The shocking images of a devastated New Orleans constitute one more evidence of the neoliberal hoax imposed to the masses by the elites. Television sets from all corners of the world have been parading for days now the U.S.'s Third World, the tragedy of the forsaken populace, abandoned to their own fate, without water or food, suffering and plundering, protesting and subjecting themselves to multiple humiliation.

Ironically, this occurs in the cathedral of neoliberalism, the United States. It is the failure of the economic model that just makes a few rich, impoverishing the rest.

Coincidence or not, the majority of those who roam the streets or camp on the soaking squares, homeless and hopeless, forced to accept Martial law and to suffer the effects of their own misery, are black. They defend themselves as they can, some even plundering, robbing and killing, in despair.

We have to pay heed to the fact that the excluded are really the majority, not only in the destroyed main Louisiana city, but in every other American town. A tsunami that reached New York, an earthquake that occurred in Los Angeles or a blizzard passing through Chicago would have equal or worse result.

Imagine then in the rest of the world, where even without natural catastrophes the reality is the same: the masses condemned to the barbarism, the elites escaping in helicopters or shielded in their people-proof mansions. There's not a banker, or business man in the abandoned crowd to be seen. Any day soon, they will not be found anywhere.

Juscelinos

President Lula is down on his luck. After comparing himself to former President Juscelino Kubitschek, he finds himself run over by other Juscelino, the Dourado.

Why the Finance Minister cabinet's chief suddenly resigned, after testifying before the Parliamentary Inquiry Committee? Did he regret all the lies he had spun? Was he warned that he would have to stand face to face with a former-companion, who would have taken to the antechamber of Finance Minister Dr. Antônio Palocci news of unethical practices?

What happens to the Minister in this story? Did he just  hand out the disposable aide to scram, the way former Chief of Staff José Dirceu tried to do with his own aide Delúbio Soares? Was it Palocci who ordered the false Juscelino to resign? Nothing will come of it or are we going to be able to prove that there was traffic of influence  under the shadows of the Ministry's main character?

The President must beware of all of this, because, if his ministers' direct advisers are being hit, it's obvious that soon the ministers themselves will also be hit. And when the ministers are hit, let's admit, it will be only a matter of time before their boss is also hit.

Third Way

The recent shooting, in Congress, left many people unaware of a very important meeting, which took place Wednesday. Leaders of the main parties of the Left gathered in Brasília. You had people like Carlos Lupi, from the PDT, Eduardo Campos, from the PSB, Roberto Freire and Raul Jungmann, from the PPS, and Aldo Rebelo and Jandira Feghali, from the PC do B.

Nothing was made official, but, in view of the possibility that the barrier clause may threaten the survival of each one of them when the political reform is approved, the trend is unequivocal: they are going to establish a kind of federation to dispute elections and to act in Congress.

But the possibility of an alliance doesn't end there. Why not find a common denominator in regards to the next presidential election? After all, after the PT's debacle, they represent what is left of the Lefts.

Separated,  they will go nowhere, but united they might, who knows? They realize that the electorate is unsatisfied with the double option: the Tucanos (from the PSDB, the party from ex-President Fernando Henrique Cardoso) or President Lula. There is room for a third way, capable to break the present economic model. No names were mentioned, even though the candidacy of Roberto Freire, from the PPS, has already been launched.

Suspense

Nobody should be surprised: in one week, when he is being sacked by the House, deputy Roberto Jefferson is going to throw mud into the fan. Instead of taking it as a victim, he will have an executioner role, denouncing what he did not denounce up to now.

This time,  he is not going to spare Lula, although he should focus his catilinarian on Dirceu. But he will present wads of deputies names whose parties accepted illegal money.

We don't know the explanation he will give about the US$ 1.72 million (4 million reais) he received from adman Marcos Valério, as PT's contribution to the PTB.

We can only imagine the impact he will have if he presents two or three suitcases filled with all the money he received still untouched, while he presses home that the didn't distribute the money among his colleagues for lack of a receipt from Valério...

Carlos Chagas writes for the Rio's daily Tribuna da Imprensa and is a representative of the Brazilian Press Association, in Brasília. He welcomes your comments at carloschagas@hotmail.com.

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