Posted 3 years, 1 month ago around lunchtime by oso
Slug’s new album: 3 thumbs up.
A few weeks ago Abogado was here in San Diego for a “real job” interview. He came into the cafe where I work for a visit when a sweet, innocent, old lady walked up to the counter and asked me what a “steamer” is. This is a question I’m used to: a steamer is steamed milk with a shot of Torani syrup. But somehow it never occurred to me that “steamer” has another meaning. That is, until Abo had a huge smirk all over his face and mumbled under his breath, “I’ll show you what a steamer is.”
My dear friend Nat used to be king of San Diego cafes. Until that title was bequeathed to me. He especially had an impressive tenure at the Leucadia Pannikin where they sell a drink of carbonated orange juice called Orangina. Clearly it’s pronounced “orange-eena.” Unless your Nat. “You mean an orangina?” (vagina) he would ask every god damned time with a straight face. No one dared argue with him.
Yesterday afternoon took the cake though. Again it was a sweet, innocent, old lady. But even better, she was from the South. Where I work now we sell a toasted, Italian sandwich called “Panini.” I was sipping on my soy iced mocha when this sweet little thing comes up and asks me, “sweetart, would ya tell me what a puhnaynay is.”
I almost spit out my iced mocha all over her. If her weight weren’t less than her age, I would’ve been sure she was fucking with me. But really: she thought panini was pronounced “puh-nay-nay.” Now, I don’t know about your regional dialect, but here in Cali, puhnaynay has one and only one meaning, and ain’t “toasted sandwich.”
Poor lady had no idea why I started laughing so hard. Nor why I couldn’t stop. But what’s worse is I couldn’t get it out of my head for the rest of my shift. Someone would be giving me their order and I’d think of Little Red Riding Hood’s grandma asking me what a puhnaynay is and I’d just start busting up. People were definitely thinking I was trippin’ last night.
I will admit, the Miers nomination has my interest piqued on the domestic front, but what’s really raising my eyebrows is the successive string of elections coming up in Latin America. You never know with these things, but it really looks like LA is set up for a continent-wide shift to the left. The foundation was laid a few years ago when Lulu took over in Brazil, Chavez regained power after an attempted coup, and Kirchner steered Argentina to an intelligent, moderate leftist path after its IMF default. But this new round of elections could really change things like never before.
Mexico’s conservative PAN party made gains after the country finally found democracy, but now the leftist PRD, led by massively popular Lopez Obredor, is making inroads. AMLO was scheduled to speak here in Dego next week, but it got cancelled after the electoral body, IFE ruled that candidates can’t campaign outside the country even though Mexicans living outside of Mexico are now allowed to vote in national elections.
Yesterday U.S. deputy secretary of state, Robert B. Zoellick went to Nicaragua to try and rally support for current conservative leader Enrique Bolaños because a strange coalition (called “el pacto”) of former Sandinista leader Daniel Ortega and former conservative (and convicted) president, Arnolodo Alemán. Zoellick says the US will withold $175 million dollars in aid if “el pacto” succeeds in taking over the government. “Respecting national sovereignty” certainly has its gray areas.
Chavez continues to make more noise than actual change from Venezuela, but two new projects that really could play a big influence throughout Latin America is TeleSur - a hemisphere-wide cable news network that is meant to cover Latin America from Latin America instead of relying on CNN in Spanish, which is what most cable news junkies currently do. A combined project of Venezuela, Brazil, Uruguay, and Argentina, I think very few could argue that it doesn’t have a leftist slant. Then yesterday it was announced that a new state company, The Technological Industries of Venezuela, will work with a Chinese company to produce at least 80,000 affordable computers for every interested Venezuelan.
Speaking of such programs, Chile’s moderate-leftist government (after having recently awarded victims of the Pinochet regime with reparations) announced “Mi Primer PC” - a public-private joint venture to get more affordable PC’s in the hands of Chileans. Though the project was obviously well-intentioned, Chilean bloggers went one step further and announced their own project - “Our PC” - a more affordable and open-source alternative which will offer tech support by volunteer bloggers. Chile also has upcoming elections in which a female Socialist is set to take power, hopefully offsetting years of increased class division during the Pinochet-regime while maintaining the economic growth that the dictatorship brought and the country has since been able to hold onto.
