I know very little about Brazil or Bolsonaro but one thing I read which shocked me was the statistic that 30% of the citizens of Rio were caught in cross fire in the last year [1]. If that's accurate it's mind blowing and really helps me to understand why Brazilians want a political change and somebody (perceived to be) tough on crime. It's like there are problems with the lower levels of the hierarchy of needs, and only after safety and stability are established will people care about the environment, liberal ideals, or fair treatment of people.

1 - https://www.presstv.com/DetailFr/2018/04/02/557207/Brazil-Ri...

> If that's accurate it's mind blowing and really helps me to understand why Brazilians want a political change and somebody (perceived to be) tough on crime.

That's understandable, and I'm certainly in no position to judge the people of Brazil. However it's possible for both of these to be true:

* Brazil is facing a public safety crisis that requires immediate, drastic action.

* Bolsanaro is a proto-fascist opportunist capitalizing on the crisis to rise to power.

I agree, and, knowing little about Brazil, that's what I think is happening. The thought behind my response was that I wanted to stress that the motivation behind electing Bolsonaro may be more serious than making trains run on time.

Mussolini was a better choice then many socialist back then. His power was massively checked and only because of development in Germany did it end up as it did.

The new guy is of course a major asshat, but government before was making lots of really bad choices as well and Brazil was not going in a good direction.

The important thing is to not let anybody get enough power to remove the whole institutional machinery.