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Losing Our Religion
Feb. 12th, 2009 10:46 amDo more than light a candle for the patron saint of capitalism
Ken Kurson | February 9, 2009
Before he ran for president, Rudy Giuliani gave a couple hundred speeches a year all over the world, to all sorts of groups—business, philanthropic, political. He would often include a riff about how capitalism has improved more lives and done more to lift people out of poverty than any other economic system. The line was usually greeted by polite nods or even raised eyebrows, especially in Western Europe and the bluer precincts of the United States. But when I saw him deliver it in Poland and Russia, it killed.
In those former Communist countries, people burst into furious applause as their translators uncoded Rudy's ode to free markets. Having lived under centralized economies, they get it. We don't.
( Read more... )
Ken Kurson | February 9, 2009
Before he ran for president, Rudy Giuliani gave a couple hundred speeches a year all over the world, to all sorts of groups—business, philanthropic, political. He would often include a riff about how capitalism has improved more lives and done more to lift people out of poverty than any other economic system. The line was usually greeted by polite nods or even raised eyebrows, especially in Western Europe and the bluer precincts of the United States. But when I saw him deliver it in Poland and Russia, it killed.
In those former Communist countries, people burst into furious applause as their translators uncoded Rudy's ode to free markets. Having lived under centralized economies, they get it. We don't.
( Read more... )
