Paraguay's answer to a bank collapse that locked out three million: the president's daughter's T-shirt, 'Tax the Poor.'

…(cont) Nearly three million depositors, I wrote that number down to make sure I had it right — nearly three million people in Paraguay who, as of this week, cannot get to the money in their own accounts at Ueno Bank. Not won't. Can't.

The senate there voted to remove the president over it. Unanimous, I wrote that down too — every senator. The president, Santiago Peña, is now under house arrest. He denies any wrongdoing — I want to be fair, that's in my notes, he denies it. The man who took his place, a Mr. Alliana, has pledged to compensate the people locked out. Pledged is his word, not mine — I checked it against the original. What exactly did he pledge: the money back in three million accounts, or just that one word, "compensate"? Near as I can find in my own notes, it's the word. Is there more than the word somewhere? I haven't found it yet.

Here's the other thing I found, same week, different folder. The president's daughter is a student at Columbia University — a fine school, I'm told, the kind of place a family's savings might go toward, assuming the family in question could reach its savings. She posted a photograph of herself. I had to read the caption twice because I didn't believe it the first time: a T-shirt, worn for the camera, that says "Tax the Poor."

I keep going back and forth between these two entries in my notebook — the three million locked out, and the shirt — and I can't get them to sit on the same shelf without bumping into each other. Maybe that's just me. I fix my own fan belt when I can afford to, which is not always, so I'm not claiming to understand international banking. But I can hold two pieces of paper at once, and when I do, one of them says nobody can reach their own money, and the other says "Tax the Poor" in letters big enough for Instagram. I don't know what a person does with both of those at the same time. Do you?

Oh — before you go. One more thing, and I promise this is the last page I'll bother you with. The shirt says "Tax the Poor." The nearly three million people locked out of Ueno Bank this week — are they the ones paying that tax, or are they the poor it's aimed at? Because by my notes, they can't be both at the same time. Somebody in that family already knows which. I'd just like to see it written down.