Monthly Archives: August 2010

<p> Ugh. Just look at the type of people they are letting in the door. Honestly.

Not necessarily. The opposition’s only plausible path to victory on September 26th is simple: turn out your base and hope the other side’s soft-supporters stay home. And, within that game plan, "¡pa que coja mínimo!" is not necessarily the wrong … Continue reading →

Is Tibisay Lucena correct in saying the opposition has 75% of all campaign TV ads? Or is she pulling these numbers out of her ass? We need those of you on the ground to give us your opinion. Have you … Continue reading →

  You know how playwrights talk about "the arc" of a character? They’ll go on and on about a character’s "inflexion point", the moment when they come to an important realization that changes them. Here is Hugo Chavez, pretending he’s reached … Continue reading →

It simply makes my blood boil to think the hacks who made this probably got paid thousands upon thousands of petrodollars while I burn the midnight oil just for the satisfaction of scratching my own OCD itch. Compatriotas revolucionarios, whatever … Continue reading →

The Pérez de León hospital in Petare is, by law, managed by the Sucre municipality. The mayor is Primero Justicia’s Carlos Ocaríz. Yesterday, Hugo Chávez said he would not approve funding for the hospital’s new wing. Chávez’s excuse for not approving … Continue reading →

The opening sequence to this latest Chigüire Bipolar video is sheer genius… Tienes que agarrar las fresitas, y echarle la lluviecita de chocolate…  ROFLcity… Plus Juan thinks the bearded guy is hopelessly trying to look like this guy. Turns out … Continue reading →

Why just today, they might say, we learn of the CNE’s Tibisay Lucena (aka Rojisbeth) threatening the State-run (Read: Chávez-run) Broadcaster with a fine (read: slap on the wrist to be paid with the same public funds that pay Lucena’s salary) for exceeding … Continue reading →

The new and much improved Caracas Chronicles Forecasting Tool for the 26S Elections is now available. You can download it here. (Users of older versions of Excel should download this version. Descárgala en español aquí.) This new tool, developed with invaluable … Continue reading →

With an increasingly unpopular government, and the country mired in stagflation, the opposition heads into this campaign stronger than ever: united, setting the debate, and mobilized around a common goal. But the government’s massive built-in advantages – overwhelming funding superiority, … Continue reading →

The Columbia University professor has been coming to this impoverished village on the western shores of Lake Maracaibo for many years. The reason? Barranquitas has the world’s highest concentration of people suffering from Huntington’s Disease – also known as Mal de San … Continue reading →

A group of PSUV candidates just went to the Prosecutor General’s office demanding they take the nineteen thousand one hundred and thirty three murder files from last year and shove them in a drawer so they can direct those resources … Continue reading →

OK, it’s back to electoral number crunching, this time on the Monte-y-Culebra Problem. First, some context. From our high point in the Constitutional Reform Referendum of 2007, when we got 50.3% of the National Vote, the opposition has lost considerable … Continue reading →

The New York Times’ Simón Romero gets it all right: the scale of the problem; the government’s efforts at censorship; and chavistas’ continued reluctance to blame the President. The article is balanced and comprehensive, and the problem is scary, so … Continue reading →

Spain’s La Razón publishes the kind of detail-oriented, intensely observed report on Caracas’s Bello Monte morgue that Venezuelan newspapers – for reasons that continue to baffle me –  seem plainly unable to produce. The report quotes a former morgue director … Continue reading →