Those protagonists who still argue that freeing world trade will lift at least 20 million of the poorest people in the world's poorest nations out of wretched poverty needn't bask in the sun just yet: the last-minute deal 'clinched' at the World Trade Organisation's summit in Hong Kong turned out to be another no-brainer. No-brainer because it has been clear to cynics like me that not one politico-economic region would be willing to budge a millimetre on freeing up world trade, because that would mean freeing up the most highly-prized, and therefore state protected, sectors of a national economy. And to free these up, to any degree, would amount to political suicide for any government. The battle of Seattle in 1999 was repeated in Hong Kong's streets, and that says a lot.