Operation Car Wash

I'm always learning stuff.

I mean, it doesn't have Operation Car Wash like PBR had, that level of epic corruption.

I was reminded of that when I was writing the Reddit post again.

I was like, oh my God, this is a great story.

That, uh, that their lives are, uh, are getting worse, are getting harder, that the country is falling apart.

Um, and this also goes into the, uh, corruption issue, which has been a perennial issue at least for a long time, especially since the J- Lava Jato, uh, investigations.

And just like under Lava Jato, it is something that implicates, uh, well, uh, politicians on both sides of the spectrum, uh, but especially politicians on the right, and yet it is an issue that has been affecting more, uh, has been detrimental more to the left.

Um, and so there's a lot of things that don't really quite make sense from a, uh, you know, material political economy perspective, uh, but that's all to show that, uh, voting is not a purely necessarily rational, uh, exercise.

Um, it is, uh, it is very much, uh, based on sentiment, uh, and feelings and trends and, uh, that is something that Lula has struggled to, uh, to deal with.

He did a shit-ton of corruption.

[laughs] In fact, Lava Jato, the car wash, one of the biggest corruption scandals in all of human history-

Mm

... literally rivaling Roman levels of corruption.

Quince.com slash Tom.

Democrats can put the entire Republican Party on trial with one word, corruption.

In a nationwide poll conducted a few weeks ago and reported on by Axios, the majority of all registered voters surveyed said the number one word to describe Donald Trump is corrupt.

This represents a massive opportunity for Democrats both now and for the next two years, and the experience of candidates in today's Democratic position around the world validates the argument that this is the best way to both campaign and win elections and political power.

Peter Magyar defeated Viktor Orban in the Hungarian elections because he ran a Navalny-style playbook calling Orban's and his billionaire's buddies capture of the media and most other aspects of Hungarian life a state capture system grounded in good old-fashioned corruption.

From Orban's son-in-law pulling a Jared and using his government position to become one of the richest men in the country to his billionaire cronies buying up the media like the billionaire Ellisons are doing right now, corruption was Magyar's singular through-line message.

And it worked, producing an overwhelming turnout and an undeniable victory.

It will work here too.

[laughs]

A- and then of course there's Sergio Moro, the one-time crusading magistrate who broke open the Operation Car Wash payback scandal and who jailed Lula for corruption.

He was elected in the first round as, uh, governor of, uh, Parana State, uh, i- i- in the south.

Jamil Chade, there, there's been, uh, a lot of talk of who's on the side of fighting corruption.

And in order to, to circumvent the central bank regulation and the other banks, Master went to the political system and, um, uh, got on its side very important politicians and very important Supreme Court, uh, justices.

So for you to understand, David, Master is very different from Lava Jato and, uh, Mensalão.

Not only because Master is clearly what we say in Brazil, a banco de direita, well, s- very strong links with the Brazilian rights and Bolsonaros, but also because it's not a systemic crisis.

It's not a crisis that involves the whole s- uh, financial system, the whole political system, the whole judicial system.

It's very common among Supreme Court justices.

But the case involves Moraes because it involves, uh, a felony that in Brazil we called advocacia administrativa, which is when an off- a public officer, uh, advocates privately, uh, or lobbies privately for, uh, uh, some particular interest.

So, um, it's different from Lava Jato, but very important.

And because Bolsonaro was convicted by Moraes and by the Supreme Court, and because he cannot run, the Brazilian right wants to remove, uh, Moraes from his post or impeach Moraes, uh, through this scandal.

They can help sometimes, uh...

Af- when, when Brazil, you had the Lava Jato scandal, you had the Brazilian authorities collaborating with DOJ.

That was a big change for the Brazilian compliance landscape.

Um, so, so again, we have a lot to, to learn and, and to be, uh, as multinationals, leaders in how you change the, the landscape.

Yeah, you mentioned, um, Lava Jato then, and that's very interesting because, I mean, that's 10 years ago that that started now.

Right.

Right? And I, I wonder, especially given that statistic I fired at you about this perception at least that corruption's risen in the past 12 months, is there a lot more then that multinationals could be doing? Do you think they've taken their foot off the pedal a little bit? You know, 'cause things aren't going in the right direction looking at those statistics, are they?

Um, well, actually Lava Jato is a good ex- a good example because it didn't, it didn't end well.