Welcome To The Dictatorship Of Happiness

[Pensador]

Its not that I think its the perfect way to get a job, look, I trully believe in meritocracy, I know an uncle of mine who lives in Mexico, and his wife, and the family of his wife, they are all scientific people, successfull scientific people, people who worked hard to have a very more than decent life. They gain thousands of dollars/month each other, they have a fancy house, nice cars, eat outside 95% of the times...

I know positively these people deserve what they have, because they studied, worked, etc. I know this is (by far) the best way to get things in this world.
The problem is that this way of getting stuff, this recognition, this prestige, this being someone in the scienttific community, this respect, etc, is just 1% of the way things are done in the world today. Its not the common way, its not the way that world works today, and while it is fair, it is rare.

I never felt capable of developing like these people myself. Also, when I started to get immerse in the job market, was the worst years to do, from 2001 to 2005. And then there were other issues, personal stuff, lots of things. I wish I had had a father, or a god father, or a friend who could help me, I wish I had opportunities. Even in the ministrys, while 'in the papers' you need exams and all that to get a public post, in reality that doesnt happen, that its just not true.

Thats why I wish I had someone who said to me "this is your work now". Not because its the best way, or even a good way, or a fair way, just because is the way people get work today everywhere, not only in Argentina. Yes, my uncle is an exception, there are very few people who get that far like that, when you have competition, and in every market you have that, when you have one who wins the spot, then you have lots of people who loose. And the losers, they are also capable, intelligent, well prepared, etc. Its just the way it works.

Find something you like to do and have a talent for strive to become the best at it and keeping doing that until you are one of the best at even if takes 20 years. It will most likely eventually pay off. I went through more struggles and pit falls and failures than I ever imagined possible. Lost everything only 12 years ago I mean penniless but I got right back up and continued on. But that down fall was actually led to the life style I have now which I very much enjoy. It is not just earning money and having things, it is doing what I love to do and what I am inspired to do at my own pace on my own terms.

Not sayying this is the only way but it worked well for me in the long run.

 

[ben]

[Edited to add: well, yes some Quebecers and Canadians can imagine, remembering that Trudeau rolled out the tanks in Quebec -- during the FLQ crisis when that group kidnapped and killed a politician. Trudeau (pere) invoked the War Measures Act in order to go after them.]

Trudeau was very articulate in explaining his position:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XfUq9b1XTa0

PS Last time I watched this, years ago, I didn't need to install country-spoofing shenanigans to be able to watch it.

 

[Matiasba]

Find something you like to do and have a talent for strive to become the best at it and keeping doing that until you are one of the best at even if takes 20 years. It will most likely eventually pay off. I went through more struggles and pit falls and failures than I ever imagined possible. Lost everything only 12 years ago I mean penniless but I got right back up and continued on. But that down fall was actually led to the life style I have now which I very much enjoy. It is not just earning money and having things, it is doing what I love to do and what I am inspired to do at my own pace on my own terms.

Not sayying this is the only way but it worked well for me in the long run.

I wish I could do what I like. I very much doubt I can do what I like, I just cant go in that, or any, direction. Money, things, success, I dont want that, at least in the first moment. What I enjoy is to study, but with objectives, with this feeling of going somewhere, not study just for study. But at this moment I cant. I wish I could. I wish i could continue studying, I wish someday I will work in what I like... :mellow:

 

[Bajo_cero2]

1) I will really appriciate to do not be compared with Matias and his search of work using nepotism. Thank you very much.

2) Ben, public emplyee cannot be dismissed just like that as I explained many times. Moreno did it to 2 CEOs of Indec that rebeled: he fired one, he retired the other. Justice ordered to reincorporate her but she had not assigned something to do (what is called an eleophant's cementery):

http://m.tn.com.ar/e...r-moreno_644825

The President is doing a political cleansy that is forbidden by the law and by international treatries of human rights.

http://www.pagina12....2016-01-09.html

If you think that he is doing this to put in their place not biased technicians, you are naive. Experience showed during the last administration that career public employed can rebel when you start cheating the numbers regarding inflacion. This is what the President wants to avoid. It is clear that the INDEC is not going to be reliable neither impartial during his goverment neither.

