Temer is the Benjamin Button of politics.

In David Fincher's film "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button," the character played by Brad Pitt reverses the chronological order of life, being born old, in his eighties, and shrinking in age and size throughout his existence until he transforms into a baby before dying. 

With the important caveat that the Temer government will never enjoy the golden years of youth, just like Button, since it follows a meteoric trajectory from birth to decline, the comparison between fiction and our sad reality makes sense. 

Temer came to power already worn down and corroded by having resorted to an old trick of the Brazilian elite: the coup d'état. And he grows smaller every day, withering away at a speed that surprises even his earliest allies in the rupture of the democratic order. 

With his stance on the two horrific episodes that marked the turn of the year – the carnage of prisoners in Manaus and the massacre in Campinas – the usurper has diminished himself morally and politically even further. The massacre of 56 inmates (beheaded, dismembered, and burned) during the rebellion in the Amazonian prison was promptly and strongly condemned by both the UN and Pope Francis.

But the coup leader who illegitimately occupies the Presidential Palace remained silent. Whether because he didn't know what to say, or to avoid political contagion, he preferred, as always, to evade his responsibilities. And five days later, when he decided to speak out, yielding to pressure, the remedy was worse than the disease. It would have been better if he hadn't opened his mouth at all.

Instead of confronting the debate about the national disgrace that is our prisons, veritable branches of hell where prisoners are denied the most basic human rights, in a system that, far from rehabilitating them for reintegration into society, causes hundreds of thousands of convicts to become even more lost in the depths of the criminal world, what is the dwarf in the Presidential Palace doing?

First, he downplays the massacre, treating it as a "horrific accident." Then, he stumbles with his limited intellectual capacity, offering conflicting analyses. While stating that the administration of the prison system falls to the states, he absolves the Amazonas government by claiming that state responsibility is unclear, since the prisons in that state were privatized. Well, privatized by whom, for goodness sake?

Regarding the massacre of 12 people, including a child and nine women, perpetrated by one of the many beasts produced by machismo and misogyny, Temer has not spoken out. Not a single word of consolation for the relatives of the victims of this barbaric crime against women and their rights.

If this happened in other civilized countries, a femicide of this magnitude would deserve the vehement condemnation of the authorities. But the content of the murderer's letter, full of attacks on women, the law, the Constitution, the Republic, and social coexistence, offers clues to understanding Temer's silence.

Perhaps this cowardly omission has something to do with the fact that his ally, the corrupt and monopolistic media, is largely responsible for spreading the disease of hatred that has spread throughout society? Furthermore, the Bolsonaro-esque statements contained in the letter resonate with a considerable number of deputies and senators who support Temer in the National Congress.

Out with Temer, Direct Elections Now!