In a recent discussion in a private forum with a group of friends I have been discussing why my home country is in trouble economically, even though we dollarized in 2001. My main argument is that the lack of continous reforms toward more freedom are the main reason why Ecuador is still in crisis.
Checking the index of economic freedom at Heritage Webpage in spanish or english (careful very large files), I found the following. Latin America appears together with Africa among the countries with less economic freedom. This is no surprise given that the Ecuador economic situation is in shambles. The only country among Latin America with a high ranking in freedom is Chile (13), very close to Sweden (12), Australia (11) and the USA (10)
There are other Latin American countries in the ranking high enough, but they are small countries with small development. It would take years of continous policies and capital accumulation to reach a state of welfare similar to the top 16. Among others, El Salvador (24), Bolivia (41), Costa Rica (50), Jamaica (56), Panamá (60)
Among the Latin countries that are less free are Venezuela (147), Cuba (144), Suriname (143), Haiti (137), Ecuador (126) (close to China by the way at position 128).
If you decide to download the file when you finish downloading it compare Ecuador with Chile and with Hong Kong. Any doubts on why Ecuador is in crisis, even with dollarization?
CATO has a competing version of the Index of Economic Freedom, the PDF's are lighter check here. Heritage's index is more user friendly but Cato's index to me is more precise although not very user friendly.
2004-07-16
2004-07-15
Another good reason to watch downloaded versions of Farenheit 911
It turns out that watching a downloaded version of Moore's Farenheit 911 can result in him loosing the chance of getting an Oscar for best doccumentary as reported by Wired Magazine. It would be really funny if this happens given his total rejection of IPR laws.
I watched Farenheit 911 from a downloaded movie as I recommended in my previous post. Although funny at times, it turns out to be not too funny, too long, too boring, and I think he ends ups loosing any credibility he has by not digging deeper on some issues that he touches and spending too long on his personal opinions on discrimination, and the suffering of some of the families of the heroes of the Irak war.
Some topics that he touches might be interesting to develop, like the saudis leavind the US right after 911, or the connections of Bush family with middle east interests, but he rather fails to do so by trying to spread his propaganda and knitting his conspiracy theories. Even critics that might be simpatetic to the idea that the Irak war has been a total mistake seem to be not favorable to him and his ramblings. To see more critics check the following:
From the right:
http://www.moorewatch.com/
http://www.moorelies.com/
http://www.reason.com/links/links070104.shtml
and from the left:
http://slate.msn.com/id/2102723/
http://www.counterpunch.org/jensen07052004.html
I watched Farenheit 911 from a downloaded movie as I recommended in my previous post. Although funny at times, it turns out to be not too funny, too long, too boring, and I think he ends ups loosing any credibility he has by not digging deeper on some issues that he touches and spending too long on his personal opinions on discrimination, and the suffering of some of the families of the heroes of the Irak war.
Some topics that he touches might be interesting to develop, like the saudis leavind the US right after 911, or the connections of Bush family with middle east interests, but he rather fails to do so by trying to spread his propaganda and knitting his conspiracy theories. Even critics that might be simpatetic to the idea that the Irak war has been a total mistake seem to be not favorable to him and his ramblings. To see more critics check the following:
From the right:
http://www.moorewatch.com/
http://www.moorelies.com/
http://www.reason.com/links/links070104.shtml
and from the left:
http://slate.msn.com/id/2102723/
http://www.counterpunch.org/jensen07052004.html
2004-07-09
Michael Moore contradictions
I this interview featured in BoingBoing Michael Moore says that he does not believe in Intellectual Property Rights (IPR), just to contradict himself seconds later to say that he is willing to let others share "his" work if they don't profit from it. If he says that there are no Intellectual Property Rights why would he care if a guy with a computer, hight speed internet access and a DVD burner starts selling his movie to guys who do not have high speed connection? So he does or does not believe on IPR? You be the judge.
I was not willing to pay for a movie theater ticket to watch Moore's latest release Farenheit 911 especially after all sort of op-eds in major US newspapers decrying that the film is full of inaccuracies. But since he has allowed it to be free, I feel no remorse in downloading it and see by myself why so many people are talking about it.
I believe in IPR, you cannot deny the existence of ownership of ideas and things, but I am not sure how you can enforce IPR in in a digital age. And that is the reason why I think the current approach by defenders of it are wrong. The whole enterteinment industry needs to reasess themselves and try to reinvent their business model. New technologies are making each day more difficult to enforce IPR and on the other hand its friends are using 18th century concepts to enforce them.