Let's see. The officialism stop publishing information regarding inflacion while they were doing this when they were the opposition.
There are 2 reasons for that 1) they were inventing the 30% of inflacion or 2) they had accurate info, they have skilled personal but they do not want to publish the inflacion we have right now that is a lot higher than 30%. If the public services are increasing the cost between 100% up to 500% we cannot have 30% inflación. Everybody knows that some items rised the price about 60% just in case when he won like cookies and the wheat price rised a lot since he announced the lift of the taxes for exportations. Meat also rised the price.

So, here you become a very good clapping seal. You agree that he is against the law but you forgives him because you like it.

3) During the previous downsizing of the State, the most used tool was the voluntee retirement. Here you have the decree:
http://mepriv.mecon....rmas/287-92.htm

It costed to the State 1229 billion usd. The decree stated the compensation and it was paid in 6 stallments. As you can see, there was not political cleansy. The decree also states that the families of the people who agree to quit continues having the medical insurance for 3 monts.

Menem faced the same problems than Macri is facing now. Menen's solution was to create an elephants cementery, a siberia for CEOs of the State that were against the administration plan. So, they were not fired.

https://sabrinaramir...rivatizaciones/

 

[Bajo_cero2]

I have to admit that i m so ultrarequete K that I started 5 dismissal cases against the 2 ultra k judges that decided in favor of Sabatella and the media law today. Forum shopping? 100% sure.

http://www.perfil.com/mobile/?nota=/contenidos/2016/01/11/noticia_0132.htmlM

Se lo dedico a la gilada por partida doble.

 

[ElQueso]

Personally, I like the Roman idea of a dictator. For those of you who don't know exactly what the difference is between a dictator of today and back then, he was a person who was given special powers by the senate to deal with a problem. Usually military issues, to deal with a certain uprising or invasion. Sulla, the next-to-last dictator, and who had revived the practice after some 100 or 200 years of not being used, was called on to deal with social and legal reform. Most (if not all) dictators, except Caesar, resigned when they completed their mission, including Sulla, who was a traditionalist.

Now, Sulla's purge was pretty bloody. I'm happy to see Macri doing a bloodless purge. Of course, granted, there is no system of appointing a temporary dictator in Argentina, but one would hope that Macri could work similar to one, within the powers that he has been given (notice that he has been stopped at many turns so far) to indeed purge the large amount of people that Cristina put into the government in her last year.

Bajo, you miss completely the point with us. We don't see Argentina governed by the rule of law, no matter how much you want us to believe that such is the case. you go on and on about all the evil things that Macri is doing, yet hang things on a very thin legal hook at best to excuse everything that Cristina did (except for one or two things you say you have done against her, like the judges you mention filing suit against) no matter whether it is in the spirit of the law or the constitution. You're a lawyer, and forgive me for this, but it's one of the reasons I don't like lawyers (I'm talking about the profession, not people themselves) - lawyers make a living finding the loopholes in the law so that they can do themselves, or for other people, what is difficult to do because people know it's not right. That includes political lawyers and even defense lawyers, who, in the US at least, are supposed to do whatever they can to get their client off even if the client has admitted to them they did the crime.

Most of us (I think - me, for sure) see Macri as a guy who is doing what he sees as necessary to put Argentina on more of a fair path, more open, more honest. I don't see him lying, changing numbers of official organizations to meet what he wants, not even complaining when the press reports something against him. Sometimes in order to strengthen something you have to cut away the dead growth, which the Argentine government has plenty of.

