You needed to have your wits about you at this year's meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, and not just because the Alpine resort's sidewalks had been rendered glass-like by a dump of snow just before the proceedings began. (The skiing, since you ask, was fabulous.) Blink too quickly, and you'd miss the founders of Google at a reception for the Australian Prime Minister; or Al Gore, Shimon Peres and the head of Iran's central bank scurrying to separate meetings in a crowded hotel lobby while Bill Gates conducted interviews in a room just above them. And then there were the celebs: Angelina Jolie and Sharon Stone; Peter Gabriel and Bono; Lionel Richie (if he still counts as one) and Richard Gere, whose white hair gave him the air of a distinguished professor parachuted in to elucidate the theory of comparative advantage.
Yet if this year's Davos was more star-struck than ever, it also returned to its European roots. Busy with their jobs in the second Bush Administration, key U.S. policymakers like Vice President Dick Cheney (last year's headliner) stayed home. Though a gaggle of senators graced the proceedings, the senior Administration figure present was Robert Zoellick, the new deputy to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. By contrast, Britain's Prime Minister Tony Blair and Germany's Chancellor Gerhard Schröder gave major speeches... |