Update March 2022: With Lula’s freedom to run for president, the “LulaMeter” is back. By Louis Smith “A metalworker with a Socialist background had to become President of Brasil to make Capitalism work. If you look at Brasil’s banks, they have never made as much money as under my government” Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, […]
Two competing narratives on Brazil: one says Dilma Rousseff was deposed in a procedural Coup d’état and Lula’s imprisonment is to stop him becoming President again. The other says that all of the above is totally legit. One of these narratives has Wall Street and Big Oil right behind it. Can you guess which? Coup-Denial […]
During the lead up to the 2016 Coup, a series of alarmist articles in the Brazilian and international media warned of Brazil’s spiraling public debt. In January, 2016, for example, the Economist wrote, “public debt is worryingly large for a middle-income country and rising fast. Because of high interest rates, the cost of servicing it is […]
When Rio City Councilwoman Marielle Franco was assassinated on March 14, much of the international coverage omitted the fact that she was a socialist and the most prominent critic of Rio de Janeiro’s federal military occupation. In this article from the Rio de Janeiro State University (UERJ) Manchêtometro project, which quantifies bias in media coverage, […]
Netflix series, the Mechanism, premiered on Friday, March 23. The new feature by Narcos and Elite Squad director José Padilha was immediately received with criticism for, in the guise of being “based on a true story”, slandering ex-presidents Luiz Inacio “Lula” da Silva and Dilma Rousseff, during an election year in which Lula is the […]
On March 23, Netflix launched a new series called “The Mechanism” about a court case which is still underway, featuring a character based on the Brazil’s leading presidential candidate, Luiz Inacio “Lula” da Silva, during an election year. The series is directed by José Padilha, who’s Narcos program has been criticized for looking at the […]
This review of ‘The Mechanism’ originally appeared at AdoroCinema, a mainstream Brazilian TV & Movie review portal. Translated by Brasil Wire. By Lucas Salgado. “In Brazil, the definition of justice in the dictionary does not contain the words balance and impartiality,” says the narrator of The Mechanism at an important moment in the plot. Not that it is the purpose of […]
When Luis Inacio Lula da Silva took office in 2003, one of his first moves was to prioritize open source software for the federal government computer systems in order to reduce costs, increase competition, generate jobs and develop the knowledge and intelligence of the country in this area. Although it was never fully adopted by all […]
The following article is an edited version of the transcripts of an interview Chuck Mertz conducted with Brasil Wire editor Brian Mier on This is Hell radio show, on Chicago’s WNUR, on December 16, 2017. Live from São Paulo, Brian Mier explains why the Northern media gets Brazilian politics so wrong – echoing US State […]
The Guardian kicked off a week of coverage about São Paulo today, as part of its Rockefeller Foundation sponsored “Cities” Series. Although part of this content appears to be generated with support from local news non-profit Agência Publica and respectable local journalists like Leonardo Sakamoto, the series opens with erroneous information. Today’s headline says, reads […]