In the 2018 election campaign, Jair Bolsonaro was portrayed as a man faithful to the military, having once served as an Army captain. Indeed, support from the Armed Forces was crucial in eventually propelling him to the presidency, not least after choosing retired General Hamilton Mourão as his running mate. Since taking office, however, the government and the military have been at each other’s throats, in a dispute which gained further proportions after new social media scandals this weekend, burying once and for all Jair Bolsonaro’s image as a “military man.”
As a general rule, any behind-the-scenes quarrels in the Jair Bolsonaro government will eventually — one way or another — end up on social media. The spat with the military is no exception. On Saturday, Mr. Bolsonaro’s official YouTube channel posted a video depicting Olavo de Carvalho, the president’s ideological savant, shooting rifles, and discussing the Bolsonaro presidency.
In the video, Mr. Carvalho rails against the “intrigue, egotism, and vanity” surrounding the government. “I think [Jair] Bolsonaro is a martyr, just for putting up with these sons of bitches he has around him,” he snarled.
Olavo de Carvalho opens fire on social media
While some of the...
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