It’s probably the Bolivian election - just two months away - that probably has most people holding their breath though. Especially US diplomats. Just a couple weeks ago, leftist front-runner, Evo Morales (a dedicated agrarian reformer) said he would break with the U.S. drug policy and let coca grow freely is elected. Donald Rumsfeld, last month, making a trip to Paraguay (”our other ally” besides Colombia) warned that Venezuela was meddling in Bolivia’s affairs (always such a classic statement coming from any American) and that Bolivia was in risk of spiraling into despair. A conspiracy theory is even circling the net that the US is building up troop reserves in Paraguay and Ecuador to get ready to secure Bolivian oil-fields if Morales wins the election and does something radical like making a nationalized oil company.
It’s interesting to see all this happening in Latin America where most countries are just starting to catapult into rapid development. In fact, it doesn’t really make sense to me at all. Europe and North America - already well into the innovation and design economies - have been creeping ever more conservative over the past decade while rapidly developing nations like much of Latin America, India, and Malaysia are turning to the left. There’s an argument to explain it: those developing areas are mostly subjugated to US interests and are only “developing” in terms of manufacturing, call centers, and natural resource exploitation. Meanwhile, the U.S. and Europe turn more conservative as a nativist reaction to increased immigration and job outsourcing.
But it still doesn’t really make sense to me. I’d expect Latin America and South Asia - finally with easy access to starting up companies - to be consumed by entrepreneurial fever. And prosperous, fully-developed nations like the U.S. and much of Europe should be turning more leftist as we stop worrying so much about economic problems and start focusing on solving social and environmental issues.
Shows you what I know.
i don’t get it. what is the other meaning of steamer? (i’m serious, i don’t know).
my favorite is soy steamers with a bit of honey…emmmm
graphic
Amigo, your post peaks my interests because I know nothing about politics in Latin America. I finally got around to reading Daniel Alarcón’s War by Candlelight, a collection of short stories from a Peruvian born writer, who writes primarily in English, but who’s focus is entirely in Latin America’s increasing political upheaval. His characters are either the poor, the indigenous, set against a huge, industrious and delapitaded cuidad like Lima. His stories are simple, yet invigorating and proof that a fiction writer can take you into a world such as the things that you talk about on this post. Why am I telling you this? Why not, I think you’d like Alarcón’s stuff.
Interesting post. Seems to me that entrapenurial fever can only take place where there is economic incentives along with freedom of ideas. Pretty hard to achieve when politics is dominated by the power to control. LA and much of Asia was controlled or oppressed for so long by Dictators andor outside Corporations taking their resouces (and usually working together) that I would think the energy for power to the people is strong. That energy takes the same path once it gains power, as it tries to bring about economic equality for everyone. True equality takes central control of resources and money flow and leaves little reward for entrapenurers going against the consensus, or making too much money. Round and round we go. Hopefully a country of laws can put enough in place to leave the flow of money, ideas and power free to compete. Noble ideas that are threantened all the time by the human political need for power over others. It also seems to me that every country goes through pendulum swings…throwing out what was not working before for a main group of constituents. In my life time (I really identify with those little old ladies in youy cafe) Latin America has usually been just the opposite of us. That trend seems to be continuing. Their worst Dictatators ruled during our New Deal Era.(l930to 50’s) Interesting!
Oso-
What easy access to starting up companies? It’s anything but down here (some do better than others… El Salvador and Costa Rica come to mind but they still fall far short).
This book is waiting for me in Venezuela where we’ll be in a few days. You might enjoy it given the topic of the post.
Peter
P.S. While I don’t agree with everything in the comment, Jean’s first few sentences hit the nail on the head. The continued distruction and recreation of institutions, whose purpose is to limit the power that government has over its citizens, has weakend these pillars of civil society dramatically in much of LA. Nicaragua, that you mention, is a perfect example.
