Venezuela: is anyone still betting on the opposition?Not me. Even a penny. But let's read its renewed commitments. “[We] are getting closer and closer to that change we [...] deserve so much (...) See you very soon in the streets of our beloved country”, declared yesterday opposition leader María Corina Machado, who has not been seen in public for weeks. I do not know what chess board the former congresswoman has in front of her, but I see checkmate in a move for her defense. The opposition does not have the muscle to win the pulse of Chavismo, which also surpasses it in wisdom—by a long distance—to fight political battles. I say this without disregarding the messy and obscure electoral management of Chavismo, but arguing that the opposition should have defended its point about the electoral fraud before the judiciary—when it had the chance—, and that the decision to go to the polls with Edmundo González Urrutia was a huge nonsense. The cowardice of the stammering former candidate dynamited all the roads that could lead the anti-Chavez supporters to the Miraflores Palace, if any existed.

SourceBolivian President Luis Arce on Monday fueled the narrative that Evo Morales is a “pedophile”, claiming that the former president and veteran coca growers' union leader's alleged sexual proclivities were “common knowledge”. Morales was formally accused of having relations with a 15-year-old girl—back in 2016—who belonged to a youth movement associated with his political organization and specifically attached to him. In practice, the teenager's parents allegedly gave her to the then president in exchange for political perks, and a daughter was born as a result of the relationship.

SourceThis was a tragic weekend for the region, particularly in Brazil. The South American giant mourns the death of 41 people in a major road accident early Saturday morning, the deadliest in the last 17 years. According to preliminary information, a large block of granite broke off the body of a truck and hit a bus with 45 passengers traveling in the opposite direction by the municipality Teófilo Otoni. The driver of the truck, who had his driving license revoked since 2022 for refusing a breathalyzer test, cowardly fled from the scene of fire and scorched flesh.

SourceThe sheriff of Lincoln City, Oregon, has called on its citizens to act in the spirit of the state's signature immigration legislation, the first to introduce the so-called sanctuary laws some 37 years ago. Citizens and officials in localities such as Lincoln City and also the small Toledo have received letters inciting them to collect and send data on potential undocumented immigrants, in a manifestation of the rhetoric and policies embraced by Donald Trump. Strategic places to obtain information—particularly license plate numbers—are church parking lots or the pick-up line for school children. The FBI has been made aware of the reported dynamics.

SourceEcuadorians will once again be able to live without the crippling scourge of power outages they have suffered since last September. A crushing drought joined the chronic lack of attention to the thermal generation plant to configure a very complex context for the national electric system. Scheduled blackouts extended up to 14 hours a day at the most critical moment of the power contingency, which, as expected, has had a notable impact on productive activity. The outlook has now improved thanks to the recovery of—and the incorporation of new—power generation capacity in the order of 800 MW, the return of energy imports from Colombia—which also faced a crisis peak recently—, and better weather. But the supply still does not cover the demand, so seven companies linked to steel, cement and mining production will continue to be limited in consumption. Experts point out that the outages may return next year if appropriate measures to improve the resilience of the system are not taken.

A vendor in Rio de Janeiro back in 2021 (sourceLula da Silva's administration is going through its worst moment, amid a downward popular valuation and growing fiscal tensions. The Brazilian currency bottomed out historically on Wednesday against the dollar—in nominal terms—, and its annual depreciation is already approaching a quarter of its initial value. Yet it performed very well yesterday, Thursday, with a strong rebound of nearly 2.3%, fueled by two strong auctions by the monetary authority totaling US$8 billion. A legislative proposal comprising cuts of $11 billion in Planalto's spending does not calm the doubts of critical financial market players. “It is not the market that needs to be worried about government spending. It is our administration. If I don't rein in spending, if I spend more than I have, it is the poor people who will pay for it,” the Brazilian president said. In this context, the federal government has requested an investigation to determine the impact of a series of fake news spread on Social Media on the money market´s health, alleging a coordinated attack.