Villa Soldati - Are you watching?

[syngirl]

This situation was a suicide for Macri and his Presidential ambitions. That´s why CFK let him burn himself.

Sorry Bajo-Cero but don't agree with you on this one -- Cristina is too much of a chicken to do anything because the poor people are the only people that will vote for her in the next election. However if only the okupas in the park get handed free housing, she'll find the rest of the poor that don't receive a handout will not be so happy to vote for her next year. If you ask me every day of silence from her puts her another foot further into the grave.

Macri -- if he plays his cards right -- will have the entire rest of the city behind him, and he could take the next election (though he seems to have not yet committed to whether he will run for gobernador or president )

The rest of Buenos Aires -- including so many of the poorer people in Capital, including poorer immigrants from Bolivia, from Paraguay, are calling into the radio and the news stations are angry at the situation, angry that they WORK, that they STRUGGLE, that they pay their impuestos and yet THEY don't get given a house just because they demand it.

If Macri solves this situation and makes sure that the okupas do not get handed public land, he will get the vote of every hardworking person in the city who is crying out against the injustice of deciding that just a few people get free housing when the rest have to go through the normal legal routes.

The longer this situation goes on, the more influence it will have on the outcome of next year's elections. In the past few days more and more anger has been growing from the rest of the city that these okupas may get a handout.

At the end of the day both CFK and Macri have their own thugs that they pay for a lot of political rumbling, but listening to the radio and the news over the course of the weekend the anger is growing that the okupas may get something that the rest of the working poor in Buenos Aires may not -- if Macri stops that from happening, his voter base will grow exponentially.

 

[syngirl]

Btw, have you seen the state that park was in? nothing like Palermo or Recoleta for sure. The south of the city has always been relegated in many ways.

Actually, my husband spent a good portion of his childhood in one of the monoblocs a few streets away from the Parque Indoamericano.

They were members of the old Club Espanol and they used the park when he was a child. The park has been called abandoned in the past few days, but this is a bit of an exaggeration -- it has not had the attention paid to it yet that they gave to Parque Centenario or Avellaneda, but it wasn't an unused predio.

The vecinos who live around there can attest to the fact that it was a used space. It is not as pretty as other parks in the city, this is true, but just because a park doesn't have a fountain and a lake and flowers and benches, does this mean that I can walk in there and build a house?

This is the issue that is at stake -- whatever happens here is going to set a precedent for the future -- give the land away and you might as well say goodbye to every public space in the city.

How do you decide who gets a house? These people are complaining, but there are thousands of others in the city who have been on the lists for longer -- why should they get passed over just because they have been waiting and trying to do things legally?

This situation should have been solved the first day -- it should not have been allowed to go on this long. Tomorrow they will do a censo of who's in the park. This shouldn't even have been necessary.

There is a dire need for more social housing in Capital (and the rest of Argentina) but dividing up Parque Indoamericana and building another villa is not the way forward. Things move so slowly in Argentina that by the time the government moves to build proper housing the okupas will have already built their own improvised housing, and then the govt will never be able to get permission to tear it down to build proper housing and services.

 

[Bajo_cero2]

Sorry Bajo-Cero but don't agree with you on this one -- Cristina is too much of a chicken to do anything because the poor people are the only people that will vote for her in the next election. However if only the okupas in the park get handed free housing, she'll find the rest of the poor that don't receive a handout will not be so happy to vote for her next year. If you ask me every day of silence from her puts her another foot further into the grave.

Well, they are receiving 210 pesos per child they send to school.
She developed the widest housing plan since Peron.
And nobody is talking about free houses. This houses are built by the government, finance by Banco Hipotecario (a state bank created for financing this houses) and paid by the people who is going to be the owner.

Macri -- if he plays his cards right -- will have the entire rest of the city behind him, and he could take the next election (though he seems to have not yet committed to whether he will run for gobernador or president )

But he didn´t. He created his Metropolitana Police to repress poor people. And he was a slop. He had to ask for help to the National Government.

The rest of Buenos Aires -- including so many of the poorer people in Capital, including poorer immigrants from Bolivia, from Paraguay, are calling into the radio and the news stations are angry at the situation, angry that they WORK, that they STRUGGLE, that they pay their impuestos and yet THEY don't get given a house just because they demand it.

Well, does this media you mentioned belong to Grupo Clarin?

If Macri solves this situation and makes sure that the okupas do not get handed public land, he will get the vote of every hardworking person in the city who is crying out against the injustice of deciding that just a few people get free housing when the rest have to go through the normal legal routes.

You are missing the point.
1) There is not such a thing as free houses.
2) There is not legal way to get them, at least for these people.
3) Because Macri canceled the housing plan
4) Elections are decided by poor people
5) Macri has no power to decide what is going to happend at the Parque Interamercano because:
a) The federal force that brought peace follows the President´s orders
b) She is not going to order the eviction
c) Seems that the land belong to the federal government (She offered the land and the city government has to build the houses) (But I am not sure about this).

The longer this situation goes on, the more influence it will have on the outcome of next year's elections. In the past few days more and more anger has been growing from the rest of the city that these okupas may get a handout.

Exactly, and whose issue is this? Macri´s because he is the city major. So, the longer the crisis is worst for him.

At the end of the day both CFK and Macri have their own thugs that they pay for a lot of political rumbling, but listening to the radio and the news over the course of the weekend the anger is growing that the okupas may get something that the rest of the working poor in Buenos Aires may not -- if Macri stops that from happening, his voter base will grow exponentially.

Well, this might be true, but how is he going to accomplish it if the policia metropolitana is useless. So, who has the power? She has it as far as she has over 100.000 armed men under her command.

