonesia,rnand Korea—and the many otherrncountries around the world that followrnthe policies advocated by the [InternationalrnMonetary] Fund —are attractingrnsubstantial amounts of private foreign investment.”rnOf course, two of the countriesrncited —Indonesia and Korea—havernnow sought bailouts from the IMF.rnHow’s that for success?rnIs the IMF pursuing policies deliberatelyrndesigned to destroy the sovereigntyrnof nations by making them dependentrnon the IMF? Or are there factors involvedrnin the global economy over whichrnthe IMF, Alan Greenspan, and the TreasuryrnDepartment have no control? If thisrnis the highest stage of capitalism, thenrnwhere is the capital and who controls it?rnNo one really seems to know. ForrnGreenspan and his colleagues, the revenuernfrom a global tax may be less importantrnthan the system of currencyrnmonitoring that would have to be implementedrnto generate it. Ironically, Sorosrnhimself could eventually endorse such arnsystem because of the damage that hernand others like him have inflicted on thernworld. It could be packaged as an attackrnon the super-rich, when in reality itrnwould affect ordinary Americans’ IRAs,rnmutual funds, and pensions—any vehiclernwith money invested abroad.rnIf such control on a global level is attained,rnit won’t be called world government,rnand it won’t necessarily be viewedrnas harmful. Steven Solomon, a formerrnreporter for Forbes, argues in his book.rnThe Confidence Game, that a “world economicrndirectorate” should manage therneconomies of the world. Echoing thernviews of the central bankers and othersrnhe interviewed, Solomon endorsed thernTobin Tax on international currencyrntransactions as a source of revenue forrnthose who will be managing our lives forrnus. He claims the tax could bring in $13rntrillion a year.rnThese staggering sums are possible becausernthe trade in foreign currencies is arnmarket that averages $1.3 trillion per day.rnCurrencies are traded right along withrngold, silver, cars, wheat, oil, soybeans,rnand corn—the so-called “real economy.”rnBut the currency market has its own reality.rnThe Asian crisis demonstrates that arnrather small group of people could bringrnabout the collapse of the entire world system,rnor at least a substantial part of it, forrnpolitical or financial reasons. Currencyrntraders play with the fates of entire nations.rnA completely integrated global systemrnwill make it possible for a very smallrngroup of very rich people to play with thernfate of the entire world.rnWilliam Greider, a left-wing journalistrnwho wrote a revealing study of the FederalrnReserve, has written a book about thisrnnew age entitled One World, Ready orrnNot. But if Greider thinks the problemrnis global capitalism, his solution is internationalrnsocialism, for he explicitly endorsesrnthe Tobin Tax as a device thatrnmight help nations restore a measure ofrnsovereignty over their internal affairs.rnBut this is not a patriotic or nationalistrnproposal. It is significant that Greider’srnbook was endorsed by John Sweeney,rnhead of the AFL-CIO and a member ofrnthe Democratic Socialists of America,rnwhich openly favors the imposition ofrnglobal taxes on the movement of globalrncapital.rnSweeney and Greider (and for thatrnmatter, Ralph Nader and congressmenrnRichard Gephardt and Dave Bonior),rnhave a gripe not with the global economicrnsystem and the international bureaucraciesrnthat manage it, but with the rulesrnand regulations under which trade occurs.rnThey want tiading and financial arrangementsrnin which the United Statesrncan impose their views on “social justicernissues,” including labor and environmentalrnstandards, on other nationsrnthrough these bureaucracies. The questionrnfor them is whether big governmentrnwill keep up with big business on a globalrnlevel, and whether global bureaucraciesrnlike the U.N., the IMF, and thernWTO can be used by the internationalrnleft to control the activities of multinationalrncorporations, banks, and lessdevelopedrncountries. They view a globalrntax as the only viable way to manipulaternthe global economy.rnBut globalism, however it’s packaged,rninevitably means one thing: tiansferringrncapital, wealth, and money out of thernUnited States. The key question on thernpolitical left is how fast this process willrnoccur—not whether it will occur. As wernhave seen over the last several years of thernClinton administration, this process doesrnnot mean eliminating jobs; it meansrneliminating some jobs. Overall, globalizationrndoes mean more jobs for people.rnIn the name of feminism and equal opportunity,rnfor instance, it means forcingrnmothers with children out of theirrnhomes into the work force. But wagesrnwill be depressed for most, and taxes willrnbe hiked to pay for federal daycare.rnThen the left will “export” our system tornthe rest of the world.rnThe proposed global warming treatyrnbetrays the true motives of the left becausernit attempts to move wealth andrncapital to so-called developing countries,rnled by communist China, at the expensernof the United States. In this case, however,rnAmerican big business and some elementsrnof big labor are saying no, at leastrnuntil they get an agreement more to theirrnliking. Yet big business said “yes” tornNAFTA and GATT and the WTO, andrnmany Fortune 500 corporations are leadingrnmembers of the Business Council forrnthe U.N. The debate is not over globalizationrnbut over who will benefit from it.rnWill big business draw the line at arnglobal tax? Big business will have to decidernif the benefits—the vague promisernof stability in the international financialrnmarkets—will outweigh the risks, includingrnthe possibility of multinationalsrnthemselves being targeted by anotherrnvariation of a global tax.rnAt the United Nations, former U.N.rnSecretary General Boutros Boutros-rnGhali publicly endorsed the Tobin Tax,rnalthough his successor, Kofi Annan, refrainedrnfrom doing so after Congressrnprotested. Currentiy, the leading cheerleaderrnfor global taxes at the world bodyrnis James Gustave Speth, administrator ofrnthe U.N. Development Program. Arnfounder of the World Resources Instituternand the Natural Resources DefensernCouncil, he argues that a global taxrncould help underwrite the global environmentalrnagenda. After I wrote an articlernfor the Washington Post exposingrnthese schemes, Speth tiied to insist thatrnthe U.N. wasn’t really pushing thesernideas. But I had the proof, in the form ofrna 200-page book advocating the TobinrnTax, edited by officials of Speth’s U.N.rnDevelopment Program. I also had a transcriptrnof one of his speeches endorsingrnAUGUST 1998/41rnrnrn