An update on the possible electoral fraud in Venezuela

Let me start first by saying, now that spirits are cooling some, that I had contemplated a possible Chavez victory a few days ago, and gave the reasons why Chavez could win. Thus I am intellectually prepared to accept that Chavez could have survived the Recall Election.

Unfortunately as the hours keep passing there is more and more questions arising, and no answers coming. It does not matter what is the alleged margin of victory of Chavez if the opposition does not recognize it. It does not matter what the Carter Center and the OAS say if they cannot convince the opposition to accept it. I will talk about their actions in a later post, one that I am sure will not please them since until yesterday I have been a strong defender of Carter even when he was vilified by most of the opposition.

Right now there is only one point that I want to stress (Francisco has a whole litany of possible fraud elements that you can consult, I hate redundancy). As I am writing the CNE stands firm in its refusal to allow for any manual recounting of paper ballots, THE ONLY THING THAT COULD ESTABLISH ONCE AND FOR ALL THAT THE RESULT WAS FAIR. There is no other way to settle the issue and IT HAS TO BE DONE TODAY AS ALREADY TAMPERING OF THE BALLOT BOXES IS POSSIBLY TAKING PLACE AS I WRITE.

I do not know about you, but for me the CNE is acting EXACTLY as if it were cheating and trying to cover the evidence. Period.

It is the duty of the CNE to play clean, or the blood spilled in Venezuela will be its fault. For those who saw the pitiful and almost hysterical presentation of Jorge Rodriguez yesterday, you should be convinced now that there is a problem, that he looks more like a man on the run than the assured statesman he would like us to believe he is. How un-shrink like, no?.