Argentina’s leading presidential candidate Javier Milei – a self-described anarcho-capitalist who won the primaries with 30% of the vote – sat down with Tucker Carlson this week in Buenos Aires for a wide-ranging discussion.
Prior to the interview, Carlson documented first-hand the hyperinflationary perils of statism run wild…
Ep. 23 Hyperinflation and reckless monetary policy could soon devastate the global economy. We traveled to Argentina, where it’s already happened. pic.twitter.com/vTEXroh4Uz
— Tucker Carlson (@TuckerCarlson) September 13, 2023
Carlson and Milei talked about why the citizens of Argentina are fed up with the relentless lack of change and the relentless economic decline, echoing many similar patterns taking place in America, with the one-time congressman explaining his platform of radical change which would include the dissolution of numerous socialist institutions and the very central bank which has led Argentina into multiple fiscal crisis events.
Milei’s advice to Americans is simple: “Never embrace the ideas of socialism.”
“Never allow yourselves to be seduced by the siren song of social justice. Don’t get caught up in that terrible concept that where there is a need, there is a right. But that can’t happen on its own.
We have to be prepared for this, and wage a cultural war every single day and we have to be careful because they have no problem with getting inside the State and employing Gramsci’s techniques: seducing the artists, seducing the culture, seducing the media or meddling in educational content.”
Reflecting in the slippery slope of American leftist politics, Carlson noted that Argentina has adopted many left-wing social issues.
“I didn’t fully appreciate the degree to which the Argentinian government had embraced fringe academic, American-style social justice,” Carlson told Milei, adding that “a businessman told me at lunch today that people who identify as transgender pay lower taxes, and that in 2019 you had a Ministry of Women and Diversity created in this country for the first time. What does that ministry do?”
“In theory, it is supposed to deal with women’s issues,” Milei said.
“But when you look at the results, you find there aren’t any. Just writing songs…”
“Are women happier here?” Carlson asked.
“No,” Milei said. “Because there are no real results.”
And added, “why isn’t there a Ministry of Men?”
Then, Milei really touched the third rail… by supporting President Trump, and offering him some advice:
“[Trump] should continue his fight against socialism. Because he is one of the few who truly understood that we are fighting socialism, that we are fighting the statists.
He understood perfectly that the generation of wealth comes from the private sector.
The State does not create wealth, the State destroys it.
The State can give you nothing, because it produces nothing. And when it attempts it, it does so poorly.”
“So I’d say, if I could humbly offer advice, all I could say would be to double down on his efforts in the same direction: defending the ideals of freedom and refusing to give an inch to the socialists,” he continued.
The discussion included Milei’s controversial denouncement of the Pope, his views on abortion, and his belief that climate change is a “socialist lie.”
Watch the full interview below:
- (0:00) Intro
- (3:32) Inflation
- (6:00) Gender ideology
- (9:57) Abortion
- (11:45) Pope Francis’ affinity for dictators
- (14:45) Architecture
- (17:52) Advice to Americans and Donald Trump
- (22:23) Climate change
- (27:55) China
- (29:18) Prayer
- (30:39) Violent political protests
Ep. 24 Argentina’s next president could be Javier Milei. Who is he? We traveled to Buenos Aires to speak with him and find out. pic.twitter.com/4WwTZYoWHs
— Tucker Carlson (@TuckerCarlson) September 14, 2023
* * *
As Manuel Garcia Gojon writes, at The Mises Institute, Milei’s full plan – which he laid out in some detail on August 2nd, is nothing if not pragmatic from an anarchist point of view.
The first measure consists of an organizational reform of the government, going from 18 to 8 ministries. The ministries to be included are interior, foreign relations, defense, economy, justice, security, infrastructure, and human capital. No career bureaucrats are to be fired initially, but they will be reassigned. The political appointees will not be renewed and will be kept to a minimum. All government employee privileges, such as bodyguards and drivers, will be eliminated, except in the cases in which they are absolutely necessary for security reasons. This measure also includes initiating the privatization or closure process of all state-owned companies.
The second measure consists of a significant reduction in public spending. For the first budget, they seek to eliminate expenditure items amounting to 15 percent of GDP, taking it from a deficit to a surplus. On the revenue side, they seek to eliminate 90 percent of taxes, which only raise an amount equal to 2 percent of GDP but have a distortive effect. There is also an intention of lowering the taxes that remain.
The third measure consists of a flexibilization of labor regulations. Firing an employee is currently very costly in Argentina between litigation and compensation. This measure is geared toward reducing those costs by making it easier for companies to fire new employees. The balancing side of this measure is the implementation of a private unemployment insurance scheme. With this measure they seek to take formal employment in the private sector from 6 million positions to 14 million positions.
The fourth measure consists of a liberalization of trade. The goal of this measure is unilateral free trade in the style of Chile. This includes the elimination of all import and export tariffs and the reduction of regulatory restrictions.
The fifth measure consists of a monetary reform. This measure includes allowing the use of any commodity or foreign currency as legal tender and the liquidation of the central bank, which would result in the elimination of the Argentine Peso. There are alternative plans for the implementation of this measure, but the leading one is the one developed by Emilio Ocampo and Nicolas Cachanosky. In terms of timing, it would take between nine and 24 months. The conversion would be made at the market exchange rate. Once two thirds of the monetary base has been converted, a countdown for the last date to convert would be triggered.
An additional challenge for this measure is that the central bank has remunerated liabilities three times the size of the monetary base. These are like the Federal Reserve’s program of paying interest on reserves in order to sterilize increases in the quantity of money. The central bank does have some commodities and foreign currencies in reserves but most of the assets consist of government bonds that currently trade at a third of their face value. To access the necessary liquidity to liquidate the central bank, the bonds would be transferred to a fund which would acquire the necessary line of credit using the bonds as collateral. The line of credit has already been confidentially agreed upon. The bonds are guaranteed to increase in price if the budget deficit is eliminated as specified in the second measure.
