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On May 01 2019 05:14 JimmiC wrote:Show nested quote +On May 01 2019 04:51 GreenHorizons wrote:On May 01 2019 04:08 JimmiC wrote:On May 01 2019 03:53 GreenHorizons wrote:On May 01 2019 03:36 JimmiC wrote:On May 01 2019 02:15 GreenHorizons wrote:One of you says I'm lying the other says it's basically true that the generals aren't defecting. I'll let you two figure that out. The TLDR is they are profiting so much from the corruption plus they fear a new government will not only end that but they may end up in jail for the corruption or human rights abuses. They also fear repercussions to their friends and family and are unsure who are the cuban spies within the organization. You are risking death, torture and that of your family too if you rick supporting Guaido. So any that do clearly feel very passionate about it I obviously have qualms with this description but rather than dwell on that I'll just note that this is why it's important to recognize even if Maduro named Guaido interim president himself there's a long way between that and legitimate elections. It's been noted JimmiC's optimism is contingent on being unaware/unaccepting of what that typically entails applying here. Yes I consider this Atypical because so much has happened differently than in the examples you use to tell me "what is actually going on" and your early predictions (which you phrased as going to happen have not). Because of this I continue to have optimism that someday, hopefully soon (next year or 2) Venezuela will go back to being a democracy. I don't know what your qualms are? I thought this was agreed upon and is known fact at this point. Now I'm confused. I literally just demonstrated your confusion is of your own making (you've gotten plenty of help from western society in general) and that demonstrating it multiple times is fruitless. + Show Spoiler +On April 30 2019 13:51 GreenHorizons wrote:Show nested quote +On April 30 2019 13:32 JimmiC wrote:
So your saying you cant prove shes not rich! Yes. That's exactly why spreading the rumor she's got billions in Europe is irresponsible and I called it out as the rumor/conspiracy theory it was. Show nested quote +And no I said ok maybe shes not a billionaire but she sure lives like one. And found articles talking about much a day the palace she refused to leave cost the people. Unlike you I admit shit. Lol To which I asked how you got that and you showed an instagram pic with her holding like $40 and jpg to (presumably) a dailymail article (that I don't think you ever actually linked) talking about a vacation that fits in the budget CNBC said "can feel avg". Show nested quote +Retracting what? That the Russian personnel were fixing aged anti air shit, sure it could be propaganda This is what I'm talking about when I say clear examples of you spreading rumor because you repeat things without any critical analysis. had they even been identified? Show nested quote +Notice how I address your entire post not just take one sentence out and attack it. I tried that for a while and you kept wildly distorting or fabricating my positions. Remember when I confronted you on the thing I had to try to correct you on 5 separate times? I can address the rumor spreading without engaging with the other stuff that would go nowhere as I demonstrated. I only use the snippets so it's clear which rumors/arguments I'm addressing and you so much as it matters people are able to clearly assess the source and reliability of the information you provide about a conflict no one but us are really addressing. You, and everyone else knows it's not hard to get me to share my opinion. The reason I've decided to focus on your arguments themselves rather than you, the invective, or the poorly framed (imo/ demonstrated) questions you ask is because even when I express an opinion in clear and unambiguous language you insist on distorting or fabricating a new one and then I have to tell you multiple times to show evidence it's my position or stop. On the off chance you do bring evidence it's based off a literal misinterpretation of your own making. Do you have qualms with that the Generals are loyal because of the corruption? If not my post was short share your qualms. My point in the post was what came after me expressing my qualms and the fruitlessness of exploring them with you. I'll just note that this is why it's important to recognize even if Maduro named Guaido interim president himself there's a long way between that and legitimate elections. I linked a video that explained this a bit in a previous postthe most relevant bit is from 3:55-~6:00 + Show Spoiler +But it explains that when a new ruler takes charge it's not as simple as just removing the bad guys or that the bad guys won't be employed by the next "good guy" to continue the same bad guy practices. Maybe you hope Guaido won't be a dictator acting in the interest of western governments, but the reality is that his practical options are quite limited as a result of the conditions in country and internationally. Today is clearly a decision point of sorts though imo based on the Lopez news and Bolton's conference. Early reports I've heard is that the opposition protests are happening but not as massive as at first and throwing Molotovs and such. I understand it is a big hill and hard one to climb, none of that is shocking to me. Your video did not open my eyes to anything I didn't know. Being optimistic that something is possible does not make you ignorant to the fact that it is hard. Also, it would not take huge improvements to make things better. Part of the problem with Chavez/Maduro is that they didn't understand that you needed to keep some important knowledgeable people around to run things they valued people that would support them completely over knowledge and aptitude for positions. This has lead to so much basic infrastructure failing as well as oil production falling so low (which sounds good for the environment but actually is not, no remediation is happening and a lot of the lower production is actual leakage.) Ideally some of those people who know how to run things, or preferably new people who know how to run things are able to be put into place for the future.
