Provocative, enthusiastic, excited, depending on your point of view, by the emotions he awakens in favor of or fiercely against his dystopia, Javier Milei moves at ease in this turbulent world, where insults and disqualification are weapons launched and received almost daily and almost simultaneously. Who is capable of convincing the president that the downward trend in inflation is not a feat or that considering that the dollar is behind is not a heresy of ignorant people or profiteers? Whether enemies or, especially, friends, their visceral, almost adolescent reaction to discrepancy is as immediate as it is merciless.
How can we also assess what is happening after Milei’s visit to Spain? The president was invited by Vox, an extreme right-wing organization, a minority in Spain. Milei is a friend of Santiago Abascal, the leader of this organization. It is not known whether Milei, who is president of Argentina, traveled to Spain last week, because neither the Royal Family nor the socialist government sent authorities to receive him. But it is known that Javier Milei and Pedro Sánchez hate each other with enthusiasm and that the Spaniard got involved in Argentine politics when he supported Sergio Massa’s candidacy last year.
But, is it possible that a relationship as intense and old as the Argentine-Spanish one suffers from the narcissism of both presidents? What would Milei say if, for example, the president of France came to Argentina and met an opposing politician and not only ignored the government, but the two also insulted him in chorus?
Milei feels, like Carlos Menem, that we are doing poorly, but we are doing well, and that inflation of 8.8% in April is another step on the path to reducing the cost of living.
The libertarian is also taking advantage of the fragmentation and disorientation of the opposition in Argentina to strengthen himself.
The trench warfare that so harms local politics will remain unresolved. It’s a global trend in which Milei wants to occupy a prominent place. Donald Trump, for example, has just declared that if he reaches the White House again he will act like a “dictator from day one”.
Let’s look at the verbal violence of the presidential message in Spain. Maybe Milei doesn’t know any other tone or knows that subtlety is in fashion.
Cristina Kirchner interprets all of this in her own way, thinking that Milei will consolidate and act like Trump if she manages to significantly increase her critical mass in the 2025 legislative elections. The former president should look at herself in the retrospective mirror of her years in power and her speeches daily on the national network, insulting independent journalism with the standards used by those who feel that the truth is on their side and there is no room for doubt. She can’t understand how Milei maintains the people’s support. She thus demonstrates that she still does not understand the depth of her failure, because her theatrical distancing from the crisis does not work as an alibi.
The support that Milei maintains is proportional to the political decadence that gave life, with the help of Peronism itself, to this new libertarian experience. They say that the former president now seeks to be the formal leader of Peronism, a structure that she, like her husband Néstor, has always despised. But currently it needs this structure to remain a reference and to face any crisis. Mainly, the one she dreams of most, and it is not necessary to clarify which one it is.