Like all other people on the planet, Argentines are many things, some truly terrific. But cautious, considerate drivers they are not. This is particularly true of Porteños. In general, the farther you get from Buenos Aires, the better the driving seems.

As someone who did not grow up driving down the country’s chaotic streets, it took me a long time to adapt to the traffic. I always found it frustratingly hard to adjust to the driving patterns. Argentine are offensive drivers, which makes it hard for defensive drivers to adjust and feel at home. But Argentines are also remarkably agile drivers, much more so, say, than U.S. drivers. They think and react quickly, and are uncannily good at avoiding accidents.

Nonetheless, they are – and this is obviously a generalization – incredibly impatient and self-centered on the road. This clashes with the nature of the defensive driver, who is constantly on the lookout for possible trouble. The offensive driver tries to get from A to B without first considering the needs of other drivers. In contrast, the defensive driver first weighs his needs against those of others on the road, trying to anticipate any trouble before it arises. If the defensive driver anticipates trouble, he or she cedes the way to avoid a problem. This approach to driving is infinitely safer, but it is not necessarily the perfect prescription for stress-free driving in Argentina.

For years, I failed to adjust successfully to local traffic, demonstrating that my adaptation skills were less than impressive. Driving stressed me out. I found myself getting angry in the car. While sitting behind the wheel, I sometimes found myself cursing out loud at the idiocy and self-absorbed nature of other drivers. Vulgarities would fly forth in a completely uncharacteristic spew of rage. Adrenaline would rush through my body, compromising my ability to think rationally. My stomach would fill with acid, reminding me that I was experiencing unwelcome stress and tension. “I should have taken a taxi,” I would often think.

“Relax,” my wife would say, “You’re making me nervous.” She pleaded with me to realize – to fully internalize – that drivers here are thoughtless. “This is not the U.S.,” she would say, tired of repeating herself.

But then a friend came up with a splendidly helpful thought. “I love driving here,” he said. “It’s just like being at the race track. You can do whatever you want and never get a ticket.” Wow, I thought, what a paradigm shift. It is very much like a race track out there and, if I could just think of it this way, I could probably learn to enjoy driving. To do this, I first needed to ditch the driving rules that had been etched into my neural pathways after so many years of driving outside Argentina.

So I came up with a list of new rules to replace the old ones. Just coming up with the list helped reduce the stress I felt while on the road. Here’s the list:

1) Unless you have to drive, don’t: take a taxi or a bus or the subway.
2) Expect other drivers to violate all the traffic rules you know. Don’t get frustrated when this happens.
3) Expect to get honked at.
4) Expect to get cursed at (¡Pero la puta que te parió!) even if you’re the one who is driving prudently. A few days ago, I saw an elderly woman curse vociferously at another elderly couple for driving slowly. It seemed ridiculously unnecessary to me, but the woman seemed to enjoy cursing at the couple. After she finished her tirade, the woman laughed about the incident, indicating that she was not deeply angry about anything. If you want to, learn to curse back but without taking the exchange too seriously. Argentines have a remarkably interesting capacity to curse and yell without actually taking themselves too seriously. The angry yelling seems to be fleeting and does not – at least in many cases – seem to represent a deep, lingering anger. The same trait seems to be common in Italy which, of course, supplied much of Argentina’s immigration. My experience is that Argentines curse and yell in traffic in part just for show. In part, they enjoy it. The verbal onslaughts are almost part of of an odd cultural ritual. If you saw similar cursing in the U.S., or in Ireland or in the U.K., my bet is that this would reflect a more profound anger, a deeper resentment that is more closely linked to violent thoughts. But that doesn’t seem to be the case here. So don’t take it too seriously when you get cursed at. Expect it to happen, because eventually it will.
5) Expect people to cut you off.
6) Don’t stay in your lane if others are not staying in theirs. Reject your inclination to stay within the white lines. Even though they are painted on the ground, you shouldn’t necessarily pay any attention to them. Since nobody else stays in these lanes, it is dangerous to do so yourself. Note: This rule does not apply to the yellow lines, which should not be crossed. There is no need to make yourself a target for oncoming traffic.
7) Go with the flow; if others are weaving in and out, you should weave in and out; if others are speeding, you should probably be speeding; if others are running through the red light, you probably should too, unless you want to get hit from behind.
8) Use your turn signal, even if others don’t.
9) If you do use your turn signal, hoping, say, to move into another lane in front of another driver already in that lane, expect that driver to speed up and block your move. Don’t get angry when this happens. Just expect it in advance. This way, if the person actually let’s you in, you can be pleasantly surprised by his or her act of kindness.
10) Don’t expect anyone else to use a turn signal.
11) Don’t stay in the left lane if you are not speeding; if you are hogging the fast lane, know that soon you will have an angry driver on your trail. It doesn’t matter if you are going the speed limit or even surpassing it. For all practical purposes, there are no speed limits on the highways, so if you are not the fastest car on the road, get out of the way.
12) Stop at most red lights, but not necessarily all of them. This is especially true in dimly lit areas where you feel unsafe. It is standard procedure to cruise cautiously through lights in such areas, particularly if it is late at night.
13) Expect people to weave into your lane if traffic in their lane suddenly slows. Drivers here do not like to slow down and stay in their lane. If they sense traffic suddenly slowing, they will burst into your lane with complete and total disregard for what you might think about it. They will assume that you are as agile as they are and that, because of this, you will react quickly and slow down before causing an accident. This is the way driving is done, so just accept it.
14) If you start to get stressed, take a deep breath and remember that life is too short to get stressed about traffic.
15) Take a taxi.

