Brazil's President Michel Temer Charged with Taking Bribes

Corruption impoverishes the poor and engorges the rich. Brazil normally has a quarter of a million child prostitutes who would starve if they didn't prostitute themselves. Instead of dealing with the incredible poverty in the country, President after President of Brazil have given inflated contracts to those who bribe them. This increases taxes and the cost of living which increases the level of poverty and subsequently, the level of child prostitution in Brazil. 

Brazilian President Michel Temer reacts during a credentials presentation ceremony for several new

top diplomats at Planalto Palace in Brasilia, Brazil June 26, 2017. REUTERS/Ueslei Marcelino

By Brad Brooks and Ricardo Brito | BRASILIA

Brazil's top federal prosecutor charged President Michel Temer with taking multimillion-dollar bribes on Monday in a stinging blow to the unpopular leader and to political stability in Latin America's largest country.

Rodrigo Janot submitted the charge in a document presented to the Supreme Court, saying "he fooled Brazilian citizens" and owed the nation millions in compensation for accepting bribes.

Under Brazilian law, the lower house of Congress must now vote on whether to allow the top tribunal to try the conservative leader, who replaced impeached leftist President Dilma Rousseff just over a year ago.

Lawmakers within Temer's coalition are confident they have the votes to block the two-third majority required to proceed with a trial. But they warn that support may wane if congressmen are forced to vote several times to protect Temer - whose popularity is languishing in the single-digits - from trial.

Temer's office and his attorney, Antonio Mariz, declined to comment on the charges. Temer has repeatedly said he is innocent of any wrongdoing.

Investigators have uncovered stunning levels of corruption in recent years engulfing Brazil's political class and business elites. Much of it centers on companies paying billions of dollars in bribes to politicians and executives at state-run enterprises in return for lucrative contracts.

Temer and one-third of his cabinet, as well as four former presidents and dozens of lawmakers are under investigation or already charged in the schemes. Over 90 people have been convicted.

Political analysts had warned, long before Monday, that the scandals reduced the chances Temer could push through reforms crucial for Latin America's biggest economy to rebound from its worst recession on record.

Temer was charged in connection with a graft scheme involving the world's largest meatpacker, JBS SA. Executives said in plea-bargain testimony the president took bribes for resolving tax matters, freeing up loans from state-run banks and other matters.

Monday's charging document alleges Temer arranged to eventually receive a total of 38 million reais ($11.5 million) from JBS in the next nine months.

Joesley Batista, one of the brothers who control JBS, recorded a conversation with Temer in March in which the president appears to condone bribing a potential witness. Batista also accused Temer and aides of negotiating millions of dollars in illegal donations for his Brazilian Democratic Movement Party.

Brazil's federal police released a separate document on Monday about that conversation with Batista. Police recovered a previously inaudible portion of the recording in which Temer is heard telling the scandal-plagued billionaire that it was mainly because of his influence that he chose to appoint Henrique Meirelles as finance minister.

The significance of the comment about Meirelles, who is widely respected in financial markets, was not immediately clear and the finance ministry did not respond to requests for comment.

LEGAL GRIDLOCK

Key lawmakers in Temer's alliance told Reuters, on condition of anonymity, they would halt work on proposed labor reforms if forced to vote on charges against the president.

Temer's supporters say they have between 250 and 300 votes in the 513 seat lower house to block a trial. But the president is expected to soon face charges of racketeering and obstruction of justice, each requiring a separate vote. Prosecutors have said they may also file other charges, which they have not yet given details on.

On Monday, the federal police recommended charging Temer with obstruction of justice - the first step toward a likely round of other charges in addition to graft.

Top lawmakers said Janot's expected strategy of presenting charges one at a time would throw Temer's future into uncertainty.

With all of congress facing re-election next year, many said that if public outrage boiled over, it would be hard to maintain support for Temer.

"If this grinds on with multiple votes, you may start to see a lack of governability," said one top lawmaker in Temer's coalition. "In that case, there will be defections, and colleagues may start to move against Temer."

Carlos Melo, a political scientist with Insper, a Sao Paulo business school, said Janot knew he would lose the first corruption charge against Temer "but he is like a chess player, thinking two or three votes down the line."

Melo said the votes by lawmakers, many of whom are facing their own corruption investigations, would be a test of how alienated Brazil's political class was from an increasingly angry population.

"If Congress has any connection left whatsoever with the society it represents, then Janot's strategy of wearing lawmakers down with multiple votes will win and you will see the president put on trial," Melo said.

If congressmen rally around Temer, Melo said, "then we must face the horrific fact that what we have is a political system entirely detached from society, and it will pay the price in next year's election."

