ONE LOOK at Washington today and you find yourself mumbling about war and the generals.
Clearly, you say, the crisis of confidence haunting Wall Street is too serious to be left to politicians. Next, you face the awful truth: If they don't fix it, who can?
Maybe Alan Greenspan, the by now legendary chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, America's central bank.
Testifying in the United States Senate yesterday, Mr. Greenspan threw the full weight of his authority on the side tougher laws to clean up "corporate governance" and improve "business transparency."
Translated into clear English, Mr. Greenspan said: Hit the crooks and hit them hard.
That's what American investors seemed to be longing to hear. Even as he spoke Tuesday noon, the Dow index of shares started moving up on the New York Stock Exchange, from deep red closer to black.
Though the "impact effect" of the corporate scandals "could linger," Mr. Greenspan told the Senators, "fundamentals are now in place" to produce economic growth of 3.5 per cent - nearly double of what the Fed had been predicting earlier in the year.
Those were the words. Then there was Mr. Greenspan's subtext. It can be summed up in three words: America is strong.
In that subtext, it would seem, Mr. Greenspan was warning Europe to stop gloating. The euro may have topped the U.S. dollar just now, but America's money is still the strongest in the world because America's economy remains strong - the corporate scandals notwithstanding.
For perfectly good reasons, Mr. Greenspan confined his remarks to the United States. Had he included Canada, his message would have been even more powerful. He would have been talking directly about the most potent part of the entire North American continent.
Canada, it so happens, has turned in "An All-Star Performance," to use the words of the Merrill Lynch economic report issued late last week.
The New York-based giant investment firm is full of superlatives about Canada and its recent track record. Here are a few samples: "June employment surges; an unprecedented 303,000 new jobs created in the past six months."
And: "Canada may only be two per cent of the global economy, but it would not be a stretch to say that it is the strongest two per cent."
It's music to the ears of every Canadian, I'm sure, to hear Merrill Lynch purring: Finance Minister John Manley "has his Northern Tiger."
When is it the last time anybody has read, in an assessment by outsiders, that "Canada has now generated more jobs than the United States since December 1999 - that's a non-trivial string of 32 months"?
That's not all. "More impressive," the Merrill Lynch report continues, "was the eye-rubbing 66,400 job gain in June that beat the consensus handily for the sixth time in the past seven months."
The report says this is "the strongest half-year performance in recorded history."
All that followed by a little afterthought and comparison with the United States: "Not bad for a country a tenth the size. In fact, June made it 16 months in a row in which the Canadian employment figure has topped the U.S. number."
Heady stuff. I like it. But let's not get carried away. Mr. Greenspan only warned about the obvious when he told the Senate that the "impact effect" of the corporate scandals "could linger." He would have been reckless had he not inserted the caveat: "Absent significant further shocks."
The Fed chairman can't know any more than you how many other scandals may come to light. But his advice to President George W. Bush and to the Congress is clear: make top corporate officers accountable for what they report.
This advice will antagonize many on Wall Street, Bay Street and elsewhere.
For the moment, it seems only a few media commentators are lamenting - Terence Cocoran in the National Post is one - that tougher laws will destroy corporate "creativity."
Rubbish, says Mr. Greenspan - and thank God his judgment carries more weight.
Which leaves Washington politicians. Maybe Mr. Greenspan sobered them up.
Otherwise the confidence crisis gripping Wall street is too serious to be left to politicians, especially the Democrats, as they exploit it for partisan gain.
Bogdan Kipling is a Canadian journalist in Washington. E-mail:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