Regards

 

[syngirl]

NYC is a rich city where was easy to get a job and there weren´t some millions of homeless. Am I wrong?

It wasn't at the time that the poster was talking about the taking of Thompson Park -- NYC in the 60s / 70s /80s was a shithole actually. There's plenty of documentaries you can watch about it. Times Square, Broadway, Soho, "TriBeca" (which didn't even exist then) -- all of these places where you think of as huge tourist haunts and multi-million dollar apartments, were essentially slums and low-cost housing.

I'm not a New Yorker, so someone else on the board can correct me, but I believe it was Ed Koch who came in, and wouldn't take shit from anyone, cleaned up the city, ditched all the corrupt cops (which was a huge problem in the city), and basically set them back on track. Then I guess Giuliani was the one that continued kicking out the prostitutes from what are now the tourist areas etc.

The New Yorkers on the board can fill in more details, but NYC today is nothing like it was 30-40 years ago. And if you watch some of the docs on the mayoral races it will make you think "wow, wouldn't it be great if Buenos Aires could get someone in to really kick some ass?" -- unfortunately at the moment there's no really clean ballsy politicians here that have the guts to do it -- and with Argentina's past as a dictatorship, I think anyone would be too scared to do it, because as soon as they started showing some real authroity, people would start screaming Dictadura!

 

[Bajo_cero2]

The vecinos who live around there can attest to the fact that it was a used space. It is not as pretty as other parks in the city, this is true, but just because a park doesn't have a fountain and a lake and flowers and benches, does this mean that I can walk in there and build a house?

You are right, I have been there and it is full of people playing futbol or having picnic at weekends. No doubt about it.

Parque de la Ciudad is abandoned and useless.

They probably said so because it look like abandoned.

Regards

 

[syngirl]

You are right, I have been there and it is full of people playing futbol or having picnic at weekends. No doubt about it.

Parque de la Ciudad is abandoned and useless.

They probably said so because it look like abandoned.

Regards

you're right -- Parque de la Ciudad is kind of crap. I can't remember though, is it the one that has the creepy abandoned amusement park?

 

[nikad]

In any case, the south of the city is never as well kept as the other parts. The differences are huge. This is not just Macri´s fault, it has been like that historically.

 

[nikad]

you're right -- Parque de la Ciudad is kind of crap. I can't remember though, is it the one that has the creepy abandoned amusement park?

Yeah, that is the one. It was called Interama when it first opened and it was built by Cacciatore during a military govt.

 

[Bajo_cero2]

The New Yorkers on the board can fill in more details, but NYC today is nothing like it was 30-40 years ago. And if you watch some of the docs on the mayoral races it will make you think "wow, wouldn't it be great if Buenos Aires could get someone in to really kick some ass?" -- unfortunately at the moment there's no really clean ballsy politicians here that have the guts to do it -- and with Argentina's past as a dictatorship, I think anyone would be too scared to do it, because as soon as they started showing some real authroity, people would start screaming Dictadura!

I was living in NYC so I insist. You can do it if you have a wealthy country because it is just a matter of clean thing up: police corruption, drugs selling at street, prostitution if this is illegal, etc.

But we are talking about poor hard workers, you are confusing two different situations.

We have over 3.7% people under the poverty line only in this city, 11% in Gran Buenos Aires, 2% are indigentes. This means about 1 million people. So, I explained before, this is a completely different situation that the NYC one you commented because there they fought police corruption and its consequences: heroine and cocaine selling at streets and illegal prostitution.

Here we have hard poor workers and politician who canceled the housing program and who the hell know what are they doing with this money.

Regards

 

[syngirl]

Well, does this media you mentioned belong to Grupo Clarin?

I don't think Grupo Clarin owns Canal 26 (yikes, yesterday was the first time I actually agreed with a lot of what was being said on Canal 26, both conductores and callers alike) -- who is behind them?

We tend to watch every channel in the house -- Television Publica (which has had BARELY any coverage of the situation compared to other channels), C5N, Canal 26, Cronica for the gore (30 mins or so with a shot of the bloodied face of a man the other night), TN, Canal 9 etc etc -- we're news junkies in this house.

We also read pretty much any newspaper you can pick up at the cafe -- this morning was Pagina 12 and Clarin because those were what were there.

Exactly, and whose issue is this? Macri´s because he is the city major. So, the longer the crisis is worst for him.

Well, this might be true, but how is he going to accomplish it if the policia metropolitana is useless. So, who has the power? She has it as far as she has over 100.000 armed men under her command.

At this point I don't think this is just a city issue. I think the national govt needs to step in. In other countries in the capital city there would not be such lack of involvement by the national governemnt.

Macri's Metropolitan are barely formed yet, of course they can't be expected to control the situation, nor would I have faith in them to try -- they are only patrolling Saavedra, Nunez, Urquiza, Ortazar and a few other barrios right now. They are softies (and their cars don't make them look anymore hardcore that's for sure) -- but I do think they have the right idea*, I dont think you can throw a newly formed force right into the muck of it before they've really been able to establish any authority. Right now they're kind of a clown police force, and I just hope that they can improve that image, otherwise they might as well abandon the idea of a Metrolpolitan force.

On the other hand it was the Federals and not the Metropolitanos that were caught on film beating the crap out of people (and unnecessarily) on weds or thurs night. Cristina's men out there beating up her voters.

* by this I mean, starting out with the force just patrolling a few areas and then as they expand, expand their reach over the city. Right now they are a bunch of rookies, so throwing them into this complex situation is something I don't think they are ready for.