Unfortunately I have delayed posting on the 2006 "Capitalist Ball" held on 24 February which was another successful social event for the free market movement in Europe. This is an annual event in Brussels, Belgium hosted by the think tank, Centre for the New Europe - http://www.cne.org/index.htm - for nearly 300 of their friends and allies.
The keynote speaker was Jonah Norberg, a Swedish intellectual and author, http://www.johannorberg.net/, who delivered a very upbeat, optimistic assessement regarding the virtues of low taxation, free trade, and globalization. This speech was in stark contrast to the big government/central planner types who view all aspects of "dynamic capitalism" as a "race to the bottom" that creates more poverty. If Space Beagle readers still need to be convinced that trade barriers actually CAUSE poverty then please consider Mr. Norberg's work.
Another feature of this annual event is the presentation of the "Adam Smith Award" to an individual who is the best promoter/advocate of the principles of freedome and liberty (my wording). The 2006 award went to Dr. Chris Tame of the United Kingdom who is a leader of the Libertarian Alliance. Sadly Dr. Tame is nearing the end of his life due to an extremely rare form of cancer. When I lived in London years ago I had the pleasure of getting to know Chris who is probably the best-read person I have met to date and a true gentleman. He will be missed when his final day arrives but his work lives on.
As for the ball itself it was a great night of networking between colleagues in the limited government, free market community which included several guests (such as myself) from the USA. The quality of the meal itself was quite impressive given the "large crowd" setting. Our menu included:
Smoked trout, salmon, and scampi with julienne of vegetables pesto and parsley coulis
Exotic fruit sherbet
Sweet-sour duck's breast from Challans with salardaise potatoes, carrots "glaces"
Gourmand selection of various chocolate treats
Coffee and biscuits
I enjoyed the entire meal especially the smoked salmon so will rate the venue (Concert Noble) with a "4" which is generous but for serving nearly 300 guests it was impressive.
My hope is that for the 2007 Capitalist Ball we will have some major tax reform to celebrate which includes greater free trade since tariffs on goods are simply another form of taxation on consumers.
Enjoy life, reduce government,
Todd
1 comment:
I tried to send you an email, but I couldn't find an address...
Hello!
I'm writing to ask for your assistance. I'm presently writing a paper that will be submitted to the International Workshop on Weblog Ecosystems, which will be in Edinburgh, Scotland, UK in May of this year. I'm writing a paper on the Minnesota Organization of Blogs, and I would like to take a survey of members of the MOB to see how the MOB compares with other profiles of bloggers, and the general public.
All of this data will be kept strictly confidential.
Age:
The reason I'm asking about age is because there was a recent journal article that said three out of four LiveJournal bloggers were between 16 and 24 years of age. I know we have a much wider spread, but I'd still like to be able to compare it.
Marital Status:
The reason I ask this is because Nick Coleman said that bloggers were the lonely guys listening to police scanners. I know this is not the case, but I want to compare it with the general population
Level of Education:
Nick inspired me to this one as well, when he compared journalists to astronomers. I believe we are significantly more educated than the general public, but I want to confirm this.
How do you read the blogs you read regularly? Do you surf a blogroll, use an RSS aggregator, use the favorites menu in your browser, etc.
The reason I ask is because other papers haven't discussed this, and I was curious.
How many of your regularly read blogs are other MOB blogs? How many of your regularly read blogs are outside the MOB?
The reason I ask this is because I'm curious as to how many of the visits to MOB blogs are from other MOBsters, and how many are from outside the MOB.
What was your traffic for the month of January? (Be honest, now! If you can give both visits and page views, that would be great)
The reason I ask this is because I plan to say "The MOB received x visits and y page views in January." Your number will just get added together with all the rest. I get less traffic than most members of the MOB, so I'm definitely not interested in comparing individual stats.
If I can get this information from you by this Thursday, that would be great.
Best wishes,
Dr. Douglas Bass
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