President Barack Obama - trying to lead, but where?

The US needs to restore growth. Other countries need to do the same. No doubt there can be some synergy in co-ordinated actions, but the fundamental decisions - government spending, tax rates, bank reserve requirements, the money supply - will be made domestically.

A government that acts intrusively and with market-killing borrowing, taxing, spending, or regulating can do a lot of harm. Governments doing such things co-operatively in a group like the G20 can do even more harm.

Some seem to believe that 20 governments meeting together may produce wiser policy than one government acting alone. It is, of course, at least as likely that a group like the G20 - whose members include societies ranging from free market to avowedly communist, and political systems ranging from democracy to despotism - will opt for a lowest common denominator that reflects not wisdom but rather banality and political expediency. The President's statement of March 24 would seem to point in that direction.

The devil is in the details

As in all government actions, it is only by seeing the details of what is actually done or not done that Americans will truly understand what is being proposed or enacted. For the US, it will be only when Americans see the details of any legislation that they will be able to understand where the President is setting the balance between economic growth and stability.

Those details are not forthcoming yet. Until they are clear, Americans should recognise the President's statement for what it is: a political declaration that temporises, leaving options open and avoiding real decisions. It is either the essence of statecraft or a fatal delay while the economy drifts. On the positive side, free marketers might even claim that it is a blessing in disguise that will give the economy time to begin to recover on its own. Time will tell.