Martin Langfield's Blog, page 8
October 26, 2015
La sorpresa
(Some more thoughts on Argentina)
Presidential elections will go to a runoff after business favorite Mauricio Macri surprised ruling-party candidate Daniel Scioli in Sunday’s vote. Scioli will surely now say Macri wants to slash social programs. But voters may rather see Cristina Fernandez’s economics as unsustainable.
http://reut.rs/1jM8gSR
(Photo mine from a 2005 trip to Buenos Aires.)
October 24, 2015
My latest column – Illusion’s end
Argentina’s election Sunday heralds an end to the magical economic thinking of President Cristina Fernandez. http://reut.rs/1PGPWay
July 10, 2015
My latest book review: Dealmaking when lives are at stake
Financiers like to compare their negotiations to military strategy. Yet the art of the deal matters far more when those talking also kill. Jonathan Powell’s “Terrorists at the Table” is a primer like few others, by a worldly ex-diplomat of stubborn hope. It’s also darkly funny.
(I took this photo of guerrillas taking a break to play soccer in rebel-held territory in El Salvador in 1991.)
May 25, 2015
My latest book review: Modernizing Mexico, one feud at a time
Two Mexicos coexist, one an insular land of hard-to-kill monopolies in politics and business, the other more outward-looking, embracing modernity and even the United States. In “Amarres perros” pundit-politician Jorge Castañeda recalls a life of trying to change the balance.
(I took the photo nearly 30 years ago at a hunger strike to demand fair elections in Chihuahua, Mexico in 1986.)
Tagged: Jorge Castañeda, Mexico
April 2, 2015
Review: Choking on digital exhaust
Government and corporate mass surveillance of citizens is an aberration on a par with child labor or environmental pollution, claims security expert Bruce Schneier in Data and Goliath. He offers a rousing call for resistance, and hope for change – a few decades hence.
My review:http://reut.rs/19Mnq4L
March 12, 2015
Sanctions? Sí, gracias
A bit of chat – in my work hat – about U.S. sanctions against Venezuela. It’s fun to be looking at Latin America again, 25 years after I first went there as a reporter.
Breakingviews TV:Martin Langfield and Reynolds Holding discuss Uncle Sam’s designation of Venezuela as a security threat and how the move could help embattled President Nicolas Maduro at home.
Sanctions? S��, gracias
A bit of chat – in my work hat – about U.S. sanctions against Venezuela. It’s fun to be focusing on Latin America again, 25 years after I first went there as a reporter.
Breakingviews TV:Martin Langfield and Reynolds Holding discuss Uncle Sam’s designation of Venezuela as a security threat and how the move could help embattled President Nicolas Maduro at home.
January 24, 2015
Review: Monetizing the moment
The Mad Men are watching you. Martin Langfield on privacy and online ads in Mike Smith’s “Targeted”:��http://reut.rs/1JtiRau
December 26, 2014
Review: Fixing the CIA – a novel approach
Could an outsider best reform the CIA in the wake of torture revelations? In David Ignatius’ novel “The Director,” a pro-privacy tech CEO tries to drag an agency that has lost its way into a new world of tighter rules, leaky secrets and cyberthreats. Good idea, uneven results.
http://reut.rs/1t5P8wP
November 29, 2014
Review: A user’s guide to slacking at work
