■"Latin America's Left Takes Pragmatic Tack: To Reduce Poverty, New Leaders May Have to Sell Economic Changes to Skeptical Public," by David Luhnow, Wall Street Journal, 2 March 2005, p. A15.
Interesting article. Yes, lotsa leftist governments now in South America, but it ain't your daddy's socialism. Lula in Brazil is so free trade that some of his supporters wonder if it would have been any different if the rightist candidate had won. The 90's were allegedly full of "centrist" leaders, but their hard-core free marketism always struck me as pretty rightist in economic orientation, minus the usual Latin American political authoritarianism. If Lula and company are the leftists, then they're about left-wing as Clinton was.
You remember Clinton? Balanced budgets and all that.
Great chart in the article detailing what's the same and what's different. The same is tight control over government spending and open trade with flexible exchange rates. What's different is more government activism in industrial development and more spending on poor. What's still missing is Hernando DeSoto stuff: overall tax code to raise government revenue, freer labor mobility, better education and more antitrust efforts.
Hell, it sounds downright Teddy Rooseveltian! If this is the leftist turn, I won't argue with a greater focus on the poor. Can't go Core if you've got too much Gap. But tackling those tougher issues is everything. No capitalism without attracting capital.
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