The mountain gave birth to a Moro.

The bourgeoisie has no heroes, no leaders, no parties. It uses one or the other as it sees fit.

In Brazil, she was a liberal with the UDN and Carlos Lacerda against Getúlio Vargas. Later, with Lacerda's active participation, she prepared a change that culminated in the military coup and the dictatorship. After this, she converted to economic and political liberalism. Until she arrived at Collor and FHC. With these exhausted, she continued betting on the PSDB, nostalgic for the glorious times, for her, of FHC, her permanent idol.

Systematically defeated by the success of Lula's leadership and the PT governments, the bourgeoisie recycled itself for the coup, with the overthrow of Dilma, the election of Temer, and the mechanisms that led to Lula's imprisonment, conviction, and his disqualification from running for office. This allowed for the monstrous operation of the "penis-shaped baby bottle" and Bolsonaro's victory.

None of this would have been possible without Operation Lava Jato and the actions of the new darling of the Brazilian right – Judge Sergio Moro. He made possible a dream that even the most radical on the right couldn't have imagined: Lula's imprisonment and the reinforcement of his label of corrupt, even though he was convicted without evidence and finally released from prison. But the association of Lula with the idea of ​​being convicted, of being imprisoned, weighed heavily on Lula, the PT (Workers' Party), and the left.

The disastrous Temer government, openly neoliberal, with all its negative consequences for the masses, led to minimal support for that government. And, despite the strong campaign – which has left its mark to this day on sectors of the population – that the recession and unemployment were Dilma's responsibility, exploiting the very problematic start of Dilma's second term, especially since in December 2014 the economy was still growing and the country was, for the first time, reaching full employment, they restored the image of Lula's government in the people's minds. But the media campaign had reversed the consensus, now focused on fiscal adjustment and blaming the PT for the legacy inherited from subsequent governments.

Lula's image recovery was enormous, revealing how, despite the accusations and the fact that some sectors that would have opted for him would even accept them, the memory of his government and the positive changes in people's lives outweighed all that, and Lula was the favorite to win in the first round. The lack of a firm leader with popular support also contributed to this recovery. FHC, Marina, and Ciro Gomes did not demonstrate the stature to project themselves as the leaders that Brazil needs at this moment. 

The Bolsonaro operation was made possible by the complicity of the Judiciary and the active militancy of the media against the return of the PT (Workers' Party), turning a blind eye to Bolsonaro's trajectory, to his outrageous statements about the dictatorship, torture, the death penalty, and even democracy. They turned a blind eye to the "baby bottle" operation, to his refusal to participate in debates – which might have been fatal for the candidate adopted by the right – and all the doubts about the alleged stabbing. Above all, the media lacked the courage to expose Lula's conviction without evidence and strongly supported his imprisonment, conviction, and disqualification from running for office, because they knew he would win. And Lula and the PT governments are the most formidable refutation of the economic and political theses of the right – of the Washington Consensus, of the single-minded thinking, of the entire neoliberal recipe. Lula is the cursed phenomenon for the Brazilian right, one that they cannot explain, with whom they cannot debate, and, no matter how many times they reiterate that he would be a spent force, they cannot negate the presence of the only national political leader with unquestionable mass leadership.

For all these reasons, through action and inaction, through accusations without proof and through silence, the media has its hands dirty in the operation that brought Bolsonaro to the presidency and to the disasters the country is experiencing today. Without the media, the monstrous operation that led from polls in which Haddad surpassed him in the second round, to his victory, which produced the disasters for the country that all the media now acknowledges, would not have been possible.

But the fundamental reference point for this entire operation was Lava Jato and Sergio Moro, the new hero of the Brazilian and even global right wing. This operation allowed for a radical reversal of the image of the PT (Workers' Party), its governments, Lula, and Brazil itself. From a country that consistently fought against hunger, which made Lula the main leader of the left and the fight against hunger in the world, the country became synonymous with corruption, with the corresponding reversal of Petrobras' image, from a symbol of the success of a state-owned company to a den of corruption. 

The word Lula, which had become more popular as a positive identifier of Brazil, even more popular than Pelé at one point, had its meaning reversed, with the PT (Workers' Party) being associated, even by sectors of the left, with a corrupt party that became corrupt in power. Sergio Moro became known worldwide as the avenger who exposed corruption in Brazil, especially on the left. He was received as a hero in the US for having achieved what they always wanted: to remove the PT from government, discrediting it as corrupt, to arrest and convict Lula, prevent him from running for office, and elect a neoliberal and far-right candidate.

Moro's entry into the government somewhat shook his image. The revelations of Vaza Jato helped to create a view, for those who were beginning to doubt the Bolsonaro government, that he had orchestrated a sham operation in order to later benefit from it by joining the government. But a large part continued to identify him as the hero of the fight against corruption, which served as an alibi to support Bolsonaro, to hide his true interests – the neoliberal model – and his greater objective, directly associated with the restoration of this model: preventing the return of the PT to government, which remains the most important factor in understanding even the level of support that Bolsonaro continues to have.

The conflict between Bolsonaro and Moro comes at a time of marked loss of support for the government, due to its inability to grow the economy and reduce unemployment, Bolsonaro's outbursts, political infighting and loss of support from those who had elected him, increasingly clear accusations against his sons, inaction in the face of the pandemic, among other factors. The right wing has become emboldened again, believing that they once again have a right-wing leader they can trust.

Globo itself, which had launched a full-scale attack against Bolsonaro – always sparing Guedes and his economic policies – began openly promoting Moro's image again. His interview broke all records for airplay across all time slots, as did the supposed evidence he had advanced to Globo. 

