Death of Peronismo? We can only hope.

[dr__dawggy]

Bob,

I totally agree with you. An excellent educational system is essential as you mentioned. The problem in many of these countries like Argentina where there is tremendous corruption, especially at the political level is that they enjoy those high levels of uneducated masses. Just look at the Kirchners and all these poor, uneducated masses they would bus in to stage protests. The highly educated and articulate and wealthier are harder at pulling the wool over their eyes than someone that isn't educated and has no assets that would gladly take a handout or vote all for a sandwich and some pesos.[/quote]

I have a friend who is a former employee of one of the political parties. His job was to buy votes in the provinces. He would go to the homes of poor families and offer to buy every member of the family a pair of shoes. They would receive the left shoe prior to the election with a promise that the right shoe would be delivered after they went to the polls to vote for the right candidate.

 

[perry]

I do agree that the education system here could be vastly improved and there is a dumbing down of the population. But this is hardly an Argentine phenomenon and is happening worldwide .

In regards to the death of Peronisimo this will never happen as a movement it is firmly entrenched in all aspects of Argentine society. As stated before the movement has been strengthened by the death of Nestor Kirchner as he will be immortalised in death as is customary in local culture. There is very little chance of a change of government next year and much less so now.

 

[earlyretirement]

I do agree that the education system here could be vastly improved and there is a dumbing down of the population. But this is hardly an Argentine phenomenon and is happening worldwide .

In regards to the death of Peronisimo this will never happen as a movement it is firmly entrenched in all aspects of Argentine society. As stated before the movement has been strengthened by the death of Nestor Kirchner as he will be immortalised in death as is customary in local culture. There is very little chance of a change of government next year and much less so now.

Perry,

I would agree with you that this isn't limited to Argentina. The "dumbing of the masses" is actually quite good for politicians. For example in the USA, look at the masses there. Although the educational system is drastically better than Argentina there are still many masses in the dark and don't understand what is going on there. They believe the government when they say the unemployment rate is only 9.9%. Instead it's closer to 17% when you count underemployment or those that gave up and stopped looking for jobs. In places like California it's as high as 22%.

In this kind of situation it is better for politicians that the society isn't intelligent or educated.

I also agree that it will be difficult for the downfall of Peronisimo. As mentioned, I doubt many of us will see systemic fundamental change in our lifetimes. I hope I'm wrong but not holding my breath.

 

[A&A]

Aside from the employee firing issue (a local friend has a company and has enlightened me as to this awful policy, especially for firing "with cause")., one could very easily apply this thread to the United States.

 

[earlyretirement]

A&A,

It's not just firing employees. I can give you so many horrible examples. I own several companies here in Argentina so I have quite a bit of experience with this so I can give you ideas on how bad it is.

Even when you do everything in "white" and legal it's horrible here dealing with employee issues. For example, last year I had an employee get hurt on his own time messing around with motorcycles. He got hurt and the doctor said he couldn't work for 1 year! So even though he didn't get hurt on company time, we had to pay his full salary for 1 year and couldn't fire him.

Then you have employees just calling in sick all the time and as long as they have a doctor's note they are covered. But of course they can pay off any doctor to write a note.

 

[SaraSara]

A note about American schools.

Our daughter went to an elite private school in Washington, D.C. (Only because my husband's firm paid the astronomical tuition).

The school gave her an excellent grounding in math, language, and science, but there were no courses in world history or geography,or foreign languages. As far as the school was concerned, the world ended at the US border.

We were amazed - this is the school the Obama girls go to, so I assume there's no better school in DC. Yet their approach to education was so insular.

 

[LAtoBA]

A note about American schools.

Our daughter went to an elite private school in Washington, D.C. (Only because my husband's firm paid the astronomical tuition).

The school gave her an excellent grounding in math, language, and science, but there were no courses in world history or geography,or foreign languages. As far as the school was concerned, the world ended at the US border.

We were amazed - this is the school the Obama girls go to, so there's no better school in DC. Yet their approach to education was so insular.

I'm sorry to say but your daughter just went to a really bad private school. No foreign languages or world history, both of which have AP exams? That's pretty standard at a private school. At least the private schools in California.

 

[SaraSara]

We couldn't understand the school's curriculum. Every time we asked her teachers, we were told such subjects belonged to college, not high school.

We were nervous when she applied to only two universities, both of them Ivy League, but she was accepted by both. Which makes me wonder.

 

[Gringoboy]

Bob,

I totally agree with you. An excellent educational system is essential as you mentioned. The problem in many of these countries like Argentina where there is tremendous corruption, especially at the political level is that they enjoy those high levels of uneducated masses. Just look at the Kirchners and all these poor, uneducated masses they would bus in to stage protests. The highly educated and articulate and wealthier are harder at pulling the wool over their eyes than someone that isn't educated and has no assets that would gladly take a handout or vote all for a sandwich and some pesos.[/quote]

I have a friend who is a former employee of one of the political parties. His job was to buy votes in the provinces. He would go to the homes of poor families and offer to buy every member of the family a pair of shoes. They would receive the left shoe prior to the election with a promise that the right shoe would be delivered after they went to the polls to vote for the right candidate.

I had to read that twice

 

[ghost]

but there were no courses in world history or geography,or foreign languages.

I must disagree on this Sara. I have kids and I have spent so much time reviewing curriculum and helping to prep for SATs and PSATs and such. And nowhere in the States did I ever encounter, even a public high school without world history, western civ, geography, or language options. Guess I got lucky.....but I doubt it. In fact sometimes the menu of language options was simply overwhelming.