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Groundhog Day in Venezuela

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Nicolas Maduro “wins” presidential elections but the opposition, the US and US-aligned governments in the region refuse to accept results. Eyes are now on Brazil, Mexico and Colombia. 

On Sunday, Venezuela’s incumbent President Nicolas Maduro won a third term in the presidential elections after obtaining 51.2% of the vote share. That’s according to Venezuela’s National Electoral Council (CNE). But did he? That is the question millions of Venezuelans are now asking themselves and each other. According to the CNE, the main opposition candidate, Edmundo Gonzalez, won 44.2% of the votes cast.

González is a former Venezuelan diplomat who was put out to pasture in 2002 after supporting the failed US-backed coup against Hugo Chavez. He is widely seen as a stand-in for Maria Corina Machado, a US-backed politician who was until recently the opposition front runner before being banned from holding political office after being charged with corruption as well as for her full-throttled support for US intervention.

During her career, Machado has backed US-led sanctions against Venezuela’s economy, the Trump administration’s farcical attempt to impose Juan Guaidó as interim president, who is now living it up in Florida, and has even asked foreign governments, including Israel and Argentina’s, to intervene militarily in Venezuela. It is crystal clear what a González-Machado ticket will mean for Venezuela: a government in thrall to the US and Israel which, like Milei’s in Argentina, will rapidly cool relations with the US’ main strategic rivals, China and Russia, lend its full support to Israel’s Gazacide and may even ask to join NATO.

“Groundhog Day in Venezuela”

Election day itself was surprisingly peaceful, though tensions have been rising  since the results were announced.

Maduro’s vote haul was down by more than a million compared with the presidential election of 2018. Following the announcement of Maduro’s triumph, US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken was among the first to cast aspersions on the results:

“We have serious concerns that the announced result does not reflect the will or the votes of the Venezuelan people. It is critical that every vote is counted fairly and transparently, that election officials immediately share information with the opposition and independent observers without delay, and that electoral authorities publish the detailed tabulation of the votes.”

Whether the US recognises the elections results is ultimately moot. Even before the elections it was among a handful of countries in the world that still failed to recognise the legitimacy of the Maduro government. As Mint Press News reports, the US government has been working overtime to dislodge Maduro’s socialist government, spending tens, if not hundreds of millions of dollars on “democracy promotion” in the country since Chavez’s electoral triumph in 1998.

Venezuela’s opposition also refused to recognise the results, just as it did in 2015 and 2019. As the Argentine geopolitical analyst Bruno Sgarzini writes, welcome to “groundhog day in Venezuela”.

Before the official results were even announced, Machado had proclaimed Gonzalez as “president-elect.” Venezuela, she said, “has a new president elect and his name is Edmundo González, and everybody knows it.”

She also claimed that the candidate of the Democratic Unitary Platform (or PUD, for its Spanish initials) had won 70% of the votes, and that Maduro had obtained just 30%, adding that PUD had won in all of the nation’s 23 states. This claim was apparently based on the quick counts coming out of just 30% of the voting sites — which invites the question: why did the opposition have access to such a small sample of results?

There were other anomalies to the proceedings. For example, it took the CNE far longer than usual to announce the results and by Tuesday evening there was still no breakdown of results by polling station. The Carter Center, which often sends election observers to Venezuela, has called on the CNE to “immediately publish the presidential election results at the polling station level.” So, too, has Brazil’s Lula government.

Exit polls conducted by US pollster Edison Research giving González a more than 30-point lead over Maduro appears to have played a key role in shaping the post-election narrative. One of the first people to publish this information was Juan Forero of The Wall Street Journal. Venezuelan opposition figures such as Leopoldo López seized on the data and spread it across social media. Given its provenance — a US journalist sharing information from a US pollster — the information was treated as gospel.

“The results are undeniable,” Lopéz declared just minutes before the CNE announced the official results. “The country has chosen the path of peace.”

