[OT] Why is Brazil like Bulgaria?

[Andre Garzia]

On Wed, Jan 5, 2011 at 7:40 AM, Curry Kenworthy <curry at pair.com> wrote:

> >Unlimited power in the hands of few is the main common
> >characteristic between Bulgaria and Brasil.
>
>
Oh there is no unlimited power in here. People outside imagine Brazil being
some banana republic where carismatic leader can do any ruthless thing and
get away with it but this is not the case, they can get away with robbing
any amount of money, passing any kind of idiotic law, doing every kind of
moronic display of ignorance, complete lack of common sense and really bad
sense of fashion and so on but it is not unlimited.

Brief Story of Brazil:

Brazil was "discovered" in the 16th century, it was made into a colony and
that was how it stood for couple centuries until napoleon went land
acquiring over europe. Portuguese royalty fled (or went on vacation) to
Brazil which was a colony made of mud, coffee, slaves and nasty diseases.
When royalty arrived in 1808 they decided to make this a proper country,
specially Rio.

Like mushrooms after rain, a country was made with proper buildings and
culture (at least on Rio). It doesn't really matter that all the slaving
went on and that the rest of this really big place was still farms and pain,
Rio was beautiful. Now Brazil was an United Kingdom - the United Kingdom of
Portugal, Brazil and Algarve. Scottish and Englishman among us knows how
this works. Heck from colony to united kingdom, looks good.

Royalty decided to go back to europe where moskito bites do not kill you and
where the natives could speak something you could understand (common people
often spoke tupi, guarani or some other indian tongue) but but but but...
TA-DA!!!! The portuguese royal guy decided NOT TO GO BACK! famous words: "if
it is for the general happiness of the nation, tell everyone that I stay!".
So Brazil was no longer an United Kingdom but was on its own with a new
royal guy. The new country was named The Empire Of Brazil (as far as empires
goes, this was a pretty big place) plus we had an emperor! Time went on,
monarchies were overthrown in lots of places and then it was not fashionable
to have emperors anymore. The last ball of the Empire went on 500m of where
I am right now on a very cute castle, they even had electrical lamps during
the ball.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2017/1582977140_5757617cf7.jpg
(this is the castle, worth a look. It is called "Castelo da Ilha Fiscal",
the ferry boat I take everyday pass by it)

The next day republic was proclaimed - "Independence or Death!!!!" - by the
same guys who were in charge since forever. Now we had presidents.

Our republic played a game of rinse and repeat, alternating presidents from
São Paulo and Minas Gerais for a while and then some other bastards came
along till we're almost at the second world war when a military coup made
Brazil into a dictatorship (New State they called). Brazil under
dictatorship was ironic, we had a fascist goverment full of people who
admired fascist ideas (including my grandpa) but fought the axis on the side
of the non-fascist guys.

After Getulio commit suicide, military really took over the dictatorship and
leftist armed guerrilla started. Students like Dilma Roussef and many others
robbed banks, kidnapped ambassadors and did all kinds of nasty stuff to make
a Cuba out of Brazil. Our mudererer goverment did worse with tortures,
deaths and everything you don't want to hear, this went on until after I was
born (hey, I was born during a military dictatorship!).

Civil disobedience and protests got too big with strikes all over the place
and students on the streets with their faces painted in green and yellow
demanding free elections and guess what, it worked! After decades of
military dictatorship, they stepped down! No war, no coup... a organized
civil election and newly elected leaders, it doesnt help that the newly
elected president died right on the spot (I think he was overwhelmed with
joy of democracy). So after that we had some really bad democratic elected
presidents. Inflation was really bad to the point that on the market you had
to race the market staff trying to pick the goodies before they re-tag them
with new prices (this is actually true). Till FHC came along and he and
other really clever people created a magic plan to con the whole country and
stabilize the economy. Brazilians are tricksters and that presidency tricked
all the country into believing there was no such thing as a bad economy and
it worked out and money stabilized. Yay for impossible plans! After him the
labor party was elected and I cried of joy. Eight years later, I've learned
that the labor party is the same as the other 40 or so parties we have and
President Lula managed to get President Dilma elected much to my disgust, I
vote for the green party. During the last election my choices for President,
Senator, Governor lost but at least my choices for Federal Congressman and
State Congressman were elected. Silly people, always voting for thieves.

So in summary:

Same guys in power: really big muddy place -> United Kingdom -> Empire ->
Republic
New guys in power, as bad as the previous ones: Last 8 years



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http://www.andregarzia.com All We Do Is Code.