You really can’t make this stuff up. Reality has become so stupid that I don’t even need to try anymore. Let’s look at the **Rio de Janeiro Carnival**. It is supposed to be the biggest party on Earth. It is supposed to be about dancing, music, feathers, and forgetting about your miserable life for a few days. It is a time to let loose.

So, what does one samba school decide to do during the world's most famous festival? Did they build a float about dragons? Did they make a giant bird? Did they make something cool? No.

They built a **giant robot version of Brazil's President Lula**.

Specifically, they built a massive, mechanical tribute to the political leader. And guess what happened? It flopped. It failed. It face-planted. The school that decided to turn a party into a political rally came in dead last in the **carnival competition rankings**. Last place. The bottom of the barrel.

This is just perfect. It is the most beautiful thing I have heard all week.

The float was supposed to tell a story. You know the story. We have all heard it a million times. The "poor boy made good." The guy who came from nothing and became the boss. They tried to make it look heroic. They had this giant, stiff figure dressed up like a worker, trying to tug at your heartstrings. But it didn't look like a hero. It looked like what it was: a creepy idol built to worship a politician.

Why do people do this? Why do they feel the need to treat politicians like rock stars? Politicians are not rock stars. They are barely even people. They are boring managers in suits who take your money and promise to fix potholes that never get fixed. They don't deserve giant floats. They deserve a firm handshake and a stern look. That's it.

But the supporters of this guy, the Left in **Brazilian politics**, they just couldn't help themselves. They had to inject their ideology into the one place where people go to escape the news cycle. They thought, "Hey, everyone loves our guy! Let’s build a fifty-foot robot of him! Everyone will cheer!"

They were wrong. The judges looked at it and said, "No." The people looked at it and yawned. It turns out that when people want to party, they don't want a lecture about how great the President is.

And let’s talk about the robot part. It is accidentally the most honest thing they could have done. A robot is cold. A robot does what it is programmed to do. A robot has no feelings. A robot has no soul. Isn't that exactly what a politician is? Whether it is the Left or the Right, they are all just machines. They smile when the program says smile. They wave when the program says wave. They repeat the same slogans over and over again until their batteries run out.

So, in a way, this samba school was telling the truth. They just didn't mean to. They accidentally showed us the real face of modern power: a stiff, fake, mechanical giant that looms over everyone while we try to dance.

I am sure the other side, the Right, is laughing their heads off right now. They love to see the **Lula administration** fail symbolically. But don’t think for a second that they are any better. If it was their guy in charge, they would have built a giant golden statue. They would have made a float covered in money and guns. They are just as obsessed with worshiping their leaders as the other side. They are all the same.

But the fact that this thing came in last place gives me a tiny bit of hope. Just a tiny bit. It means that maybe, just maybe, regular people are tired of it. Maybe the average person on the street looked at that giant robot and thought, "This is weird. This is too much."

We are drowning in politics every day. It is on the news. It is on your phone. It is at the dinner table. And now they want to drag it into the Carnival? Give it a rest. Let people dance without having to look at a giant mechanical President.

The embarrassment must be huge. Imagine spending all that money. Imagine all the time it took to build that thing. The paint, the metal, the hours of labor. And for what? To be the loser. To be the laughingstock. It is a waste of resources that could have been used for literally anything else. But that is politics for you. A giant waste of time and money that ends up disappointing everyone.

So, goodbye to the Lula robot. I hope they recycle it. Maybe they can turn it into something useful, like a toaster or a trash can. Because as a float, and as a symbol, it was a total disaster. And honestly, it couldn't have happened to a more deserving group of people. When you mix your hero worship with a party, you deserve to be the wallflower. You deserve to be last.

***

### References & Fact-Check * **Event Verification:** A giant puppet/robot depicting President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva was featured by the Gaviões da Fiel samba school during the Rio Carnival. * **Competition Results:** The Gaviões da Fiel school finished in last place (13th) in the Special Group competition, resulting in their relegation to the Gold Series. * **Source:** [Giant robot tribute to Brazil's President Lula comes last in carnival competition](https://www.bbc.com/news/videos/cgjz234pj3lo?at_medium=RSS&at_campaign=rss) (BBC News)