The Howler

I don’t have to relate here about the events and emotions in Iran. The Pullitzer-Prize-worthy blogging of Andrew Sullivan at The Atlantic and Nico Pitney at HuffPost are appallingly complete and deeply moving. They embody Obama’s words: “We are bearing witness”.

Using Andrew Sullivan’s words: “Did you notice how many times he [Obama] invoked the word "justice" in his message? That's the word that will resonate most deeply with the Iranian resistance. What a relief to have someone with this degree of restraint and prudence and empathy - refusing to be baited by Khamenei or the neocons, and yet taking an eloquent stand, as we all do, in defense of freedom and non-violence.”

In stark contrast to Obama’s eloquent stand and the cautiousness of the European government leaders, Lula, the great world leader, saw fit to defame the standing of Brazil and its people in the world.
As a belligerent child, who sees his beloved toy taken away from him, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva declared in Geneva, that based on personal experience, the protests currently taking place in Iran are a reaction of losers, and that the controversy surrounding the re-election of Ahmadinejad will not change his intention to travel to Tehran in the near future.

In this hour of desperation, while the Iranian people are demonstrating in the streets for their democratic rights, Lula can only talk about trade between Brazil and Iran.
"I want to go to Iran, I pretend to fix a date and visit Iran because we are interested in building a partnership with Iran, interested in trade with Iran," he said.

At a press conference, to emphasize his understanding of world politics and the definition of democracy, he stated that Iranian’s actual president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has 61 or 62% of the votes. How can you imagine fraud with such an impressive popular support?, he wondered.

"I do not know anyone other than the opposition, who should have disagreed with the Iranian election results. There are no figures available, there is no proof. For now, it's just, you know, something between “flamenguistas and vascaínos," (referring to two rivalling Brazilian football clubs).

Lula, the popular leader of the Brazilian dream, prototype of the common man that reached the highest levels of society, collided head-on with equality, with equal rights and obligations, with the principles of equality and democracy. With his imbecile statements he shook off his carefully built-up image as a reformist and took the cloth of the repressor and anti-libertarian.

The Brazilian president's view on the election in Iran does not make the slightest difference - either in Tehran or anywhere else in the world, but it is revoltingly gross to compare the peaceful demonstrations for justice of the Iranian people to two rivalling Brazilian football clubs.

Seeing his jaunt to Iran going beyond reach, he probably had meant to say to the Iranian people: "Sifu" (fuck you).
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Note 1: Lula used this obscene expression (Sifu meaning fuck you) during a meeting with governors. The TV-News outlet ‘Jornal Nacional’ qualified the words as "extravagant", which was very generous of them.
Note 2: With the peaceful demonstrations getting approached with violence by the Iranian authorities and the hospitalized injured arrested by the Basiji, several foreign embassies in Tehran are helping to protect the victims and are taking in injured. Why is the Brazilian Embassy not on the list?

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