The UN Represents The Governments Of The World. May A "Bell Of Atri" Represent The People Of The World? (Part 59)
Since the beginning of Time, the People Of The World have faced many great challenges & obstacles; but, those hardships were eventually triumphed over, with the Almighty's help, most of all in the form of the spiritual resilience & reasoning skills of the human soul. However, this inner strength could only be put to practical use, in the presence of clarity of mind; as long as confusion reigned supreme, humankind stood frozen & helpless.
There has never been more chaos than the confusion running riot through almost every information channel, whether it is managed by the Governments Of The World, the Intergovernmental Organizations (IGOs) or the international media. Different public & private organizations that are all answerable to the same Government Of The World, are enforcing competing policies, in which the fulfilment of the policies of one organization necessitates the repudiation of the policies of another. Different IGOs regularly put out binding orders that clash with each other, e.g. while the FATF emphasises the importance of maintaining transactional integrity, the IMF orders policies that unavoidably violate transactional integrity.
Tumult such as the current dangers to the welfare & happiness of the People Of The World, that the majority of the current Governments Of The World & IGOs have clearly proved unable to address (to the point that a number of them are actually aggravating matters further), constitutes proof beyond a reasonable doubt, that a Bell Of Atri is now imperative, because it is all that stands for the human rights of the People Of The World.
"US consumer confidence hits lowest level since July 2022" - Yahoo (April 30, 2024)
To summarize: According to the latest numbers published by the Conference Board, Inc. (a 501 non-profit business membership & research group organization headquartered in New York), US consumers are increasingly distrustful of the policies of the authorities responsible for the management of the US economy. Disappointment in current policies & strategies is at a 2-year low, & there are strong indications that consumer confidence is likely to continue declining for the foreseeable future, ceteris paribus.
"Stock market today: US stocks set to snap 5-month win streak with Fed, Amazon in focus" - Yahoo (May 1, 2024)
To summarize: All the major US bourses - the Dow Jones Industrial Average, Nasdaq Composite, S&P500 - slipped ~1% in April 30 trading, due to burgeoning hopelessness among US investors, that the Fed's rate cut strategy is going to prove more effective in the months ahead than it has proved in the past 2 & a half years. To further underline the lack of faith in governmental policies, unemployment is reportedly down & wages are reportedly up...but, seemingly in the opinion of the American public, nowhere near enough.
Once upon a time, human society was divided into, not racial &/or religious groups, as much as financial &/or professional groups...& the most exclusive group of all, was the investor group, who thought, spoke & acted in a manner that was mostly independent of the thoughts, words & deeds of the rest of society. No more; as illustrated by the aforementioned 2 news items regarding the US financial landscape, workers & traders, employers & employees, skilled & unskilled, rich & poor, citizens & foreigners, are now all equally affected by current global economic conditions...which implies that the underlying triggers for the troubles faced by the People Of (for example) The United States, goes beyond the borders of the United States, i.e. is far more international in nature than ever before.
One possible contributory factor in the US' financial problems could be the persistent "natural gas loadshedding" still ongoing in Pakistan; when the majority of Pakistan's domestic & industrial needs are satisfied by natural gas (by itself as well as in the production of electricity), wouldn't the resultant productivity crash (both because industrial activity is stunted as well as because workers & traders must grapple to the point of exhaustion with gas shutdowns in their homes), decimate American industrial & consumer revenues (given that Pakistani imports are the lifeblood of the American industrial sector)?
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"Senators question US firm’s role in FBR digitisation" - Dawn (April 30, 2024)
To summarize: Plans for the digitization of the records held by Pakistan's Federal Board Of Revenue (FBR) appear to be vulnerable to legal challenges, in view of reports that selection of the private sector firms & organizations may not have been according to prescribed legal procedures. According to members of the Pakistan Senate, Federal Finance Minister M. Aurangzeb held talks with the CEO of Karandaaz & an unnamed representative of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, after which he may be about to announce that the digitization contract has been handed to them, with McKinsey being the unopposed candidate for the management consultant position.
"Pakistan to block mobile connections of over 500,000 individuals for not filing tax returns" - Arab News (April 30, 2024)
To summarize: On Tuesday (April 30), the Pakistan Federal Board Of Revenue (FBR) issued official instructions to the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) & all public & private Cellular & Internet Service Providers (CSPs & ISPs) to deactivate all SIMs registered in the names of 506,671 Pakistani citizens who had failed to file their income tax returns for the year 2023; & file a compliance report with the FBR by May 15, 2024. Said SIMs will remain non-functional until the FBR can assure the International Monetary Fund (IMF) that the People Of Pakistan are all coughing up as much tax revenue as the IMF has demanded.
Interesting fact about McKinsey: It has just finished assuring the American public that they can continue spending on cute knick-knacks...mere months before the Conference Board published its findings regarding record-low consumer confidence - which either means that most Americans never really trusted McKinsey, or that most Americans trusted McKinsey implicitly & are paying for it now.
The love-hate relationship between the IMF & the FBR is getting exhaustingly repetitive: The IMF instructs the FBR to follow a (legally-questionable) routine to secure an (impossibly-high) amount in tax revenues. The Government Of Pakistan glances menacingly at relevant FBR officials who (metaphorically) see the potential end of their governmental careers looming & hastily comply with IMF orders. Said orders hit a brick wall because neither are the People Of Pakistan unaware of their legal rights & nor can they afford the IMF's exorbitant extortion racket. The IMF feels enraged (or gets caught for the backlash of its policies on the Developed World economic system, e.g. the US economy), looks about wildly in search of a scapegoat, & invariably chooses the FBR. The FBR (whose domestic popularity is already in the doghouse for obeying illegal IMF orders) is immediately informed to prepare for the whipping of the Century...& the story keeps getting repeated ad nauseam, as illustrated by the debacle of the Track & Trace System & the debacle-in-the-making of the SIMs-for-income-tax project (ala the Food For Oil disaster).
If a consumer - Mr. A - pays a licensed go-between - Mr. B - to hire any basic utility, e.g. cellular, Internet, television, water, natural gas, electricity, etc., from a Service Provider - Mr. C - the automatic legally-accepted assumption is that the contract is binding (given that it contains all the requisites of a contract, i.e. offer, acceptance, compensation & capacity). Now, should a third party - be it the IMF or the FBR or any other office - nullify the aforementioned contract, regardless of the reason (e.g. "This consumer is pettier than Ebenezer Scrooge!"), who will bother to honor any contract with Mr. C ever again? Further, should the judge of the relevant jurisdiction court suddenly lose his intellectual &/or vocal capacity, won't the judicial system's seemingly-silent-as-the-grave response constitute legal evidence that nobody anywhere within or beyond the borders of the country in question, ever need bother about Mr. C's commercial rights?
The aforementioned 2 case studies - regarding the People Of The United States & the People Of Pakistan - prove the importance of reliability...& the destruction that inevitably comes about in its absence.
"The faults of the burglar are the qualities of the financier." - George Bernard Shaw