Sancho's Panza

For those looking for a strong, thoughtful voice on Latin American literature (and art (and politics)), you'll be glad to see that Marcelo Ballve is back posting again at Sancho's Panza. Here's a sample of what awaits you therein:

Vargas Llosa Jr., along with other somewhat well-known intellectuals, Plinio Apuleyo Mendoza and Carlos Alberto Montaner, co-wrote The Guide to the Perfect Latin American Idiot, which is basically a manual devoted to hunting down and stamping out any remnants of romantic leftist sentiment surviving in the region, and trying to blame the left for all the bad things that have ever occurred in Latin America.

Here are the first couple of paragraphs from the book, which contain, in a nutshell, all its theses:

"The perfect idiot's political tutelage included, in addition to connivings and resentments, a mixture of the most varied and confusing ingredients. First, of course, there is a lot of the Marxist vulgate from his university years. In those years, various introductory-level Marxist brochures and leaflets provided him with a simple and complete explanation of the world and history. All was duly explained as class struggle. History advanced according to a preordained script (from slavery to feudalism to capitalism and then socialism, the threshold of a truly egalitarian society). Those guilty of our countries' poverty and backwardness were two disastrous allies: the bourgeoise and imperialism. Such ideas of historic materialism provided him a stew in which he could later brew up a strange mixture of Third World theses, outbreaks of nationalism and populist demagogy, and one vehement reference or another to compassion, almost always comically quoted from some emblematic strongman of his country ... "

Mario Vargas Llosa himself wrote the introduction to this book, which is available in English and already has had a sequel. In short, Vargas Llosa, father and son, along with Montaner, Mendoza and other intellectuals riding their coat-wings, have established a franchise industry in promoting the cause of economic liberalism and free market democracy in Latin America while exterminating, with a vengeance, any leftover affection for lefty institutions like the Cuban Revolution, student movements, state-run industries, social assistance programs, free health care and education, etc.

Now, in league with right-wing Iraq War cheerleader and former Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Aznar, Mario Vargas Llosa and company are spreading their message through a network of well-funded think tanks . . .