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January
7, 2001
Wael Masri
They
Are Taking
Our Rights Away
Philip
Farruggio
Better
Medicine
January
6, 2002
Ralph
Nader
Students
Put the Heat on Foreign Sweatshops
Tariq
Ali
Battleground
Kashmir
January
5, 2002
Mark Schneider
Kifah:
The Movie Star
Israel Killed
Edward
Said
Is
Israel More Secure Now?
January
4, 2002
CG Estabrook
Anti-War
= Anti-Globalization
Jordan
Green
What's
Changed in New York
January
3, 2002
Walt Brasch
Exit
Cheney, Enter Ridge
Mokhiber
and Weissman
The
10 Worst Corporations
of 2001
Robert
Hunter Wade
America's
Empire Rules an Unbalanced World
Shahid
Alam
Is
There an Islamic Problem?
January
2, 2002
Ross Regnart
Patriot
Act Redefines the Mob as "Terrorist Associates"
John Chuckman
The
Republicans' Secret Plan X
David
Vest
Turn,
Turn, Turn
January
1, 2002
Kathy
Kelly
Iraq's
New Year
December
31, 2001
John Absood
An
Alternative to War in Iraq
Ramzi
Kysia
Iraq
Goes Radioactive
December
28, 2001
John Chuckman
Observing
George Bush
Suren
Pillay
Civilian
Bodies
Aaron
Lehmer
Inviting
Future Terrorism
December
27, 2001
Patrick
McNamara
Palestinian
Children Bear Brunt of Mideast Violence
Nelson
Valdés
A
Possible Scenario on the Location of bin Laden
Jensen
and Mahajan
Remember
the Afghan Dead
Philip
Farruggio
A
New Year's Resolution
Ramzi
Kysia
The
People of the Valley
December 26, 2001
John Chuckman
In
Praise of the Unspeakable
Sam Bahour
2002:
Year of the Twos
December 25, 2001
Jennifer Loewenstein
Israel's
Human Rights Record
December 24, 2001
Sam Bahour
It
Happened One Morning
Yair Khilou
Why I Resisted
Being Drafted into the Israeli Army
Michael
Chisari
War
as Diversionary Tactic
Cockburn/St. Clair
Enron
and the Green Seal
A Photographic Journal of Life
in an Afghan Refugee Camp
By Judith Mann
Resources:
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About 9/11
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Days That
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Seattle and Beyond
By Alexander
Cockburn
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Photos by Allan Sekula
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War Diary
CIA's Assassination Plan a History of
Torture in US Prisons
bin Laden and Bush
Business Connections
Aisha Ikramuddin on the Hidden Hype
of US Food Bombs
Peter Linebaugh on
Pakistan
Christopher Hitchens' Love for Mrs. Thatcher
Jiang Zemin Tells Bush:
Nuke 'Em
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and Osama bin Laden
Whiteout:
CIA, Drugs & the
Press
by Alexander
Cockburn
and Jeffrey St. Clair
The Memphis Blues Again:
Six Decades of Memphis Music Photographs
Photos by Ernest Withers
Text by Daniel Wolff
The New Intifada:
Resisting Israel's Apartheid
Edited by Roane Carey
A Pocket Guide to
Environmental Bad Guys
by James Ridgeway
and Jeffrey St. Clair
The
Phoenix Program
by Douglas Valentine
Al Gore:
A User's Manual
by Cockburn
and St. Clair
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January
7, 2002
Argentina: Confusing Tales
From Progressive Economists
By Lawrence McGuire
I've been trying for years to figure out the world
economic system, but it ain't easy. No matter how much I read
I always seem to end up even more confused than when I started.
For example, lately I've been trying
to understand what is happening in Argentina. I know there is
a connection between the crowd surrounding the finance minister's
house banging pots (he resigned that night), and the International
Monetary Fund (IMF), and people raiding grocery stores because
they are hungry, and motorbike couriers being shot and killed
by soldiers in Plaza de Mayo, but I don't know how it all fits
together. So for help I turn to some progressive economists and
political commentators. They're professionals and should be able
to explain it to me, right?
First I read Marc Cooper (contributing
editor to The Nation and a columnist for LA Weekly). In his recent
column in the LA Times (12/30/01), Cooper tells me that for the
past decade Argentina has been a 'gold mine' for international
investors. Ok, I guess that means that big corporations and rich
individuals invested their money in Argentina and made golden
profits. That's clear.
But then Cooper says "That experience
[the collapse of the Argentine economy] should be enough to throw
into question the free-market globalization model....".
