It was one of the most politically charged presentations at the Book Fair. Not only because of its protagonists but, mainly, because of the background. After the head-on clash between the organizers of the exhibition and the President, and the explosive homophobic statements of one of its authors, the authorized biography was presented last night “Milei, the revolution they didn’t see coming”. It was a meeting with a strong presence of militants, leaders and deputies of La Libertad Avanza, which met in the José Hernández room, the largest on the La Rural property in the Buenos Aires neighborhood of Palermo.
The book was co-written by Nicolas Marquez -Milei’s friend, lawyer and who defined homosexuality as an unhealthy and self-destructive behavior- and by the journalist Marcelo Duclos, and edited by Hojas del Sur. It arrived in bookstores at the end of April and was actively disseminated by the president, who on his social networks shared each of the alternatives linked to the publication, distribution and presentation of the work, which took place on the cold night of this Wednesday. with a significant influx of public.
At last night’s event, the presence of libertarian leaders such as national deputies Lilia Lemoine, Bertie Benegas Lynch, Nicolás Mayoraz, María Celeste Ponce and Lourdes Arrieta, and other leaders and references, from the president of LLA de Capital, Juan Pablo Scalese, was significant. , the journalist Juan Bautista “Tata” Yofre, the influencers Iñaki Gutiérrez and his girlfriend Eugenia Rolón, Emmanuel Danann; the liberal Jorge Pereyra de Olazábal, the activist Cecilia Pando and the former Menemist official Vicente Massot, among others. Everyone sat in the first two rows to listen to the presentation given by both authors.
Márquez and Duclos spoke after a presentation given by Agustín Laje, who defines himself as an intellectual of the new right, in which he addressed how the cultural battle allowed Milei to come to power and, at the same time, appears as an imperative to maintain power and promote reforms that are not limited to the economy, but have more to do with social and political issues.
“The cultural battle is an active, conscious, deliberate confrontation, whose purpose is to try to influence the definition of the cultural frameworks of a society. Javier Milei’s electoral victory is inseparable from these efforts (…) Milei has understood the cultural battle in a comprehensive sense, he has understood it in terms of cultural topics and not just merely economic topics,” Laje stated.
The author of the book’s prologue – who began the presentation with a speech that was broadcast on a giant screen, since he was in Spain – also stated: “I hope that this book, and I am sure it will be like this, serves to keep us encouraged. in the course of the cultural battle to make Argentina a great country.”
After that speech, Nicolás Márquez took the floor, who was in the eye of the storm this week for his statements about homosexuality in a radio interview with journalist Ernesto Tenembaum. There he said that “there are objectively healthy behaviors and objectively unhealthy behaviors. When the State promotes, encourages and finances homosexuality, as it has done until the appearance of Javier Milei on the scene, is encouraging self-destructive behavior”, he noted on Radio Con Vos.
“It is unhealthy and self-destructive because A person with homosexual tendencies lives an average of 25 years less than a heterosexual person for several reasons. They are seven times more prone to drugs, they are 14 times more prone to suicide. 80% of people in the West with HIV They are homosexuals, being, according to the United States Ministry of Health, 2% of the population. 75% of people who have sexually transmitted diseases, that is, hepatitis B, hepatitis C or less harmful diseases such as gonorrhea, etc., are homosexual. They have four times the propensity for smoking, four times the propensity for alcoholism,” he said. Those words generated strong rejection, among them from famous journalist Jaime Bayly.
At the beginning of the book presentation -and before in a talk with Infobae– The writer, lawyer and friend of Milei spoke about the interview, insisted on these positions and claimed that in that interview he “didn’t get a bullet in.” It was a position that contrasted with that expressed by his book companion, Marcelo Duclos, who clearly posed a contrary position, based on Milei’s own permanent quote: “Liberalism is unrestricted respect for the life project of others. Of all. Love is love”said the journalist.
