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Friday, August 23, 2019

BRAZIL'S PRESIDENT JAIR BOLSONARO IN HIS OWN WORDS

I haven't blogged here for months - my apologies.  Yes, I'm still living with and care-taking my 92-year-old mom, unable to go anywhere, but brainstorming and philosophizing a lot on money, gift economy, and spirituality.  I hope to share the fruits of this time of pondering in future blog posts.

Meanwhile, I feel the urge to post this wake-up call. It's a departure of my usual posts. But it is the perfectly  obvious object lesson of the predictable end of the "Christian" mind that pretends it can serve both "God" and Mammon.  


BRAZIL'S PRESIDENT JAIR BOLSONARO in his own words:


ON THE AMAZON FOREST, GUNS, AND GENOCIDE

“It’s a shame that the Brazilian cavalry hasn’t been as efficient as the Americans, who exterminated the Indians.”* Correio Braziliense newspaper, April 12, 1998

“In 2019 we’re going to rip up Raposa Serra do Sol [Indigenous Territory in Roraima, northern Brazil]. We’re going to give all the ranchers guns”
In Congress, posted on January 21, 2016

“[indigenous reserves] are an obstacle to agri-business. You can’t reduce indigenous land by even a square meter in Brazil”
Campo Grande News, April 22, 2015

If it’s up to me, every citizen will have a firearm in the house. There will not be a centimeter demarcated for indigenous reservations or quilombolas.”
Estadão, April 3, 2017

“If I become President there will not be a centimeter more of indigenous land.”
Dourados, Mato Grosso do Sul, February 8, 2018

“There will not be a centimeter demarcated for indigenous or quilombo reservations.”
Talk at Clube Hebraica in Rio de Janeiro, on 3 April 2017.

“The Indians do not speak our language, they do not have money, they do not have culture. They are native peoples. How did they manage to get 13% of the national territory” Campo Grande News, April 22, 2015

“There is no indigenous territory where there aren’t minerals. Gold, tin and magnesium are in these lands, especially in the Amazon, the richest area in the world. I’m not getting into this nonsense of defending land for Indians” Campo Grande News, April 22, 2015


ON TORTURE

“I'm support torture. You know that. And the people too. Through the vote, you'll change nothing in this country. Nothing, absolutely nothing. We'll only get change, unfortunately, when we go into a civil war here someday and do a work the military regime didn't do, killing as much as thirty thousand people, starting with FHC. It's all right if some innocent people die. Innocent people die in many wars.”
Gazeta do Povo (10 October 2017).


ON GENOCIDAL MILITARY DICTATORSHIP

“The Military Police should have killed 1,000 rather than 111 prisoners in the Carandiru massacre.”
Folha de S.Paulo (3 October 1997).

“Pinochet should have killed more people.”
Veja essa. Veja (3 December 1998).


ON GAY PEOPLE

“I will not fight against it nor discriminate, but if I see two men kissing on the street, I'll beat them up.”
Folha de S.Paulo (19 May 2002).

“I would be incapable of loving a gay son. I wouldn't be a hypocrite. I prefer that he die in an accident than show up with some guy with a moustache.”
Inverview to Playboy magazine in 2011.


ON IMMIGRATION

“The scum of the world is arriving in Brazil, as if we didn’t have enough problems to solve.”
About Senegalese, Haitians, Iranians, Bolivians and Syrians in an interview to Jornal Opção on 17 September 2015.

ON WOMEN

“I wouldn't hire them [women] with the same salary.”
RedeTV! (15 February 2016).

“She doesn't deserve it [to be raped] because she's very bad, because she's very ugly. She's not my type, I'd never rape her. I'm not a rapist, but if I was, I wouldn't rape her because she doesn't deserve it.”
In interview with Zero Hora newspaper on 10 December 2014.

“I have five children. There were four men, on the fifth I got weak and a woman came out.”
Talk at Clube Hebraica in Rio de Janeiro, on 3 April 2017.


ON NATIONALISM AND CHRISTIANITY

“Since we are a Christian country, God above all. This history of a secular state doesn't exist, no. The state is Christian and the minority that is against it can leave.”
At Campina Grande Airport on 8 February 2018.

“Brazil above all, God above everyone.”
In the presidential debate held by TV Bandeirantes on 9 August 2018.

""You were decisive in helping to change the destiny of Brazil.... This is the first time that the name of God is being heard within the Brazilian presidency.... It's very good to be among friends. And even better when they are friends with God in their hearts."
Speaking to the "March for Jesus", a huge throng of Evangelicals, June 21, 2019


ON TAX EVASION

“It's my advice and I do it: I evade all the taxes I can.”
On the program “Câmera Aberta at Band” on 23 May 1999. Gazeta do Povo (10 October 2017).


