DBC posted this comment that I think deserves to be posted for everyone to read:
Brunilde — I was following up on your comment to SH “Chavez transformed a pluralistic society into a “we and then” society where everything is black and white. This happens only in fundamentalists states. Your views then, clearly show the type of Chavist fundamentalism that is currentl! y governing Venezuela.” It’s frustrating to watch as the norms and mechanisms of a democratic society are used to construct a militaristic, monopolistic one-party police state, irreversibly. Like a virus using its host until it dies. The opposition has lost, and lost, and lost again – legitimately at times, questionably at others.There is less and less transparency as time goes by and power accumulates. A comment by one of the Brit camaradas after the RR,over on Fernando Toro’s blog, sticks with me – to paraphrase, “The victor doesn’t ask for a post-mortem”. When El Proceso is complete, and the opposition says “But, you cheated”, the Chavistas/SinestroFascists/Mullah-equivalents can say “The victors don’t ask for post-mortems, and to the victors go the spoils”. The thing the Bolsheviks said to the Mensheviks (sp?). It’s futile to carry on a political discussion with the internacionalistas, when for the true-believers, politics are just a means to an end. The public face is a neutral observer, but the actual face is that of a Missionary eager to see a Utopian sociopolitical experiment implanted in Venezuela. Whether the Venezuelans want it or not. If, when Venezuela ends up like Iran, with a popular political fury that turns into a totalitarian, unending rule by the keepers of the Revolution, with a new generation fed up with the mullahs, but unable to express that frustration electorally, meaningfully—what do the Weisbrots and Pallasts, the Pulpos and Roy Carsons, the Guardians, the Canadian Professors holed up in posh hotels, “observing”, the Steven Hunts—-what will they have to say to those future Venezuelans? They won’t be accountable for the Proceso they are cheerleading, helping to build, and most likely the internacionalistas would call them contrarevolucionarios, Esqualidos. Fascistas, gusanos, what have you. The political convulsions in Venezuela aren’t Black/White – had Miquilena opted to annoint Arias Cardenas, you wouldn’t have this insane confrontational political realignment- but the stakes have become just that. The true believers, in Venezuela and abroad, understand this, be they firebrands in the AN or wolves-in-sheeps-clothing supporters carrying Chavez’s water. The opposition in Venezuela hasn’t this clarity, or has intended to ride the tiger, or has been forced into th defensive, into a smaller and smaller corner. This isn’t a debate at Oxford, it’s a contest, and the parties aren’t playing by the same rulebook. The future of Venezuela is at stake -or was-, so debating some extranjeros entrometidos, lecturing Venezuelans about –their own country– while they’re sitting back in the States, or Britain, or Academia—they’re cheerleading or actively building a state they won’t live in, one they’d never allow the opposition in their own countries to install, without accountability. Me choca. I suppose I’d like to see, say, the late Amalia Perez Diaz (a true reencauchada) giving them hell – “Atrevidos, insolentes, sinverguenzas,fuera de mi pais! Larguense”…
The Devil's Excrement 
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