The Thrill of Victory (Venezuela) and the Agony of Defeat (Russia)
Filed under: Russia ~ Venezuela
Three cheers for the heroic people of Venezuela! Sweet, sweet victory is ours! By a narrow vote of 51-49, the voters have rejected the attempt by Hugo Chavez to anoint himself "president for life." This means that, unless he comes up with something even more nasty than this proposal, he's out in 2012.
Three catcalls for the craven lemmings who call themselves the voters of Russia! By an overwhelming margin, they have ejected from their legislature every single member of every single party who favored democracy and civil liberties, handing dictator Vladimir Putin about 90% of the seats and implying they want him to become "president for life." This means that unless somebody does something truly heroic, Putin will only leave office as his Soviet predecessors always did, in a pine box.
The only hope for Russia is that there are allegations of widespread fraud in the tabulation of the ballots, so there may be many Russians who are victims of fraud rather than collaborators in atrocity -- but if they do nothing to stand up for their votes, it matters little.
Check out my latest installment on Pajamas Media where I review the election results from Russia. Pajamas also has an excellent piece on the Venezuela vote. The contrast between the peoples of these two countries, one struggling with all its might for freedom, the other doing all it can to repeat the mistakes of the failed past, could not be more striking.
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