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The U.S.’s shameful silence on Brazil: The insane hypocrisy of the right-wing coup can’t be exaggerated or ignored
By Ben Norton - WEDNESDAY, JUN 1, 2016 11:35 AM CDT
Corrupt right-wing ousted non-corrupt left-wing to prevent investigation into corruption — with tacit U.S. support
The absurd political developments unfolding in Brazil sound like they were directly lifted from an outlandish Hollywood film.
A slow-motion coup is presently being carried out in the fifth-most populated country, and the layers of hypocrisy pile on and on like an onion.
The latest development: the anticorruption minister in Brazil’s new coup regime was forced to resign on Monday after a leaked secret recording proves he was actively trying to prevent an investigation into actual corruption that he and the coup leadership were involved in.
Yes, that’s right, for emphasis: the “minister of transparency” in Brazil’s interim government helped carry out a coup on false corruption allegations in order to prevent an investigation into actual corruption he is a part of.
For context, then, here is a brief summary of the ludicrousness going on in Brazil:
Corrupt right-wing politicians, who are presently being investigated for criminal corruption, carried out a congressional coup against the democratically elected left-wing president (Dilma Roussef) — who has never been charged with a crime and who is herself one of the few politicians not implicated in corruption — by pushing for an impeachment trial based on trumped-up allegations of fiscal mismanagement — a non-impeachable, non-criminal offense.
~Snip~
Brazilian oligarchs, Greenwald added, are trying to remove “from power a moderately left-wing government that won four straight elections in the name of representing the country’s poor, and are literally handing control over the Brazilian economy (the world’s seventh largest) to Goldman Sachs and bank industry lobbyists.”
Read more:
http://www.salon.com/2016/06/01/the_u_s_s_shameful_silence_on_brazil_the_insane_hypocrisy_of_the_right_wing_coup_cant_be_exaggerated_or_ignored/
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tonyt53
(5,737 posts)yeoman6987
(14,449 posts)Enough. Hopefully we will stick with fixing the U.S. We've done enough around the world good and bad.
jberryhill
(62,444 posts)think
(11,641 posts)But the United States doesn’t think that the blatantly naked power grab that just took place in Brazil—which ended the Workers’ Party’s 13-year control of the presidency, installed an all-white, all-male cabinet, diluted the definition of slavery, lest it tarnish the image of Brazil’s plantation sector (which relies on coerced, unfree labor), and began a draconian austerity program—is a coup.
It’s democracy at work, according to various Obama officials.
Last week, Washington’s representative to the OAS, Michael Fitzpatrick, rejected accusations that the Obama administration held Venezuela, whose government has long been at odds with the United States, to a different standard than it does the newly installed Brazilian regime, which is fast putting into place economic policies favored by Washington and Wall Street. In Brazil, Fitzpatrick said, “there is a clear respect for democratic institutions and a clear separation of powers. In Brazil it is clearly the law that prevails, coming up with peaceable solution to disputes. There is nothing comparable between Brazil and Venezuela. It is in the latter where democracy is threatened…. We don’t believe that this is an example of a ‘soft coup’ or, for that matter, a coup of any sort. What happened in Brazil complied perfectly with legal constitutional procedure and totally respected democratic norms.”
Others in the administration have stayed on point. The State Department said that it was “confident Brazil will work through its political challenges democratically in accordance with its constitutional principles.” Obama, a White House spokesman reported, “has faith in the capabilities of the democratic institutions of Brazil to hold up against political turbulence.”
Read more:
http://www.thenation.com/article/still-selling-neoliberal-unicorns-us-applauds-coup-in-brazil-calls-it-democracy/
Maybe the opposite of that?
.
stillwaiting
(3,795 posts)
Dont call me Shirley
(10,998 posts)jberryhill
(62,444 posts)And it is also generally not appreciated, wanted, or welcome.
Dont call me Shirley
(10,998 posts)jberryhill
(62,444 posts)Dont call me Shirley
(10,998 posts)
MisterP
(23,730 posts)geek tragedy
(68,868 posts)what happened in Honduras was scandalous.
But I'd much rather have the US get criticized for failing to intervene than for intervening.
think
(11,641 posts)And Honduras coup was condemned all over the globe and by the UN.
This is America going back to pushing it's will on it's weaker neighbors for the profits of Wall Street.
That's why we won't get involved because behind the scenes we already are.