I believe that authors should start working more in a bussines model where their income does not come from selling a book, a record or a movie, but rather from lecture tours, concerts, or the selling of the movie memorabilia. After all an actor, book writer, or singer wants to be listen, read, and commented. They do need a revenue to compensate them for their creative work, but it has to come from other sources, not by selling the product itself. The product in a way is their ad campaign for people that find interesting the author's work and will like to go the extra mile and support those efforts. I don't expect anybody to pay me to write this nor I expect to be paid if someone quotes me, but I do expect that if I become quoted and read by people, they will acknowledge or recognize that I did it and that it will in turn open the door to jobs writing, more income for selling to somebody first my comments or just be supportive by someone sending me a gift choosen from my Amazon wish list. At least if I don't cash anything for my efforts, I will develop some prestige and a lot of fun doing this kind of work.
In any case if you are interested in finding out by yourself why Michael Moore is right or wrong check Eduardo Arcos Blog about a good comment on how to find the movie and what software you need in order to dowload it and watch it. By the way thanks to him that his post alerted me about watching Michael Moore for Free.
I was not willing to pay for a movie theater ticket to watch Moore's latest release Farenheit 911 especially after all sort of op-eds in major US newspapers decrying that the film is full of inaccuracies. But since he has allowed it to be free, I feel no remorse in downloading it and see by myself why so many people are talking about it.
I believe in IPR, you cannot deny the existence of ownership of ideas and things, but I am not sure how you can enforce IPR in in a digital age. And that is the reason why I think the current approach by defenders of it are wrong. The whole enterteinment industry needs to reasess themselves and try to reinvent their business model. New technologies are making each day more difficult to enforce IPR and on the other hand its friends are using 18th century concepts to enforce them.
I believe that authors should start working more in a bussines model where their income does not come from selling a book, a record or a movie, but rather from lecture tours, concerts, or the selling of the movie memorabilia. After all an actor, book writer, or singer wants to be listen, read, and commented. They do need a revenue to compensate them for their creative work, but it has to come from other sources, not by selling the product itself. The product in a way is their ad campaign for people that find interesting the author's work and will like to go the extra mile and support those efforts. I don't expect anybody to pay me to write this nor I expect to be paid if someone quotes me, but I do expect that if I become quoted and read by people, they will acknowledge or recognize that I did it and that it will in turn open the door to jobs writing, more income for selling to somebody first my comments or just be supportive by someone sending me a gift choosen from my Amazon wish list. At least if I don't cash anything for my efforts, I will develop some prestige and a lot of fun doing this kind of work.
In any case if you are interested in finding out by yourself why Michael Moore is right or wrong check Eduardo Arcos Blog about a good comment on how to find the movie and what software you need in order to dowload it and watch it. By the way thanks to him that his post alerted me about watching Michael Moore for Free.
2004-07-06
Espanglish
Check out this funny note from Texas Public Radio about spanglish language spoken by hispanics in the US and more specifically on the Texas border. Thanks to Freedom Pundit for the link.
2004-07-02
Life is Beautiful
I am a great fan of movies that depict reality as it is. But the truth is that I have huge problems to see those that show realistic violence. I feel really uncomfortable. I do not mind watching movies that I know are not true like any of the Lethal Weapons, but it's a different story when I see movies like Schindler's list and Saving Private Ryan. I have not seen yet the Passion of Christ, for that reason but someday I will do it. Life is beautiful is such a great movie because it is so touching without depicting images of violence. I actually think I have never been more emotional in a movie about the horrors of war and violence, without actually being tortured seeing the images of it.
We as parents should go at great lenghts to protect our children of all evil. No matter what our current situation is, always we have to be positive. It all depends on the glass that we use to see reality.
No matter what, even if as parents we have to do what Guido did for Giosué.
How emotionally healthy we and our children are depends on our efforts to see reality. How we see it whether as tragedy or as something beautiful is going to shape our feelings of success or our feelings of accomplisments. No matter where we are or what problems we confront always remember that Life is Beautiful.
_________________________________________________
"A man who becomes conscious of the responsibility he bears toward a human being who affectionately waits for him, or to an unfinished work, will never be able to throw away his life. He knows the "why" for his existence, and will be able to bear almost any "how."
p.127
"It did not really matter what we expected from life, but rather what life expected from us. We needed to stop asking about the meaning of life, and instead to think of ourselves as those who were being questioned by life - daily and hourly. Our answer must consist, not in talk and meditation, but in right action and in right conduct. Life ultimately means taking the responsibility to find the right answer to its problems and to fulfill the tasks which it constantly sets for each individual." p.122
Above quotations reprinted from, Frankl, Viktor E., Man's Search for Meaning, Washington Square Press, Simon and Schuster, New York, 1963. As quoted by Tracy Marks at http://www.geocities.com/~webwinds/frankl/frankl.htm
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