Wednesday, April 2, 2008

"I HAVE ANOTHER SIN - BEING A WOMAN" - C. F. de K.

MEAT STRIKE: DAY 21

"To the client: We inform you that for reasons beyond the control of this business, we find ourselves with a deficiency of meat products"

First off, allow me to wish all my readers a very happy Argentine Malvinas Islands day. In the grand tradition of politics in this country, yesterday President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner reaffirmed Argentina's inalienable sovereignty  over the tiny, sheep-rich islands just as she managed to send the country straight to hell with a 40 percent tax increase on soy exports. Although global prices for agrarian exports are at their highest level in years in years, La Presidenta's glorious leadership has resulted in a general strike across the farm industry. Gauchos are burning bails of hay on the highways at roadblocks every few miles to prevent any agrarian products from going anywhere, and millions of cows, pigs, sheep and chicken are enjoying a stay of execution. Instead of enjoying an enormous influx of foreign currency, the country is at a complete standstill. 

Why are these Gauchos enjoying an afternoon drive instead of killing me some steaks?
More pressing to me than the fate of the country, though, is that there is no meat anywhere. I don't want to say that I came here to eat steak, but I certainly didn't come here to not eat steak. Rather large numbers of the locals seem upset as well, and protests have taken place all over the city. Unfortunately, these protests have gone from extremely annoying to violent in a rather short span of time. It began with large middle class protests against the government that saw thousands taking to the street (or simply hanging out the windows) banging pots and pans. I was willing to endure this cacophonic outburst of popular sentiment as I thought that the nonstop clanking might encourage the government to reconsider is position.  The Peronists, however,  already know that they do not enjoy major support in the capital, and have decided to play to their base by not appearing weak in front of the effete citizens of Buenos Aires. Instead, Kirchner's government has brought in the nations number one rabble-rouser to create the appearance of grassroots support by whipping up a mob. Some of the counter demonstrations organized by Luis D'Elía (pictured below) have already erupted into brawls, largely ignored by the federal police.  

Mr. D'Elía supplies thoughtful commentary to representatives of the fourth estate.
To a crowd of thousands bused in from the slums and suburbs of the city, La Presidenta delivered an impassioned speech about how the nebulous and fascistic powers behind the current strike have conspired to undermine her government because they fear the mob (not Cristina's words) and because she is a woman. Then, in a masterstroke of political double or triplethink, she changed the topic from the present situation paralyzing the country to the 1976 military coup and then on to Argentina's specious claim to the windswept Falkland Islands.  
 La Presidenta opens the roads with ruthless efficiency. 
Allow me to attempt to enter the mind of her excellency: This strike is being perpetrated against me by fascists because I am a woman, these same fascists are responsible for the last coup, the fascists want to keep the country weak, the country needs the Falkland Islands, do not look at the man behind the curtain. That the 1976 coup just so happened to oust the other woman president to occupy the Pink House allows Cristina to distract the audience from the issue of the unjust tax increase and create sympathy for herself by portraying herself not only as the victim of sexism, but also by assuming the unassailable mantle of a martyr of the dictatorship.

Instead of focusing on the government's exorbitant tax hike on small farmers, the audience is left with the impression that Cristina - sanctified by the blood shed in the dirty war - is defending the country from the criminals of the oligarchy. That the claim to the Falklands was by and large manufactured by these same criminals (Nicolás Francomano himself, probably) when their own incompetence was becoming readily apparent matters little. Even though it was the fascists whom Kirchner decries that had the idea to invade the Falklands in the first place, the president seems content to manipulate the mob with the feverish sloganeering of irredentism rather than addressing the problems she has created. 

All things being equal, I suppose that this sort of political duplicity exists in every country of the world (except in Scandinavia), and that Argentina is still better off with Peronism's duplicity than Bolivarian Socialism's totalitarian inclinations. Maybe someday they will get the Falkland's back, but until then I'd like somebody to do something about the steak situation.



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