See, the difference between me and you, in this case, is I'm not a clapping seal, happy simply because we think Macri will do something for me. My eyes are wide open. I'm hoping he will do what's necessary to make Argentina a truly fair place, but having to play some dirty pool to accomplish it. Hopefully, like a good dictator of the Roman variety, he will leave the country's institutions stronger than when he entered office - without literal bloodshed.

 

[Bajo_cero2]

1) Elqueso, many of the complaints againts the former administration were because you (plural) didn't agree but they were legal. Most of the time I waste was explaining the law, the background and the history in this country.

2) You don't even understand that I attacked the base of the power of CFK. Now that the authorities at the Consejo de la Magistratura changed, they are going to be sanctioned if not dismissed.

3) Well, until now Macri failed to fulfill all his promises, besides to open the cepo to the usd and to lift retenciones to wheat.

How can he strengthen the institutions if he is attacking them? He cannot.

4) However, I appriciate your honesty regarding you like dictators.

You are wrong regarding that the National Constitution does not regulates dictators, it does, as a crime:

Artículo 29 de la Constitución Nacional: “El Congreso no puede conceder al Ejecutivo nacional, ni las Legislaturas provinciales, a los gobernadores de provincias, facultades extraordinarias, ni la suma del poder público, ni otorgarles sumisiones o supremacías por las que la vida, el honor o las fortunas de los argentinos queden a merced de gobiernos o persona alguna. Actos de esta naturaleza llevan consigo una nulidad insanable y sujetarán a los que formulen, consientan o firmen, a la responsabilidad y pena de los infames traidores a la Patria”.

The criminal code defines the crime of traition and it has between 10 up to 25 years of jail. You can read arts. 214 up to 218 of the criminal code.

So, I guess that if someone can finish in jail is not precisely the former President...

5) Here we agree partially because you confessed that I'm right and we are living in the dictatorship of happiness.

 

[ben]

2) Ben, public emplyee cannot be dismissed just like that as I explained many times. Moreno did it to 2 CEOs of Indec that rebeled: he fired one, he retired the other. Justice ordered to reincorporate her but she had not assigned something to do (what is called an eleophant's cementery):

http://m.tn.com.ar/e...r-moreno_644825

The President is doing a political cleansy that is forbidden by the law and by international treatries of human rights.

http://www.pagina12....2016-01-09.html

If you think that he is doing this to put in their place not biased technicians, you are naive. Experience showed during the last administration that career public employed can rebel when you start cheating the numbers regarding inflacion. This is what the President wants to avoid. It is clear that the INDEC is not going to be reliable neither impartial during his goverment neither.

Let's see. The officialism stop publishing information regarding inflacion while they were doing this when they were the opposition.
There are 2 reasons for that 1) they were inventing the 30% of inflacion or 2) they had accurate info, they have skilled personal but they do not want to publish the inflacion we have right now that is a lot higher than 30%. If the public services are increasing the cost between 100% up to 500% we cannot have 30% inflación. Everybody knows that some items rised the price about 60% just in case when he won like cookies and the wheat price rised a lot since he announced the lift of the taxes for exportations. Meat also rised the price.

So, here you become a very good clapping seal. You agree that he is against the law but you forgives him because you like it.

If you read what I wrote, you'll see that I wasn't discussing the law much. I'm not discussing that aspect now, and am certainly not interested in doing so with you.

In fact, I wrote quite clearly that CFK used her control of the state to screw thing up sufficiently to make any fixing it strictly by the books near-impossible. Any necessary pushing, stretching, and even - when absolutely necessary - breaking of the rules involved in fixing what everybody agrees needs fixing, is the direct responsibility of CFK and her cronies. As an example, take the stacking of every ministry, agency, and government-owned enterprise with camporistas and ñoquis galore. It was far easier to them to pack every level of government with ñoquis and ideologues than it will be for Macri to fix, they knew it, and they did it anyways (or precisely for this reason). The responsibility of what happens when sane management returns rests on them.

