Carta abierta a los cara dura de Chavez y Diosdado

Es que en verdad hay que ser cara dura para identificarse con socialistas democráticos como ustedes trataron de hacer ayer.  Pero ya los demócratas les dieron su bofetón, ni siquiera 24 horas después de las barbaridades que dijeron ustedes dos.  Y no hablemos del tontín de Nicmer que les sirve de intelectual de tercera.  No son ustedes los que tienen que enseñarle a Francia lo que la multipolaridad es, no les toca a ustedes dar lecciones de socialismo y de capitalismo: aprenden de las fotos que pongo abajo, fotos que describen lo que es una democracia verdadera y no un gobierno de malandros y ladrones como el que ustedes presiden.

En esta primera foto, ni siquiera 48 horas después de la elección de Hollande, el presidente Sarkozy lo invita a presidir junto a el las conmemoraciones del 8 de mayo en Francia, el día que termino la segunda guerra mundial.  ¿ Díganme, cuando fue la ultima vez que ustedes permitieron el pase a alguien de la oposición en un 19 de Abril, o en Carabobo?  ¿No les pica la curiosidad de saber porque un presidente recién derrotado hace un gesto de esa naturaleza, y un presidente recién electo lo acepta con toda la cortesía y amabilidad posible?

¡Pero miren esta segunda foto!

Hollande wins in Paris, loses in Athens

Less votes than Hollande but, more clout?

The important electoral result yesterday is not the one in France (although a lot can be said of Hollande winning by less than all polls were saying).  No, the result that is sending Europe into convulsion (even if no one is ready to quite admit it publicly) is the one in Greece where not only a bona fide truly Nazi party made it to Parliament (next to Golden Dawn Marine Le Pen is your garden variety democratic right wing), but the parties that refuse to abide by European conditions to the rescue of Greece got at the very least 60% of the vote and enough in Parliament to block a grand coalition between Pasok and NeoDemocracia.  Not that the expected grand coalition, forced upon the Greeks, had much hope of success in the best of cases.

The French second round ballot: stormy skies ahead for France and Europe

Useless vote getter

So tomorrow Saturday I have to cast my second round ballot at the French embassy of Caracas.  I will vote for Sarkozy but I can assure you that I am not doing it happily.  He will lose the election and he deserves to lose: he made too many P.R. errors in the earlier part of his term that he was unable or unwilling to amend for, he wasted precious time to push critical reforms and the crisis caught him  pants down, depriving of real reform options.  Truly he managed the crisis rather well, but electorates rarely understand such subtleties.

Then the second round campaign was nasty.  I do understand that he had no other choice but to court the National Front (FN) voters of Marine Le Pen who came at a surprising and astounding 18%.  Sarkozy personally has demonstrated that he is a democrat, a gruff one maybe but a real one.  So I never believed his posturing, but I also expect that for opposite reasons fewer than he needs in that 18% will buy it (according to some polls up to a third may end up voting for Hollande anyway, preferring to sink the democratic center right at any cost believing that it will open the door for their control of the opposition to Hollande).  Still, his courting of FN voters was often unbecoming and thus probably counter productive even among his own UMP party.

Of dropeth shoes and rats out of ships: et tu Hugo Carvajal?

Well, looks like the "apontiada^2", famous epic poem on corruption and abuse of power is just starting.  Through a tweeeet, representative Ismael Garcia tells us that not only a second high court Judge has left the country (should we start using words such as defected?), but a famous drug trafficker suspect has just left.  Seeking the witness protection program?  Since it is a mere tweet we shall wait more until commenting on Marco Tulio Dugarte defection and even more, Carvajal escape..... Yet Globovision feels confident enough to put it on its website page. See you later.

Update 1: good thing I have a limited trust in tweets: Dugarte is reported to be in Venezuela by El Universal. Ooooh...   This is going to be so much fun to watch! Garcia lied? Was he hacked? Dugarte missed his flight?

The S.O. was drafted to the chavista May 1 march

The old US of A embassy, now the tourism ministry 

 As a public employee he had no choice but to show up for at least an hour.  Before he found a was to sneak out he managed to take a few pictures and there you have some for your enjoyment.  By the way, the regime did pull all the stops and plugs and it was one of the best rallies it made in months.  Then again chavismo only marched in Caracas while the opposition workers did dare to do a few rallies outside of Caracas.

General comments: you will notice how red is the whole thing and how often they try to compensate for the absence of Chavez.

So many chavistas are idiots...

... and Weil nails them today.

Screaming Pro Chavez Marcher (May 1st parade?): In the other governments we had no right to housing nor to jobs
Anchor Person: Do you have housing?
SPCM: No
AP: A job?
SPCM. Neither

This is the result of 12 years of brain washing: utter disconnection with reality.

Things that go bump in cadenas: Chavez leaving the IACHR

[Post scripted] Certainly it was not the most important announcement of the day by Chavez, just before he took of for Havana again.  But it may have been one of the most telling moments of his presidency in recent months.  After signing the new Labor Law, Chavez decided to activate finally the "Council of State" and ask from it as a first mission to study ways that Venezuela can exit the Inter American Court for Human Rights.