Cristina Kirchner: From Harvard to Tehran Non-Stop

Claiming that ruling international relations in Argentina have been –traditionally and euphemistically– dysfunctional is now almost axiomatic. The Palacio San Martin, after all, is highly experienced in managing under extremist behavior, either the supine obsequiousness (Di Tella Era) or the open society with outcast nations (Timerman Management). Those in favor of the theory which claims that extremes are destined to meet now accumulate more arguments than ever before and, not surprisingly, Carlos Saúl Menem has become a faithful soldier of Cristina’s. Curiosities of vernacular history: it was General Juan Perón who referred that 'Reality is the only truth'. And he himself –at the dawn of his intellectual debacle– declared war on Nazi Germany when the Reich began to look knocked off.

In such a context, the ruling party propaganda mechanisms have also lost their way. Used to controlling citizenship’s rhythm of attention, public opinion and political analysts with cynical elegance –but admirably quickly–, today the Casa Rosada observes how its rhetorical resources fade away –it promotes something bad in an attempt to impose something worse. This has been recently observed in its determined efforts to establish the dubious benefits of cohabitation among couples from around the country, sweeping under the carpet its intentions of sparing leadership from criminal responsibility in the face of serious corruption acts or disasters arising from misappropriation of the res publica and its resources (obligatory reference to the preface incorporated into the New Civil Code sponsored by Supreme Court's Judge Ricardo Lorenzetti).

Now, the average citizen and journalism not related to the pink building in 50th Balcarce St. choose to entertain themselves watching Cristina Elisabet Fernández Wilhelm stumbling before American University students’ questions. An environment in which the head of state was laid for the slaughter, thanks to her select group of incompetent advisors. Her academic journey now transcends protocol boundaries to become humorous. But this negative outcome should end up in tears again –the fact that the President becomes, all of a sudden, the laughing stock of the free world is unbearable for everyone. After all, the nation institutions and image are now reporting an irreparable damage.

The answers at Harvard and Georgetown expressed by the President with militant distaste – probably unconsciously, though one might doubt it– have served to draw a veil over the most serious news, coinciding with the Lady’s initiative of accepting not only Tehran government explanations but also sending Héctor Timerman, Minister of Foreign Affairs, to a private meeting with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s diplomats. A fact that, in practice, represents a partnership with a state classified as a sponsor of international terrorism by the European Community, the United States and Israel. In the end, Argentina’s Jewish community has come to join the official complacent speech regarding the Islamic Republic. And this maneuver takes place after years of supporting the alleged National Government commitment to clarify what occurred at AMIA, an episode in which Iran has yet to solidify its defense by presenting acceptable arguments. At a stroke, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner has brought the Argentine Foreign Service to the table to cheerfully engage them in dialogue with Hezbollah financiers: the local Semitic community will throw up their hands in horror, but it will be too late for them. Time for their self-criticism has come, after having ¨bought¨ the publicity events from the ruling subsystem. And it is worth remembering that they have never criticized Vice President Amado Boudou in corpore presence in the struggle for justice conducted by the attack victims’ relatives.

It is easy to foresee that the ruling militancy non-cultural scope will begin to retrace the path of a blind defense of Iran regime and, in this process, Kirchner administration will spectacularly stumble again. And the reason is that this radicalization will draw a foregone conclusion, tending to reinforce the suspicion that this element motivation comes from certain affinity with a modus operandi verging Nazism. Coincidences recur, embodied in the repressive behavior of Guillermo Moreno -Secretary of Commerce- and Julio Alak, Minister of Justice, who is by this time decided to frighten any good citizen willing to exercise his legitimate right to protest. His impetuosity to bring criminal charges against people banging pots and pans (caceroleros) could not be interpreted otherwise. Analysts have been tracking sources from which the government is nurtured in order to combat people demonstrating in streets; infiltrating their own soldiers, stigmatizing these groups with the rusty label of coupist and conveniently provoking them from the lectern. A copy of the Führer’s preliminary plan days before his scheme ended with the Reichstag arson. That is why everyone pursuing an education on these marrowy subjects must –imperiously– complete their historical notes with Sartre, Nietzsche, Hegel, Kant, Gramsci, Lenin, Trotsky and Goebbels, among others (not necessarily in that order). A useful combination to predict what irreverent neobourgeois Ernesto Laclau will get the first news of within a week, and the speeches that will be delivered by respectable men of the ¨President of the Argentine people¨.

Perhaps the most reprehensible part of what Sunday columnists periodically picture is that some of them still support the hypothesis that the late-lamented Néstor Carlos Kirchner would always spare a few minutes out of his agenda to be in good terms with Washington. An error of biblical proportions, as the laissez-faire that he implemented in order to publicly denounce and repudiate former President George Bush Junior in Mar del Plata with his own picketers has not been forgotten. Just as Shylock’s apprentice was proud of his ¨slip in Mar del Plata¨, his widow wildly applauded –to tears– the infamous episode of ¨Timerman’s plane¨ (when the Afghan province of Helmand was closer to Buenos Aires than ever before, by reasons not worth mentioning here).

The long arm of Cristina’s propaganda has also reached Washington, D.C. and with it, the conclusive acknowledgment of the ideological-commercial society between Argentina and transnational terrorism together with their ​​well indoctrinated Third World cousins (Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia, Nicaragua, North Korea, etc.). This news –alone– should serve to suddenly silence any legacy of laughter at CFK’s lectures at the most prestigious North American cloisters. Because what is concealed behind the curtain is far more sinister than what you can glimpse from the first row, lately occupied by Jorge Argüello and Víctor Santa María (SUTERH).

The consequences that will fall on the average citizen’s daily life from the current administration terroristphile confession are virtually impossible to measure, but time will allow them to show up. Meanwhile, it can be confirmed that the condescending eye of the world’s civilized nations regarding Argentina will turn into a somehow stricter look as soon as reports concerning how illegal goods are traded in popular fairs located in our unpunished geography supporting fundamentalist activities in the area known as Triple Border Area (TBA) come to light. This is a paradise in which sleeper cells from –to name but a few– the Egyptian Al-Gama'a al-Islamiya and al-Jihad, Hamas, Hezbollah and the pro-Iranian al-Muqawamah (The ¨Resistance¨) coexist and operate. Keywords: recruitment and fundraising to plan and execute attacks in several parts of the globe.

* Translated into English by Débora Gravano Jordán | e-Mail: debora.gravano@gmail.com

Originally published in Spanish on September 28th, 2012