(Additional reporting by Lisandra Paraguassu in Brasilia and Tatiana Bautzer in Sao Paulo; Editing by Daniel Flynn and Tom Brown)

‘Valve Turner’ Climate Activist Guilty of Oil Pipeline Tampering, Faces 10yrs in Prison

© Shut It Down - Climate Direct Action / Facebook

A jury in Skagit County, Washington, has found climate activist Ken Ward guilty of burglary for his actions during a coordinated protest in October, where activists shut off pipelines carrying Canadian tar sand oil.

On Wednesday, Ward, 60, was found guilty of second degree burglary for closing a safety valve on the Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain Pipeline and blocking the flow of oil to the Anacortes refineries. The jury deadlocked on a second charge of sabotage. 

Ward faces a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison and a fine of up to $20,000. His sentence hearing is set for June 22, according to Jay O'Hara, a fellow activist at the Climate Disobedience Center.

Ward's attorney said the defense team focused on conveying Ward's intentions to stop harm brought on by climate change.

"We sort of likened these actions to those of people who engaged in the Boston Tea Party and who risked their liberty," Lauren Regan told Vice News. "That in many ways, particularly in regards to Trump pulling out of the Paris Accord, and the fact that the government seems unable to adequately protect the public from exacerbating climate change, that it may be that the people are going to act on their own behalf to protect their communities and their futures."

This is the second time Ward has been tried for his actions. He initially faced three felony charges and one misdemeanor charge, which carried a 30 year sentence. In January, a different jury was unable to reach a verdict and a mistrial was declared. 

During his testimony in the first trial, Ward was able to show the jury evidence of the effects of climate change could have on the planet, according to an article he wrote for EcoWatch. 

However, during his retrial, Ward was not allowed to use the “necessity defense,” to show that his crimes were necessary to prevent a greater harm. 

“The judge did not allow us to offer what is called a necessity defense in which we would have been able to argue to the jury that yes, I did what I did, but I did it for this greater purpose dealing with this larger crisis,” Ward told Oregon Public Broadcasting.

It is easy enough to show that climate change is affecting the planet and much of it in a negative way. It is not so easy to show that man is the primary driver in climate change. That has been assumed by hyperbolic climate activists but it has certainly not been proven. In fact, there is good reason to believe that the primary driver in climate change is sunspot activity which is slowing down and should result in some cooling, or at least levelling off of the rising global temperature. Except for an exceptionally strong El Nino over the previous couple years, that appears to be the case.

If the temperature rises by half a degree or more over the next 15 years, then I will admit that anthropogenic CO2 is the primary driver. But I also have a problem trusting the data and the computer programs which are being kept secret from scientists who question their validity.

Having said that, it is obvious to anyone with a brain that the planet has been warming over the past century.

Ward added that he plans to appeal his case. 

Ward was one of five activists known as the “Valve Turners,” who took part in the #ShutItDown pipeline protests organized by the Climate Disobedience Center last October. Other activists carried out similar acts of civil disobedience in Montana, North Dakota and Minnesota, stopping all pipelines carrying oil from Canada’s tar sands to the US. 

Ward broadcast the act live on Facebook, with footage showing him cutting two chains to enter the valve site and closing the valve as part of a coordinated protest. 

Following his arraignment last October, Ward released a statement that said his direct action was the only effective way to stop the effects of climate change. 

"I am a responsible and law abiding citizen," Ward said. "I did these things because I believe that it is the obligation of every thinking person to find a way to stave off climate cataclysm, and there is no effective, legal alternative to personal direct action."

There is an example of hyperbolic terminology used by climate activists. The world will not come to an end in this century if the temperature rises a degree or two. In 2015, I predicted a rise in global temperature of less than one degree by the end of the 21st century. 

There are many other reasons for the world to come to an end, reasons far more valid and much more urgent than global warming. The extremely aggressive build-up of military along the European borders with Russia; the mad rush to buy hundreds of billions of dollars in arms by countries that ought not to have them; the extraordinary amount of poverty; the completely unrecognized level of child sex abuse that is destroying a generation; and the Muslim invasion of Europe are all far more urgent and extreme matters than climate change.

I criticize North Korea for spending billions of dollars on weapons to feed their communist paranoia while much of their population is starving, yet, here we are in the developed world using hundreds of billions of dollars on weapons research and development and on environmental R&D, while our neighbours are starving and selling their children because they can't afford to feed them.  Half a million children in Brazil have to prostitute themselves to get enough to eat and we are building bombs and protesting pipelines. What insanity!

The Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain Pipeline has experienced over 80 spills in the past 70 years, including two that exceeded more than 1,000 barrels of oil, according to data from TransMountain.

Skagit Co., Washington