How To Destroy A Rich Country

The next election may determine where America is headed — to a restoration of its greatness, or to a retreat into the obsolescence of history. Before one casts a vote, an example stands before us of a country that made the wrong choice, warning us what to avoid.

The country is Argentina, chiefly unknown to most Americans, apart from its creation of the tango . This ignorance on our part is inexcusable, since Argentina resembles an America that went awry.

Argentina’s statistics are astounding.

Argentina is a little less than half the size of the continental United States, with a climate that runs from polar in the south to tropical in the north. Most of Argentina’s land mass is in the subtropical belt, where one finds the pampas — arguably the best beef- and grain-growing region on the planet. The warm extended growing season gives Argentina an advantage over our cooler Kansas and Nebraska. There are times when Argentina has exceeded the USA in cattle product exports, and this production has been going on for over a century. Its grain exports are enormous, and much of the planet depends on Argentina for food. This is all the more amazing when one considers that Argentina has only 41 million people, one eighth the population of the United States. In the early 20th century, the ratio vis-à-vis the United States was even smaller, and still the Argentines could outperform us on agricultural exports at times.

Argentina, like the United States, had massive European immigration from 1870 to 1920. Large numbers of Italians, Germans, French, Jews, Welsh, Christian Arabs from Syria and Lebanon, Swiss, Basques, Croats, and Galacians from Northwest Spain settled in. There were even some Irish, English, Poles, Ukrainians, and Scandanavians, though in considerably smaller numbers.