Link: Drivers Ed Online Video Game

Basketball greats Argentina and the U.S. will play Friday at 11:15am local time (10:15am ET/14:15 GMT). The winner will play for the gold medal Aug. 24 at 3:30pm local time (2:30pm ET/19:30 GMT) while the loser will play for the bronze medal at 1pm the same day.

The last time Argentina and the U.S. clashed for an Olympic medal was in Athens in 2004, when Argentina clobbered the Dream Team. Before that, in 2002 at the World Championship in Indiana, Argentina, the so-called Dream Team Killers, embarrassed the U.S. on its home turf. Since then the teams have faced off three times, with the U.S. winning each time.

Despite impressive talent, admirable humility and incredible heart, the Argentine team is not that deep this time around. The Argentines are running a bit thin, with key players out, forcing them to rotate through half a dozen tried and true players.

Look for the U.S., led by Kobe Bryant and Lebron James, to play aggressively, trying to force Argentina into committing unnecessary fouls. Argentine legend Manuel Ginobili and star teammate Luis Scola will have to play virtually perfect ball for Argentina pull off another upset against a U.S. team seeking redemption from its Athens defeat.

Ginobili described this year’s U.S squad as “by far the best team” in the Olympics. “We know we’ll have to play a perfect game,” he was quoted as saying. “And that’s probably not enough. They’ll have to play badly.”

Bryant, who speaks Spanish and Italian and is self-described as a huge fan of soccer and Lionel Messi, has described Argentina “as the best team” out there. In addition to his quest for redemption for the U.S. team, he has another incentive to win: He turns 30 on Aug. 23.

Link: Starters List For Each Team
Link: Official Schedule

The title of this post is nothing if not loaded. It is a value judgment of sorts, an implication that the Kirchners are not to be trusted: He, Nestor, is a liar and she, Cristina, is too. Generally speaking, respected newspapers, magazines and other media outlets do not use the word “lie” to describe a person’s actions or statements. Doing so implies a kind of character judgment that many careful journalists are loathe to associate themselves with. Imprudent use of the term indicates that a reporter has stepped atop a pedestal of public propriety, removed his cloak of objectivity and assumed the role of judge instead of journalist.

This can be dangerous for readers, for reporters and the people they write about, and for the public at large. But reporters also have a duty to describe reality as accurately as possible. And a simple fact of life is that people do lie, often repeatedly. So the question arises: When is it fair for a reporter to say someone has lied? When is it fair to describe someone as a liar?

Former U.S. Senator John Edwards recently admitted to lying about cheating on his wife. Given the blatant nature of his lie, and his public confession to it, reporters should feel no ethical misgivings about saying Edwards lied. But what if the lies, or perceived lies, are not so blatant? What if the lie is subtle or seems relatively harmless? Or what if the “lie” is deeply suspected but hard to prove? Here, journalists have to be much more careful.

By way of example, consider the Argentine government’s recent claims about poverty. In May President Cristina Fernandez said poverty had declined to 20.7% from 54% in early 2003. “These are numbers that make us proud,” she said. The achievement was laudable. Unfortunately, economists said it was implausible. Many economists, including Ernesto Kritz, who runs the Society of Labor Studies, said the government was likely underestimating the number of poor people by about 4 million. Kritz said the real poverty rate at the time was probably around 30%. Other economists offered similar estimates, while charity organizations and Catholic church officials said that poverty likely had increased within the past year.

Adding to this, half way through last year the government stopped publishing poverty data. But Kirchner went even further. He fired national statistics agency specialist Cynthia Pok after she warned that poverty estimates could not be accurately made unless the government also accurately measured inflation data. Instead of praising her for being a patriot and a whistle blower, Pok’s superiors sacked her. Economists said that when Fernandez said poverty had declined, she did so based on a report using discredited inflation data. That data, even according to off-the-record comments by members of Kirchner’s own government, likely underestimates inflation by two or three-fold. But inflation data makes the difference between statistics that show millions of people falling into poverty or being lifted out of it.

