THREE days before Javie Milei was sworn in as Argentina’s president, the Wall Street Journal reported that “El Loco” — his nickname, “the crazy one” — was already taking “a softer tone….”
That shouldn’t be a bad thing. Governing is vastly different from campaigning. And we’re talking about governing Argentina — a once prosperous nation ruined by popular but boneheaded big-government policies that have strangled the economy.
As commentators around the world have noted, Milei is the first libertarian elected to lead a country. Libertarians favor, among other things, deep cuts in spending and taxes, which, when implemented, usually result in public outcry. To be sure, most voters — anywhere — would say they favor spending cuts and lower taxes…as long as their cherished spending items are untouched, and the rich pay more taxes. The usual result of these policies is more of the same: an overspending, bloated government mugging society’s most economically productive members — the creators of wealth and jobs — many of whom, eventually, will up and leave.
Some libertarians didn’t want Milei to win. Four years — or even eight if Milei is re-elected in 2027 — is not enough to undo the statist policies of the past 80 or so years. He must deal with a bicameral Congress, the municipal and provincial governments, and the leaders of other political parties, including the most dominant, durable and demagogical of them all, the nanny-state Peronistas, who have provided utility subsidies and cash handouts while expanding pensions. (Sounds familiar?) Milei could end up a failed president, which would discredit libertarianism for years or even decades to come.
But it now seems that Milei is already adjusting to the realities of the presidency. His tone, the Journal reported, “has shifted from talk-show personality to stoic voice of reason. He acknowledged the transition from nearly two decades of leftist Peronist governments to his vision of unfettered capitalism could take longer than expected.”
In his inaugural address on Sunday, Milei said, “I prefer to tell you the uncomfortable truth, rather than a comfortable lie…. There is no alternative to an adjustment, a fiscal shock. It will impact employment, the most needy and it’s true: there will be stagflation. But it will not be very different to the last 12 years and this is the last difficult pill we need to swallow before we can begin the reconstruction of Argentina.”
An economics professor, Milei can mention “stagflation” in a speech, and explain what it is: A combination of stagnant economic growth, high unemployment, and high inflation.
And he is telling Argentineans to expect all that as he tries to implement spending cuts and other painful policies through the National Congress, which his party does not control.
Can he pull it off? And can his policies at least tame inflation, which has turned the Argentinean pesos into virtually worthless pieces of paper? (Last year, the Journal reported that in Argentina, “Hoarding is a must. ‘I came to this market and bought as much toilet paper as I could for the month, more than 20 packs,’ Melanie Lichtensztejn, a 24-year-old university student, said on a recent day. And not just toilet paper — there was also cleaning supplies, bottled drinks, milk. ‘I try to buy all I can because I know that next month it will cost more to buy,’ she said.” The news story was titled, “Inflation Got You Down? At Least You Don’t Live in Argentina.”)
In this era of social-media, Moisés Naím, a Venezuelan journalist and author, believes that President Milei must take his case directly to the public. Reform “won’t speak for itself. The case for reform must be made again and again to build and sustain public support,” Naim wrote in the Journal recently. “The key is to keep control of the narrative by telling a clear and compelling story about why reforms are needed despite their obvious short-term costs,” Naim added. “Here Milei’s obvious gifts as a communicator could be crucial. Too often in the past, reform has been sold in the kind of dry, technical language that may convince economists but leaves voters befuddled. This is not a mistake the new president is likely to make. Telling and retelling the story of reform in language regular people can easily understand is what Milei lives for.”
But according to Benjamin Gedan, director of the Latin American program at the Wilson Center, a nonpartisan think tank in Washington, “Argentines are in no mood for sacrifice, after more than a decade of economic suffering. Unions, social movements, and the Peronist opposition will be out for blood from day one.”
It seems you must be crazy to want to be president.
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