ON HIS ROLE MODEL DONALD TRUMP

“We want to have a great Brazil just like Trump wants to have a great America.”
Jair Bolsonaro’s speech to the Chamber of Commerce on 18 March 2019.

____________________________________________

WHEN I VISITED THE AMAZON AND SAW THE ROOT OF WHAT'S HAPPENING NOW







"The next blow to his religious convictions came when he and Corinne went to visit a missionary....
The missionary, with the blessing of the Ecuadoran government, had gone into the cattle business, shipping a herd from North America. He had brokered a deal with his converts: if they raised and fed his cattle, the government would grant them a plot of jungle, and the converts would be entitled to keep every other generation of calves. The alternating generation would be added to the American's herd....
...boasted the missionary, 'Now the Christian Indians are the richest in the jungle.'

'This is why governments all over the world love missionaries-- they civilize people and get them into the money system...

'What of Jesus's teaching his followers to give up possessions? And suddenly it dawned on me: if you were going to call something Antichrist, this would be it. The people who were promoting this so-called Christianity are really Antichrist.'
....
"What's more, with each acre of land doled out to ranching, more jungle was clear-cut. And after just a few years of grazing, the land was unusable, turned into desert.

'What about the jungle?' Daniel asked.

'It's infinite,' said the missionary. 'If you're up in a plane, look at the Amazon. It goes for miles.'

Daniel took a scenic flight over the Amazon. 'It looked like Paul Bunyan had taken a razor blade to it.'
....
Suelo juggled the contradictions.
....
'There was no poverty in the jungle until they introduced money, and all the sudden there's poverty,... and all the diseases that come with it. And you look at people and they're not happy. They have all these goods, and they're unhappy.'" 
[p. 84-86, The Man Who Quit Money, by Mark Sundeen]

______________________________________________________

*Notice Bolsonaro is paraphrasing Adolph Hitler in Mein Kampf, expressing inspiration and admiration for the USA's extermination of indigenous peoples:
 "But in North America the Teutonic element, which has kept its racial
stock pure and did not mix it with any other racial stock, has come to dominate the American Continent and will remain master of it as long as that element does not fall a victim to the habit of adulterating its blood. . . .  
"We ought to remember that during the first period of American colonization numerous Aryans earned their daily livelihood as trappers and hunters, etc., frequently wandering about in large groups with their women and children, their mode of existence very much resembling that of ordinary nomads. The moment, however, that they grew more numerous and were able to accumulate larger resources, they cleared the land and drove out the aborigines, at the same time establishing settlements which rapidly increased all over the country." (Adolph Hitler, Mein Kampf, p 238, 252)

14 comments:

  1. We live in an asylum run by the most psychopathic inmates.. But things are happening in this world.. there is an undercurrent of dissidence and a growing awareness that things are not as they should or could be..

    I have faith that this time of darkness is coming to an end, which will mean huge changes and a total collapse of the status quo..

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    1. Yes, the corrupt forces are so big and overwhelming it's easy to lose sight of the forces of light that are also growing. Truth itself is light, and all truth, no matter how small, is dissidence to the darkness.

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  2. The work you are doing for your mother... that is christianity. Thank you for continuing to inspire!

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  3. Bolsonaro is disgusting. Unfortunately, many Brazilians still support him. I am Portuguese and work with a Brazilian colleague (who is also a PhD student) who frequently tries to explain me why he supports Bolsonaro (through very messed up logic). I am very sad to see supposedly smart young people think like this...

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    1. It's kind of baffling, huh? In the past I had always thought it would take more to fool people, that deception and corruption would be more subtle. But both Bolsonaro and Trump are proving how blatantly easy it is to fool masses of people, even some supposedly smart ones. I'm realizing it is not a lack of intelligence but a lack of moral fiber, a mass poverty of basic integrity. And without moral fiber and basic integrity, intelligence quickly decays.

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    2. I think it's also very often a not wanting to look at reality for fear of having to do too much, having to work too hard, having to see the mountain of things that would have to change, and the possible effects on the ego. It's mostly fear of not pursuing the dream of being 'one of them' which often makes people look the other way. Fear of having to give up what little they do have...