Critics attacked the president, calling her a liar. Most journalists, on the other hand, simply reported the discrepancies between the government’s data and that provided by private economists. Did the president lie? Who can say for sure? After all, she may have been given faulty information. Or the private economists may be wrong, or she may really believe that poverty has declined. In this latter case, it is certainly logically possible that she could have been guilty of saying something that was untrue but without doing so intentionally. And intentionality – that is, intended deception – seems to be a key element of lying.

Whatever the case, the point here is not to examine the veracity of the government’s poverty claims. Instead, it is to look at some of the things journalists must consider when writing about the people – in this case, politicians – and their truth claims.

All of which brings us to the point of this post.

The newspaper Perfil has begun posting videos whose goal is to show how Cristina and Nestor Kirchner are dishonest. The title of the series? “The 100 Lies of The Kirchners.” How is that for clarity! The conclusion is forgone, the verdict in, the judgment rendered: The Kirchners are liars. There is nothing subtle about it, no room for interpretation.

In case anyone doubted it, Perfil has taken sides. It has thrown down the gauntlet, and issued a challenge to the Kirchners. The paper will release a new video daily for 100 days that – so says Perfil – will highlight the Kirchners’ disregard for the truth. Perfil says the videos will demonstrate how the Kirchners have failed to keep their word. Will Perfil keep its word to its readers, to you? You be the judge.

Link: Perfil Story
Link: Videos

Politicians worldwide often are accused of failing to practice what they preach. So it should come as no surprise that Argentine politicians, too, are also sometimes accused of such hypocrisy. On Sunday La Nación, the country’s No. 2 circulating newspaper, published an article indicating that former president Nestor Kirchner and his wife and successor, Cristina Fernandez, are guilty of practicing precisely the opposite of what they preach.

According to the article, which reportedly examines federal documents, Nestor Kirchner last year earned 5,264,105 pesos ($1.7 million). The money came from rent collected on properties owned by the former president. The properties, which include 16 houses, two retail stores, 13 apartments and six pieces of land, are reportedly administered by the ex-president’s son, Máximo Carlos Kirchner. In 2007 Nestor and Máximo paid taxes totaling a combined $4,461 on that $1.7 million of income, according to La Nación.

The Casa Rosada press office did not answer calls by The Argentine Post seeking comment.

As cited by the daily, federal law requires individuals to pay a 6% income tax on property rental income over 1,200 pesos a month. At that rate, if this law is indeed applicable to him, Kirchner should have paid taxes totaling $102,000 last year, or 2,187% more than he and his son combined actually paid. Cristina Fernandez, meanwhile, who was a Senator before becoming president in December of 2007, paid taxes totaling $416 for all of last year.

The combined taxes paid by Nestor, Cristina and Máximo in 2007 amounted to roughly $4,877, or about 0.28% of Nestor Kirchner’s total declared income.

Cristina declared income totaling $3,960 in 2007, according to La Nación. A separate story by the newspaper reported in June of 2007 that Congress had passed a bill raising legislators’ salaries to about $2,970 a month. This was a raise of about 16.5%, meaning that prior to this, the average senator made about $2,550 a month. This is about 750% more than what Fernandez declared.

As noted, The Argentine Post was unable to immediately contact a presidential spokesman to confirm La Nación’s article, so it is hard to know what explanation might exist for the discrepancy between what the Kirchners paid in taxes and what they apparently owed.

The comparatively minor amount of income tax apparently paid by the First Couple sharply contrasts with their declared plans to use the “redistribution of wealth,” implemented through progressive tax policies, to reduce social and economic inequity in Argentina. When farmers recently protested the government’s decision to raise export taxes to as high as 45%, Fernandez justified the move by saying it was necessary to “redistribute wealth from those who have the most to those who have the least.”

Ironically, if La Nación’s article is correct, this philosophy of redistribution does not apply to the Kirchners, who are wealthier than 99% of Argentines.

Link: La Nación Story (in Spanish)

If you’ve got even a bit of free time between now and September 7, you should consider using it to go see the Soho Telo Muestra in Palermo. Twenty art galleries have taken over the old Pussy Cat love hotel (or “telo” as these hourly hotels are called) and turned the hotel rooms into unique artistic exhibitions. The result is a stunningly interesting work of art. Not all the rooms are particularly enticing but many will grab your attention and sense of fascination. One of the best displays is in room 109. Project 109, as its creators call it, was designed by friends of The Argentine post, This is Not A Gallery. Their impressive display was put together by the highly-touted Argentine director Andy Fogwill.