What Lopéz and other members of the opposition didn’t mention (but Ben Norton does) is that Edison Research is a CIA-linked firm with a long history of providing US state propaganda organs with convenient polling results in geopolitical hotspots such as Ukraine, Georgia and Iraq:

It is too early to divine the veracity of the opposition’s allegations of electoral fraud. As I’ve already noted, there were anomalies in the reporting process. And Maduro clearly has a motive and the means to commit electoral fraud.

That said, the Maduro government did issue an alert on Sunday night warning of a massive cyber attack against the CNE’s electronic transmission system (h/t Marc). Venezuela has had an automated voting system since 2004, though it does have a physical verification system Is that why it has taken the CNE so long to produce the election results in granular format? Or is it just a pretext?

Also, disinformation on social media has played a key part in shaping the narrative. That includes a fake video of people purportedly stealing ballot boxes that was retweeted by Elon Musk, who appears to be developing a penchant for meddling in Latin American affairs on the side of US-aligned forces.

The Migration Effect

According to the CNE, voter turnout was 59% — in a country whose population has slumped by around 25% over the past decade as a result of mass migration. Abstention due to migration appears to have played a major role in the result.

In the past ten years, Venezuela’s population has shrunk by roughly a quarter after more than seven million people have fled the country trying to escape a brutal hyperinflationary crisis. A large part of that crisis was made in the USA. As Aaron Maté points out in the tweet below, John Bolton himself recently admitted to the Washington Post that the goal of US sanctions was not only to make Venezuela’s economy scream but also to “drive” its people out of the country.

Even before the Trump administration ratcheted the US’ sanctions regime against Venezuela in 2019, to coincide with its appointment of Juan Guaido as Venezuela’s interim president, the Centre for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) published a report alleging that U.S. sanctions on Venezuela had killed tens of thousands of people by crippling its ability to produce its number-one export commodity, oil, or import basic goods. Here’s Jeffrey Sachs explaining to Democracy Now how that process played out:

Calling for Another Coup

Following Sunday’s elections, 10 Latin American countries (Argentina, Chile, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Guatemala, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, the Dominican Republic and Uruguay) and the US signed a letter demanding that the “will of the Venezuelan people be respected at the polls.”

All of the governments are closely aligned with the US and their message bore a strong resemblance to the August 8, 2017 declaration of the 12-nation Lima Group, a multilateral body that was established with the goal of pursuing a peaceful overthrow of Venezuela’s government exit to Venezuela’s crisis.  As Szargini says, this is groundhog day in Venezuela.

Of course, it is not just the US that has spent the past 20 years or so trying to topple Venezuela’s Chavista government. So, too, has the British government, which “has surreptitiously given £450,000 from its overseas aid budget to establish an ‘anti-corruption’ coalition in Venezuela through a controversial fund,” as Declassified UK reported in 2020. The UK government and the companies whose interests it represents want access to the huge deposits of oil lying under Venezuelan soil or seabed.

In 2016, Maduro accused factions of the Spanish political, business and financial establishment of illegally financing Venezuela’s opposition. In the lead up to the elections a delegation of nine members of Spain’s Popular Party (PP) went to Caracas where they were duly refused entry and forced to fly back to Spain. Spain’s Pedro Sánchez government has responded by accusing the PP of using Spanish public funds to put on a “political show” in a foreign country.

One of the most vicious attack dogs this time round has been Argentine President Javier Milei, who tweeted the following message on X even before the official elections results were announced:

“The data reveals a crushing victory of the opposition and the world is waiting for [the Maduro government] to accept defeat after years of socialism, misery, decadence and death. Argentina will not recognise another fraud, and expects the Armed Forces [of Venezuela] to defend democracy and the popular will this time round.”

Former Argentine President Mauricio Macri also urged Venezuela’s armed forces to seize this opportunity to get on the right side of history and guarantee that the will of the Venezuelan people is honoured. In other words, two Argentine presidents, one current, one former, are publicly calling for a military coup in a neighbouring country, with all the chaos, destruction and bloodshed that would entail.

