Fausta's Blog

American and Latin American Politics, Society, and Culture

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On the mend

First of all, my heartfelt thanks to each person who wrote, called and texted asking how I am doing.

At one point, I thought, “I will get well. Look at all the people praying for me.”

I am doing much better, and continue to improve. When I left the hospital on April 10th, I could not sit up; I’m now able to walk half a mile unaided. Recovering from ileus and peritonitis took me two full months, and I still have to get back to full speed.

For the past two months I have mostly avoided the news, politics and particularly Latin American politics. As far as I can see, American politics has descended into contrived hysterics over every darn thing. LatAm will continue to be LatAm, and I simply did not have any energy to summon.

Many thanks, again, and I’ll be posting more frequently now.





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Sunday palate cleanser: Bach Easter Oratorio

Wishing you a happy and blessed Easter,

J. S. Bach’s Easter Oratorio : Sir John Eliot Gardiner , 2013
Sir John Eliot Gardiner conductor
Hannah Morrison soprano, Proms debut artist
Meg Bragle mezzo-soprano, Proms debut artist
Nicholas Mulroy tenor
Peter Harvey bass
Monteverdi Choir
English Baroque Soloists (pre-1977, Monteverdi Orchestra)
London, PROMS 2013
Royal Albert Hall .

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Guatemala: The Bitkov case

Guatemalan Attorney General Thelma Aldana, at the urging of the United Nations’ International Commission Against Impunity in Guatemala and the Kremlin, has convicted Igor Bitkov, his wife, Irina, and their 26-year-old daughter, Anastasia, in spite of lack of plausible evidence.

Mary O’Grady describes the Kremlin revenge:

Mr. Bitkov was the owner of the St. Petersburg-based North-West Timber Company (NWTC). In 2005 he borrowed money from a handful of Russian state banks to upgrade some of his factories. Around the same time, a senior executive of one of the banks that lent him money asked to buy 51% of the company, Mr. Bitkov told me from prison through his Guatemalan lawyer Rolando Alvarado last week. He turned down the offer.

From 2005 to 2007 NWTC revenues grew by 30%, according to company financial statements. In 2007 Sberbank valued the company at $428 million. By 2008 he’d repaid 71% of the loan, along with interest due. NWTC was worth 2.7 times the remaining $158 million owed. Nevertheless, Mr. Bitkov says, in April 2008 the banks demanded that he immediately repay the balance.

He couldn’t comply and the company was forced into bankruptcy. Mr. Bitkov alleges that the bankruptcy administrator sold NWTC’s assets at fire-sale prices to entities controlled by various executives of the banks.

The Bitkovs feared for their lives and fled the country.

And that was only the beginning of their woes. Read the rest here.

This case raises many questions. For instance, I do not understand why the whole family is persecuted – after all, they lost all their assets. Why is the UN involved in this? What was the banks’ initial involvement?

And on and on. Should we just look at this as another instance of the long reach of tyranny and corruption?

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The US’s latest export to Brazil: sperm

Brazilians want blue-eyed babies so they’re buying sperm from the US:

Demand for American Sperm Is Skyrocketing in Brazil

Over the past seven years, human semen imports from the U.S. to Brazil have surged some 3,000%, with most buyers selecting donors whose online profiles suggest they will yield light-complexioned and preferably blue-eyed children.

Blond, blue-eyed guys are in demand,

The preference for white donors reflects a persistent preoccupation with race in a country where social class and skin color correlate with glaring accuracy. More than 50% of Brazilians are black or mixed-race, a legacy of Brazil having imported more than 10 times as many African slaves than the U.S.; it was the last Western country to ban slavery, in 1888. The descendants of white colonizers and immigrants—many of whom were lured to Brazil in the late 19th and early 20th centuries when the ruling elite explicitly sought to “whiten” the population—control most of the country’s political power and wealth.

In such a racially divided society, having fair-skinned offspring is often viewed as a way to provide a child with better prospects, from a higher salary to fairer treatment by the police.

And don’t forget market forces:

Imports are rising in part because many Brazilians simply don’t trust the national product. Unlike in the U.S., it is illegal to pay men to donate their sperm here, so domestic stocks are low and information about Brazilian donors sparse.

I see a marketing opportunity for Scandinavians, too.

You can calculate the odds for eye color here.

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Peru: President PPK resigns

Peru’s President Pedro Pablo Kuczynski has quit over a vote-buying scandal.

He has denied wrongdoing but said on Wednesday that he did not want to be an obstacle to the country’s development.

Party leaders in Congress later agreed to accept President Kuczynski’s resignation. He had been facing an impeachment vote on Thursday.

Pressure has been growing after footage emerged of his allies offering opposition politicians financial rewards if they backed him in the vote.

Is he gone for good now?
Congress still has to vote on whether to accept President Kuczynski’s resignation. Lawmakers will meet on Thursday to discuss the issue and are expected to put it to a vote later on Thursday or Friday.
. . .
Mr Kuczynski has already been through one impeachment vote. In December, his opponents wanted to remove him for allegedly receiving illegal payments from the Brazilian construction giant Odebrecht.

You can tell PPK’s resignation is bad news when you realize the Venezuelan communists celebrated with fireworks.

I don’t know what comes next. All I know is that LatAm news is an endless “shampoo rinse repeat” cycle of news in countries where people never learn.

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Venezuela: US bans the petro

The new cryptocurrency cannot be legally traded in the USA:

U.S. Bans Use of Venezuela’s Cryptocurrency. Official blasts so-called petro as ‘a desperate attempt by a corrupt regime to defraud international investors’.

With the economy in shambles and the country cut off from debt markets, Venezuela President Nicolás Maduro launched the so-called petro cryptocurrency last month in a bid to skirt intensifying financial sanctions from the U.S., the European Union and others aiming to punish the government for its authoritarian rule.

“Investing in the petro should be seen as investing in the dictatorship,” a senior U.S. official said after President Donald Trump signed an executive order banning the currency.

Indeed, (emphasis added)

U.S. officials say any other cryptocurrencies created by Venezuela’s government in the future will also be subject to the ban, which took effect immediately. Echoing the U.S. action, Venezuelan lawmakers opposed to Mr. Maduro say the petro is illegal because it was created without parliamentary approval, raising questions about the asset’s validity if there were a change of power.

The petro is the regime’s cheap excuse for a make-believe revenue source in exchange for nothing. If they were simply oriented towards creating a money laundering tool, there’s plenty of bitcoin action in that direction.

In other Venezuela news,
Tuberculosis is on the upswing

A city issues its currency: Venezuelan City Launches Its Own Currency Amid Cash Crunch

Even the Russians are starting to worry: Rosneft seeks to ease fears over Venezuela loans.
Russian oil producer says repayments are being made on schedule

Last, but not least,

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