SEARCH
August 6, 2012 London, England At one point during lunch today at an infamously spicy Sichuan restaurant in London’s Soho district, my colleague turned to me and said, “You know, it’s shocking to me that there hasn’t been a single instance anywhere in the world of a banker getting beaten to death by
August 3, 2012 Bergen, Norway I was sitting across from an impossibly blonde account executive this afternoon when I heard three words I never thought I’d hear at a foreign bank. “Are you Greek,” she asked me with a bit of a smile… me: “Uh, no. I have a US passport, among others…”
August 2, 2012 Bergen, Norway High up above Scandinavia about 75 degrees north latitude is an obscure archipelago that few people in the world know about, and even fewer have been to. It’s called Svalbard, population ~3,000. And while the islands are technically part of Norway, they come with some incredibly unique benefits
August 1, 2012 Bergen, Norway Ah, Norway. Government-loving statists love to hold this place up as a shining example that big government and high taxes are good. Free education. Free healthcare. “Happy” people. Yes, Norway is certainly one of the wealthiest countries in the world on the basis of GDP per capita… and
July 31, 2012 Bergen, Norway Every summer, my colleagues and I invite young people from all over the world for an intensive 4-day workshop about freedom and entrepreneurship. This year’s workshop just concluded yesterday afternoon, and it was, without doubt, the best one ever. 58 students attended from countries as diverse as Tajikistan,
July 25, 2012 Trakai, Lithuania We’ve spoken before about the importance of a second passport. It is, in short, one of the best insurance policies you can have. If you only have one passport, you become trapped by a single government– a government that has the power to tax you into the poorhouse,
July 24, 2012 Vilnius, Lithuania Paul Krugman, one of America’s most decorated faux-scientists, recently told an audience that what’s happening in the world right now is “dramatically, painfully a confirmation that a broadly demand-side Keynesian view of the world is appropriate…” The intellectual dishonesty which oozes from this statement is astounding. Apparently on
July 23, 2012 Kiev, Ukraine No doubt, Eastern Europe is a part of the world where people are accustomed to being abused by politicians. After decades of Soviet Rule, the cultures in places like Ukraine, Moldova, Azerbaijan, Belarus, etc. have been inculcated with a strong mistrust of government. All government. One obvious sign
July 20, 2012 Kiev, Ukraine Bruce Lee, one of the most focused and driven human beings to have ever lived, passed away 39 years ago on this day. He went way before his time. As a kid, I idolized the man. As a teenager I trained in his style. And as an adult, I studied his
July 19, 2012 Vilnius, Lithuania It’s critical to be realistic about what’s happening in the world and to take steps to reduce the impact of governments gone wild. But as an unapologetic optimist, I think it’s likewise important to recognize that there is extraordinary opportunity all around us, no matter what. I’ll give you an example.
July 17, 2012 Vilnius, Lithuania In the mid-1800s, a cousin of Charles Darwin by the name of Francis Galton wrote a series of works expanding on an old idea of selective breeding in human beings. Galton’s theory became known as eugenics. At its core, eugenics was underpinned by an assumption that talent and genius were hereditary traits,
July 13, 2012 Warsaw, Poland One of the things that sets Warsaw apart from every other European capital is the noticeable lack of an old city center. Athens, Paris, London, Rome, Prague, Kiev– these cities are thousands of years old, and it shows. One of Europe’s delights, in fact, is the continent’s well-preserved architecture. Yet despite
July 12, 2012 Brussels, Belgium Late last night I arrived to Brussels. As the capital of the European Union, Brussels is Europe’s political mother ship, the home base of the continent’s good idea factory. You may recall, for example, the proposed EU regulations from 2010 which required all foods to be labeled by weight instead of
July 10, 2012 Porto, Portugal It’s been said that the definition of insanity is to do the same thing over and over again but to expect a different result. On that basis, the western world’s economic policymakers are clearly certifiable. They cut rates. It does nothing. So they cut rates again. And again. They in
July 10, 2012 Porto, Portugal Portugal is a country that I’ve always enjoyed, full of warm, welcoming people, excellent wine, and great weather. I came to Porto, the country’s second largest city of some 1.5 million, to get a sense of what’s been happening since the eurocalypse. 1. Capitulation of hope Excluding the city’s still-bustling