But even this is nothing new. Five years ago, it was Brazil’s then-President Jair Bolsonaro who was talking about mobilising Venezuela’s armed forces against the Maduro government:

“The intention of the United States and ours is to create a fissure, a division, in the Venezuelan Army. There is no other way because, as I said some time ago and I was criticized, it is the Armed Forces who decide whether a country is in a democracy or a dictatorship.”

Somewhat less rabid statements were made by many of the governments of the aforementioned countries. The Costa Rican government said that it does not recognise Maduro’s election, calling it “fraudulent” and saying it “repudiates” it. Peru’s government, led by an unelected president with a 5% approval rating, also called the election “fraudulent”. Guatemalan President Bernardo Arevalo said his government is “very hesitant” to accept the results while Ecuador’s President Daniel Noboa called for a meeting of the Permanent Council of the Washington-based Organisation of American States to discuss the crisis in Venezuela.

Chile’s ostensibly left-of-centre President Gabriel Boric also cast doubt on the election results, describing them as “difficult to believe” and stating that Chile will not recognise data “that is not verifiable.”

Maduro to Lose More Local Allies? 

Maduro is not completely isolated and his government has ridden out equally grave crises in the past. Whether he is able to ride this one out will depend on whether he maintains the support of Venezuela’s armed forces.

A number of Lat Am countries, including Honduras, Bolivia, Nicaragua and Cuba, have ratified his electoral victory. Further afield but no less importantly, both Russia and China also congratulated Maduro on his triumph. China’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Lin Jian said that Beijing is “eager to collaborate with Venezuela to further strengthen their all-weather strategic partnership, aiming to benefit both nations’ people.”

However, as of the time of writing, neither Brazil, Mexico nor Colombia, three key nations that in recent years have helped the Maduro government withstand the siege initiated by the Lima Group, had failed to recognise the election results. If one or more of these countries refuses to ratify Maduro’s triumph, his government risks becoming even more isolated in its direct neighbourhood.

Ominously, Mexico’s outgoing President Andrés Manuel Lopéz Obrador has said he will wait for all the votes to be counted before making an informed decision on the matter, which is uncharacteristic of him. Colombia’s Gustavo Petro, who is usually so vocal on foreign policy issues on social media, has opted for an uncharacteristically “eloquent silence,” as El País cheekily puts it.

Of the three countries, the one that is most likely to break ranks with Venezuela is Lula’s Brazil. Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva does not want to be perceived at home or abroad as supporting an authoritarian regime on Brazil’s borders. Just over a week ago, he admitted in an interview with international news agencies that he was “scared” on hearing his Venezuelan counterpart, Nicolás Maduro, say that there could be a “bloodbath” and a “civil war” in Venezuela if he loses the elections:

I was scared by Maduro’s statement that if he loses the elections there will be a bloodbath; whoever loses an election takes a bath of votes, not blood. Maduro has to learn that when you win, you stay [in power]; when you lose, you go.

But Lula also knows that if Maduro were to fall, there is a very real risk of Venezuela, which shares a border with Brazil, plunging into chaos. As the Wall Street Journal recently reported, US oil executives have been warning of this possible eventuality.

Lula also knows that if Venezuela’s rabidly right-wing opposition were to gain the upper hand in the country, another South American country would fall into Washington’s grip. Ecuador and Peru have already signed military partnerships with Washington over the past year while Milei’s government in Argentina has made huge concessions to Washington, including granting US SOUTHCOM a navel base in Patagonia.

Lest we forget, an attempted coup just took place in Bolivia. Like Venezuela, Bolivia is keen to join the BRICS+ grouping, which is presumably the last thing Washington wants, especially given their wealth of natural resources. As we have been reporting for the past year or so, the US is once again vigorously stirring the pot in its own “back yard” as it tries to regain geopolitical and strategic dominance over the American continent. The results could not be more clear.

