A Political Earthquake
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2023-11-20 06:22 by Karl Denninger
in International , 375 references Ignore this thread
A Political Earthquake
[Comments enabled]

I doubted it could happen, but it did.

After decades of socialism -- all failed, with insane inflation rates, a full-on collapse that led to wild violence both political and between citizens and more -- Argentina has had enough of it.

Argentinians have elected as their next president Javier Milei, a self-described anarcho-capitalist whose sensational rhetoric has drawn comparisons to former U.S. President Donald Trump. 

Partial election results showed Milei had 55.8% and Massa 44.2%, with 95% of the votes tallies. Should that margin hold, it would be wider than predicted by all polls and the widest since Argentina's return to democracy in 1983.

I'm relying on translations, which of course can be fraught with risk -- but the positions Milei has taken were clear.

No more handouts.

No more deficit spending to try to "redistribute."  You want something you will pay taxes for it first.  If you won't pay, you won't get, and the government will massively shrink in size as a result.

No open immigration, or open anything for that matter.  Argentina and her people first, period.

We'll see.  Its easy to say all this but hard to do.

Nonetheless that the people have been willing to at least in theory walk off from the disaster and attempt to resolve it is a promising sign.  Argentina has a lot of natural resources; with reasonable government policies there is no reason to believe they should not be able to have a good degree of prosperity -- but not equal results for all, which always ends in failure.

Is it dawn -- not in America, but for a nation that has been plagued with government malfeasance and disaster for decades?

We shall see.

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Comments on A Political Earthquake
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Rickyd 2k posts, incept 2009-07-07
2023-11-20 06:54:17

I will be curious to see what happens to the Argentine Peso. Right now, it's 1 USD gets you about 352 ARS.
Unwashed 161 posts, incept 2023-06-23
2023-11-20 07:49:51

It would be nice to see the tide turning but seeing is believing.
Manawa 9 posts, incept 2021-11-10
2023-11-20 07:49:55

If he is actually representing the people of Argentina he will probably be removed from office by the globalists in any way possible i.e., scandal or assassination. Can't have anyone in office that doesn't toe the socialist/marxist/communist party line. "If voting actually accomplished anything, they wouldn't let us do it". George Carlin
Gianmarko 272 posts, incept 2013-03-11
2023-11-20 07:59:32

There will be the usual international reaction against the populist, far right, racist and homophobic threat, the country will be cordoned off, diplomatic relations severed, the "markets" will punish the argentinians, sanction will be imposed, and a violent media campaign will start. Then the judiciary will spring into action and multiple investigations and indictions will appear, followed by the inevitable convictions.

In the meanwhile, whatever this guy might decide to do, it will be ignored, buried into dusty drawers, fought in court by the usual NGOs.

I wish things would go differently but this is my prediction.
Flappingeagle 5k posts, incept 2011-04-14
2023-11-20 08:00:21

We shall see is correct.

Ive often thought that one of the key differences between capitalism and socialism is that with capitalism it is pain first and long-lasting prosperity later. With socialism it is prosperity first (the illusion of) and long-lasting pain later.

The idea of prosperity first suckers in the idiots every time.

Flap

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Here are my predictions for everyone to see:
S&P 500 at 320, DOW at 2200, Gold $300/oz, and Corn $2/bu.
No sign that housing, equities, or farmland are in a bubble- Yellen 11/14/13
Trying to leave
Europeasant 52 posts, incept 2011-07-03
2023-11-20 08:30:32

The Argentina experiment will be worth watching. I hope they succeed but at first it will be painful for a few/many people. The communist/socialist system is deeply entrenched in developed countries. Many, many laws and rules and systems are in place to govern/control the people.
Synopsis 112 posts, incept 2010-02-05
2023-11-20 08:30:38

It just goes to shows you how far out of whack and for how long it can go on before people start to wake up. By this gauge, we still have a long way to go.
Gianmarko 272 posts, incept 2013-03-11
2023-11-20 08:32:05

"capitalism it is pain first and long-lasting prosperity later"

That is one of the best descriptions i have seen.

Unfortunately, many think that is possible, in capitalism, to have prosperity first, by printing money.
Joancrawford 855 posts, incept 2013-10-14
2023-11-20 08:41:44

No more handouts.

No more open immigration.

No more free shit (you have to be taxed first).

What kind of sick Nazi are you, Mr. Denninger?

The next thing you'll be spouting is, no more involvement in foreign entanglements.

If I didn't know better, I'd swear you were one of those Constitutionalist bigots.