Abogado, I clicked on that link. I feel very unclean. How do people learn these terms? And who makes them up? I would never ever consider thinking somethinkg like that up. Man. Abogado, I can’t believe you know this stuff.
You are right, some time ago I would have expected first world countries like the U.S. to move towards the social democratic ways implemented in Scandinavia but all of that was obliterated the day that Bush got re-elected. The way that first world economies have shifted to post-industrial management “Europe and North America - already well into the innovation and design economies –“ only makes me think about the dependency structure that is being set up. Post-industrial economies produce ideas while third world countries that haven’t completely achieved an industrialized status produce the material from witch the idea will take form. While first world countries can shift from place to place, depending on costs for production (always raised once a country becomes successful (success= demise)), the third world is trained to measure their success in relation to their dependence to the U.S.
I can see these populist leftist regimes popping up in Latin America as a result of dissatisfied poor people (semi-industrialization has so far only helped but a few) and the need to remain autonomous. To obliterated that dependency. In some cases it might be worth taking a look at. I haven’t made up my mind but I do know that any extreme is bad and that things can be done with a little more diplomacy e.g Chavez.
It is funny to have been fallowing most of these posts through Global Voices and know exactly what you are talking about. Ohh, you don’t have to be from Cali to know about pu-nay-nay. I dream of it every day.
the steamer is something new though
Oso, I am going to see Atmosphere tonight.
EMC,
With your persistence, Alarcón is quickly climbing his way up my reading list. Plus, it gives me a good excuse when HP tries to unload his next bundle of propaganda on me.
Jean,
I would’ve thought the same, but China seems like a pretty good argument against this. In fact, in China it seems like it is the neoliberal development model which is actually at work: entrepreneurial fever encourages competitiveness and open markets which in turn encourage greater transparency which in turn allows for a greater freedom of ideas.
Like China, though not to the same degree, much of Latin America has a very centralized and focused amount of political participation. But whereas China represses protest, I’d argue most Latin American governments (like our own) encourage it as a harmless way to let out the steam.
I would also argue (though I’ve never been to mainland China) that Latin America lacks the same degree of entrepreneurial spirit that has taken over places like urban China and South India. This is a cultural difference, but it’s one that has to be kept in mind when encouraging greater political participation.
I also agree with what you say about the pendulum. It’ll be very interesting to see what happens down the road as US debt skyrockets and some developing economies get leaner and meaner.
Peter,
When I talked about easier accessibility to starting a company, I wasn’t comparing Latin America to the U.S., but to their own countries 20 years ago. Ask any life long businessman/woman in any country (Venezuela might be the sole exception) and he/she will tell you it’s a thousand times easier to start up a company now.
It’s funny that you mention Álvaro Vargas Llosa - when I was in DC, on my day to really explore the city, I spent at least 3 hours in the World Bank bookstore thumbing through Liberty for Latin America : How to Undo Five Hundred Years of State Oppression and Jeffrey Sachs’ The End of Poverty. For anyone who might be interested, there’s a good collection of his articles here.
Peter, you write:
I like it, because when I’m speaking and writing in Spanish a lot, I often subconsciously type ‘i’ for ‘e’ when switching back to English. But I don’t really understand your point. The only institutions I can think of whose purpose is to limit the power of Latin American governments are the a.) C.I.A. and b.) Organization of American States and neither one of them have lost power. Maybe you could give me a more specific example from Nicaragua or anywhere else (except Venezuela). I hope you are enjoying Costa Rica my friend. If you go to Monteverde, make sure to try the ice cream at the Quakers’ dairy. And if you find yourself in Golfito, the fish burrito at David’s is a must.
Davo,
Yours is the comment that really makes the most sense to me, though Elenamary’s disgust with Abogado is also pretty logical. I think a lot of free market economists would argue that post-industrial designers are just as dependent on developing nation manufacturers as the other way around which negates any kind of subjugation, but that’s obviously foo foo. Like you say, “post-industrial economies produce ideas while third world countries that haven’t completely achieved an industrialized status produce the material” and the product.
