We are already May 21

I was not planning on writing today. But three tweets sort of forced me to do so.  They are telling, among so many tweets these days, that we are turning a page, that Maduro with his beyond expected victory tomorrow is in fact is merely closing a cycle.


The first tweet is about those that will not be in the new pages to be written as of May 21: I have named the Frente Amplio. These guys have been trying to take over the deliquescent MUD/UNIDAD for the last three months and they have proposed nothing serious that I know of. And then suddenly this tweet:

Nunca antes se había formado un consenso tan amplio dentro y fuera de un país rechazando un proceso plagado de inconsistencias, trampas y chantajes. #El20MDesobedece pic.twitter.com/l6U6P3dqCt

— Frente Amplio Vzla Libre (@FrentAmplioVzla) May 19, 2018

"never before was there such ample consensus inside the country and abroad rejecting a processus plagued with inconsistencies, cheating and blackmail". Well, they could have started by reading this blog and they would have uttered earlier such brave words....

And so they propose that we disobey the order to go to vote, that we dress in white, grab our flag and go to church tomorrow morning.

Really? That is their plan? 24 hours before voting starts? In what arse was their head planted all of these weeks?

Since we can pretty much forget about the Frente Amplio to do anything meaningful in the foreseeable future let's see what is in the plans of the futre wanna-be leader of the opposition. Martinez is a connoisseur of Venezuelan electoral problems and even though I do not agree with him on many things, and think he has been dead wrong on occasion, this tweet is truer than truth.

See, in Venezuela, for EACH voting machine each side is allowed to have witnesses. In fact having more than one party support your electoral bid allows you to have more than one witness.  The implication of that is that in a dictatorship like this one, not having witnesses at a voting station is an open invitation for ballot stuffing if all the chavistas in attendance agree. And trust me, they will agree out of fear, the more so if some military are watching. What Martinez tells us is that the Henri Falcon commando has requested that in a multi machine voting center, a single witness can have access to the tally of all the voting machines.

Aunque comando de @HenriFalconLara sostiene que tiene 100% de testigos, la presidenta del CNE aseguró que le fue solicitada (como excepción a la norma) que un solo testigo puede tener acceso a las copias de actas de escrutinio de todas las mesas de un centro electoral

— Eugenio G. Martínez (@puzkas) May 19, 2018

This is wrong on so many levels....

First, it is an admission that the Falcon machinery has not been able to attract the necessary number of witnesses. A semi united opposition could not do it last October and at least in Miranda state got robbed of their votes.  Falcon promised us that he would run until the end only if he was certain that conditions were fair. They are not, they are getting worse, he admits it and yet, he has not dropped out of the race.

Second on a practical point of view a single witness cannot monitor all the voting machines of a single center. Maybe 2 or 3 but some centers may have more. At some point he needs to go to the rest room, she needs to take a break for lunch, etc...  If the others are all in agreement they can have a few extra votes printed for Maduro by the machines and that is that. The witness will get all of the tallies, indeed, but will be clueless as to their meaningfulness. This would be rendered more the easier if participation is low.

Clearly, Falcon may be appointed by Maduro leader of the opposition on May 21, it ain't happening.

Last but not least, on what truly starts on May 21. Clearly the world is not going to put up with a narco military dictatorship that is absolutely unable to learn from its mistakes, refuses to do so anyway and is only hell bent in sweet deals as long a some oil money keeps flowing in the country. Many governments have already made it clear that they will not recognize Maduro, and not even Falcon (1).

So we have for example Sebastian Piñera, president of Chile, doing today this little video where he wonders aloud what is that that pushes Maduro to have such ambition to cling to power against the obvious unhappiness of his people. Of course, Piñera knows why but he plays dumb on purpose, as a way to notify that Chile, as a main receptor of Venezuela's emigration, will not put up with Maduro for much longer. In many Latin American capitals we are already on May 21 and the communiques of no recognition of the electoral result are already written. Fair enough, Maduro already knows his margin of victory.

Mensaje del presidente de Chile @sebastianpinera al dictador de #Venezuela @NicolasMaduro.
Maduro se aferra tanto al poder, porque de dejarlo, tendría que ir a la cárcel, al exilio o a la pena de muerte por genocida. Por eso prefiere seguir aferrado al poder....
Mañana #NoVotes! pic.twitter.com/i8nXLlM6v9

— Cristian Crespo F. (@cristiancrespoj) May 19, 2018

But as I was typing this entry I received the latest tweet of Henri Falcon today at 5:13 PM. The guy is saying that if Maduro is elected by a million votes it will be because of the naughty ones that stayed at home. So the guy in a swell scoop announces that he lost the election and that it was not his fault, but mine for not finding reasons to vote for him. I shall be punished, as if I were not already punished enough.... (2)

Si Maduro gana con un millón de votos será la abstención quien logre hacerlo presidente. Los demócratas somos más, y solo participando podemos demostrar que lo somos. #SiVotasSeVa

— Henri Falcón (@HenriFalconLara) May 19, 2018

I am sorry, I just blanked out for a second...  As I was saying, Falcon the beloved leader of the opposition, it ain't happening.


I feel strangely like in a new version of the Gregorian Calendar when ten days were eaten up. Nobody cares about the Venezuelan election except to criticize it. All are already dealing with what happens on May 21. The chavian calendar jump.

--------------------

1) a very unlikely victory of Falcon was finally a discarded option Friday. That the US decided to put sanctions on Diosdado Cabello and his family left then with no other choice but to cling on to power, Hitler-in-his-bunker style if necessary. Neither ones are/were courageous but all of them knew what awaited them once defeat was official. If someone can explain to me how Cabello will now recognize a victory of some non entity as low as Falcon, please, let me know. I am clueless on that. But heck, this blog sometimes get it wrong and Falcon will be declared the winner so he can dictate a full cover amnesty.   Ahahahaah.....

2) It turns out that Falcon has erased that tweet and said it was fake, some form of hacking except you do not recover from hacking in tweeter within minutes. So in case the tweet does not appear later here below the print screen I got from the post as I was checking it earlier, still inbed in the post.  Oh dearest.....