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Impeaching Dilma Rousseff Democracy’s Death Blow in Brazil
Stephen Lendman
It’s all over but the vote-counting, scheduled for Tuesday or Wednesday.
Washington conspired with fascists in Brazil at a time its economy is mired in Depression, using Rousseff’s low approval rating during hard times to falsely accuse her of budget-manipulating crimes she didn’t commit.
Impeachment is certain, pre-scripted, a coup d’etat by any standard. Enough Senate votes exist to oust her, a scandalous exercise in tyranny triumphing over democratic governance - ordinary Brazilians to be harmed most by punishing neoliberal harshness when vital aid is most needed. Rousseff is currently suspended from office, awaiting the outcome of Senate proceedings to remove her by impeachment.
On Monday, she addressed the body honorably, forthrightly and truthfully, saying “I am here to look directly in your eyes to say…I have nothing to hide. I did not commit the crimes that I am accused of.”
“I have never enriched myself with public funds, and I have never manipulated budgets to benefit myself. I have acted honestly, and I will now be tried for crimes I have not committed.”
No evidence supports fabricated charges against her. “We are one step away from a serious institutional rupture,” she stressed. “We are one step away from a real coup d’etat…I fear the death of democracy.”
In the next 24 - 48 hours, her removal will become official. Enough Senate votes against her assure it. At least 54 of 81 are required.
Despite no evidence linking her to wrongdoing, around 60% of Brazil’s 594 congressional members, elements against her, are linked to serious crimes, including corruption, bribery, kidnapping and murder.
Interim coup d’etat president Michel Temer will serve out the remainder of her term. A Sao Paulo court found him guilty of corruption, declaring him ineligible to run for political office for eight years.
Yet no proceedings are planned to prevent him from becoming Brazil’s president - nor intention to remove him once installed in office.
A criminal cabal is about to take over Latin America’s largest economy, the world’s 9th largest, rich in oil, iron ore and numerous other resources, a nation of over 200 million people, its land mass larger than America’s continuous 48 states.
A harsh future awaits its people - tyranny replacing democracy, neoliberal harshness perhaps eliminating social justice entirely, unemployment to increase, poverty to become more a growth industry than already - powerful privileged interests served at the expense of all others.
Programs being instituted represent a “wish list for markets and investors,” reported the Financial Times - ordinary Brazilians stuck with the hindmost.
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Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.
His new book as editor and contributor is titled "Flashpoint in Ukraine: How the US Drive for Hegemony Risks World War III
http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html
Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.
Listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network
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