Argentines Dying From Debt

-grog: December 20, 2001

According to the Reuters news agency, 16 lives have been lost in protests demanding that the Argentine President, Fernando de la Rua, quit his post. The past four days have seen looting and rioting as a result of the President's austerity measures and forced the mass resignations of the cabinet.

The South American nation is grappling with the most devastating economic crisis in decades. Today, hundreds of otherwise peaceful protesters, angry at wage and pension cuts designed to pay off public debt rushed into the Plaza de Mayo, which lies near the presidential palace. The police have been granted special powers of arrest since a state of siege was declared by the government.

2,000 people a day drop below the poverty line. The unemployment rate is 18.3 percent. What few supermarkets remain open are guarded on the outside by police with rifles and batons, and on the inside by men armed with sticks and electric cattle prods who watch for shoplifting. In a a wheat and beef-rich country, the protesters are hungry, living in the most appalling conditions in the slums, or are part of the now impoverished middle class, or are merchants whose businesses have been decimated by strict controls on money, and they have had it. The Economy Minister, Domingo Cavallo, has already stepped down, and now they want the President to do the same.

In a proof of Wall Street's general cluelessness, Cavallo was considered a financial darling for his "innovative ideas" but since has been severely criticized by these same suits for allowing Latin America's No.3 economy to linger in the biggest debt default in history.

But how much of that is his fault? Cavallo forced 36 million people into pay cuts and tax hikes trying to pay down the $132 billion debt and prop up the nation's currency. The International Monetary Fund has held back $1.3 billion in Argentine aid because of missed fiscal targets, said it was "concerned" about Argentina. In Washington, President Select Bush was similarly "concerned". Spokesman Ari Fleischer stated, "The president is concerned about the events in Argentina and the situation is being monitored closely. The president considers Argentina a valued ally and friend."

A friend would forgive the debt. Unfortunately, considering the natures of both Bush I & II, what will more likely occur is a routine denial of the real nature of the problem until the violence of desperate people prompts the Shrub to blunder in with military intervention either covertly or overtly, thus solving nothing and create still more problems.

De la Rua, one of Argentina's most unpopular democratic leaders, in a speech late on Wednesday night blamed the rioting on "enemies of the republic.'' If he really wanted to save his butt, all he'd have to do is call the poor people "terrorists" and we'd go running down there guns-a-blazing like happy idiots. This could go very bad, or I should say very much worse (it's already bad), very quickly.

The worldwide problem of international debt will only increase with time and neglect, as will the resulting violence. Debt is literally enslaving the southern hemisphere. The question was asked many years ago, "Must we sacrifice our children to pay off our debt?" And the answer is apparently yes. Infant mortality rates directly tied to the poverty which results from such national debt causes a child every second to die from malnutrition, or disease.

How could their parents NOT protest?