Can you tell us more about Lula and the workers party in general? We seldom hear criticism of him from the left in the U.S. As a Brazilian, stuff you take for granted is probably completely unknown to the rest of us. I had the general impression that he had moved somewhat right -but that is all. What is he for and against these days? What remains of his program that has the world financial community actively campaigning against him?
Thanksir
Gar
-The Brazilian PT (Worker´s Party) was born in 1982 as a broad leftwing -coalition, with VERY strong influence from the catholic left. It also -included non Stalinists Marxists and "independent" leftwing tendencies, -with links to Trade Unions. This party grew steadily in the following -elections. Now they have something like 10-15% of the nationwide voting -and are the party who controls more capital cities (including São Paulo, -the biggest city in our country). They also have 4 state governors. -Since 1989, they are moving to right and after 1994, they started to move -even faster. Now their program doesn´t say one word about renationalizing -the enterprises sold in the 90´s (in a disastrous program of privatizations -that ended by allowing foreign enterprises control over many strategic -sectors of Brazilian economy, including telecoms, electricity and railways) -In fact it´s very dificult to see diferences between Lula and Jospin or -Blair. However, the finacial community is afraid of whatever leader that -isn´t 100% reliable (ie., willing to play according to Wall Street rules) -so they oppose Lula despite his efforts to appear "reliable" for the -"market". Furthermore, even if Lula wins, he won´t have a majority in -the Congress, and in Brazil it´s halfway to disaster, as it was in Chile -by 1971-3. We have a Presidentialist system, but a non cooperating -Congress can led a government to complete administrative paralysis. -The alliance with PL, a rightwing party with strong links to Universal -Church of God´s Kingdom (an ultra rightwing neopentecostal church) is -designed to make the party more appealing to conservative electorate, but -it will have the opposing effect since it will alienate tradional PT voters -(like me, for instance, I won´t vote for a PT representative in the Congress -because they are in coalition with PL and here we have proportional voting -so I can vote PT and help to elect a representative from PL) while they -won´t overcome the deep distrust the rightwingers have towards PT. To make -things even worse we are approaching a deep economic crisis that may be -associated to an international crisis. I don´t know how the current situation -in US will evolve, but a prolonged stagnation, Japanese style, isn´t impossible, -this, of course, may be a good thing since the US hegemony can be weakened -thus allowing 3rd World countries more autonomy to follow their own policies.
Alexandre Fenelon -