By Sarah van Gelder - 04/21/2016 05:45 pm ET | Updated Apr 23, 2016
Twelve years ago, John Perkins published his book, Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, and it rapidly rose up The New York Times’ best-seller list. In it, Perkins describes his career convincing heads of state to adopt economic policies that impoverished their countries and undermined democratic institutions. These policies helped to enrich tiny, local elite groups while padding the pockets of U.S.-based transnational corporations.
Perkins was recruited, he says, by the National Security Agency (NSA), but he worked for a private consulting company. His job as an undertrained, overpaid economist was to generate reports that justified lucrative contracts for U.S. corporations, while plunging vulnerable nations into debt. Countries that didn’t cooperate saw the screws tightened on their economies. In Chile, for example, President Richard Nixon famously called on the CIA to “make the economy scream” to undermine the prospects of the democratically elected president, Salvador Allende.
~Snip~
Perkins: Three or four years ago the CIA orchestrated a coup against the democratically elected president of Honduras, President Zelaya, because he stood up to Dole and Chiquita and some other big, global, basically U.S.-based corporations.
He wasn’t assassinated but he was overthrown in a coup and sent to another country.
He wanted to raise the minimum wage to a reasonable level, and he wanted some land reform that would make sure that his own people were able to make money off their own land, rather than having big international corporations do it.
The big corporations couldn’t stand for this. He wasn’t assassinated but he was overthrown in a coup and sent to another country, and replaced by a terribly brutal dictator, and today Honduras is one of the most violent, homicidal countries in the hemisphere....
Read more:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sarah-van-gelder/more-confessions-of-an-ec_b_9752878.html
geek tragedy
(68,868 posts)into chaos. Capital is a coward.
think
(11,641 posts)~snip~
Henrique de Campos Meirelles, a former President of FleetBoston Financial’s Global Banking (1999-2002) and former head of the Central Bank under Lula’s presidency was appointed minister of finance on May 12.
~Snip~
The US does not want to deal or negotiate with a sovereign reformist nationalist government. What it wants is a compliant US proxy state.
Lula was “acceptable” because he followed the instructions of Wall Street and the IMF.
While the neoliberal policy agenda prevailed under Rousseff, a reformist-populist agenda was also implemented which departed from the Wall Street sponsored macroeconomic mainstay during the Lula presidency. According to IMF’s Managing Director Heinrich Koeller Lula was “Our best president”. “I am enthusiastic [with Lula's administration]; but it is better to say I am deeply impressed by President Lula” (IMF Press Conference, 2003).
Under Lula, there was not need for “regime change”.
The temporary demise of Henrique de Campos Meireilles following the election of Dilma Rousseff was crucial. Wall Street had not approved Dilma’s appointments to the Central Bank and the Ministry of Finance.
If Dilma had chosen to retain Henrique de Campos Meirelles, the Coup d’Etat would most probably not have taken place.
Read more:
http://www.globalresearch.ca/wall-street-behind-brazil-coup-d-etat/5526715
geek tragedy
(68,868 posts)think
(11,641 posts)geek tragedy
(68,868 posts)responsible for this.
Corrupt pols are more than capable of abusing their office for their own benefit, without being instigated by outsiders
think
(11,641 posts)In the first hours of his new mandate, acting President Temer promised the new government will announce austerity measures. Temer has previously set eyes on Paulo Leme, the chairman of Goldman Sachs in Brazil, to potentially serve as finance minister or central bank chief. Temer also is considering Luiz Fernando Figueiredo, a previous central bank official and founder and CEO of asset manager Mauá Capital, to be Treasury secretary for the central bank. They have been consulted for the drafting of “A bridge to the Future”, the PMDB economic plan.
http://www.coha.org/soft-coup-in-brazil-a-blow-to-brazilian-democracy/
And of course one would have to deny that economic hit men really exist...
geek tragedy
(68,868 posts)Doesn't mean that they're some kind of Rothschildesque master puppet lords.
think
(11,641 posts)They took part in rigging markets.
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2016/04/goldman-sachs-admits-it-defrauded-investors.html
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2011-04-14/goldman-sachs-misled-congress-after-duping-clients-over-cdos-levin-says
http://news.forexlive.com/!/goldman-sachs-investigated-for-rigging-the-treasury-market-20160321
http://www.wsj.com/articles/goldman-entangled-in-malaysia-fund-scandal-1444795262
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/politics-government/article24561376.html
http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/greek-debt-crisis-how-goldman-sachs-helped-greece-to-mask-its-true-debt-a-676634.html
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/the-people-vs-goldman-sachs-20110511
But hey what's the big deal about a lot of heinous crimes when you're getting amazingly filthy rich? Money can buy your way out of all of it!
