Argentine Politics Thread

So, on a scale from 1 to ten, with ten being "Best President EVER!!!!!!!" and 1 being "Goerge W Bush", how does he rate?

Since he starts in 18 days, can I get back to you on that when he has actually done stuff as president?

I mean, he seems like he has interesting proposals, and enough skill and diplomatic abilities to get at least some of them thorugh if the remaining kirchnerist block in government doesn't go full tea-party.

edited 23rd Nov '15 8:20:54 AM by IFwanderer

I would be hesitant to celebrate. While the Peronists were corrupt and recalcitrant about sustainable solutions, i would fear things swinging in the other direction.

Giving into the vulture funds, for instance, will set a bad trend for developing-world debt relief, and a government of "experts" is by no means a good thing.

This could go well, or it could simply swing too far in the other direction, which is the reason for all of the South American left-populism in the first place, a reaction either to direct military tyranny or to indirect economic exploitation.

Hopefully this shakes up the Peronistas and gives them some much-needed reflection and internal reform

The "final" (there still needs to be a recount) difference was of around 700000 votes, and no party has majority in either chamber ^{small digression on politics} The FPV technically has, but it's likely to fragment since there's already rumors about the Justicialist Party, which is the core of Peronism, leaving the FPV so Macri is more or less forced to reach agreements to pass laws.

That would honestly be for the best, as long as they are able to get things done and it doesn't just lead to legislative paralysis. The business-reformers might be well meaning, but the businesses they work with too often are not.

And part of me doesn't want the vulture hedge funds to walk away the winners from this.

So, inspired by the Trudeaumetre, some people made a Macrimetro in spanish, with an english version in progress.

Well, that didn't take long.

Guardian: Argentina urges UK to return to negotiating table over Falkland Islands.

So presumably there's going to be another tantrum when the Islanders demand representation.

Maybe with Kirchner now gone there will be something resembling maturity.

Do they know the definition of madness in Argentina?

There's a fine line between Madness and Science.

Fingers crossed that the new goverment is actually sane and will let the islanders attend the negotiations?

I'm an optimist.

I still stand that we should get that and over overseers territories off the "non-self governing territories" list by annexing them, would also deal with the tax haven problems.

Sorry, apparently its actually in our constitution that we have to claim the fucking islands, so we are kind of forced to be this annoying about it.

What.

A 1994 amendment to the Argentine Constitution made it the duty of all citizens to seek the return to the Falklands and South Georgia to their rightful place as Argentine territory.

And the chance that this gets removed again is near zero, right?

Not while the government wants a convenient distraction for when things go pear shaped.

Well, never change Argentina, your neighbours always love a good laugh whenever the Falklands issue is brought up.

So nothing really big, the chances of the Falklands being returned to Argentina also has the issue of no sane Falklander wanting to be part of Argentina.

Try "not until the government wants to lose the elections, and maybe get a 0% approval rating since no matter how stupid it may be, nationalism is still nationalism".

It would be really difficult to take it out because it requires to change the constitution, to do that the first step is to declare the need to reform the constitution (partially or complete) and call a constituent assembly. It is the congress that declares if there is a need to reform the constitution and to do that it has to have a bill aproved by at least 2/3 of the members of the congress. If it is aproved then the constituent assemble is formed and they disscus the changes and once decided the changes take effect.

The current goverment could try to, but will never get the 2/3 needed and the kirchnerism will spin it negatively against M Acri if his goverment tries to.

Should a political settlement over the islands be reached, couldn't the constitution simply be reinterpreted?

I guess not as long as they're not ceded to Argentina.

Maybe? I'm not a lawyer. It's a "transitory disposition" so I assume that means it would stop being in effect after some point (probably "when" the islands are part of the country). Here's the text of that part, in spanish, and a translation done by me:

Now, in english (my own translation, not an official one):

Now, I guess it can be said "respecting the way of life of its inhabitants" would require allowing them to remain British unless they choose to become Argentinian in a referendum (or something similar to it), but good luck getting any president or foreign affairs minister to publicly agree with that interpretation.

The good(?) thing, from a non-Argentine POV (since mostly everyone in the country adscribes to the "the islands are ours AND THAT'S IT!" view of the subject, with more mental gymnastics the more instructed in the subject anyone is), would be that the new administration is not as populist as the last one, so we'll probably not insist on the subject a lot outside of early April (since the 2 of April is the day we honor the veterans and fallen in that war) unless there's some really bad shit going on at the time.

So, how are things going there? In my head, Macri's election was about the best thing that could happen for Argentina. but I want to hear it from you... if it isn't too soon to ask, is his management giving fruit?

In my opinion, mostly well with some small difficulties. Our congress is going to vote on some laws required to end the negotiations with the "vulture funds" this week. And if I understand correctly, this should open up loans for new infrastructure work during the next year.

The Peronists are more busy infighting (they lasted even less as a coherent group than anyone thought) than opposing the government.

Now, I'm a bit worried about unemployment rising, but according to some people I've asked, the plan is that stuff should start to improve in the second half of the year.

Argentina ex-official arrested over cash bags at monastery I am not making this up, the Kirchner administration was that corrupt, and that stupid.