The Details:
Paraguay 4747, in Palermo
Sunday-Monday 11am-8pm
Friday & Saturday 11am-9pm

Link: This is Not a Gallery
Link: This is Not a Gallery Blog
Link: Andy Fogwill

By Mark Axelrod
August 20, 2008

Mark Axelrod, Professor and former Chair of the English Department at Chapman University, California, will give a lecture on Screenwriting at the ENERC – National School of Cinema – on Wednesday, August 20 at 7:00 pm. The event will be translated.

The lecture is free, but there is limited space available, so please RSVP to rsvp@enerc.gov.ar

Address:
ENERC
Moreno 1199
Auditorio

About Mark Axelrod

Mark Axelrod is a Professor and former Chair of the English Department at Chapman University, Orange, California. Prior to teaching at Chapman, he taught at the University of East Anglia, UK and as a post-doctoral fellow at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland. A graduate of both Indiana University (BA, MA) and the University of Minnesota (PhD), he is also the Director of the John Fowles Center for Creative Writing for which he has received four National Endowment for the Arts Grants.

Link: Escuela Nacional de Experimentación y Realización Cinematográfica
Link: Axelrod’s Homepage

*This is a near verbatim copy of a notice from the U.S. Embassy. For a Spanish version, click here.

The “creatives” at Liebre Amotinada, a local ad agency, had an idea. They were thinking about “the good ol’ days,” a time when people were honest and the city was safe. Wouldn’t it be nice, they thought, if you could ride your bike to the nearest panadería, leave your bike in front of the store, and go inside without having to worry about someone stealing your ride. Yeah, that would be nice. But the days when this was possible are long gone. Porteños are no longer as honest as they used to be, or at least, as honest as people now nostalgically think they used to be. So just how honest are Porteños these days? To answer this question, the ad people came up with a brilliant idea. Why not place unlocked bikes around the city and see how long it takes for people to rob them? The results are documented in a series of videos that you can see here, and here.

In the above video, filmed in a plaza at Salguero and Charcas, in downtown Buenos Aires, you can see an average-looking guy casing the plaza, trying to figure out if he can get away with stealing an unlocked bike. His actions are at once funny and pathetic. It took just 6 minutes and 20 seconds for someone to steal the bike left in this plaza. In another experiment, this time at the corner of Perón and Riobamba, it took just 3:20min for someone to steal the bike. In all of the experiments done, the bike that lasted the longest was left near the corner of Lavalle and Maipú. It lasted 60:10min. In another test, this one in Palermo near the corner of French and Salguero, the bike lasted just 8min. All in all, it sure gives the impression that the so-called “port people” are not the most trustworthy folk in the world. Check out the videos and draw you own conclusions.

Unfortunately, the Argentine government does not publish crime data, as far as I know. This makes it exceptionally difficult to track trends in the country. It also makes it impossible to verify the truth of statements about declining crime, such as one recently made by Justice Minister Anibal Fernandez. In addition, this makes it hard to compare crime here with crime in other countries, so I’m not sure how Argentina’s bike theft numbers might compare to those in other nations. More about this can be found at www.stolenbicycleregistry.com. This site has links to FBI data indicating that in 2006 some 231,238 bikes were stolen in the U.S. That number has declined for each of the past five years. In the U.K., the Home Office estimates that 480,000 bikes will be stolen this year, according to this article. Clearly, bike theft is a global problem, a human problem. Even so, this does not make it any less pathetic that bikes are stolen so quickly in Buenos Aires.

Link: A video explanation of the experiment with English subtitles
Link: The Bicycle Experiment Homepage
Link: The Bicycle Test’s Facebook Page

*Kudos to La Nación for running a story about this in Sunday’s paper. While the experiment has been written about quite a lot, I hadn’t heard about it before La Nación’s story, which you can see here.

**In an upcoming post (which is almost finished) I will explore in-depth the history and nature of trust and honesty in Buenos Aires.

Photo from Prensa Presidencia

The big news from Saturday’s press conference was that there was no big news. The biggest news of all, actually, was the fact that there was a press conference at all. No sitting president in Argentina has fielded questions openly from journalists for at least five years. Here are two highlights:

*”I would do each and every thing I’ve done over again,” the president said after being asked if she had any regrets about her first eight months in office.

*Asked if controversial Commerce Secretary Guillermo Moreno would be let go, the president said: “My God. Why are people always comparing government officials to Satan? One has to see if each official carries out his duties honestly, according to the orders received from the president.”

You can see my complete report on this at http://online.wsj.com/home/us (subscription required, unfortunately)