My friends mom used to tell us as kids "hope in one hand, shit in the other, then tell me which hand fills up first".
Which is a somewhat vulgar way of expressing the truism that you can't eat hope. Hope based on the the mathematical possibility is nice, but it's unwise to bet your house (or in this case regional stability so much as it exists) on that royal flush with a rainbow flop, both mathematically and imo.
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On May 01 2019 04:50 Godwrath wrote:Show nested quote +On May 01 2019 03:50 warding wrote:On May 01 2019 03:36 Godwrath wrote:On May 01 2019 02:24 warding wrote:
Reading GH you might thinkg we've never seen a country emerge from a totalitarian regime into a democracy before. It's not only entirely possible and feasible for Guaidó to succeed in that task, it's actually necessary. The lives of 30 million people actually depend on it. Will you provide an example and how it support such case in the very specific scenario of Venezuela? Or are you speaking long term ? I'm not sure what you mean. What I meant was that we have almost 100 democracies in the world today, and the majority of them actually were born after 1970 with a mixture of non-violent and violent resistances, civilian and military uprisings and so on. Including Portugal and Spain. It's easy to dismiss fledgling uprisings as unlikely to succeed, but the other side of the coin is that dictatorships running failed states are just as unlikely to remain in power. I have no personal preference for Guaidó, either way. He is the leading man now, but what matters is getting Venezuela on track to building back a functioning country and democracy. Yes, over 60 countries, in the majority of cases they were not through foreign interventions, and very rarely violent. It is also true that overthrowing dictatorship very rarely ends up in a democracy (through foreign intervention or an inside coup), so instability isn't neccessarily a step towards democratization in itself. Dictatorships transition to democracy when they don't have a "what to do next" or how to hold into power. War is the oppossite direction you want to go, and that's what Guaidó is asking for with a military uprising. What is important is to know what the people IN Venezuela think about what's going on, and it is very hard to get unbiased information about it. All we can do about it is speculate. My biggest problem with GH is how determined he is to defend the form of goverment in Venezuela in some aspects, when the corruption has strangled its credibility for decades, no matter the sanctions imposed. I was just trying for you to develop your argument rather than leave it at as a cheapshot at GH, but it is fair that you were not interested.
Guaido is asking for military support because that's the only thing keeping Maduro in power. How else do you expect him to come down? Where are you getting your probabilities on how often overthrowing dictatorships ends up in democracy? Why is it hard to believe a scenario of Maduro coming down, Guaidó leading a temporary government supported by western powers and international organizations and organizing free elections in one year? You know, this is exactly what happened in Portugal in 1974 - with the military overthrowing the dictatorship peacefully, the global powers trying to influence the outcome (Russia financing the communist parties and supporting the communist military leaders, the US financing the social democrats and western-minded military leaders), a bunch of temporary governments, some instability, and finally fair elections in 1975, exactly one year after the revolution.
Venezuela isn't in the middle east surrounded by other authoritarian regimes and in a place where Russia, Saudi Arabia or Iran can easily project their power and destabilize. Venezuela is surrounded by democracies and clearly in the US sphere of influence. What I'm saying is that Venezuela looks more like Portugal in 1974 than Syria in 2011.
