> don't see how sacrificing jungle would get Brazil a top-tier semiconductor industry.

It wouldn't. It was just a rhetorical device to express the fact I care far more about national industrial and economic development than some jungle.

> US influence in South America is a pretty bloody chapter in history.

I agree, but Lula's no paragon here. He's had ~20 years to undo the neoliberal privatization policies enacted as of the Washington Consensus.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington_Consensus

Instead of actually reindustrializing Brazil, he anesthetized the population with handouts and lined his pockets. Meanwhile, banks are literally raking in record profits.