COM SAUDADES DE FUTURO.

LIBERALISM FOR PORTUGAL, FOR NEWS GENERATIONS

Lisboa, 2 de Outubro de 2009

 

 

Por  José Adelino MALTEZ*

 

I’m an old professor of political science, an old liberal with his writings in books and newspapers, and regular interventions in television. I was in the meeting of International Liberal in Dakar and was a militant of the first group who was declared liberal in this country: the Ofir Group of Francisco Lucas Pires (eighty years in the XX century). All my words are written, now we must listen the new generations of Portuguese and European people who love liberty. They are these:

 

1

I was not born when Portugal was a dictatorship, I was not born when communism was a real threat to democracy. I was born and raised in 1985 and I don’t know what those threats mean or meant, so I can not have a clear valuation on that period. What I know so far is that economically (in terms of growth) the 90′swere worse than the 80′s, and the 2000s were even worse than the 90′s.

 

2

And except for those who are somehow affiliated with the restricted club of parties who have in fact ruled Portugal, or for those who have been in government, mayor’s office or state-owned companies, things are not better and they will not get better soon.

 

3

With an external debt bigger than our GDP, a Government budget which is more than half of the GDP, with successive governments who badly invest the tax payers money, with awful economic results that continually raise the taxes and invest more and more, promising a magical solution, I can not see a short term solution either.

 

4

I do not care if the left (PS) is better than the right (PSD), or vice versa, as I would not choose between being drowned or burned. Nor would I care about demagogues who only present us with criticisms of how remuneration of labor should be, and how powerful and oppressive the labor class is, just because they have read Karl Marx’s Capital when they were young, but now in the XXI century, even a Ph.D. in econometrics forgets to have in mind that we live in a globalized and  competitive world, and the capital, evil or not, is needed, and it drains faster from unproductive economies than sand from an open hand.

5

I don’t care that we conquered democracy and freedom of speech in 1974, if today, in 2009, we do not have economic freedom and live in a “kleptocracy” where the government is so called socialist. In theory, socialism is a fair system because it takes part of the riches wealth and  gives it to the poor and needy. In practice, so far, what I have observed is that socialism takes a lot from the presumably rich to give a small part to the poor and needy, and another part to the unproductive people and in between a large part to the corrupt politicians and their pairs.

 

6

For me its common sense that distributing wealth mostly by other criteria than merit only makes an economy poorer and less competitive, and is used as the perfect excuse to disguise an old scam where only some keep living at the expense of many others, and some others even  get very rich as well.

 

7

Do not falsely accuse me of being selfish and not wanting to help the poor and needy. Because I am as worried about them as I am with everyone else except for the few chosen ones. This system, in which the government takes so much of our money but in return promises that everyone, and their children and grandchildren will have a great education, a good health care system, a wealthy retirement, an efficient administration, well-built infrastructures and profitable public investments is a big scam, it is a big lie. People seem to ignore that it affects them directly. I know this and it is obvious that private enterprises would help more people, be more productive and have more wealth to distribute if only they did not have to give so much to those who don’t deserve it.

 

8

I am frustrated with these left demagogues who lower the level of this discussion to a perspective that fairness in the economy can be easily changed by giving them, as they demand from us, the power of the state to do so with laws and “bureaucracy”. They forget to consider, or to tell us, that in a global economy, with an open labor and trade market and now with lack of currency deflation, the government role drifting the economy is very challenging, and with the actual terms: almost irrelevant.

 

9

When they talk about social justice and fairness they forget to say, that in the long term, a welfare state is a luxury of productive economies, but it can be their death as well.

 

 

10

Sometimes I feel like Portuguese people are hopeless, they think that there is no solution, this has been like this and always will be, that the government deserves all the taxes we pay and we have to continue to pay, even if they raise them. They think that the two big political parties will always win the elections and when a new one appears it will be a heavy spender as well.

 

 

11

We do not compare the successful political decisions (the real democratic victories) of other countries with our own.  Their success is minimized and the lack of implementation of similar measures in Portugal is always excused with something (our XX century long dictatorship, our small geographic, economic, and political size, even the typical attitudes of Portuguese  citizens).

 

12

Everything and everyone except the character and decisions of the politicians we elected in this young democracy. Thus, we live in a dangerous peace of mind, thinking that doing nothing is a better way, because there is no way you can change our country.

 

13

“There is nothing we can do, and even if we do it, it will always be the same” – Enough, No, I do not know which is the way, I do not know exactly what investments we should do together or individually, much less the perfect and fair solution. I would know even less in the short term.

 

14

All I know is where I want to go as a country and a citizen, and I know that this way is not  the direction nor the path. I can not stand to pay more taxes and tolls, to be rewarded with an economy with fewer jobs, smaller wages, shrinking  wealth, fewer public services, less education, less healthcare and eventually less safety and more crime and poverty. It is time to say enough, it is time to say stop, we are not ignorant and we won’t stand for this anymore.

The words are not mine, but from my son, Francisco. The spirit is the same. Like the Portuguese poet, and liberal, Fernando Pessoa, “com saudades de futuro”

 

* Professor Catedrático de Ciência Política. Universidade Técnica de Lisboa. Antigo dirigente do Partido do Centro Democrático e Social (1983-1987). Fundador do Movimento Cívico Intervenção Radical (2000) e do programa não cumprido do movimento Nova Democracia. Comentador político nos principais órgãos de comunicação social. Assumido liberal pouco neoliberal e nada neoconservador.