#luiz inácio lula da silva

[dadsinsuits]

Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Ruth Ben-Ghat at Lucid:

The benchmark of democratic political systems used to be elections, and the practice of holding elections was often used to determine whether a country could be classified as a democracy. Today, as "electoral autocracies" take hold around the world, that's no longer the case. Many illiberal leaders come to power through elections, and then manipulate the electoral system to get the results they need to stay in office. As the U.S. election approaches, it’s useful to remember that the history of autocracy is the history of war on the idea and practice of free and fair elections. For authoritarian leaders on the right and the left, allowing a population to determine through their votes who is in government and for how long is unthinkable. Why should lesser beings decide the fate of the strongman, who alone can lead the nation to greatness?

Fascist dictator Benito Mussolini derided elections as a “childish game” that had “already humiliated the nation for decades.” Il Duce replaced democratic elections with occasional plebiscites. In 1934, as he prepared to invade Ethiopia and was dealing with increased internal unrest, he staged a vote. Italians were actually weighing in on a purge of the political class: a single list he had approved of nominees for seats in Parliament, with the choices YES or NO. The real point of the exercise was to show Italians and the world that he had popular approval for his governmental measures. To that end, voting was “assisted” by Fascist "poll watchers," (squadrists in black shirts, armed with knives), and the regime’s communications about the vote can be summed up as “vote yes or else,” in the Fascist manner. This propaganda piece, on the façade of Palazzo Braschi in the center of Rome, depicted Mussolini's face as a kind of death mask, suggesting what could happen to those who voted no. The result of the plebiscite --99.85% YES, and only .15% NO--suggests that Italians got the message.

Today’s autocrats may keep elections going, but they won’t hesitate to game the competition by finding ways to silence rivals. Here’s Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in 2018 when CNN asked him if he was a dictator. "Here we have a ballot box...the democracy gets its power from the people. It's what we call national will," But in advance of the 2023 Turkish presidential contest, Erdoğan sentenced popular Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu to several years in jail. That way İmamoğlu could not be the opposition candidate. The newer autocratic tactic, facilitated by disinformation, is to discredit elections before the election is held so the public will believe you when you say, in the event of defeat, that the whole contest was “rigged” against you or invalidated by fraud. If the authoritarian is able to marshal his party and allies into sustaining the falsehood in public, then the idea of an illegitimate election can gain traction. This is called institutionalized lying: when a lie that is particularly important to the leader and his survival in politics becomes party doctrine. Then anyone who wants to have status in the authoritarian party or state must perform the lie in public, or at least refuse to refute it. Propagandists know that a lie, when repeated with enough frequency, becomes familiar and eventually can be taken as truth.

[...] The outcome of this scenario In Brazil offers an example of gatekeeping as democracy protection. After President Jair Bolsonaro lost the 2022 election, he decided to try and replicate the Donald Trump playbook, claiming that the election was rigged and planning an insurrection for January. Stephen Bannon and Jason Miller were among his advisors. Lack of military participation was among the reasons for the failure of Bolsonaro’s insurrection. Brazil had a military coup in 1964, which led to a military dictatorship that only ended in 1985. Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva acted promptly to prosecute participants. In 2023, Bolsonaro was convicted of abuse of power in office and banned from running for office until 2030 for spreading lies about election fraud. In America, Trump, who incited a far bloodier insurrection, continues to maintain he won the 2020 election as he prepares to possibly contest the 2024 outcome. Trump has worked hard for almost a decade to get Americans to give up their quaint ideas about voting as a valued democratic right. He has conditioned them to see democracy as a failing system, and to view elections as an inferior and unreliable way to choose leaders.

Ruth Ben-Ghiat’s Lucid post on how elections are the enemy of the autocrat is a must-read.

