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Notes on El Salvador

mattlakeman.org

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Re: Notes on El Salvador

#71

Post by thisislife2 »

greenavocado wrote: post #55
Gimpei wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not true. Japan and South Korea both experienced the majority of their growth as democracies. Eastern Europe only took off after the fall of the USSR. Chile experienced most of its growth after Pinochet. India is the largest Democracy on earth and it is growing at a very fast clip. That being said, there simply aren’t very many countries and even less ones that made the successful leap to rich world status re…

That's not quite accurate. The dominance of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) for most of the post-war period has led to critiques regarding the vibrancy of political competition and the effective functioning of democracy. The chaebols, those massive family-run conglomerates, have essentially been the architects behind South Korea's economic renaissance since the '60s. Think Samsung, Hyundai, LG - these giants spear…

Quite true - and even with democracies like Japan and India, it is quite apparent from their early history that they were kind of autocratic democracies with one large party / leader / family in power for a long period. In India, the Indian National Congress ruled for nearly 5+ decades since independence, and 3 of its Prime Ministers were dynasts (Nehru, Indira Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi) from the same family. Note also that in Japan and South Korea, the US had a vested interest in not allowing democracy to thrive.

Re: Notes on El Salvador

#72

Post by bombcar »

sexy_seedbox wrote: post #51
deanresin wrote: post #31

I read an article a while ago that showed a correlation between the violent crimes per capita and how close to the equator that country was. Basically, the hotter the climate, the more crime.

Link the article? Sounds badly researched as Belarus and Russia are cold places with a lot more crime than hotter places in East and South East Asia.

It is probably "somewhat" true when accounting for all possible variables, as the better the weather the more time people spend outside.

Crime rises in the summer in most areas, iirc.

Re: Notes on El Salvador

#73

Post by SV_BubbleTime »

macintux wrote: post #67
SV_BubbleTime wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why are you under the impression that the bureaucracy class does not have a political leaning/allegiance? We know it does, 95% of DC votes for the people that want larger government.

Allegiance is not the same thing as a tendency. And the fact that one party uses smaller government as part of its sales pitch may not last forever. In the U.S. I would say that Trump’s takeover of the GOP has generally de-emphasized smaller government as a plank of the party. He certainly doesn’t care about it. Whether the bureaucrats lean towards one party or the other doesn’t change the fact that they aren’t compe…

> Whether the bureaucrats lean towards one party or the other doesn’t change the fact that they aren’t compelled out of fear for their jobs to break the law at the president’s command.

I’m thinking about all of the politically motivated “leaks”, the weaponization of institutions like the FBI, DOJ, IRS and I’m just wondering how you are seriously saying above.

The “deep state” or “the state” or “the elites” or “ the bureaucracy class” or whatever you want to call it and whatever you want to claim it exists for… is a different topic than “they don’t break the law”. I’m thinking I must be really misunderstanding your text, because that’s just ridiculous.

Re: Notes on El Salvador

#74

Post by perryizgr8 »

> Like all educated middle-class Americans, my core understanding of urban crime comes from The Wire

Lol this is accurate for people like me too who know almost everything they do about America from TV shows

Re: Notes on El Salvador

#75

Post by hayst4ck »

screye wrote: post #8
stainablesteel wrote: post #5

> Rather, the best case against Bukele is that he has created severe systemic political risk in El Salvador by converting the government from a democracy to a de facto dictatorship then hes in a good place to introduce some kind of monarchy, or personal transfer of power, someday. people want him to be dictator for life and he seems to be loved enough to receive it. democracy doesn't deal with gangs well enough to ma…

As a cynical idealist, I once tried to find 1 country of decent size that could escape the poverty/mis-governance trap while being a democracy. I found zero success stories. Every 20th century economic success story was a defacto autocratic nation. They only transitioned to democracy after they'd reached a certain level of development. (I excluded preexisting high HDI nations and ones that accidentally hit mineral go…

CGP grey did a great video on The Dictators Handbook: https://www.cgpgrey.com/blog/rules-for-rulers

It is well worth a watch. Anyone with an interest in democracy (or corporate politics or dominance hierarchies) definitely should watch it. I feel that his discussion of the making of the video was even more interesting (although long winded): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ILvD7zVN2jo

The interesting conclusion that he draws in the discussion of the video is that all systems of governance are dependent upon responsible people getting into positions of power and then choosing to act responsibly rather than selfishly. The key insight is that getting into the position of power is corruptive and you have to make personal sacrifices to not be corrupted.

