World leaders - and Pittsburgh - steeled for G20 whirlwind

The leaders of the world’s 20 most important economies arrive in Pittsburgh this afternoon for a geopolitical A-list after-party.
After listening to the various strains of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi at the United Nations General Assembly, the cello music of Yomo Ma will provide welcome relief when the leaders arrive at a dinner hosted by Barack and Michelle Obama.
After just two full sessions tomorrow, the G20 hopes to announce progress on rebalancing a world economy skewed by huge deficits and surpluses; reining in bankers’ bonuses; regulating hedge funds; and reviving climate change talks in time for the two-week Copenhagen summit in December.
Some members, notably Gordon Brown, also want the process to show that the G20 has superceded the G8 as the default forum for tackling global problems.
It is a tall order, partly because the group has a problem of leadership. It is not clear who is in charge. President Obama will chair tomorrow’s meetings, but the G20 has no permanent staff or premises and even the date, host and venue of its next summit have not yet been confirmed.
In the meantime, 14 Greenpeace activists have already been arrested ahead of the summit, a homeowner under the final approach to Pittsburgh Airport has daubed the words “Obama Lies!” on his front lawn in letters 20 feet high, and the Russian delegation has parked not one but two huge Antonov transport planes at the end of a disused runway.
No one is overawed by Mr Obama in the home of the Steelers.
His main initiative for the summit is a call to end fossil fuel subsidies, which the Environmental Law Institute in Washington estimates were worth $72 billion to the US energy sector between 2002 and 2008. Yet American firms will not give them up without a fight. China is unlikely to join the effort if the US cannot lead by example, and European governments may see the idea as a distraction from the President’s stalled carbon cap and trade bill.
On executive pay, France and Germany had hoped for a binding agreement to cap bonuses, but they will not get one because of British and US opposition. On hedge fund regulation, the German finance minister said despairingly in an interview published on Wednesday that London was fighting “tooth and nail” to keep its competitive advantage.
Those hoping for a revolution in global governance will be disappointed. This summit does have one critical advantage over the UN General Assembly, however – Iran and Libya are not invited. It has another advantge over the G8: instead of being embarrassed by the presence of an undemocratic and uncooperative Russia, it makes no claims to political purity. Instead it is validated by the presence of the entire BRIC grouping (Brazil, Russia, India and China), on which so much of the planet’s economic future depends.
Why Pittsburgh? One answer is that its hyperactive 29 year-old mayor, Luke Ravenstahl, lobbied the White House for the honour as soon as Mr Obama agreed to host the summit at the last G20 in London. Another is that Mr Obama considers Pittsburgh a good example of a rust belt buckle reinvented for the knowledge economy. It prides itself on its “Eds and Meds” (hospitals and universities) and is ready to give its visitors an earnest welcome.
Volunteers have been given printed answers to anticipated questions, among them “Why are there so many fat Americans?” and “Do all Americans have guns?” The suggested answers are “The US is working to address the issue of obesity,” and “no”, or words to that effect. According to a 2008 Gallup poll, roughly a third of US adults owns a gun.