[xtruss]

‘A Beacon of Hope’: Indigenous People Reunited With Sacred Cloak In Brazil

Denmark Sends 300-Year-Old Feathered Cloak Considered An Ancestor By Tupinambá de Olivença to Rio

— Tiago Rogero | Rio de Janeiro, Brazil 🇧🇷 | Thursday 12 September 2024

The Cloak will be Publicly Unveiled at a Ceremony on Thursday. Photograph: Niels Erik Jehrbo/Nationalmuseet

The scene resembled a funeral: seven Indigenous people, overcome with tears, gathered around a loved one resting in a coffin-like wooden box. Instead of grief, however, it was a moment of celebration: the long-awaited reunion between the Tupinambá de Olivença people and a sacred feathered cloak that was taken from Brazil at least 335 years ago.

The relic – which the Indigenous people consider not as an object but as an ancestor – had been at Denmark’s National Museum until July, when it was sent to Rio de Janeiro.

Chief Jamopoty and six other Representatives of the Tupinambá de Olivença people reunited for the first time with the cloak taken from Brazil at least 335 years ago. Photograph: Tiago Rogero/The Guardian

It will be publicly unveiled at a ceremony at Brazil’s National Museum on Thursday attended by President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. But the first private encounter between the Tupinambá of Olivença and the cloak took place on Sunday, in an intimate moment witnessed by the Guardian.

The reunion had been eagerly anticipated: after the cloak’s return to Brazil, the Indigenous group had complained that they were not initially given the chance to perform their reception rituals for the sacred relic, which they refer to in the same terms they would to a person.

“We spoke to him, and he responded,” said Cacique Maria Valdelice Amaral de Jesus, 62, known as Jamopoty Tupinambá.

About 200 Tupinambá de Olivença made the 1,250km journey from their land in Bahia to Rio de Janeiro and have been camping near the National Museum. Photograph: Tiago Rogero/The Guardian

Jamopoty said the cape had returned to resolve the numerous land disputes threatening Indigenous communities across Brazil, adding: “He said we must have our lands demarcated.”

She was joined in the temperature-controlled room by six other representatives of the Tupinambá de Olivença, who for about 20 minutes prayed and spoke to the cloak, which lay under an oxygen-free glass dome, as technicians carefully monitored the humidity.

Jamopoty’s remarks were recorded by the documentary director Carina Bini who, with the Indigenous leader’s consent, shared them with the Guardian.

“You’re lying down, but you’ll stand up. We came to visit you,” she said.

“I don’t even have words. It’s the most beautiful thing I have ever seen,” she said as tears ran down her face, which was painted with the red dye of annatto seeds.

Her partner, Averaldo Rosario Santos, told the cloak that its return was “a beacon of hope for all the Indigenous peoples that remain in this once-invaded Brazil.”

Maria Valdelice Amaral de Jesus, 62, known as Jamopoty Tupinambá. Photograph: Tiago Rogero/The Guardian

Tupinambá cloaks – typically made from thousands of scarlet ibis feathers – were used as ceremonial vestments by coastal Indigenous peoples, said Amy Buono, an assistant professor of art history at Chapman University.

“These capes probably functioned as supernatural skins, transferring the vital force from one living organism to another,” said Buono, who has studied this cloak and 10 others still in European museums in Denmark, Italy, France, Belgium and Switzerland.

“Tupinambá capes were some of the most sought-after artefacts in the early 16th century,” she said. Several Tupinambá cloaks were worn by the courtiers during a 1599 procession at the court of the Duke of Württemberg in Stuttgart.

The newly returned cloak was first inventoried by Denmark in 1689 as part of the collection of Frederick III, possibly after it was taken from Brazil by Dutch forces, which occupied the state of Pernambuco from 1630 to 1654.

“When the cloak was taken from us, it weakened our community,” said Jamopoty.

A Parade in Stuttgart at the Court of Duke Frederick I of Wurttemberg in 1599. Photograph: Album/Alamy

The Tupinambá de Olivença’s fight for the cloak’s repatriation began in 2000 when it was loaned for an exhibition in São Paulo. Jamopoty’s mother, Nivalda Amaral de Jesus, who was known as Amotara, visited the exhibit and demanded its return to Brazil.