BainsBane
(53,026 posts)I understand people equate it to a coup, a coup orchestrated by Globo and the rest of the right, but she was impeached by the House and there is a pending conviction in the Senate. That is not the same as a coup. It was not conducted by the military and it was not violent, though it certainly was a power grab by the right. That isn't to say it was the right thing to do, but it was constitutional.
think
(11,641 posts)Did you read that part?
BainsBane
(53,026 posts)but that still doesn't make it a coup, which is the violent overthrow of a government. Corruption allegations had to do with Petrobras rather than her individually, and ironically the new president has a slew of allegations of corruption against him. Clearly it's a power grab by the right, but it was not a military overthrow of a government.
In theory, impeachment is a charge brought before the Camara dos Deputados and the Senado convicts, not unlike our own system. If the Senate had convicted Bill Clinton, it would not have been a coup, even though it would have been a brazen partisan maneuver. There is a difference. Now this may well work to undermine political stability in Brazil, but again it is not the kind of military coup that Brazil has seen a number of times in its history (1889 and 1964, most notably).
From what I've read, she will likely be convicted for political reasons. The economic deterioration is what underlies all this. Without the worsening economic situation, the right would not have been able to get away with it.
I will also point out that Greenwald's claim the PT has governed in the name of the poor is not accurate. Lula was elected with the support of the economic elite, and the PT would not have been able to even gain power let alone hold it for a decade if they were primarily focused on the poor. The wealthy in Brazil are far too powerful for that to happen. The PT's appeal was much broader, and they continued to stay in office because the economy grew. The fact is the PT government is the longest serving since the transition to democracy.
think
(11,641 posts)minister helped create the false allegations used against her.
Wall Street interests got pissed when she didn't appoint the bankers they wanted. That's why she's being removed.
BainsBane
(53,026 posts)I understand as an American you're accustomed to imagining us the center of the universe. That line about Goldman Sachs is obviously thrown in for American consumption. Brazil has its own powerful economic elite. An oligarchy would be a kind word to describe them. In rural areas they still operate in ways very much like a landed aristocracy, and during the Empire they actually took aristocratic titles.
A vote of impeachment is a charge--a charge before congress. The Senate convicts. Of course the charges are false. In Brazil, charging someone with corruption is nearly always an excuse, never the reason. You can see from the figures involved in this incident just how common corruption is, and Dilma is unique in not having being personally implicated. The impeachment vote was horrific, in part because the deputy who introduced the vote dedicated it to Dilma's torturer (and probably rapist) under the dictatorship.
My point is not to justify it at all but rather to say it is not a military overthrow of the government, which is the definition of a coup. Fernando Collor, the first elected president following the transition to democracy, was also impeached and left office. The charges were also corruption, and he was guilty as sin. His campaign treasurer was on the run with countless millions of dollars when I was living in Brazil.
think
(11,641 posts)The US was directly involved with the right wing coup in 1964 in Brazil. The US has a long and sordid history in the region. They've learned to create soft coups now and are using them often in the region.
And again I remind you that the minister of transparency was caught trying to cover up the false allegations of the recently ousted female president in Brazil.
Some might read The Confessions of an Economic Hitman to understand how powerful corporations and parts of our government collude to control third world countries for economic gain. It's pretty much common knowledge to anyone familiar with US historical involvement in the region.
Our involvement in trying to push regime change in Venezuela is also well known.
By Ted Snider - June 1 2016
The ouster of Brazil’s left-of-center president was the latest right-wing victory in Latin America, but was this “quiet coup” driven by local politics or part of a broader U.S. strategy to reclaim dominance over its “backyard,” asks Ted Snider.
There can no longer be any doubt that the impeachment of Brazil’s democratically elected President Dilma Rousseff was an illegitimate act of power politics. The maneuvering by opposition politicians has been revealed for what it clearly was all along: a quiet coup dressed in the disguise of good governance.
