Has Bolsonaro been naughty or nice?

If you have a younger sibling, you might have experienced the feeling of fighting over gifts when a kid. It is the norm for children close in age: they complain about what they received and, at the same time, want what their parents gave the other kid. 

This tale relates to children but is certainly useful to explain the not-close-to-an-adult behavior of President Jair Bolsonaro when it comes to accepting… anything. This time we’re not talking about gifts, but about this year’s electoral results that made Mr. Bolsonaro the first and only head of state to not be reelected. 

He is still the president and, by not accepting the results, he attacks the democratic order, causes political instability, and, even worse, encourages thousands of people to embark on his own stubbornness.

After being defeated, Bolsonaro isolated himself from everything and everyone. And to keep his undemocratic intentions warm enough, in another example of not accepting reality, he has raised a mystery about whether he will hand over the presidential sash to his political nemesis Lula in January. This indecision paved the way for many alternatives. His VP could step in and carry out the tradition, someone representing “the people” could do it, or, who knows, Brazil might even ditch the sash-swapping ceremony altogether. 

But we have a better idea: why doesn’t Santa Claus hand over the sash? We know he’s not real, but he’s about as real as Bolsonaro’s claims that the elections were rigged. Food for thought. 

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• While Bolsonaro remains silent, his allies begin accepting defeat