At the time, the Tupinambá were not even officially recognised as an Indigenous people – they were even described as extinct in history books.

Under pressure from Amotara (who died in 2018) and other leaders, the Tupinambá de Olivença were finally recognised in 2001 by the Brazilian government.

Eight years later, the first step was taken towards demarcating their territory – an area of 47,000 hectares spanning three municipalities in Bahia.

Since then, however, the Brazilian government has made no further progress in mapping their territory, which has led to land grabs by cocoa farmers and tourism developers.

Indigenous Leaders Frustrated Despite Cloak’s Return to Brazil after 300 Years! Denmark returns artefact but Tupinambá leaders say they were prevented from performing the necessary rituals to receive sacred relic. Cloak is made with about 4,000 Red Feathers of the Scarlet Ibis Bird was first inventoried by Denmark in 1689, but some believe it was taken from Brazil nearly 50 years before. Photograph: Niels Erik Jehrbo/Nationalmuseet

‘We Wanted To Perform Our Rituals, With Songs and Incense Using Our Herbs … It would have been a Special Moment for Strengthening Our Identity,’ said the Chief of Tupinambá de Olivença People. Photograph: Niels Erik Jehrbo/Nationalmuseet

About 200 Tupinambá de Olivença made the 1,250km journey to Rio to receive the cloak, camping near the National Museum, which is still being rebuilt after a huge fire destroyed about 85% of its collection in 2018.

The museum’s director, Alexandre Keller, said the cloak would go on display to the public when the museum reopens in April 2026. Until then, it will be available only to researchers and Indigenous people.

There is no indication that any other Tupinambá cloak will be repatriated but Buono argued that they should all return to Brazil: “These capes were collected by Europeans to be displayed as curiosities and studied for their materials.

“But for the Tupinambá these were, and continue to be, sacred, living forces. Their presence in Brazil will be an extremely important marker of communal identity and evidence for land rights and other legal matters,” she said.

[faz-o-l]

Viva a democracia e viva o presidente democraticamente eleito, Presidente Lula

O Brasil é maior que os terroristas

[skellybonesandtrees]

thanks for giving our stupid people stupid ideas, America.

[fabiansteinhauer]

Kreisen

Die Geschichte und Theorie Os ist auch die Geschichte eines Kreisens, das nachahmt oder imitiert. Hat der Mensch eine Geschichte und ist das die Geschichte Os, dann ist der Mensch ein kreisendes und gekreistes, besser gesagt umkreistes oder umrissenes Wesen, er ist dann Mensch, weil und indem er Mensch nachahmt und damit seinen Umriss erhält, und zwar sowohl so, wie man ein Denkmal erhält als auch so, wie man unerwartbare, fremde Post, sogar so etwas wie Spam-Emails, also eigentlich falsch adressierte, überraschende und überrumpelnde Sendungen erhält. Das Erhalten kann in beiden Fällen launisch sein und in beiden Fällen sowohl Beständigkeit als auch Unbeständigkeit kaschieren. Der Mensch entspringt einer Geschichte und Theorie Os, die durch Kreisen entsteht.

Auf die Forschung zu den Kulturtechniken des Rechts färbt da etwas ab: Rekursion erscheint zumindest im Lichte der Nachahmung, der Imitation und der Mimesis - soweit, dass man daran zweifelt, inwieweit nicht vielleicht Rekursion ein anderes Wort für Nachahmung, Imitation und Mimesis ist. Alles was dieser Geschichte ist, ist wiederholt, ist ein Effekt, taucht noch mit seinen natürlichen Elementen artifiziell und zur Wiederholung auf, noch vom Ereignis erfährt man dank des Umstandes, das jemand diesem Ereignis sekundiert, in dem er es wahrnimmt und in seiner Wahrnehmung schon dadurch verdoppelt, dass er es übersetzt. Weiter noch: wo Kreise sind, da sind vague Assoziationen und vague Trennungen, da wird vague etwas gekreuzt oder versäumt, da wird vague etwas behalten und vague etwas ausgetauscht, da sind Kreisen und Nachahmen Operationen, die durch Trennung und Assoziation erfolgen, die demjenigen gleichen, was auf Warburgs Tafel 79 Verzehren genannt wird und dessen Spuren darum verschlungene Verhältnisse zeigen.