But it’s not like developing nations aren’t coming up with innovative ideas that can compete in the global marketplace. It’s just that “the west” has a monopoly on global advertising and marketing that easily pushes away products and ideas which could threaten that monopoly. For example, the Amida Simputer is one of the most forward-thinking and adaptable commercial tech products to be released, probably since Apple’s iPod. But no one has heard of it because no PR firm has yet figured out how to push a “third world product” to “first world consumers.”
It’s also a problem of culture though. I was living in the small town of Acambaro, Guanajuato for a couple months interviewing former Braceros and recent migrant-returnees and they all said the same thing - they’d rather cross the border to work as gardeners and dish-washers than work for “los pinches Chinos” in one of the maquilas. In every interview I would ask if they ever thought about getting together with their friends to start their own maquila and they looked at me like I was crazy. That’s what I don’t know how to change.
EM,
I’m jealous. Although, last night I was talking to the person who first introduced me to Atmosphere on a mix tape (ah the lost art of the mix tape) which had The Woman With The Tattooed Hands on it. She said she forever lost her faith in Slug when she saw him live. He was bringing up random girls on stage, making out with them, then talking shit and kicking them off. It’s a second hand account and rappers don’t have to be heros, but I certainly expected something more from someone as thoughtful (ie. full of thought) as Slug.
Revaz tried to get me to read the Pitchfork review before listening to the latest album and I’m glad I didn’t. Every time I read one of those damn things it always gets in the way of how I first hear the recording. I’ll admit, the first 8 tracks aren’t my favorite, but 9 - 13 mark a return to the post-modern poetics that he’s known for. Track 13 especially, is pure literature.
eek, steamer. who thinks of those things.
Oso, you left me speachless. Your awareness of latin american politic situation is astonishing for a gringo. Well, I may even say that you know more than some of my mexican friends here in Monterrey. LOL!
En serio wey, cuando vengas a Monterrey, vamos a echarnos unas “Indios” bien frias a tu cantina favorita para cotorrear.
¡Saludos!
cleaveland steamer? LOL I thought the act of leaving the passed out chick was the steamer..not literally taking a dump on her. LOL
[...] Sipping my warm soy steamer and having a great conversation with McPocho. He smiled and asked me “Do you know what tomorrow is?” “No, what?” “Come on you know. It is the second Monday in October. You know this.” “No really, I don’t know. What?” “I was hoping to bait you into it. Get you to get all pissed about Columbus day and then tell you that really I was talking about Canadian Thanksgiving.” “It is día de la raza, not Columbus day. You silly Canadian. Sorry to disappoint you by not getting enraged over Columbus day.” [...]
hey, just wanted to say that i really enjoy this blog. i read some of the older posts and wanted to comment on the chinese pop in n mexico one but couldn’t figure out how to do it. i have a friend who will probably write his ph.d. diss in anthro on the topic. so serious academic research is on its way!
Oso-
First:
I was thinking more along the lines of all institutions that derive their power from the constitution of their country (i.e. Supreme Court, Congress, etc.).
Let’s look at Nicaragua. You have a dictator in the country up until 1979 who is overthrown by the Sandinista/FAO alliance. Shortly afterwards this alliance breaks apart, along with it the structure of the state council set up to govern. Money starts flowing to the Contras from the U.S., while USSR/Cuba aid flows to the Sandinistas and the civil war escalates. In preparation for the 1984 elections, freedom of speech is suspended as the FSLN takes control of the news media. Ortega is “elected” as his opposition groups boycott the election. 1987 a peace accord is finally signed but not lived up to.
Under international pressure Ortega decides to hold election in the early 1990s, which he expected he would easily win. The country, weary from the inefficiencies of the command and control economy, boots him out of power. Enter the UNO, yet Ortega’s brother stays in control of the army. 1996 sees another election with the Sandinistas losing again. The victor is the right of center Aleman, who is unbelievably corrupt and does even more damage to the country. All this time constitutions were being rewritten, amended, scrapped, or ignored altogether. Not a formula for strong internal institutions to limit the power of the government.
