Old 08-16-2004, 11:54   #16
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http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/americ...all/index.html

Recall vote: Chavez claims victory
Monday, August 16, 2004 Posted: 9:46 AM EDT (1346 GMT)

CARACAS, Venezuela (CNN) -- Hugo Chavez, the president of Venezuela, the world's fifth largest oil exporter, has claimed victory in a popular referendum to oust him.

Initial results after 94 percent of the more than 8.5 million votes had been counted showed about 58 percent voted to keep Chavez in office while 42 percent favored ousting him. Opposition leaders rejected the results as a "gigantic fraud."

The result -- if confirmed by final results expected to be announced later on Monday -- means the leftist populist president can complete the remaining two years of his term.

World oil prices promptly fell from fresh record highs with the result easing fears that unrest could upset the country's oil exports. (Full story)

U.S light crude oil for September fell to $46.33 a barrel at 1000 GMT Monday, down from an early peak of $46.91. London Brent was down to $43.35 a barrel.

Shortly after the announcement in Caracas by election commission chief Francisco Carrasquero, a triumphant Chavez appeared on the balcony of the presidential palace as thousands of flag-waving and cheering supporters appeared below.

"Long live the constitution ... of Venezuela," Chavez said. "Long live the Venezuelan people. What a great victory."

Carrasquero did not declare Chavez the outright winner of Sunday's referendum. But vote counts he released -- 4,991,483 against Chavez's recall and 3,576,517 in favor -- indicated an insurmountable lead.

The opposition vowed they would contest the outcome though. "We firmly and categorically reject the result," opposition leader Henry Ramos Allup told a news conference.

"We're going to collect the evidence to prove to Venezuela and the world the gigantic fraud which has been committed against the will of the people."

CNN's Karl Penhaul said many opposition supporters were in tears at their apparent defeat and that it was possible some would take to the streets in protest.

The verdict of international observers, including former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, could be key to whether stability is restored.

They praised the voting Sunday but on Monday had yet to give their final verdict on the referendum.

"With the sides now so polarized, a decision either way could trigger unrest," Credit Suisse First Boston analyst Jan Dehn said in a research note Monday according to Reuters.

Millions had turned out on Sunday to weigh in on Chavez's rule -- prompting voting hours to be extended twice.

Voting was first extended from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. (0000 GMT), but with thousands of people lined up to cast ballots on whether to keep Chavez in office, officials extended balloting until midnight.

Chavez, a former army officer, was elected president in 1998 with overwhelming support of the country's poor, but many people in the middle and upper classes call him a budding tyrant.

They accuse him of steering Venezuela toward communism and of riding roughshod over the nation's democratic institutions.

Social reforms
The country has been wracked by anti-Chavez demonstrations for more than a year, and opponents managed to collect enough signatures to force a recall vote in June.

But for Chavez to be recalled, at least 3.76 million Venezuelans needed to have voted to remove him -- the number of votes the former paratrooper won in 2000, when he was re-elected to a six-year term.

Analysts had said the opposition faced an uphill battle with estimates showing that only 4 to 5 million of the nation's 25 million people were vehemently anti-Chavez. Opponents collected 2.4 million signatures to force the recall vote.

Carter, whose Carter Center was among international groups monitoring the referendum, called it "the largest turnout I have ever seen."

Larry Birns, director of a Washington-based think-tank called the Council on Hemispheric Affairs, said Chavez's support was centered among the 18 million to 19 million Venezuelans who were poor.

Chavez, who led a 1992 coup attempt before being elected president, has used the recent rise in oil prices to offer a welter of new social services to the majority poor in the nation, which is the world's fifth-largest exporter of oil.

Those services include education, health care and subsidized food.

He was ousted in a 2002 coup that his supporters blamed on the United States -- an allegation Washington denies -- but he returned to power within days when the opposition collapsed.

CNN Correspondents Lucia Newman and Karl Penhaul contributed to this report.
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Old 08-24-2004, 12:21   #17
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http://www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=110005518

LETTER TO THE EDITOR

Venezuela's Voters Have Spoken
Hugo Chávez won fair and square.

