Javier Milei or how to take over the Argentine political scene with a handful of votes

Javier Milei, the controversial right-wing character who emerged from television sets and candidate for deputy for the libertarian party “Libertad Avanza”, won 13.60% of the votes in the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires in the recent Simultaneous and Compulsory Open Primaries (PASO). The political party led by Milei, who claims to maintain an “almost natural alignment” with Bolsonaro and Trump, thus became the third most voted force in the Buenos Aires district, after Together for Change (JxC – constituted by the Pro, the Radical Civic Union, the GEN and a sector of non-Kirchnerist Peronism) and the ruling Frente de Todos (FdT – constituted by various sectors of Peronism and led by Kirchnerism).
With an increasingly recurrent discourse, based on insults, grievances, discriminating against women and mistreating all those people who do not agree with his ideas, Milei has achieved an “anti-political” profile, which even led him to describe the entire political leadership as “caste”. Phrases such as “I don’t know if left-handers hate bathing, working or data more” or “don’t do charity with my pocket, so it’s very easy, with someone else’s ass we are all fucks” have shown how the leader of “Libertad Avanza” publicly exercises extreme violence.
Milei’s good performance in the internal elections, and in the face of the general elections to be held on November 14, seems to affect his competitors, mainly considering that, within the Together for Change coalition, a libertarian candidate, Ricardo López Murphy of the “United Republicans” party, obtained significant electoral support (11.20%), and is projected among the pollsters, that part of these votes could migrate to Milei.
At times it is difficult to understand “the Milei phenomenon” considering that it only obtained about 220 thousand votes and concentrated in a single district. The figure of the controversial Milei seems to take greater coverage since the leadership of JxC and FdT is too aware of what is going to happen with the Buenos Aires votes that the libertarian attracted.
Probably what is most disturbing is not the presence of a candidate with a good arrival in the federal capital, who constantly detests politicians and politics, nor his timeless speeches, which, from the plainest, demand that the State must disappear from the galaxy. What is really worrying is that much of the Argentine ruling class seems determined to tune in to Mr. Milei.
On the right, the former president of the Pro, Mauricio Macri, expressed, in allusion to Milei, “I hope we get together by 2023”, “I am a liberal of the first hour and we have the same ideas”. While the head of the Buenos Aires government of the Pro, Horacio Rodríguez Larreta, (to whom Milei said “… like the shitty left-hander you are, you can’t even shine your shoes to a liberal, sorete. I can crush you still in a wheelchair”) is in charge of organizing meetings with young followers of the libertarian. For her part, the current president of the Pro, Patricia Bullrich maintains an excellent relationship and a very fluid dialogue with Mr. Milei.
The ruling Frente de Todos also presented, without reservation, a “very Milei” turn shortly after the adverse results of the primary elections were known. The new pro-government cabinet incorporated as Chief of Staff Juan Manzur, a declared enemy of women and the right to abortion, and a strong lobbyist in the laboratories. In security, Aníbal Fernández resurfaced, who allegedly promoted a database on social and political militants used for espionage. And as Minister of Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries was appointed Julián Domínguez, a friend of the Rural Society and the Catholic Church. And in the last hours, a mayor of the FdT of the province of Chaco culminated a campaign act shouting “let the radicals die” (in allusion to the centennial party, Radical Civic Union).
Thus, Mr. Milei, seems to be generating a world of cowardly, reactionary and violent sensations from both sides of the split Argentina.

From the electoral arithmetic it is understood that, if Milei obtained a high percentage of votes in the port city, the Buenos Aires candidates intend to attract their vote in the general elections. But it is worth asking whether it will not be more honest, more dignified and less pathetic to run the veil to the string of incongruous and violent statements of Mr. Javier Milei, instead of twinning with his speeches or inviting him to be part of one of the coals.Itions that today monopolize political power in Argentina
You don’t have to be an economist or an expert in anything to understand that the state in various latitudes generates a comfortable welfare state. Or to understand that the total deregulation of the economy has also wreaked havoc on various nations, including Argentina.
On the other hand, who could assent that it is right for the state to spend excessive resources and for those who govern to manage public resources inefficiently and/or dishonestly? Nobody. An omnipresent state, which intrudes on the private lives of citizens and which spends badly or steals what it collects through its taxes, harms us a lot. And we don’t need a Milei to understand this.
Finally, it is worth asking why the focus is on this reactionary/misogynistic/violent character, who obtained in the internal legislative elections the third place in a single district of the country, when the Left Front and the Workers-Unity in the port city came in fourth place, at the same time that he represented the third place in the Province of Buenos Aires, “mother of all battles” (named for being the district that gathers the most voters) and won third place nationally.
We live in democracy and it is great that there are voters who prefer what they prefer, but it could be useful for us to stop and reflect on certain issues that are presented as maxims and perhaps are minimal, and remember that what Argentina needs least today is to play with extremes and appeal to the fanaticism of violent characters. 
Sandra Choroszczucha is a political scientist, professor at the University of Buenos Aires (UBA) and columnist in different Argentine media. www.sandrach.com.ar
www.latinoamerica21.com, a plural media committed to the dissemination of critical and truthful information about Latin America. 

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Original source in Spanish