Tag Archives: ecuador

Ecuadorians Reject Neoliberalism in Presidential Race

Posted on April 9, 2017 by | Comments Off on Ecuadorians Reject Neoliberalism in Presidential Race

NEP’s Bill Black appears on Rising Up With Sonali talking about Ecuadoreans and their choice of continuity by choosing a left-leaning government over a neo-liberal agenda in recent Presidential elections.

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Murdoch Warns Pope Francis about Ecuador’s President Correa

Posted on July 13, 2015 by | 1 comment

By William K. Black
Quito: July 12, 2015

Now that Pope Francis’ visit to South America has ended we can reflect on the Rupert Murdoch’s effort to slam Pope Francis and Ecuador’s President Rafael Correa using the pretext of the Pope’s recent visit here.  The Wall Street Journal warned “Ecuador’s Correa Wants to Co-Opt Pope Francis: The pontiff risks leaving the impression on his visit that the church condones repression.”  Given that Pope Francis is Argentine, the idea that the Murdoch’s minions needed to inform and warn the Pope about President Correa is very funny.

Murdoch’s minions are always reaching for a thesaurus of insults when they write about Correa, and this article is no exception.  The title: “condones repression” gets the verbal assault going quickly.  But the minions are only warming to their task and are a bit repetitive, warning in the second paragraph that “the visit is likely to leave the impression that the church is in solidarity with the repressive Correa machine.”  Note the addition of “machine” at the end of that agitprop.

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La Lista Loca – Part 1

Posted on April 17, 2015 by | 2 comments

By William K. Black
IAEN, UMKC, U. Minnesota

This is the first column in a five-part series about money laundering. When you think about Ecuador and international financial regulation the fact that leaps out at you as bizarre is Ecuador’s presence on the short list of nations that purportedly have “strategic [money laundering/funding of terrorism] deficiencies that have not made sufficient progress in addressing the deficiencies….”  Algeria, Ecuador, and Myanamar (Burma) are the only three nations on the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) (GAFI, in Spanish) “gray” list.  There are two nations on the FATF “black list” for providing funding to terrorists – North Korea and Iran.

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Obama Imports and Immunizes Banksters Who Donate to the Democratic Party

Posted on December 17, 2014 by | 4 comments

By William K. Black
Bloomington, MN: December 17, 2014

President Obama and then Secretary of State Clinton decided that America has a critical shortage of banksters and decided to import some from Ecuador. The banksters showed their gratitude by showing the Democratic Party with “donations.” Sometimes a small story reveals the core truth of large public policy issues far better than the big overall story can. The New York Times has just published an article entitled “Ecuador Family Wins Favors After Donations to Democrats.” The short-version is that Obama has decided to give what amounts to asylum to a family from Ecuador after it made large campaign donations to Democrats.

“It was one of several favorable decisions the Obama administration made in recent years involving the Isaías family, which the government of Ecuador accuses of buying protection from Washington and living comfortably in Miami off the profits of a looted bank in Ecuador.

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The BBC Hates Correa So Much that it cannot Restrain Itself

Posted on September 5, 2014 by | 9 comments

By William K. Black

I was peacefully reading a BBC article on Ecuador’s plans to introduce a digital currency to bring banking services to the rural poor, when in the midst of the article the anonymous author decided to attack President Rafael Correa because Ecuador borrows money from China.

“Ecuador introduced the US dollar as its currency after a crippling bank crisis in 2000. Since then, the government has tripled social spending and the state is currently billions in debt, mostly to China which buys most of Ecuador’s oil.”

The reader is meant to understand that Correa is recklessly increasing “social spending” through massive public borrowing from China. How did a story purportedly about an innovative program to marry new mobile telephony technology and a new digital currency to bring banking services to the rural poor suddenly include this gratuitous attack on Correa? Because any excuse will do if you piss off the Brits by giving sanctuary to Mr. Assange.

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The WSJ’s Editorial Posing as “News” about Ecuador

Posted on August 19, 2014 by | 4 comments

By William K. Black

Greetings from Bogota where I’m participating in an economic conference and teaching two class sessions.

Under the banner “Latin America News” the Wall Street Journal has poured out its pain that the people of Ecuador might reelect President Rafael Correa.  The article is actually an editorial attacking Correa and the people of Ecuador for potentially voting to reelect Ecuador’s most successful President in the modern era.

The issue is term limits.  I have always opposed term limits as an obstruction to democracy and competence.  The U.S. had no presidential term limits for most of its history and the only president the population chose to elect to more than two terms was Franklin Delano Roosevelt – one of our greatest presidents.  I am deeply thankful that our Nation had the great good sense to reelect FDR to four terms in office.

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Kenneth Rogoff is an Even Worse Criminologist than Economist

Posted on May 30, 2014 by | 3 comments

By William K. Black

Kenneth Rogoff, the creator of the fictional 90% budget deficit cliff, is back spreading new myths.  He has now ventured into white-collar criminology, without the benefit of any study of criminology.  The results are yet another embarrassment for Rogoff. The title of his article is “Paper money is unfit for a world of high crime and low inflation.”

I’ll leave his claim about removing the “lower bound” on central bank monetary policy to others.  I note only that he ignores the readily available (and superior) alternative of fiscal policy.

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An Economist in Ecuador Gives “William Blake” (sic) a Quiz

Posted on March 31, 2014 by | 6 comments

By William K. Black

Dr. Pablo Lucio Paredes, an economist from Ecuador who served as Planning Minister implementing the Washington Consensus in the disastrous run-up to Ecuador’s 1999 financial crisis has responded to a presentation I made at FLACSO in Quito, Ecuador by publicly announcing a quiz about economics he would like to administer to “William Blake.”  It is easy to spell foreign names incorrectly.  I am happy that the quality of my presentation reminded Paredes of William Blake.  Here is the link to my talk.

Paredes plans to be the grader of his quiz.  The tone of his “letter” to “Blake” makes it clear that he will declare I have failed his test.  He has already provided his conclusion: that I only presented because of my desire to issue “propaganda.”

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Hoy, a Newspaper in Ecuador, Wants Us to Know How Much It Despises the People of Ecuador

Posted on March 31, 2014 by | 2 comments

By William K. Black

One of the many pleasures that life offers is seeing your critics prove your point.  I got to see this dynamic first hand in Ecuador when I was interviewed by Roberto Aguilar, described as the “Content Editor” of Hoy.  Aguilar’s column, which seethes with hostility and disdain, unintentionally proves the thesis of my talk.

This first installment responding to Aguilar will discuss only the most important points.  I was confused by Aguilar’s column the first few times I read it.  His column is so angry that I wondered what terrible thing I said that caused him such pain.  I focused too much in these early readings on his ad hominem attacks on my looks, my inability to speak Spanish, and my non-elite nature because I teach in “Kansas” (sic) (“profesor de Kansas”).  Aguilar is unable to speak English and does not understand the U.S. system of federalism or he would not write that the University of Missouri is in the state of Kansas rather than the state of Missouri.

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NEP’s Bill Black on GamaTV in Ecuador

Posted on March 18, 2014 by | 1 comment

NEP’s Bill Black is interviewed on GamaTV in Ecuador, 3/18/2014. Note: Interviewer speaks Spanish but a translator translates all questions to English.

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