[imagesource:flickr]

Argentinians call him “the Madman”, and as far as politicians go, Javier Milei makes even Donald Trump look rational.

The mad showman/president held a massive concert at an 8,000-capacity arena in Buenos Aires called Luna Park this Wednesday, where he bellowed at his mostly male, right-wing fans: “I’m the king of a lost world! I’m the king and I will destroy you!”

The rock-loving libertarian leader ran around the stage wearing a knee-length leather jacket. “I did this because I wanted to sing,” proclaimed Milei, 53, who as a teenager was the frontman of a Rolling Stones cover band called Everest and is also said to be a fan of the opera composer Giuseppe Verdi.

“It was a two-hour-long pagan mass celebrated by a president in ecstasy.”

Despite people being miffed at Milei’s decision to perform on a stage previously graced by the likes of Frank Sinatra, Duran Duran, Liza Minnelli and a-ha, the self-described “anarcho-capitalist” reflects the strength of a right-wing populist movement that has won elections around the world in recent years.

During the show, Milei railed against the “damned communists” he blames for Argentina’s economic malaise and the “enemies who are trying to overturn this government because they want socialism and misery to continue” as well as the “murderous” pro-choice movement.

“I eat the elites for breakfast!” Milei sang.

As rock and roll as the whole show might be, even his loyal supporters admit the president’s radical economic policies had, without exception, “been detrimental”.

Much like other ‘showman leaders’, Milei vowed to dismantle a corruption-riddled state ruled by shadowy elites, but none of his counterparts is quite like Milei, who leads a resource-rich regional power plagued by decades of political mismanagement and economic instability –  which has now become a test case for the governing theories of a radical ideologue.

Since taking office, Milei has frozen public works projects, devalued the peso by more than 50%, and announced plans to lay off more than 70,000 government workers. So far, he sees signs that his economic “shock therapy” is working. Inflation has slowed for four months in a row.

Milei thinks he is pioneering an approach that will become a global blueprint. “Argentina will become a model for how to transform a country into a prosperous nation, I have no doubt.”

While Milei vowed the “political caste” would bear the brunt, his austerity measures have pummeled ordinary Argentines. The annual inflation rate is still nearly 300%, among the highest in the world.

Many Argentines have been forced to carry bags of cash for even small transactions; some stores have given up on price stickers entirely. Milei’s moves—cutting federal aid, transport and energy subsidies, and getting rid of price controls—have caused living costs to spike. More than 55% of Argentines are mired in poverty, up from 45% in December.

Milei may be running out of time before his popular support crumbles. But in the meantime, he’s rocking out to his own tune.

Argentina’s opposition was less impressed, calling the jam session an attempt to distract from domestic woes exacerbated by Milei’s austerity drive and reforms.

“Thatcherism on steroids”

“With his show at Luna Park, Milei is covering up an enormous economic and social crisis, which his economic administration only aggravated,” said Itai Hagman, a lawmaker for the centre-left coalition Frente de Todos. “There is no prospect of short- or medium-term improvement; the idea of a quick recovery or a foreign investment boom is only in the mind of the president.”

The newspaper La Nación said Milei’s “utterly flamboyant event” had been unlike anything Argentina had witnessed before “above all in times of crisis and economic adjustment”.

The rock concert – at which the president’s specially assembled band played tracks by the Argentinian hard rock band La Renga – will help cement Milei’s growing international reputation as what Time magazine this week called “the world’s most eccentric head of state”.

It will also bolster his position as a leading member of the global hard right, alongside Donald Trump, the former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro and Hungary’s prime minister, Viktor Orbán.

While ‘the Madman’  rocks out, Argentina’s economic activity has fallen by 8.4% compared with the previous year, the informal dollar exchange rate, known as the “blue dollar”, hit an all-time high of 1,280 pesos, police officers and schoolteachers are protesting, and three in five citizens are living in poverty amid annual inflation that has surged to almost 300%.

Milei is partying while Argentina is burning.

[source:guardian&time]