Peron started out as the savior of the working class, much to the chagrin of aristocrats and privileged intellectuals, but then fell in with the wrong crowd and ended up becoming just another South American thug. Peronism, which continues to exist today, even despite Evita, is a rabble-rousing cult whose ideology is difficult to pin down, because it is neither left nor right, neither fish nor fowl, but an eclectic mix of the worst elements of both. Eva, with her own solid working-class credentials, had little trouble winning the hearts of the hoi polloi, but could never quite seduce the upper classes, who found her pushy, Machiavellian, absurdly coiffed and just a smidgen trashy.
Ring any bells?