The election of far right candidate Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil has caused shockwaves around the world -- and for good reason. The president-elect is not only a misogynistic, homophobic, racist who idolizes dictators, he is also rabidly anti-environment, and is about to launch a ...read more
Israel has long been sensitive to criticism of its actions with respect to the occupied Palestinian territories, but it may have gone overboard with its response to an official statement from the Brazilian government condemning Israel's "disproportionate use of force" in Gaza. ...read more
Photo: Kai Pfaffenbach/Reuters Before Brazil and Germany even stepped out onto the pitch to play their now-legendary World Cup semi-final match on Tuesday, it was almost impossible to talk about the two teams without resorting to obvious clichés. Brazil was always the club that ...read more
Photo: AP It's one hour into the World Cup semi-final match between Germany and Brazil. Well, it's really more like the Germans are playing nobody because in the first half they managed to score a staggering five times while Brazil has yet to score once. The German attack is ...read more
Life and Other Four Letter Words: G O A L Imagine the whole world is in stuck in an elevator together. It’s tense and crowded. We’re all standing shoulder to shoulder holding in our farts. It’s hot in the elevator and tempers are high because we all hate each other. Some of us ...read more
The spying activities of two particular nations have been conspicuously ignored by Glenn Greenwald and Edward Snowden: Brazil and Russia. Chances are that no one wants to bite the hand that feeds, but given how Snowden and Greenwald are Americans attacking the U.S. government, ...read more
In an open letter to the Brazilian people, Edward Snowden offered to assist Brazil's efforts to thwart NSA spying in exchange for asylum. Almost immediately, Brazil declined Snowden's offer. However, Glenn Greenwald tweeted today that Snowden, in his letter, didn't request ...read more
It’s Wednesday. It is what you make of it. Here’s what’s happening on the interweb: 1. Budget Deal Announced By Patty Murray, Paul Ryan On Tuesday, lawmakers from the House and the Senate took to the microphones to announce that they had reached a budget deal. The deal, which ...read more
The notion that the U.S. was alone in its efforts to use surveillance as a means of not only keeping track of terrorist activities but also as a time-honored means of maintaining a diplomatic edge was never really big news to anyone with a realistic view of foreign policy and, ...read more
It would be easy to call Glenn Greenwald a libertarian nihilist who detests and distrusts all forms of government, and if that were the case I might at least respect him for his intellectual honesty in standing firm on his principles. But the reality is that he's only hostile ...read more
We're not sure exactly which section of the U.S. Constitution protects the privacy rights of foreign leaders, but Glenn Greenwald and Edward Snowden appear to believe it's in there somewhere. The tandem crusaders for the Fourth Amendment have once again extended their reach ...read more
Back in 2011 when the Arab world exploded with popular uprisings, the Western media's first response was confusion. Was this a good or bad thing? The media appeared paralysed in the face of these developments which did not conform to the stereo type of the Barbarian Arab ...read more
As we all know, the global environmental outlook isn't exactly great - temperatures are rising, eco systems are being destroyed and species disappearing at a frightening rate. But it isn't all doom and gloom, as Brazil's new deforestation legislation appears to be slowing down ...read more
The world's economy might be on the brink of destruction, but its lungs are doing a heck of a lot better. From the Guardian: Deforestation of the Amazon has fallen to its lowest levels since records began, according to data recently released by Brazil's National Institute for ...read more
Unlike the United States, most of the world takes climate change extremely seriously, and countries ranging from China to Brazil are taking up the challenge with some very aggressive measures. For example, to combat the rapidly increasing deforestation of the Amazon, Brazil is ...read more
