By Alex Cuadros
Widespread anger over corruption helped to bring about Rousseff’s downfall, but in getting rid of her the Congress has swapped one President tainted by scandal for another.
Early last Thursday morning, after Brazil’s senators voted to begin an impeachment trial against President Dilma Rousseff, fireworks crackled in cities around the country. Rousseff was out at last. During her five and a half years in office, she had presided over the country’s deepest recession since the nineteen-thirties, and had been caught in the middle of a giant corruption scandal. Thursday’s vote forced her to step down for the duration of the impeachment trial, and no one expects her to return to power. But by the standards of the recent mass protests against Rousseff, Thursday’s celebrations were muted. In Brasília, the capital, a news photographer’s lens