Was manche Leute politische Theologie nennen, kann auf weit entfremdete Art politisch und theologisch sein. Man kann weder die Stadt noch den Staat benennen oder sich nicht vorstellen können, muss weder von der Gemeinschaft oder der Gesellschaft einen Begriff oder ein Bild haben, auch der Gott und Götter können völlig fremd sein: und doch bleibt, anonym und ungebildet, so etwas wie polis/ polus im Spiel. Politische Theologie kann ein Verwechslung sein, die durch Referenzen und Rückbindungen begünstigt wird. Etwas wird nachgemacht, man glaubt gleich an Verdoppelung. Jemand ist reproduziert, ist fabriziert: Sein Äußeres macht ihn leicht und schnell betrachtbar - und man glaubt gleich daran, dass ein monumentales Wesen hinter ihm stünde. Zuerst ist da nicht mehr als eine Linie, die Linien wiederholt, dann sind da Umrisse, die Umrisse wiederholen, Kreise, die Kreise wiederholen, wobei die Nachbilder ihre Vorbilder jeweils verschlingen und darum neben den Ähnlichkeiten auch genug Unähnlichkeiten entdeckt werden können. Politisch ist es dann nur noch, weil es auf Referenzen verweist, die wie akkumuliert, einfach geballt oder angehäuft erscheinen. Theologisch ist es dann, weil in der Rückbindung zerspringt, was Gegenwart und Präsenz ist und diese Rückbindung damit auch nicht in Immanenz versackt. Lulas Geste oszilliert zwischen Bericht aus dem Kreißsaal, Ikonographie des ungläubigen Thomas (Zeige Deine Wunde) und Zeugenbericht einer Marienerscheinung, der Verweis auf den Nabel ist zumindest an der Küste im Nordosten, dort, wo Lula viel Heil verspricht, auch Verweis auf eine Mutter oder Madonna von O, da stehen ihre Kapellen aufgereiht.

[brasilbrasilbrasil]

bora brasil!

[aprincesadegales]

Lula e Janja comparecem a recepção no Palácio de Buckingham oferecida pelo Charles às delegações estrangeiras que estão em Londres para acompanhar a coroação | 05.05.2023

Lula and Janja, the President and First Lady of Brazil, at a reception hosted by Charles for overseas guests attending the coronation | 05.05.2023

[thegirlinmask]

Two months after Jair Bolsonaro lost his re-election bid for the presidency, angry supporters charged into Brazil’s Congress and presidential offices on Sunday.

New York Times

Jack Nicas and André Spigariol

Two months after Bolsonaro’s loss, his supporters are staging a major protest.

Supporters of Brazil’s former president, Jair Bolsonaro, stormed the country’s Congress and presidential offices on Sunday to protest what they falsely believe was a stolen election. It was the violent culmination of incessant rhetorical attacks by Mr. Bolsonaro and his supporters against the nation’s electoral systems.

Here’s what to know:

Dozens of protesters streamed into the presidential offices, with some holding a barricade to hold back police and clear the way for more protesters to enter. Inside the building, the protesters could be seen attempting to build more barricades with chairs. Outside, a crowd of protesters using sticks or poles struck a police officer on horseback, pulling him off his horse, according to video posted to social media.

President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who defeated Mr. Bolsonaro in October and took office on Jan. 1, was in São Paulo, and Congress was not in session. Both Congress and the presidential offices were largely empty on Sunday.

