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But generally the sad conclusion is that for all his liberal quoting of Popper, Soros deems a society "open" not if it respects human rights and basic freedoms, but if it is "open" for him and his associates to make money. And, indeed, Soros has made money in every country he has helped to prise "open". In Kosovo, for example, he has invested $50m in an attempt to gain control of the Trepca mine complex, where there are vast reserves of gold, silver, lead and other minerals estimated to be worth in the region of $5bn. He thus copied a pattern he has deployed to great effect over the whole of eastern Europe: of advocating "shock therapy" and "economic reform", then swooping in with his associates to buy valuable state assets at knock-down prices.

More than a decade after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Soros is the uncrowned king of eastern Europe. His Central European University, with campuses in Budapest, Warsaw and Prague and exchange programmes in the US, unashamedly propagates the ethos of neoliberal capitalism and clones the next pro-American generation of political leaders in the region. With his financial stranglehold over political parties, business, educational institutions and the arts, criticism of Soros in mainstream eastern European media is hard to find. Hagiography is not. The Budapest Sun reported in February how he had been made an honorary citizen of Budapest by the mayor, Gabor Demszky. "Few people have done to Budapest what George Soros has," gushed Demszky, saying that the billionaire had contributed to "structural and mental changes in the capital city and Hungary itself". The mayor failed to add that Soros is also a benefactor of Demszky's own party, the Free Democrats, which, governing with "reform" communists, has pursued the classic Soros agenda of privatisation and economic liberalisation—leading to a widening gap between rich and poor.

The Soros strategy for extending Pax Americana differs from the Bush model, particularly in its subtlety. But it is just as ambitious and just as deadly. Left- liberals, admiring his support for some of their favourite issues such as advocating rights and the legalisation of soft drugs, let him off lightly.

Asked about the havoc his currency speculation caused to Far Eastern economies in the crash of 1997, Soros replied: "As a market participant, I don't need to be concerned with the consequences of my actions." Strange words from a man who likes to be regarded as the saviour of civil society and who rails in print against "market fundamentalism".