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Lula defeats Bolsonaro to again become Brazil’s president

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Re: Lula defeats Bolsonaro to again become Brazil’s president

#61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can understand (if disagree with) your view of Lula as a populist. Why do you call him a fascist though? > His campaign ran on a platform of “regulating the media” It didn't, but in any case the media is regulated. Everything that's being argued in this regard is about breaking trusts and monopolies in the media. Trusts and monopolies are widely regarded as counter to working democracies, and free markets. Seeing l…

https://jovempan.com.br/noticias/brasil/jovem-pan-sob-censur... https://revistaoeste.com/politica/eleicoes-2022/tse-censura-...

Thank you, but I would hardly consider these references unbiased.

The first is the acutal supposedly censored media vehicle complaining. That's expected.

In any case, the decision is at best in a grey area. A lot of people cry about freedom of press but the decision was around electoral laws and was simply trying to get better isonomy for both candidates.

The other decision was about avoiding the use of an incredibly loaded and polemic at best situation that happened 4 years ago to influence this year's elections. Mind you, there's nothing more than hearsay and conspiracy theories to try to link the event to Lula, PT or others related to the elected President.

This is an interesting topic, certainly one where there's a non-obvious balance between freedom of press and speech, and just and isonomic elections.

Re: Lula defeats Bolsonaro to again become Brazil’s president

#62

The fact that the result was so close is chilling. How bad do populists have to be to not be re-elected?

Can we stop equating populism with fascism? Populism can be good, actually. Lula is arguably a populist.

It's because the new brand far-right politicians that have shown up, and are popular, are nothing but empty populists. They have no substance, no real beliefs, they just say whatever gets the people's interest so that they can get power, and then do the things they actually want/believe in (usually around money and power). They're mostly fascist or close to fascist as well, but that's not, IMO, their defining trait. Boris Johnson and similar British politicians absolutely fit the empty populist description (even though for him it's purely a façade, for someone like Trump it's his persona), but they haven't exhibited any fascist traits that i know of.

For Bolsonaro, he's a fascist, if nothing else for glorifying the previous dictatorship and threatening an army coup (but there's plenty else).

Re: Lula defeats Bolsonaro to again become Brazil’s president

#63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if all that is true (I have my doubts) that wouldn't make Lula a fascist.

https://www-cnnbrasil-com-br.translate.goog/politica/interes... Lula’s party has a history of totalitarian tendencies and of siding with dictatorships (Cuba, Venezuela, Libya, Angola, etc) and a well known desire to control the media (of course, they call it “democratizing the media”). If dictatorships, totalitarianism and state-sponsored censorship are not fascist, I don’t know what is.

Sounds like the word you're looking for is "authoritarian". All fascists are authoritarians, but not all authoritarians are fascist.

A few more key characteristics of fascism: nationalism, overt anti-egalitarianism, militarism.

Bolsonero is the fascist here. Lula is not.

Re: Lula defeats Bolsonaro to again become Brazil’s president

#64
post #11
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Bolsonaro sees three options for future: Prison, death or victory" (aug 2021) - https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/8/29/bolsonaro-sees-thre...

At least he cares about preserving the national identity and puts domestic issues first.

> puts domestic issues first

Like a pandemic he criminally mismanaged resulting in tens of thousands of unnecessary deaths? Or brutal deforestation of the Amazon?

Re: Lula defeats Bolsonaro to again become Brazil’s president

#65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www-cnnbrasil-com-br.translate.goog/politica/interes... Lula’s party has a history of totalitarian tendencies and of siding with dictatorships (Cuba, Venezuela, Libya, Angola, etc) and a well known desire to control the media (of course, they call it “democratizing the media”). If dictatorships, totalitarianism and state-sponsored censorship are not fascist, I don’t know what is.

Sounds like the word you're looking for is "authoritarian". All fascists are authoritarians, but not all authoritarians are fascist. A few more key characteristics of fascism: nationalism, overt anti-egalitarianism, militarism. Bolsonero is the fascist here. Lula is not.

The defining slogan of fascism is “Everything in the State, nothing outside the State, nothing against the State”.

Bolsonaro tried to reduce the size of the state, in direct contradiction with that.

Please list concrete actions by his government that can be reasonably characterized as “anti-egalitarian” or “militaristic”.

In fact the military in his government was mostly used in the process of helping Venezuelan refugees escape their country into Brazil.

Re: Lula defeats Bolsonaro to again become Brazil’s president

#66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://jovempan.com.br/noticias/brasil/jovem-pan-sob-censur... https://revistaoeste.com/politica/eleicoes-2022/tse-censura-...

Thank you, but I would hardly consider these references unbiased. The first is the acutal supposedly censored media vehicle complaining. That's expected. In any case, the decision is at best in a grey area. A lot of people cry about freedom of press but the decision was around electoral laws and was simply trying to get better isonomy for both candidates. The other decision was about avoiding the use of an incredibly…

They were prevented by the State to mention facts about a candidate. Facts, not opinions. This is not a grey area, it’s plain old censorship.

About the documentary: it was censored based on its title only. It was not even watched by the sensors. When questioned about it, the president of the electoral court basically said something like “Let’s not fool ourselves, we know what will be there”. In other words, preemptive censorship.

At the same time, a “documentary” that explicitly invited watchers to vote the opposing candidate was aired for free on YouTube on the week of the election, with zero concerns about isonomy or its influence over it.

This kind of double standards casts a shadow of partisanship and illegitimacy on the electoral and supreme courts (they’re ridiculously basically the same people anyway), especially in a close election like this one.

Re: Lula defeats Bolsonaro to again become Brazil’s president

#67
post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can we stop equating populism with fascism? Populism can be good, actually. Lula is arguably a populist.

It's because the new brand far-right politicians that have shown up, and are popular, are nothing but empty populists. They have no substance, no real beliefs, they just say whatever gets the people's interest so that they can get power, and then do the things they actually want/believe in (usually around money and power). They're mostly fascist or close to fascist as well, but that's not, IMO, their defining trait.…

> It's because the new brand far-right politicians that have shown up, and are popular, are nothing but empty populists.

That's half of it, yeah. The other half is the centrist technocratic hegemony exploiting the situation to malign the working-class-power left in the same stroke.

Re: Lula defeats Bolsonaro to again become Brazil’s president

#68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bulshit. Deforestation was at record levels during Lula’s first terms. Please don’t normalize the election of a criminal.

Yes, it was. For half of his first term. That said, this is hardly an argument against Lula's effectiveness at cutting down deforestation, and even less an argument for Bolsonaro. It took Lula the first half of his first term to effectively cut the trend that had started between 1997 and 1998. For the rest of his time in office, there was a sharp and sustained drop. Numbers put it at roughly a 70% drop. That trend co…

> the unlawful imprisonment of Lula

Are you joking?

Re: Lula defeats Bolsonaro to again become Brazil’s president

#70

Worth noting that Lula is more pro-russian than bolsonoro and blames zelensky for the war equally. The coming decade is going to be as profound as end of world war

That is the default view of many in SA, including the current pope. This is driven by the hate towards the US rather than anything else -- they dream of a 'multipolar' world and idealise Russia. Same with e.g. Chomsky.

However, Bolsonaro is arguably more pro-Russian: https://www.reuters.com/world/brazils-bolsonaro-says-western... So it does not really matter, at least Lula will help the rainforest or whatnot.

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