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60 comments

  1. timbers

    Blinken:

    “We have serious concerns that the announced result does not reflect the will or the votes of the Venezuelan people.”

    Hypothetical Reporter: “Mr. Secretary, do your policies on Israel and Ukraine reflect the will and votes of the American People?”

    Who cares what the USA thinks about elections that are none of it’s business? If Blinken were actually concerned about fair elections, where was he when a virtually unknown nobody random guy defeated Bernie Sanders in Iowa…as reported by an “App” owned and operated by a billionaire supporting unknow nobody random guy along with the establishment folks doing the counting who the Supreme Court said have a Constitutional right to fraudulate elections.

    Moduro, China, Iran, Russia should announce every elected President in USA won by illegitimate elections because they were not authorized by the legal ruler of America, the King of England, and henceforth they will not deal with the illegitimate regime in Washington, and will update us when they have decided who is really the legitimate representative of America. Maybe some nobody unknown random guy in Siberia or Mongolia.

  2. vidimi

    what an ugly word, Gazacide. The word is Genocide. The people of Gaza, along with their history and their culture, are being exterminated. Gazacide makes it sound as if it’s something different than genocide.

    1. Philip Roddis

      Gazacide was a word well chosen. It captures both the specificity and historic generality of what’s being done there. Ugly? So it should be. Mass murder is no oil painting.

      Back to Venezuela, and a cancerous Munroe Doctrine blighting the lives of all peoples, comprador classes excepted, with the misfortune to live in Uncle Sam’s backyard – good and useful piece, Nick

  3. John

    The tattered playbook again? What did Chavez and Maduro ever do to deserve this everything-but-the-marines-wading-ashore treatment? Refused to bend a knee to the DC Bubble and Big Oil? Now that is a serious offense.

    1. Synoia

      They wanted the the US oik giants take the the spoils.

      Or it is about the spoils/.

      Non of which are a sunprise.

    1. The Rev Kev

      The US, among others, is demanding that all the results be released on a polling station by polling station level and that they do it immediately. So how long did it take the US to release all their results back in the 2020 election? More than a day or two? I think that the Venezuelans did well rejecting the neoliberal candidate approved by Washington for the devil that they know. In any case, Edmundo González was just a stooge candidate for Machado and everybody knew it. If elected, he would have been the same sort of President that Biden is right now with other people making all the real decisions.

    2. Carolinian

      Wha? And when did he stop beating his wife?

      Thanks to the above article, at least, for the clear reporting versus innuendo. Of course going back to Vietnam the US cry of “democracy” has been a smoke screen and one starts to wonder if that applies to this country as well. Clearly the intended aim against Russia was to reduce it as well to chaos so regime change could happen in the name of democracy. Our foreign policy masters of the universe don’t have much imagination and keep banging on the same drum.

  5. Martín

    The Communist Party of Venezuela challenges the results of the election

    The Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Venezuela (PCV) calls on the genuinely democratic, popular and patriotic forces to join forces to defend the will of the Venezuelan people, which was expressed this Sunday, July 28, with a clear intention of political change in the country.

    Hopefully now there can be no further discussion about the lack of legitimacy of the elections? I don’t think anybody will claim for the PCV to be a US puppet, right?

    1. Carolinian

      Why is that exactly? The above article just explained that the exit pollster, who you were promoting yesterday, is a CIA front.

      You can’t claim to be for democracy while working behind the scenes to tip all the scales in a particular direction. Transparency also needs to apply to those who claim to be in favor of transparency.

      1. Martín

        Of course you can, as long as you are commited to tip the scale in the direction of whatever the ballots read.

        And we agree, lack of transparency by the regime is the reason why Venezuela is caught up in this mess in the first place.

        1. Carolinian

          No we don’t agree, and the lack of transparency by the US regime–for decades even–is the reason for the mess. Graham Greene wrote a book about it–the good Americans promoting democracy out of one side of their mouth while secretly promoting regime change and corruption in secret.