Also as for what the people in Venezuela think, we do know that nearly 2 million have already migrated to Colombia alone, we know what happens when you have those levels of hyperinflation, unemployment and gdp contraction in a country, we know of the extreme shortages in electricity, water, medicine and food, we know of the human misery and deprivation. Using statistics alone we can confidently conclude we've never seen such a self-made clusterfuck of a failed state. We also know what types or political regimes offer the best chance for happiness to populations. There's really no missing information needed to reach an informed conclusion about what's happening in Venezuela and what needs to happen next. But hey, you can ask Venezuelans as well. There's half a million Portuguese-Venezuelans in Venezuela, with loads of them coming back to PT in the last couple of years. There's no shortage of first-hand Venezuela horror stories being told around here.
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On May 01 2019 19:17 warding wrote:Show nested quote +On May 01 2019 04:50 Godwrath wrote:On May 01 2019 03:50 warding wrote:On May 01 2019 03:36 Godwrath wrote:On May 01 2019 02:24 warding wrote:
Reading GH you might thinkg we've never seen a country emerge from a totalitarian regime into a democracy before. It's not only entirely possible and feasible for Guaidó to succeed in that task, it's actually necessary. The lives of 30 million people actually depend on it. Will you provide an example and how it support such case in the very specific scenario of Venezuela? Or are you speaking long term ? I'm not sure what you mean. What I meant was that we have almost 100 democracies in the world today, and the majority of them actually were born after 1970 with a mixture of non-violent and violent resistances, civilian and military uprisings and so on. Including Portugal and Spain. It's easy to dismiss fledgling uprisings as unlikely to succeed, but the other side of the coin is that dictatorships running failed states are just as unlikely to remain in power. I have no personal preference for Guaidó, either way. He is the leading man now, but what matters is getting Venezuela on track to building back a functioning country and democracy. Yes, over 60 countries, in the majority of cases they were not through foreign interventions, and very rarely violent. It is also true that overthrowing dictatorship very rarely ends up in a democracy (through foreign intervention or an inside coup), so instability isn't neccessarily a step towards democratization in itself. Dictatorships transition to democracy when they don't have a "what to do next" or how to hold into power. War is the oppossite direction you want to go, and that's what Guaidó is asking for with a military uprising. What is important is to know what the people IN Venezuela think about what's going on, and it is very hard to get unbiased information about it. All we can do about it is speculate. My biggest problem with GH is how determined he is to defend the form of goverment in Venezuela in some aspects, when the corruption has strangled its credibility for decades, no matter the sanctions imposed. I was just trying for you to develop your argument rather than leave it at as a cheapshot at GH, but it is fair that you were not interested. Guaido is asking for military support because that's the only thing keeping Maduro in power. How else do you expect him to come down? Where are you getting your probabilities on how often overthrowing dictatorships ends up in democracy? Why is it hard to believe a scenario of Maduro coming down, Guaidó leading a temporary government supported by western powers and international organizations and organizing free elections in one year? You know, this is exactly what happened in Portugal in 1974 - with the military overthrowing the dictatorship peacefully, the global powers trying to influence the outcome (Russia financing the communist parties and supporting the communist military leaders, the US financing the social democrats and western-minded military leaders), a bunch of temporary governments, some instability, and finally fair elections in 1975, exactly one year after the revolution. Venezuela isn't in the middle east surrounded by other authoritarian regimes and in a place where Russia, Saudi Arabia or Iran can easily project their power and destabilize. Venezuela is surrounded by democracies and clearly in the US sphere of influence. What I'm saying is that Venezuela looks more like Portugal in 1974 than Syria in 2011. Also as for what the people in Venezuela think, we do know that nearly 2 million have already migrated to Colombia alone, we know what happens when you have those levels of hyperinflation, unemployment and gdp contraction in a country, we know of the extreme shortages in electricity, water, medicine and food, we know of the human misery and deprivation. Using statistics alone we can confidently conclude we've never seen such a self-made clusterfuck of a failed state. We also know what types or political regimes offer the best chance for happiness to populations. There's really no missing information needed to reach an informed conclusion about what's happening in Venezuela and what needs to happen next. But hey, you can ask Venezuelans as well. There's half a million Portuguese-Venezuelans in Venezuela, with loads of them coming back to PT in the last couple of years. There's no shortage of first-hand Venezuela horror stories being told around here.