But the evidence suggested by Moro, and especially the recordings shown to Globo, proved to be flimsy. The president's interventions in the Federal Police may be improper, but they are not illegal, nor do they, in themselves, constitute crimes of responsibility. Because Moro doesn't have the courage to reveal Bolsonaro's real intentions – to have the information and be able to intervene, through a Federal Police director who is a friend of the family, to protect his sons. This would constitute a crime of responsibility, intent to obstruct justice, and even prevarication. But if he touched on the subject, Moro would reveal his complicity in all of Bolsonaro's actions to protect his sons – which seems to be his greatest and perhaps only concern today in a country affected by the pandemic and unemployment, among other ills.

The right wing became excited, but neither the fragile tone of his speech, the hoarse sound of his voice, nor his lack of clarity and firmness, allowed them to find in him their rediscovered leader and hero. Bolsonaro, who is a master at these things, resumed the offensive, making serious revelations about Moro – including the exchange of a position on the Supreme Court for accepting the replacement of the director of the Federal Police, which Moro has not denied to this day, in addition to the confusing recordings he presented to Globo – the lack of investigation into the stabbing, the lack of action against violent attitudes of the Federal Police, while a campaign was being waged to tarnish Moro's image, threatening a dossier on his wife – including the accusation of embezzlement of money from APAE – against him, threatening to resume his scandalous actions in the Banestado case, among other cases. Threatening to release images that could confirm what Bolsonaro says about Moro, including his subservience and adulation of Bolsonaro. Several analyses reveal how difficult it is for Moro to prove accusations against Bolsonaro without himself, as a member of the government, incriminating himself. (In addition to the sordid request for funds for his family.)

Unless the eight hours of statements to the Federal Police have radically changed the terms of Moro's interventions so far – which seems unlikely, because he presented his main arguments in the press conference and in the recordings given to Globo – Moro may have gotten himself into a tight spot. Bolsonaro will not forgive any further missteps on his part, as he has already done with accusations based on weak evidence so far, to the point of Bolsonaro reiterating that the accuser has the burden of proof and that Moro must present the evidence to the Supreme Court. Moro's summons to testify in the process accepted by the Supreme Court is not necessarily favorable to him, depending on the evidence he presents and the skill he demonstrates in not incriminating himself. The predictions are not necessarily favorable to him and unfavorable to Bolsonaro. His image is at stake, and the process could be fatal for him.

The immediate consequences were not good for the right wing, which expected a radical drop in support for Bolsonaro, which did happen, on the order of 8% in his image and even less in that of his government. At his worst moment, Bolsonaro maintains 28% support, and that support is higher than that of political leaders like Moro. Moro's lack of firmness in facing the fierce offensive from Bolsonaro's supporters against him is eroding his public image as the kind of leader the right wing would like him to be: firm, aggressive, offensive, and convincing.

Bolsonaro lost one of the pillars of his government, which underpinned his supposed fight against corruption. Aware of his weakening position, Bolsonaro abandoned the prospect of maintaining his original support and began to defend himself against impeachment by winning over the centrist bloc through the exchange of positions, which contradicts another pillar of his government – ​​the fight against old politics. But he realizes that any impeachment process would have to end up in Congress and is trying to defend himself there, even with the strain on sectors of his original support base.

On the other hand, it takes advantage of the weaknesses of the social isolation policy, which is impossible for a large part of the population, who neither protect themselves at home due to the precarious conditions in which they live, nor can they stop going out into the streets to seek their livelihood. The calculations of 62,1 million people in fragile conditions reflect the scale of these people living in precarious conditions who cannot afford to stay at home for months without income or with only the meager government assistance they manage to obtain. 

Bolsonaro wants to yield to the interests of big business, which wants the immediate and total resumption of economic activities, while simultaneously yielding to the needs of small and medium-sized businesses, suffocated by the lack of economic activity, and the masses who need to earn their living on the streets. Polls indicate that Bolsonaro has lost support in sectors with higher levels of education, but has partially compensated with popular support, probably from those sectors needing to go out into the streets, as evidenced by the movement of people in favelas and working-class neighborhoods throughout Brazil. It's not about preaching the health advantages of isolation as the media does. The vast majority who do not obey social isolation are not the behavior of wealthy women walking their dogs, but of this poor and majority mass of the population. If they want the masses of the population to obey social isolation, they must guarantee them systematic and substantial financial support. On the one hand, the government is incompetent to fulfill this, and on the other hand, Bolsonaro is exacerbating the crisis, which is becoming increasingly severe, stemming from this isolation policy, which can only be obeyed by those with good housing conditions and guaranteed income—that is, the minority. Therefore, even today only half the population is obeying the isolation measures, and the situation is likely to worsen, given the current health catastrophe and deterioration of living conditions for the majority of Brazilians.

The right-wing excitement surrounding Moro is tending to subside. They've already been disappointed by the much lower degree of erosion of Bolsonaro's support and by the ability of Bolsonaro's supporters to counter-offensive against Moro, as well as Moro's impotence in defending himself and publicly resuming the offensive. The traditional columnists obsessively committed to anti-PT sentiment, the same ones who said that the PT was concerned about Mandetta's image, hastily elevated to the right-wing candidate against the PT, now say that the PT prefers to confront Bolsonaro rather than Moro. A sweet illusion for the widows of FHC, the PSDB, Bolsonaro, and now, it seems, Moro himself.

If Moro becomes worn down by this complex situation he has gotten himself into, misjudging it, the right wing will be left with the alternatives it had before this episode: militarization of the government or the delicate operation of placing Mourão in the presidency. Or, the panic that it has, of a political crisis of proportions, which leaves open alternatives for the country, reopening the possibilities of what it has most: elections and democracy. The mountain will have, once again, given birth to a mouse, for the right wing, in its eternal search for the anti-PT savior.