Introduction (and mission statement)

I should start this note with a declaration: I am a Peronist. This might sound meaningless for those of you that are not Argentines. And for Argentines, at least for those that still got some electrical brain activity, this might sound baffling. Because, what is a Peronist nowadays? And if I am a Peronist, why do I look so much like a gorilla (in traditional Argie political argot, an anti-Peronist)? As a matter of fact, both questions are closely interrelated: the current Argie government, presumably Peronist, is so backward and obtuse, so unnecessarily centralized, and so opposed to what Peronism had become by the end of the XX century, that if this is the "new" and "real" Peronism, well, I am a Gorilla then...

I realized I was a Peronist when I finally understood that the Old Man (Perón) was not a progressive, but an old military man, rabidly anti-Communist, thoroughly conservative, whose main purpose was to save Argentina from the claws of Communism, towards which the country was arguably heading in the early 1940´s. To avoid that fate, the General (Perón) concluded that it was necessary to force Argentina´s myopic, stingy conservative elite  to "share" a tiny bit of their mammoth wealth in order to preserve order, and the rest of their piggily-hoarded riches. Now the idiotic conservative elite never understood this (to this day) and fought Perón with all they could. They never understood that Peronism was the big, massive, popular conservative party that Roque Sáenz Peña could only dreamt of forging in the early 1910´s, when he was developing his electoral reform. But they failed (that is what idiots like these do best) in getting Argentina rid of Peronism, and only achieved the leftist infiltration of the party, which is now definitely turning progressive, or something like that.

But parties, and political movements and ideologies change over time. Anglo-conservatism was not always market oriented: that is a relatively recent innovation in English-speaking countries, courtesy of Barry Goldwater and Maggie Thatcher. And Peronism was not always this shameful shell in which it has become under the Kirchners. So if Peronism can evolve (and regress), then gorillism can evolve as well, in this case from a visceral, mindless reaction of personal rejection towards Peron, devoid of any actual policy ideas, to the movement Peronism would have become were not for blind and corrupt elites. In  other words, the electoral tool of a popular, market oriented, law and order enforcing conservative movement. Advocating for this new Gorillism will be one of the driving forces of this space.

But I am also an economist. An old-fashioned one. Of the kind that think that governments are not all-powerful, and that sometimes, there are things they cannot achieve. And more importantly, there are things they should not even attempt. Specially with other people´s money! Sort of a XVIII century economist... Even though by history and education I should be (and to a large extent am) a mainstream economist, I am certainly not a new Keynesian (see my previous sentence) and crucially, I despise the intellectual arrogance of some of my colleagues. Especially those who think a doctorate entitles them to opine forcefully what is better for other people´s interests. They seem to believe that, because they came up with a couple of over-simplified, cleverly and even elegantly designed economic models, they can actually have a valid opinion on any subject even remotely connected with their model. And they even pretend to be able to anticipate the effect of policy changes, when their models scream Lucas´ critique all over (meaning that the model parameters are very likely to change when the policy regime is modified). And now that they have crashed the world, they still want to continue micro-managing markets, now they are gonna do better, now they understood: they are like compulsive gamblers, looking for a final lucky strike that will allow them to recover their huge losses. The important thing is: do not let them. If democracy is gonna be good for anything, it should be at least able to rid the policy circles of these arrogant pricks.

Anyway, now you know my basic philosophical starting point, and hopefully that will help you to understand better what I write or, at a minimum, to know which way I tilt... and then you can adjust and right size all the preposterous things (for the conventional wisdom at least) that I am gonna be writing here... My mission (that I have already decided to accept) is try to offer a different perspective than that offered by the financial press and some mainstream economists about the challenges and phenomena that mark our global (and sometimes regional, or national) economy. I will try to make the case of liberty and markets, over regulatory overstretch (and again, hubris), and calling the bureaucrats lies as they see them.

Have a good time and... enjoy the ride!!!

Lucas