Via NY Post:
BRASILIA, Brazil — Brazilians struggled Friday to comprehend the protests shaking their nation after 1 million anti-government demonstrators took to the streets the previous night in scores of cities, with clusters battling police and destroying swaths of storefronts and government buildings.
President Dilma Rousseff held an emergency meeting about the protests with the nation’s justice minister but didn’t make any comment afterward, continuing her largely silent response to the unrest.
Her aides said they didn’t know if she would address the nation in an attempt to calm protesters, but she was expected to meet in the afternoon with top bishops from the Catholic Church about the protests’ possible effects on a papal visit still scheduled next month in Rio and Sao Paulo state.
Rousseff, a former leftist guerrilla who was imprisoned and tortured during Brazil’s military dictatorship, has done little more than show brief support for the protesters since the biggest demonstrations seen here in decades began a week ago. That mute reaction has triggered furious criticism that she has let the situation spiral out of control.