The Night Before Davos

Usually, the night before Davos begins is a bit of an intellectual smorgasbord, as people look forward to the variety of things they're going to enjoy in the next few days. Not this year. At the opening receptions and dinners, where everyone catches up with old friends and makes new ones, the talk was not of Wen Jiabao or Vladimir Putin or brilliant scientists or socially-conscious rock-stars. It was all about the global economy, about the scale of job losses blazoned over the front pages of the papers this morning, about the death of decoupling (the idea that the developing world might continue to grow even if the rich one didn't) and deep uncertainty about the year ahead. We 'll explore some of those themes at the opening day session on the global economic outlook, which I'm chairing, tomorrow morning.

There's the usual talk in the papers about the relativey low-level American participation - only Valerie Jarrett of top level Obamaistas is coming. But this is no story; it happens every four years, when a new administration finds it has more pressing things to do on the last weekend on January. Besides, who comes to Davos to see Americans? One of the secrets of the meeting's success is that it is one of those places where American concerns, American tropes, American folks, are not reflexively at the center of things. In which sense, of course, it mirrors our world. Which is probably a topic for another post.

Anxious readers will want to know that my bags finally arrived. And that the rosti - an artery-clogging local dish of potatoes, bacon, and fried egg - is as good as ever. I had a great one tonight with my German friends Joe and Christine Joffe, then dropped in to the drinks party hosted by Israeli high-tech entrepreneur Yossi Vardi at the Belvedere. And then the long trudge through the icy streets - it snowed off and on all day, and I was told that the skiing on the Parsenn was spectacular, dammit - and so to bed.