Javier Milei
speaker
426 appearances
7 recordings
3 series
first heard Nov 2024
last heard 22 Jan
Javier Milei’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 6 in all, peaking in Jan 2026 with 6.
Appearances
And the fact is that when you get to that notion, I would dare say that you become an anarcho-capitalist de facto. And what that describes, it is an idea which represents my ideal world. I mean, that is the ideal world. Now, real life poses a whole lot of restraints. And some of those you can lift, and those restrictions and others you can't. So, in real life I am a minarchist.
I advocate for minimizing state size. I try to remove as many regulations as possible. In fact, that is what I used to say during my campaign. And let's say that is what I'm now carrying out. We have just carried out the largest structural reform in Argentine history. It is a structural reform that is eight times larger than Menem's, which had been the largest structural reform in history.
And we did that with 15% of the representatives and 10% of the senators. Furthermore, we have a deregulation ministry where basically every day we eliminate between one and five regulations.
On the other hand, we have 3,200 additional structural reforms pending to the point that the day we finish all these reforms, we will be the freest country on the planet with the consequences they have in terms of well-being. Think about this. When Ireland started market reforms just over 40 years ago, it was the poorest country in Europe.
Today, its GDP per capita is 50% higher than that of the United States. So, I have a current situation. And what I am constantly looking for, whether from my academic works and my outreach notes and books, is the world we have today. that every day we are closer, that every day we gain more freedom, because there are some very interesting things here. First, I would like to quote Milton Friedman.
There is a moment when they do an interview with Milton Friedman and they ask him about liberals. And then he says that there are three types of liberals. There are the classical liberals, where, for example, Adam Smith or Milton Friedman himself could fit. Some say that Hayek could fit into that category. For me, Hayek is a minarchist.
Then you have the minarchists where you could clearly find in that place Mises, Hayek, one could find in philosophical terms Nozick and basically Ayn Rand. And at one point Milton Friedman, based on his own son, he says, but if you look closely, there are some who are anarchists.
Let's say, probably from my point of view, the person who has been the greatest inspiration in my life is essentially Murray Newton Rothbard. So therefore, There are two dimensions. One is where I want to go. And the topic is where I stand. So the most important thing is to try each day to advance further toward that ideal of anarcho-capitalism. In that sense...
Sometimes we face strong and harsh criticism regarding that ideal vision. I think that's the Nirvana fallacy. If you compare yourself against paradise, everything is horrible and miserable, but you don't live in paradise. You live on earth. Basically, what you need to understand is something called the state conditions. Let's suppose that you don't like rectangular tables.
You prefer circular tables. Now, the reality is I have only a few hours until I go and catch my flight. And the table is rectangular. You like a circular table, a round one, but there isn't one. What you have is a rectangular table. So either we do the interview here or we just can't do it. So what do you do? You adapt to the current conditions. This is what there is now.
So then you have some restrictions that you can change and others that you cannot. The idea is to modify all the ones that can be changed in the short term and start working on those that can be modified in the medium or long term. For example, if you really like roundtables, perhaps the next interview we may do at a roundtable, we're going to try and solve it.
But today it's something that we couldn't possibly solve. So that's basically the idea, right? Let's say it's about understanding that some restrictions you can't change, others you can, and there are institutional restrictions too.
There are many anarcho-capitalists who are dedicated to criticizing and incredibly they do so with more violence towards liberals and many of them actually criticize me which truly make no sense because it is precisely the nirvana fallacy. But The reality is that, look, in Argentina, for example, the most popular sport is soccer. When you go to watch an Argentina match, it is beautiful.
The stands are full and they're all painted with sky blue and white colors. There is a lot of joy. People sing songs that are very fun, that are very distinctive. Very, it's very much part of Argentine folklore, so to speak. But you see, that beautiful show is external. That is to say, it does not determine the outcome.
You place the ball in the middle of the field and no matter how much people shout, the ball doesn't move. The one who moves the ball and scores the goals is messy. So what do I mean? If you don't get involved and don't get into it, No, you don't do anything.
So, I mean, what do I know is that there are many liberals, libertarians and anarcho-capitalists who are really useless because all they do is criticize, let's say, those of us who want to lead the world toward the ideas of freedom. And what they don't realize is that power is a zero-sum game. And if we don't have it, then the left will have it.
Therefore, if you level your harshest criticism at those in your own ranks, you end up being subservient to socialism, probably. And also, for instance, you have cases of strong hypocrisy, let's say. I have seen cases of agorists. I mean... It's the anarcho-capitalists who criticize Rothbard because he said that you have to get into politics, otherwise the socialists will advance.
And it's interesting because some of them, I have seen them criticizing, proposing agorism. And I remember one of them, one day, the police showed up and honestly, he was peeing himself. So, I mean, it's very easy to criticize, propose and suggest But if he was truly such an agonist, he should have been willing to endure going to jail.
However, when it was time to face the consequences of the idea he was promoting, he froze, wet his pants, and ended up, let's say, accepting all the restrictions because, clearly, it was better to be out of jail than in jail. But in doing so, he sold out his ideas. So it seems to me that no... not taking into account the restrictions
of the situation only serves to be functional to socialism because all it does is strike against one's own.
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