Rolling Back Hugo Chavez's "Revolution"

By John R. Thomson

Washington Times | Monday, December 10, 2007

CARACAS, Venezuela.

It has not been a happy few weeks for Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez. First, he was roundly chastised by the king of Spain in front of his Latin American peers and, later, the world. A few days later, the red-shirted dictator was dealt a major verbal blow by his Colombian counterpart, Alvaro Uribe.

Then, most embarrassing of all, his countrymen defeated Mr. Chavez's proposed constitutional changes, which he had assured one and all would be overwhelmingly approved. And the defeat was not by the purported slimmest of margins, 50.7 percent, as announced by Venezuela's electoral commission: Highly reliable sources put the opposition's majority at 53, perhaps as high as 55, percent. Of course, we will never know the actual vote, as the commission can change the automatic voting machine tallies at will.

Former U.S. Ambassador to Venezuela George Landau notes: "Venezuelans, even the poor, do not want a Cuban-communist regime. What killed Chavez were the abstentions of his own people ... unhappy that, while they live in misery, Chavez subsidizes vast parts of the world, even including the Bronx...Food shortages were a big reason for massive abstentions. Student involvement was a major factor that goes back to Chavez closing the popular RC-TV, his biggest mistake so far because people realized he was an absolute dictator."