Tijolaço: Cunha is a bomb that Temer has to defuse.

By Fernando Brito, from brick

Today's report from State St. Paul It reveals an attempt to throw the main architect of the impeachment, Eduardo Cunha, overboard.

"The strategy to remove Cunha from the scene has been called behind the scenes in the government and Congress 'Operation Cat's Paw,' a double reference to the feline's gesture of striking and immediately withdrawing its paw, and to the act of acting stealthily. The fear of the PMDB and the Planalto Palace is that Cunha, in a gesture of revenge, might make accusations against Temer and the party. In the Planalto Palace, the assessment is that Cunha has become a factor that only hinders the government."

Within the Centrão bloc, the prevailing belief is that "the creature has become bigger than its creator," as one leader defined it when speaking about the group and Cunha. The bloc's objective is to maintain power over the leadership of the Chamber of Deputies and to ensure the successor to the ousted president of the House is elected."

According to reporters Alberto Bombig and Igor Gadelha, Cunha is beginning to show signs of instability – very unusual for his glacial behavior – in the face of the possibility that his wife might be arrested by Judge Sérgio Moro.

They say that two congressmen who were supposedly close to him advised him to resign, "for the good of the government of acting president Michel Temer." They report that the "ice block" lost control and, shouting, said that he would never take that action because Moro would "besiege" him and his family.

Obviously, Cunha knows that this wouldn't be done without at least the approval of the Temer government, but he still believes that the power he holds in the Chamber is a stronger reason for Temer to maintain the complicity with him that, ultimately, led to his nullity in the office of President.

But he also knows that establishment, Led by Globo, they want to get rid of Cunha as quickly as possible, so that only the most opportunistic group in the Chamber remains aligned with Temer, thus enabling, without surprises, the approval of measures restricting social and labor rights—a bitter pill for part of the so-called "Centrão" (center bloc).

The pressure is undisguised:

"Schizophrenic behavior" [by Temer] This becomes even more evident in the relationship with the suspended Speaker of the House, Eduardo Cunha. All of his appointees to the federal government were nominated and retained even after his removal. The government lacked the courage to support the dismissal of his replacement, a figurehead created by the arrogance of someone who knows he is beyond the reach of retaliation. Moreover, it aided in the maneuvers to prevent Cunha's impeachment.

Cunha is a ticking time bomb that Temer needs to defuse. But he's not the one wielding the pliers he intends to use to cut the wire, as if it were so simple to end the blackmail power of someone who, for more than a decade, has accumulated accomplices, as is the interim president himself.