The truth is that, in addition to referring to the issue of homosexuality, Márquez said that he wrote the first part based on an interview he had with President Milei, with whom he spoke mainly about biographical issues, but also advanced a political interpretation of the time and the ideas surrounding Milei’s landing in the Casa Rosada. “The book talks about a revolution and it sounds pretentious that a government that has not yet been able to pass a law is accused of being revolutionary. I interpret the revolution from another perspective. This is not a change of government, because a change of government is an administrative procedure. A president lasts four years, lasts eight, depending on the case, another one comes, the ceremony takes place and that’s it. And it comes and there is a new leadership. “This is a change of era and that is where the revolution lies,” he considered.
“Since ’83, ideas more or less similar to those of Javier Milei were only well regarded in exclusive environments, in the upper classes. They had their deputies, they had their votes, but it was always a minority party. Milei garnered all the votes in the most vulnerable environments. This revolution, furthermore, is idiosyncratic. He was the only politician who did not say ‘Vote for me because I’m going to give you this or that and that and the rest in a quick time’. He said ‘To stop suffering we have to continue suffering even worse than what we are suffering, and at the end of the tunnel there will be a way.’ What does the change of era consist of? “The people voted to be worse off, but with the hope that with this they will later have a new Argentina,” he considered.
Furthermore, Márquez stated that “many accused Milei of being a utopian lyricist, a theoretical man who read convenient literature, but from a political point of view this could not be put into practice. However, what we see today is someone who recognizes reality, does not crash into reality and knows how to stop in time. An example when he had to roll back the Bases Law and then achieved it with a notable speech at the opening of sessions, a notable speech in which he returned to the fray with the Bases Law in another context, rehearsing a different alternative.
Furthermore, he asked: “What is the book for? I think that in the part that concerns me it helps to understand Javier Milei, because I think they don’t understand him. It serves to understand who Milei is, his psychology, his rock influences that are visible and sports aesthetics, which also form a certain psychological attitude. He gives many sporting examples that have marked him as apothegms of wisdom.
Meanwhile, Duclos began his presentation with a reference to the conflict that the authorities of the Book Fair had with the government and the disagreement that ended with Milei’s suspension from the presentation he had planned to make at the Palermo fairgrounds of his latest book.
“It has become very clear that Culture and State are separate issues. It has been suggested that the President of the Nation had a hostility towards culture. Because? Because he decided not to use taxpayer money to finance a stand,” said the journalist, who wrote the final section of “Milei, the revolution they didn’t see coming,” linked to the dissemination and explanation of the fundamental concepts of the economy according to the libertarians.
Marcelo Duclos Argentina highlighted that “Argentina has everything we already know, but it also has the best human resources in the world. Argentina has a beautiful future. I cannot assure you what Argentina can become if we do things right. So read, study, redouble your arguments, because really for the first time, for the first time there is hope.”
Likewise, he acknowledged that citizens “are having a bad time, but we are having a bad time because the economic variables that have shown us how we are have been cleaned up. The veil has been removed from the situation they left us with. “Logically this is not easy.” “Argentina is going to decide to go down the path of investment, economic growth, development, or if they are going to continue betting on the question that the worse the better to boycott. There is no president here who is going to leave by helicopter and the one who is here. Those of us who know each other can assure you that he will have to be taken out of there when he is dead,” he considered.
The event included the participation of the economist Miguel Boggiano, one of the disseminators of Milei’s ideas and who is a member of the Council of Economic Advisors that he presides. Demian Reidel. In his closing speech, he told several anecdotes linked to his relationship with President Milei and lavished him with multiple praises: “He is generous, brave, humble,” said the head of Carta Financiera, a regular panelist on journalistic programs, where he defends the ideas of the libertarian government.
As the rest of the speakers did, Boggiano also referred to the cultural battle. In that sense, he stated: “I ask you not to remain silent. In reality it is more than a request, it is almost a demand, it is a claim. Let it burn inside you and scream, don’t stay silent, raise your voice and above all and above all, it is forbidden to be ashamed.”
“Victory in battle does not depend on the number of soldiers, but on the forces that come from heaven. So long live Nicolás Márquez! Long live Marcelo Duclos! And long live freedom, damn it!”, the president’s economist friend closed the event.
