Elections and Strikes

Unrelated gratuitous cuteness picture.

Last Tuesday marked the second transit strike since Anne, Mark and the HBomb arrived in Buenos Aires.  You may remember that the silver lining of the first transit strike was that Mark got to attend the South American premiere of Game of Thrones slightly before it premiered on HBO.  This tells us a couple of things - first, Mark measures time in terms of Game of Thrones related events - this will probably morph into a "True Detective"-based time system following the GoT season finale tonight, and second, that is a lot of transit strikes.  So why does Argentina have so many transit strikes?  Well, it's complex, but the simple story is inflation.  The most recent strike was called by the transit unions because the government proposed a raise of 25%.  For most of the world, that is a pretty good bump in pay.  But in Argentina, the rate of inflation is officially reported to be about 24%, but most independent economists put it closer to 35%.  So if you have the same salary two years in a row, you have less buying power in the second year.  And even if you have a 25% raise, you are less well off than you were the year before.

Henry believes in a predictable rate of inflation between 1-3% annually.

Anyway, there were negotiations but it didn't work out and now they had their second strike in 3 months.  And we're not talking a minor inconvenience.  We are talking all of the transit workers in the city.  That's bus drivers, port workers, airplane workers, and some taxi drivers.  On top of that, some of the striking workers took it to the next level and set up barricades to shut down traffic on some of the major thoroughfares in town.  Ouch.

This past Wednesday was another significant day in Argentina.  The political parties had to announce and register their alliances with the government.  Argentina is having presidential (and a bunch of other) elections this year.  Argentina has a whole host of parties ranging from the extreme left to the extreme right to the extreme middle - actually, I am not sure that last one is a thing.  Anyway, because the parties are legion, many have no reasonable expectation of winning seats or the presidency running alone, but have a shot if they band together.  In past elections these alliances have shifted based a multitude of factors, so now the country actually has a law saying that all political alliances for this election have to be declared and registered with the government.  By last Wednesday.

How many Argentine campaign workers does it take to make a political ad?  This many.

Being as how Mark, Anne and the HBomb are not voters in the Argentine elections, they do not have to decide which candidates to support.  However, that does not mean they are not surrounded by political messaging… and sometimes - candidates.  A few weeks back, HBomb was leading one of his famous tours of Buenos Aires when our intrepid trio encountered a photo shoot.  There were camera men, lighting guys, make up people, a director - the whole deal.  Anne, Mark and HBomb investigated further in hopes that it was a movie or TV show being shot.  Wouldn't that be cool?  To run into a movie on the streets in B.A.?  But, alas, no it was a political ad being shot.  The candidate is running for mayor of Buenos Aires.  He is currently the head of Aerolineas Argentinas, so … well, I am not really sure how to complete that (not really a clear causal relationship there).  But anywho…pretty cool.

I think the guy in the blue shirt is the candidate