Husband/Wife team seek Argentine Presidency.

BUENOS AIRES, Feb. 28 — In political circles here, a single question is being asked incessantly these days: him or her? Will President Néstor Kirchner run for a second term or will he, as seems increasingly likely, step aside and let his wife, Senator Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, become the Peronist candidate?

It would be highly unusual for a head of state in a situation as favorable as Mr. Kirchner’s to voluntarily relinquish office. The Argentine economy has grown by 8 percent or more every year since he took power in 2003, and largely as a result, two-thirds of Argentines approve of his job performance.

But the Kirchners seem to be playing for stakes much bigger than just the Oct. 28 election and the next four years, political analysts argue. Rather, their objective is said to be to take turns in office for at least the next dozen years.

Term limits in Argentina are in some respect similar to those in the United States, with one important difference. Presidents here are restricted to two consecutive four-year terms, but they are allowed to return after four years on the sidelines and run again — though no one has yet achieved that feat.

“If he were to be elected to a second term now, party discipline would break down and power would rapidly flow away from Kirchner,” said Joaquín Morales Solá, the chief political columnist of the conservative daily newspaper La Nación. “This is the form they have found to avoid a weakened second term for him: create the possibility of eight years of Cristina and then his return.”

The Peronist movement has a tradition, of course, of power couples that dates back 60 years, to Gen. Juan Domingo Perón and his wife Eva, the former actress who became the idol of Argentina’s poor “shirtless” masses. But political analysts suggest that a more appropriate analogy for the Kirchners may be that of Bill and Hillary Clinton.

more...http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/03/world/americas/03argentina.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

and so, it's understandable that people would want him, or he plus his wife, to remain in power for a long while--much like us here in the north wanted FDR to stay in office just as long as he was willing to. (FDR died in office in his fourth term.) The circumstances of Kirchner's rise to power and great success in office are important to understand. Argentina was a basket case, decimated by World Bank debt and IMF policy. The prior rightwing governments incurred World Bank huge debt, ripped off the money, and left the poor to pay the bill. The IMF, on behalf of rich countries' banks and global corporate predator financiers, extracts stringent cuts in social programs, and the free reign of corporate predators, as the terms of repayment for World Bank loans. Argentina's economy was in meltdown because of this, and its society was nearly destroyed. But the people rebelled. A coalition of the poor and middle class went round with tiny hammers and broke every bank ATM display window in the country, in protest of these policies. Three governments later--in quick succession--and they finally got a left/center government--Kirchner's--to promise to get Argentina out of World Bank debt and never get into it again. Enter Venezuela. The progressive Chavez government--which has made a political philosophy out of regional cooperation and Latin American self-determination (called Bolivarianism*), and which was also flush with oil profits--bought up a big chunk of Argentina's debt on easy terms for Argentina, and thus helped create a strong trading partner for Venezuela, Brazil and other countries. Argentina immediately started to recover, was able to restore funding for progressive programs in education and help for the poor, and is doing so well that they are now in talks with Brazil about a common currency.

This--and oil greed--are why Chavez is considered an enemy by the Bush Junta and by global corporate predators and their war profiteering corporate news monopolies. He is inspiring Latin American countries to stand up for themselves, and to band together in common cause. And all of the new leftist (majorityist) governments in South America are into Bolivarianism to one degree or another, and are defenders of Chavez. Chavez in Venezuela, Evo Morales in Bolivia, Rafael Correa in Ecuador, and Nestor Kirchner in Argentina are especially close and like-minded. But Bolivarianism has caught on as an idea everywhere, even in a place like Colombia, where rightwing President Uribe has refused to engage in Bushite/fascist plots against Chavez, and in countries where big leftist movements are in progress--such as Peru and Paraguay-- that will likely join the Bolivarian revolution in the next election cycles. (In Peru, a Bolivarian leftist came out of nowhere, with no experience and no money, in the election last year and almost won the presidency. In Paraguay, the very popular Catholic bishop, a strong advocate for the poor, has resigned his church office in order to run for president.) Brazil, Chile and Uruguay also have leftist governments, and all are seeing the advantages of South American unity. Talks have begun on a South American "Common Market."

The people and their new leftist governments want it to last forever, naturally. Democracy has finally succeeded in South America, in a big way, and these countries are fast creating equitable societies where the government serves all of the people, where everyone's talents and enterprise are called upon, and where the country's resources benefit all, not just rich elites and foreign corporations. So it is not just Kirchner, as an individual (or his wife), or Chavez as an individual, that people want to extend in office--it is the ideas and the kind of government that they represent--government of, by and for the people. It is natural to look to individual leadership for the stability of these ideas, especially in countries where U.S. interference, in particular, has fostered instability, and horrid brutality in the past. The longer these governments last, the more permanently notions of constitutional government, fairness and stability will be stamped on these societies. I just saw the documentary "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised" for the first time--by an Irish film crew who happened to be in Venezuela in Miraflores Palace when the fascist coup attempt against Chavez occurred--and what struck me most about the film were the words "our Constitution" on everyone's lips, as people protested the coup and the kidnapping of their elected president. They were attached as much to the RULE OF LAW and to DEMOCRACY as they were to Chavez, champion of the poor. And I can only presume that a similar situation exists in Argentina. Kirchner represents the establishment of fairness and an orderly economy, and democratic government.

The temptations of power are, of course, always there, for anyone as popular as Chavez, Kirchner, Morales and Correa--but I think there are also "checks and balances" against individual powermongering and abuse. For one thing, these leaders are all friends. That militates against authoritarianism. They are set upon a common project--South American self-determination. And they are, after all, representatives of the majority, and responsive to the majority, as leaders of a democratic society should be (and as our own leaders in the once great democracy of the U.S. of A. are not). Also, there are many intelligent and talented people working in these governments, as well as supportive citizens working on greater civic participation in government by all sectors of society. It is an insult to all of these people to think that they would bow down to a dictator or authoritarian of any kind. And it is, frankly, absurd to contend that leaders who have worked so hard to democratize their societies, and to create broad constituencies, would or could become "dictators." Neither Chavez nor Kirchner has suggested that they stay in office outside of their country's electoral process. If it is the will of the people that they be able to run for office for third or fourth terms--or, in the case of Kirchner, to extend his regime by his wife running for office, and Kirchner himself returning for further election--what is UN-democratic about that? It is no more undemocratic than FDR being elected to four terms of office, by a country that approved of, and desperately needed, his policies.


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*(Bolivarianism is named after Simon Bolivar, the great South American revolutionary hero, who helped free all of these countries from colonial rule by Spain, and who dreamt of a "United States of South America.")

:sarcasm:

:shrug:

It made for a terrific musical though.