Bad, Bad Bird Dog
By I’ve mentioned before that Tacitus.org is a pretty pointless blog when Tac himself isn’t posting. Harley, the liberal, is decent but hardly anything special. The rest don’t do anything but spew the worst of conservative received wisdom. Today, Bird Dog weighs in on the election of Chavez:
Although several websites have serious questions about the election, the Carter Center and the Organization of American States gave the Venezuelan recall a stamp of authenticity, so Fidel-wannabe Hugo Chavez retains power, the New York Times reports. His keys to victory were the largesse he lavished on the electorate prior to August 15th, support from the poorer elements, the power of incumbency and an opposition fractured into 27 political parties.
Translation: He probably didn’t win, but if he did, it was because poor people voted for him, who really shouldn’t count. Anyway, “several websites” are asking questions about the election, which shows clearly that there’s something rotten going on. Also, in spite of the fact that the vote was “yes” or “no,” the fracturing of the opposition somehow let Chavez slip through.
Will the recall put the brakes on Chavez’s power grab or will he continue to consolidate power, take away freedoms and usher in a Castro-style communist state? Chavez may claim“humbleness” but I fear the latter. Chavez is a communist in command of large oil reserves, an advantage that Castro, Allende and Ortega never had.
Translation: He’s clearly a communist monster. The fact that he has won several democratic elections, and that his opponents best chance of removing him seems to be with a coup, demonstrates all the more clearly that he is a viscious dictator bent on domination of his own people and anyone else he can find. Exactly like Fidel Castro, except elected. Several times. By large majorities. Using constitutional means. With the benefit of a free press that virulently hates him.
The worst story concerned a mother and her three year old child. Outside a shopping area, after dark, a robber accosted her. He demanded that she, at gunpoint, surrender her expensive earings. Scared for her life and holding her child closely, she did just that. The robber than gave her a look of scorn as he said “The President is right when he says that you rich people have so many possessions that you do not care if you lose one. Well, I am going to take something from you that you do care about it.” With that he put the gun to the three year old’s head, and blew his brains out.
Translation: Even more so than in the United States, the wealthy of Latin America have achieved their positions through merit. In fact, it is remarkable that an area that produces such virulent communists also produces good hearted capitalists who, with their own sweat and toil, fight their way to the top. It certainly isn’t the case that a semi-feudal aristocracy rooted in the Spanish era still dominates Venezuelan elite circles. No, not at all. Also, clearly, poor people in Latin America shouldn’t be allowed to vote, because one or more of them may have killed a rich person at one point in the near or distant past.
This isn’t over yet, and it may explain why Chavez was willing to proceed with a recall election. By gaming the system, victory is ensured and he looks so democratic doing it. This will not be settled until the polling results are audited. Carroll Andrew Morse writes in TCS how Chavez has subverted democracy and grown more dictatorial since his rise to power in December 1998.
Translation: Our side may have lost, but we certainly shouldn’t act as if it has lost. Obviously, the effort to have a democratic election was just a scam designed to promote authoritarianism. Very clever, those communists. Almost, but not quite, as clever as the boys at TechCentralStation.
Venezuela’s National Electoral Council will conduct an audit of Sunday’s recall vote on President Hugo Chavez to address opposition allegations of fraud, former U.S. President Jimmy Carter said. Chavez, 50, won the referendum 58 percent to 42 percent, based on 94.5 percent of the vote counted, council President Francisco Carrasquero said at a press conference in Caracas yesterday. The council will do a manual audit of returns from 150 voting centers and compare
the results with those from automatic voting machines, Carter said at a press conference in Caracas. The audit will be monitored by international observers, and officials from the government and opposition, which is led by Miranda State Governor Enrique Mendoza and Julio Borges, national coordinator for the First Justice Party.
Translation: Chavez is so confidant that Jimmy Carter is also a communist that he has decided to allow a recount. This is another clever ploy to destroy democracy by being overly democratic. We who fondly remember the Reagan administration understand this well; it is often necessary to destroy a democracy in order to save it for rulers that we like.
Ok, enough of that. Venezuela is going to slip out of the news, regardless of how guys like Bird Dog feel. The markets are really happy with the Chavez victory, and don’t want anymore instability. The Bush administration won’t mess with Chavez at all until November, which should give Chavez plenty of time to consolidate himself. Then, I suppose, the wingnuts can return to hatching plots to overthrow Latin American leftists.