January 6^th in Brazil: Thousands of supporters of Brazil’s right-wing former president, Jair Bolsonaro, yesterday stormed the buildings that house the three branches of government in a massive protest over what they claim was a stolen election.

  They set a fire in the lower house of  Congress, rifled through papers in the president’s office where they tried to barricade themselves inside, and broke windows at the Supreme Court.

  The riots were the result of election-fraud claims by Bolsonaro and his supporters. In video reminiscent of the January 6^th insurrection in Washington, rioters can be seen smashing windows and occupying the upper house of Brazil’s congress. People with covered heads waved flags and battled with sticks as tear gas wafted through the area. 

  The military police eventually took back all three buildings and Three Powers Square. Hundreds of people were reported to have been arrested and the federal district governor said on Twitter that they “will pay for the committed crimes.”

  Bolsonaro for years has been feeding his supporters with lies about the country’s electin systems and the recent election he lost, undermining confidence in his country’s elections. Since December, he has been living in a rented house in Orlando, a few miles from Disney World.

It’s Political: After a 15 round slugfest in which California’s Kevin McCarthy was elected Speaker, the House goes to work today setting the rules for the session, probably turning off all the C-Span cameras that allowed the country to see how the sausage was made for four days last week.

  McCarthy has always been said to have wanted to become speaker “in the worst possible way,” and that may be exactly what he did. He gave away power over moving legislation … a primary function of the Speaker … and agreed to allow a single unhappy member to trigger a vote on his removal. 

  But like a true political professional, McCarthy ground down his die hard opponents until he convinced them to vote merely “present,” thereby lowering the number of votes he needed to win the 15^th round. McCarthy’s “never Kevin” opponents had nothing and no one to offer as an alternative except “no.” 

  After days of speeches about “the American people” and what “we were elected to do,”  it’s interesting to note that cumulatively over the 15 votes, McCarthy was outpolled by Democrat Hakim Jeffries 3,179 to 3,072. But, that’s not how it works.

  The stalemate that crippled the House is a harbinger of what might come as the result of  ideological infighting among the Republicans. McCarthy is going to have to work with about 20 members who don’t like him and some who don’t even like government. He could have a hard time passing  government funding bills and financing the federal debt. He’s up against some people who might not care if the government goes into default on its debt.

The War Room: The US and France announced that they are both sending Ukraine tracked armored fighting vehicles in support of their ground war.

  Fighting vehicles are often confused with tanks, but that’s not what they are. In the case of the Bradley, it’s a ferocious machine capable of carrying a half-dozen infantry and armed with a 25 mm chain gun, a machine gun, and anti-tank missiles.  Powerful as it is, the Bradley is not a substitute for the M1 tank and the German Leopard, which are what the Ukrainians really want. 

  Russian forces are attempting to encircle the Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine, north of the sea of Azov. While there are some Russian claims of imminent success, reality tells a different story.

  The Institute for the Study of War says, “the recent rate of gains in this area has been on the order of a few hundred meters a day, at most.”

   The head of the Russia’s Wagner mercenary group, Yevgeny Prigozhin, recently admitted that his fighters have sometimes spent weeks trying to capture a single house in Bakhmut. Prigozhin was seen in a video visiting a basement stacked with the bodies of his men killed in fighting for the city and being prepared for shipment home.

The Obit Page: Bernard Kalb, a former correspondent for CBS, NBC, and The New York Times died yesterday at his home in North Bethesda, Maryland. He was 100. Kalb covered wars, revolutions, and the diplomatic breakthroughs ending the Cold War.

  Bernard was the lesser-known brother of correspondent Marvin Kalb. A joke floating around CBS told of a woman calling the newsroom saying, “This is Marvin Kalb’s mother, is Bernard there?” 

— Adam Rich, who as a child actor with a manicured mop of hair became famous playing the youngest Bradford family member in the television drama “Eight Is Enough,” died at home in Los Angeles at age 54. No cause of death was given. 

The Spin Rack: American skier  Mikaela Shiffrin won the women’s slalom in Slovenia yesterday, matching Lindsey Vonn’s women’s World Cup skiing record of 82 wins. She has a shot at breaking the record on Tuesday. — Despite having lost the election as well as a lawsuit to overturn the result, failed Arizona republican gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake has taken to calling herself the “duly elected” governor of the state. —The first grade teacher shot by a six-year-old boy in Virginia last week was trying to confiscate the gun when the boy fired. It has not been reported where the boy got the gun.

Below the Fold: The fight for Speaker last week spawned some new names for the extreme right that was holding up the House: The Taliban 20, The Chaos Caucus, The Suicide Squad, and The Berserkers, after the ancient Norse warriors who fought in a drugged up fury.

  Another offshoot of the House fight is the term “Lost in the C’s” because McCarthy kept losing before the roll call had even gotten through names that begin with C. It probably won’t be the last time he’ll have lost in the C’s.