Mr. Bolsonaro has been staying in Florida, where he traveled late last month as his presidency was coming to a close.

The invasions capped months of protests by supporters of Mr. Bolsonaro, who have been camped outside military bases across the country, and had called on the armed forces to take control of the government and halt the inauguration of Mr. Lula.

[environmentalwatch]

Deforestation in Brazil Falling

Lula Upholds Promise, Axes Deforestation

Deforestation in Brazil has already fallen by over 60% in the first month of President Lula’s administration, according to satellite data. During his first presidency from 2004-2010, president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva made preserving natural resources a priority, and he stopped over 75% of deforestation in Brazil. But after he was removed from office, progress on environmental policies ceased.…

[dadsinsuits]

Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva

[girlunionize]

Vamos ser hexa com o Lula

[tomorrowusa]

The far right extremists who rampaged through Brazil’s federal government buildings behaved much like the January 6th terrorists and Putin’s marauding invaders in Ukraine.

There is an impulse by some people to compare them to various animals. But animals are usually not gratuitous about destruction. The pro-Bolsonaro mob, like its US and Russian fringe counterparts, are consciously anti-civilization. Being opposed to civilization and worshiping an ignoramus figurehead misperceived as strong are things various fascist movements have in common.

A blue Adolf Hitler moustache had been daubed on to a portrait of the Duke of Caxias, a 19th-century prime minister, on the second floor of Brazil’s presidential palace.

A multimillion-dollar masterpiece by the modernist legend Emiliano Di Cavalcanti was stabbed seven times.

Not even the palace’s press rooms escaped the wrath of thousands of far-right insurrectionists when they stormed the building on Sunday afternoon, as well as the national congress and supreme court.

After smashing their way into Oscar Niemeyer’s breathtaking curved creation, extremists relieved themselves in the press room and defecated in the room for photographers next door.

Yep, pooping on the floor in public buildings seems to be another fascist trait. Make sure your kids are properly toilet trained so they don’t turn into fascists.

“The whole place stank of urine and beer,” one palace employee said of the moment officials re-entered the building after Sunday’s day of rage to discover scenes of inconceivable depredation.

The Guardian toured two of the three ransacked buildings in Brasília on Monday afternoon, 24 hours after the attack by hardcore followers of the former president Jair Bolsonaro.

The Planalto palace and the national congress are both architectural gems at the heart of Niemeyer and urban planner Lúcio Costa’s bold 1950s vision of a new, forward-looking Brazil.

Both now appear to have been hit by a natural disaster, their outer windows smashed to smithereens by rampaging Bolsonaristas desperate to overturn the result of October’s election, which their radical leader lost to his leftwing rival Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.

At the senate museum, plaques still read: “Please do not touch the artwork.” But rioters ignored those as they swept into the exhibit room and began wrecking hundreds of years of Brazilian art and political history.A knife had been taken to portraits of former senate presidents Renan Calheiros and José Sarney. A copy of the Brazilian constitution had been slammed through the top of a display case and was now framed by shards of broken glass.

Questions need to be raised about security.

The rioters made it into the inner sanctum of what should be one of Brazil’s most secure addresses, leaving a bizarre trail of destruction and fury in their wake and many questions over how such a politically sensitive building could have been left so exposed.

The mob failed to access the offices of President Lula but other rooms were looted and smashed. A felt-tip pen was used to scrawl curly lines along the ceiling of the corridor occupied by members of the Institutional Security Bureau, which is responsible for the president’s safety.

[ ... ]

Amorim, who is Brazil’s former defense minister, said he was struggling to fathom how security forces and intelligence agencies had failed to detect or stop the threat. “The resistance only came after the deed had been done – it’s as if it was allowed to happen,” he said.

This report from France 24 shows only a fraction of the destruction.

If Ramsay Bolton were a real person, I would put him in charge of the punishments for these fascist terrorists.