Free Republic

For nearly five decades the left has been trying to impose a socialist and confiscatory land reform on Brazil. From the beginning, the so-called Catholic left, and particularly the National Conference of Brazilian Bishops (CNBB), has been the leading proponents and the most important driving force of that policy. With strong links to this Catholic left, the government of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva made land reform one of its main goals. For this purpose it designated Miguel Rossetto from the Workers Party's most radical wing as the Minister of Land Reform. The party also gave the government posts...

LISBON (AFP) - Portugal wrapped up campaigning ahead of a weekend presidential election which is expected to select a right-of-centre leader for the first time since democracy was restored in 1974. Economics professor Anibal Cavaco Silva, who oversaw a period of economic growth as a centre-right prime minister between 1985 and 1995, has between 52 and 53 percent support, four polls published Friday showed. The 66-year-old candidate, backed by the Social Democrats and the smaller Popular Party, needs to get more than 50 percent of the vote on Sunday to avoid a runoff election between the top two contenders on...

LISBON (Reuters) - Portugal's opposition Socialists scored their biggest-ever electoral victory on Sunday as voters ousted centre-right Prime Minister Pedro Santana Lopes after only seven months in power, exit polls showed. Western Europe's poorest nation swung to the left in giving Socialist leader Jose Socrates an absolute majority in parliament needed to implement a platform the party said would boost the lagging economy. Analysts said the resounding win amid a large turnout was a welcome sign of stability for the nation of 10 million people. Socrates's government will be Portugal's fourth in three years. President Jorge Sampaio dissolved parliament...