Argentina's self ruin: a "diverse" perspective

I'm so used to hearing college students euphemize studying abroad as "an opportunity to experience diverse perspectives," that if someone were to object to this dogma - "Have you tried Mecca's study abroad program?" - I might become confused and clammy and ask "Where am I?"

So behold the unique perspective we can gain from Argentina's socialist government.

If you saw the fiesta of banners and drums in the streets of DC on election night, you've seen Argentina on Nyquil. Since Evita, the masses of Buenos Aires make it a tradition to cheer in the streets right before their government socializes the economy, and then take angrily to the streets (forcing a president's helicopter evacuation in 2001) when they realize half the nation is impoverished, then repeat.

Now comes Argentina’s "New Deal" from President Cristina Kirchner. An audacious name, given the real deal's failure. But consider Argentina's "diverse perspective": Decades of interventionist rule under General Perón spun the country into hyperinflation in the 1980s. Carlos Menem's "shock-therapy" privatizations in the 90s were great, but are now scapegoated for 2001's bitter debt default (actually attributable to corruption and bad fiscal policy). So today everyone is a "Peronista," privatization is but Menemism, and the public universities teach that FDR’s New Deal ended the Great Depression.

Cristina is loud and proud about "redistribution of wealth." One sneaky reporter asked if she'd lead by example and give him $50 to redistribute to street vendors, and she complied.

Socialism works for export-dependent countries when commodity prices are high (gas in Russia, oil in Venezuela, soy in Argentina), but when prices drop you have, shall we say, "a unique cultural experience."

Cristina wants to fix this glitch of socialism with more socialism. She nationalized pensions in October, and will use the money on her "New Deal" projects.

She wants to raise and spend money. One way to do this is to stop asking questions when people deposit money in Argentine banks. "You sir, Muhammad bin-Jihad from the tri-border region, how much will you be depositing?" (Islamic terrorists allegedly train in the Paraguay’s lawless slums. Where the money flows in Latin America – from Iran or from Chavez to terrorists to Argentine banks – is no matter of indifference to Americans.)

The US isn't alone today in its dreary woods. We can "study what's happening abroad," and "gain a diverse perspective" of the ways other cultures masochistically annihilate their economies, so that we don't make the same mistakes.