Re: Notes on El Salvador

#76

Post by thisislife2 »

bitcurious wrote: post #35
screye wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a cynical idealist, I once tried to find 1 country of decent size that could escape the poverty/mis-governance trap while being a democracy. I found zero success stories. Every 20th century economic success story was a defacto autocratic nation. They only transitioned to democracy after they'd reached a certain level of development. (I excluded preexisting high HDI nations and ones that accidentally hit mineral go…

The US became absurdly wealthy during the 20th century. Canada did well too. Poland, Czechia, Estonia and a few other recently independent democracies are thriving as well.

Can you really disregard its imperialistic history here - the foundation of the American economy was built on slave labour and colonisation (even if it was a late player), and you wish to completely ignore the role of the early western settlers in America.

Re: Notes on El Salvador

#77

Post by [deleted] »

stainablesteel wrote: post #5

> Rather, the best case against Bukele is that he has created severe systemic political risk in El Salvador by converting the government from a democracy to a de facto dictatorship then hes in a good place to introduce some kind of monarchy, or personal transfer of power, someday. people want him to be dictator for life and he seems to be loved enough to receive it. democracy doesn't deal with gangs well enough to ma…

[deleted]

Re: Notes on El Salvador

#78

Post by rsync »

grecy wrote: post #7
melling wrote: post #4

I backpacked through El Salvador in 2007. I don’t remember people saying it was particularly dangerous. Honduras was the place I was told to skip, unless you wanted to scuba in Roatan There were other backpackers in the hostels. Even Colombia at that time was fine.

They all still are fine. I drove the entire pan American highway from Alaska to Argentina from 2009 to 2011. I have dozens of Friends that have done it, and I moderate a Facebook group where thousands are doing it right now. As the marketing for tourism Colombia goes “the only danger is you’ll never want to leave”

"I drove the entire pan American highway from Alaska to Argentina ..."

How did you cross that part of Colombia that is impassable and has no road and blah blah blah ?

Genuinely curious as I was dissuaded from a similar trip by the supposed inability to go all the way through Columbia.

Re: Notes on El Salvador

#79

Post by macintux »

SV_BubbleTime wrote: post #73
macintux wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Allegiance is not the same thing as a tendency. And the fact that one party uses smaller government as part of its sales pitch may not last forever. In the U.S. I would say that Trump’s takeover of the GOP has generally de-emphasized smaller government as a plank of the party. He certainly doesn’t care about it. Whether the bureaucrats lean towards one party or the other doesn’t change the fact that they aren’t compe…

> Whether the bureaucrats lean towards one party or the other doesn’t change the fact that they aren’t compelled out of fear for their jobs to break the law at the president’s command. I’m thinking about all of the politically motivated “leaks”, the weaponization of institutions like the FBI, DOJ, IRS and I’m just wondering how you are seriously saying above. The “deep state” or “the state” or “the elites” or “ the b…

The thesis that started this thread: the deep state protects democracy.

Obviously if you interpret “deep state” as “secret cabals of evildoers” then yes, that’s a nonsensical argument.

My personal interpretation of the “deep state” argument that Trump has been bandying around is that he means “people who resist my desire to do whatever I want as President”.

Re: Notes on El Salvador

#80

Post by 29athrowaway »

Extortion was the main crime in El Salvador. Asking people for a share of their income.

The cure to mass extortion is carrying weapons, or making the extortionist believe there is a good chance you have a.weapon. There is no other mitigation.

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