Wishful thinking

Nancy Birdsall at the Center for Global Development, one of the few decent think tanks in DC, has produced her "policy wish list" for 2009. It's pretty predictable stuff and some of her wishes are stuff we here at zzzeitgeist have been advocating for some time, though her methods are not prescriptions we see too often. 

Everyone seems to support freer trade and increased development, but is it a good idea to avoid protectionism by offering "permanent duty-free, quota-free market access for the poorest countries" and embrace innovations such as cash on delivery aid? Foreign aid certainly needs to be modernized but Blattman does a better job of explaining why. It's hard to only give aid based on quotas when a country lacks the infrastructure necessary to reach said quotas. 

Too bad in this economic climate these wishes will remain just that.

BTW what's up with number 5?