The sixth measure consists of an energy reform. This measure intends to eliminate all subsidies to energy providers through a recalibration of the financial equilibrium to lower costs to keep the companies profitable and minimize the impact on the cost to the consumers. This measure opens a door to subsidies on the demand side for vulnerable households. They also seek to improve the energy infrastructure through a scheme of public interest declarations for projects which would be financed and executed by the private sector, but for which the government might provide a minimum revenue guarantee.
The seventh measure consists of fostering investment. This will be done through a special legal arrangement for long term investment with a focus on mining, fossil fuels, renewable energy, forestry, and other sectors. In order to foster investment, they will also aim to eliminate foreign exchange restrictions and export fees.
The eighth measure consists of an agrarian reform. This includes the elimination of the foreign exchange spread between the official exchange rate and the market exchange rate through the liquidation of the central bank, the elimination of all export fees and retentions, the elimination of the gross revenue tax, the elimination of all restrictions to foreign trade including quotas and the need for authorization, the promulgation of a new seeds law, and the improvement to road infrastructure through private enterprise.
The ninth measure consists of a judicial reform. This measure includes the designation of a Minister of Justice with the consensus of the judicial branch, as well as the appointment of a Supreme Court Justice without political affiliations to fill the present vacancy, prohibiting members of the judicial branch from engaging in partisan politics, and promoting the budgetary independence of the judicial branch. Furthermore, they will seek to implement jury trials and oral proceedings throughout the country.
The tenth measure consists of a welfare reform. Current welfare benefits will be initially maintained. They aim to move in the long term towards a private system in which users pay for the health and education services they consume. In the short term they aim to provide income protection programs to mitigate extreme poverty, nutritional programs, parental educational programs about cognitive stimulation, greater coverage for preschool, incentives for graduation, programs for the integration of people with disabilities, the promotion of access to private credit, and the elimination of all middlemen in the provision of welfare.
The eleventh measure consists of an educational reform. They aim to move towards a greater degree of freedom to choose the curricula, methods, and educators. The measure also includes launching a school voucher pilot program. They will also establish an evaluation criterion for schools so that they may compete for incentives.
The twelfth measure consists of a health reform. They aim to transfer the subsidization of healthcare from supply to demand to allow for greater freedom of choice and competition. This measure includes providing the existing healthcare benefits as vouchers so that there is no restriction to a specific provider.
The thirteenth measure consists of a security reform. This measure includes reforms to the homeland security, national defense, and intelligence laws, as well as a reform to the penitentiary system to incorporate public private hybrids and intensifying the prosecution of drug trafficking.
The Argentine election is on October 22nd.
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Good luck to this guy, but he’s an anarchist (anarcho-capitalist, a Rothbardian term) using the state to reduce or remove the state’s influence on the marketplace. At best he’ll fail; at worst, a dead man walking.
Just abolish the state. Why keep any cancer? Excise it all. It NEVER doesn’t grow back . . . which it does parasitically. Let the philosophical ivermectin get rid of the bloodsucking state.
You have started with a sentence I meant. Thanks.
The state must be abolished. Period.
How to? This guy offers practical steps.
You have to tart with something, then progress.
Did anyone try before?
Was that tested?
Perhaps this is some innovation?
Agree with both you and him though.
He must take care!
No longer possible to edit.
So for the errata:
Start for tart:)
What a pun.
Stop feeding the beast…..IK,easier said than done right??……
The only way to win is NOT to play…..
Serious question: has any country that has hit this level of inflation recovered without war? We know about Germany. Are there examples of countries that have righted their ship. If so, how did they do it?
I appreciate practical questions above all. Consider Russia. Poland. Odd bedfellows, I know.
Russia didn’t recover until it rid itself of the bolshevicks…..which promptly came over here….
you also took in the marxists that Hitler booted from the German universities
aka “the frankfort school”
Fuck Argentina!….it’s happening right here in the good ole’ USA!….that’s right ,step right up and get your heaping helping of MARGINALIZATION like you have NEVER EVER SEEN!….now the gov has stolen your cow AND your horse AND your bridge between the two(viable currency)!,we will pick you up and FINE THE HECK out of you for being poor and carrying around OUR worthless lettuce in your pocket!…..idiot!…it’s all your fault anyway…….
Ok,ok…..only HALF sarcastic……you guess which half…..
As this site’s resident permanent resident of Argentina and an election monitor for Milei on election day (all paper ballots in our small village), I can state without hesitation that in my 20 years here, I’ve never seen an election generate such excitement as is the case with this one. The rejection of the federal leftist government is running high and disgust with professional politicians running higher still. My Argentine daughter-in-law, mother of my three grandchildren and next door neighbor (same property), is the product a a long-time Peronista family, but she informed me that the lot of them voted for Milei! She was always the odd-man-out, so to speak, but now she’s converted them! This is the breath of fresh air we need here, and from he sound of it, it’s what’s needed up there too.
Monte, I predict that Argentina will return to its moocher looter Peronista ways within 2 years.
Not an illogical prediction given the country’s history, but given the present circumstances, the anger and disgust exhibited by folks I’d have found very unlikely to have demonstrated publicly, it truly seems as if many are now decidedly on board the Milei train. Our election day monitor team has already been warned (as if we needed to be!) that we’ll have to be attentive, suspicious and very careful for the full length of what will be a long day at the school house. One hopes it will be worth it!