[Marxism] "Oíd el ruido de rotas cadenas ..."

[Joaquín Bustelo <jbustelo@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

That's how an Argentine friend of mine reacted to Thursday's grand
announcement by President Nestor Kirchner that Argentina would free
itself from IMF tutelage by paying these imperialist bagmen in a lump
sum everything Argentina owes them.

It was a strange sight, all the ministers, the general staff, the boards
of various chambers of commerce and industry, the leaders of the CGT and
other representatives of the Argentine nation formally summoned by
urgent appeal to the most formal hall of the presidential palace, the
Casa Rosada.

And then the official announcement: "As of today's date...." The
applause built slowly, and then became an ovation as the assembled
functionaries and dignitaries stood up in a wave. 

The words are from the Argentine National Anthem:

Oíd Mortales, el grito sagrado:
!Libertad¡ !Libertad¡ !Libertad¡
¡Oíd el ruido de rotas cadenas ...

Hear, mortals, the sacred cry:
Liberty, Liberty, Liberty!
Hear the noise of broken chains ...

It may seem odd to talk that way about a simple act of prudent husbandry
and use of the nation's resources. Argentina has accumulated significant
national reserves of 25 billion dollars; it is spending less than 10
billion to rid itself of this noisome imperialist albatross but it is
money it would have paid out within  months, two or three years at most
anyways, and by paying now, it is saving more than a billion dollars
just over the next couple of years in additional interest that the IMF
would have "earned."

Ever since I can remember --my friend tells me-- every six months the
IMF representatives would come from Washington, go to the government,
say here's the plan for the next six months, and get back on a plane and
leave. 

*Those* are the broken chains... 

Just the day before the head of the Imperialist Monetary Fund had been
prattling on about the need for Argentina to follow an adjustment plan.
Kirchner's message on Thursday was, "just what part of 'no' don't you
folks in Washington understand"?

It was strange --and pleasant-- to hear the neoliberal and free market
commentators. "More political than economic" one sneered. Another,
imagining it was a *criticism*, said that Kirchner's tone was more one
of someone proclaiming a war for independence than that of a responsible
trustee. 

Especially significant, in my view, was Kirchner's statement that the
measure had been thoroughly discussed in Mercosur --where Venezuela's
joining as a full member was approved a week ago, BTW-- and his
expression of thanks to Lula for his friendship and to the "Bolivarian
Republic of Venezuela" for its solidarity and support. At which there
was applause from a section of the audience. 

Just by coincidence, I guess, three days ago Lula's folks had done their
own IMF thing, Lula style. No summonses. No formal Act of State, just a
brief communiqué, a minor bookkeeping thing: we're paying the IMF the 15
billion we owe them. Today.

In the meantime, halfway around the world, in Hong Kong the ministerial
meeting of the WTO's Doha round of negotiations hasn't provided any
fisticuffs for the TV cameras mostly because TV cameras aren't allowed
inside the real negotiating sessions. 

The Group of 20, or G20, headed by China, India and Brazil, has been
clear in expressing its requirements for a gesture of good faith from
the imperialists of Europe, Japan and the United States. First, a 50%
cut in the billion dollar a day subsidies the imperialists give to their
farmers and agribusiness which allow them to dump into the world market
at prices way below the cost of production  everything from cotton to
soybeans to sugar. Second, a date certain by which the imperialists will
commit to 100% elimination of all trade-distorting subsidies.

The European imperialists have been especially scurrilous. Faced with
repeated WTO rulings that various aspects of their "Common Agricultural
Policy" and other anti-Third World schemes are outrageously illegal
under *existing* world trade rules, they present what they're *forced*
to do to avoid devastating LEGAL retaliatory tariffs as if these were
new "concessions" on their part, and demand the same from the Third
World. And when someone like Brazil gets up to point out that just since
the meeting started a little more than 48 hours before, more than two
billion in *additional* subsidies had been given by imperialist
countries as weapons for their agribusinesses to ruin third world
peasants with, this the Euroimperialists denounce as demagogy.

Given the G-20's stance, a few days ago the imperialists unilaterally
announced that actually Hong Kong wasn't about trade negotiations at
all, but about helping the LDDC, the least developed developing
countrries, and hinted they were ready to give literally *millions* of
dollars, several million, in fresh new aid and trade concessions to
them. 

Yet instead of showing gratitude, here comes Brazil making rude noises
about the billions the imperialists are spending *just this week* raping
the agricultural sector in the third world. The ingrates.

Now I don't know this for a fact, this is entirely speculation on my
part, and probably the fact that John Snow, U.S. Secretary of the
Treasury just happened to visit Mexico Thursday is pure coincidence, but
I harbor the deep suspicion that seeing how "uppity" the darkies in
Brazil and Argentina's governments were getting about these sugar and
corn subsidy things, it might not have been out of place to remind both
governments that without IMF financing, they'd be left without fish out
of water trying to function in the world market, and they should be more
friendly, like for example that sugarwater salesman, the faux Fox cub,
is. 

If so, then this long-analyzed and carefully-prepared move to repay the
IMF is Kirschner and Lula's way of telling Bush to go fuck himself.

Like my friend said, "Hear the noise of broken chains...."

It is beautiful music.

Joaquín





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