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Time may be a great healer, but it's a lousy beautician.-Dorothy Parker

Boys don't make passes at girls with fat asses.-slightly modified DP
Eoinw 189 posts, incept 2021-07-14
2023-11-20 08:53:50

Listening to him describe "Shit Leftists" I would swear he lived in Canada through the fake covid pandemic. As liberals lost their minds - because their precious FEAR justified everything they did - they behaved just like the Leftist Milei talks about. The buggers even turned me into a 2nd class citizen!

Now I'm not crazy about his hairdo. Reminds me of that pseudo-Conservative Boris Johnson.

Yes I know, all Conservative politicians in the West are fakes. That's why everything is liberal and woke.

I guess I'll celebrate now because I remember Meloni and I remember Trump's wasted 4 years. I also know that when they talk about RINOs they pretend it's a minority when it's actually over 90% of Republican politicians my entire lifetime!

I ain't from Missouri, nevertheless, Javier Milei - SHOW ME!
Barley 40 posts, incept 2015-12-09
2023-11-20 08:55:02

How far did Argentina have to fall before this happened? I'm afraid America has a lot further to fall before this happens here. 2016 was an aberration. More of a rejection of Hellary than an endorsement of Trump. He was given his chance and failed to deliver.
Ocdawg 527 posts, incept 2019-03-14
2023-11-20 09:08:34

smiley

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29 in a row, but the quest for the Three-peat ends...
GO DAWGS!!! SIC 'EM! WOOF! WOOF!! WOOF!!!
smileysmileysmiley
Tickerguy 200k posts, incept 2007-06-26
2023-11-20 08:57:23

@Barley if we go anywhere near there the entire FIRE "economy" is dead, buried and the skulls fucked repeatedly.

There effectively no credit and no insurance possible in a high-inflation environment since it can't be priced; the further out in time you go the more-impossible pricing it is, so things like life insurance are completely impossible to purchase.

Credit of any sort is similarly impossible, particularly for any sort of duration.

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"Anyone wearing a mask will be presumed to be intending armed robbery and immediately shot in the face. Govern yourself accordingly."
Raven 16k posts, incept 2017-06-27
2023-11-20 09:08:56

When all else fails, try something else.

Let's see how they do.

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Mission Complete
Pilot 2k posts, incept 2008-10-15
2023-11-20 09:09:01

IMHO we got a LOOOOONG way to go before any of that happens here. Its definitely what is needed, but as others have mentioned, this will just be on a much bigger scale. Our economy is so much larger and the amount of folks who have to reach the "level" to elect someone like that is much farther away.

There are NO candidates on the current political landscape that would even truly and realistically consider this.

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"Alas, alas, that great city of Babylon, that mighty city! for in one hour thy judgment come"
Bluto 2k posts, incept 2021-07-10
2023-11-20 09:09:16

One of the tricks the left employs is to make their political opposition feel isolated and outnumbered. An example of this is when online newspapers started removing online comments several years ago.

When people feel outnumbered, most of them are less likely to get engaged since they feel it is a losing battle.

One very positive side effect of this overwhelming win is to confirm that those folks are not only a fringe minority, but a majority. For context, the closest thing we have to a 12-point win in the US was Reagan's 1984 re-election.

Hopefully he can do better than Trump did here. He does seem more intelligent, at least in the one interview I saw with Tucker Carlson.

The other mistake that happened here is that most of Trump's voters expected Trump to single-handedly fix everything (of course, Trump's ego played into that). As a result, Trump did not get competent help, nor could he get his voters to show up for midterm elections. Hopefully Milie can do a better job at building an effective and long-lasting coalition.

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"You must never confuse faith that you will prevail in the end -- which you can never afford to lose -- with the discipline to confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever
Off_grid99 49 posts, incept 2022-02-03
2023-11-20 09:09:28

I hope he has a kick-ass security detail. The radical left will not sit quietly while he tries to dismantle their path to communist utopia. We shall see.
Greenacr 948 posts, incept 2016-03-15
2023-11-20 09:11:01

@ Tickerguy "Is it dawn -- not in America"

Unfortunately, in America our political class is partying like it's 1999.

We need a second great depression and soon to wake everyone up. The longer we go with the can being kicked means that more and more people get used to free shit and the effects of our socialist education system continue to warp our Nation's youth.

At some point we hit a point of no return in that we can never return to the model that the nation was founded on. Hell, we might even be past that point now.
Bluto 2k posts, incept 2021-07-10
2023-11-20 09:17:24

@Greenacr What makes you think a second great depression will make people wake up?