          One would think that if you are indeed from Chile you would get this more than anyone but of course there were those in Chile who greatly gained from Kissinger’s coup just as there are those in Venezuela who hope for that history to repeat.

          1. Martín

            Why wouldn’t it be possible that both sides suck? Kissinger is a murderer in my book, but his doing is not an excuse for everything that is going on in Venezuela today. Give current leaders some responsibility in this mess!

            PS: Freddy Superlano, a leader for the opposition, was just “arrested”. Let’s hope Maduro doesn’t follow through on his bloodbath promises.

            1. JonnyJames

              But Kissinger brought freedom and democracy to Chile, by helping Pinochet come to power. Allende was a brutal communist dictator, after all

      1. Martín

        Thanks, I wasn’t aware of this. Venezuela is usually portrayed as a communist dictatorship here in Chile, so it was suprising to me when the PCV came out challenging the election.

        1. pjay

          If it surprised you that Venezuela was not a “communist dictatorship,” then I have to question the sources of your own understanding of its political situation, including the reasons for its severe economic problems, the long history of US intervention, and the role of its comprador class in that history. I’m not yet certain about the specifics regarding this election, but based on past experience I am quite certain who *not* to believe, and who is the lessor and greater evil in this case.

          1. JonnyJames

            That reminds me: When I was living in the UK, I regularly watched the 6 O’clock News on BBC1 (for laughs mostly). In 2006, a segment on Venezuela featured and the “expert” was a woman from Chatham House (MI6). She said that Chavez was a brutal communist dictator and all that rot, even though the Carter Center, the UN and other official observers said that the elections in Venezuela were some of the cleanest in the world. The anchor never questioned the lie, and no other opinion was offered. It’s the same ol’ British Bollocks Corporation propaganda (or British Bullshit Corporation)

            Then years later, I heard Sen. Bernard Sanders say almost exactly the same thing. With “progressives” like him, we don’t need no far-right warmongers.

          2. Martín

            The source of my understanding comes mostly from Venezuelan immigrants who have had to leave their country, particularly through the last five years. Sure, it may be biased (how could it not be, being forced to leave familiy and friends behind), but that doesn’t mean it is all lies, is it? BTW, if not a “communist dictatorship”, how would you describe the Venezuelan regime? This may come as a shock, but there’s literal millions of people here in Chile that would agree on Venezuela being a communist dictatorship.

            1. JonnyJames

              Who cares? What people in Chile or the US think is not relevant.

              The issue should be: no matter what govt. is in power in Caracas, the US is engaging in criminal behavior by imposing “sanctions” (illegal siege warfare) that has resulted in the deaths of many thousands of Venezuelans and forced many others to flee.

              I don’t like having the public resources of my so-called country (the US) spent on mass murdering children in Gaza, Venezuela etc. etc. If you think that’s cool, then put your money where your mouth is, and give a sizeable donation to a US politician.

              1. Martín

                Why would I endorse mass murdering? What are you talking about? I do appreciate your concerns about your country, it is a particular concern I do not have to deal with. I hope one day you may not have to deal with it too. But I do care about what happens to people in other countries just like you do, even if my country has had nothing to do with it. And I don’t agree with you about people’s opinion around the globe not being relevant.

                1. JonnyJames

                  Read or re-read the article above by Nick Corbishley. Connect the dots. Forgive me for sounding arrogant, but you don’t appear to have a grasp on the history, power relationships or larger context.

                  BTW, it sounds like you agree with foreign intervention. Would you like more foreign intervention in your country?

                  Maybe also read some Eduardo Galeano.

                  Here’s another new article on the subject
                  https://geopoliticaleconomy.com/2024/07/29/us-government-edison-poll-venezuela-election/

            2. Gregorio

              The reason they “had” to leave bears closer examination.
              The US and their western allies seized Venezuela’s gold reserves and placed crushing economic sanctions on the country, while simultaneously installing an unelected president, that most Venezuelans had never heard of, and who actively worked with the west to destroy Venezuela’s economy. It’s hard to imagine a more undemocratic regime than that of Juan Guido considering how he came to end up in power. A key feature of US foreign policy for almost a century has been the overt and covert political and economic war against socialist governments, to insure that it’s impossible for them to succeed, then they can point their finger and say with a straight face, “Look at the failure of socialism.”

