Yesterday, 12:16 PM
For example, instead of just briefly mentioning a list of tax hikes or the seemingly pointless purchase of fighter jets - which are two of the more problematic items, IMO - they could have made an effort to determine if those actions were actually instigated by Milei himself, or whether they are things he had to accede to as part of his agreement with the coalition partners (Bullrich, Obaid, et al.) whose support he needed in order to win the election (and will continue needing in order to enact other policies). In either case, they are bad things and deserve to be criticized, but as I've pointed out several times in this thread, Milei is not the OmniGod of Argentina - he was always definitely going to have to enact at least some unlibertarian policies, regardless of whether he really wanted to or not (not possibly, not probably, but definitely).
In assessing and judging Milei, it makes a difference whether he "wanted to" or "had to". Reason could have helpfully tried to sort that out, but instead they just went "bitch mode" . The nature of politics - and especially electoral politics - is that you can easily do that with anyone. If Ron Paul had become POTUS, Reason could have written exactly the same kind of article about him - "Oh, look, he appointed his less-than-honorable grandson-in-law Jesse Benton as his Chief of Staff! Nepotism!" - "Oh, look, those newsletters! Racism!" - "Oh, look, the military spent more money on planes! All that 'non-interventionism' stuff must have been bullshit, after all!" - and so on.
I suspect this has much more to do with Reason's social libertinism vis-ŕ-vis Milei's social conservatism than it has to do with actual libertarian principles. (Hence, their complaints about "gender issues" and Milei being a "pro-lifer").
In the case of Milei (or Ron Paul), was that money offset by greater spending reductions elsewhere? Maybe. Maybe not. If not, was it by choice or political necessity? Who knows? Reason couldn't (or wouldn't) be bothered to try to find out and tell us.
Connect With Us