Swoosh! That one flies right by me and
I'm confused.
If Argentina was a gold mine for international
investors, why should the 'free market globalization model' be
questioned? Who created and implemented the 'free market globalization
model'? It worked for the people who devised it, didn't it? Isn't
the IMF controlled by the US Government, which is controlled
mainly by rich individuals and big corporations? The IMF employees
managed the Argentine economy for the benefit of their bosses
in the U.S., and apparently did a damn good job. So why should
the model be questioned?
I wrinkle my forehead and gird my mental
loins. 'Concentrate,' I say to myself. 'Focus and you will understand.'
Cooper continues: "The United States
and other economically powerful nations, and the international
financial organizations they finance, should allow for alternative
models of development."
Now I'm even more confused. Why should
they allow alternative models if they are making such huge profits
with their current model?
Looking for clarity I turn to Mark Weisbrot,
(co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research)
writing in the International Herald Tribune (12/26/01), and The
Nation (12/10/01).
Weisbrot says: "The IMF's role here
was crucial. It arranged large loans, including $40 billion a
year ago, to support the peso. This was the IMF's second fatal
error."
'Ok,' I say to myself, 'Go slowly. Why
was this an error? Where did the $40 billion go?'
I continue reading. Weisbrot says: "The
sacrifice of Argentina's economy for the sake of Washington's
imperial interests and the interests of 'emerging market' bondholders
fits a pattern at the IMF,...."
Zip zip zip! I've missed something again.
First Weisbrot says the IMF made an 'error', then he says that
this 'error' was made for the sake of 'imperial interests'. So
what is the error? Isn't it the precise job of the IMF to implement
'Washington's imperial interests'? Again, who appoints them and
pays their salary? The $40 billion apparently went to pay foreign
bondholders, right? And the $40 billion came originally from
US taxpayers, right? (Isn't that where IMF money comes from?)
So apparently, last year the IMF transferred $40 billion from
US taxpayers to private US investors, via Argentina....it seems
that IMF is doing exactly what they are paid to do. Why does
Weisbrot call this an error? Has he not read what he has just
written?
Maybe not because next he says: "Why
does the IMF seem incapable of learning from repeated failures?"
Forty billion dollars transferred in one year from the taxpayers
to the private pockets of the folks who control the IMF is a
failure. Hmm, what more could they possibly have to learn in
order to succeed?
After recounting to us the similar things
the IMF did to Russia, and Asia, Weisbrot calls what the IMF
did in Argentina a '...failed economic experiment...'.
Zing! I'm confused again. How can it
be an 'experiment' if they did the same thing in Russia and Asia?
If an institution does the same thing over and over again, with
similar results, I would call it a well-crafted policy that must
work for the people implementing that policy, otherwise why would
they continue doing it? What is experimental about it?
Longing for the light, I turn to the
New York Times (01/02/02) and Paul Krugman, known as a fierce
critic of the IMF.
Krugman (also writing about Argentina)
says that in the 90's, in response to IMF demands, "Tariffs
were slashed, state enterprises were privatized, multinational
corporations were welcomed, and the peso was pegged to the dollar.
Wall Street cheered, and money poured in."
'OK,' I tell myself, 'Remember Econ.
101. If money poured in we can assume that it also poured out
in the form of corporate profits, otherwise why would Wall Street
cheer? Does Wall Street cheer for anything else?'.
But then Krugman, like the other guys,
confuses me. He says: "The catastrophic failure of those
policies is first and foremost a disaster for Argentines, but
it is also a disaster for U.S. foreign policy."
But wait a minute, the major purpose
of U.S foreign policy is to make Wall Street cheer, correct?
Where is the failure? How can this be a major disaster for U.S.
foreign policy?
I agree it is a major disaster for Argentina.
But the 'free market' policies implemented in the past ten years
will now allow U.S. investors to swoop into bankrupt Argentina
and buy all the companies they want at rock bottom prices. And
isn't that something that will make Wall Street cheer again?
Cooper, Weisbrot, and Krugman have described
exactly how a relatively small group of wealthy people used their
available financial and political resources to enrich themselves
at the expense of others. But despite the fact that the IMF system
worked incredibly well for the people who designed and paid for
it, these three writers conclude it was a 'catastrophic failure',
an 'experiment', a 'failure,' an 'error' and a 'failed model'.
Why?
I'm still confused. Perhaps somebody
else can answer that last question.
Lawrence McGuire
is a novelist who lives in France. His latest most recent book
is The
Great American Wagon Road. He can be reached at: blmcguire@hotmail.com
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