Portugal's revolution started in Africa didn't it? With hundreds of generals turning on the government because of colonialism and it's conflict with the socialist factions?
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The war in the colonies certainly made the population unhappy and fatigued the regime and the military, so it was certainly a contributing factor in how it all played out, but I wouldn't describe it exactly like that. It started as a corporatist movement from the military captains who were unhappy about promotion schemes and pay. What made it possible for that to turn into a fully fledged revolution was the fact that the regime didn't care enough to continue. We were lead at the time by a sort of Gorbatchov-type figure who actually wanted to reform the regime and bring it closer to Europe and who was much happier exiling to Brazil than fighting for power.
As for the socialist guerrilas in Africa, IMO most of them were socialist for the convenience of having military and financial support from either Russia or China. Portugal was a NATO founding member so you had to go to the socialist powers for support. You have fun examples like UNITA in Angola who started out as Maoists and then in the civil war in the 80s was backed by the US, against MPLA who were backed by Russia.
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On May 01 2019 19:17 warding wrote:Show nested quote +On May 01 2019 04:50 Godwrath wrote:On May 01 2019 03:50 warding wrote:On May 01 2019 03:36 Godwrath wrote:On May 01 2019 02:24 warding wrote:
Reading GH you might thinkg we've never seen a country emerge from a totalitarian regime into a democracy before. It's not only entirely possible and feasible for Guaidó to succeed in that task, it's actually necessary. The lives of 30 million people actually depend on it. Will you provide an example and how it support such case in the very specific scenario of Venezuela? Or are you speaking long term ? I'm not sure what you mean. What I meant was that we have almost 100 democracies in the world today, and the majority of them actually were born after 1970 with a mixture of non-violent and violent resistances, civilian and military uprisings and so on. Including Portugal and Spain. It's easy to dismiss fledgling uprisings as unlikely to succeed, but the other side of the coin is that dictatorships running failed states are just as unlikely to remain in power. I have no personal preference for Guaidó, either way. He is the leading man now, but what matters is getting Venezuela on track to building back a functioning country and democracy. Yes, over 60 countries, in the majority of cases they were not through foreign interventions, and very rarely violent. It is also true that overthrowing dictatorship very rarely ends up in a democracy (through foreign intervention or an inside coup), so instability isn't neccessarily a step towards democratization in itself. Dictatorships transition to democracy when they don't have a "what to do next" or how to hold into power. War is the oppossite direction you want to go, and that's what Guaidó is asking for with a military uprising. What is important is to know what the people IN Venezuela think about what's going on, and it is very hard to get unbiased information about it. All we can do about it is speculate. My biggest problem with GH is how determined he is to defend the form of goverment in Venezuela in some aspects, when the corruption has strangled its credibility for decades, no matter the sanctions imposed. I was just trying for you to develop your argument rather than leave it at as a cheapshot at GH, but it is fair that you were not interested. Guaido is asking for military support because that's the only thing keeping Maduro in power. How else do you expect him to come down? Where are you getting your probabilities on how often overthrowing dictatorships ends up in democracy? Why is it hard to believe a scenario of Maduro coming down, Guaidó leading a temporary government supported by western powers and international organizations and organizing free elections in one year? You know, this is exactly what happened in Portugal in 1974 - with the military overthrowing the dictatorship peacefully, the global powers trying to influence the outcome (Russia financing the communist parties and supporting the communist military leaders, the US financing the social democrats and western-minded military leaders), a bunch of temporary governments, some instability, and finally fair elections in 1975, exactly one year after the revolution. Venezuela isn't in the middle east surrounded by other authoritarian regimes and in a place where Russia, Saudi Arabia or Iran can easily project their power and destabilize. Venezuela is surrounded by democracies and clearly in the US sphere of influence. What I'm saying is that Venezuela looks more like Portugal in 1974 than Syria in 2011. Also as for what the people in Venezuela think, we do know that nearly 2 million have already migrated to Colombia alone, we know what happens when you have those levels of hyperinflation, unemployment and gdp contraction in a country, we know of the extreme shortages in electricity, water, medicine and food, we know of the human misery and deprivation. Using statistics alone we can confidently conclude we've never seen such a self-made clusterfuck of a failed state. We also know what types or political regimes offer the best chance for happiness to populations. There's really no missing information needed to reach an informed conclusion about what's happening in Venezuela and what needs to happen next. But hey, you can ask Venezuelans as well. There's half a million Portuguese-Venezuelans in Venezuela, with loads of them coming back to PT in the last couple of years. There's no shortage of first-hand Venezuela horror stories being told around here.
