It's Just Sad

Larry Rohter has an article today about the resignation of Severino Cavalcanti, a Congressman and the speaker of Brazil's lower legislative house. While it's encouraging to see someone as crooked as Cavalacanti resign and while it's encouraging to see this:

Calling himself the victim of "bad faith" on the part of "a political elite" and the press, Mr. Cavalcanti warned against what he called "an insidious campaign that seeks to strike down all legislators."

He then signed the document formally relinquishing both the speakership and his seat in Congress.

A tumult broke out in the congressional gallery, led by a group of students protesting the corruption, which has sapped popular support for the government. [my emphasis]

It's also very,very frustrating to read about yet again, someone being forced out, some thirteen years after the ouster of Fernando Collor that this sort of thing continues and no one appears to pay a price for it. Indeed, the fact that Collor was even able to run for mayor of São Paulo or governor of Alagoas is dispiriting, to put it mildly. As my niece's boyfriend said to me about Cavalcanti, "He'll be back."

Meanwhile in Brazil, inflation appears to be slowing, real wages are up, unemployment is at a three year low and the real is at a 41 month high against the dollar (which probably says a great deal more about the weakness of the dollar than about the strength of the real). In addition, Brazil has smackeddown the Bush administration on their failure to make deep cuts in cotton subsidies to farmers in the US and the consequences may only get worse for the Bush administration in this area.

If the trends in that last paragraph continue, it may be enough to make people forget about the bagunça in Brasilia.

Comments

[Stephen]

You know, our two years in Brazil seem so remote from current experience. It was the Lula honeymoon, with only a few scandal cracks around the edges, and the Real was on the ropes (we were getting about R$4:USD, which kept the cost of living ridiculously low). I am sure it must feel very different on the ground.

Catriona has forgotten most of her Portuguese, but bagunça is one we still use nearly every day, especially in relation to her room, and especially associated with the word enorme.