When the president of the United States visited this region almost a year ago, the city of Dubai closed down for the entire day. Locals and expats alike jokingly refer to this event of yore as “Bush Day,” a day when they stayed home from work and watched movies as the leader of the “free world” took a Big Bus tour of the city.

Now, twelve months later, as W’s presidential twilight years draw to a close, another of the West’s leaders journeys to the Gulf region. Like Bush, England’s Gordon Brown is not particularly popular in the polls. But this captain from the west has more pressing issues to deal with than the restoration of his public image; he needs cash to rescue the world’s “emerged” nations from the brink of financial collapse. And so, hot on the trail of the dollars and pounds that have poured from the west