Photo courtesy of Bloomberg.
I introduce you today to Venezuela News and Views, a blog I just encountered myself. i don't know anything about it, except that it provides an inside look at the constitutional election tht Hugo Chavez has foisted on the people of Venezuela.
My political intuition--whose accuracy, admittedly, is only so-so--tells me that public opinion may be turning against Chavismo. Even poor people who like a strong leader don't really want a dictator. And even uneducated people object to the kind of physical persecution of dissenting students going on in Caracas right now. There is no knowing whether the elections will be fair or whether there will be enough resentment built up to cost Chavez the victory he expects. But even a close election might pressage the eventual, if not iminent, end of his reign.
Incumbent politicians and the media chronically make the mistake of extrapolating from past popularity into the present. But politics is always changing. Blue states become red when the voters get fed up with presumptuous big government (e.g., New Jersey's recent vote against funding stem cell research) and red states turn on conservative leaders with alleged ethical weaknesses (e.g., the recent Republican defeat in Kentucky). Hillary the Inevitable is slipping in national polls, and could lose the Iowa caucuses. A hugely successful prime minister, John Howard, was just ousted in Australia. It just shows you.
Vox populi, vox deo. And, where sovereign, the people don't really have to justify their ways in order to get their way.