“The Good Hombre”

Argentina and the eternal return to stupidity. How a simple Trump call made many Argentines believe they are safe from chaos

By Charles H. Slim

It is not the best moment of Donald Trump and he knows it. So much has fallen into its popularity and appreciation for the political class in Washington that it is practically an outcast about to be evicted from the White House. And it is not an exaggeration. Nancy Pelosi and Hillary Clitnon have set in motion the constitutional impeachment process that will end the megalomaniac dreams of the eccentric businessman.

All this to give context to the telephone call made on Friday, November 1, by the US president to the next Argentinian president Alberto Fernández while some of his advisors wonder who is that? And it is that for the Argentines who ideologically go where the wind takes them, this is something magnificent for their luck. The demonstrations of this hurried uproar were not long in the hands of the same media and journalists who for four years sheltered the outgoing government. But as always, Argentines and especially their politicians prove to be two steps behind international political reality given that once again they have believed -and especially the adept media- that this has been an auspicious signal for their country.

The background of this tare comes from afar. To not extend beyond contemporary history remember what has happened 40 years to this part. When Argentina in the Seventies (70´s) claimed before sovereignty over the islands of the South Atlantic as part of the countries not aligned to the United Nations forum, Washington played an auspicious intermediary between Buenos Aires and London, which was actually an imposition in favor of his British cousins.

When Argentina in April 1982 carried out the "Operation Rosario" that regains control of the Falkland Islands, Georgias and South Sandwich Islands occupied by the United Kingdom for 133 years, in addition to not activating the Inter American Teatry of Reciprocal Assistance IATR and play In an apparent intermediary in good faith, he provided valuable intelligence and logistics assistance to the British Royal Navy, which was vital for them to overcome the beating that the Argentines were giving him.

In 1990 when the crisis broke out in the Persian Gulf, the pseudo-Peronist government of Carlos Menem embarked -without having been summoned- in a war intervention that did not give any benefit to his country. Worse, Carlos Menem and his cabinet believed that they were participating in a peace mission requested by the United Nations, something of which never existed. By the time his government realized it, it was late and their ships were already entering what a month later would become the most important War Operations Theater of the end of the century. At that time, George H. Bush gave Menem high praise for something that the Argentine president himself and most Argentine politicians believed, as a blank check for his country.

Today, Argentina is in an economic crisis that does not yield despite the election of the new president and his political force, a front of heterogeneous forces that already shows internal fissures. For many this will represent a setback to times of anachronistic ideological confrontations since the "Fernández" have as part of their political assets, strips of resentful sectors and with the search to deepen the wounds of old times that for the worse, only pursue economic benefits for them.

On this, one should not lose sight of the low esteem for this political orientation in Argentina that exists on Wall Street and the toughest sectors of American politics. And just as Macri and his people were wrong to believe that Donald Trump would support his government in exchange for an unconditional obsequency, the "Fernandez" should not believe that a simple phone call will be a safe conduit to success. Not at all!

The reasons for this are several. First of all, it is the same internal situation in the United States that conditions this. There is a situation in their domestic economy that despite the implementation of an ultramontane commercial protectionism has not yet been resolved by the White House.

Second powerful reason is that Donald Trump is not the United States or who leads to the political financial establishment that dominates the nation's political threads. Moreover, Trump himself knows that today his words have the same value as a toilet paper in a public restroom. I could assure you that he is a devalued president with one foot inside and one outside the White House in the face of the possibility of the Democracy-driven Empeachment in Congress.

The third reason to keep in mind is that Trump at the time had also expressed the same approval when Mauricio Macri was elected president promising, among other things, economic aid for Argentina to leave his quagmire. And what the hell happened? Just nothing, if there was any management of Washington or Donald Trump himself before the IMF to grant loans that Macri took is something that nobody remembers.

Argentines have a severe problem with their memory and it is not precisely because of the lack of it. The problem is that it is selective and even modify it at ease and convenience of the moment they face. They forget very quickly their previous loyalties so as not to blush, to become the most official government of the day. The Argentines and especially the inhabitants of the province of Buenos Aires seem not to recognize themselves in their identity, in the knowledge where they want to go and abandon their wills to ideologically inconsistent leaders who end up disappointing them.

That moves to their political castes that today cannot be distinguished ideologically by the simple fact that they have no ideology. It can be said that it is a country governed by a single party, that of “Opportunism” something that other countries warn and it is then that when they should discuss issues of state with Buenos Aires, they whisper in their ear the hymn of opportunity.

At that time Macri was for Donald Trump "The Good Man" and all possible praise was for his Argentine pair, but nothing more. There was even a common story between the two linked to private businesses that at some point crossed them. For now, Washington will maintain its movements in the region and within Argentina since it does not see in the government of the "Fernández", any real danger of opposition would cause it to reconsider any retraction. But we must comply with this colloquial procedure. Today things have changed and the flattery are for the new president-elect who, beyond not being liked by the American establishment and his supporters in Argentina, will be with those who must interact from now on. Things of politics; "These are matters of interest, not friendship."