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  4. I would encourage you to be more understanding of conservatives, this post seems to suggest they're "the other" and like they're misunderstood. I don't think Trump and Bolsonaro should be compared to Hitler, have they really done anything like Hitler? Bolsonaro talks about evading taxes, but are you supporting taxes? Wouldn't you like a 0% tax rate? And it is legal to reduce amount legally that you need to pay, but not to avoid taxes that are required in U.S. I don't know about Brazil (look up difference if you're unaware). Missionaries also gave technologies to natives that would help improve their lives, and Christianity is the one true religion so it was helpful to them spiritually to be evangelized. And what's wrong with Bolsonaro wanting to make Brazil great, like with Trump? I can understand if you don't like certain policies, but other policies have bipartisan support. Just a reminder that there are conservatives (probably a lot more today than maybe you are aware of, judging by this post?) that might agree with a lot of other things you say. Divisive posts like this are off-putting, I'm sure you would disagree with a lot of things liberal politicians have done.

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    1. Oh help really? Under a whole lot of quotes of Bolsonaro saying he thinks eradication and suppression of indigenous peoples is okay, you only see the one line about the taxes and defend the man? What makes him a Hitler, well exactly the things you seem to ignore now. The neoliberal story has failed in many ways, but I wish you your dreams...

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    2. This post suggests nothing. It's Bolsonero's own quotes, not my opinion. You yourself are recognizing Bolsonaro as comparable to Hitler by his very own quotes, not my words. And the last part is simply quoting a description of my youthful disillusionment of a jungle mission doing the very opposite of what Jesus implored.

      Isn't it logical to compare blatant genocide, by Bolsonero's own admission, to blatant genocide?

      And it is interesting you would call doing what is in complete opposition of Christ's teachings "Christianity" and "the one true religion."

      And it is also fascinating how you would overlook everything else Bolsonero admitted to and latch onto taxes, the least important part of this post.

      But let's go with that too. Here's what a Wiki article says about Hitler and taxes:

      "Throughout his rise to power, Hitler neglected to pay taxes on his income and allowances. In 1934, one year after becoming Chancellor, the tax office of Munich sent Hitler a fine of 405,494.00 Reichsmarks for not paying taxes nor properly declaring his income. He was given only eight days to pay off this debt. The new Chancellor responded by ordering a state secretary of the ministry of finance to intervene, which resulted in Hitler becoming tax-free. The head of the Munich tax office declared, "all tax reports delivering substance for a tax obligation by the Führer are annulled from the start. The Führer is therefore tax-exempt". After the death of President Paul von Hindenburg, Hitler took over his office and claimed his salary as well." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolf_Hitler%27s_wealth_and_income

      And it's also fascinating you would see this as a conservative or liberal thing, about politics, when it's simply about human decency as opposed to obvious inhumanity. I'm surprised you would regard genocide, greed, bigotry and hatred as "conservative." True conservatives are likely reeling from your labeling.

      Sorry, I can't candy coat the truth to please everybody. This is not partisan, it's just truth. And whatever political faction, right or left, simple truth offends, let it be offended. If truth causes division and makes me lose readership, so be it. That is the benefit of working for free, unpaid, not for a market.

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  5. All those in places of power and control with a main goal to enslave humanity and promote a system of scarcity, war, disease, suffering, lack of empathy etc, are not human. They are another race not from earth with the main goal of creating a new world order and owining planet earth. The human race must step up in large numbers to reject this dark anti-christ system of greed (money), fear and destruction. We must all unify to liberate our race and bring back the true abundance of the universe, LOVE, and christ in all. Just like the indigenous people, Daniel understands how the universe provides in abundance if we allow it. Much love and courage to all.

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  6. No no, they are human, they've just for some reason lost their way. Making them 'not human' makes it very easy for them not to take responsibility for their actions. It's not about human/not Human/evil. It's about the choices we make in life through our pain and our own path. In being righteous, there is no light either. We are all human, we are all one, it just takes some people longer to see the light, and at the moment we are unbalanced. However, I feel more and more humans are seeing the light. It is in love that we will survive and thrive, not in fighting evil... Anything you fight becomes your own demon...

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  7. Dear Daniel, hello! Long time no comment back! After reading this post about the Brazilian president I was left with one unanswered question. Am I to conclude from reading this long post that Brazil's president is seeking to exterminate indigenous peoples in Brazil because he believes that Pres. Donald Trump (his model) is seeking to do the very same atrocity in the USA? Is that the idea that the final paragraphs of this post highlighted? Because I did not have Pres. Trump pegged as a racist. A replicated penny for your thoughts...Timothy K. Lawson

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    1. I withhold my own opinions about comparing Bolsonero and Trump in this post, so I just present quotes (though I do post my own past quotes from my first-hand observations on "civilizing" Amazon natives, as recorded in Mark Sundeen's book).

      I leave to people's own intelligence, not my opinion, to determine whether or not there are parallels between Trump's and Bolsonero's presidencies and policies, and whether Trump agrees or disagrees with with public sentiment that calls Bolsonero "the Trump of the Tropics," and to think about, investigate, and draw your own conclusions.

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