-Polls continue to say that the NO will win by a narrow margin. Three of the four pollsters that did well in 1998 and 2000 in predicting the outcome are saying the No squeaks by. (more on this on Friday)
-Despite this, yesterday’s closing of the campaign by Chavez was very weak. Despite hundreds of buses and paying people to attend, Avenida Bolivar was barely full, VTV cameras only showed certain angles and Chavez’ speech had barely begun when you could see wide empty areas because people had left.
-Chavez is reportedly mad about how bad yesterday’s event was and is pressuring to have the CNE extend the campaign to Friday so that he can have another rally to close his campaign. The opposition will close its campaign on Thursday. It was clearly a bad strategy to have the rally to close his campaign so early.
-Today Chavez failed to show up at a rally in Zulia state to close the campaign in that state, the most pro-opposition state in the country, where he only got 45% of the Presidential vote in 2000. His Vice-President was there saying that the NO would win by 18% of the vote.
-Despite earlier saying that “tourists” would not be able to vote, the Minister of Foreign Relations said today that anyone with a valid visa and registered may vote. This is a change from an earlier position that tourists could not vote and some sort of residence permit was required.
–More violence in Plaza La Candelaria today. This time the Chavistas burned down the “Si” stand, a street peddler’s stand and a motorcycle. The National Guard was there and used firearms against…you guessed it, people from the “Si” stand.
– CNE Director Jorge Rodriguez, accused the opposition (specifically Enrique Mendoza and Henry Ramos Allup) of setting a bomb that blew up four cars away from his sister’s car, revealing in the car next to which it blew up a voting machine which was supposedly being used for training purposes. Convoluted, no?
-After Enrique Mendoza said that the CNE could not regulate what people said next Sunday, CNE President Carrasquero said that only the Electoral power can announce the winner on Sunday and that the CD could not do it. What Mendoza said was that the CNE could not stop people from announcing the results, only political parties and the media according to the law and that the CD would announce it when it is appropriate and that the CD would not tolerate the five day period that the law gives it to make the announcement.
-In a poll, only 70% of the people said that they trusted that the vote was truly secret. Many people believe that the objective of the fingerprint machine is to know who voted which way. There is no interconnection between the fingerprint machines and te voring machines.
Things are certainly heating up!
The Devil's Excrement 
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