If you are interested, i am pretty sure a google search with "democratization" will suffice.
My point isn't that Guaidó if (somehow) manages to get the military in his side he won't be able to dethrone Maduro, but that it isn't that likely to the democratization if there are not social movements with huge popular support already in place in key positions for the Venezuelans to get a hold of their state and resources to make their lives substantially better.
You can explain to me Portugal democratization process, i am sure you know a whole lot more than I do about it, but ask yourself if there weren't in place those movements gathering support for years or even decades so when the regime didn't have an out, the most likely option was the democratization of the country. That's what happened in Spain when Franco died. Not to speak that being surrounded by european democracies (wealth being the most deciding factor in what their support can accomplish) is not the same as south american ones (where hostility towards an US puppet regime is common from the socialist parties).
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The transitions were pretty different in Portugal and Spain. Here there were dozens of communist resistance parties and a very strong communist party financed by the Soviet Union. Needless to say they were not very democratic and they did try to establish a socialist dictatorship in the transition process (which also featured the nationalization of a third of the economy and hammers and sickles galore). The country's transition to democracy wasn't really the likeliest route but it happened because that's what the majority of the people wanted, because the CIA financed the new fledgeling social democratic parties and because of European influence.
It's hard to say how much was wrecked from the civil society by Chavez and Maduro but it might be worth reminding that Venezuela held parliamentary elections in 2015 with the majority of the voters preferring the opposition party. Maybe not totally Portugal but definitely not Syria.
EDIT: Most of my point is that I believe there's a general recent bias against believing in successful democratization due to the generalized failure of the Arab spring, China's success case so far and the democratic clusterfucks in the West. The wider history of the world, however, still points toward an increasingly democratic world, and that's what we need to be aiming for.
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Thank you for the input on Portugal. Maybe there was a missunderstanding, i don't mean international meddling through economic support and resources (those are always useful if well thought out in the long run, sanctions not so much), but direct military interventionism or developing proxy wars in those countries.
About your second paragraph, yeah, it's my ignorance in that regard, since most of the info i get are from migrants, and that reminds me of Cuba, they are against Maduro, but they are not in their country as fuel for change (understandable, i am not trying to fault them for it), and i can't really take that as a sample for what is going on in the country. Most of the information we get is that the population is very polarized and any kind of intervention will result in civil war. An unwanted scenario, atleast for me.
About your edit, it's not really bias, democratization through direct intervention from foreign powers or internal coups has been very rarely successful towards implanting a democratic and liberal regime well before the arab spring. So my biggest problem continues to be with Guaidó's call for dethroning the king the old coup fashion, rather than rallying support towards true democratic process and civil movements in Venezuela so when the Regime is exhausted (and it's already showing signs), there won't be a different end. But since the call for intervention failed, maybe Guaidó re-defines his strategy.
About the world being increasingly democratic, some might argue that it's the oppossite, and we are past that point where democracy is unavoidable and a consequence of the cold's war result and the US hegemony, which was true well until the global recession, but due to the US internal and external constraints is not so sure anymore. The US has grown increasingly not trust worthy to its allies, its internal divides has made their deals worth less than towell paper, with its foreign policy menacing to switch like a pendulum depending on who holds the presidency, and that isn't going to change anytime soon.
