Maduro is a crook who manipulates elections, stacks the courts and invents a second, new parliament when he doesn't like the real one.

NOBODY IN THE FUCKING WORLD THINKS THAT ANY ELECTIONS IN VENEZUELA IN THE LAST 5 YEARS HAVE BEEN FAIR.

But, sure... if Trump hates Maduro then Maduro must be a great guy.




Oh, I remember how people on DU defended the murderous dictator and enemy of the press Muammar Gaddafi.

Why did they defend him?

Because the US hated him.

From the posted article I presume you read already, or you wouldn't be responding to the original post:

With complete unanimity of outlook, the supposedly oppositional US media served to delegitimize the elections as well (FAIR.org, 5/23/18), with the New York Times (5/20/18) describing them as “heavily rigged” and the Miami Herald (5/2/18) christening them “fraudulent,” a “sham,” a “charade” and a “joke” in one column alone. Yet this perception of events can only be sustained through the careful curation of information: informing readers of certain facts, while ignoring strong evidence to the contrary.

The idea that the 2018 elections were, at best, highly questionable is taken as a fact across the media. For instance, CNBC (1/23/19) stated that Maduro’s re-election “was widely viewed as a sham due to widespread election irregularities”; Reuters (1/23/19) said the vote was “widely viewed as fraudulent.”

In reality, Venezuela has one of the most intensely monitored election system in the world, and the government called on the United Nations to send observation teams. This was blocked by the US on the grounds that the UN would “validate” the elections. Despite this, numerous international election monitoring organizations attended and attested to the vote’s quality. For example, the report of the African Nations’ delegation stated:

The Venezuelan people who chose to participate in the electoral process of May 20 were not subject to any external pressures, and carried out their right to vote in a peaceful and civil manner which we commend. As such, we implore the international community to abide by international law and the principles of self-determination and recognize what we consider to be a free, fair, fully transparent and sovereign election.

Maduro’s re-election was widely anticipated in establishment media, with campaign polls indicating that many opposition voters planned to sit out the election. “Maduro Favored as Venezuelans Vote Amid Crisis” was the headline of a PBS NewsHour story (5/20/18), which went on to explain:

While polls show Venezuelans overwhelmingly blame Maduro for their mounting troubles, he’s still heavily favored to win thanks to a boycott of the election by his main rivals.

https://fair.org/home/resistance-media-side-with-trump-to-promote-coup-in-venezuela/


As people who actually carefully followed the information from the first day of Hugo Chavez' time as the elected President of Venezuela already knew long ago, the right-wing, US-right-wing-supported oligarchy just decided to run and hide the first time they knew they would be getting their squishy European-descended butts kicked in the next election. And, of course, they stooped low enough to insist Chavez screwed the election. Everyone sober, and sane in the world knew how the election would end before they decided to stay out of the voting booths, because Chavez was deeply popular, and they of course were NOT.

No way will serious people ever be vulnerable to such a lot of hooey spewed by insecure, foolish people who actually believe it is the right of their country to control the way people in other countries live. That would be evil. Despicable. Nasty. Who doesn't understand that automatically? Sociopaths.

Reports of vote buying were also prevalent during the presidential campaigning. Venezuelans suffering from hunger were pressured to vote for Maduro, with the government bribing potential supporters with food.[121] Maduro promised rewards for citizens who scanned their Carnet de la Patria at the voting booth, which would allow the government to monitor the political party of their citizens and whether or not they had voted. These prizes were reportedly never delivered

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018_Venezuelan_presidential_election#Vote_buying

Of course I know you prefer blogs for your news...lol

How come he had to resort to manipulating the voting-machines for the 2017 election of the constitutional assembly?

How come he saw it necessary to unconstitutionally turn the constitutional assembly into a second parliament to neuter the opposition-controlled real parliament?



Do you want to know why Chavez was popular? Because back when he was in charge, the price of oil was high and Venezuela could afford the expensive Chavez-socialism.

Now, under Maduro, Venezuela happens to be broke and would need economic reforms. But in order for Maduro to make reforms, he would first have to admit that Chavez-socialism is not perfect and in need of change. And he can't do that for ideological reasons.

Funny, that.