Macri will be judged by whether he respects the spirit of the law even when forced to push the letter, by whether he limits his pushing the law's limits to only what is absolutely necessary rather than what is good for him and his friends, and by whether he gets the job done. As well, by whether he starts pushing for institutions which will outlast him and what is convenient for him. If doing that involves taking the poor staff of Indec, an agency universally acknowledged as rotten to the core, and letting them go (rather than what seems to be your preferred approach of having every dismissal take as long as does an execution in the US, and having all of government paralyzed forever, or at least until the K's return in 2019) that's OK with me.

If that makes me a clapper seal, so be it. I rather think calling me that - in this context - makes you an idiot.

 

[ElQueso]

Things can be made legal and done legally, even under a dictatorship. Even democracy is a kind of dictatorship, though not under the strictest sense of the word - a better word is authoritarian. The difference of how authoritarian either a dictatorship or a democracy is, is in degrees. Even true dictatorships can't exist indefinitely - they need the support of a good portion of the people, as many dictators have found out in history.

The institutions of this country are weak. I've read pieces by at least one Argentine legal scholar who has written about this (not to mention many others with the same opinion) - I'm certainly not the only one who thinks so. I've seen things first-hand (i.e., not someone just telling me a story, but have been involved) where TANJ (from one of my favorite science fiction writers, Larry Niven - There Ain't No Justice) for people who truly need it in Argentina.

A would-be queen who lies about things to make people believe that she has the answers and force those answers on the population is at least as bad a dictator as someone who lays out the problems and works towards resolving them. If you truly think that Macri is a dictator, then you are telling me that the institutions of this country are not truly strong enough to combat someone who is in power and abusing it, which makes those institutions indeed weak. Macri has been stopped from doing things that you are saying makes him a dictator. Maybe they are not as weak as I'm saying - when those who are in control of legal decisions are favoring one president over another. I know you've said that everything Cristina did was legal and was stopped when it wasn't, but I go back to legal not making things right anyway - an institution who allows one party to control everything is weak in democracy yet strong in authority.

I call Macri a dictator a bit tongue-in-cheek. Because I realize that he is not a dictator until he seizes control of the apparatus of state through force - since he doesn't have control of lawmakers like Cristina did (who, BTW, had an awful lot of control of the apparatus of state). I was comparing him to a dictator of Rome, who in those times was given a mandate from the Senate (and there was no real universal democracy in Rome in the Republic - it was the Patrician families who had most of the power, exercised through the Senate) to do things that critically needed to be done.

If you accept that Macri is a dictator, given that he has not taken the state over by force and even when confronted by legal powers has not purged those who ruled against him, you must accept that Cristina was a dictator as well. Neither one of them had or have absolute rule (the definition of a dictator). One lied and paid people to get votes (yeah, I know people personally who were visited by people giving away food for votes for Cristina) and stacked the government with useless people and such that the government couldn't afford, not to mention doing everything she could to ensure that the next government would be hampered in their efforts no matter the change of mandate from the people. The other one has tried some things and had some successes and tried others and has been rebuffed by the legal system.

The electrician that is working on our kitchen is a pretty smart guy, and not just because I happen to agree with his politics. He thinks Macri knew exactly what he can and can't get away with, but is stirring the hornet's nest (the electrician's exact words), specifically with the two supreme court judges. He's making waves and making people worried - but at the end of the day, what has he actually done that was illegal, has been called on it, and proceeded with force?

Macri is no more a dictator in the true sense of the word than Cristina was, though they may both be wanna-be dictators. True, I happen to think that Macri's brand of politics is better for the country (and myself, to be sure) and I'm willing to cut him a bit more slack than I was Cristina, who I believe was a power-hungry, greedy shark who had no real interest in "the people", at best.

 

[Bajo_cero2]

If you read what I wrote, you'll see that I wasn't discussing the law much. I'm not discussing that aspect now, and am certainly not interested in doing so with you.

Wise.

