Introduction: For me, the sudden abandonment of neutrality by Sweden and Finland after Putin’s invasion of Ukraine were like separate lightning bolts striking the same tree.
How likely was that? Sweden had been a neutral country for 200+ years. Finland for 75, since 1948. Continue reading Lightning Strikes Three Times: Japan, Taiwan & The Emerging Big Power Arms Races
Pundits are making much of the similarities between the attempted coup in Washington by Donald Trump supporters two years ago and the one by Jair Bolsonaro supporters in Brasilia last Sunday, but they are missing the biggest one.
These debacles were the most incompetent and half-hearted attempts to seize power illegally in the history of the world. Continue reading Gwynne Dyer on Two Stupid Attempted Coups & a Warning
Gwynne Dyer · Columnist | Oct. 7, 2022
The reports about Luiz Inácio (Lula) da Silva’s impending comeback as Brazilian president verged on the ecstatic in the week before last Sunday’s vote.
He was, after all, 14 points ahead of his populist rival, incumbent president Jair Bolsonaro, in the last opinion poll before the vote.
“Lula on track for stunning political comeback,” said one paper. “Olé, olé, olé! Lula voters sing for a heroic comeback to banish Bolsonaro,” said another. Speculation was rife that Lula would win more than 50 per cent in the first round of voting, avoiding the need for a runoff vote between the two leading candidates on Oct. 30.
But the polls were wrong.
Lula got a respectable 48 per cent of the vote, but he was only five points ahead of Bolsonaro at 43 per cent and, in Brazilian politics the candidates in the lead often fall behind in the second round. The long anticipated global decline and fall of the hard-right populist movement has been at least postponed.
This is particularly relevant to the United States, where Donald Trump constantly praises Bolsonaro as Tropical Trump. Lula is to the left of Joe Biden, but both men are ageing stalwarts of the centre-left who have made political comebacks, but already feel a little bit like yesterday’s news. Continue reading Gwynne Dyer On The International Populist Wave