BY JIMMY CARTER
Tuesday, August 24, 2004 12:01 a.m. EDT

I would like to respond to Mary O'Grady's recent column about the Carter Center's role in the Venezuela recall referendum.

The Carter Center has monitored more than 50 troubled democratic elections, all of them either highly contentious or a nation's first experience with democracy. We are familiar with potential fraudulent techniques and how to obtain a close approximation to the actual results to assure accuracy.

One of our prerequisites for involvement is to be invited by all major political parties and by the central election commission, so it is necessary for us to remain absolutely neutral. These criteria obviously apply to Venezuela.


In 1998, Hugo Chávez was elected president of Venezuela. There was a subsequent referendum to approve a new constitution, and in 2000, another nationwide election for local, state and national offices, with Mr. Chávez prevailing by close to 60% in both presidential elections. Accuracy of results was accepted, but the opposition remained determined to remove him from office.
A military coup against Mr. Chávez was successful in April 2002, but an aroused Venezuelan public and condemnation of the coup by Latin American governments resulted in Mr. Chávez being restored to office after two days in custody. The next attempt to depose him was a series of nationwide strikes that shut down oil production and almost destroyed the nation's economy. The government survived, but the political confrontation continued.

In January 2003, I proposed that a provision in the new constitution be implemented, providing for a referendum on whether Mr. Chávez should leave office or complete his term. Both sides agreed to this proposal, and the Organization of American States joined our Center in monitoring the gathering of necessary petitions and observing a recall referendum. An organization known as Súmate served as the opposition's driving force in encouraging signatures to depose Mr. Chávez and providing technical advice for their campaign efforts.

The Aug. 15 vote was the culmination of this process, and extra care was taken to ensure secrecy and accuracy. An electronic system was developed by a Venezuelan-American consortium led by SmartMatic that permitted touch-screen voting, with each choice backed up by a paper ballot. International machines were tested in advance, and we observed the entire voting process without limitation or restraint.


During the voting day, opposition leaders claimed to have exit-poll data showing the government losing by 20 percentage points, and this erroneous information was distributed widely. Results from each of the 20,000 machines were certified by poll workers and party observers and transmitted to central election headquarters in Caracas. As in all previous elections, paper ballots were retained under military guard. As predicted by most opinion polls and confirmed by our quick count, Mr. Chávez prevailed by a 59% to 41% margin.

Subsequently an audit was conducted to assure compatibility between manual ballots and electronically transmitted data, but opposition leaders insisted that their exit polls were accurate and that all other data were fraudulent. We met the following morning with Súmate, and they reported their own quick count showing a 10% government victory. Since their only remaining question was the accuracy of the audit, we developed the procedure for a second audit. Súmate and election commission members (government and opposition) agreed with our proposal. The second audit revealed no significant disparities.

Our responsibilities do not end when votes are counted. We seek acceptance of the results by all sides, and reconciliation if distrust or disharmony is deep. We have already begun efforts to establish a dialogue between the Venezuelan government and the still-antagonistic opposition leaders.

When local citizens or foreigners disapprove of a political decision made in free and fair elections, the only legitimate recourse is to honor the decision, cooperate whenever possible, and promote future leadership changes through democratic means.

Mr. Carter is founder and chairman of the Carter Center at Emory University.
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Old 08-24-2004, 17:08   #18
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He does fail to mention that Chavez himself was a member of an attempted coup against the elected leadership of Venezuela.

How very representative of Ol' Peanut Head" to overlook that fact.

TR
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De Oppresso Liber 01/20/2025
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Old 08-24-2004, 21:44   #19
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Quote:
Originally posted by The Reaper
He does fail to mention that Chavez himself was a member of an attempted coup against the elected leadership of Venezuela.

How very representative of Ol' Peanut Head" to overlook that fact.

TR
Apparently that don't count unless you actually succeed as long as you are a Marxist trying to overthrow a non-Marxist.
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He knows only The Cause.

