Penna Dexter
Argentina’s new president, Javier Milei delivered a warning to business and political leaders gathered last week at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
Through a translator, he told an audience of global elites: “the Western world is in danger,” and he didn’t mean from climate change. He explained that those whose responsibility it is “to defend the values of the West are co-opted by a vision of the world that inexorably leads to socialism, and thereby to poverty. “
He said free markets and entrepreneurs, not the state, are the “benefactors” of societies.
This was a courageous message delivered at an annual meeting where global planners favor top-down variants of socialism. But President Milei insists that socialism, wherever it’s tried, is impoverishing.
He pointed to the path his country has taken. Argentina’s economy fell from among the world’s largest at the beginning of the 20th century to one of the world’s worst, largely due to its embrace of socialism.  “We’re here to tell you that collectivist experiments are never the solution to the problems that afflict the citizens of the world — rather they are the root cause.”
President Milei accepted his 11-point victory as a mandate to overhaul Argentina’s economy, including its 211-percent inflation that has devastated citizens’ purchasing power.
This was Javier Milei’s first trip overseas since taking office last month. He said he “came to invite the rest of the countries of the Western world to get back on the path of prosperity.”
He blasted radical feminism, which he says is “ridiculous and anti-natural” and stated that, once communism failed, climate alarmism became the tool global socialists use for control.  He decried their advocacy of “population control mechanisms and the bloody abortion agenda.” Though he lives a libertine lifestyle and calls himself a “radical libertarian,” he insists life begins at conception and abortion is murder.
President Milei must administer “shock therapy” in Argentina. It will hurt. Let’s watch it work.

Kerby Anderson
Thirty years ago, Daniel Patrick Moynihan wrote a landmark essay “Defining Deviancy Down.” In case you are not familiar with him, Moynihan was an educator, counselor to the president, ambassador, diplomat, and four-term US senator from New York. He was a well-respected leader in the Democratic party but was also willing to challenge programs and policies he thought were detrimental.
When he wrote his essay, the rise in crime, the breakdown of the family, and even the rise in mental illness had reached significant levels. He argued that the only way the culture learned to deal with these social problems was to deny their existence. In other words, define deviance down.
Whenever I mention his essay during a speech, I immediately turn to Isaiah 5:20 where God says woe to those “who call evil good.” The values in Israel at that time were inverted. That was an apt description thirty years ago and a relevant description today.
But that was only part of the problem. Columnist Charles Krauthammer wrote an essay with the title, “Defining Deviancy Up.” He argued that in addition to making deviant social behavior seem normal, there were others in society making the normal seem deviant. Large areas of behavior we used to respect were now criticized.
Go back to Isaiah 5:20. The first part talks about those “who call evil good” and the second part of the verse condemns those “who call good evil.”
We live in a world with inverted values. Many in our secular culture call “evil good” and “good evil.” That’s why we should follow the command in Colossians 2:8 and “see to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy.”

Kerby Anderson
You may have noticed when someone criticizes you, often they are criticizing you for their own behavior. Sigmund Freud described this as “projection.” Another person “projects” their own motives or behaviors on you as a way of coping with their own problems.
We also see this in the political world, which is why on radio I often attribute many of the political comments these days to projection. Politicians are often guilty of condemning their opponent’s behavior when they are just as guilty of it themselves.
Columnist Robert Knight recently wrote about how projection and denial have become the way this president and his administration engage the political process. Projection is used to blame problems on the other party and candidates.
Denial is another Freudian concept. That occurs when someone dismisses external reality and formulates his or her own “truth.” Robert Knight concludes, “Both disorders are not only rampant among America’s political left but have become tools in their war on common sense, truth, and decency.”
He goes on to explain that these two disorders have significant consequences in our political discourse. “By painting opponents as ‘threats to democracy,’ they issue a license to would-be tyrants at all levels of government to silence speech.” He goes on to provide lots of examples from speeches by the president along with actions by many within his administration.
I might mention he is not the only pundit talking about this. For example, Columnist Victor Davis Hanson writes about how the president is arguing that he is “saving democracy” while at the same time “destroying democracy.” Many of his examples can be found in the attempts to keep Donald Trump off the ballots of some states.
During this election year, a wise voter should be aware of projection and denial when listening to the candidates.