The recent publication (by Brazil’s largest newspaper, Folha de São Paulo) of transcripts from secret conversations that took place in March, just weeks before the impeachment vote, has done for Brazil what the intercepted phone call between Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian affairs Victoria Nuland and U.S. Ambassador Geoffrey Pyatt did for Ukraine: it provided proof that the removal of the elected president was a coup.
The call — between Romero Jucá, who was a senator at the time and is currently the planning minister in the new Michel Temer government, and former oil executive Sergio Machado — lays bare “a national pact” to remove Rousseff and install Temer as president. Jucá reveals that not only opposition politicians but also the military and the Supreme Court were conspirators in the coup.
Regarding the military’s role, Jucá said, “I am talking to the generals, the military commanders. They are fine with this, they said they will guarantee it.” And, as for the Supreme Court, Jucá admitted that he “spoke with and secured the involvement of numerous justices on Brazil’s Supreme Court,” according to The Intercept’s Glenn Greenwald (who lives in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil).
~Snip~
For the U.S. government, which was uncomfortable with the leftist trend, the surge to the right has been welcome news since Washington has long viewed Central and South America as its strategic “backyard” with compliant states accepting U.S. hegemony and granting American companies easy access to natural resources.
As former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger put it, if America could not control its own backyard, it could hardly hope “to achieve a successful order elsewhere in the world.”
Key to this reclamation of Latin America is the repossession of Venezuela after the death of populist leader Hugo Chavez in 2013. Chavez’ successor, Nicolás Maduro, is not considered nearly the skilled political leader that Chavez was but Maduro did continue the run of Bolivarian Revolution victories, albeit by a narrow margin over Henrique Capriles, Washington’s choice.
Though some 150 international monitors observed the election and an audit of more than half the vote tally found no problems, the United States refused to recognize the election results, the only country to do so. Since then, political pressure on the Maduro government has continued, often cheered on by the U.S. news media and made worse by the drop in world oil prices that contributed to an economic crisis.
Read more:
https://consortiumnews.com/2016/06/01/a-us-hand-in-brazils-coup/
~Snip~
US involvement
LBJ receives briefing on Brazil.
Lyndon B. Johnson receiving briefing on events in Brazil on March 31, 1964 on his Texas ranch with Undersecretary of State George Ball and Assistant Secretary for Latin America, Thomas C. Mann. Ball briefs Johnson on the status of military moves in Brazil to overthrow the government of João Goulart.
The US ambassador at the time, Lincoln Gordon, and the military attaché, Colonel Vernon A. Walters, kept in constant contact with President Lyndon B. Johnson as the crisis progressed. Johnson urged taking action to support the overthrow of João Goulart by the military, as action against the "left-wing" Jango government.[29]
Operation Brother Sam
Declassified transcripts of communications between Lincoln Gordon and the US government show that, predicting an all-out civil war, and with the opportunity to get rid of a left wing government in Brazil, Johnson authorized logistical materials to be in place and a US Navy fleet led by an aircraft carrier to support the coup against Goulart. These included ammunition, motor oil, gasoline, aviation gasoline and other materials to help in a potential civil war in US Navy tankers sailing from Aruba. About 110 tons of ammunition and CS gas were made ready in New Jersey for a potential airlift to Viracopos Airport in Campinas. Potential support was also made available in the form of an "aircraft carrier (USS Forrestal) and two guided missile destroyers (expected arrive in area by April 10), (and) four destroyers", which sailed to Brazil under the guise of a military exercise.[30]
CIA involvement[edit]
In the telegraphs, Gordon also acknowledges US involvement in "covert support for pro-democracy street rallies…and encouragement [of] democratic and anti-communist sentiment in Congress, armed forces, friendly labor and student groups, church, and business" and that he "may be requesting modest supplementary funds for other covert action programs in the near future.".[31] The actual operational files of the CIA remain classified, preventing historians from accurately gauging the CIA's direct involvement in the coup.[29]
Read more:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1964_Brazilian_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat#US_involvement
Goldman Sachs? Those bastards are at the heart of this issue in Brazil also. Don't think it's a coincidence that a GS banker was chosen by the new right wing to take over the main banking position in the government. That was the damn plan all along:
By Alexandre B., Juan Sebastian Chavarro, Raiesa Frazer, Rachael Hilderbrand, Emma Tyrou, Research Associates at the Council on Hemispheric Affairs - May 12, 2016
The impeachment this week of Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff represents the most significant test for Brazil’s institutions since the end of its military dictatorship in 1985. After the Senate voted Thursday to begin an impeachment trial of the country’s first female president, less than halfway through her second term in office, one politician described the events as representing the “saddest day for Brazil’s young democracy.”[1] Since the post-dictatorship transition, impeachment requests have been filed against each and every one of Brazil’s presidents, but none were carried through.[2] Rousseff, however, will be only the second president to experience an actual trial. Portrayed as a crusade against corruption, the current process against a democratically elected president rests on unclear budgetary charges and bears the mark of a right wing retaliation after 13 years of left rule. This process is further complicated by the fact that virtually all of Brazil’s leading political figures are implicated to some degree in the corruption schemes. In the eyes of many, Brazil’s institutions seem to be failing this test and are not holding all actors equally accountable. From the outside it appears that in the young Brazilian republic, the structures of democracy are being shaken down. While the right-wing claims that Rousseff’s impeachment request is a legitimate response to budgetary malfeasance, her supporters are characterizing the efforts to impeach her as unconstitutional, and therefore a coup.