              1. ISL

                Agree – I mean, if it is the failure of socialism, then why are the sanctions needed?

                I looked at some statistics many years ago and the fraction of the Venezuelan economy that is market is higher than in the US, and if you include big pharma monopolies….

      2. Valerie in Australia

        That is very interesting. I made assumptions about the Communist Party always being on the side of socialist movements. Good information to know.

    3. midtownwageslave

      Dear Doctor Biden,

      My name is Gretchen, a 10 year old girl living in Caracas, Venezuela. My family and I are suffering daily with severe shortages of Democracy. When we go to the supermarket, there are is no Democracy on the shelves. When we go to our local Mercedes dealership, there is no Democracy there either.

      My family’s situation is dire. Please send a highly armed contingent of American Marines, HIMARS missile systems, and F35 squadrons.

      Sincerely,
      Gretchen Machado

      1. hk

        Like that other shining democracy on the Dniepr, they should just have canceled the election….

    4. Henriux Miller

      [Responding to Martin at 8:28 AM]
      It won’t be the first nor the last time in Latin American history that Communist and leftist parties (at least among those who self-identify as such) and their politicians are on the side of the USA. Remember how The Bolivian Communist party opposed Che Guevara’s guerrilla force? (Same thing had happened earlier in Cuba when Fidel Castro started his armed opposition to the Batista regimen. The Communist were against it until the very last minute). Or do you remember how the Salvadorean left in the 60s – 70s was deeply divided, and turned against some of its brightest leaders and intellectuals, like when they murdered Roque Dalton? I don’t know what happened in this election we are discussing here; I don’t think the result is clear to anyone. I know that meddling in the internal affairs of sovereign nations is illegal and deeply undemocratic. Let’s not forget how the Collective West, not that long ago, was selling Guaido to the world as the “legitimate” Venezuelan president, while stealing Venezuela’s gold without hesitation. Some regimes are shameless, and I am not talking about the current one in Venezuela…

  6. JohnA

    Whenever I hear the utterly undiplomatic Blinken open his mouth, ‘let he who is without sin, cast the first stone’ comes to mind.

    1. Gregorio

      Whenever Rockin’ in the Free World Tony appears at the podium, an irresistible urge to slap that disingenuous smirk off his face, overwhelms me.

  7. Louis Fyne

    Some in the Twitter-sphere opine that after the embarrassing (but buried below the lede) performance of the US military in Yemen (and of course Afghanistan), the Pentagon is looking for an easy win to spike the football, Grenada 2.0.

    The Biden War Council may pick Venezuela before Jan. 20. But if DC is insane enough to pick on the kid in the corner in the name of democracy, I doubt it will be as easy as they think.

    1. The Rev Kev

      If the US cannot muster the military manpower to invade Yemen and put a stop to all those missiles and drones, then how can they amass the troops for an invasion of Venezuela? Even if they did, it would be a jungle war just like in Vietnam and look how that turned out.

      1. vao

        Presumably they think that, contrarily to Yemen, there are sufficient forces within Venezuela that would act as a 5th column, and that “friendly democracies” Ecuador and Columbia would also help. Besides, they also have military bases in the region, and the logistical train, while not negligible, would be less daunting than sailing all the way to the Red Sea.

        1. ISL

          they always think that (Vietnam, Iraq, Cuba, etc. etc. etc.). The record is better in Europe.

          In any case, the economy is shifting very rapidly to China – follow the money – and it will get harder and harder to attract flies with vinegar.

    2. Rob

      The army and the people’s militias in Venezuela will not go down without a fight. As I recall, they have a very large membership. Urban guerrilla warfare is not a strength of the U.S. military.