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Old 08-25-2004, 08:26   #20
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I saw yesterday on local news where the Chavistas are rounding up members of the opposition on weapons charges.
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Somewhere a True Believer is training to kill you. He is training with minimal food or water, in austere conditions, training day and night. The only thing clean on him is his weapon and he made his web gear. He doesn't worry about what workout to do - his ruck weighs what it weighs, his runs end when the enemy stops chasing him. This True Believer is not concerned about 'how hard it is;' he knows either he wins or dies. He doesn't go home at 17:00, he is home.
He knows only The Cause.

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Old 08-25-2004, 08:32   #21
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Talk about a country squandering its potential.

At least Colombia has an excuse.

TR
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"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat." - President Theodore Roosevelt, 1910

De Oppresso Liber 01/20/2025
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Old 08-25-2004, 08:35   #22
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Agreed Boss. Its a shame.
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Somewhere a True Believer is training to kill you. He is training with minimal food or water, in austere conditions, training day and night. The only thing clean on him is his weapon and he made his web gear. He doesn't worry about what workout to do - his ruck weighs what it weighs, his runs end when the enemy stops chasing him. This True Believer is not concerned about 'how hard it is;' he knows either he wins or dies. He doesn't go home at 17:00, he is home.
He knows only The Cause.

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Old 09-09-2004, 09:29   #23
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http://www.opinionjournal.com/editor...l?id=110005586

REVIEW & OUTLOOK

Conned in Caracas
New evidence that Jimmy Carter got fooled in Venezuela.

Thursday, September 9, 2004 12:01 a.m. EDT

Both the Bush Administration and former President Jimmy Carter were quick to bless the results of last month's Venezuelan recall vote, but it now looks like they were had. A statistical analysis by a pair of economists suggests that the random-sample "audit" results that the Americans trusted weren't random at all.

This is no small matter. The imprimatur of Mr. Carter and his Carter Center election observers is being used by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to claim a mandate. The anti-American strongman has been steering his country toward dictatorship and is stirring up trouble throughout Latin America. If the recall election wasn't fair, why would Americans want to endorse it?

The new study was released this week by economists Ricardo Hausmann of Harvard and Roberto Rigobon of MIT. They zeroed in on a key problem with the August 18 vote audit that was run by the government's electoral council (CNE): In choosing which polling stations would be audited, the CNE refused to use the random number generator recommended by the Carter Center. Instead, the CNE insisted on its own program, run on its own computer. Mr. Carter's team acquiesced, and Messrs. Hausmann and Rigobon conclude that, in controlling this software, the government had the means to cheat.

"This result opens the possibility that the fraud was committed only in a subset of the 4,580 automated centers, say 3,000, and that the audit was successful because it directed the search to the 1,580 unaltered centers. That is why it was so important not to use the Carter Center number generator. If this was the case, Carter could never have figured it out."

Mr. Hausmann told us that he and Mr. Rigoban also "found very clear trails of fraud in the statistical record" and a probability of less than 1% that the anomalies observed could be pure chance. To put it another way, they think the chance is 99% that there was electoral fraud.


The authors also suggest that the fraud was centralized. Voting machines were supposed to print tallies before communicating by Internet with the CNE center. But the CNE changed that rule, arranging to have totals sent to the center first and only later printing tally sheets. This increases the potential for fraud because the Smartmatic voting machines suddenly had two-way communication capacity that they weren't supposed to have. The economists say this means the CNE center could have sent messages back to polling stations to alter the totals.
None of this would matter if the auditing process had been open to scrutiny by the Carter observers. But as the economists point out: "After an arduous negotiation, the Electoral Council allowed the OAS [Organization of American States] and the Carter Center to observe all aspects of the election process except for the central computer hub, a place where they also prohibited the presence of any witnesses from the opposition. At the time, this appeared to be an insignificant detail. Now it looks much more meaningful."

Yes, it does. It would seem that Colin Powell and the Carter Center have some explaining to do. The last thing either would want is for Latins to think that the U.S. is now apologizing for governments that steal elections. Back when he was President, Mr. Carter once famously noted that the Afghanistan invasion had finally caused him to see the truth about Leonid Brezhnev. A similar revelation would seem to be in order toward Mr. Chavez.
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