~Snip~
Regional Implications
With clear parallels to the 1964 coup that ousted then-President João Goulart as well as to the political crisis that led to oustings of democratically elected presidents in Paraguay and Honduras, Brazil’s ongoing impeachment process is an assault on democracy. The ousting of the current Brazilian president based on political and judicial manipulations, as well as constitutional misinterpretations, undermines the democratic legitimacy of the government but moreover calls into question the viability of Brazil’s major institutions. In its success, the precedents set for future governments are devastating not only in Brazil but in all Latin America. Brazil represents the eighth largest economy in the world, and it is a leading power in the continent.
In the first hours of his new mandate, acting President Temer promised the new government will announce austerity measures.[8] Temer has previously set eyes on Paulo Leme, the chairman of Goldman Sachs in Brazil, to potentially serve as finance minister or central bank chief. Temer also is considering Luiz Fernando Figueiredo, a previous central bank official and founder and CEO of asset manager Mauá Capital, to be Treasury secretary for the central bank. They have been consulted for the drafting of “A bridge to the Future”, the PMDB economic plan.[9]
Read more:
http://www.coha.org/soft-coup-in-brazil-a-blow-to-brazilian-democracy/
BRASILIA | BY ALONSO SOTO - Fri Apr 15, 2016 4:59pm EDT
razil's Vice President Michel Temer is considering a senior executive at Goldman Sachs Group Inc (GS.N) and an experienced money manager as candidates to join his economic team should he take over the presidency in coming weeks, two people familiar with the matter told Reuters on Friday.
Paulo Leme, the chairman of Goldman Sachs in Brazil, may be picked to serve as finance minister or central bank chief, said the sources, who asked to remain anonymous because the selections are still under consideration....
Read more:
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-brazil-politics-cabinet-idUSKCN0XC2O4
socialist_n_TN
(11,481 posts)of regime change if it happened here? And quite frankly, I don't give a fuck if it's legal or not. EVERYTHING that's been done to oppress people has been "legal". Everything from slavery, to the genocide of Natives in all undeveloped countries, to the ovens of the Nazis and Jim Crow in the US was "legal". Legal don't mean shit when it comes to fighting oppression because EVERY FORM OF OPPRESSION IS LEGAL.
BainsBane
(53,026 posts)and I'm not blase about it. I instead think it important to make clear what we are talking about. This is not the same as the tanks rolling in an ousting, even assassinating, a president.
socialist_n_TN
(11,481 posts)It still results in the overturning the majority vote of the people. But it's up to the Brazilian people to decide whose side they're on. But I wouldn't let the factor of illegality stop me. I've been jailed before. Some things are worth going to jail for.
Doctor_J
(36,392 posts)condemn it.
think
(11,641 posts)
malaise
(268,844 posts)Rec
skepticscott
(13,029 posts)when Bush v Gore was handed down? Exactly what they did, which was to mind their own fucking business.
Why do so many idiots think that the Great and Glorious United States can always make things better by "intervening" in everyone else's affairs?
PufPuf23
(8,759 posts)terms of size and natural resources.
Brazil is more important a nation than evidenced by our media.
Sloppy transition in power.
guillaumeb
(42,641 posts)Are you truly surprised by the support in this case?
davidn3600
(6,342 posts)Nothing the opposition in Brazil did was illegal according to their own constitutional laws.
This is an internal political issue for the Brazilians to work out themselves.
