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十月卅一日（金）晴。金鐘の運輸署で国際運転免許証申請と受領。列に並ぶこと２分。カウンターでは即時発行で１分。計３分で出来上がり。この効率を日本の役所も見習ふべき。而も今日は顔写真２枚必要なところ１枚しか持参せず、インスタントの証明写真撮つて再訪かと覚悟したら「いいわよ」と顔写真１枚分コピーして済ませてくれる親切な職員。「金融混乱もほんとどうなるのかしら」とその職員に笑顔で返され、何事か？と思つたら、アタシが列に並んで読んでゐた２週間前のThe Economist紙、“Capitalism at bay”なる巻頭記事読み耽つてゐて、その雑誌までカウンターで手渡してゐたが為のこと。田中康夫氏も納得するであらう、この服務とは何か？の答へ。運輸署から戻るとちやうど届いたThe Economist誌の最新号。驚くまでもなく当然、小浜氏への支持表明。“It's time”と題して“America should take a chance and make Barack Obama the next leader of the free world”と宣ふ。ここまで左も右も小浜馬楽君諸手を挙げて支持して何か間違ひがあつた場合に誰が責任をとるのかしら。「元ネオコンの」フランシス＝フクヤマ氏も小浜支持の由。晩に帰宅して夕食済ませてから香港空港。晩十時前の空港行きリムジンバスに乗客はアタシともう一人。築地のＨ君が実に1991年以来17年ぶりに来港。今回は若いＡ君とＫ君同伴。Ａ君は前回来港の時は幼く香港の記憶なし（胎児だから当たり前か）。難民フライトと言つては失礼だが東京発最安値は決まつてこれ、のNW011便。デトロイト発成田経由のこの便は決まつて遅れるが今夜も成田発が一時間半近く遅れた割には一時間ほど挽回して20分ほどの遅れ。23：45頃Ｈ君らゲイトアウト。Ａ君、Ｋ君と会ふのは10数年ぶり。エアポートエクスプレスで九龍站。三更半夜すでにシャトルバス終はりタクシー長蛇の列。九龍站では見つけ難い乗り場から路線バスで佐敦。歩いて尖沙咀。ハロウィンの騒ぎで巷民多し。深夜営業の茶餐庁で食べ盛りのＡ君、Ｋ君の夜食。H君と「さうやつて食べてゐるのを見てゐるだけで此方はお腹いつぱい」なんてドラマの出来合ひの台詞だと若い頃は思つてゐたが、それが本音、と笑ふ。茶餐庁には片言の日本語ながら実に丁寧に話す給仕が忙しいなか働く態あり。敬服。Ｈ君らを午前一時の重慶マンションに案内。もと／＼バックパッカーのＨ君にとつて香港の宿泊＝重慶マンション、なのは困つたもの。Ａ座４階のChungking Houseは重慶マンションの中では５ツ星。３人部屋は冷房、シャワー完備、でHK$550だ。明日のラグビー試合80分観戦のチケット代よりずつと安い。深更でさすがにＨ君ともども飲みに出る気も失せる深更で三人をホテルに残しタクシーで帰宅。
▼上述のThe Economist紙（10月28日号）の“Capitalism at bay”は必読。
ONE hundred and sixty five years ago, a Scottish businessman set out his plans for a newspaper. James Wilson’s starting point was “a melancholy reflection”: “while wealth and capital have been rapidly increasing” and science and art “working the most surprising miracles”, all classes of people were marked “by characters of uncertainty and insecurity”. Wilson’s solution was freedom. He committed his venture to the struggle not just against the protectionist corn laws but against attempts to raise up “barriers to intercourse, jealousies, animosities and heartburnings between individuals and classes in this country, and again between this country and all others”. Ever since, The Economist has been on the side of economic liberty.
なんて書き出しにアタシは身震ひするが、以下、いくつか抜粋。

• Over the past century and a half capitalism has proved its worth for billions of people. The parts of the world where it has flourished have prospered; the parts where it has shrivelled have suffered. Capitalism has always engendered crises, and always will. The world should use the latest one, devastating though it is, to learn how to manage it better.
• The politicians all claim they understand this. Of course, they have no intention of revisiting Mitterrand’s mistakes, of trying to run the banks themselves, or of taking stakes elsewhere. Yet already voices (including Lady Thatcher’s Tory heirs) are pushing to limit executive pay. It will be a brave president who goes to Detroit and explains why the 45,000 well-paid folk at Morgan Stanley should get $10 billion of taxpayers' money, but the 266,000 people at General Motors should not. Brave too would be any politician who proposed deregulation as a solution to a public-sector problem.
• Even allowing for the credit crunch, this decade may well see the fastest growth in global income per person in history. The free movement of non-financial goods and services should not be dragged into the argument―as they were, to disastrous effect, in the 1930s.
• A second group of critics focuses on deregulation in finance, rather than the economy as a whole. This case has much more merit. Finance needs regulation. It has always been prone to panics, crashes and bubbles (in Victorian times this newspaper was moaning about railway stocks, not house prices). Because the rest of the economy cannot work without it, governments have always been heavily involved.

経済と金融とのきちんとした見分け。自由経済は守られるべきだが金融は、殊にデリバティヴのやうな手品が横行するからこそ規則が必要となる。九十年代に地獄を経験した日本と韓国は国による金融の監督を強めたが、その必要はこれに因るもの。

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