Two good reads for Saturday

This is a wonderfully entertaining read and reminds me of the brilliant brains this author has been lucky enough to meet and listen to along the way. It's an acceptance speech for a lawyer's award in Canada. I've never heard of the man (Leon Getz) nor the award, but as it was featured on David Baines' blog I thought it worth a read. That turned out to be a smart decision. Here's an excerpt:

"F.E. Smith, the great English barrister, once said of Winston Churchill that he had spent the best years of his life preparing his impromptu remarks. These are my impromptu remarks.

"It is said that following a lengthy and somewhat difficult argument in the Supreme Court of Canada, the late Senator Farris took a lengthy Mediterranean cruise to recoup his energy.  Some weeks into the cruise he received a cable from one of his juniors.  It read: "Justice triumphed". The Senator replied:  "Appeal at once".

CONTINUES HERE

Here's a throwback to when Time Magazine used to be a fascinating and obligatory read (whatever happened to it?). Anyway, this Time report on Peru, world's number one counterfeit money producer, shows a side of the country that's been less promoted these last few years (wonder why). It's a very solid piece of reporting and will enlighten the English language reader to the flipside of the 'progress' made in Peru this decade. Here's an excerpt.

"The largest single haul so far came in early September, when police officers raided a printing press in Lima's San Juan de Lurigancho district. While the house had been under surveillance for some time, officers were stunned to discover the extent of the operation. The final tally of the six different currencies produced was just above $27 million. Fake U.S. $100 bills accounted for nearly one-third of the total, while euros accounted for another $4 million. The rest of the bills were Bolivian, Chilean, Peruvian and Venezuelan currency.
"A month earlier, agents ran a sting operation that netted $1 million. The drop-off point was the food court at an upscale Lima shopping center built into cliffs overlooking the ocean. The counterfeiters agreed to sell each $100 bill for $5 to an undercover agent. The three people arrested had initially agreed to sell $3 million in fake bills. Around 20 illegal printing presses have been dismantled in Lima, each capable of turning out mass amounts of bills.

CONTINUES HERE

Peru: The lies behind the miracle

As the old chestnut goes there are lies, damned lies and statistics. Never truer in the pretzelmath world of banana republic statistics offices that first ask what result the government wants and then supplies. This chart, taken from data supplied by top Peruvian economist Bruno Seminario of Lima's Pacific University (and also the guy in charge of leading Peru economics site "Actualidad Económia del Perú") shows how the current government of Alan García has spun lies into the growth "miracle" of Peru.

What we have here are two sets of monthly GDP calculations for the period 2009 to date. The blue line shows the GDP calculation published by the official stats office INEI for the period. However the red line shows what the GDP results would have been if the INEI hadn't changed the methodology of its calculations in 2006 when Twobreakfasts came to power.

It's one of the little snippets of data that gets lost amongst outside observers. In 2006 the INEI went under orders of Twobreakfasts and the head guy was changed to one of García's favourites. The INEI then set about using a new methodology that it didn't even admit to until repeatedly challenged on the strange results being offered up in 2009. Not only that, but the old method was a clearly published dataset and calculation that could be tracked accurately by third parties (hence Semanario can still apply the old method and get an correct reading). However the INEI has never published the "new improved" method or explained to anyone outside its building how they now calculate the GDP number that's fed to the world.

These days the "old method" would give a +7.9% GDP growth headline while the "new improved" offers 9.2%. A difference, but not as much as the papered over period of 2009 when the world and his wife could see Peru was going through the same recession as anywhere else but the INEI cooked the books to make it look much better than reality.

News roundup (half the news, some of the time)

Trade-in, che?

Venezuela has recalled its ambassador to Peru 'for consultations' by way of protest against Peru's granting of asylum to Manuel 'BraveSirRobin' Rosales. Hugo himself has been pretty quiet about the whole Peru thing.........so far.

Ecuador. Only in Spain would Studmuffin have to field such dumbass questions about an Axis between Ecuador, Bolivia and Venezuela. Sincerely, the Spaniards make your average US Joe look smart on LatAm and there's not even the language barrier to deal with. Anyway, Mr Prez-Til-2013 said (and I quote), "I've probably travelled more to Brazil than to Venezuela. I've travelled many more times to Argentina. If they (you) want to look for axes, look for them and find them....If there were an axis it wouldn't (necessarily) be a bad thing, but explicitly there isn't one. There's too much talk and popular is confused with popularism."

Yay, The Muffin still rules!

Fox News again accuses Mexico of...being slow off the mark with its swine flu prevention program. They even managed to find some Neocon doctor to agree with them.....que sorpresa.

Argentina, and big agromachinery company Agco reports country tractor sales down 60% in the first quarter even though they climbed 3% in Brazil in the same period. The reasons being a combo of the drought weather period and total dumbasses in government. Klishtina&Co still insist that GDP is rising in Argentina....it's skin-crawlingly embarrassing.

It's never too late

An old crook

Peru provides today's WTF moment. Here's the link to the El Comercio story (has a video of the lady in question), and here comes the Ottotrans™:

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

A 90 year old woman who looks like a sweet grandmother was captured in Lima when she took part in a house robbery, according to police reports today.

Fanny Marulanda went to a house that was for sale along with two other women in the Lima district of Los Olivos. The old woman's job was to distract the host with a supposed deal negotiation while the other two stole valuable objects.

On being discovered the two younger women escaped in a taxi that was waiting for them, but Marulanda couldn't get to the taxi in time and tried to escape on foot. Her age got the better of her and she was apprehended two blocks away.

At the police station Marulanda gave a false name to officers and told them that the other two women had conned her by saying they were only going for a visit. However, when Marulanda's true identity was confirmed so was her previous criminal record as a thief.

The woman was freed by police who took her age into consideration.

This year's APEC meeting might get pretty explosive

Via Reuters and not one but three people writing in (thanks to you all), here's a very interesting story that hit the wires today. It seems as though the left-wing terrorist group Sendero Luminoso (Shining Path) are making a bit of a comeback unfortunately, as on Monday this week 50 of the band took over a outcamp of Peru mining and smelting company Doe Run in the Andean foothills East of Lima. After giving them a long lecture of the ills of the world and how they're right about everything, Sendero stole a bunch of stuff including antibiotics, a radio and, spookily, a whole shitload of dynamite.

Why is this spooky? Well, as Reuters rightly points out, dynamite was one of the weapon of choice amongst SL members back in the 1980s and 90s. And then there's the little matter of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit coming to Peru this year and starting on November 20th. This is a big, big protocol event, and at least 20 heads of state are due to visit Peru including those of Russia, Japan, Australia and all the Americas (including a dude called Bush who'll be making his final trip as prez).

Expect....how can I say this?...tight security. Like "tight" as in "a sparrow farts within 500 paces and it gets arrested".

Keep on rockin' da free world, people.