November 02, 2025

Can We Add Vietnam To The List Of Countries Abandoning Socialism?

November 02, 2025/ Francis Menton

Even as New York City looks poised to try one more time to make socialism work, multiple countries that have gone down the socialist road are trying instead to turn off.
Notable examples include Argentina, where President Xavier Milei’s party just scored a notable victory over the Peronists in legislative elections; and Bolivia where, in the August 2025 first round of the presidential election, after nearly 20 years of explicitly socialist rule under the MAS Party, accompanied by economic stagnation, the MAS candidate for President got just 2% of the vote.
Can we add Vietnam to the list of countries moving away from socialism?

May 07, 2025

Update On Trump's Tariff Gambit

May 07, 2025/ Francis Menton

It was back at the beginning of February that President Trump launched what I have called his “tariff gambit” — sequential edicts of flat-rate, economy-wide tariffs imposed against various of our trading partner countries.
The process began with February 1 announcements of blanket 10% tariffs on all goods from China, and 25% tariffs on all goods from Mexico and Canada. Since then, in a blizzard of activity, there have been multiple rounds of announcements on this subject: new countries added to the tariff edicts, increases or decreases in the blanket rates applicable to various countries or products, granting of exceptions and exemptions, postponements of announced effective dates, and more. It’s more than just about anybody can keep track of. Here is an April 10 chronology from PBS compiling all the various tariff actions issued by the administration up to that time. The sheer speed of the announcements, and lack of direction toward any discernible purpose, are astonishing.
In a post about a month ago on April 8, I expressed extreme skepticism about this gambit.

April 08, 2025

April 08, 2025/ Francis Menton

While I have spent the past couple of weeks writing about conspiracy theories and the Kennedy assassination, the rest of the world has been consumed by the news of President Trump and his big tariff gambit.
After talking at length during the campaign about imposing a new and expansive tariff regime, Trump announced the details of his big move on April 2 — tariffs on everything, from all countries, of at least 10%, ranging up to 50% or more on some countries (e.g., China) and certain products. All of this is to be done by Executive Order, said to be based on a declaration of “emergency” under a collection of pre-existing statutes (the International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977; the National Emergencies Act; and the Trade Act of 1974).
The stock markets have reacted with turmoil. Various indices were down 10% or more over the past week, and, after initially gaining, have fallen further today. Liberal media outlets, including the New York Times gleefully foresee impending economic damage. (From today: “Investors overwhelmingly believe that Mr. Trump’s tariffs, and retaliation from U.S. trading partners, will lead to higher prices, slower growth and possibly a global recession.”).
Regular readers here will not be surprised to learn that I am not a fan of what Trump is doing on the tariff front.

November 21, 2023

November 21, 2023/ Francis Menton

In an election held on Sunday, Argentina chose as its new President self-described libertarian Javier Milei. Milei won by a not-close margin of about 56/44 over Sergio Massa, who has been the economics minister under the incumbent President Alberto Fernandez. Milei is known for a bombastic style of speaking, and for using a chainsaw in his campaign appearances as a symbol of how he plans to hack away at the government. He is also known for having even worse hair than Donald Trump.
The Perónist model of economic policy basically tracks the Democratic Party/Paul Krugman/blue state model here in the U.S.
The last 100 years — and particularly the Perónist period from 1946 on — have seen Argentina decline from one of the richest countries in the world to a kind of perennial basket case.

July 17, 2022

July 17, 2022/ Francis Menton

The Supreme Court’s West Virginia v. EPA decision a couple of weeks ago has brought forth a big wave of hand wringing in the precincts of the left. How oh how are we now going to save the planet, if our friends at the EPA can no longer order up a nation-wide energy system transformation on their own authority?
A couple of examples of the genre come from Ron Brownstein in the Atlantic, and from Coral Davenport in the New York Times, both from Friday July 15.
The funny thing about these pieces, and many others like them, is that the authors seem to have completely lost track of, or failed to follow, what has happened and continues to happen in the arena of international energy consumption.

February 28, 2021

February 28, 2021/ Francis Menton

About two years ago I visited Cambodia. While there I wrote this January 2019 post, which focused on the “killing fields” genocide that swept Cambodia in 1975-79, during the rule of the Khmer Rouge and their leader Pol Pot. In connection with my trip, I bought the Ben Kiernan history titled “The Pol Pot Regime,” which I have just now gotten around to reading.
Why my fascination with Cambodia in the day of the Khmer Rouge? It is one of the clearest modern instances of leftist/socialist ideology put into practice and then pushed to its logical conclusion.
Highly educated elitists got taught a utopian vision of a transformed society with perfect fairness and justice, and they determined to impose that vision upon the backward and unlearned masses in their country. Then they came to power, and got the opportunity to carry out their plans.
The circumstances in Cambodia were such that they could implement their plans with few to no constraints. We get to study the results. Any relevance to our current situation is for the reader to draw.