A coup is imminent.

The figure of speech used by an anonymous military officer in the Estadão newspaper could be attributed to General Heleno, who abandoned quarantine and is already fighting in the Planalto Palace: “If someone gets shot in the leg in a war, they can't just lie there waiting to be treated to have the bullet removed; they need to keep attacking, reacting, to guarantee their survival.” This image reflects the thinking of at least ten officers interviewed by that newspaper: fearful of social chaos, they support Trump's position of relativizing life in favor of economic laissez-faire. Their reservations about Bolsonaro, for now, are limited to his erratic and emotionally unbalanced behavior. Even so, they could definitively end our last democratic breath using a Mourão-style move.

The coup machine set in motion by the wandering gang sheltered in the Alvorada Palace is now opposed by the revived center-right, the PSDB-DEM alliance with strong positions in the legislature (Alcolumbre-Maia), in state governments (notably Dória, the neophyte Witzel and our new Toninho Malvadeza, the ruralist Caiado who has just shouted "Ties off" to the Décio Limas of the moment), the judiciary and in the media.

A favorable outcome for the center-right in this coup-mongering tidal wave depends, however, on a difficult move for this bloc: accepting the untimely nature of market fundamentalism. The military is right to fear the social explosion resulting from the prolonged confinement of millions of Brazilians to indecent housing, where everything was already lacking, without any prospect of employment or income. Gotardo, executive secretary of the Ministry of Health, is not enough. Someone like his former boss, José Serra, would have to lead this revived Center towards the economic specificities of this epic crisis: income of at least 350 reais per family member without income, support for small and medium-sized employees, guaranteed employment and income for formal workers... in short, every effort, even with a debt of 10% of GDP, to prevent the country from piling up dead bodies. 

Would they unite in favor of a large-scale effort to improve sanitation, disinfection, and cleanup of cities and their impoverished communities? Would they convert industries and invest what is necessary to restore and revitalize the public health system, research...? Clear proposals that could discredit the cynical Trumpian slogan that only the market saves and attract military personnel concerned about the country's future.

Overcoming the Bolsonaro-militia coup would, however, be much easier if, instead of a narrow center-right bloc, we had a revived, broader bloc for national salvation from Bolsonaro-militiaism, like the one that united the MDB of Ulisses and Montoro, the PDT of Brizola, the PT of Lula...

Doria is not Montoro, Rodrigo Garcia is not Claudio Lembo, Witzel is light years away from Brizola. This is what we have. How can we prevent an anti-PT bloc from emerging victorious in the current coup-mongering tidal wave, and keeping the country in a perverse dynamic of stagnation and deepening inequalities? Would a front that included former presidents FHC and Lula open alternative paths? Hope must overcome fear. Replacing the militia-like Bolsonaro regime with Mourão's ultra-liberal eccentricity is the last thing the country needs to face this now intensified war against disease, poverty, and inequality.