  9. CA

    https://theintercept.com/2014/10/17/democracy-really-means-u-s-jargon-subservience-u-s/

    October 17, 2014

    What ‘Democracy’ Really Means in U.S. and New York Times Jargon: Latin America Edition
    By Glenn Greenwald

    One of the most accidentally revealing media accounts highlighting the real meaning of “democracy” in U.S. discourse is a still-remarkable 2002 New York Times Editorial * on the U.S.-backed military coup in Venezuela, which temporarily removed that country’s democratically elected (and very popular) president, Hugo Chávez. Rather than describe that coup as what it was by definition – a direct attack on democracy by a foreign power and domestic military which disliked the popularly elected president – the Times, in the most Orwellian fashion imaginable, literally celebrated the coup as a victory for democracy:

    “With yesterday’s resignation of President Hugo Chávez, Venezuelan democracy is no longer threatened by a would-be dictator. Mr. Chávez, a ruinous demagogue, stepped down after the military intervened and handed power to a respected business leader, Pedro Carmona.”

    Thankfully, said the NYT, democracy in Venezuela was no longer in danger . . . because the democratically-elected leader was forcibly removed by the military and replaced by an unelected, pro-U.S. “business leader.” The Champions of Democracy at the NYT then demanded a ruler more to their liking: “Venezuela urgently needs a leader with a strong democratic mandate to clean up the mess, encourage entrepreneurial freedom and slim down and professionalize the bureaucracy.”

    More amazingly still, the Times editors told their readers that Chávez’s “removal was a purely Venezuelan affair,” even though it was quickly and predictably revealed that neocon officials in the Bush administration played a central role… **

    * https://www.nytimes.com/2002/04/13/opinion/hugo-chavez-departs.html

    ** https://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/07/opinion/hugo-chavez.html

    2. hk

      If you replace Venezuela with US and military with party apparatchiks, this could very well apply to US today. Boy, how far have we fallen…

    3. Ezra Teter

      Don’t forget the hundreds of people the Carmona regime killed in a 48 hour period. I have never seen a Chavista “dictator” that was so violent.

  10. Lefty Godot

    Democracy means having elections that we can denounce as rigged whenever the result is not what we want.

  11. Matthew G. Saroff

    The US definition of a free and fair election is one where its favored candidate wins.

  12. JonnyJames

    Groundhog day, the same ol BS, lies and hypocrisy. Enablers and cheerleaders for genocide, mass murder, try to overturn yet another election in another country. They starve children in Gaza and Venezuela, what a coincidence. The criminal unilateral “sanctions” (euphemism for siege/starvation warfare) should be the headlines in the MassMedia, but instead it’s the CIA cover story as usual

    Maybe I don’t recall clearly, but in the past, oligarchs like Elon Skum, did not have such prominent and public foreign policy influence. On the other hand, this demonstrates the level of institutional corruption the US has reached. Like Medieval peasants, we are supposed to worship these people, and turn a blind eye to the crimes and hypocrisy.

    To be honest, when I saw Elon the Oligarch weigh in on the matter (as he did with Evo Morales etc.), an image of a guillotine with his head in the lock, popped into my imagination. Then I thought better:, he in prison with a copy of Eduardo Galeano’s Open Veins of Latin America being read to him 24/7 with him screaming in agony.

  13. Alex Cox

    Telesur reports that Venezuela has broken relations with the Latin American nations which refused to acknowledge the election result, and recalled its ambassadors.

  14. noonespecial

    Nick indicates, “Whether he (Maduro) is able to ride this one out will depend on whether he maintains the support of Venezuela’s armed forces.”

    Well, according to hot-off-the-press item, Colombia’s daily El Tiempo provides the following. For now it seems as if the military is standing by Maduro. Machado’s call for citizen assemblies sounds like something out of France 1789, I’m sure she’d be happy with a gringo Marat reporting on things in her favor to crown her the victor.

