He brought with him a Midwestern optimism, and he blended it with a western "can do" spirit.

CNN: Reagan praised for?'eternal faith in America'

Meanwhile, any continuation of euro zone debt problems or failure to control spending in the U.S. will have its impact on those emerging markets that, while rich in capital and probably even rich in spirit, are by Western standards still quite poor as a whole.

FORBES: Emerging Nations Realizing It's Not Easy Getting Rich

This was a gauntlet thrown down, in a spirit of malicious glee, before the Western powers.

NEWYORKER: Getting Real

There's more to the plot, of course, in a movie that celebrates wild mustangs as the spirit of the Old West. ("Spirit" is, among other things, an exciting Western.) There's an alliance between the stallion and a young Lakota brave named Little Creek.

WSJ: 'Insomnia' Has Too Much on Its Mind

At the same time, the transition is going at full speed companies become more transparent, they hire western management and specialists from around the world, embrace an entrepreneurial spirit and shoot for the stars in their effort to make science profitable and elevate homegrown businesses into global companies.

FORBES: Venture Capital, Russian Style

The argument goes that politics, at least in this country, depends less on individual - glib or lofty, depending on your taste - Western-style television performances and more on structures, local branches and a collective spirit.

BBC: Which African leaders can make good speeches?

Popular western books such as The Bookseller of Kabul and the Dressmaker of Khair Khana speak to the entrepreneurial spirit of the Afghan people, and later works such as The Beauty School of Kabul illustrate the value of vocational training for women provided by such groups.

FORBES: 11 Years After 9/11: Looking Ahead At The Youth Of Afghanistan