News of Michael Soltys

Michael Soltys

Michael Soltys, who first entered the Buenos Aires Herald in 1983, held various editorial posts at the newspaper from 1990 and was the lead writer of the publication’s editorials from 1987 until 2017.

BEYOND THE HEADLINES

It’s a small World (Cup) II: The geopolitics of football

13-06-2026 05:41 No host nation has won in this century, while there were no less than six home triumphs in the 16 tournaments of the previous century. The so-called World Cup is a Euro-American monopoly – will a new champion emerge from the record 48 competitors?

by Michael Soltys

BEYOND THE HEADLINES

It’s a small World (Cup)

06-06-2026 06:06 FIFA has 211 member football associations, of whom only 80 have ever participated in a World Cup tournament in almost a century while for the highest level of winners, you would have to knock the zero off that figure – just eight countries, all of whom are past or present members of the European Union or Mercosur.

by Michael Soltys

BEYOND THE HEADLINES

Breaking the bank

30-05-2026 05:56 Today the widespread acceptance of the inevitability of central banks is based on the belief that every nation has one. Almost inevitable, then, but desirable?

by Michael Soltys

BEYOND THE HEADLINES

Underneath it all

23-05-2026 05:32 The shift of wealth and population from the Greater Buenos Aires industrial belt to inland mining, farming, oil and gas is only now starting to be visible. Not all provinces are blessed with such natural resources, which could lead to new disparities arising alongside the old.

by Michael Soltys

The end of inflation in Argentina – or of Javier Milei?

BEYOND THE HEADLINES

Inflation as a false friend

16-05-2026 05:59 Inflation is rightly seen as the most malign tumour which can hit an economy but another way of expressing that might be to say that it grows on you like cancer.

by Michael Soltys

The Mission to Seafarers' Argentine chapter is being relaunched.

COMMUNITY

Reviving the maritime welfare mission in Argentina

14-05-2026 15:55 The Mission to Seafarers has 120 centres and a presence in over 200 ports in 50 countries, attending merchant sailors in 74,000 cargo ships and tankers worldwide – now its Argentine chapter is being relaunched.

by Michael Soltys

BEYOND THE HEADLINES

Europa and the bullies

09-05-2026 06:00 This month finally sees a massive free-trade agreement covering some 700 million people come provisionally into being – deserving that description because it eliminates tariffs on 91 percent of EU goods while opening European markets to South American farm produce.

by Michael Soltys

BEYOND THE HEADLINES

Less work in labour

02-05-2026 00:37 Trade unionism in Argentina predates May Day as International Workers Day in the world – Argentine printers first unionised in 1878; May Day as an occasion for worker protest has its roots in the Chicago general strike of 1886.

by Michael Soltys

Winners from the English-Speaking Scholastic Association of the River Plate's annual competition outside the British Embassy in Buenos Aires.

COMMUNITY

Preserving the art of public speaking

30-04-2026 19:40 English-Speaking Scholastic Association of the River Plate marks its centenary in style with final of national competition.

by Michael Soltys

BEYOND THE HEADLINES

From eternity to here

25-04-2026 06:33 Every now and then death is larger than life in Argentina.

by Michael Soltys

BEYOND THE HEADLINES

Is right right or a write-off?

17-04-2026 15:24 With Orban losing power and Trump upbraiding Meloni for sticking up for Pope Leo against his insults, President Javier Milei finds himself in a shrinking club.

by Michael Soltys

The Crucible; Directed by Simon Chater; The Suburban Players; The Playhouse, Moreno 80, San Isidro; Remaining shows April 18, 24, 25, 26 and 30, May 1 and 2.

THEATRE

Salem trial as a witch’s brew

17-04-2026 11:58 The Crucible; Directed by Simon Chater; The Suburban Players; The Playhouse, Moreno 80, San Isidro; Remaining shows April 18, 24, 25, 26 and 30, May 1 and 2.

by Michael Soltys

BEYOND THE HEADLINES

Cabinet chiefs past and present

11-04-2026 07:38 The Cabinet chief’s role as whipping boy can be traced back to the post’s origins in the 1995 constitutional reform.

by Michael Soltys

BEYOND THE HEADLINES

Easter islands

04-04-2026 06:31 Argentina is celebrating Easter with a president more interested in Passover but the bigger challenges to the traditional Church are coming from secularisation and Protestantism.

by Michael Soltys

Demian Reidel, President Javier Milei, US Senator Rand Paul and US Ambassador to Argentina Peter Lamelas.