    It’s my quick translation so apologies if I miss the mark.

    https://www.eltiempo.com/mundo/venezuela/venezuela-vladimir-padrino-lopez-ministro-de-defensa-denuncia-intento-de-golpe-de-estado-y-reitera-su-respaldo-a-maduro-3367222

    Defense Minister of Venezuela, Vladimir Padrino López, denounced in a message surrouunded by military personnel that a “coup is underway led by the right”…[He goes on to say,] “we will act strongly in perfect civic-military-policial unison, to preserve internal order throughout national territory…
    …María Corina Machado on Tuesday called for “citizen assemblies” in front of the United Nation’s building in Caracas, as well as in all cities in the country.

  15. Marc

    The actions of the opposition do remind me all over again of the many times they have tried to overthrow the government, and I do abhor Machado, but I can’t ignore the failure of the CNE to publish the details of the election results as they have in past elections. The CNE website is still down, and I have found no satisfactory explanations on why they are withholding this information. Would anyone venture a better explanation than that Maduro failed to garner the majority of votes?

    1. britzklieg

      …and how long does it take the USA to “vrify” election ressults?

      There are any number of reasons why the CNE may have not reported yet , well beyond your assumption that it is so Maduro can hide the “real” results.

      Meh…

      1. Marc

        From my understanding, the election process in Venezuela is much better than the USA, with quicker turnaround time to be able to share the results.
        Was looking for perspective on some of the any number of reasons…

      1. jrkrideau

        The CIA denies everything!

        Given the reported vote count, I cannot see any reason to think we are seeing vote rigging. Assuming any or all of the voting surveys were accurate a sudden surge in turnout by Maduro supporters, a low turnout by Opposition supporters believing the surveys, or just the plain cantankerousness of voters makes the results seem reasonable.

        A Maduro victory with 65% of the vote might set off the alarm bells. An Abdul Fattah al-Sisi type of victory with 89.6% of the vote would really be suspicious.

      2. Marc

        The government is saying there was a cyberattack on the CNE website (which is very plausible), but it has now been two days and they still have not got the website back up or offer any updates about the sharing of the election tally sheets.

        1. Nick Corbishley Post author

          Thanks for reminding me of this crucial detail, Marc. You just earned yourself a hat-tip!

          1. Marc

            I think I understand now. While the CNE traditionally shares polling station results online, they did not in the past post tally sheets, and never planned to. If a candidate believes there is fraud, they initiate it by requesting an audit by the Supreme Court, and the Supreme court is provided access to the tally sheets from the CNE as well as copies provided at the polling station to participating parties. Any fake tally sheet can easily be spotted by comparing the unique code generated when the final tally sheet is created. The CNE may not want to publish tally sheets because it provides these unique codes that could theoretically used to make fraudulent tally sheets (which under scrutiny would not hold up, but may fool general public?).
            The Tally sheets shared online by the opposition party Vente Venezuela are not verified and do not have legal standing. They would have to be verified and matched with the voting machine unique codes issued.

  16. chris

    I feel very naive writing this, but is it really too much to ask that my country stop interfering with everything on the planet for benefit of a few people who happen to bank in the US?

    What possible benefit is there to the US to cause misery and dissension in Venezuela? Why are we continuing to promote genocide in Gaza? Why are we rooting for the death of generations in Ukraine? Why have starved do many in Yemen? Why can’t we leave Syria to the Syrians? Why did we cripple our allies in Europe? Why have decided that domestic issues should be ignored when so many of our actions abroad are contributing to domestic strife?

    I do feel like a child asking that simple Why? so many times. I’m pretty sure I know the answer. But it’s hard to accept that my leaders are the cause of so much pain because their rich friends want them to do it.

  17. MFB

    This may seem rude, but Corinthians says it best:

    When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things.

    So long as one accepts that one’s leaders are decent people intent on doing the right thing but somehow forced to deviate from that course by factors outside their control, one will never be able to respond meaningfully to the political world.

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