We could also speak about growing sympathies to authoritarianism elsewhere in the world, even if at different rates, it's a new wave we have to navigate through (while climate change starts to bring its first consequences), and China is tightening its grip to close sphere of influences to western democracies with the US retreat, and a big etc of problems that western democracies are facing or going to.
Sorry for the offtopic in that regard, even if somewhat related.
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Continuing to look like Guaido has failed and it's unclear if the Trump administration will follow through with threats for another Cuban missile crisis/Bay of Pigs/Death squad route from what I'm reading.
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On May 02 2019 03:23 JimmiC wrote:
I missed those threats. Could you source them or are you talking about all the vague "all options are on the table" talk that has been happening for months and months.
Yes, I'm saying "all options" include the convicted war criminal in charge of the US's role doing what he was convicted of and the current AG approved the pardon of.
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On May 02 2019 03:32 JimmiC wrote:The Marriott is getting some bad press for hosting an award honors Bolsonaro who is openly anti gay. The Marriott in the past has been very pro LGBTQ so it is a little bit surprising they would host this. The other sponsors are listed in the article and are also receiving backlash. My favorite quote from the article is Show nested quote +Openly gay New York State Senator Brad Hoylman told the Daily News “The only award President Bolsonaro should be receiving is bigot of the year. [It is] incredibly offensive that a business in my Senate district, which has a large LGBTQ population, would host a man who once said he’d rather have a dead son than a gay man.” Hopefully he gets continued backlash for his awful awful comments. https://www.cnbc.com/2019/04/30/event-for-brazils-bolsonaro-defies-corporate-backing-of-lgbt-rights.htmlIn slightly more uplifting news (because it is too bad that they need to fight him in the first place) the women of the indigenous tribes are fighting back again bolsonaro's attempt to develop their land. This is also strong for womens rights as traditionally the women of the tribes do not get leadership rules. If their rights are not reason enough to be pissed at bolsonaro's policies they could mean horrible things for the Amazon Rain Forrest which is one of the most important things in the world. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-brazil-indigenous-women/breaking-from-tradition-indigenous-women-lead-fight-for-land-rights-in-brazil-idUSKCN1S51W6
I'm not hopeful Bolsonaro loses Trump's/US government's steadfast support any time soon.
At a news conference after the two men held a luncheon meeting, Mr. Trump gushed that “I think Brazil’s relationship with the United States, because of our friendship, is probably better than it’s ever been by far.”
“Our trade with Brazil will go substantially up,” Mr. Trump predicted earlier in the afternoon, “and that’s one of the things Brazil would like to see.”
United States officials said this week that Mr. Trump appreciated the way Mr. Bolsonaro powered his way to victory in Brazil’s election by being unabashedly pro-American and declaring repeatedly that he wanted to have a close relationship with Mr. Trump.
www.nytimes.com
I agree that Bolsonaro is horrific as is the treatment of indigenous women and land at his encouragement and mentioned this story before.
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On May 02 2019 04:05 JimmiC wrote:
I believe that Brazil is still a democracy so there is hope to get rid of him that way at some point at least for now. I think the bigger issue is that there is so many people that agree with him. How do you educate (I'm sure there is a better word but it is all I can think of) the public so that they find him as despicable as you and I do.
I mean it's terribly corrupt and they imprisoned the (more popular) opposition (as well as being linked to assassinations of opposition figures) so I'm pretty sure you would agree that "democracy" is a stretch?
I mean I don't think anyone really cares? I presume most people are aware there are horrific people all over South America and the rest of the world, many supported not just by Trump but with bipartisan/international support.
I mean Bolsonaro is horrific, a threat to the stability and people of his country, the region, and the world (through environmental damage and pollution) but he's probably not even in the top 5 horrific people we openly support (mostly because just because, like Trump, he's largely incompetent).
