Hmm, seems to me Correa has been on the side of the poor folks all along. Ability to enter the middle class in Ecuador has much to do with your color--how light or dark you are. And rich folks like to pass on their entitlement to their kids to insure that dynasties--political and otherwise--hold through the generations. You can call this "family-friendly." I call it anti-democratic, because it depresses opportunity for those not born into that entitlement.
Getting rid of term limits, however, is a sign of stupid overreach--happens to the best of men when they get into power--but the rest sounds pretty good to me. On Tue, Jun 30, 2015 at 8:31 PM, Gary Schiltz <g...@naturesvisualarts.com> wrote: > [A long post follows - I hope it is interesting to at least a few on > the list (I'm thinking especially of Ivan Ordoñez)] > > Despite living here in EC for 7 years, I'm still trying to figure the > place out. There are so many things I could say about it, but most > would be just sort of gut feelings. My Spanish reading skills have > only recently reached the point where I can read newspapers with > little enough pain to make it worthwhile. > > First, the good things. The country is extremely varied > geographically. It is about the size of NM, with a population of about > 13 million. We have Amazonian jungle, mountains over 21,000 feet, > Pacific beaches, and then of course the Galapagos. I live at about > 6500 feet elevation, so I don't need much heat, and never any cooling. > It's amazing living on the west slope of the Andes. I can drive half > an hour and get an increase in temperature of about 10 degrees F, > another half an hour for another 10 degrees. Or, I can drive half hour > up our gravel road for a decrease of 10 degrees. So, up to a 30 degree > temperature range in an hour and a half of driving. It's very > beautiful where I live, but quite cloudy (that's why it's called cloud > forest :-) People are generally very friendly here, but the idea of > "the truth" seems to be a little flexible. Non-prepared food is cheap, > especially fruits and vegetables. It is still legal for foreigners to > own land here, and land in rural areas can be bought for between the > low hundreds of dollars per acre, up to thousands. You can get > permanent residency by several means; Karen and I did so by investing > more than $25K by buying land (and then building two houses on it). > > In my opinion, the bad things pretty much begin with the current > government. Rafael Correa swept into power in 2007 on a populist > platform modeled laregly after Hugo Chavez of Venezuela - many have > called him "Chavez Light". At first, he was pretty moderate, and spent > all of Ecuador's income from oil (I believe we are a member of OPEC), > which was high because of the price of crude, on infrastructure > projects. I wholeheartedly support investing in infrastructure. So > though I was initially a little skeptical, after 8 years of GW Bush, I > had convinced myself that leftist governments are a good thing. > However, within a couple of years, the entire national assembly was > from Correa's party, and the populist rhetoric, replete with > rich-vs-poor talk, steadily increased. Then he loaded the courts with > his supporters, so with all three branches of government, he has > pretty much gotten whatever he wants. He has a huge ego and hates to > be criticized. So, he started passing laws restricting legitimate > criticism, much like Chavez. After a couple of journalists were fined > millions of dollars for "libel" against Correa, criticism pretty much > died, and many people became genuinely fearful to say anything > negative about him in public. > > When the price of crude dropped dramatically, there wasn't enough > money to feed his newly created huge bureaucracy. So, he turned to a > few countries, especially China, and got high-interest loans. At the > moment, I believe EC is in debt to the tune of $35 billion, and even > with crude prices going up somewhat, there still isn't enough cash > being collected to maintain the bureaucracy. At first, he merely added > "safeguards" (basically import quotas and higher import duties). After > all, this only affected "the rich". Even that wasn't enough. So, he > made a mistake that may (I hope) be his downfall. He proposed large > capital gains taxes on real estate (I'm not sure, but my impression is > that this may even apply when you don't sell). > > But the extremely unpopular thing that he did was to propose > progressive high inheritance taxes. EC, like most latin countires, is > very family oriented. He made the mistake of criticizing the ability > to pass property down to heirs with little tax, and that struck a > nerve. One remark that he made went like this: if you have property or > a business worth, let's say $500K, and you have five children and ten > people working for you, you can leave each child $100K, which would > put them into the 72% tax bracket, which would mean they would each > have to raise $72K just to receive their share. But, why not divide > the estate into 15 parts, leaving $33K to each child, as well as to > each worker? That would put them all into a much lower bracket, > allowing them all to inherit their small amount tax free. That's > pretty much when the shit hit the fan. Even communist-leaning folks > tend to have a dim view of leaving the same thing to their workers as > they do to their kids, especially here in family-oriented Latin > America. > > So Ecuadorians have recently found their voice, especially the middle > class. Emboldened by anger over his anti-family stance, people have > finally started vociferously criticizing Correa. Starting a couple of > weeks ago, people have been peacefully demonstrating in the streets by > the tens of thousands in Quito, and even more in Guayaquil. I believe > there were estimates of up to 300K people in Guayaquil alone > demonstrating against Correa on June 26. In Quito, a group numbering > in the tens of thousands marched to as close to the presidencial > residence as they could get, chanting "Fuera, Correa, Fuera!" ("Out, > Correa, Out!"). [#FueraCorreaFuera] They even broke through the police > lines, but Correa himself was off somewhere else giving a speech to > his mass of supporters, numbering in the low hundreds in that > particular location. > > So, it isn't clear what's going to happen. Oh, the other thing that > Correa has been pushing for is a change to the Constitution to remove > term limits (he is two years away from the end of his second term, > which is all that is currently allowed). The assembly apparently could > amend the constitution by itself, but polls show over 70% in favor of > a national referendum, which almost certainly would go against > indefinite re-election, and thus, against Correa. > > The next few months will be pretty interesting, to say the least. > > ============================================================ > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College > to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com -- Merle Lefkoff, Ph.D. President, Center for Emergent Diplomacy Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA me...@emergentdiplomacy.org mobile: (303) 859-5609 skype: merlelefkoff
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