>Does Eduardo Galeano really not know that the IMF spent a lot of time
>telling Argentina to (a) balance its budget (either by reducing tax
>evasion or cutting spending) or (b) move off of its hard peg of the
>value of the peso to the dollar?
Brad, mate, this just isn't true, for any reasonable value of "spent a lot of time telling". The IMF did not agree any program with Argentina that included a zero deficit until the crisis was well under way; even then, the zero deficit plan was Cavallo's idea, not the Fund's. The IMF also did not insist or even strongly advise the removal of the currency board, and indeed actually demanded a similar currency board in Ecuador.
It's true that the IMF has occasionally made generic comments in favour of balanced budgets and against currency boards, but it has never pushed these as actual solutions to be implemented in Argentina in any public document dated earlier than 2001. The view of the world so seem to be taking above makes it very, very difficult to explain away all the glowing statements made About Argentina by the Fund between 1996 and 2000.
Shortly after the crisis, I seem to remember you saying that Argentina was a genuine worry for the neoliberal model, since Argentina had implemented as much of the model as would ever be practical, and it hadn't worked. You now appear to be moving away from that position in favour of one which suggests either that the Argentines could and should have done more, or that only 100% compliance with the program is acceptable (something not so far from the dreadful Dornbusch's view).
And what's the newfound obsession with "improving tax collection"? This is a red herring and you surely must know it. When tax evasion is as deeply entrenched in public life as it is in Argentina, there is no short-term method to suddenly massively increase collection; the evidence for this is the failure of the numerous moves actually made by the Argentines attempting to improve it (the financial transactions tax, etc).
I'm honestly beginning to worry that you've been brought back "on message", in the pejorative Blairite sense.
dd
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