I only say that to mean I don't think sharing information about how bad he is changes anyone's mind or changes that any political shift leftward (outside of necessary to maintain control) will be opposed by Bolsonaro's Western supporters. Doesn't matter how corrupt or horrific he treats his people or regional neighbors westerners basically don't care about (in the way we turn a blind eye to Yemen).
fwiw Bolsonaro is terribly unpopular in Brazil, just again, I don't think anyone cares as much as they do about other stories.
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On May 02 2019 05:26 JimmiC wrote:
I have not read much on it so I'm not going to claim to be an expert on anything but what I have read is that it was more a populism thing like Trump, so super popular with his base and super unpopular with his opposition but the base is big enough to carry him to victory.
The various reports that I read on democracy have them as a flawed democracy even above countries like Mexico. The good news is that Bolsonaro won 55% of the vote in a second-roundrun-off, his right-wing Partido Social Liberal won just 10% of the seats in Brazil’s Congress, which will force it to seek support from other parties in Congress so he can't just do whatever he wants.
Would you be able to send the sources on the links to the assassinations I have not read about them.
I have read about Temer (right of center) and Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (left) and Operation Car wash. I'm guessing you think this a US conspiracy based on your posts. Do you have any sources so I can catch up.
"democracy ratings" are a good place to start but are not always accurate. I'm sure the US scores pretty high on them as well and the last two years have been non-stop coverage of how a foreign country may have made Trump president despite his lack of popularity.
Bolsonaro may be less popular than Trump depending on how you measure but you're right it's largely characterized as a "populist win"
The president, a right-wing populist, was swept into office with an expansive mandate for change by voters fed up with political corruption, violence and the lingering effects of a deep recession. But without a new strategy in place, Mr. Bolsonaro has struggled to keep even the 58 lawmakers of his own party in line, calling into question his ability to pass politically unpopular measures in Brazil’s unruly, multiparty legislature, which has 594 representatives. Hearings on pension changes have devolved into shouting matches, frustrating proponents inside and outside the government, and leading even former allies to speak of Mr. Bolsonaro with open contempt. All of this has left him with the lowest popularity rating of any first-term president at this point in a tenure since democracy was restored in the mid-1980s, according to a poll by Datafolha: Thirty percent of those surveyed called his presidency bad or terrible. + Show Spoiler +Jair Bolsonaro (PSL) has his government approved, that is, evaluated as good or good by 32% of Brazilians aged 16 years or more, and a similar share of 30%. he sees as bad or bad and disapproves. The rest consider the government of the retired military regular (33%) or preferred not to comment (4%) Mr. Bolsonaro has also made it easier for civilians to acquire weapons
www.nytimes.com
Many reports suggest Brazilian government is actually run by the military and Bolsonaro takes orders. He's put generals in charge of many main industries and a general recently admitted to threatening the supreme court to imprison Lula.
Bolsonaro has appointed several generals to various ministries, such as those of transportation and defense. He also appointed judge Sergio Moro as his minister of justice. Moro is the judge who was behind the imprisonment of Lula da Silva, who at the time was the frontrunner in this year’s presidential race.
Last weekend, a high ranking general of Brazil’s military, General Villas Boas, admitted in an interview to the newspaper Folha de Sao Paulo that he threatened Brazil’s Supreme Court so that it would rule in favor of Lula’s imprisonment.
therealnews.com
On his ties to assasinations I was thinking of:
Brazil’s far-right president, Jair Bolsonaro, is facing growing calls to explain his family’s alleged links to the heavily armed and notoriously violent paramilitary gangs that control large swaths of Rio de Janeiro.
Questions over possible connections between the Bolsonaros and Rio’s so-called “militias” were swirling even before the former army captain took office in January – so much so that revellers at this year’s carnival penned a song satirising the president’s supposed criminal ties.
But those concerns intensified this week when a photograph emerged in which a grinning Jair Bolsonaro appears with his arm around Élcio Queiroz, one of the two men arrested on Tuesday for the 2018 assassination of the Rio councillor Marielle Franco
www.theguardian.com
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EPT