During the first great depression, FDR was a four-term president, the US took a hard turn left, and then entered WWII. Not such a good outcome. And the country was, in many ways, much stronger then.

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"You must never confuse faith that you will prevail in the end -- which you can never afford to lose -- with the discipline to confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever
Eoinw 189 posts, incept 2021-07-14
2023-11-20 09:30:30

Have to give the Argentines credit. How many times has the country defaulted on its debt? That's socialist governments defaulting. Guess what, every time the IMF and World Bank came running back to lend them more money.

What's the point of being a banker if you can't collect interest? Don't tell me they all think like George Bailey!!!

When a conservative friend talks about the great Stephen Harper, I ask a simple question: If he was so conservative, why didn't he eliminate the debt? If Argentina can do it...

Which begs the obvious question: if we are the richest society in human history then why is every country ALWAYS in debt? Could it be a giant wealth transfer from productive taxpayers to parasitic financiers?

Have to say Argentina is certainly different. Even Juan Peron. He'd put on a great fascist show for his Anglo-American backers, while secretly funding every revolutionary movement in Latin America.
Joancrawford 855 posts, incept 2013-10-14
2023-11-20 09:38:04

And the country was, in many ways, much stronger then.- Bluto

Good point. It was also a lot whiter. Among other things we've lost in the past 60 years.

I look back on the war years and marvel at the way the entire country got off their asses and got behind (arguably for better or worse) the war effort. I grew up during the Vietnam era, so all I've ever known is a divided populace.

We have an entire generation of people who have been given participation trophies and affirmation that their feelings should always be given careful consideration. What happens to them when they're told that they're really not special? That in order for them to be able to succeed in life, they most buckle down, listen in school (as opposed to scrolling through their iphones and heaving chairs at teachers), or they'll be no soup that night for dinner?

As I see it, there's a world full of pain coming at all of us, regardless of the directions we go. It's unavoidable. At this point, anyone who doesn't have a plan B and a plan C when (not if) the SHTF, is in for a very rude awakening.

The free shit is drying up and the time to prepare for it was yesterday. Regrettably, most of the populace is still fixated on what to post on Fartbook o the latest Tic Toc fad to take any notice.

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Time may be a great healer, but it's a lousy beautician.-Dorothy Parker

Boys don't make passes at girls with fat asses.-slightly modified DP
Eoinw 189 posts, incept 2021-07-14
2023-11-20 09:39:09

@ Bluto

Pushing on a string?

In Canada, there were no social programs and the government refused to go into debt - until 1939. Going into debt to help people was verboten. Going into debt for a war on the other side of the world was perfectly acceptable.

No disrepsect to John Steinbeck, however the great Depression was far worse in Canada than the USA.

Today, how does one save the day with debt when we're already past maximum debt?

I do agree with you that it's a faint hope people will wake up. In 1930 citizens were way more in touch with reality than today's Alice in Wonderland world.

I'd describe the 21st century westerner as primed for a Brave New World. A shame, for them, the people ushering it in are so incompetent they'll just create a giant mess.
Abelardlindsey 2k posts, incept 2021-03-26
2023-11-20 10:20:35

Vox Day thinks this will end up as a nothing-sandwich. He may or may not prove to be right. Only time will tell.

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Its all in the mitochondria.

Soylent Green is people!
Peterm99 10k posts, incept 2009-03-21
2023-11-20 10:47:30

Flappingeagle wrote..
. . . one of the key differences between capitalism and socialism is that with capitalism it is pain first and long-lasting prosperity later. With socialism it is prosperity first (the illusion of) and long-lasting pain later.
Excellent description that applies in theory. In reality, the prosperity associated with "capitalism" tends to degrade with time.

Never in history has "capitalism" survived in its ideal state for any appreciable length of time. It invariably degenerates into "crony capitalism" or oligarchy or the like fairly quickly, in which the primary benefits of the system accrue not to the society, but to TPTB and those who have managed to curry favor with TPTB. Preventing such a transition requires well-intentioned, incorruptible rulers and/or strict, even draconian, accountability of those in power by an involved, well-informed electorate who themselves are incorruptible by various promises. One might as well dream of utopia.

Nevertheless, what this guy claims to want to accomplish would certainly be a huge improvement for his country. If this guy is for real, I wish him lots of luck - he's definitely gonna need it, as he will have extremely strong opposition from well-entrenched, powerful interests both within and without the country. Sadly, I believe that Gianmarko's prediction is likely to be spot-on.


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". . . the Constitution has died, the economy welters in irreversible decline, we have perpetual war, all power lies in the hands of the executive, the police are supreme, and a surveillance b
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