Election over, battle for Brazil rages

Abstract

Last week I sat down with a Brazilian acquaintance who was shaking his head over the state of national politics. A graduate of a military high school, he'd been getting e-mails from former classmates, many of them now retired army officers, who were irate over the recent presidential elections. 'We need to kick these no-good Petistas out of office,' one bristled, using the derogatory shorthand for members of the ruling Workers Party, or PT in Portuguese.