US SENATOR IN ARGENTINA

(Ayn?) Rand Paul’s libertarian fest

01-04-2026 11:21 US Senator Rand Paul – Capitol Hill’s leading libertarian – pays a visit to Argentina, meeting with President Javier Milei, among other activities.

by Michael Soltys

BEYOND THE HEADLINES

Completing memory

28-03-2026 05:55 It should be well within the means of libertarians (at all odds with dictatorship in theory at least) to challenge the denialist tag often placed on them and one wonders why they do not make more effort to do so.

by Michael Soltys

Theatre

Anti-matter also matters

26-03-2026 17:40 Boy From Antimatter is a two-act English-language multi-media musical for both children and adults, based on the book by Cliff Williamson.

by Michael Soltys

50th anniversary of 1976 coup

Anniversary recall

21-03-2026 00:06 Inviting people to recall their own memories of the 1976 coup excludes around 85 percent of the population – the others have to steer a tricky course between dogmatic echo chambers and broader perspectives.

by Michael Soltys

BEYOND THE HEADLINES

No inertia with Persia

14-03-2026 06:46 The 90 million Persians are very self-consciously not Arabs – ethnically, they are Indo-European, not Semitic while their Farsi language is fairly unintelligible for speakers of Arabic, far less overlap than, say, between Russian and Polish.

by Michael Soltys

BEYOND THE HEADLINES

A future which works

07-03-2026 06:53 Milei’s determination to open up one of the world’s most closed economies is moving at vastly superior speed to the painstaking parliamentary passage of the structural reforms local companies need to compete.

by Michael Soltys

BEYOND THE HEADLINES

Ironies of FATE

28-02-2026 06:05 Tensions between the liberal right and the nationalistic right could start to make themselves felt here.

by Michael Soltys

Irene Bianchi in 'Te invito a mi velorio.'

THEATRE

Death be not proud

26-02-2026 19:06 Taboo subject of death is made an intro to a sequence of sardonically thought-provoking reflections in this special one-off performance.

by Michael Soltys

BEYOND THE HEADLINES

Hidrovía – time and tide

21-02-2026 06:05 A pro-market government keener on export-led than consumer-led growth and committed to opening up Argentina is nevertheless singularly indifferent to the infrastructural pillars of growth, sacrificed to an obsessive fiscal surplus.

by Michael Soltys

BEYOND THE HEADLINES

Stupid cupid – an $LIBRA of love

14-02-2026 06:41 Exactly one year ago today the first black swan came along after probably the longest presidential honeymoon in Argentine history.

by Michael Soltys

BEYOND THE HEADLINES

Lies, damned lies and statistics

07-02-2026 00:04 The blow to confidence from this institutionally messy political interference in the formation of statistics (even if child’s play compared to the Kirchnerite fudging of the figures) remains to be seen.

by Michael Soltys

BEYOND THE HEADLINES

Rocker versus Rocca and a deal with steel appeal

31-01-2026 06:50 How did an exclusively private tender become such a political football and why should there be much to choose between the tubing of an Argentine multinational flogging Brazilian steel and an Indian competitor hawking Chinese steel?

by Michael Soltys

BEYOND THE HEADLINES

The forgotten reform

24-01-2026 00:17 Central to the passage of Milei's labour reform is the assent of the provincial governors controlling the deputies and senators needed to take the ruling party to an overall parliamentary majority.

by Michael Soltys

BEYOND THE HEADLINES

Is Vaca Muerta now a dead cow – and EU-Mercosur deal a cherubic baby?

17-01-2026 00:12 Today will go down as a historic day with the world’s biggest free-trade area numbering over 700 million consumers signed into being in the Paraguayan capital of Asunción.

by Michael Soltys

BEYOND THE HEADLINES

Fracas in Caracas

10-01-2026 06:43 Whisking Maduro from a heavily guarded Caracas military base to a New York courtroom was also an almost magical feat but has yet to prove a game-changer in Venezuelan history. If Bolivarian 21st-century socialism could outlive Hugo Chávez, it could also survive Maduro.

by Michael Soltys

2025: YEAR IN REVIEW

2025: The year that was

31-12-2025 00:01 The death of a pontiff, an American Pope, Milei’s provincial election disaster, and midterm comeback, Javier at the White House, Trump’s tariffs, new envoys, Washington’s bailout, CPAC, Cryptogate, mysterious luggage, ANDIS claims, Cristina jailed, IMF backing, deadly flooding, Supreme Court rows, 'El Eternauta,' no divine justice for Diego, Garrahan protests, Lula in BA, triple narco murder, Oasis at River and a new Congress… just another year in Argentina.

by Michael Soltys

'Tiempos Circulares' (2025); Directed by Andrés Dunayevich; Documentary; 78 minutes.

FILM & CINEMA

Sending silence to oblivion

22-12-2025 17:35 'Tiempos Circulares' (2025); Directed by Andrés Dunayevich; Documentary; 78 minutes.

by Michael Soltys

CAMPAIGN COMMENTS

Is Kast caste?

20-12-2025 07:31 While Bolivia, Honduras and now Chile have all swung right in recent voting, Trump’s pet candidate in each nation had problems riding the crest of the wave.

by Michael Soltys

Karina Milei and Javier Milei: Curtain falls on opening Congress sessions.

