 There was this fear campaign that if Millet won, he would be the sort of fascist, you know, who would be a danger for democracy, just like people in the US talked about Donald Trump in recent years or people in Brazil talked about Shahid Bolsonaro. Millet was described as this very dangerous person who should not be president. So this is the reason why I think it was Massa, particularly who got more votes, because Millet was sort of competing with the rest of the opposition for the anti-government vote. He won that, if you take that as a primary, as another primary say, then he won that because he beat Patricia Borich, who will not be in the second ballot, but the government sort of consolidated its support and got more votes, I think, because of this fear campaign and because it tried to focus, it tried to avoid economics, basically, because the presidential candidate is the minister of economy, but our economy is in shambles right now. We have a 140% annual inflation rate, an ongoing recession, poverty rates that are through the roof. So it was smart of the government to try to avoid the economic themes and just focus on how dangerous Millet would be. And I think that's the reason why they got more votes. But it wasn't just the fear campaign, right? Like Massa also engaged in a little bit of, I would say, not exactly trickery, but almost like bribing people to vote for him when it really got down to the wire. It was even reading a little bit about how people would show up to bus stations and train stations and see the government basically communicating, oh, if Millet comes into power, then here is how much your ticket will actually be because it'll no longer be subsidized by the government and he'll slash all of these programs, which is a fairly compelling pitch to people who are struggling financially. Could you tell us a little bit about like, what was this very slimy campaign that Massa was running? Yeah, I mean, it was all very sketchy and it wasn't just that. For people who haven't been to Argentina, bus tickets, train tickets, subway tickets are highly subsidized, particularly in Buenos Aires. And so a bus ride can cost something like seven cents of a dollar when the true price should be something like a dollar. And so who's paying for that? Of course, taxpayers. It's only indirectly that they're paying for that with, for example, this monstrous inflation rate that we have, but it's not something that you pay directly. And so what the government did was they actually installed like signs that said, if without a subsidy, you would be paying 10 times what you're paying today, which was a very, not a direct, but a very clear reference to the fiscal adjustment that both Millet and Bullridge were proposing. Something else that Minister Masa did was he actually cut taxes in these past two months, which is something that a leftist, Peronist government as we call it here would never do, but this time they do it. Minister Masa sort of slashed income tax for actually, this was mostly for people who are high earners in Argentina, but he basically slashed it and he also implemented, well, they passed a law that Minister Masa sent to Congress, which would, which is effective now, and sort of gives money back to taxpayers, the VAT attacks, it gives it back basically to consumers who use their debit card in supermarkets and grocery stores. So there were lots of measures put in place by the government, which are already fueling inflation because the September rate, for example, was 12.7%, which was the highest monthly rate in 30 years in Argentina. Wow, really? Yeah, yeah, I know, right? Okay, yeah. And before that in August, we had, you know, surf past our record again. So this is like a continuous thing, you know, every month we get higher inflation than the previous one, and it is in part because of these measures. They weren't enough to sort of calm markets down. There still was a run against the peso right before the election for people to get a sense of what the exchange rate is here. Right after the August primaries, the dollar was trading at something like 600 pesos. But right before the election, this past Sunday, the dollar was trading at something like 1,000 pesos. So there was definitely a run against the peso, which Mr. Massa was unable to contain. But still, you know, these measures that he took, these very populist measures, they're very, we're used to them. That's probably why I didn't even mention them in the first place, you know? Because we see that happen repeatedly. And regardless of who the president is, of what their political affiliation is, they all try to implement measures that will get them the most votes right before the election. In the case of Massa, it was tax cuts, which alongside this fear campaign, I think were very effective. So you could say Malay has already delivered his first tax cut just through the fear of his election by his political opponents. But you know, when Malay- That's actually, I'm sorry, that's actually what he said because he has to cease in Congress right now. Yeah, he has to cease in Congress. One of them is actually him. And he actually voted in favor of the tax cuts. And he told people, you know, this was actually his doing all around, that he was forcing Massa to cut taxes through his agendas. Let's return to the election results for just a moment. As you mentioned, the top finisher here, Massa, got about 37% of the vote. Malay, 29.9% of the vote, almost 30%. And then Bullrich with almost 24%. So actually a fairly even split between the three. Could you just explain to us the difference between these three main, these three top finishing parties and candidates? Yeah, so basically, instead of Massa, you find the representative of the current administration. He is the administrator of economy. He is sort of like the shadow president, if you will, because our president has largely gone out of stage. He's doing nothing really. Nobody really cares about what the president is doing since like the beginning of this year, when he announced that he was not going to go for a reelection, he's deeply unpopular. But Massa represents the Peronist party that of Juan Domingo Perón, who back in the 40s and the 50s introduced populist policies, which it's hard to explain because the Peronist party has many faces. Some of them tend to be leftists, some of them tend to be rightists. And Massa is a perfect example of that. Massa actually started his political career in a center-right party, in a sort of libertarian party really, back in the late 1980s. And there are some people who still remember him as defending economic liberty, like strongly, very strongly. But after joining the Peronist party, he sort of defended whoever the Peronist in charge was, which made him actually oppose, Nestor and Christina Kirchner, who were presidents from 2003 to 2015. He was a minister for that government. He then resigned. He ran as a presidential candidate against Kirchner's candidate. So he's been going back and forth between leftist and rightist positions. Right now, he's the representative of the left in Argentina, of the center-left. Did you wanna go to some audience questions, Zach? Yes, there's quite a few that have come in. One is from Narama Shanmuk, says Massa is not center-left. He's a left-wing populist. From what you were describing, it sounded to me like, I think these terms get a little confusing across in different contexts, because populist, well, giving out a bunch of goodies ahead of the election, that's a populist move. Here in America, we tend to think of populism as anti-establishment figures, but it's a little muddled here because he's part of the establishment, but he's also a populist. And I don't know that Millay, he's often described as a populist. I don't know that he is a populist, but he's anti-establishment. Is there anything else you wanna add to the understanding of these terms? Yeah. People also describe Millay as like a fascist or in keeping with Bolsonaro, which is sort of not my understanding of the policies that Millay is promoting. I think people are very imprecise with their labels. Yeah, so in terms of labeling, Masa is definitely the establishment candidate. I mean, he's been in politics for decades. He's actually calling for a government of national unity. He's actually courting these parties, these juntos por el cambio parties that will not endorse Millay. He's trying to get them to be part of a potential government by him. I would call Masa a populist, definitely, because of the measures that he took, that he's taking. And I think at this point, he represents basically all of the left in Argentina, the center left, but also the far left, and the left just left, you know? Because, I mean, with the far left candidate out for the runoff, anyone who feels leftist will vote for him. But again, I think Masa has switched skins in the past. He has been rightist, he has been leftist, and many people think he can actually make another 180 degree turn. So we don't really know what's gonna happen. And then you were talking about Millay as sort of a Bolsonaro or Trumpish figure. That's a very interesting discussion. I understand why many people have compared Millay to Trump or Bolsonaro. I am not sure that that comparison is completely accurate because neither Trump nor Bolsonaro were a libertarian. I mean, we're self-described anarcho-capitalists. It's not that Millay, it's not that Millay... Right, it's not that Millay calls himself just a classical liberal or a libertarian. He's called himself an anarcho-capitalist. Hey, thanks for watching that clip of our talk with Marcos Falcone about the presidential candidacy of Javier Millay. You can watch the full conversation here or another clip over here.