The dastardly helper of the poor

The Economist has a cautionary portrait of Brazil's incumbent president Luis Ignacio Lula da Silva, generally know as just Lula. President Lula will face a runoff for re-election at the end of this month.

The somewhat menacing title of the piece: 'Love Lula if you're poor, worry if you're not.'

Of course, helping the destitute is a pretty good strategy, both political and social, for the leader of the country with the world's greatest disparity between rich and poor.

From the cataclysmic title, you'd think he were some sort of Robert Mugabe or Hugo Chavez where he steals land or assaults judicial independence.

But his real crime, at least by reading the article, is being from the center-left.

According to The Economist, among the catacylsmic developments of Lula's first time:

-The poverty rate, as measured by the Getulio Vargas Foundation, a business school, fell from 28% of the population in 2003 to 23% last year

-While suppressing inflation and containing the deficit, he has transferred more cash to households, partly through the Family Fund, which helps the poor, but also through increases in the minimum wage, which raises publicly financed pensions.

-Instituted a Family Fund, a stipend of up to 95 reais a month that goes to parents who keep their children at school and take them for medical check-ups. The fund now reaches the poorest quarter of Brazil's population... the price of rice has “fallen a lot”, another boost to the family budget.

-Cash transfers have animated the economy of the poor north-east, where retail and wholesale trade jumped 15.6% in the year to July.

-His government has done several useful things, such as passing a bankruptcy law. A long-delayed measure to encourage the private financing of public works may at last yield results. And, after a shaky start, a new model for commissioning power generation is starting to show it can attract private capital to the electricity industry.

So his policies have reduced poverty for millions of citizens, increased trade and encouraged parents to seek education and health care for their children? By The Economist's own analysis, Lula has cut inflation, created jobs and kept the economy growing. Foreign debt no longer hangs over Brazil like the blade of a guillotine.

What a monster!

But the magazine's real objection is that state spending is high and economic growth as other countries in Latin America. Ironically, the fastest growing in South America is in evil Hugo Chavez's Venezuela. But as real life improves for ordinary Brazilians, if not for foreign money men, I'm sorry if I don't seethe with outrage at Lula.

There certainly are more issues to tackle. Urban crime is rampant and the country's educational system needs improvement. And while the president is seen as personally incorruptible, several prominent members of his party have been shown to be otherwise. The constitution Lula inherited is a convulted mess and he's called for its reform.

But so far, he's off to a good start.

Unless your standard for judging presidents is how well they cater to financiers in New York and London.