But speaking of “el pacto” that you mention in your original post, let’s talk about what this pact between Aleman and Ortega has done to Nicaragua’s institutions and constitution since just the year 2000:
Constitutional amendments by “el pacto” approved by the National Assembly in January 2000 removed almost all checks and balances on their power. They changed the makeup of the Supreme Court. They also changed the structure of the Electoral Council, stacking both with partisan appointees. Meanwhile they stripped the Comptroller General’s office of most of its power.
In addition, they awarded lifetime National Assembly seats to outgoing presidents (meaning Aleman would have immunity from further investigations… something Bolanos stripped).
As if that were not enough they pushed through the legislature laws making it much more difficult for small parties to gain legal status. We’re not done… they also reduced the percentage of votes needed to secure the presidency (which they thought would help the Sandinistas) and “el pacto” redistricted a popular mayor of Managua to nullify his candidacy.
And now with control of the courts and the legislature “el pacto” is trying to weaken the executive branch despite a ruling against them in the Central American Court of Justice.
To me, that sounds like one more country (other than Venezuela) where the institutions to limit the state’s power have been under attack and have been severely weakened. I’m not going to defend any U.S. foreign aid, but the situation is a bit more complicated than the U.S. failing to respect national sovereignty.
Second:
Well, if you look at Nicaragua fighting a civil war and under the control of the likes of Ortega 20 years ago, then, if you pose the question: “Is it easier to start a business today rather than in 1985?” I’ll agree with you that people will probably say, “Yes, it is easier today”.
But to me that is like taking me to a gym and having me try to bench 500lbs then afterwards 300lbs. Was the 300lbs easier? Yes… but that answer doesn’t tell you anything about just how hard it was to bench-press 300lbs. [Hint: impossible].
The only countries where I felt I received legitimate answers to such questions were El Salvador, where business was visibly booming, and Costa Rica where the economy has grown considerably over the last few decades. Everywhere else, Nicaragua especially, people reply that things are staying the same or getting worse in recent years and that the economy is horrible. Additionally, in Nicaragua, everyone we talked to about politics would say it is hopeless due to the fact that everyone is corrupt.
But to defend my first response, in your original post you didn’t make it sound like a comparison between anything. You stated (and I quoted you directly) that these countries finally had “easy access to starting up companies”.
They don’t.
Comparison or not your implication is misleading. Most of these countries are not “starting to catapult into rapid development”, nor is it easy to start businesses (take a look at the size of the informal economy).
That is why in the introduction Llosa’s book you reviewed he says international bodies have started to refer to the last five years in Latin America as the “lost-half decade,” after the “lost decade” of the 1980s. This is specifically because a lack of limited and stable governments. Such governments, in my opinion, need to be defined by strong constitutions that protect an individual’s rights against the state.
I’d love to get into a debate about the merits of the last few points but I just don’t have the time. Instead I’ll direct you over to HP’s where you can find lots of articles like this one:
http://www.hooverdigest.org/983/friedman.html
Talk to you later,
Peter
Irasali,
Obviously, Abogado does. Personally, I think it’s disgusting. And I want to clarify that I had no idea what a cleaveland steamer was until his comment. In my world, a “steamer” was a bowel movement and nothing more.
Gustavo,
I can picture the senate confirmation hearings now: “Mr. Abogado, is it true that in 2005 you offered to defecate on the chest of an innocent, elderly woman in La Jolla, California?”
Linda,
Thanks for the note. Keep us up to date on the Chinos en Mexico research.
Peter,
As always, your intellectual humility is astonishing. It is a wonderful thing to learn that you are not able to bench 300 pounds. I’m pretty sure that means I could take you if that’s what it came down to.
Joking comrade. I actually agree with every single thing you wrote in that comment and your grasp of Nicaraguan history is pretty damn impressive. So I don’t really have anything to say here besides poking fun. I hope you are well and safe.
I had a crush on a Nicaraguan…shocking I know. His grandpa was pres of the country…i would have loved to have had a good grasp on that Nicaraguan history
[...] Oso and I even discussed it a few years back when I mentioned I was going to an Atmosphere show: “…last night I [...]