In fact, I wrote quite clearly that CFK used her control of the state to screw thing up sufficiently to make any fixing it strictly by the books near-impossible. Any necessary pushing, stretching, and even - when absolutely necessary - breaking of the rules involved in fixing what everybody agrees needs fixing, is the direct responsibility of CFK and her cronies. As an example, take the stacking of every ministry, agency, and government-owned enterprise with camporistas and ñoquis galore. It was far easier to them to pack every level of government with ñoquis and ideologues than it will be for Macri to fix, they knew it, and they did it anyways (or precisely for this reason).

Well, in fact, you are complaining about the republican and democratic system. The check and balances ingeniering is all about that, that the President cannot acchieve all his objectives (absolute power). This is specially true when the power of a President like Macri is so limited because the President needs the Congress to make the changes he wants to.

On the other side, you thinks that the last administration screw up things but half of the country disagree with you.

What Macri wants is a change of 180 degrees, it means that what he wants is a revolution.

The problem Macri is facing is the rule of law: 1) he cannot privatize the State owned companies because you need a law for that 2) he cannot dismiss public employed because they have permanency in their work unless they are real ñoquis and you can dismiss them after a show and fast due process 3) he cannot dismiss by decree the General Prosecutor because is illegal 4) he cannot abolish the media law because is a crime.

So, the big problem Macri is facing is that he is behaving as a dictator but it is a serious crime in this country as I explained before.

The responsibility of what happens when sane management returns rests on them.

Well, this is a simple expresion of wishes. Reality is that responsability relies on the President and if he continues like this, he can finish in Jail just like Videla did.

Don't forget that the National Constitution also has a permition of using letal force against dictators:

Artículo 21- Todo ciudadano argentino está obligado a armarse en defensa de la Patria y de esta Constitución
Artículo 36- Esta Constitución mantendrá su imperio aun cuando se interrumpiere su observancia por actos de fuerza contra el orden institucional y el sistema democrático. Estos actos serán insanablemente nulos.
Sus autores serán pasibles de la sanción prevista en el Artículo 29, inhabilitados a perpetuidad para ocupar cargos públicos y excluidos de los beneficios del indulto y la conmutación de penas.
Tendrán las mismas sanciones quienes, como consecuencia de estos actos, usurparen funciones previstas para las autoridades de esta Constitución o las de las provincias, los que responderán civil y penalmente de sus actos. Las acciones respectivas serán imprescriptibles.
Todos los ciudadanos tienen el derecho de resistencia contra quienes ejecutaren los actos de fuerza enunciados en este Artículo.

This means, among many other consequenses, that the person appointed by the President at any State agency by decree by passing the Congress can be criminally prosecuted for lifetime.

This also means that if people takes weapons against a dictator, it is legal.

The big problem I see is the huge lack of responsability of the President because he was spending a lot of money in call centers to spred that speach of hate and this is a proper back ground for going back to the political violence of the 70'. I wish I m wrong because this is not the country I want for my children because I remember very well how was it.

Macri will be judged by whether he respects the spirit of the law even when forced to push the letter, by whether he limits his pushing the law's limits to only what is absolutely necessary rather than what is good for him and his friends, and by whether he gets the job done. As well, by whether he starts pushing for institutions which will outlast him and what is convenient for him. If doing that involves taking the poor staff of Indec, an agency universally acknowledged as rotten to the core, and letting them go (rather than what seems to be your preferred approach of having every dismissal take as long as does an execution in the US, and having all of government paralyzed forever, or at least until the K's return in 2019) that's OK with me.

If that makes me a clapper seal, so be it. I rather think calling me that - in this context - makes you an idiot.

I appriciate that you accept that you are clapping the President decision even you understand that they are illegal, but you do it because you like him or you agree with it no matter how illegal it is. So, yes, this makes you a clapper seal. I didn't invented this nickname, you (plural) did at the call centers or, perhaps, Duran Barba did.