CAMPAIGN COMMENTS

The curtain falls … and rises

13-12-2025 09:17 The new Senate has no less than 13 caucuses but the big picture has 21 senators responding directly to the Javier Milei administration, 26 in the Kirchnerite orbit, 14 in the centre-right and 11 heeding purely provincial interests.

by Michael Soltys

CAMPAIGN COMMENTS

And so it (almost) ends

06-12-2025 06:00 Quite apart from the uncertainties over Lorena Villaverde’s Senate entry, Congress has been the scene of musical chairs with its first minority changing in the course of this week.

by Michael Soltys

Campaign comments

Disunited provinces

22-11-2025 06:51 Looking at inland Argentina is far from irrelevant since tax reform is high on the list of President Javier Milei’s priorities with negotiating the revenue sensitivities of provincial governors perhaps the biggest obstacle there.

by Michael Soltys

Campaign comments

The City and the Senate

15-11-2025 05:05 While the government’s overall midterm triumph represented a huge shift from gloomy pre-electoral expectations, this city’s results did not show that much change from last May’s local voting.

by Michael Soltys

CAMPAIGN COMMENTS

Karina rules OK

08-11-2025 06:34 Karina Milei’s claim to the electoral laurels seems a slam dunk, but a different conclusion emerges once we look beyond the big picture to the provincial results.

by Michael Soltys

Campaign comments

The colour purple

01-11-2025 06:10 Despite governing the province for 34 of the last 42 years, the Peronists ran up a hat-trick of national midterm defeats there last Sunday – in 2017, in 2021 and in 2025.

by Michael Soltys

Lower House Speaker Martín Menem and Turkish Ambassador Ömür Budak.

COMMUNITY & DIPLOMACY

Turkish Republic marks 102nd anniversary

31-10-2025 09:01 Ambassador Ömür Budak celebrates 102nd anniversary of the founding of the Republic of Türkiye in style.

by Michael Soltys

Representatives of the ABCC with Ambassador David Cairns.

COMMUNITY

UK ambassador welcomes new ABCC authorities

31-10-2025 08:55 Ambassador David Cairns welcomes newly installed Argentine-British Community Council (ABCC) officials, who plan December Christmas fair at Embassy.

by Michael Soltys

CAMPAIGN COMMENTS

151 shades of grey

25-10-2025 05:58 Voters are being asked to select not the next president but 127 deputies and 24 senators for which 217 lists are contending in the 23 provinces and this City with a total 1,648 candidates. The multiplicity of combinations arising from these numbers points to an infinity of results, each one of which would make the parliamentary negotiations lying ahead slightly different with no chance of any overall majority – 151 shades of grey.

by Michael Soltys

CAMPAIGN COMMENTS

Trump card or joker in the pack?

18-10-2025 06:15 Milei’s government is confident of success in only seven of Argentina's 24 districts but this fails to point out that fears of defeat are also only limited to seven provinces, with the other 10 up in the air.

by Michael Soltys

CAMPAIGN COMMENTS

‘Panic Show’ name of the game

11-10-2025 06:00 We are told that the choice is “libertad or kirchnerismo” but neither libertarians nor Kirchnerism will be able to do very much with the 110 of the 257 seats accruing to whoever wins – Argentina’s middle ground has far less seats than Brazil’s "centrão" but could carry equivalent clout.

by Michael Soltys

CAMPAIGN COMMENTS

A spooky Halloween earlier this month?

04-10-2025 06:38 To lay any claim to a positive result, pundits suggest that Milei would need to be the leading minority with at least 35 percent of the vote. The first objective looks like a done deal since LLA is the only nationwide contender.

by Michael Soltys

Campaign comments

The future’s not ours to see

27-09-2025 06:25 Mayoral tails wagged gubernatorial and presidential dogs in Buenos Aires Province but next month’s midterms stand to be genuinely, not synthetically national with the state of the economy and the quality of governance deciding votes.

by Michael Soltys

CAMPAIGN COMMENTS

The lion sleeps tonight

20-09-2025 06:31 Milei actually polled a higher percentage in Buenos Aires Province this month than in BA City last May, yet the former is unanimously deemed an unmitigated disaster while the latter was a resounding triumph.

by Michael Soltys

Campaign comments

Blast from the past

13-09-2025 06:09 Last Sunday’s election was very much the mayoral tail wagging the dog and here we’re not just talking about Greater Buenos Aires Peronist “barons” – almost the only successes of third parties came thanks to the PRO mayors bucking the Milei alliance, proving mayoral clout beyond the general trend.

by Michael Soltys

CAMPAIGN COMMENTS

A tale of two provinces

06-09-2025 07:07 The population of Buenos Aires Province outnumbers over two-thirds (160) of the world’s 233 countries and territories.

by Michael Soltys

CAMPAIGN COMMENTS

Swimming against the current

30-08-2025 06:04 The undecided in Corrientes could just top up Juan Pablo Valdés over the 40 percent needed to ensure first-round victory, although the current Zeitgeist of voter apathy would make it likelier for them to sit this one out.

by Michael Soltys

Campaign comments

Ins and outs of Congress

23-08-2025 06:42 Almost all those deputies taking their leave would doubtless be rubbished by President Milei as “caste” but most carry a political weight far from evident in their prospective replacements.

by Michael Soltys